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you look at civil rights issues whether it’s race, or whether it’s women, the more we humanize the issues … the easier it becomes. All this progress didn’t take place just in the last 12 months. This goes back generations and generations.”
But there are voices in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community who caution to not simply move one after the U.S. Supreme Court allowed same-sex marriages in Virginia to move forward. LGBT community member Fatima Sissoko said she believed that dismissing an issue as complicated as same-sex marriage is problematic, because the issues in the community run much deeper.
“I find it hard that in this day and age people still have that, ‘Ok, this is done, now we can move on,’ type of mentality,” said Sissoko. “That mentality is harmful for people my age and a little bit younger, because they see it as, ‘Now that this is done, we’re done with the marriage issue and we can go to something else’- but what about class issues? What if you can’t afford to get married but still need the benefits? What if you’re in the military and you already get benefits? There are more than single point issues.”
VCU student Madison Baya agreed that same-sex marriage is an important issue, but that there are many other issues that the LGBT community wants to address.
“I think a lot of people think that if we endorse same-sex marriage, then we’ve covered all the LGBT issues. But there’s so much more behind it,” said Baya. “People get caught up with this one issue when trans people are getting killed everyday and a lot of people don’t even know what ‘asexual’ is. So it’s not just a matter of getting that issue on the forefront, but … all these other issues coming to light too.”
But the importance of the issue varies from voter to voter. Lesbian couple Erika Straus and Savannah Flores had different takes on same-sex marriage and the upcoming election. When asked if they would change their vote for the midterm elections because same-sex marriage is now legal, Straus said that maybe she would.
“Now that it is legal, it would be less of an [issue]. Before, when I was voting for the presidential election, it was something that was not necessary, because I want gay marriage or I need it, but, I’m gay,” said Straus, explaining why she voted for President Barack Obama, who supported same-sex marriage.
Flores, on the hand, said that her voting pattern will remain the same. “I’m pretty much Democrat the whole way,” said Flores.
The perception that the Democratic Party is more concerned with same-sex marriage is common, but Harrison believes both parties are becoming more open.
“I think that marriage equality has become somewhat of a partisan issue, although I do know a significant number of Republicans who have no problems with marriage equality and I think we’re going to see that grow. There are some Democrats who have problems with this,” said Harrison. “The majority of leadership on a state and national level has come from the Democratic Party, but there is support from Republicans.”
He said that the LGBT community has the same concerns as any other voters.
“We would all agree we want safe streets. We want good schools. We want a good police department, a good fire department. We want a transparent government and we also want to be treated like first class citizens. Marriage equality is bringing us closer and job discrimination should be the next step,” said Harrison.
By Shakola Walker and Ali Mislowsky (Special to WTVR.com)
This story was reported by the “iPadJournos” mobile and social media journalism project, a cooperation between WTVR.com and VCU’s Richard T. Robertson School of Media and Culture.Direct Federal Financial Interventions and Subsidies in Energy in Fiscal Year 2016
Release date: April 24, 2018
Overview and Key Findings
Overview
This report—an update based on Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 data and earlier EIA reports on direct federal financial interventions and subsidies in energy markets—continues a series of U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports[1] that began in response to congressional requests. More recently, the Secretary of Energy requested updated information as part of the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Grid Resiliency Study.[2]
The scope of this EIA report is limited to direct federal financial interventions and subsidies, i.e., subsidies provided by the federal government, subsidies that provide a financial benefit with an identifiable federal budget impact, and subsidies that are specifically targeted at energy technologies and markets. State and local programs—although significant in a number of cases—have been excluded from EIA’s reporting. As a result, this report does not encompass all subsidies that affect energy markets and should therefore be viewed in context and in conjunction with related information from other sources (see discussion of Other energy subsidy studies in the Analytic Approach section).
Consistent with EIA’s independent role and mission, this report focuses on providing information to inform discussion rather than drawing conclusions or discussing policy issues related to energy subsidies. By using a comprehensive data acquisition and analysis process, EIA estimates how federal financial actions are distributed among a defined set of categories comprising the U.S. energy system.[3] EIA has made only limited observations of the scale, trends, and relationships within the data and the report tables.
Table 1 summarizes total within-scope energy subsidies and selected U.S. energy system indicators.
Subsidy types
Federal financial interventions and subsidies included in this report fall into four categories:
Tax expenditure: the amount of tax benefits or preferences received by taxpayers and forgone by the federal government
the amount of tax benefits or preferences received by taxpayers and forgone by the federal government Direct expenditures to recipients (i.e., both producers and consumers): the amount of grants, loans, or other financial assistance awards made directly to recipients
to recipients (i.e., both producers and consumers): the amount of grants, loans, or other financial assistance awards made directly to recipients Research and development (R&D) support: the amount of grants, loans, or other financial assistance awards made for R&D
(R&D) support: the amount of grants, loans, or other financial assistance awards made for R&D DOE loan guarantees: financial support authorized to be provided by DOE for innovative clean energy technologies that are typically unable to obtain conventional private financing because of their high technology risks.[4]
Table 1. Total energy subsidies and support and selected energy indicators, FY 2010, FY 2013, and FY 2016
trillion British thermal units or as specified Indicators FY 2010 FY 2013 FY2016 Total Energy Subsidies and Support
(million 2016 dollars) 37,992 29,335 14,983 U.S. Energy Consumption 96,850 98,655 96,788 U.S. Energy Production 73,695 81,151 84,833 U.S. Natural Gas (dry and liquids) 24,105 28,220 32,652 U.S. Crude Oil 11,512 15,370 18,797 U.S. Coal 21,657 20,223 14,807 U.S. Nuclear 8,318 8,099 8,352 U.S. Biomass 4,358 4,680 4,963 U.S. Hydroelectric 2,588 2,582 2,482 U.S. Wind 863 1,557 2,038 U.S. Solar 88 205 533 U.S. Geothermal 207 215 209 Note: Totals may not equal the sum of components due to independent rounding.
Sources: Consumption: EIA, Monthly Energy Review, February 2018, Table 1.3. Production: EIA, Monthly Energy Review, February 2018, Table 1.2. Tax expenditure estimates: Office of Management and Budget, Analytical Perspectives, Budget of the U.S. Government, FY 2012, 2015, and 2018. Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal Years 2010-2014, JCS-3-10 (Washington, DC, December 2010), Table 1, Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal Years 2012-2017, JCS-1-13 (Washington, DC, February 2013), Table 1, and Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal Years 2016-2020, JCX-3-17 (Washington, DC, January 2017), Table 1. Federal direct expenditure and R&D expenditure subsidies: DOE: U.S. Department of Energy, Office of the Chief Financial Officer, Base Financial Data, FY 2010, FY 2013, and FY 2016; FY 2010 and FY 2013: U.S. General Services Administration, USASpending.gov - Government spending at your fingertips, https://www.usaspending.gov/, accessed October 22, 2014; FY 2016: U.S. Department of the Treasury, USASpending.gov, https://www.usaspending.gov/, accessed November 16, 2017. Loan guarantee programs credit subsidy: Computed from data from U.S. Department of Energy, Loan Program Office, https://www.energy.gov/lpo/portfolio/portfolio-projects, accessed January 20, 2015 and EIA, Direct Federal Financial Interventions and Subsidies in Energy in Fiscal Year 2010, July 2011, Table 29.
Key findings
Table 3 and Table 4 summarize the allocation of federal direct financial interventions in U.S. energy markets by subsidy type. Several key findings stand out.
The scope and complexity of federal financial and award activities are very large and spread over a wide range of sources, recipients, and time frames. Despite a recent trend of decreasing federal activity, hundreds of distinct energy-related federal financial programs continue to pursue a wide range of goals using various methods. The time frames of these programs and activities can be very different, as in the case of tax provisions that allow taxpayers to decide which year to take a credit or to pay a deferred charge. Isolating the impacts of these programs, as well as characterizing the net impact of the whole set of actions on the U.S. energy system, is challenging.
Most current federal subsidies support developing renewable energy supplies (primarily biofuels, wind, and solar) and reducing energy consumption through energy efficiency. In FY 2016, nearly half (45%) of federal energy subsidies were associated with renewable energy, and 42% were associated with energy end uses. Table 4 shows a more detailed distribution of renewable energy-related federal support. The amount and distribution of renewable energy subsidies over time (see text box on renewable-related subsidy trends) have depended on congressional authorizations and the market competitiveness of renewable electricity technologies. Among renewable technologies, biofuels received the only incremental increase in FY 2016 subsidy support, driven by greater domestic biomass-based diesel production and foreign imports of these products that resulted in an approximately $1 billion increase in tax credits from FY 2013 levels.
Energy end-use and conservation subsidies decreased from $7.7 billion in FY 2013 to $7.2 billion in FY 2016 (Table 3). The largest program in this combined category—the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) operated through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)—maintained its funding levels at $3.2 billion and $3.4 billion in FY 2013 and FY 2016, respectively. The decrease in total subsidies and support for energy-related conservation and end-use programs between FY 2013 and FY 2016 was led by declines in direct expenditures, which decreased from $4.2 billion to $3.6 billion, respectively. Of the $438 million decline in total federal support of conservation and end-use programs between FY 2013 and FY 2016, direct expenditures decreased $597 million. The tax credit for energy efficiency improvements to existing homes (26 U.S.C. 25C) accounted for $106 million of the decrease, and conversely, many tax expenditures (e.g., the credit for residential energy efficient property, 26 U.S.C. 25D) increased during the same period.
Since FY 2010, the scale of federal support has decreased as temporary measures expired, even as the U.S. energy system continues to grow. Federal activities within the scope of this study have been decreasing, in large part because of the expiration of provisions and programs authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA or the Recovery Act) of 2009 (Figure 1). The Recovery Act provided energy funding that greatly increased DOE’s previous energy program budgets but also required the rapid obligation of funds that would cover outlays over several years. The U.S. energy system, as a whole, continues to grow, with production activities growing more rapidly than energy consumption. As a result, the relative scale of federal activity within the overall context of the energy system has continued to decline since FY 2010.
Source: Office of Management and Budget, Historical Tables, Tables 4.1 and 5.2, accessed February 23, 2018.
In FY 2016, tax code provisions were the largest source of direct federal financial interventions and subsidies in energy markets, following a period of higher federal direct expenditures resulting from ARRA programs and funding. The federal tax code—with 36 wide-ranging, energy-specific tax provisions (Table 5)—provided greater financial support to energy in FY 2016 than direct expenditures and R&D support. This reversal from FY 2013 is best captured by the temporary ARRA Section 1603-grant program to allow an investment tax credit (ITC)[5] in lieu of the renewable energy production tax credit (PTC).[6] In FY 2013, this ITC grant program pushed the direct expenditure category above estimated tax expenditures in absolute dollar terms.[7] In FY 2016, the ITC grant program had largely ended, and tax expenditures (in total) regained their dominance, with tax provisions representing 59% of the total (Table 3).
No new DOE loan guarantees were issued in either FY 2013 or FY 2016. The subsidy cost of the loans issued in FY 2010 totaled $1.7 billion. Because this cost is assessed at the time the loan is issued, there was no related subsidy cost for FY 2013 or FY 2016. The loan guarantees associated with the Vogtle nuclear project[8] are included with FY 2010 subsidy costs. However, there were still outstanding debts in FY 2016 for loans issued in prior years. Although lending authority for the Section 1705 loan program had expired by 2013, budget authority remains for future lending on the Section 1703 loan program.
Electricity projects accounted for 25% of FY 2016 total R&D expenditures. This share is similar to the share in FY 2010 and FY 2013. Except for biofuels, virtually all non-fossil energy subsidies (renewable fuel and nuclear) were for electricity projects. In addition, most coal subsidies were electricity-related, even though they were often not denoted as such, because about 85% of coal consumption is used to generate electricity. The share of natural gas subsidies for electricity generation is more difficult to determine.
Table 2. Measures of electricity net generation and growth (FY 2000 versus FY 2016) Beneficiary 2000 Net Generation
(billion kilowatt-hours) 2016 Net Generation
(billion kilowatt-hours) Share of 2000 Generation
(percent) Share of 2016 Generation
(percent) Annual Growth from 2000 to 2016
(percent) Coal 1,931 1,208 51.4 29.6 (2.9) Natural Gas and Petroleum Liquids 684 1,431 18.2 35.1 4.7 Nuclear 765 799 20.4 19.6 0.3 Other 13 21 0.3 0.5 3.1 Renewables 365 618 9.7 15.2 3.3 Biomass 59 63 1.6 1.5 0.4 Geothermal 15 16 0.4 0.4 0.5 Hydroelectric 286 268 7.6 6.6 (0.4) Solar 1 51 0 1.2 31.8 Wind 5 220 0.1 5.4 26.3 Total 3,759 4,077 100 100 0.5 Notes: Totals may not equal sum of components due to independent rounding. A table value in brackets () denotes a negative value. Zero denotes rounding to zero value. Other includes net generation from hydroelectric pumped storage, other gases, batteries, chemicals, hydrogen, pitch, purchased steam, sulfur, and miscellaneous technologies. Biomass includes net generation from wood and waste. Solar includes distributed (small-scale) generation and utility-scale generation.
Sources: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Monthly Energy Review, February 2018, Table 10.6 (solar) and Table 7.2a (all other).
See complete report
Footnotes
1. The first EIA study was undertaken at the request of Congress in Fiscal Year (FY) 1992, pursuant to language appearing in the House Appropriations Committee’s Report on the U.S. Energy Information Administration FY 1992 appropriations.
2. U.S. Department of Energy, Staff Report to the Secretary on Electricity Markets and Reliability, Washington, DC, August 2017.
3. EIA has requested further detailed data from the Internal Revenue Service as it pertains to the distribution of energy-related tax benefits.
4. Section 1703 of Title XVII of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 authorizes the U.S. Department of Energy to support innovative clean energy technologies that are typically unable to obtain conventional private financing due to high technology risks. In addition, the technologies must avoid, reduce, or sequester air pollutants or anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases. The Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing (ATVM) Loan Program was established in Section 136 of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 to support the production of fuel-efficient, advanced technology vehicles and qualifying components in the United States. American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 amended Loan Guarantee Program’s authorizing legislation, creating Section 1705.
5. This report will reference only renewable electricity investment (i.e., energy investment credit) as the ITC.
6. This report will reference only renewable electricity production (i.e., energy production credit) as the PTC.
7. This categorical shift can be viewed as an accounting issue, with the subsidy still ultimately stemming from the tax code.
8. DOE, Loan Guarantee Office, website: https://energy.gov/lpo/vogtle, accessed February 20, 2018. On September 29, 2017, the U.S. Department of Energy offered conditional commitments for construction to the Vogtle project, website: https://energy.gov/lpo/articles/vogtle-conditional-commitments-support-energy-infrastructure, accessed February 27, 2018.According to the latest teaser published by Roy Taylor, which shows the earlier unveiled Falcon Northwest Tiki SFF gaming PC, it appears that the reference dual-GPU flagship Radeon Fury X2 might have air cooling after all.Although the picture, posted by Roy Taylor on Twitter, only shows the closed system and does not reveal the rumored Radeon Fury X2 in full details, it does give us a glimpse of it through the case window and shows an air-cooled graphics card. According to a report from Videocardz.com, the graphics card in the picture is roughly the size of a reference Radeon R9 380X, which suggest that the dual-GPU Radeon Fury X2 could be the same size, mostly thanks to High Bandwidth Memory, which puts the VRAM on top of the die.As rumored earlier, the upcoming Radeon Fury X2 could be based on two Fiji GPUs with similar clocks seen earlier on the AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics card and, by the looks of it, it could end up with a larger, and thus more powerful, blower-style fan which could be enough to keep both GPUs well cooled.Hopefully, AMD will announce the dual-GPU Fury X2 soon, or just in time for first VR headsets and we will have a chance to check out the power of two Fiji GPUs paired up on the same PCB. Unfortunately, we still do not have a precise launch date or any rumors regarding the price of such dual-GPU beast.Source: Videocardz.comHealth secretary admits trolley waits are ‘totally unacceptable’ but says majority of hospitals are coping better this winter
Jeremy Hunt has rejected the British Red Cross’s description of a humanitarian crisis in emergency NHS care, arguing that most hospitals are coping better this winter than they did last year.
The health secretary – who plans to make a statement to the House of Commons on the NHS later on Monday – said while it was “totally unacceptable” for patients to be left on trolleys for hours, the situation was improving.
Also on Monday, the Health Service Journal (HSJ) reported that the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), which represents emergency doctors, was in “early discussions” over more funding for A&E departments, in the hope this could end up saving money on locum doctors.
Theresa May denied that there was any crisis within the health service, insisting that the difficulties were similar to those experienced every year.
“We recognise the pressures that the NHS has been under over the winter - this is not unusual. There are always extra pressures for the NHS over the winter period,” she said, arguing that the government had responded to demands for a £10bn funding injection, despite controversy over the figure.
”I would like to thank all those medical professionals working so hard over this period to make sure they are delivering services to patients. The figure was something like 150,000 medical professionals working on Christmas day and new year’s day.”
Mike Adamson, the chief executive of the British Red Cross, reiterated his charity’s description of the situation, saying his staff were helping out in 20 A&E departments.
“We see people discharged from hospital to chaotic situations at home, falling and not being found for hours, not being washed because there is no carer to help them,” he wrote in an article for the Times.
“These are people in crisis and in recent weeks we have started talking about this as a humanitarian crisis. We don’t say this lightly and we have a duty to say it,” he said.
Speaking on ITV’s Good Morning Britain, Hunt said he would be making a statement to MPs on the situation in the NHS later on Monday. A Department for Health source said that while timetabling a statement was dependent on Commons authorities, Hunt would update MPs “one way or another”.
Asked about reports of emergency patients being kept on trolleys for hours due to a lack of available beds, Hunt said: “Well, these problems are totally unacceptable. This is the most difficult time for the NHS in the year. It always is very difficult after the Christmas period when GP surgeries are not open over the actual days of Christmas and then they reopen and a lot of people get sent to hospital.”
However, he argued that the situation had “eased significantly” over the weekend, saying the numbers of patients kept too long on trolleys “has reduced to a handful now. so it’s much, much lower than it was a week earlier”.
He added: “This is always the busiest week but we need to work with the public to understand that accident and emergency departments are there for what it says on the tin, for accidents and emergencies.”
Speaking later on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Hunt rejected Adamson’s notion of a humanitarian crisis, citing the view of Chris Hobson, the chief executive of NHS Providers, the body that groups NHS acute care.
“I don’t want to pretend that we haven’t, at this most difficult time of year for the NHS, had some very serious problems in some hospitals. But I think we need to listen to independent people,” Hunt said.
Of Hobson, Hunt added: “He says the vast majority of hospitals are actually coping better this year than last year.”
Hunt’s characterisation ran contrary to the views of some hospital managers who spoke to the HSJ.
Nick Hulme, the chief executive of Colchester and Ipswich hospital trusts, told the journal the current problems in A&E were unprecedented. He said: “I’ve not seen anything like this in 37 years in the health service. There is always a hangover from Christmas and the new year but this has been absolutely relentless.”
Dr Taj Hassan, the president of the RCEM and associate medical director at Leeds teaching hospitals trust, told the journal: “Going into winter we were in the worst-prepared position that we have ever been … in terms of existing performance and the amount of intended investment, with the existing staffing levels in emergency departments and the social care crisis clearly identified as major issues.”
Hunt argued that the problem was less about overall funding than about consistency of provision. “We actually spend a little bit more than the average for rich countries on our health services,” he told Today.
“But we still have 150 avoidable deaths in our hospitals every week. We still have weekend provision that isn’t as good as it needs to be in some places. We still have children with brain injuries, twice a week, which could have been avoided.
“The truth is we have a paradox. We have some of the safest and best hospitals in the world, some of the best mental health care in the world, but it isn’t consistent. What we want to do is to be able to promise all NHS patients that wherever you go, you’ll be able to access the same high-quality care.”
The shadow health secretary, Jon Ashworth, declined to use the term humanitarian crisis, but told Good Morning Britain: “I agree that the NHS is in an absolutely dire situation, on its knees. I’m not going to use those words, but I do agree the NHS is in a crisis. The controversy has to be about the systematic underfunding of the NHS under Theresa May.”Best Answer: It's because of the hamster conspiracy for world domination. Not many people know this, and government is trying to keep it secret, but military research in the 1950s attempted to train hamsters to attack enemy electronics by chewing through insulation. One of the few people surviving this research, Barry Buzacott (not his real name) now has revealed that electronic equipment brought close to hamsters detected communications between the rodents on a very high level. All hamsters are born with an intrinsic knowledge of physics and chemistry superior to anything known to modern science.
After years of work scientists managed to translate the emissions and found that the rodents were planning to use their cute and innocent appearance to spread around as many backyards as possible.
At a certain signal. thought to be generated by a secret community of "wild" hamsters located in central Asia, all hamsters were to attack all human communications and from there move on to food stores. This plan was stimulated by the military experiments themselves, which is where the hamsters got the idea, it supplanted an older plan merely involving food stores.
Mr. "Buzacott" now lives in considerable fear in a trailer in a southern US state, where he uses a duplicating machine to reproduce stencilled warnings. These can sometimes be found tacked to trees, but never near his home.
It isn't well known but some governments, including that of Australia, has banned the import of hamsters in an attempt to prevent this catastrophe.
Source(s):
Brigalow Bloke · 9 years ago
1 Thumbs up 0 Thumbs down Report Abuse“It was like someone had picked my pocket,” says Prashuram, a 52-year-old casual laborer in the Indian capital New Delhi, recalling the evening of Nov. 8.
The day had begun well. The onset of north India’s traditional wedding season had brought a steady stream of work for Prashuram and his 33-year-old friend Hari. Migrants from nearby Indian states, the two spent the day working a series of odd jobs for a busy wedding caterer. For a dawn to dusk stint, they pocketed 500 rupees (about $7.5) each. That is typical in India’s vast informal economy, which employs more than 90% of the country’s workforce. Agreements here are verbal, the pay very often in cash and workers tend to have few, if any, guarantees or benefits. They also earn less than their compatriots in what is called the formal sector, where salaries are taxed, the work more regular and the average pay is more than twenty times higher.
Prashuram and Hari were each paid in a 500 rupee note. “It was always 500 or maybe a 1,000 rupee note for two days work,” says Prashuram.
After collecting their dues, the two friends went to a food stall near a Delhi night shelter they call home. It was there, just as Parshuram was about to start digging into his meal of lentil curry and chapattis, that the stall owner asked him how he intended to pay for his dinner.
“I was surprised. We’re regulars there. The lentils cost 25 rupees (30 cents), and the chapattis are 2.5 rupees (3 cents) each. But because he asked, I showed him a 500 note, the one I’d received from the caterer,” says Parshuram. “He said he didn’t want it.”
The stall owner he said he would only accept 100, 50 or other, smaller rupee bills. “We didn’t understand what the stall owner was saying,” explains Prashuram. “We hadn’t heard Modi’s speech.”
Prashuram and Hari were just finishing their shifts when India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi made an unscheduled national address, interrupting local news broadcasts about the U.S. presidential contest. As Americans went to the polls and India’s talking heads were busy speculating about how the results might impact ties between the two countries, Modi suddenly began speaking from New Delhi. What he said shocked the nation — and left Parshuram and Hari with empty stomachs.
A roadside tea shop asks customers not to give 1000 or 500 rupee notes on November 10, 2016 in Chandigarh, India. Hindustan Times via Getty Images
“To break the grip of corruption and black money, we have decided that the 500 and 1,000 currency notes presently in use will no longer be legal tender from midnight tonight, that is Nov. 8 2016,” Modi announced. “This means that these notes will not be acceptable for transactions from midnight onwards.”
It was a stunning move. At the moment Modi banned them, the two bills accounted for roughly 86% of all cash in circulation, meaning that many Indians besides Parshuram and Hari went hungry. Plastic isn’t an option for the vast majority. Most small businesses, such as restaurants or grocery stores, do not accept credit or debit cards. Not that it would have helped: Parshuram is like an estimated 90% or more of Indians in that he relies exclusively on cash. And his friend is among the roughly 233 million Indians who did not even have bank accounts, let alone credit or debit cards.
“ All business, all industry, whether white or black, requires cash. When you [remove] such a large percentage of the cash, it’s like from a patient you’ve taken out [86%] of the blood,” says Arun Kumar, a Delhi-based economist and author of The Black Economy in India, an account of the shadowy swathes of Indian economy where wealth goes untaxed, and where the corrupt and the criminal operate.
To help the government catch tax evaders and other hoarders of illicit money, Modi said Indians would have to go to the bank to disclose all their cash. They had two options. Until the end of the year, they could either exchange small amounts of old notes for a redesigned 500 and a new 2,000 rupee bill, or deposit their funds and then withdraw set amounts from ATMs. From January, the only option would be to go to the country’s central bank to make deposits, a facility that would expire in March, Modi said. Big deposits would be scrutinized by tax authorities, driving those with large stocks of ill-gotten banknotes into a corner. They could either come clean, or be forced to destroy their dirty money.
That, at least, was the theory. “The problem is that only a small proportion of black wealth is stored in cash,” says Kumar. Estimates vary, but he puts the figure of illicit wealth stored in cash at around just 1 or 2% of the total black wealth in the country. The criminal and the corrupt seldom hold on to cash, he says. Instead of stuffing their mattresses, they purchase property or gold, or move their funds abroad. “They find ways to put their money in the stock market, mutual funds or other places. Most black wealth isn’t in cash,” he explains.
Swati Dhingra, an economist at the London School of Economics (LSE), agrees: “This is essentially just targeting petty corruption. You clearly don’t hold cash if you’re super rich. You go buy property, you have a Swiss bank account.”
A shop owner counts out the 500 rupee banknotes he plans to exchange at a bank in Kolkata, West Bengal, on Nov. 9, 2016 Pacific Press—LightRocket via Getty Images
Any impact, says Kumar, is likely to be temporary. “This targets some stocks of black wealth that are in cash, not the mechanisms that generate black income in the first place. Next year, you’ll still generate the same amount of black income. So it’s not achieving the purpose of stopping the growth of the black economy.”
The suddenness of the move, with Indians given just a few hours notice before the cash ban, raised another, more pressing question: would the fallout be worth it in what is a cash-based economy? Shortly after Modi’s speech, Parshuram and Hari were forced to beg for credit at the stall to finish their meals. “It was before midnight. But the stall owner refused to take any 500 or 1000 rupee notes from anyone,” says Parshuram. With his announcement, Modi had made the notes “jaali,” he adds, using the Hindi word for fake. The stall owner refused to budge. “He wanted smaller notes. I had money, but it was of no use.”
Much worse was to follow when the government bungled the currency swap, sharpening concerns about the potential economic fallout. Officials insist that they have enough new currency available to replace the banned notes. But across India, ordinary citizens have been struggling to get their hands on the new cash, with long queues forming outside banks and ATMs up and down the country. The picture is the same at many post offices where cash can be deposited and exchanged.
Many ATM machines simply aren’t working, and when they are, often run out of cash within hours of replenishing. And in the days after Modi’s speech, it emerged that the new replacement bank notes were of a different size to the old ones, meaning country’s roughly 200,000 ATMs will need to be reconfigured. (The government says it could not have made the changes public beforehand, as the cash swap plans had to be kept secret to avoid giving those with illicit funds the time to launder their cash hoards.)
Read More: Bank Queues Across India Swell as Millions Rush to Exchange Old Currency Notes
There are other hurdles, borne of longer-term gaps in India’s financial infrastructure. Take the spread of bank branches across urban and rural areas, where the majority of Indians live. According to a recent central bank report, the number of branches per 100,000 people in rural and semi-urban India is still less than half of that in the country’s big cities. And although the government has been encouraging the spread of new forms of digital payments — a booming sector in India — the country suffers from a sharp digital divide, with nearly a billion people still offline.
If only the list of issues stopped there. Modi’s speech has been followed by a convoluted rule-making spree, with officials repeatedly tweaking regulations about who can withdraw how much money and in what circumstances, and where the old notes can still be used. The upshot is widespread public confusion in an already chaotic situation. Modi’s announcement, for example, made clear that Indians could exchange up to 4,000 rupees ($58) in old notes over the counter at banks and post offices until Nov. 24. Thereafter, Modi said, “the limit will be increased” until Dec. 30. But on Nov. 24, the government changed its mind: India’s Finance Ministry said it was stopping over the counter exchanges, leaving the hundreds of millions of Indians without bank accounts in the lurch.
“A move like this affects everything in the economy,” says Kumar. “First, the black economy is intertwined with the what you call the white economy. But even if they weren’t intertwined, you still require cash in the white economy. It is very disruptive.” The gaps in the implementation of the cash swap has only made it more so, he adds. “It is already clear that discretionary spending is being affected, as people put off purchases because they don’t know if they can get cash.”
On the upside, bank deposits have surged. Over time, say economists, that could potentially help boost lending to small businesses and bring down interest rates. But much depends on how quickly the government can dispense the replacement cash. A prolonged crunch could prove deeply damaging. “The more problems there are in implementing the policy, the more pain there is for the poorest people India,” adds the LSE’s Dhingra.
Indian police detain a member of the Communist Party of India outside a bank during a protest against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the withdrawal of high-value banknotes from circulation, in Chennai on November 24, 2016. ARUN SANKAR—AFP/Getty Images
The effects are already being felt in an economy that had been expanding at an annual rate of more than 7%. At the bottom end of the economic ladder, casual laborers like Parshuram and Hari have seen a sudden drying up of work, because prospective employers don’t have the cash needed to hire them. “We’ve been offered work but they say they can only pay in the old notes. What use is that?” asks Hari.
They are not alone. To the west of Delhi, in Punjab state, for example, the impact of the cash ban has reportedly hit an industrial hub that produces nearly 15 million bicycles a year. As cash-strapped customers stop or put off buying bicycles, factories are said to be cutting back on production and purchases of raw materials such as iron and steel. Workers’ shifts have |
Bernie Sanders’ recent surge in the polls has got some rethinking the outsider candidate’s viability in the 2016 Democratic presidential race. News profile after profile has attempted to show the real Sanders, but the media — and some Democratic candidate rivals — are also stirring up controversy about the Independent senator from Vermont. Yes, he identifies as a socialist, but that and other “controversies” are really non-issues.
Here are 5 bogus Bernie Sanders controversies:
1. He’s a socialist!
Sanders has self-identified, and qualified at length, his socialist leanings. He explained recently to The Des Moines Register:
Democratic socialism is taking a hard look at what countries like Denmark, Sweden, Norway (and) Finland … have done over the years and try to ascertain what they have done that is right, in terms of protecting the needs of millions of working families and the elderly and the children. And I think there’s much that we can learn from those countries that have had social democratic governments and labor governments or whatever.
Not to mention, many Americans agree with Sanders and his leftist principles. If we can get past Republicans’ Red Scare rhetoric and listen to Sanders’ message and ideas, many would probably realize that, hey, this guy makes a lot of sense politically.
2. He wrote an essay about “rape fantasy”!
In a May profile of Sanders, Mother Jones included a 1972 “stream-of-consciousness essay on the nature of male-female sexual dynamics” written by a young, radical Bernie Sanders for a lefty alternative newspaper in Vermont.
On the essay, The New York Times reports:
Its opening passage, which deals with men’s sexual fantasies, is meant to be satirically provocative but comes across as crassly sexist. (Mr. Sanders’ underlying point, expressed less feverishly farther down in the article, is that men and women should rethink how they deal with one another.)
Sanders tried his hand at satirical writing and social commentary; it didn’t go well, which both he and his campaign spokesperson readily admitted. But Sanders’ larger point, NPR reports — “that traditional gender roles help create troubling dynamics in men’s and women’s sex lives” — is pretty non-controversial, especially in 2015.
Summing up the non-issue, National Review‘s Charles C.W. Cooke writes:
Nobody honestly believes that Bernie Sanders is a sexual pervert or that he is a misogynist or that he intends to do women any harm. Nobody suspects that he harbors a secret desire to pass intrusive legislation or to cut gang rapists a break. Really, there is only one reason that anyone would make hay of this story, and that is to damage the man politically.
3. Sanders has a “dark secret”!
Sanders’ son Levi was born in 1969, to Susan Campbell Mott, a woman with whom Sanders lived in Vermont. They were not married; Sanders had divorced his first wife in 1966. So what? No two families are alike, plus it was the ’60s.
While “the fact that the mother of [Sanders’] one biological child is not his ex-wife” (as has been reported, and gone uncorrected, in the past) is an interesting personal anecdote, details of his professional experiences and early political career provide more insight into how his politics developed and what kind of president he would be.
4. Wait, Sanders is not progressive when it comes to guns?
Despite what a recent attack ad from a SuperPAC supporting Democratic presidential backrunner Martin O’Malley would like you to believe, Bernie Sanders is actually pretty reasonable on guns, if not progressive. The NRA has consistently given Sanders a failing grade for his stance on gun regulations, and he voted for banning high-capacity magazines of over 10 bullets in 2013, and against decreasing gun waiting periods from three days to one in 1999, as a member of the House.
A brief history of Sanders’ voting record on guns, from the Los Angeles Times, offers some explanation as to his less-than-progressive positions:
Sanders’ reputation as soft on guns comes in part from his vote against the 1993 Brady Bill, which created mandatory background checks for gun buyers in many sales. Then a member of the House, Sanders argued that it was a matter that should be left to the states. Sanders also voted for the 2005 Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, a National Rifle Assn.-backed bill intended to protect gun manufacturers and dealers from being sued for negligence when their products are used to commit crimes. The law is opposed by some gun victims’ families who have sought to hold gun makers accountable for shooting deaths.
On Thursday, Sanders was confronted by a local chairwoman of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America about his voting record, at an appearance in Virginia. Watch Sanders’ explanation below, and decide just how controversial his views on gun regulation really are.
Illustration: DonkeyHotey via FlickrABC is debuting a whole slate of new shows in the 2014-2015 television season, but one comedy might look a little different from the rest. “Fresh Off the Boat” will air in early 2015 (the exact release date has not yet been given) and bring a welcome dose of diversity to network comedy. The series is based on celebrity chef Eddie Huang’s memoir of the same name and follows his Asian-American family as they move to Florida to chase the American dream.
The show centers on Eddie’s childhood in the 1990s at the point when his family picked up and moved from Chinatown in Washington, D.C., to Orlando, where his America-loving father had bought a cowboy-themed restaurant. Eddie is only 11 years old in the show and obsessed with hip-hop, but he and his family will have to adjust to life in suburban, mostly white Florida.
Here are seven reasons to give this hilarious new show a chance:
1. Culture shock
It has been 20 years since Margaret Cho’s “All-American Girl” was canceled after only 19 episodes. Since that time, there has not been a single American sitcom based around an Asian-American character or family. For a demographic that represents a significant and growing fraction of the country, some mainstream representation is long overdue. The fact that it comes in the form of this smart and truly funny show means “Fresh Off the Boat” deserves to be a hit.
2. Eddie Huang
Fans may already know Eddie Huang, the real-life celebrity chef on which the show is based, from his culinary career. Huang hosted “Unique Eats” on the cooking channel and now hosts a segment for media company Vice that shares its “Fresh Off the Boat” title with the new ABC comedy. Huang is also outspoken about his love for hip-hop culture and recreational drugs. His hilarious memoir was well received, and a show based on the childhood of a guy this interesting should make for good television.
3. Randall Park
On a show largely made up of unknowns, Park is the closest thing “Fresh Off the Boat” has to star power. Fans may recognize him for some notable guest starring roles, including Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s rival in HBO’s “Veep,” Danny Chung, and "The Mindy Project." He has also appeared in a handful of films including “Sex Tape,” and “The Interview” (playing Kim Jong Un). Park has earned a shot at the spotlight.
4. Young blood
It is not often that a sitcom is carried by a child actor, and although “Fresh Off the Boat” will clearly lean heavily on its adult characters for much of the comedy, this show (unlike shows such as “Modern Family,” which heavily feature child actors as well) is Eddie’s story. It should be a fun ride watching the young Hudson Yang take on that challenge.
5. Constance Wu
The big surprise of the “Fresh Off the Boat” trailer (below) is the hilarious performance of Constance Wu, who plays Eddie’s mom. A relative unknown, Wu steals the show in the trailer, whether screaming at customers at the family’s restaurant to drink more beer or questioning what a flashy suburban grocery store “is so excited for.”
6. '90s hip-hop references
Who doesn’t love 1990s hip-hop? Eddie, the show’s main character certainly does and between him and the show’s time period, expect tons of references and music from your favorite '90s rappers from Notorious B.I.G. to Dr. Dre.
7. It’s just funny
If that trailer does not convince you to tune in to the show, not much else will. The three-minute promo puts the show’s unique take on American life on display, while never ceasing to get laughs. The show might be the most original and hilarious network family comedy since “Modern Family” and seems primed to be another hit for ABC.
Watch the trailer for “Fresh Off the Boat" below.
Are you excited for "Fresh Off the Boat?" Tweet your thoughts to @Ja9GarofaloTV.[ 7,403 views ]
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Harm's Way
Angel Du$t
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Red Death
, andwill team up with, andthis summer for "The Life & Death Tour 2016." The schedule can be found below.7/6 Chicago, IL @ The Double Door7/7 Louisville, KY @ The New Vintage7/8 Columbus, OH @ Ace of Cups7/9 Detroit, MI @ The Sanctuary7/10 Toronto, ON @ Velvet Underground7/11 Montreal, QC @ Les Foufounes Electiques7/12 Albany, NY @ Upstate Concert Hall7/13 Holyoke, MA @ The Waterfront Tavern7/14 Long Island, NY @ Revolution7/15 Virginia Beach, VA @ Shaka's Live7/16 Greensboro, NC @ Greene Street Live7/17 Atlanta, GA @ The Masquerade7/19 Jacksonville, FL @ 19047/20 St. Petersburg, FL @ Local 6627/21 Baton Rouge, LA @ The Dojo7/22 Houston, TX @ Walters7/23 Dallas, TX @ Club Dada7/24 San Antonio, TX @ The Korova7/26 Phoenix, AZ @ The Nile Theater7/27 Chula Vista, CA @ The Industry7/28 Los Angeles, CA @ Union7/29 Berkeley, CA @ Gilman Street7/30 Anaheim, CA @ Chain ReactionThere’s a lot of articles on the internet these days that include crazy lists from places like Buzzfeed to Business Insider. I haven’t seen many BJJ related list articles so now it’s our time to shine. Here are 13 things only people who have served time on the mats will understand.
1. Any references to the word shrimp is not about the food, it’s about saving your ass.
2. When you mention BJJ to a friend and they think it’s Karate.
3. The phrase, “warm ups” has an extremely loose definition.
4. Color purple holds a lot more badassery than most could ever realize.
5. Don’t cross your feet if you have someone’s back. You know why.
6. When you come back from BJJ class with hickeys on your neck, it can be tough to explain to your girlfriend and coworkers.
7. The strange habit to go for double-unders when hugging pretty much anyone.
8. OSS. Enough said.
9. No Gi – the only variation of a sport that is named the absence of something else.
10. “Rolling” is what we say to each other, but “fighting” or “sparring” is what we say to impress our non-BJJ friends.
11. Sloth grip is king, save the thumb destruction for another day.
12. You know what, “Answer the phone” means.
13. Twister isn’t just a game, it’s a spine destroying workshop.
13.5 Rear naked choke isn’t from 50 shades of grey.
Do you have any to add?
AdvertisementsThe new DR-1 model has many features that are new to the MB range. Body wood is swamp ash, a lightweight wood with a unique sound, that is warm, with a sweet top-end and balanced mids. The fingerboard is ebony, noted for its tight sound, dark grain and durability. The back of the neck is finished in matching military green satin lacquer and black Gotoh and Schaller hardware is employed throughout. Woodwork for the DR-1 is manufactured in Europe and final build and assembly is completed here in the UK.
The DR-1 finish is completely new and was directed by Matthew himself during the recording of the album Drones. Development included various prototype models and many months creating the correct finish and visuals to reflect the military nature of the design. Drones 01 and 02 were both reserved for Matthew and feature special distressed finishes to give an even more war decayed visual.They picked a relatively simple eye salve calling for garlic, onions and cow bile, to be mixed with wine and aged in a copper vessel.
“We chose this recipe... because it contains ingredients such as garlic that are currently being investigated by other researchers on their potential antibiotic effectiveness,” Lee says in a video released by the university. “We also looked at a recipe that was relatively straightforward.”
It didn’t look exactly sanitary, even if onions and garlic are known to have some antimicrobial activity, and even if wine might kill some germs if the alcoholic content is high enough. Copper, also, has some antimicrobial properties. As for bile from a cow’s stomach — maybe not so much.
Nonetheless, said Nottingham microbiologist Freya Harrison, “we recreated the recipe as faithfully as we could.”
They even went to a vineyard that’s been around since the 9th century for some wine, said the university’s Steve Diggle.
They pounded together the ingredients and left them to stew for days, as directed. And the resulting mash seemed to kill germs pretty well. It even killed germs that had formed a sticky mess called a biofilm — something that’s usually pretty hard to get at, even with modern antibiotics.
The researchers, who presented their findings this week to a meeting of microbiologists in Britain, sent some of the stuff off to Kendra Rumbaugh, an associate professor at Texas Tech, who tests antibiotics. She tried it against MRSA, one of the most common and vexing superbugs that’s spreading rapidly.
“It certainly works as well as, if not better than, what we are using in clinics,” Rumbaugh told NBC News. “The gold standard is vancomycin and it worked as well as if not better than vancomycin.”
"People are looking in wonderful new places or, I guess in this case, old places."
Rumbaugh tested the stuff in tissue taken from mice infected with MRSA. The salve will have to be made using more modern methods before anyone can test it in a living animal, she said.
“Usually we don’t find very much that works that well, certainly not against MRSA,” Rumbaugh said.
Individually, the ingredients did not kill the germs. “It wasn’t until they put it all together that we saw this really nice antibacterial activity,” Rumbaugh said.
She hopes there’s a chemical reaction going on that creates a new compound.
It’s badly needed — antibiotics are rapidly losing ground against evolving bacteria. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and World Health Organization have been warning that the world could be about to enter a "post-antibiotic era" when fewer and fewer drugs will work to kill common infections.
The White House released a five-year, $1.2 billion plan this month to fight drug-resistant "superbugs" that includes better tracking of infections, faster tests and new drugs.
Researchers are looking for new drugs in dirt, tropical plants and the sea. But not, usually, in ancient tomes.
"People are looking in wonderful new places or, I guess in this case, old places,” said Rumbaugh.A new report by the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development found that overcrowding in housing is increasing citywide, an indicator that the homelessness population may increase. View Full Caption Shutterstock
NEW YORK CITY — In a new report assessing threats to affordable housing citywide, advocates say one issue is getting even worse: overcrowding.
In the five boroughs, the rate of severely overcrowded households increased 18 percent from 2014 to 2015, according to the latest available data from the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development, an advocacy group that studies affordable housing in New York.
In its 2017 report “How is Affordable Housing Threatened in Your Neighborhood?” the group charted 19 different factors deemed threats to affordable housing, including a neighborhood’s unemployment rate, percentage of rent-burdened households, the number of ongoing housing-related litigation and foreclosure rates.
The report found neighborhoods in the South Bronx — particularly the Highbridge and Concourse areas where indicators of gentrification continue to crop up — had the most threats to affordable housing.
But citywide, the factor that jumped out to the group was overcrowding, which advocates say is a precursor to more families moving to city shelters.
“What often happens is a low-income family get evicted for whatever reason, and it is often the case that they will spend a long period of time bouncing around and couch surfing with family and friends, doubled and tripled up, and searching for affordable housing,” said Benjamin Dulchin, executive director of ANHD.
“It’s only when all of their search options run out … that they end up in the shelter system,” he said.
Neighborhoods with the highest overcrowding in this year’s report include Elmhurst and Corona in Queens where 9 percent of households are severely overcrowded, Sunset Park in Brooklyn (8.7 percent) and the Fordham section of The Bronx (8 percent).
The city is already coping with a record-high number of homeless residents. According to the Coalition for the Homeless, nearly 62,000 New Yorkers are currently housed in the shelter system.
There are some places where overcrowding has eased a bit, but Dulchin says that could indicate late-stage displacement in areas where there has already been a major loss in affordable housing.
For example, in Crown Heights the percentage of severely crowded households dropped from 3.8 percent to 2.4 percent between 2014 and 2015, a decrease AHND attributes to an uptick in smaller, wealthier families displacing larger households.
“It tends to be the case that when the younger, more affluent and whiter population moves in, what they are often doing is displacing a family and themselves living with far more space,” he said.
The AHND report was completed in conjunction with the office of Councilmember Jumaane Williams, representative of Flatbush. In a statement, Williams said households where people are “doubling and tripling up to afford rent” are often forgotten in conversations about homelessness and affordable housing.
“This is an issue that spans all demographics,” he said. “My hope is that these figures help paint a true picture of what life is like for many people in this city, and help create income-targeted housing for all."
To see the full report, visit AHND’s website.EA is temporarily pulling the microtransactions from Star Wars Battlefront II, a shocking move that comes after days of zealous fan anger and just hours before the official launch of the game.
“We hear you loud and clear, so we’re turning off all in-game purchases,” wrote Oskar Gabrielson, GM of Battlefront II developer DICE, in a blog post this evening. “We will now spend more time listening, adjusting, balancing and tuning. This means that the option to purchase crystals in the game is now offline, and all progression will be earned through gameplay. The ability to purchase crystals in-game will become available at a later date, only after we’ve made changes to the game. We’ll share more details as we work through this.”
Previously, you could spend real money on crates and crystals that let you improve your gear and get better at the game, a system that veered dangerously close to “pay-to-win” waters.
Controversy over Battlefront II has been swirling for weeks now, but peaked over the weekend after Early Access players discovered that the game’s heroes could take dozens of hours to unlock, a process you could expedite by spending money to buy loot crates and earn credits. On Monday, EA cut the costs of all heroes, but the damage had been done, and was exacerbated by widespread confusion over whether EA had also cut the number of credits you’d receive from playing the game.
This week, it seemed like the only thing video game fans wanted to talk about was Star Wars Battlefront II’s various methods of making you pay extra money. The rage led to the most downvoted Reddit comment of all time and even hit mainstream press, with a CNN article today proclaiming that “The new Star Wars video game is under attack.”Boston Bombings Bring Out The 'Crowdsleuthers'
toggle caption FBI via AP
If you were at the Boston Marathon wearing a backpack, chances are some citizen sleuth has pored over your photo in the hunt for possible suspects in Monday's blasts.
Federal investigators have said the key to breaking the case is likely to come from photos or video taken by members of the public, and social media sites such as Reddit and 4chan are buzzing with speculation over the scores of images on the Internet.
"Our expectation of a horrific crime like this being solved is higher than it was in the past because of the ubiquitous nature of the collecting of images," says Robert McCrie, a professor of security management at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.
With surveillance cameras in so many stores and smartphones in nearly every pocket, there's an expectation that a clear picture of the bomber or bombers must be out there. But with so many pictures to look through, it's like trying to find the one slightly off-white pingpong ball buried under 10,000 white pingpong balls.
"This is a test case in terms of electronics and amateur sleuthing," says Gerald Posner, an investigative journalist and author of Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK. "If they can find the lead that leads to the perpetrators, it will be a new standard of law enforcement."
More Images Than Ever
In the past, investigators would have to get lucky. There weren't enough cameras or angles, for instance, to identify immediately the men who blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995.
"There was only one camera from the building," Posner says. "They found some camera footage from downtown, but it wasn't clear enough who was driving."
When President Kennedy was killed 50 years ago, the only complete video investigators could find was an 8 mm home movie shot by Abraham Zapruder. Although frames from the film were published by Life magazine days after the killing, the film was not broadcast until 1975.
The Zapruder film shows a woman who is wearing a babushka and holding what appears to be a video camera.
"The FBI never found her," Posner says. "If the Zapruder film were released today, everybody would have her picture and we would know who she was in minutes."
DIY Detectives
That's because now, there's no end to still pictures and video footage. "Especially with social media now, information is going to be out there as quick as it's happening," says Adam Reed, a public information officer with the Pennsylvania State Police.
In Boston, investigators not only asked the public to help, but also went so far as to ask visitors departing from Boston's Logan Airport to share any photographs they had.
"Invariably, it's the tips and the help that is provided by the public that results in the solution of most of our cases today," says McCrie, the John Jay College professor.
toggle caption Elise Amendola/AP
But, as Reed notes, in a case with as high a profile as the Boston Marathon bombings, the amount of information offered up by the public can be overwhelming. More than 1 million images have been submitted to law enforcement, as well as more than 1,000 hours of video footage.
"It's incumbent on law enforcement to sort through those tips to figure out what might be legitimate and what might not be," Reed says.
The people trying to "crowdsleuth" Monday's blasts are part of a cottage industry. In the age of the Internet, Amber Alerts and TV shows such as America's Most Wanted, many people with no connection to law enforcement devote countless hours to trying to solve crimes.
"I'm something of a DIY detective," Michelle McNamara, who runs a blog called True Crime Diary, wrote recently in Los Angeles magazine. "I delve into cold cases by scouring the Internet for any digital crumbs authorities may have overlooked, then share my theories with the 8,000 or so mystery buffs who visit my blog regularly."
Groups of amateur sleuths such as the Doe Network and the Vidocq Society have helped solve dozens of missing person and murder cases, poring over old records.
Theorizing Vs. Tips
Those in law enforcement sometimes have a hard time believing that someone will come up with useful ideas that their own trained personnel and computers hadn't managed to figure out.
"Some hesitance [on the part of law enforcement] is always there," says William Fleischer, a private investigator in Philadelphia and commissioner of the Vidocq Society. "When we started 24 years ago, the first words out of their mouths was 'who?' Now, I believe we're still listed as a resource in the Justice Department for cold cases."
He adds: "Police, like other people, are very competitive, very protective and territorial."
There is always a tendency among cops, when approached by well-meaning citizens with a theory of the case, to offer thanks politely but dismissively, says McCrie. "The reality is, police cannot succeed in their endeavors without support from the public," he says.
In Boston, that support is primarily taking the shape of thousands and thousands of images. There is far more visual information available in this case than could have been dreamt of during the Kennedy assassination, or the Olympic bombing in Atlanta in 1996, or even the terrorist attacks that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001.
"This sounds like a broken record — we tend to say this with each catastrophic event — but it's different now," says Posner, author of Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK.
If pictures or video do in fact lead to an arrest or arrests, law enforcement will forever welcome floods of images of crime scenes from the public, Posner says. When it comes to images and information, the more authorities have, the better.
"If they can find the lead that leads to the perpetrators, it will be a new standard of law enforcement," he says.
But if the case is solved slowly — with the key clue available all along but initially overlooked because the police and feds were overwhelmed — Posner says that could cause more skepticism about the utility of torrents of information offered up by the public.In the annals of political correctness run amok in American schools, this story — if true — is easily an all-timer.
A junior-high school Spanish teacher has filed a lawsuit alleging that she was fired from P.S. 211 in the Bronx in March 2012 because of a misunderstanding over the word “negro.”
The non-tenured teacher, 65-year-old Petrona Smith, maintains that she was instructing her class about how to say the various basic colors in Spanish, reports the New York Post. The word “negro” naturally came up because “negro” is the Spanish word for “black.”
A seventh-grade student in the class took offense at the term, however, believing the word to be a racial slur. It’s not clear if Smith directed the term at the student. Whatever the case, he reported the incident to school officials.
But, wait. It gets better. Smith, a native of the West Indies, is black. And to top it all off, P.S. 211 is bilingual.
Smith’s attorney, Shaun Reid, called the charge that allegedly led to his client’s termination ridiculous.
“They haven’t even accounted for how absurd it is for someone who’s black to be using a racial slur to a student,” Reid told the Post.
School officials refused to make any comment about the allegations in the lawsuit. As such, the publicly-known facts are tremendously one-sided at this point.
In court papers, Smith does address another incident involving an allegation that she labeled some students as “failures.” The teacher states that she had only asked certain students to move to the rear of the classroom after they had failed a test.
The Post notes that Smith also claims that students hurled insults at her, calling her “fucking monkey” and other abusive names.
Smith hasn’t been able to find another job since she was sacked.
Follow Eric on Twitter and send education-related story tips to erico@dailycaller.com.Last night, the Rockies slept in San Diego. For the most part, they slept well. They’ll head to Colorado after today’s game, and they won’t sleep as well when they get home. This is important, and backed by the players and science, so stick with me.
I did not sleep with them, or ask each one, but the ones I did talk to all mentioned the difference between sleeping at home and sleeping in San Diego and San Francisco. “The first night we were here, everyone was talking about how well they slept,” Rockies’ starter Tyler Chatwood told me in San Francisco. “Sometimes you feel it the first night, you have a crappy night’s sleep and feel tight,” said setup man Adam Ottavino of Colorado.
Plus, science says sleeping at high altitude is hard, and that rest and recovery generally is a difficult thing up high. In 2013 a meta-study in Turkey summed up the research:
High-altitude (HA) environments have adverse effects on the normal functioning body of people accustomed to living at low altitudes because of the change in barometric pressure which causes decrease in the amount of oxygen leading to hypobaric hypoxia. Sustained exposure to hypoxia has adverse effects on body weight, muscle structure and exercise capacity, mental functioning, and sleep quality.
“I notice I feel ten years older when I wake up in the morning here,” laughed starter Jon Gray, making that link between rest and recovery that’s so important to a professional athlete. “As long as you’re able to sleep, you’ll feel good,” agreed Chatwood. “If I throw a night game and then have to be up for a day game, I’ll notice the difference.”
There’s a cumulative effect. “More often than not,” pointed out Ottavino, “you’ll actually feel okay for the first few days and then you feel a little wore down. Especially if you threw a really stressful couple of games, really exerted yourself, you just don’t bounce back as well. Sleep is not deep here.” The position players feel it over time: “The first couple days back are hard,” admitted second baseman DJ Le Mahieu.
The second straight start of a home stand was something the starters mentioned. Starting pitchers are creatures of comfort, and when each of the part of their routine is met with less effective sleep and recovery, they feel that much worse when the second start rolls around. And it looks like there’s some evidence of an effect in the numbers.
We pulled all consecutive starts by pitchers in a single park since the last expansion in 1993 and tracked the runs per nine innings as a measure of their success. This should be mostly pitchers pitching at home in two straight starts. The sample was over 500 for most parks, and the effect, though perhaps small, may be real. Here are the ten most extreme parks by elevation in both directions, with averages.
Second Consecutive Starts in Extreme Elevation Parks High Elevation First Second Difference Colorado 5.79 6.30 0.51 Arizona 4.75 4.56 -0.19 Atlanta 3.78 3.79 0.01 Minnnesota 4.82 4.99 0.17 Kansas City 4.93 5.16 0.23 Pittsburgh 4.23 4.65 0.42 Average 4.72 4.91 0.19 Low Elevation First Second Difference Oakland 4.22 4.12 -0.10 Miami 4.31 4.06 -0.25 San Francisco 4.05 4.09 0.05 New York AL 4.26 4.45 0.19 New York NL 3.84 4.04 0.20 San Diego 3.94 4.17 0.22 Average 4.10 4.16 0.05 Runs per nine inning per start for starting pitchers throwing consecutive starts at home, grouped by team since 1993.
The effect is not huge, and you might notice that the run environment is higher for the high altitude parks. But if you express the difference between starts in each grouping as a percentage, starting pitchers were 4% worse in their second start in the altitude, and only 1% worse closest to sea level. And since Denver is almost five times higher than the second-highest park, we should note that Denver starters are 9% worse in their second starts.
There’s hope! The players themselves had some coping mechanisms. “You gotta try and make yourself sleep as long as you can,” said Chatwood. “if you do that, I think you’re fine.” Ottavino has a one-year old at home, and after pitching a high-adrenaline eighth or ninth inning around 11 pm local time, finds he can’t get to sleep until two or three in the morning. “It’s a little tricky sometimes at home,” he laughed, “but I get naps in. We have one little spot, I know they’re building a new nap room for the clubhouse, but we have a little spot where one guy can catch a nap.e I usually do.”
And then there’s what you put in your body. DJ Edwards of Push Performance in Denver works with pitchers. “We really stress hydration and active recovery,” he said. “The higher elevation training it is more difficult to gain weight or keep weight on because there is a lack of oxygen cells that aid in recovery. It is more difficult to carry oxygen to muscle cells at that high of an elevation. We recommend lots of water, high nutrient dense foods. We recommend amino acids as would anyone else. Timely carbohydrate intake pre and post workout as well.”
Hydrating was on everyone’s mind. “Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate,” said Le Mahieu. Everyone echoed some form of that mantra, but Chatwood had just heard a teammate complain about it in a unique way: “Someone was just talking about having drank six or seven bottles of water and hadn’t peed yet,” grinned the starter. “Constant hydration,” affirmed Edwards. “Almost to the point where they are over hydrated.” Including hydration at night: “On the sleep side we recommend humidifiers in the bedrooms because of our dry climate.”
But the food is important, too. “Sometimes when I’m really sore I forget to eat and I can tell the difference then,” said Chatwood. “You have to crush food.” Gray said he took as many amino acids as he could, and Le Mahieu mentioned eating well. They all praised the new nutritionist and cook in the clubhouse as a real help. “Our team is eating a lot healthier because we have new guidelines and a new chef because of the CBA,” pointed out Ottavino. “Little things like that help.”
The pitchers and trainers have also adjusted their schedules. “Since I came back from surgery, I’ve thrown a lot less, and I think that’s helped,” said Tommy John survivor Chatwood. Ottavino, who had his surgery more recently, agreed: “At this point in my career, if I can skip throwing, I usually do, save my bullets and all that.”
Edwards at Push Performance has some guidelines. “Between starts we like to lift our heaviest lift the day after a start,” said Edwards of training pitchers in Denver. “That gives the most time to get them recovered. The rest of the week we really focus on movement, recovery, regaining anything lost i.e. Internal rotation, hip mobility, shoulder stability etc.”
They also have some breathing exercises for their athletes at Push. “We do focus on a lot of post workout breathing,” Edwards said. “We really want the athlete to expand the diaphragm and learn to regain their breaths quickly. This helps allow a slower heart rate and go from sympathetic to parasympathetic safely, quickly and efficiently.”
And there’s even a little benefit to this annoyance that is sleeping and recovering at high altitude: it makes you better on the road. “There is a reason why the United States Olympic Training Center is located in Colorado Springs,” pointed out Edwards. “Aerobic captivity is built because of the higher elevations. The lungs are stronger, Vo2 max is higher. The pitchers should be able to go deeper into a start at sea level.” This isn’t definitive or anything, but the Rockies are the only team in baseball since 1993 that has gotten more innings per game started on the road than at home.
Innings Per Game Started, Home & Away Top Five Away IP/GS Home IP/GS Diff Rockies 5.71 5.62 0.10 Rangers 5.75 5.77 -0.02 White Sox 6.06 6.15 -0.10 Diamondbacks 5.97 6.08 -0.11 Red Sox 5.85 5.98 -0.13 Bottom Five Away IP/GS Home IP/GS Diff Mets 5.85 6.22 -0.37 Dodgers 5.84 6.21 -0.37 Giants 5.82 6.20 -0.38 Athletics 5.73 6.11 -0.38 Padres 5.64 6.07 -0.42 Since 1993, all games started home and away grouped by team
So the next time Tyler Chatwood calls for a new ball, sighs, and rubs the seams as he looks at the scoreboard during the second start of a homestand, maybe that little asterisk will help him out a little. ‘Where are we headed next again?’The CPM-led Left government in Kerala, which came into power in 2016, will particularly be noted for two things: First is the constant criticism over political violence between the CPM and RSS, and the subsequent political deliberation by the BJP's central leadership. And secondly, repeated instances of caste-based discrimination in the state.
Instances of the caste-based violence and discrimination have surfaced from many different parts of the state. An inter-caste marriage, the subsequent unrest in Palakkad district's Ambedkar Colony, and the custodial torture of a Dalit teen leading to his suicide in Thrissur district are some of the recent examples.
These stories hit the news media consumed by the middle class before suffering a slow death and leaving the caste reality behind. Meanwhile, government and political parties move ahead with their development agendas.
There, however, is one woman, Chitralekha, who has dared the CPM and fought |
with its characteristic and lovable chime. But I’ve always wondered what was to be found on the inside, and in my twenty-two years thus far, I had never experienced what lied within… until last night.
As the current intern at the Royal Society of Biology I was invited to help out at the Biology Week Parliament Reception, which I jumped at the chance to help at (although at first I half suspected I might be serving the canapés).
After making it through security; which I found to be more rigorous than any airport I’ve been through (I got a VERY thorough pat-down from an over-enthusiastic guard), collecting my belongings that thankfully did not alert security (I was slightly worried about my safety pins - an undeniable weapon if it should fall into the wrong hands) and obtaining my pass, I was finally inside Parliament.
Like any tourist, although minus the i-pad and selfie stick, I excitedly snapped away on my camera and likened the interior to Hogwarts innumerable times.
Armed with the large unwieldy packages I had been entrusted with carrying, I weaved my way through numerous colourful corridors and grand stone hallways; passing lots of suited and booted individuals as well as police with terrifyingly large guns, managed not to get lost, where upon I finally arrived at the Churchill Room, the location for the evening’s event (and wondering slightly how I would ever find my way back out).
This year’s Biology Week Parliament Reception, held by the Royal Society of Biology in partnership with the BBSRC, was a huge success, with a packed room at the House of Commons. The annual celebration brings together Ministers, MPs, RSB Fellows and representatives from member organisations, all under one roof to keep biosciences at the forefront of the UK.
The night was hosted by prominent MPs Stephen Metcalfe and Chi Onwurah, with a series of warm welcomes and speeches regarding science’s ‘unique’ role in the UK.
Nicola Blackwood, MP and chair of the Science & Technology Select Committee, took to the (rather tiny) stage to say a few words regarding the success of science in the UK stating: “The UK is a science superpower.” She stressed the importance of investing in research, and emphasised her wish for the impending spending cuts to not drastically impact on UK science and her determination to not let science fall off the agenda. This was met with murmurs of support from around the room!
Attendees were provided with a ballot slip from which to cast their vote for their favourite insect. The ballot was based on the Royal Society of Biology’s UK Top Insect poll, launched in August earlier this year, which called for the public to choose their favourite insect from a selection of creepy crawlies, in order to crown one as victor. Of the 191 votes cast, 64 went to the Buff-tailed Bumblebee, a winning majority that sealed this ‘Queen Bee’s’ victory, which was met with rapturous applause.
As the bumblebee representative, and with cries of “Speech, Speech!” from the audience, I hopped onto to podium and grabbed the mic with the slight apprehension yet unfaltering buzz of confidence that only two complimentary glasses of white wine can provide, and attempted to deliver an impassioned speech about my beloved bee.
Looking at the photos from last night, I am slightly distressed at my open-palmed hand gesturing, typical of former Lib Dem MP Nick Clegg, that I didn’t even realise I was doing. But overall, my first (and probably last) speech in Parliament seemed to be a hit, and whilst I didn’t pass a legislative act or change the world, I am still pretty proud.
Admittedly, I am not the most clued up individual when it comes to politics, regularly mixing up my left and right wings (shameful I know), and I am ashamed to say I am yet to use my vote (despite reminders of what women went through in order to obtain it). Hence initially I was more than a little nervous to be confronted with a room full of politicians, fuelled by a lot of wine and endless canapés.
However, I came away from the evening feeling inspired. Would I consider a future in politics? Certainly not… however I am far more motivated to seek out information, to educate myself in the world of politics and to make my vote count in the next election.Czech readers were shocked by yet another dose of staggering news about the Islamization in Germany. The German minister of interior, Thomas de Maiziere, has recommended to introduce Muslim holidays in Germany. Shockingly enough, this man is a member of the "Christian" Democratic Union, CDU, the strongest party in Germany.
The proposal was criticized by some other politicians – especially those from Bavaria's CSU – but immediately praised by Martin Schulz, the leader of the Social Democratic Party, Germany's second most powerful party. Incidentally, the Czech party with the same acronym – SPD – is led by a Czech-Japanese nationalist who wants to completely ban Islam, among many other things. ;-)
According to the proposal, up to five Muslim holidays could be celebrated locally, in Bundeslands, districts, or cities where the percentage of Muslims is higher. But everyone in those regions would have to observe these holidays!
I am not the only one who finds it increasingly crazy that given this frightening political situation in Germany, we still have open borders with Germany. My feeling is that this anomalous situation cannot last for too long. While most Czechs would probably agree that the threat of Islamization is Europe's gravest political problem in the medium or long run, top politicians in Germany not only fail to recognize this threat. They are actively working to make this nightmare come true.
Maybe in coming weeks, the proposal will be defeated. But that's clearly where this ill German nation seems to be going. Similar insanities are increasingly becoming a part of the "German mainstream".
I am convinced that Germans will soon integrate themselves among the Muslims.I officially ask the admin to reintroduce the vomiting smiley face.So this is the hard core of Europe that we can't allow to escape from us?Now, he is proposing to introduce Muslim holidays. In ten years, he will be proposing to abolish the Christian ones. Thank you very much but I don't want that.The very fact that this is being proposed by someone from the [Christian] CDU is... decadent.This is approximately what the symptoms look like when a person loses his survival instincts.The chairman of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany Mr Aiman Mazyek has welcomed the proposal. [Source.] It's the same chairman who screamed before the elections that if AfD would get to the Parliament, he would return to Turkey. So now he should keep his word, pack his belongings, and kick himself out of Germany.We should consider the introduction of border checks and visas for the crazy Germany.Germans can no longer be helped by anybody.I recommend Germans to abolish the Christian holidays. Another move could be the reintroduction of work on Saturdays. Otherwise Germany will face the threat that they won't be capable of earning enough money for the bunch of the freeloaders.Yuup! Especially Ramadan. That's the holiday that will teach you to starve and thank God-Allah for the starvation on top of it. Given the number of the recipients of welfare, it will be a useful training for your future. :-))Nothing good has come from the Germans in the recent 1,000 years.Do good to the devil, he will reward you by Hell. That's how the proverb has it, right?Where did the comrades from FRG make the mistake? [The famous movie quote from the Cozy Dens originally had comrades from GDR and maybe it could be more apt here because of Merkel, too.]This already looks like a diagnosis.And Islam is already being taught in 7 out of 16 Bundeslands.But this is a Renault from a fish.It's already here. Germany is lost and it's unfortunately our neighbor.Do introduce the Sharia Law, too. But please, don't try to impose it on anyone else and build a fence around yourself.Are the German brains' already raking [are they going nuts] or is it due to fear from the rising Muslim population?I can see that Germans are integrating increasingly well.He's visibly a Christian Democrat like a leg. [smiley with a tongue]I don't know what he smokes but he should interrupt it.And Mr Vaněk still wonders why I don't want to become a welcomer.The same opinions appear at Echo24, Novinky, iDNES, Lidovky. A poll in Novinky shows 98.4% of the readers against the Muslim holidays.Someone on here once pointed out how whenever beauty vloggers on youtube do those, “my boyfriend does my makeup” challenges; the guy never seems to know what he’s doing, he doesn’t know what contouring is or highlighting and everyone thinks he’s just being a dude but really it shows that he obviously doesn’t watch his girlfriend’s videos that she’s clearly passionate about making, if he can’t understand something as simple as a primer and that really sucks
I also think about how wild it is that women get mocked and made fun of for pretending to be interested in sports and other things that are typically understood as male interests, and it seems like we’re the weird ones for doing that, but it’s crazy how there’s no pressure on men to be interested in, or at least understand anything considered feminine, like, wouldn’t you want to have knowledge about something your significant other is interested in?
I see memes where the guy is shopping for what to get his girlfriend and someone suggests a highlighter and dude goes out and gets sharpie highlighters! Then people think it’s hilarious, because he’s just a guy being a dude y'know but if a girl doesn’t know shit about basketball, or football, or video games, or cars, or comics or whatever else she’s an idiotSHOCKING AUDIO: Obama Is Leading OFA in Shadow Government to Take Down Trump
Author Ed Klein told Pete Hegseth on Fox and Friends Weekend in December that Barack Obama is setting up a shadow government in Washington DC to undermine President Trump after Inauguration Day.
Ed Klein: For the past 100 years every president who is outgoing has packed up his stuff gone home and not criticized his successor. This is not what the Obamas are planning to do. They rented an eight-bedroom mansion in the section of Washington near Joe Lockhart, Bill Clinton’s last press secretary. In that house there’s enough room for Valerie Jarrett and Michelle and the kids. A place for ten cars to park. They are setting up what they are calling a shadow government. Pete Hegseth: The Obamas claim it is because the children want to stay in D.C.. Ed Klein: That’s not the real reason they are staying there. They are staying there because despite what the president said in his press conference, he’s in a sense of outrage over this incoming Trump Administration, which he thinks is going to wipe out his legacy. So he’s setting up this kind of almost insurgency, picking people in foreign affairs, labor, abortion, union matters and setting them up to start appearing on television, making speeches and doing op-ed pieces for next four years, you’re going to see not only a Trump Administration but you’re going to see a shadow government opposing the Trump…
Klein said it was an insurgency by the left starting on Inauguration Day with the mass demonstrations organized by Michael Moore.
Via FOX and Friends Weekend:
Now this…
Obama is ramping up Organizing for Action to take down Trump.
Paul Sperry at The New York Post reported: In what’s shaping up to be a highly unusual post-presidency, Obama isn’t just staying behind in Washington. He’s working behind the scenes to set up what will effectively be a shadow government to not only protect his threatened legacy, but to sabotage the incoming administration and its popular “America First” agenda. He’s doing it through a network of leftist nonprofits led by Organizing for Action. Normally you’d expect an organization set up to support a politician and his agenda to close up shop after that candidate leaves office, but not Obama’s OFA. Rather, it’s gearing up for battle, with a growing war chest and more than 250 offices across the country. Since Donald Trump’s election, this little-known but well-funded protesting arm has beefed up staff and ramped up recruitment of young liberal activists, declaring on its website, “We’re not backing down.” Determined to salvage Obama’s legacy,”it’s drawing battle lines on immigration, ObamaCare, race relations and climate change. Obama is intimately involved in OFA operations and even tweets from the group’s account. In fact, he gave marching orders to OFA foot soldiers following Trump’s upset victory… …Obama is intimately involved in OFA operations and even tweets from the group’s account. In fact, he gave marching orders to OFA foot soldiers following Trump’s upset victory.
Here is more evidence that Obama is working behind the scenes to take down Trump.
A caller from Texas told Trump supporters Diamond and Silk this past week that she received a prerecorded message from Obama seeking donations to go against President Trump.
If true – This is very disturbing!2016 FIA Formula 3 European Champion Lance Stroll signed off from a stunningly successful season and the F3 category by posting three dominant victories at Hockenheim this weekend.
The Montreal-born Williams development driver, who looks set to step up to a full race seat next season, ultimately closed out his season a colossal 185-points ahead of his closest rival having wrapped up the title with four races to go earlier this month. This represents the biggest winning points margin in the history of the Formula 3 Euro Series and FIA Formula 3 European Championship.
Stroll's season will go down as arguably the most dominant in European F3 history. The British Racing Driver's Club Rising Star recorded a staggering 24 top-six finishes including 20 podiums that featured 14 wins in the 30-race series having started 17 times from the front row - 14 from pole-position.
Stroll, who celebrates his 18th birthday on 29 October, is the first driver from North America to ever win the Euro F3 title and is the youngest ever F3 Euro Series & FIA Formula 3 European Championship winner.
Stroll started Saturday morning's race - the 60th in his F3 career - from pole, a front right lock-up going in to Turn 2 momentarily dropping him to third before he re-took the lead in a bold overtaking move at the Mercedes Arena on the opening lap.
Thereafter he stamped his authority on the race, taking a commanding six-secs victory, and leading home a Prema 1-2-3-4 having set the fastest race lap for the 11th time this year.
The afternoon race saw Stroll blast away from pole and complete the first lap with a 1.58s lead. Total dominance ensued with the Canadian cruising to the chequered flag with a over 4s+ advantage.
Stroll, who has led well over twice as many racing laps this season than the next successful driver, lined-up fourth for his final race of the season this morning - his 22nd race start this season from either the first or second row of the grid.
An electrifying start saw him second at the first corner and in the lead on lap two after a brilliant manoeuvre - thus scoring his 14th victory of the season by 4.716secs.
Immediately after the race which had been delayed due to fog, Geneva-based Stroll was presented with the championship winning silverware on the podium by Prema's 2014 F3 champion and current Formula One driver Esteban Ocon.Greenacres Police Officer Jared Nash is accused of breaking a 14-year-old girl's arm during an arrest attempt that was initiated because the officer attempted to view a video on her cell phone without a search warrant. The officer then arrested the teen for resisting arrest.
The incident happened at the John I. Leonard High School in the Palm Beach County suburb on October 21. According to the arrest report for the girl, whose name is being withheld by New Times because she is a minor, Nash believed she had video evidence on her phone of a fight that occurred at the school. The officer attempted to speak to the girl, but she was speaking to her mother and refused to talk to him.
See also: Boynton Cop Stephen Maiorino Arrested for Raping Woman at GunpointEarlier this month we reported that Google AdWords was planning to change the way conversions are counted. Now it’s official.
Google AdWords has officially announced a new way for advertisers to track and measure conversions with their new flexible conversion counting. The goal is to help advertisers track the types of conversions that work best for their business model.
The change to the “many per clicks” conversions means that an advertiser can track different conversion types on the same click.
For example, AdWords uses the example of the Berkeley Tees company, where they want to track both leads, which they determined by those who download catalog, as well as those that actually buy a T-shirt:
It can then also effectively track when the same customer to click on an ad does the same conversion action multiple times – such as downloading the catalog three times, and will still only counted as a single unique conversion for that download. But if another customer clicks an ad once, and then makes two purchases in a week, it counts that as being two sales conversions, since two sales are made.
In your AdWords account, there’s the option to select which conversion that metric you would like to use, either converted clicks or conversions.
There are two new columns in the flexible conversion counting the replace the current conversions (one-per-click) and conversions (many-per-click) in the AdWords account.
“Converted clicks record clicks that deliver value to your business, or in other words, only clicks that drive conversions,” said Vishal Goenka, AdWords Product Manager. “The new conversions column gives you even greater visibility. It allows you to see the relative value of each converted click. This column will report all your conversions, whether you want to count all instances of the conversion or just unique conversions. Now you can focus on the value of each conversion delivered to your business.”
Want to stay on top of the latest search trends? Get top insights and news from our search experts. SubscribeHouse Speaker Paul Ryan Paul Davis RyanBrexit and exit: A transatlantic comparison Five takeaways from McCabe’s allegations against Trump The Hill's 12:30 Report: Sanders set to shake up 2020 race MORE reiterated Tuesday that he’s seen “no evidence” of rampant voter fraud during the 2016 election.
The Wisconsin Republican’s remarks came one day after President 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 told Ryan and other congressional leaders during a private White House meeting that he lost the popular vote only because 3 million to 5 million “illegals” voted.
“I’ve seen no evidence to that effect. I’ve made that very, very clear,” Ryan told reporters at the Capitol, reiterating his position on Trump’s claim of mass voter fraud.
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Trump won the White House in November by easily defeating Democrat Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonSanders: 'I fully expect' fair treatment by DNC in 2020 after 'not quite even handed' 2016 primary Sanders: 'Damn right' I'll make the large corporations pay 'fair share of taxes' Former Sanders campaign spokesman: Clinton staff are 'biggest a--holes in American politics' MORE in the Electoral College, 304 to 227. But Clinton won the popular tally by taking home nearly 3 million more votes than Trump nationwide.
That's been a sore subject for the new commander in chief. Shortly after his successful election, Trump tweeted: “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.”
He rehashed that false claim — which has been dismissed by state officials and independent fact-checkers — at Monday’s bipartisan meet-and-greet with the top eight House and Senate lawmakers, according to two sources familiar with the White House discussion.
"He said 3 to 5 million 'illegals' voted so that's why he lost popular vote," said a Democratic aide.
Trump’s latest comments drew a stern rebuke from one former presidential rival, Sen. Lindsey Graham Lindsey Olin GrahamHouse to push back at Trump on border Trump pressures GOP senators ahead of emergency declaration vote: 'Be strong and smart' This week: Congress, Trump set for showdown on emergency declaration MORE (R-S.C.), who urged him to stop claiming voter fraud cost him the popular vote.
“… I am begging the president, share with us the information you have about this or please stop saying it,” Graham said.
“As a matter of fact, I’d like you do more than stop saying it, I’d like you to come forward and say, ‘Having looked at it, I am confident the election was fair and accurate and people who voted voted legally.’ ‘Cause if he doesn’t do that, this is going to undermine his ability to govern this country.”“So, where are you right now?” We’ve all started phone calls or video chats this way, curious about background noise or the art on the wall behind our colleagues. It’s an interesting question.
We may be talking with each other, but physically we’re in completely different places, creating a kind of dissonance or feeling of disconnection that hinders our ability to collaborate via phones and computers.
I believe virtual reality can change this because it creates a real sense of place, a feeling of actually being somewhere.
And when multiple people share that virtual place, the physical dissonance recedes and collaboration seems more natural because we feel like we’re actually together.
This is why I believe collaboration will be one of the killer applications for VR, and it’s why we’re excited to be investors in Bigscreen, an app that lets people bring their 2D desktops into a shared virtual space to work or play together in VR.
The app has seen great adoption and reviews among early VR users, many of them spending hours inside Bigscreen as they write code, watch movies or play games.
Welcome, Bigscreen, to the True portfolio! You are an exciting addition to our community.
Read more about Bigscreen’s history from Founder/CEO Darshan Shankar on Medium.As their recent losses to the Memphis Grizzlies and Denver Nuggets suggested, the Warriors, well… they are who we thought they were! They have some of the best shooters in the league, no doubting that. The backcourt of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson can hit a dozen threes before you even know what hit you. Even Harrison Barnes has proven of late to be good for the occasional shot from behind the arc. Then there’s Jarrett Jack who sometimes forgets the half-court line isn’t the three-point line…but makes it anyway
Of course, there’s the foundation of David Lee, who should be a 2013 All Star. 20 points and 11 rebounds per game, D-Lee is an incredibly well-rounded scoring weapon and playmaker. Just when the opposition locks him down on the inside, he dishes to a shooter or steps out for a 15-foot jump shot.
But the Warriors excel in high-tempo games where Steph Curry can step up and hit threes or Klay sits in the corner waiting to drop daggers (Golden State has the 6th highest tempo in the NBA). As the Grizzlies proved, when the tempo slows, the Warriors will struggle. Two main reasons: 1) harder to get off in transition on made baskets and 2) second chance points. The first point is self-explanatory but the second is something that the Warriors have been able to cover up against weaker competition—which, to their credit, is most of the NBA.
The Warriors gave up second chance points to the Grizzlies because Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph were too much for the Warriors to handle. They create mismatch problems; if Mark Jackson opts to put his defensive stoppers on the floor (Draymond Green, Festus Ezeli, Andris Biedrins), then he risks defenses locking in on the “Big Three” (Klay, Lee, and Curry). If Jackson chooses to go small with Curry-Jack-Thompson-Landry-Lee, which is a popular choice the Warriors are nearly helpless on the inside. It’s a that will have a tough time against the Spurs, Thunder, Grizzlies, and Clippers.
seventeen offensive rebounds against Golden State in last Friday’s game. While their shooting overcame that, it won’t against the best Western conference teams in the playoffs. Some problems even arose against the Trail Blazers, who hadoffensive rebounds against Golden State in last Friday’s game. While their shooting overcame that, it won’t against the best Western conference teams in the playoffs.
This is why the Warriors need Andrew Bogut.
Realistically, a playoff appearance alone will excite a Warriors fan base that has been deprived of May basketball for more than five years. But if they want to go further than a first round exit—which is possible—Andrew Bogut will need to be there. He won’t be a “cure-all” because for one, the Warriors have proven that they can do very well without him. What he will be is an important piece that has been missing from the puzzle. His size allows David Lee to take advantage of mismatches (take smaller forwards inside and taller big men outside of the lane). Most importantly it adds a tremendous defensive presence and yet another way the Warriors can put the ball in the bucket.
If he returns from injury and plays anything like he did during his tenure in Milwaukee, Golden State can compete with any team in the West (save maybe the defending conference champs). While I originally thought the Warriors matched up well against Memphis, their last meeting proved there are challenges to overcome. And even though they have played the Clippers well over the season series, a playoff matchup will allow Los Angeles to exploit their weaknesses inside. I still believe that Steph & Co. match up well against the Spurs…especially in a potential second round matchup (which is likely unless the Warriors fall to the seventh spot in the West or San Antonio drops a slot to Memphis). Put Bogut on Duncan and even ESPN might start whispering upset.
Bogut is that combination of offensive and defensive playmaking that the Warriors have starved for. In most cases Mark Jackson is forced to choose between expecting scoring or stopping from the center position—and thus far has made it work. But come the playoffs, the top teams in the West will know what buttons to push against the Warriors; and if the shots aren’t falling, it could cause some serious problems.MAC Bangin’ Brilliant Collection – New Permanent Eyeshadows, Blushes, Lipsticks for June 2016
BANGIN’ BRILLIANT! A kaleidoscope of 29 new Lipstick shades, 24 new Eye Shadows, and five new Powder Blushes, here to stay, in various textures. An audacious pop of colour that goes off with a BANG! June 2016 in North America, October 2016 for International Regions; select locations MAC Cosmetics
The Details
Dazzleshadow, $18.00 U.S. / $24.00 CAD (Permanent) All shades have been previously reviewed here. Can’t Stop, Don’t Stop Deep plum purple with sparkles (Repromote)
Deep plum purple with sparkles (Repromote) Feel the Fever Deep blue purple with pink sparkles (Repromote)
Deep blue purple with pink sparkles (Repromote) Get Physical Purple with light blue sparkles (Repromote)
Purple with light blue sparkles (Repromote) I Like to Watch Mid-tone brown with gold sparkles (Repromote)
Mid-tone brown with gold sparkles (Repromote) Last Dance Peach-beige with pink sparkles (Repromote)
Peach-beige with pink sparkles (Repromote) Let’s Roll Red bronze with sparkles (Repromote)
Red bronze with sparkles (Repromote) Say It Isn’t So Dark grey with pink sparkles (Repromote)
Dark grey with pink sparkles (Repromote) She Sparkles Light grey with silver sparkles (Repromote)
Light grey with silver sparkles (Repromote) Slow/Fast/Slow Bronze with red sparkles (Repromote)
Bronze with red sparkles (Repromote) Try Me On Deep blue-green with sparkles (Repromote)
Eyeshadow, $16.00 U.S. / $19.00 CAD (New, Permanent) Cherry Topped Fuchsia pink (Frost)
Fuchsia pink (Frost) Fashion’s Field Day Pinky-coral (Frost)
Pinky-coral (Frost) How Royal Pearly cerulean blue (Veluxe Pearl)
Pearly cerulean blue (Veluxe Pearl) I’m Into It Dark red brown (Matte)
Dark red brown (Matte) In the Shadows Vibrant dark blue (Frost)
Vibrant dark blue (Frost) New Crop Vivid hunter green with pearl (Frost)
Vivid hunter green with pearl (Frost) Nice Energy Electric yellow lime green (Veluxe Pearl)
Electric yellow lime green (Veluxe Pearl) Oh My Mocha! Antiqued cranberry (Frost)
Antiqued cranberry (Frost) Ruddy Intense red (Veluxe Pearl)
Intense red (Veluxe Pearl) Shock Factor Lime green (Matte)
Lime green (Matte) Suspiciously Sweet Coral orange (Frost)
Coral orange (Frost) Teal Appeal Intense teal blue/green (Veluxe Pearl)
Intense teal blue/green (Veluxe Pearl) Up at Dawn Sherbet orange (Satin)
Sherbet orange (Satin) Zinc Blue Deep ocean blue (Matte)
Lipstick, $17.00 U.S. / $21.00 CAD (Permanent) 4Eva Creamy light purple (Matte)
Creamy light purple (Matte) Breathing Fire Hot fuchsia pink (Matte) (Repromote)
Hot fuchsia pink (Matte) (Repromote) Deep Rooted Brown taupe (Matte)
Brown taupe (Matte) Designer Blue High metallic deep ocean blue (Frost)
High metallic deep ocean blue (Frost) Dew Creamy purply blue (Satin)
Creamy purply blue (Satin) Dreampot Light candy blue (Matte)
Light candy blue (Matte) Frosting Pure white (Matte)
Pure white (Matte) Gold XIXI Lemony pastel yellow (Lustre) (Repromote)
Lemony pastel yellow (Lustre) (Repromote) Highlights Very pale creamy peach (Lustre)
Very pale creamy peach (Lustre) In My Fashion Darkened chocolate brown (Matte)
Darkened chocolate brown (Matte) In the Spirit Pure black (Matte)
Pure black (Matte) Lavender Jade Dirty mauve with gold pearl (Matte) (Repromote)
Dirty mauve with gold pearl (Matte) (Repromote) Lazy Lullaby White lavender purple (Matte)
White lavender purple (Matte) Lightly Charred Cool grey (Matte)
Cool grey (Matte) Love & Cherished Creamy light purple (Cremesheen)
Creamy light purple (Cremesheen) Mangrove Hot, bright red (Matte) (Repromote)
Hot, bright red (Matte) (Repromote) Model Behaviour Clean violet with blue pearl (Frost)
Clean violet with blue pearl (Frost) Nifty Neon Orange (Amplified)
Orange (Amplified) No Interruptions Muted gold pearl (Frost)
Muted gold pearl (Frost) On and On Deep purple with blue pearl (Frost)
Deep purple with blue pearl (Frost) Pick Me, Pick Me! Muted lavender with pink pearl (Frost)
Muted lavender with pink pearl (Frost) Pink, You Think? Hot neon pink with blue pearl (Frost)
Hot neon pink with blue pearl (Frost) Punk Couture Deep blackened grape (Matte) (Repromote)
Deep blackened grape (Matte) (Repromote) Really Me Muted neutral pink (Matte)
Muted neutral pink (Matte) Red Rock Classic clean red (Matte)
Classic clean red (Matte) Soft Hint Candy blue with blue pearl (Frost)
Candy blue with blue pearl (Frost) Spoiled Fabulous Metallic gold (Frost)
Metallic gold (Frost) Time to Shine Silver with white pearl (Frost)
Silver with white pearl (Frost) Wild Extract Lime green with electric pearl (Frost)
Blush, $22.00 U.S. / $26.00 CAD (New, Permanent) Bright Pink Intense fuchsia pink (Matte)
Intense fuchsia pink (Matte) Bright Response Vibrant clean orange (Frost)
Vibrant clean orange (Frost) News Flash! Red orange with pearl (Satijn)
Red orange with pearl (Satijn) Never Say Never Deep scarlet red (Matte)
Deep scarlet red (Matte) Saucy Miss Bright blue pink (Matte)
MAC Bangin’ Brilliant Collection – New Permanent Eyeshadows, Blushes, Lipsticks for June 2016
Row 1: Can’t Stop, Feel the Fever, Get Physical, I Like to Watch | Row 2: Last Dance, Let’s Roll, Say It Isn’t So, She Sparkles | Row 3: Slow/Fast/Slow, Try Me On, Cherry Topped, Fashion’s Field Day | Row 4: How Royal, I’m Into It, In the Shadows, New Crop | Row 5: Nice Energy, Oh My Mocha, Ruddy, Shock Factor | Row 6: Suspiciously Sweet, Teal Appeal, Up at Dawn, Zinc Blue
Row 1: Bright Pink Bright, Bright Response, Never Say Never | Row 2: News Flash!, Saucy Miss
Row 1: 4Eva, Deep Rooted, Designer Blue, Dew, Frosting | Row 2: Gold XIXI, Highlights, In My Fashion, In the Spirit, Lavender Jade | Row 3: Lazy Lullaby, Lightly Charred, Love and Cherished, Mangrove, Model Behaviour | Row 4: Nifty Neon, No Interruptions, On and On, Pick Me Pick Me, Pink You Think | Row 5: Punk Couture, Really Me, Red Rock, Soft Hint, Spoiled Fabulous | Row 6: Time to Shine, Wild ExtractMEDIA RELEASE
OTTAWA, May 23, 2012 – Quality of life in Toronto and Canada's other major cities has been seriously harmed by urban planners' "radical densification" policies that use "malicious incentives" to force developers to build within restrictive urban boundaries, a leading urban policy authority argues in a Commentary released today.
Radical densification policies that pack people into tight urban spaces and try to force them to use public transit are "hopeless," Wendell Cox argues in Mobility and Prosperity in the City of the Future, released today by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. As seen in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal, they drive up housing prices beyond affordability for many, fail to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and even have the perverse effect of lengthening commute times, rather than cutting them.
Given the significant share of the Canadian population living in a handful of cities, the losses of efficiency occasioned by these policies are borne by the entire national economy and not just by workers, consumers and taxpayers in the cities themselves.
Cox points to the failed regional planning effort in San Diego, where officials plan to use half of all transportation development money on public transit between now and 2050. Yet, today less than two per cent of citizens use transit and – even with this massive investment – "transit share will remain under four per cent in 2050."
It is a fallacy to think that public transit is quicker than automobile trips. Cox looked at the six Canadian metropolitan areas with populations of more than one million (Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa-Gatineau, Calgary and Edmonton), and found that transit trips take more than 50-per-cent more time than trips by car. "Forcing more people onto transit will not reduce work trip travel times," says Cox, "but rather the reverse."
While transit is typically oriented towards urban cores, the largest employment is now often outside the core. In Toronto, for example, approximately 325,000 people work in the core, but 350,000 work in the employment area centred around Pearson Airport, which stretches over 120 square kilometres.
Comparing Toronto to Dallas-Fort Worth (the cities have similar populations), Cox notes that the Canadian city has a density 164 per cent higher than the U.S. city and 10 times as many Torontonians use transit to commute to work. Yet, it takes longer to get to work in Toronto than it does in Dallas-Fort Worth: 33 minutes versus 26 in the Texan city.
Further, the median house price in Toronto is 5.5 times the median household income, while it is only 2.9 times the median household income in Dallas-Fort Worth. "The fundamental problem with urban growth boundaries... is that they ration land. This, of course, raises land prices and housing prices," Cox writes.
"A well-governed metropolitan area will have policies that seek to minimize the cost of living, maximize discretionary incomes, minimize traffic congestion, and thereby improve economic growth."
Noting that radical densification policies can retard economic growth, Cox points out that land-use and transportation policies in the Golden Horseshoe area of southern Ontario "are far more important to the Canada economy than the policies of New York are to the United States economy or the policies of the Rhine-Ruhr are to Germany. Getting these policies right (or wrong) affects Canadians everywhere."
Wendell Cox is the principal of Wendell Cox Consultancy (Demographia), an international public policy firm that specializes in urban public policy, transport and demographics.
For more information or to arrange interviews, please contact Tripti Saha at tripti.saha@macdonaldlaurier.ca or call (613) 482-8327, ext. 105.
The Macdonald-Laurier Institute is the only non-partisan, independent national public policy think tank in Ottawa focusing on the full range of issues that fall under the jurisdiction of the federal government. www.macdonaldlaurier.caNewsletter – Positive Actions You Can Take This Summer
This week, we look at some of the current struggles in the United States and ways that you can get involved this summer.
Health Care Fight Heats Up
This week, the Senate came out from behind closed doors to reveal the contents of their version |
due to the sea lions. “And, not only do they eat this stuff, but when the sea lion has had enough to eat, they will actually kill for sport,” says Robert Evert, permit and project manager for the Port of Astoria. The sea lions are also taking a bite out of the port’s bottom line. “I estimated we lose close to $50,000 a year because we can’t rent those slips out,” says Evert.
The population of sea lions, an endangered species, has rebounded significantly since the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act, says Brad Hanson, a wildlife biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It is still forbidden to hunt, capture or kill them. The docks in Astoria, meanwhile, provide a convenient spot where sea lions can get out of the water, rest and conserve their energy. “They’re territorial. Once they decide they like a particular place, they become very defensive on that site, particularly when there’s food available,” says Hanson.
There is one solution almost guaranteed to keep the sea lions off the docks, which is to build steel railings about 46 cm from the top of the dock, with a panel below it. “The challenge [with that] is the cost,” says Evert, estimating the final bill could end up around $100,000. A nearby company recommended using electrified mats with a low-voltage charge that wouldn’t hurt the sea lions, but would be enough of an irritant to keep them away. But the sea lions started to lie on the mats willingly.
Gallery Replica whale 1 / 7 Joshua Bessex/Daily Astorian/AP Replica whale The fake life-sized fiberglass orca passes the Lady Washington as it continues down the Columbia River toward the East End Mooring Basin on Thursday, June 4, 2015 in Astoria, Ore.
One local resident came up with the idea of tying beach balls to the dock. Evert isn’t sure whether it’s the colour of the rotating balls or their unpredictable movement in the wind, but the beach balls had some success: The sea-lion population on the dock dropped from about 2,000 to 1,500.
Evert is not optimistic the beach balls will keep the mammals away for good, ergo, the fake whales. To improve their odds of success, Buzzard’s whales will get some enhancements. Already capable of floating, an outboard motor will allow an employee to drive the whale around the dock. The whales, called Mr. Island and Little Mariner (after Island Mariner), will have improved sound systems so they can converse with each other in “whale talk,” as Buzzard puts it. “It’s not going to be a cheap exercise by the time we get the sound in it and the motor in it and trailer it to Astoria,” he says. “Maybe we’ll get some advertising for our whale-watching business out of it. With that in mind, I’m willing to spend a couple bucks.”
Hanson remembers a problem similar to Astoria’s happening farther south in San Francisco in the late 1980s, when sea lions took over Pier 39. In the aftermath of the 1989 San Francisco earthquake, the sea lions proved to be a tourist attraction. “The restaurant owners were saying, ‘Don’t get rid of the sea lions,’ ” Hanson says. “In San Francisco, they decided to give up and let them have the docks.” Pier 39’s website even has a 24-hour webcam that users can control from home to look at the sea lions.
Back in Astoria, however, the mammals have not proven to be as popular with tourists or locals. “The residents, I’d say within a 20-block radius of the east basin, really don’t appreciate the noise,” says Evert. The same goes with those spending the night in the hotels close to the port. “People want to sleep. They don’t want to be disturbed by barking sea lions 24 hours a day.”
One of Buzzard’s fake orcas were deployed on Thursday. “The only thing I can tell you is I don’t know what I’m doing,” Buzzard said before the launch. “The best-case scenario is the sea lions take a look at it and head for the ocean.” And the worst-case scenario? “They sit and laugh at us,” Buzzard added, “thumb their noses at us as we go by and say, ‘I wonder what those dummies are doing with a plastic whale.’ ”
The worst-case scenario panned out Thursday, only it was even worse than the thousand onlookers could have anticipated. On its first trip into the water, the fake orca’s motor flooded, causing several hours of delay while they installed a replacement. Not long after “Mr. Island” set sail again, it capsized after being swamped by a wave from a passing cargo ship. No injuries were reported, though the captain needed to be rescued.
With the phoney whale now upside-down in the water, it was towed past the sea lions on its return to shore. The sea lions reportedly got quieter for a brief moment, but none seemed bothered enough to run for their lives.
“They probably think it’s dead now that it’s belly up,” Knight told local media. The fake orca whale may still get another chance on Friday, once it gets dried off.
(This story has been updated from an earlier version.)On December 20, the White House released Artificial Intelligence, Automation, and the Economy, a new report that investigates how AI will likely transform job markets over time, and recommends policy responses to address AI’s impact on the US economy. This report is further evidence that AI is now reaching the kind of market impact that requires well thought out strategies by both business and government.
AI research has been around since the early days of IT - having gone through ups and downs over the past several decades. But it’s recent advances based on machine learning and related data-driven technologies are still relatively new, making it hard to predict where AI will be heading over time.
Harder still is predicting AI’s longer term economic and societal impact. Think of anticipating the impact of the emerging Internet revolution back in the mid 1990s, before the advent of e-commerce and social media, let alone smartphones, IoT and cloud computing in the 2000s. That’s roughly where we are with AI today.
But, there’s one big difference. The Internet generated a fair degree of hype, especially in the dot-com era of the late 1990s, but the overriding feelings were ones of hope and excitement. Not so with AI. Along with admiration for its considerable accomplishments - from assisting in the treatment of rare forms of cancer to self-driving cars - there are serious fears that AI advances will lead to massive job losses, economic dislocations and social unrest.
Automation anxieties are hardly new, but each time those fears arose in the past, in the long run technology innovations ended up creating more jobs than they destroyed. Such fears have understandably accelerated in recent years. For the past few decades, jobs and wages have been declining for many workers, driven by advances in technology as well as by globalization. But the concerns surrounding AI’s long term impact may well be in a class by themselves. Like no other technology, AI forces us to explore the very boundaries between machines and humans.
“Accelerating artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities will enable automation of some tasks that have long required human labor,” notes the White House report in its opening paragraph. “These transformations will open up new opportunities for individuals, the economy, and society, but they have the potential to disrupt the current livelihoods of millions of Americans. Whether AI leads to unemployment and increases in inequality over the long-run depends not only on the technology itself but also on the institutions and policies that are in place.”
How strongly will AI disrupt the US workforce? Is this time different from past technological disruptions? How long will it take to arrive? It’s very hard to come up with precise answers to these questions. But the report recommends that policymakers should be prepared to deal with AI’s likely impacts - supporting AI for its potential benefits while addressing those disruptions that might affect the livelihoods of millions.
Technology and Productivity Growth
As has been the case with past technology innovations, in the long run AI should make the economy more efficient and lead to productivity growth and higher standards of living. Such an AI productivity boost is particularly important, given that productivity has significantly slowed down over the past decade in the US and other advanced economies.
How can AI boost productivity? I particularly like Kevin Kelly’s comparison to the advent of electricity a century ago in a 2014 article in Wired: AI will likely evolve as a kind of “cheap, reliable, industrial-grade digital smartness running behind everything, and almost invisible except when it blinks off… Everything that we formerly electrified we will now cognitize.” Like any other tool, this “utilitarian AI will also augment us individually as people (deepening our memory, speeding our recognition) and collectively as a species. There is almost nothing we can think of that cannot be made new, different, or interesting by infusing it with some extra IQ. In fact, the business plans of the next 10,000 startups are easy to forecast: Take X and add AI.”
Uneven Impact
It’s very hard to predict which jobs will be most affected by AI-driven automation. Like IT, AI is a collection of technologies with varying impact on different tasks.
Recent research suggests that the effects of AI in the short- and medium-term will be similar to those of IT, - lower skilled workers face the biggest threats from AI-based automation, while higher-skilled workers stand to benefit most from the new kinds of jobs that AI might create. New AI-based jobs fall into four main categories:
Engagement. Tasks that cannot be substituted by automation are generally complemented by it, often leading to higher demand for workers. “Many industry professionals refer to a large swath of AI technologies as Augmented Intelligence, stressing the technology’s role as assisting and expanding the productivity of individuals rather than replacing human work.”
Development. We can expect a great need for highly-skilled software developers and engineers to put AI to practical use across multiple industries. Given the central role of data in AI applications, there will be increased demand for data scientists, and other data-oriented jobs.
Supervision. There will also be a growing number of jobs to monitor, license, maintain and repair AI systems and applications. “The capacity for AI-enabled machines to learn is one of the most exciting aspects of the technology, but it may also require supervision to ensure that AI does not diverge from originally intended uses.”
Response to Paradigm Shifts. AI innovations will likely require major changes in the surrounding environment. Self-driving vehicles, for example, will lead to new careers in transportation engineering and urban planning. Similarly, the increased use of robotics will be accompanied by major changes in manufacturing systems.
Continue reading the full blog on Medium, here.
This blog was first posted on Jan. 10, 2017, here.Even through the depression brought about by the heavy haze in China’s North East, people still tried to have a little fun with it. On Tuesday we reported on the Peking University students who put masks on all the statues on the campus. Yesterday, a young newlywed couple decided to make the most of the terrible air quality they were given for their wedding day.
The two posed on the streets of Beijing: the man in his suit and the woman in her flowing white wedding dress. But the pair also sported a set of his and hers gas masks. The photos created quite a stir as many passersby stopped to take in the unusual photo shoot. As soon as the shoot was done, not wanting to be exposed to the harsh air for longer than need be, the pair along with the photographer, quickly left the scene in their car.
Source: news.163.com
Warning：The use of any news and articles published on eChinacities.com without written permission from eChinacities.com constitutes copyright infringement, and legal action can be taken.
Keywords: Wearing Gas Masks Wedding PhotosDerek Thomas – Political Analyst
Will hemp be federally legal before marijuana? It’s looking like a strong possibility, and the economic implications would be huge.
Since 2005 there have been a total of nine attempts to remove hemp from the Controlled Substances Act – six bills in the House of Representatives and three in the Senate. All of the bills died in committee.
Now the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2017 is back for its 10th attempt (this version is a House bill) – and supporters of the bill, including a bi-partisan coalition of congressional leaders, think this time will be different.
Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) told The Cannabist “With the introduction of The Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2017 by Kentucky Republican Rep. James Comer, Congress is closer than ever to exempting hemp plants – defined as having less than 0.3 percent THC – from the C.S.A. and recognizing it as an agricultural commodity. He continued with “For the first time since I started work on this issue years ago, I’m confident that the finish line is in sight to create new opportunities in industrial hemp for Colorado farmers, processors and consumer product companies”.
The Democratic Comer joined Republicans Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Bob Goodlatte and Virginia to introduce the bill last month. Rep Comer said the bill, which ended up having a total of 16 co-sponsors (a good start!) would allow states that have passed laws regulating industrial hemp “to continue having a robust hemp economy without interference from the federal government and will encourage investment in processing as well as farming.”
When you consider that only five states have no current or planned hemp laws, the implications behind the bill are huge.
The biggest challenge the bill faces, according to NHA executive director Erica McBride, is educating lawmakers and the general public about the differences between marijuana and hemp. “We have to make both groups aware of the possibilities and benefits that the industrial hemp industry has to offer” she said. “Hemp has been so closely entwined with the marijuana issue for such a long time that it’s a mindset that’s difficult to get past.”
Regardless of an uncertain political climate (both within the hemp issue itself and surrounding the greater political atmosphere in the USA at the moment), McBride feels it is the right time for congressional action towards industrial hemp.
“It’s pretty obvious that Congress is hungry for some bipartisan work that it can actually get done,” she said. “With all this chaos swirling around the (Trump Administration), I’m very hopeful that — if we do our job properly on the education side — we can convince them that this bill is something that they really should latch on to, come together on, to show this country that they can get stuff done.”
Primary sponsor Comer has been advocating for the crop since he was Kentucky’s commissioner of agriculture.
“By removing industrial hemp from the definition of a controlled substance, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act will finally allow for responsible, commercial production of industrial hemp without fear of violating federal law,” Comer said in his joint press release.
2017 has been an incredibly divided year. The political landscape is more divded than ever, and the American people seem to be following Washington’s lead on this growing division (or is it vice-versa?).
Who would have thought that it would be hemp that would actually be a bridging topic?
One of the reasons for this common ground is hemp’s history in the United States and its economic potential for the districts of House members. For example, Kentucky has historically produced some of the worlds’ finest hemp, and both of its senators, Republicans Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul, are strong supporters of industrial hemp.
Last June, Paul sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions calling on him to take a hands-off approach with banking accounts linked to farmers, research groups and other individuals or organizations associated with industrial hemp ventures.
“While we do not believe the government should compel financial institutions to do business with the hemp industry,” the letter said, “we are worried that the fear and uncertainty of government action…is causing financial institutions to close these accounts.”
Paul is also calling on “big government” to “get out of the way” when it comes to America’s rapidly-growing industrial hemp industry.
Last week, when Paul spoke to Kentucky hemp farmer and processors, Paul criticized the fact that farmers couldn’t use hemp as feed for livestock. He said he didn’t like the idea “that we would have to ask somebody in Washington for permission to feed the root of the plant to a chicken or to a cow.”
Hemp, often touted as the next ‘billion-dollar industry’ could help replace jobs lost in the struggling coal mining industry for the Appalachia area, scoring major political points for republicans without deepening the divide between them and democrats.
When you factor in the total economic potential of all of hemp’s known industrial uses (building and construction materials, food products, clothing, industrial clean up products, animal feed, nutraceuticals, graphene substitutes, CBD’s, and ethanol) it’s surprising that more legislators – and our president – are not willing to give hemp a shot at improving the welfare of farmers, entrepreneurs, local and state economies, and the earth.The EEA briefing ‘Releases of pollutants to the environment from Europe’s industrial sector,’ analysed emissions data from largest industrial facilities including power plants, petrochemical refineries and metal processing plants which Member States have to report under European Union (EU) rules. The analysis is based on the latest available data for 2015 recently added to the EU’s European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register (E-PRTR). The register contains data reported annually covering 35 000 industrial facilities over 65 economic activities located across the EU, plus Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland and Serbia.
Although good progress is being made by the EU towards its climate and energy policy objectives for 2020 and 2030, the briefing highlights that coal-fired power plants remain responsible for the largest releases of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ), sulphur dioxide (SO 2 ) and nitrogen oxides (NO x ) to the environment. In 2015, Bełchatów (Poland) released the highest amounts for these three pollutants while Drax (United Kingdom), Jänschwalde (Germany) and Kozienice (Poland) were listed as top polluting facilities for each of these three pollutants. Of the 65 economic activities included in the E-PRTR, coal-fired power plants were responsible for Europe’s largest releases of SO 2 and NO x and comprised all but one of the facilities releasing the most CO 2.
Coal remains the most used fuel in large combustion plants — power plants, refineries or large chemical plants and steelworks — despite a decreasing amount being used over recent years. Still, these facilities have significantly improved their environmental performance over past years, releasing fewer emissions to air per energy unit consumed. Biomass use in combustion plants remains minor, but has increased threefold between 2004 and 2015.
According to the analysis, half of the facilities responsible for the largest releases of air and water pollution were located in the United Kingdom (14 facilities), Germany (7), France (5), and Poland (5).
Latest reported data also found that wastewater treatment plants were responsible for the highest amounts of total nitrogen, phosphorus and organic carbon released to water. The most polluting of these facilities were located in the United Kingdom, France and Spain.
Figure 1. Location of Europe’s top polluting industrial facilities to air and water
Click here for full screen version
Source: The European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register (E-PRTR), Member States reporting under Article 7 of Regulation (EC) No 166/2006
Note: The size of symbols reflects the magnitude of pollutants. Italy did not meet the deadline for submitting E-PRTR data for 2015 and is not included.
Background
Under the E-PRTR, information is provided for each facility, concerning the amounts of pollutant releases to air, water and land as well as off-site transfers of waste and of pollutants in waste water from a list of 91 key pollutants, including heavy metals, pesticides, greenhouse gases, and dioxins. The register ensures more transparency and public participation in environmental decision making.The We Hunted the Mammoth Pledge Drive continues! If you haven’t already, please consider sending some bucks my way. (And don’t worry that the PayPal page says Man Boobz.) Thanks! And thanks again to all who’ve already donated.
The ManKind Initiative, a UK organization devoted to fighting domestic violence against men, recently put out a video that’s been getting a lot of attention in the media and online, racking up more than six million views on YouTube in a little over a week.
The brief video, titled #ViolenceIsViolence, purports to depict the radically different reactions of bystanders to staged incidents of domestic violence between a couple in a London plaza. When the man was the aggressor, shoving the woman and grabbing her face, bystanders intervened and threatened to call the police. When the woman was the aggressor, the video shows bystanders laughing, and no one does a thing.
The video has been praised by assorted Men’s Rights Activists, naturally enough, but it has also gotten uncritical attention in some prominent media outlets as well, from Marie Claire to the Huffington Post.
There’s just one problem: The video may be a fraud, using deceptive editing to distort incidents that may well have played out quite differently in real life.
A shot-by-shot analysis of the video from beginning to end reveals that the first “incident” depicted is actually a composite of footage shot of at least two separate incidents, filmed on at least three different times of day and edited together into one narrative.
A careful viewing of the video also reveals that many of the supposed “reaction shots” in the video are not “reaction shots” at all, but shots taken in the same plaza at different times and edited in as if they are happening at the same time as the staged “incidents” depicted.
Moreover, none of the people depicted as laughing at the second incident are shown in the same frame as the fighting couple. There is no evidence that any of them were actually laughing at the woman attacking the man.
The editing tricks used in the video were brought to my attention by a reader who sent me a link to a blog entry by Miguel Lorente Acosta, a Professor of Legal Medicine at the University of Granada in Spain, and a Government Delegate for Gender Violence in Spain’s Ministry of Equality. He goes through the video shot by shot, showing each trick for what it is.
The post in Spanish, and his argument is a little hard to follow through the filter of Google Translate, so I will offer my own analysis of the video below, drawing heavily on his post. (His post is still worth reading, as he covers several examples of deceptive editing I’ve left out.)
I urge you to watch the video above through once, then follow me through the following analysis.
The first “incident” is made up of footage taken at three distinct times, if not more. The proof is in the bench.
In the opening shot of the video, we see an overview of the plaza. We see two people sitting on a bench, a man in black to the left and a woman in white to the right, with a trash can to the right of them. (All of these lefts and rights are relative to us, the viewers.) The trash can has an empty green bag hanging off of it.
As the first incident begins, we see the same bench, only now we see two women sitting where the man was previously sitting. The trash can now has a full bag of trash sitting next to it.
In this shot, showing bystanders intervening in what is portrayed as the same fight, and supposedly depicting a moment in time only about 30 seconds after the previous shot, we see that the two women on the bench have been replaced by two men, one in a suit and the other in a red hoodie. The full trash bag has been removed, and the trash can again has an empty trash bag hanging off of it.
Clearly this portion of the video does not depict a single incident.
What about the reaction shots? The easiest way to tell that the reaction shots in the video did not chronologically follow the shots that they come after in the video is by looking at the shadows. Some of the video was shot when the sky was cloudy and shadows were indistinct. Other shots were taken in direct sunlight. In the video, shots in cloudy weather are followed immediately by shots in roughly the same location where we see bright sunlight and clear shadows.
Here’s one shot, 9 seconds in. Notice the lack of clear shadows; the shadow of the sitting woman is little more than a vague smudge.
Here’s another shot from less than a second later in the same video – the timestamp is still at 9 seconds in. Now the plaza is in direct sunlight and the shadows are sharp and distinct.
If you watch the video carefully, you can see these sorts of discontinuities throughout. It seems highly unlikely that the various reaction shots actually depict reactions to what they appear to be reactions to. Which wouldn’t matter if this were a feature film; that’s standard practice. But this purports to be a depiction of real incidents caught on hidden camera and presented as they happened in real time.
The issue of non-reaction reaction shots is especially important when it comes to the second incident. In the first incident, we see a number of women, and one man, intervening to stop the violence. There is no question that’s what’s going on, because we see them in the same frame as the couple.
In the second incident, none of the supposed laughing onlookers ever appear in the same frame as the fighting couple. We have no proof that their laughter is in fact a reaction to the woman attacking the man. And given the dishonest way that the video is edited overall, I have little faith that they are real reaction shots.
The people who are in frame with the fighting couple are either trying resolutely to ignore the incident – as many of the onlookers also did in the first incident – or are clearly troubled by it.
I noticed one blonde woman who looked at first glance like she might have been laughing, but after pausing the video it became clear that she was actually alarmed and trying to move out of the way.
There is one other thing to note about the two incidents. In the first case, the onlookers didn’t intervene until after the man escalated his aggression by grabbing the woman by her face. In the second video, the screen fades to black shortly after the woman escalates her aggression to a similar level. We don’t know what, if anything, happened after that.
Is it possible that the first part of the video, despite being a composite of several incidents, depicts more or less accurately what happened each time the video makers tried this experiment? Yes. Is it possible that onlookers did indeed laugh as the woman attacked the man? Yes.
But there is only one way for The ManKind Initiative to come clean and clear up any suspicion: they need to post the unedited, time-stamped footage of each of the incidents they filmed from each of their three cameras so we can see how each incident really played out in real time and which, if any, of the alleged reactions were actual reactions.
In addition to the editing tricks mentioned above, we don’t know if the video makers edited out portions of the staged attacks that might have influenced how the bystanders reacted.
The video makers should also post the footage of the incidents that they did not use for the advert, so we can see if reactions to the violence were consistently different when the genders of attackers and victims were switched. Two incidents make up a rather small sample – even if one of these incidents is actually two incidents disguised as one.
Domestic violence against men is a real and serious problem. But you can’t fight it effectively with smoke and mirrors.
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Changes to the planned increase in State Pension age Published: Tuesday, 29 November 2011 In his Autumn Statement, on 29 November 2011, the Chancellor announced that the State Pension age will now increase to 67 between 2026 and 2028. The government said it took this decision because of increasing life expectancy, to help manage the cost of State Pensions. If you were born in the 1960s, find out how you could be affected.
Changes to State Pension age Under current legislation, State Pension age is planned to increase to: 66 between November 2018 and October 2020
67 between 2034 and 2036
68 between 2044 and 2046 The government has announced that the increase to 67 will now take place between 2026 and 2028. This change to the timetable is not yet law and will require the approval of Parliament.
Who is affected by the announcement? This will mean that people born after 5 April 1961 but before 6 April 1969 will have a State Pension age of 67. People born after 5 April 1960 but before 6 April 1961 will reach State Pension age between 66 and 67 as shown in the table below. Date of birth Approximate State Pension age 6 April 1960 to 5 May 1960 66 years and 1 month 6 May 1960 to 5 June 1960 66 years and 2 months 6 June 1960 to 5 July 1960 66 years and 3 months 6 July 1960 to 5 August 1960 66 years and 4 months 6 August 1960 to 5 September 1960 66 years and 5 months 6 September 1960 to 5 October 1960 66 years and 6 months 6 October 1960 to 5 November 1960 66 years and 7 months 6 November 1960 to 5 December 1960 66 years and 8 months 6 December 1960 to 5 January 1961 66 years and 9 months 6 January 1961 to 5 February 1961 66 years and 10 months 6 February 1961 to 5 March 1961 66 years and 11 months 6 March 1961 to 5 April 1969 67 years Under the Pensions Act 2007, people born after 5 April 1969 but before 6 April 1977 already have a State Pension age of 67. For people born after 5 April 1968 but before 6 April 1969, their State Pension age would have been between 66 and 67. Under the announcement these people will now have a State Pension age of 67.
Changes to State Pension age beyond 67 State Pension age is planned to start to increase to 68 from 2044 and this would affect anyone born after 5 April 1977. The government is considering how the State Pension age could better reflect changes in life expectancy in the future. This is likely to mean that the existing timetable to increase State Pension age to 68 will be revised.
Pension age calculator You can use the State Pension age calculator to work out your State Pension age. However, the State Pension age calculator will tell you when you will reach State Pension age under the current law and does not take account of the recent announcement to bring forward the increase to 67.
Calculating your State Pension age Calculating your State Pension ageEvery time Pete Evans opens his mouth, a public health body throws up its hands in despair.
There was the time he warned his 1.5 million Facebook followers against the dangers of sunscreen, saying that it’s full of poisonous chemicals and that wearing it is a “recipe for disaster.”
Then there’s his ongoing crusade against fluoride in tap water, which has been slammed by the Australian Dental Association as “delusional” and by NSW Health Minister Jillian Skinner as “inappropriate and quite disturbing.”
The My Kitchen Rules judge is also no fan of Wi-Fi, and leapt to the defence of fired ABC journalist Dr Maryanne Demasi, who was let go after a Catalyst report claiming that it causes brain tumours.
In a Facebook Q&A session shortly after, he was asked by a fan about “the dangers of Wi-Fi in our schols and houses”, and doubled down on claims that it causes health problems, saying:
“EMFS [electromagnetic fields] are causing a lot of issues for people … [we] turn off Wi-Fi at night at home and have our house EMF friendly. If people have no educated themselves on this yet, then I urge them to do so as well. EMFS are casing a lot of issues for a lot of people.”
In a recent Fairfax profile that was packed with quality quotes, Evans hit peak Pete when he explained that he protects himself from the dangers of Wi-Fi via the earthing process, which involves a special mat that he keeps by his computer.
He told journalist Jane Kadzow:
“When you’re sitting at your computer, you put your feet onto a little mat and it sort of, potentially, negates any of the Wi-Fi issues, you know, and reconnects you to the Earth. So that to me sounds like, wow, that’s a positive thing.”
Adherents of earthing believe that “connecting to the Earth’s natural, negative surface charge by being barefoot outside” can act as “a defence against chronic inflammation and cancer.”
Seeing as earthing mats are now the new activated almonds, you can pick up one of the type Pete described for around $70. You can also buy fitted sheets, sleeping pads and yoga mats, so your entire home can scream WAKE UP, SHEEPLE.
One of the key texts of the movement is Earthing: The Most Important Health Discovery Ever!, a weighty tome that Evans recently spruiked to his Facebook fans.
You could give that a go, or skip straight to this piece by Yale University clinical neurologist Dr Steven Novella, who called earthing “one of many pseudosciences that fits into the ‘just make shit up’ category.”
The Blocked By Pete Evans Facebook group has already clocked the article, so you could also just grab a snack and spend the afternoon reading the comments there.
Source: Fairfax.
Photo: Pete Evans / Facebook.[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_D-qHOB2tY]
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released a study Monday on how best to keep the invasive species Asian carp from overwhelming the Great Lakes and threatening the area’s multi-billion dollar fishing industry. Ash-har Quraishi of WTTW Chicago reported in 2012 how fishermen and scientists were catching the fish in an attempt to keep the invasive species’ population in check. Video by WTTW
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released a long-awaited study Monday that listed options on how to best keep the Great Lakes’ waterways clear of Asian carp, an invasive species that has threatened the region’s $7-billion-a-year fishing industry and the mid-country ecosystem since the 1990s.
The Corps’ study — the Great Lakes and Mississippi River Interbasin Study, GLMRIS — offered eight options on preventing 13 invasive species — including varieties of Asian carp — from transferring between the aquatic pathways of the Great Lakes and the Mississippi waterways. Congress authorized the Corps to conduct its study in 2007.
The proposal includes a “No New Federal Action” option that requires no additional cost and relies on the existing electric barrier between the Mississippi River and Lake Michigan that has been, for years, the last line of defense against the Asian carp.
Half of the other options cost at least $15 billion. The most expensive option, topping $18 billion, calls for a physical barrier between the lakes and the Mississippi River basins and would take 25 years to complete. The study explains that two new reservoirs and tunnels would be needed to manage the flooding risks resulting from this option.
The completed project times for almost all the options are 25 years. Several of the other options suggest physical barriers at different locations. The study refrains from recommending any one option.
At the Big Muddy National Fish & Wildlife Refuge in Missouri, an Asian carp jumps high out of the water to escape biologists’ nets. Photo by Steve Hillebrand/USFWS
Asian carp are native to China and were first introduced to the U.S. in the 1970s to control algae build-up at sewage treatment plants in the South, the USGS said. The Asian carp escaped into the Mississippi River and its tributaries and eventually made their way up north to Midwest waters.
Of the four Asian carp species, the most feared culprits include the silver carp — which can weigh as much as 60 pounds and are known for rocketing out of the water — and the non-flying bighead carp, which can swell to 100 pounds in size. Asian carp are ravenous creatures that reproduce quickly and consume between 20 to 120 percent of their body weight in plankton each day, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
A 2012 U.S.-Canadian study concluded that as few as 10 mature females and even fewer males could establish a foothold in the lakes that crowds out the native fish populations. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers also reported in December that, while there’s no evidence that the invasive fish are bypassing the electric barriers, Asian carp can still evade the electrical field with the help of passing vessels.
“Initial findings indicate that vessel-induced residual flows can trap fish and transport them beyond the electrical barriers, and that certain barge configurations may impact barrier electric field strength,” the report said. “Additionally, the preliminary DIDSON, dual-frequency identification SONAR, findings identified the potential for small fish, between two to four inches, to pass the barrier array in large groups, or schools.”
USGS research also confirmed in October that the grass carp, a species of Asian carp, were found living and breeding in the Sandusky River in Ohio as “the result of natural reproduction within the Lake Erie basin.” If grass carp reach high densities in the area, the report said, it could disrupt early development of native fish populations.
More troubling, finding the less-aggressive grass carp in the Great Lakes watershed is “an indication that other species of Asian carp — silver, bighead and black carp — might be able to reproduce there,” the report said.
Three bighead carp were caught in Lake Erie in the 1990s, but dismissed as accidents, The New York Times reported. Bone analyses years later revealed that the fish had apparently lived in the lake for several years. The Times also reported that Asian carp DNA was found in Lake Michigan last year, although the source of said DNA remains unclear.
As a means to curtail the species’ upward migration into the Great Lakes, Ash-har Quraishi of WTTW Chicago reported in 2012 that scientists and fisherman took to catching and marketing Asian carp, hoping to change a nuisance into a lucrative business for commercial fishermen.Working with the government to suppress stories, covering up election fraud in the ruling party and ruthlessly campaigning against the main US opposition leader, The New York Times has sentenced itself to wither away into irrelevance. Remembered only in |
handful of T-26s, while the armored cars were BA-10s and BA-3/6s, which were similar in armor (6–15 mm (0.24–0.59 in)) and armament (main: 45 mm (2 in) gun 20K mod, secondary: two 7.62 mm (0.30 in) machine guns) to the Soviet light tanks. The Soviet armored force, despite being unsupported by infantry, attacked the Japanese on three sides and nearly encircled them. The Japanese force, further handicapped by having only one pontoon bridge across the river for supplies, was forced to withdraw, recrossing the river on 5 July. Meanwhile, the 1st Tank Corps of the Yasuoka Detachment (the southern task force) attacked on the night of 2 July, moving in the darkness to avoid the Soviet artillery on the high ground of the river's west bank. A pitched battle ensued in which the Yasuoka Detachment lost over half its armor, but still could not break through the Soviet forces on the east bank and reach the Kawatama Bridge.[33][34] After a Soviet counterattack on 9 July threw the battered, depleted Yasuoka Detachment back, it was dissolved and Yasuoka was relieved.[35] Overall, the Japanese lost 42 tanks in these encounters, primarily to 45 mm gunfire, which outranged the Japanese weapons.[36] In return, on 3 July alone, the Soviet-Mongolian side lost a total of 77 tanks and 45 armored cars out of a total of 133 and 59 committed to the fight, respectively.[37]
Japanese pilots pictured on a Toyota KC starter truck
The two armies continued to spar with each other over the next two weeks along a four-kilometre (2.5 mi) front running along the east bank of the Khalkhyn Gol to its junction with the Holsten River.[38] Zhukov, whose army was 748 km (465 mi) away from its base of supply, assembled a fleet of 2,600 trucks to supply his troops, while the Japanese suffered severe supply problems due to a lack of similar motor transport.[29] On 23 July, the Japanese launched another large-scale assault, sending the 64th and 72nd Infantry Regiments against Soviet forces defending the Kawatama Bridge. Japanese artillery supported the attack with a massive barrage that consumed more than half of their ammunition stores over a period of two days.[39] The attack made some progress but failed to break through Soviet lines and reach the bridge. The Japanese disengaged from the attack on 25 July due to mounting casualties and depleted artillery stores. By this point they had suffered over 5,000 casualties between late May and 25 July, with Soviet losses being much higher but more easily replaced.[29][40] The battle drifted into a stalemate.
August: Soviet counterattack [ edit ]
BT-5 Tanks in the Battle of Khalkhin Gol
BT-7 tank with infantry mounted to bring them into combat
With war apparently imminent in Europe, Zhukov planned a major offensive on 20 August to clear the Japanese from the Khalkhin Gol region and end the fighting.[41] Zhukov, using a fleet of at least 4,000 trucks (IJA officers with hindsight dispute this, saying he instead used 10,000 to 20,000 motor vehicles) transporting supplies from the nearest base in Chita (600 kilometres (370 mi) away)[8] assembled a powerful armored force of three tank brigades (the 4th, 6th and 11th), and two mechanized brigades (the 7th and 8th, which were armored-car units with attached infantry support). This force was allocated to the Soviet left and right wings. The entire Soviet force consisted of three rifle divisions, two tank divisions and two more tank brigades (in all, some 498 BT-5 and BT-7 tanks),[42] two motorized infantry divisions, and over 550 fighters and bombers.[43] The Mongolians committed two cavalry divisions.[44][45][46]
In comparison, at the point of contact, the Kwantung Army had only General Komatsubara's 23rd Infantry Division, which with various attached forces was equivalent to two light-infantry divisions. Its headquarters had been at Hailar, over 150 km (93 mi) from the fighting. Japanese intelligence, despite demonstrating an ability to track the build-up of Zhukov's force accurately, failed to precipitate an appropriate response from below.[47] Thus, when the Soviets finally did launch their offensive, Komatsubara was caught off guard.[47][48] To test the Japanese defences prior to their main assault on 20 August, the Soviets launched three aggressive probing assaults, one on 3 August and the others on 7/8 August. All three were disastrously thrown back, with around 1,000 combined dead and several tanks knocked out on the Soviet side compared to just 85 Japanese casualties.[49] Moreover, the Japanese counter-attacked and routed elements of the Mongolian 8th Cavalry Division, seizing a hilly sector of the battlefront.[50] Despite the fact that no more major fighting would take place until 20 August, Japanese casualties continued to mount at a rate of 40 wounded per day.[51] Kwantung Army staff officers were becoming increasingly worried over the disorganized state of the 6th Army's headquarters and supply elements. In addition, the growing casualty count meant that the already green 23rd Division would have to take, train, and assimilate new replacements 'on the job.'[51] By contrast, Tokyo's oft-stated desire that it would not escalate the fighting at Khalkhin-Gol proved immensely relieving to the Soviets, who were free to hand-pick select units from across their entire military to be concentrated for a local offensive without fear of Japanese retaliation elsewhere.[52]
Zhukov decided it was time to break the stalemate.[43] At 05:45 on 20 August 1939, Soviet artillery and 557 aircraft[43] attacked Japanese positions, the first fighter-bomber offensive in Soviet Air Force history.[53] Approximately 50,000 Soviet and Mongolian soldiers of the 57th Special Corps defended the east bank of the Khalkhyn Gol. Three infantry divisions and a tank brigade crossed the river, supported by massed artillery and the Soviet Air Force. Once the Japanese were pinned down by the attack of Soviet center units, Soviet armored units swept around the flanks and attacked the Japanese in the rear, achieving a classic double envelopment. When the Soviet wings linked up at Nomonhan village on 25 August, the Japanese 23rd Infantry Division was trapped.[29][54][55] On 26 August, a Japanese counterattack to relieve the 23rd Division failed. On 27 August, the 23rd Division attempted to break out of the encirclement, but also failed. When the surrounded forces refused to surrender, they were again hit with artillery and air attacks. By 31 August, Japanese forces on the Mongolian side of the border were destroyed, leaving remnants of the 23rd Division on the Manchurian side. The Soviets had achieved their objective.[56]
Captured Japanese soldiers
Komatsubara refused to accept the outcome and prepared a counteroffensive. This was canceled when a cease-fire was signed in Moscow.[dubious – discuss] While Zhukov defeated the Japanese forces on "Soviet territory", Joseph Stalin had made a deal with Nazi Germany.[43] After the Soviet success at Nomonhan, Stalin decided to proceed with the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, which was announced on 24 August.
The Soviet Union and Japan agreed to a cease-fire on 15 September, which took effect the following day at 1:10 pm.[29][57][58] Free from a threat in the Far East, Stalin proceeded with the Soviet invasion of Poland on 17 September.[59]
Aftermath [ edit ]
Japanese tank Type 95 Ha-Go captured by Soviet troops after battle of Khalkhin Gol
Captured Japanese guns
Japanese records report 8,440 killed, 8,766 wounded, 162 aircraft lost in combat, and 42 tanks lost (of which 29 were later repaired and redeployed). Roughly 3,000 Manchukuoan and Japanese troops were taken prisoner during the battles. Due to a military doctrine that prohibited surrender, the Japanese listed most of these men as killed in action, for the benefit of their families.[60] Some sources put the Japanese casualties at 45,000 or more killed, with Soviet casualties of at least 17,000.[29] However, these estimates for Japanese casualties are considered inaccurate as they exceed the total strength of the Japanese forces involved in the battle (estimated at 28,000–38,000 troops, despite Soviet claims that they were facing 75,000).[61] According to the records of the Bureau 6A hospital, the Japanese casualties amounted to 7,696 killed, 8,647 wounded, 1,021 missing, and 2,350 sick, for a total of 19,714 personnel losses, including 2,895 Manchukuoan casualties. The Kwantung Army headquarters and their records give a slightly different figure of 8,629 killed and 9,087 injured. The Soviets initially claimed to have inflicted 29,085 casualties on the Japanese, but later increased this to 61,000 for the official histories.[2]
The Soviets initially claimed 9,284 total casualties, which was almost certainly reduced for propaganda purposes. In recent years, with the opening of the Soviet archives, a more accurate assessment of Soviet casualties has emerged from the work of Grigoriy Krivosheev, citing 7,974 killed and 15,251 wounded.[62] In the newer, 2001 edition, the Soviet losses are given as 9,703 killed and missing (6,472 killed and died of wounds during evacuation, 1,152 died of wounds in hospitals, 8 died of disease, 2,028 missing, 43 non-combat dead), 15,952 wounded and sick, and a further 2,225 hospitalizations due to disease, a total of 27,880 casualties.[63] In addition to their personnel losses, the Soviets lost a large amount of materiel including 253 tanks, 250 aircraft (including 208 in combat), 96 artillery pieces, and 133 armored cars. Of the Soviet tank losses, 75–80% were destroyed by anti-tank guns, 15–20% by field artillery, 5–10% by infantry-thrown incendiary bombs, 2–3% by aircraft, and 2–3% by hand grenades and mines.[16] The large number of Soviet armor casualties are reflected in the manpower losses for Soviet tank crews. A total of 1,559 Soviet "Tank Troops" were killed or wounded during the battles.[64]
Mongolian casualties were 556–990, with at least 11 armored cars destroyed and 1,921 horses/camels lost.[65]
Nomonhan was the first use of airpower on a massive scale in a high-intensity battle to obtain a specific military objective.[66] The combatants remained at peace until August 1945, when the Soviet Union declared war on Japan and invaded Manchukuo and other territory after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
Nakajima Ki-27b of Kenji Shimada, commander of the 1st Chutai of the 11th Sentai, battle of Khalkhin Gol, June 1939
Air combat [ edit ]
Soviet aircraft losses [ edit ]
I-16 fighter I-152 biplane fighter I-153 biplane fighter SB high-speed bomber TB-3 heavy bomber R-5 reconnaissance aircraft Total: Combat losses 87 60 16 44 0 1 208 Non-Combat losses 22 5 6 8 1 0 42 Total losses 109 65 22 52 1 1 250 Ref[17]
Japanese aircraft losses [ edit ]
Ki-4 reconnaissance aircraft Ki-10 biplane fighter Ki-15 reconnaissance Ki-21 high speed bomber Ki-27 fighter Ki-30 light bomber Ki-36 utility aircraft Fiat BR.20 medium bomber Transport aircraft Total Aerial combat losses 1 1 7 3 62 11 3 0 0 88 Write-offs due to combat damage 14 0 6 3 34 7 3 1 6 74 Total combat losses 15 1 13 6 96 18 6 1 6 162 Combat damage 7 4 23 1 124 33 6 20 2 220 Ref[17]
Aircraft losses summary and notes [ edit ]
Combat losses include aircraft shot down during aerial combat, written off due to combat damage or destroyed on the ground.
Non-combat losses include aircraft that were lost due to accidents, as well as write-offs of warplanes due to the end of their service life. Thus Soviet combat losses amount to 163 fighters, 44 bombers, and a reconnaissance aircraft, with further 385 fighters and 51 bombers requiring repairs due to combat damage. VVS (Soviet Air Forces) personnel losses were 88 killed in aerial combat, 11 killed by anti-aircraft artillery, 65 missing, six killed in air-strikes and four died of wounds (174 total) and 113 wounded. The Japanese combat losses were 97 fighters, 25 bombers and 41 other (mostly reconnaissance), while 128 fighters, 54 bombers and 38 other required repairs due to combat damage. The Japanese air-force suffered 152 dead and 66 severely wounded.
Aircraft ordnance expenditures [ edit ]
USSR: Bomber sorties 2,015, fighter sorties 18,509; 7.62 mm machine gun rounds fired 1,065,323; 20 mm (0.8 in) cannon rounds expended 57,979; bombs dropped 78,360 (1,200 tons).
Japan: Fighter/bomber sorties 10,000 (estimated); 7.7 mm (0.3 in) machine gun rounds fired 1,600,000; bombs dropped 970 tons.[67]
Summary [ edit ]
While this engagement is little known in the West, it played an important part in subsequent Japanese conduct in World War II. The battle earned the Kwantung Army the displeasure of officials in Tokyo, not so much due to its defeat, but because it was initiated and escalated without direct authorization from the Japanese government. This defeat combined with the Chinese resistance in the Second Sino-Japanese War,[68] together with the signing of the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact (which deprived the Army of the basis of its war policy against the USSR), moved the Imperial General Staff in Tokyo away from the policy of the North Strike Group favored by the Army, which wanted to seize Siberia for its resources as far as Lake Baikal.
North Strike Group plans
Instead, support shifted to the South Strike Group, favored by the Navy, which wanted to seize the resources of Southeast Asia, especially the petroleum and mineral-rich Dutch East Indies. Masanobu Tsuji, the Japanese colonel who had helped instigate the Nomonhan incident, was one of the strongest proponents of the attack on Pearl Harbor. General Ryukichi Tanaka, Chief of the Army Ministry’s Military Service Bureau in 1941, testified after the war that, "the most determined single protagonist in favor of war with the United States was Tsuji Masanobu." Tsuji later wrote that his experience of Soviet fire-power at Nomonhan convinced him not to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.[69] On 24 June 1941, two days after the war on the Eastern Front broke out, the Japanese army and navy leaders adopted a resolution "not intervening in German Soviet war for the time being". In August 1941, Japan and the Soviet Union reaffirmed their neutrality pact.[70] The United States and Britain had imposed an oil embargo on Japan, threatening to stop the Japanese war effort, but the European colonial powers were weakening and suffering early defeats in the war with Germany; only the US Pacific Fleet stood in the way of seizing the oil-rich Dutch East Indies.[69] Because of this, Japan's focus was ultimately directed to the south, leading to its decision to launch the attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December of that year. Despite plans being carried out for a potential war against the USSR (particularly contingent on German advances towards Moscow), the Japanese would never launch an offensive against the Soviet Union. In 1941, the two countries signed agreements respecting the borders of Mongolia and Manchukuo[71] and pledging neutrality towards each other.[72] In the closing months of World War II, the Soviet Union would annul the Neutrality Pact and invade the Japanese territories in Manchuria, northern Korea, and the southern part of Sakhalin island.
Soviet assessment [ edit ]
The battle was the first victory for the soon-to-be-famous Soviet general Georgy Zhukov, earning him the first of his four Hero of the Soviet Union awards. The two other generals, Grigoriy Shtern and Yakov Smushkevich, had important roles and were also awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union. They would, however, both be executed in the 1941 Purges. Zhukov himself was promoted and transferred west to the Kiev district. The battle experience gained by Zhukov was put to good use in December 1941 at the Battle of Moscow. Zhukov was able to use this experience to launch the first successful Soviet counteroffensive against the German invasion of 1941. Many units of the Siberian and other trans-Ural armies were part of this attack, and the decision to move these divisions from Siberia was aided by the Soviet spy Richard Sorge in Tokyo, who alerted the Soviet government that the Japanese were looking south and were unlikely to launch another attack against Siberia in the immediate future. A year after defending Moscow against the advancing Germans, Zhukov planned and executed the Red Army's offensive at the Battle of Stalingrad, using a technique very similar to Khalkhin Gol, in which the Soviet forces held the enemy fixed in the center, built up an undetected mass force in the immediate rear area, and launched a pincer attack on the wings to trap the German army.
Following the battle, the Soviets generally found the results unsatisfactory, despite their victory. Though the Soviet forces in the Far East in 1939 were not plagued by fundamental issues to the same extent as those in Europe during the 1941 campaigns, their generals were still unimpressed by their army's performance. As noted by Pyotr Grigorenko, the Red Army went in with a very large advantage in technology, numbers, and firepower, yet still suffered huge losses, which he blamed on poor leadership.[12]
Although their victory and the subsequent negotiation of the Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact secured the Far East for the duration of the Soviet-German War, the Red Army always remained cautious about the possibility of another, larger Japanese incursion as late as early 1944. In December 1943, when the American military mission proposed a logistics base be set up east of Lake Baikal, the Red Army authorities were according to Coox, "shocked by the idea and literally turned white."[73] Due to this caution, the Red Army kept a large force in the Far East even during the bleakest days of the war in Europe. For example, on July 1, 1942, Soviet forces in the Far East consisted of 1,446,012 troops, 11,759 artillery pieces, 2,589 tanks and self-propelled guns, and 3,178 combat aircraft.[74] Despite this, the Soviet operations chief of the Far Eastern Front, General A. K. Kazakovtsev, was not confident in his army group's ability to stop an invasion if the Japanese committed to it (at least in 1941–1942), commenting: “If the Japanese enter the war on Hitler’s side… our cause is hopeless.”[75]
Japanese assessment and reforms [ edit ]
The Japanese similarly considered the result not a failing of tactics, but one that simply highlighted a need to address the material disparity between themselves and their neighbours.[76][77] They made several reforms as a result of this battle: Tank production was increased from 500 annually in 1939 to 1,200,[in what year?] a mechanized headquarters was established in early 1941, and the new Type 1 47 mm anti-tank gun was introduced as a response to the Soviet 45 mm. These cannons were mounted on Type 97 Chi-Ha tanks, resulting in the Type 97 Shinhoto Chi-Ha ("New Turret") variant, which became the IJA's standard medium tank by 1942. IGHQ also dispatched General Tomoyuki Yamashita to Germany in order to learn more about tank tactics, following the crushingly one-sided Battle of France and the signing of the Tripartite Pact. He returned with a report where he stressed the need for mechanization and more medium tanks. Accordingly, plans were put underway for the formation of 10 new armoured divisions in the near future.[78]
Despite all of the above, Japanese industry was not productive enough to keep up with either the United States or the Soviet Union, and Yamashita warned against going to war with them for this reason. His recommendations were not taken to heart, and Japanese militarists eventually successfully pushed for war with the United States. In spite of their recent experience and military improvements, the Japanese would generally continue to underestimate their adversaries, emphasizing the courage and determination of the individual soldier as a way to make up for their lack of numbers and smaller industrial base. To varying degrees, the basic problems that faced them at Khalkhin Gol would haunt them again when the Americans and British recovered from their defeats of late 1941 and early 1942 and turned to the conquest of the Japanese Empire.[29][79]
Also, events exposed a severe lack of procedures for emergency staunching of bleeding. The original Japanese doctrine explicitly forbade first aid to fellow soldiers without prior orders from an officer, and first-aid training was lacking. As result, a large proportion of Japanese dead was due to hemorrhaging from untreated wounds. Furthermore, up to 30% of the total casualties were due to dysentery, which the Japanese believed was delivered by Soviet biological-warfare aerial bombs. To reduce susceptibility to diseases, future Japanese divisions would commonly include specialized Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Departments.[80] Finally, the Japanese food rations were found to be unsatisfactory, both in packing and in nutritional value.[81]
Legacy [ edit ]
After the Second World War, at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, fourteen Japanese were charged by delegates of the conquering Soviet Union, with having "initiated a war of aggression... against the Mongolian People's Republic in the area of the Khalkhin-Gol River" and also with having waged a war "in violation of international law" against the USSR.[82] Kenji Doihara, Hiranuma Kiichirō, and Seishirō Itagaki were convicted on these charges.
The Mongolian town of Choibalsan, in the Dornod Province where the battle was fought, is the location of the "G.K. Zhukov Museum", dedicated to Zhukov and the 1939 battle.[83] Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia also has a "G.K. Zhukov Museum" with information about the battle.[84]
In popular culture [ edit ]
The Battles of Khalkhin Gol were depicted in the 2011 South Korean war film My Way. The film was inspired by the true tale of a Korean named Yang Kyoungjong who was captured by the Americans on D-Day. Yang Kyoungjong was conscripted in the Imperial Japanese Army, fought in the Battles of Khalkhin Gol against the Red Army, then was enlisted to the Red Army, fought against the Germans and, after being taken prisoner, he joined the Wehrmacht.
The Nomonhan Incident casts a shadow over the whole of Haruki Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, although there is little detail about the main battle itself. Two characters who were in the Imperial Japanese Army during the war, relate their experiences in the Mongolian border area at a much later date to the protagonist, which seems to profoundly affect his later adventures.
See also [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]
^ [1] and 4,860 MPR personnel.[2] Combined Soviet-MPR strength was possibly as high as 74,000.[3] Includes at least 57,000 Sovietand 4,860 MPR personnel.Combined Soviet-MPR strength was possibly as high as 74,000. ^ [15]
15,952 wounded
2,225 hospitalized due to disease 9,703 dead and missing,15,952 wounded2,225 hospitalized due to disease ^ Japanese military record:
8,440 killed,
8,766 wounded
Soviet claim:
60,000 killed and wounded,
3,000 captured[20]
See the "Aftermath" section. 8,440 killed,8,766 wounded60,000 killed and wounded,3,000 capturedSee the "Aftermath" section.The vast majority of the people Hamilton's ACTION officers give tickets to don't have any intention of paying the fines or going to court, testified Sgt. Michael Dunham, who oversaw one of the five ACTION teams in 2014.
"Ninety per cent of the people that we dealt with, you knew you were never going to court," Dunham said.
Unfortunately, we deal with probably the same 25 people, day in, day out, 365. - Sgt. Michael Dunham, who joined ACTION team in 2012
The people ticketed would either tell the officer they were throwing the tickets away, "or they crumpled it in a ball and put it in their pocket with the other four or five tickets," he said.
"Unfortunately, we deal with probably the same 25 people, day in, day out, 365," Dunham said. Court heard from one downtown panhandler on the receiving end of that attention, who said he was ticketed close to 300 times.
Dunham was testifying Tuesday in a trial begun Monday where four Hamilton police officers from the ACTION and mounted units are charged with falsifying tickets in 2014.
Constables Bhupesh Gulati, Shawn Smith, Stephen Travale and Daniel Williams are each charged with obstructing justice between April 1 and Oct. 1, 2014.
Each was also charged with fabricating between two and six tickets, and each pleaded not guilty to all charges.
(Const. Staci Tyldesley also faces related charges; those are being heard in a separate preliminary hearing that began last month.)
A window into the high-profile ACTION team
The trial so far is a window into a high-profile policing team, known for its yellow jackets and bicycles, launched by former Chief Glenn De Caire. It's been credited with helping to reduce crime downtown, but also has been criticized as a heavy-handed approach.
I think there's something wrong with asking someone for a quarter and you give me a ticket for $65. - Dwight Perry
And some of the testimony heard so far reveals that many of the targets of the "cleaning up" owe tens of thousands of dollars in fines for panhandling, trespassing and open liquor tickets that they never intend to pay.
Dunham's testimony suggests the effort can feel futile.
Dunham said he'd often issue a ticket for someone who was drinking in public "not so much for the punishment of it but for the visual" of the other people watching downtown.
"There's nothing that's going to happen to [the person drinking], and they know that," he said.
A sergeant from the Hamilton police ACTION team, known by its yellow jackets, testified Tuesday that the team deals with 'the same 25 people' every day. (Benjamin Dyment/CBC)
Court heard Monday the officers on the ACTION team were trying to reach a goal of 100 to 120 tickets per officer per year. But Tuesday, Dunham said there was no trouble meeting those targets for ACTION officers working downtown.
'Now I've got to pan twice as hard to pay for the ticket'
The trial also is yielding an rare look at the human side of the policing strategy.
Another of the "frequent fliers" known to Hamilton police downtown testified in court Tuesday, claiming he owes $20,000 in fines for panhandling and trespassing tickets.
"I think there's something wrong with asking someone for a quarter and you give me a ticket for $65," Dwight Perry said. "It just don't balance out."
Perry's testimony added to a picture where Hamilton's downtown-focused ACTION and mounted officers issue dozens of tickets to the same people, often in the same places and for similar offences, year after year.
Perry's humour and cheerfulness had lawyers and others in the courtroom chuckling Tuesday morning. Perry, 59, said he has a problem with the way the law is structured, which he said has added up to about 285 tickets, some of which are all over his house.
Court heard this morning from Dwight Perry, 59, who thinks he's been given more than 250 tickets for panhandling in downtown <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/hamont?src=hash">#hamont</a>. <a href="https://t.co/mUcVdAfvu4">pic.twitter.com/mUcVdAfvu4</a> —@kellyrbennett
He said the tickets just make his bad financial situation worse. His spot, he said, is typically between John and Bay streets and between St. Joseph's hospital and Wilson streets.
"Now I've got to pan twice as hard to pay for the ticket," he said.
'It was all just ludicrous'
Dunham was arrested but not actually charged as part of the initial probe into falsified tickets when De Caire announced that five were being charged.
His arrest stemmed from a ticket that was timestamped from Rebecca Street one minute before he was logged in in the station — but he said Tuesday "the only explanation I have is that I wrote the wrong time on that ticket." He was not charged and was allowed to go.
Const. Bhupesh Gulati, Const. Daniel Williams and Const. Stephen Travale leave the John Sopinka Courthouse on Monday afternoon. (Kelly Bennett/CBC)
Dunham said in September 2014, when the undelivered tickets were found in the shredder, there were rumours flying around Central Station.
People were accusing the team of simply watching the police's downtown security cameras and writing tickets up from the station, or "going to breakfast and deciding who we were going to give a ticket to," he said.
"It was all just ludicrous."
The trial continues Thursday.
kelly.bennett@cbc.ca | @kellyrbennetthttps://www.rockislandauction.com/detail/72/2461/u-s-springfield-1915-bolo-bayonet
The M1915 bolo bayonet was originally the brainchild of US Army Captain Hugh D. Wise, Quartermaster with the 9th Infantry in the Philippines. In 1902, he recommended the implement in a letter to his superior officers, noting that a bolo style of bayonet (ie, one with a widened machete-like blade) would have several advantages over the standard knife bayonet then being issued with the Krag-Jorgenson rifles the US Army was using. Specifically, the wider bayonet would be easier to recover after a thrust (he noted several instances of troopers being killed while trying to extricate their bayonets from enemies) and also (and more significantly) make an excellent and necessary bushwhacking tool in the jungle environment of the Philippines.
Wise's idea was taken with interest and Springfield produced a series of experimental bolo bayonets, but the project ended there as the 1903 Springfield was adopted with a rod bayonet instead of a blade. Of course, the rod bayonet would be shortlived, and the blade bayonet would come back. The bolo bayonet ideas resurfaced in 1911 when a commission was formed to look into special equipment for the Philippine Scouts. After another series of experimental designs, the M1915 Bolo bayonet was formally adopted on May 22, 1915 and an order was placed for 6,000 of them to be made at Springfield Armory.
Delivery of these bayonets took place in 1915 and 1916, and they proved to be extremely popular tools with the soldiers in the Philippines. They would remain in service on the islands until World War Two, serving at last as a replacement for the M1913 cavalry saber for the 26th Cavalry.
http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons
Cool Forgotten Weapons merch! http://shop.bbtv.com/collections/forgotten-weaponsPrime Minister Stephen Harper's office asked staff to include a list of "friend and enemy stakeholders" in their transition binders for new ministers appointed in Monday's cabinet shuffle, according to a leaked email.
The email, obtained by CBC News and several other media outlets, was sent July 4 by Erica Furtado in the Prime Minister's Office and shows a checklist for what should be in the transition binders.
"Who to avoid: bureaucrats that can't take no (or yes) for an answer" is on the list, as well as "Who to engage or avoid: friend and enemy stakeholders."
The request for a list of problematic bureaucrats was subsequently dropped, according to another email sent a few hours later on July 4.
The person who leaked the emails said that when some staff balked at the idea of coming up with the blacklists, they were cut off from further communications about the matter.
The person also said staff were given examples of stakeholders that could go on the "enemies list" and they included environmental groups, non-profit organizations, and civic and industry associations with views different than the government's.
Transition books and briefing notes for new ministers would normally include names of key people on issues, but dividing them into "friend and enemy" categories isn't common.
The other items on the checklist were:
What to say in question period.
What to expect soon, hot issues, legal actions, complaints.
What to expect later, longer-term forecast.
What to do, status of mandate items, off-mandate items.
What to avoid: pet bureaucratic projects.
What to attend: upcoming events, meetings and FPTs.
Who to appoint: outstanding GiCs and hot prospects.
Private member's bills, lines and caucus packages.
FPTs refers to federal/provincial/territorial meetings and GiCs refers to Governor in Council appointments, people who sit on agencies, boards and commissions.
"While we don't comment on internal communications, we are collaborating with our ministers, especially new ministers, to ensure they are fully briefed so they can continue their work on behalf of Canadian taxpayers," said PMO spokesman Carl Vallée in an emailed response to a request for comment.
Harper appointed eight new MPs to his cabinet on Monday and shifted multiple ministers around to new portfolios.
PMO acting 'paranoid'
The NDP's deputy leader Megan Leslie said the instructions to provide an "enemy" list show the PMO is "paranoid" and trying to exercise control over ministers.
"But they also have this 'for you or against you' kind of attitude where unless you are toeing their line and marching to the beat of their drum you are an enemy," she said.
Leslie said it's useful for ministers to share information with each other but classifying people as enemies crosses a line.
John Bennett, executive director of the environmental group Sierra Club Canada, said based on his past experience with some ministers he likely would have wound up on the enemy list.
"I wasn't surprised but I continue to be disappointed that stakeholders like environmentalists are considered enemies rather than stakeholders who are trying to pursue important issues," he said in an interview with CBC's Rosemary Barton.
He said if some ministers were more "mature" they would understand how democracy really works and that all perspectives should be considered when making decisions.
"They don't believe in democracy the way we do, which is it's an exchange of ideas and debate and try to come up with reasonable solutions. They believe in forcing ideology and if you're forcing ideology on the Canadian public then you see people like me as an enemy and that's unfortunate," said Bennett.PUC’s West Goshen ruling cheers advocates for local control over pipelines
Jon Hurdle Bio Recent Stories Jon is an experienced journalist who has covered a wide range of general and business-news stories for national and local media in the U.S. and his native U.K. As a former Reuters reporter, he spent several years covering the early stages of Pennsylvania’s natural gas fracking boom and was one of the first national reporters to write about the effects of gas development on rural communities. Jon trained as a general news reporter with a British newspaper chain and later worked for several business-news organizations including Bloomberg News and Market News International, covering topics including economics, bonds, currencies and monetary policy. Since 2011, he has been a freelance writer, contributing Philadelphia-area news to The New York Times; covering economics for Market News, and writing stories on the environment and other subjects for a number of local outlets including StateImpact. He has written two travel guidebooks to the European Alps; lived in Australia, Switzerland, Israel, and Saudi Arabia, and visited many countries including Ethiopia, Peru, Taiwan, and New Zealand. Outside of work hours, Jon can be found running, birding, cooking, and, when weather permits, gardening in the back yard of a Philadelphia row home where he lives with his partner, Kate.
Emily Cohen / StateImpact PA
Pennsylvania’s Public Utility Commission halted Sunoco’s plans to build a valve for its Mariner East 2 pipeline in Chester County’s West Goshen Township, raising questions about whether the massive cross-state project will be completed on time, and encouraging advocates for local control over gas development.
The commission voted unanimously on Thursday to uphold a judge’s ruling that prevented Sunoco from building the valve and associated equipment on private land on the basis that the construction breached a settlement agreement between the township and the company.
The commissioners backed Administrative Law Judge Elizabeth Barnes who ruled in July that the township had met the legal requirements for being granted emergency relief from the court. Sunoco must now drop its plans for building the valve until the PUC holds a full hearing on the case next April.
David Brooman, an attorney for the township, said the PUC’s 35-page ruling meticulously considered all of the facts presented to Judge Barnes, and the legal arguments used by Sunoco.
“Sunoco Logistics flagrantly breached its Settlement Agreement with |
you will begin to believe that. Your children will start to act as if the world is doomed, so they'll cut themselves, they'll dress in black, they'll throw bins through windows and steal stuff. Because there's no future, you've given them nothing to believe in. I honestly think this is self hypnosis right now, and our culture could do a lot more. We could be building starships, we could do a lot more than we're actually doing, and we're fucking around.
And it seemed very strange that we're telling this very dark story, and I thought the idea of the superhero has arisen as a response to that. Whether it's an unconscious response, whether there were some people deliberately saying well this is all we've got, we don't have Star Trek any more, we don't have a space programme, there is no image of the future that is not dystopian, except for the idea of the superhero. The notion that maybe one day we can pull off these shirts and reveal some kind of inner self that's our highest, our best, our kindest, our toughest, our wisest, our smartest, and actually use that to get out of our problems. Because we created these ideas to solve problems. There is no enemy that Superman can't defeat, there is no enemy Batman can't defeat, these are ideas that cannot be destroyed. And even as ideas, once people like Alan Moore went in there and deconstructed the superhero, the superhero just took it and Alan created one of the greatest works ever in the field but the superhero survived and got up again. By the end of Watchmen everybody thought it was over, I remember the days and they were saying that's the end of the superhero, it's the graveyard of the superhero, but of course it's not – the superhero is made to survive any assault.
So I thought there's something in that idea that maybe we should be latching on to, maybe we should be using this as a counter-narrative strategy, against the one that we're selling people right now, and there's something in this. You know, I think there's a power in it, however crude and however small and... what would you call it.. culturally unacceptable an area that it comes from, it's actually, those are the places we sometimes find the real truths. Where people have been allowed to say things that the rest of the culture isn't allowing us to say, which is maybe that maybe we're okay. You know, the scariest thing you can say to anyone, and try it tomorrow with all your friends, is to say maybe the world isn't going to end! Maybe it's all meant to be like this, and it's all working out just fine! And all those riots and everything, that's just part of the process, that's just something heating up and moving and changing, and that's just how it looks to us, because we're so small and so short-lived that we don't see the longer processes that are involved.
If you say that to anyone they'll go "No! No, no, we're all doomed! Don't you get it? We are doomed!" [laughs]. So I kind of, I wanted to bring that out and to use, yeah there's a manifesto in it to the sense that we have ideas here that were created to solve any problem – let's set them loose on our problems.
On how when Superman was created our enemies (eg Hitler) could be defeated, unlike now when we have the War on Terror:
Grant: Which is a meaningless war, it's like the War on Length [laughs]. Oh okay, I'll become a soldier in that war you know, and again the War on Drugs, what does that mean? We don't even know, they don't even tell you what drugs are or how different one substance is from another, it's one blanket ridiculous war that has never been won. How can you fight drugs? Again, that's like fighting atoms [laughs]. These things are everywhere, they're natural, we have DMT in our own brains, it's a natural neurotransmitter, so what are they gonna do – start coning into our brains to get that out? Probably! [laughs]
So no these are ludicrous things, the idea that you can fight an abstraction, because really there's nothing left. There is no Hitler, there's just an asymmetric enemy that's like a virus, and may not even be an enemy. We're dealing with people that can barely start up a truck in some cases and it's like the West is trying to pretend that these people pose some threat to these powers that wield nuclear weaponry on a scale beyond anything you can imagine. There is no enemy. You know, all this stuff, I honestly think, has just been created to get us all in a state so that the news every night can be this insane manic hyper-accelerated fear creation. There's no enemy, they got one good hit and that was it, you know, and there's been ten years of people trying and we've stopped pretty much everything they've tried to do. Because really, they're working with bananas. And it's not a threat.
On Hollywood and whether the comic book movie boom has had a positive effect on comics:
Grant: Yeah I mean the whole idea... people who are familiar with comics, you'll know that in the last ten years comics have developed this style where it's just like four or five thin panels on each page. And those panels are designed to look like a cinema screen. And a lot of times the background's black so that there is also the feeling of being in a darkened auditorium, but without the heads of the audience. And so you're watching a movie, but movies do it better now. I was talking about this today, the things that comics used to do, the artistic experimentation has disappeared because kind of writers took over. And a lot of the writers, including myself, over the last ten years have kind of been pitching to Hollywood because suddenly okay, Hollywood wants to do this stuff, there's a lot more money to be made, why not?
But out of that what you got was people basically showing off that they could write Hollywood screenplay style comics. And we got ten years worth of that and sales have just gone down and down and down. So my idea now is to let the artist take over again and just, the guys I'm working with like Chris Burnham on Batman and with Rags Morales on Superman, to start just saying, look you guys lay out the page, lets see the things that comics can do, the way they can slice time, the way they can have multiple panels, the way that they can have spreads that are symmetrical, or you know, a whole set of information presented in a way that's not only digital with panels but it's also, you know, you can read two pages all at once or you can read individual panels simultaneously. You can't do that in a movie. So I kind of think we need to bring that back and yeah the Hollywood thing has effected comics quite badly and it hasn't helped the sales. When Spider-Man comes out, the Spider-Man comics don't sell any better when there's a movie. And again that's partly because the only place to buy these comics is in a comic store where a lot of people won't go. If they sold them in the movie theatre right next to the popcorn, yeah I mean people would probably buy Spider-Man when they came out the Spider-Man movies. But there is, it's a very uneasy thing you know, it's drawn people's attention to things, and it's allowed me to write books like this which can be at least seen in the context of movies for some people rather than comic books which most people wouldn't want to talk about. So at least we can say that superheroes are things that exist in movies and on television, and you're allowed to talk about these kind of mainstream things. But it's been a weird relationship with Hollywood, and it's been lucrative for some of us but for comics it's been a not necessarily benign influence.
On the differences between working on existing characters and creator owned:
Grant: It's two different kind of feelings you know, The Invisibles you're creating your own thing and that was like a diary for me so it was a very different type of story. But doing something like Superman or Batman, you're part of a seventy year continuum, and to be able to go in there and tie this little knot in the story of Batman somewhere, you know when I'm dead and gone and forgotten in a couple of generations, my name will still be there on those Batman stories and Batman will still be around. So you know, I've kind of scrawled my signature on his arse [laughs]. It will be there forever. So there's that, I really like that idea, the idea that the DC and the Marvel Universes, I kind of approached them as, it was like environmental art. I saw them as real places, and that was the big breakthrough for me, was to recognise that this was an actual terrain that had been created. And Superman actually exists, but he's made of paper. And he's like seventy years deep and you can go and pick up Superman's first appearance in 1938, with the kind of crude Joe Schuster drawings, and then you can hold it next to a Jim Lee Superman from 2005 or whatever, and those two comics don't know that you're holding them together. You know, you can make 1938 Superman kiss 2005 Superman, but they don't know [laughs]. No really! Go home and try this! And don't stop there, you can make Batman kiss the Hulk as well!
But the creations in that story don't recognise that 1938 and 2005 exist side by side, so there's something really weird going on for me, I saw this as an environment. Superman's created and then the guys that created him die, but someone else does it and then I want to do it – why do I want to do Superman? Who's more powerful in this exchange? Me or Superman? Well Superman lives longer than me, he was around long before I was born and he'll be around long after I'm gone, so he's actually more real than I am. And the chance to get involved with what is basically, like I said they are Supergods, we made these things, these entities that are thought forms and they're drawn out on paper and they have lives and they have continuities, very different from time as we understand it, it's like a kind of cyclical mythical time where the same stories get retold for each new generation. But the character persists and the idea, like I say, people keep coming in and refreshing it. You know and Richard Dawkins talks about Meme Theory, and the idea of what is Superman or Batman as a meme, what is this voracious entity? That started out on paper and has now crawled its way on to the screen and now we're seeing people in real life putting on these costumes and going out on the street and getting themselves beaten up and fighting guys with tasers.
So it seemed to me like here's an idea that's working its way into reality as well, and that was the other strand of the book. That yeah we're using these images as maybe hopeful or utopian ideas of our future, and at the same time they're forcing their way into real life. They're coming off the second dimension on to the screen and then into the real world, and you know, give it another 25 years, let's say even within 5 or 10 years, kids are gonna have radio telepathy you know, they're basically building this stuff right now, you've got a little receiver in your ear and you can talk to people with your head. So think about what those kids will be like when privacy doesn't exist any more, because whoever came up with a stupid idea like that, because we're all connected. Superhumans are coming, and comics and these films have kinda analysed the idea and broken it down and thought about it to the extent that, as I say in the book, I think they may turn out to be the social realist fiction of tomorrow. For these characters who are suddenly bionically enhanced and they have omni-directional internet in their heads, and who live longer than we do because of medical advances, are gonna look back at this stuff for role models, and again, we should give them good role models rather than you know, characters with runs in their tights or problems. We should be creating big ideas that we can live up to.
Going to the audience for some questions now! First up, a question on how Grant got away with writing Final Crisis for DC. The questioner said, “it's like letting David Lynch direct a Transformers movie!”:
Grant: I think DC realised this somewhere round about issue 3! [laughs]
And continuing the question, why can comics get away with such risks?
Grant: Just because they're cheap to make I think. A movie cost £200 million if it's a big movie and a smaller one, even a small one would cost £40 million dollars to make say. A TV show cost a lot of money to make but a comic doesn't cost a lot to make. And because they're hand drawn, you know again, there's something really fascinating, there's guys sit up and hand draw these things and make stories up by taking a pencil and actually drawing the individual frames of a story. I find that quite bizarre, it's like Medieval monks doing all these illuminated manuscripts, it's a really intense magical meditative experience of hand drawing on paper.
So you get away with a lot more, you know if I'd presented Final Crisis to a film studio they'd have read it and then they'd have got in a hundred other people and gone "we like the guy with the red hair" and they'd have pulled that guy out and made it about him and it wouldn't have been allowed. I was deliberately, when I got the opportunity to do Final Crisis, I thought I will deliberately break all these Hollywood storytelling rules that everyone's currently learning, you know and the three act structure, and how things are supposed to fall, and when you introduce this character they've got to have an arc... I thought no, fuck that!
Because comics, as you say, are the only place we can do that. Just to be deliberately destructive to those story structures and just say, what if a story fell apart, what if the whole thing just went to hell because a vampire was draining the narrative. And suddenly the characterisations go, and the plot goes, and people just talk rubbish to each other and characters appear out of nowhere and don't get resolutions. And then bring it all back and kind of wrap it up. But as you say, it would not have been possible anywhere else and it probably will never be possible again to be honest! But most people don't want to go there, they want to prove that they can write the Hollywood structure which is just one way of doing stuff, and it's a way of making stories appealing to a very wide audience. It's quite a streamlined way of doing it. But it's nice to break, it's nice to see what happens when you take it away and remove those props because something still remains you know. Pure imagination on the page can be anything so yeah comics have been, as I said in the book, the last pirate art form but they've kind of swapped the Jolly Roger for the Stars and Stripes. It'll be interesting to see what happens next but we are a time, because the sales are so low, and DC are doing this crazy thing of launching all their books, anything can happen. People are trying anything now, it's quite an interesting volatile time.
Next question is on low sales and new technology and whether the latter can save the former:
Grant: Yeah, I think the iPad and basically electronic delivery of comics will change everything. We're talking specifically about the comic form, the transfer from the page on to the screen will open up a lot of new potential. As I've said before, right now what they've got, they've kind of taken the comic and just stuck it on screen so you flick, and basically it's a con, but the screen can do an awful lot more than that. And I'd like to see comics where you can press it and play a little game or you can press the Joker and get the original Joker origin just by touching it, and there's a lot more connectivity and maybe kind of fractal explosion of narrative. So I think that will happen. Right now what we're seeing is people transferring comics on to the screen, it's like the early days of Hollywood where they just set up a camera and they filmed from, you know it was like a theatre with presidium arch, and they just filmed and everything happened on the same plane. But then they discovered that they could move the camera around. And that's what we're getting with comics, comics haven't made the jump quite yet, but it's a very tentative leap into the medium. I think that's what's going to change everything, honestly. The paper thing will probably have its day and it'll become like poetry, it will become a little collectible thing that only real enthusiasts buy. But definitely, something is going to happen on the screen because the potential for just pulling out panels and explosives and a very different type of storytelling is there on screens, so yeah if anything saves the comic form it will be that.
On Grant's Wonder Woman as a sexualised/fetishised character and how he'd handle her portrayal:
Grant: Ooh I'm sweating the minute you said fetish! [laughs] Well yeah, interestingly the thing about Wonder Woman, I don't know if people know this, you probably all know this, but I'm gonna tell you it again just to bore you, but Wonder Woman was created by William Moulton Marston, who was a pop-psychologist and a little bit more than that in the 30s and 40s, and basically he was a kind of proponent of free love and that kind of you know, 1950s post-Kinsey stuff. So him and his wife had a lover called Olive Byrne, a younger, an 18 year old, and they were both sort of professors, and Olive was the original physical model for Wonder Woman. And Elizabeth Marston and Charles [William's pen name] basically created this character, because they felt that Superman represented a kind of blood-curdling masculinity as they said, so they wanted to introduce somebody who was a bit more feminine, but now at the same time Marston also had all these amazing kinks, because he had this idea that basically the world would be better if men would just submit to women's complete instruction. And I'm sure many of you may agree! [laughs] But he took it all the way, not just submit to instruction but get collars on, and get down on all fours, and just admit that's where you belong guys!
So a lot of the Wonder Woman stories had this thread through them, this idea of bondage but it was "loving submission" Marston called it. And it was this notion that, as I said in the book, there's a story where Wonder Woman rescues the slave girls of an evil Nazi villain, and the slave girls don't know what to do, even though they've been rescued they're kind of, they like being slaves. So Wonder Woman just says "Oh, don't worry, you can be slaves on Paradise Island and one of our girls will take over but she'll be really nice to you unlike the Nazi!", and that was seen as, that was the resolution to the story! You've got a nice mistress instead of a crop-cracking Paula Von Gunther.
So Marston had all these ideas and it was very deep, there was a book by him which was hidden in the DC Comics vaults because they didn't really want anyone to see it, and a friend of mine at DC sneaked it out for me one time. And it's this thing, and honestly you can't read it, it's deranged, it's like the guys just done mescaline or something, talking about his sexual theories. And it reads like William Burroughs, it's all this stuff about the luminous women from Venus and how they'll tie something round you and you'll be sorted out! So there was that, the Wonder Woman strip had this weird libidinous kind of element and obviously on Paradise Island, it was this amazing Second Wave, separatist, feminist idea of an entire island where women had ruled for 3000 years and what they did for fun was chase one another! So the girls would dress up like stags and run through the forest and another girl would chase them and then they'd capture the girl, tie her up and put her on a table and pretend to eat her at a mock banquet. This is a typical Wonder Woman adventure! [laughs] In 1941.
But then Marston died, and that energy left the strip, it just disappeared. They were really worried about what he was doing, the bondage elements were becoming more and more overt, but the sales were good! [laughs] This was working! Unlike Superman, as you say, I started looking at trying to do a Wonder Woman that brought back some of these elements but without it being prurient or exploitative.
Superman when he began was, he could throw people out of windows, you used to see him drop kicking guys into the ocean, and obviously that would kill you. You know Batman had a gun and sometimes he would shoot people. But those things weren't intrinsic to the strips, you know, you could take out those elements, you could take out the murder element of Superman and Batman and the strips still worked. But when you took the sex out of Wonder Woman, the thing went flat. And the sales died immediately after Marston himself died and never ever recovered.
So it seemed that there was something about those libidinous elements that were actually fundamental to the concept of Wonder Woman, and trying to find a way to put those back without being William Moulton Marston and not being into what he was into, was quite a difficult thing. But yeah, I think I've found a way, but I'm not gonna tell you what I've done because hopefully the Wonder Woman series will be out next year sometime or thereabouts. But I think I've found a way to get all that back in again but it took a lot of reading. This has been the hardest project I've ever done. I had to read feminist theory all the way through, from Simone De Beauvoir to Andrea Dworkin and apply it to this character. And to try and do something that incorporated those ideas but completely took them in a different direction. So I mean beyond that I'll say, Wonder Woman needs sex definitely because you know, again as I said in the book, they kind of transformed her into a cross between the Virgin Mary and Mary Tyler Moore. This girl scout who had no sexuality at all and the character's never quite worked since then.
In the way that Superman's supposed to stand for men but at least he's allowed to have some kind of element of sexuality, Wonder Woman is expected to stand for women without any element of sexuality, and that seems wrong. I don't know if that answers the question but it shows I've been thinking about it! [laughs]
On whether there is still a British sensibility to comics here or whether the number of UK creators that have gone to the US have diluted that distinction:
Grant: Yeah, I don't think there is as much as there once was; it was very obvious in the 80s when we all came over with a very distinct, kind of punk rock based viewpoint. And then we influenced another generation of writers who are now currently working so the boundaries between what British writers and creators did and what American creators do are completely dissolved. I think that the American writers now, there's so many of them that are as good as anything. But I think what's difficult about now is that there are a dozen comics that are up there with the best, whereas in the 80s or 90s, there were two or three or four maybe. Now there are an awful lot of them, and you become used to a certain standard of excellence. So no, the qualities that made us special have long ago been absorbed and redeployed by others.
I don't read a lot of British comics nowadays, so I don't know what's going on in 2000 AD or the Megazine or if there's a new sensibility or if it's really just the same old punk rock chundering on so I don't know about that aspect of it. But in terms of what we brought to comics, it has been fully absorbed I think.
On whether Grant thinks other writers have incorporated sigils into their work, and a general plea to talk about sigils for a bit:
Grant: I never know whether people are doing things though, I know what I do and the idea with The Invisibles was to create a hyper-sigil as I called it, it was to take the sigil idea... In magic, or in the occult, the notion of a sigil is that you have a desire, say I want to be a championship showjumper [laughs]. I'm sure many of us share that desire! So you write down "I want to be a championship showjumper" and then you take out all the vowels, and then you take out all the repeated letters, and you crush what you've got into one of those weird witchy things that you see in the Blair Witch Project, you know those kind of strange signs, it's a mash up of letters. And the idea is supposed to be that if you concentrate on this hard enough and then get rid of it, forget all about it, that your desire will manifest. Now it doesn't mean that, again as I've said before, if you want the desire to manifest, and your desire is "I would like to win the lottery", then you also have to buy a ticket! [laughs] This is the real world, you don't just write "I want to win the lottery"” and money will pour in. Magic is actually just quite practical.
So the notion of a sigil is to take a desire and condense it and it will happen. What I did with The Invisibles was to take that idea of a sigil and to develop a... a guy called Austin Osman Spare, an occult artist at the start of the last century. I took that notion though, what if you added a dynamic element to it, rather than a static sigil, what if you had something that lasted six years and had plots and characters and all the things that we associate with narratives. So it was the notion of creating a narrative sigil and I figured if also that if you could extend that, anyone could do that. You could do it in dance, you could do it in poetry, you could do it in music, you could do it as I did with writing. And it's basically to create a desire, you know, The Invisibles was this big desire to change the world. The original solid sigil that I did to start the process off, I did a bungee jump in New Zealand, and kind of threw the sigil down as I was screaming in horror towards the Kawarau river in New Zealand. So I kind of launched it with this moment of abject terror, when my mind completely shut down which is the idea, you want to create this "no mind" effect when you're projecting a sigil.
So I did that and then the series itself became the extension of that and it became the working out of that desire as a long term structure. And I found it was immensely effective, it was like really spooky big time Voodoo. Things that I was making happen to the characters that would then happen to me. Like when King Mob got sick, he's being tortured and he believes that his face is being eaten by a necrotising fasciitis bacteria, three months later my face is being eaten. And I've still got the scar - you can see it, wherever it is, I've forgotten. I had a sudden vision of Kerry Katona there and I don't know why! [laughs]
So suddenly there was this weird interconnectiveness happening, and I began to believe that if you create a model or a dynamic sigil of the world and then make tweaks in the sigil or the model of the world, those tweaks will manifest themselves in the larger scale reality that we live in. So there's a weird isomorphic mapping that you create between this object which as I say could be a comic story, it could be a book, it could be a novel, it could be a song, it could be a dance sequence. But it was creating this weird, this stickiness between the fiction and me. So as I say I've got this, I ended up in hospital on this bed, and the character's lung collapsed and my lung collapsed immediately afterwards. So I was in hospital writing the next issue, and it's like, "King Mob's getting up out the bed now! He's really fit! He's doing great, he's running down the hall in fact!" [laughs]
And I found that honestly, I came out of that, and I was convinced while I was in hospital that I was actually participating in this kind of dialogue with the staphylococcus aureus infection that had taken over my body. So I figured that this, you know, it's a living entity, there must be some way of contacting it totemistically, so I kind of started trying to talk to the disease. And I said, look I'll put you in The Invisibles as the bad guys if you let me go. And you can be this monstrous cosmic disease that's eating into the walls of reality and staph aureus said, "sounds great! So we'll let you go." [laughs]
So I was convinced, all the way through, as part of this sigil and these weird exchanges, with the idea of the infection. I had this notion that I could inoculate myself with words basically and tried to do that. And obviously it may not have worked if the doctors weren't also inoculating me with antibiotics [laughs], but at the same time it was giving me this mad magical context.
And that's how the hyper-sigil worked. It was a real, a stickiness between reality and fiction that I just found very bizarre. I don't really have explanations for it yet, I've got a lot of daft ideas and theories but as always, I just say, try it for yourself and see what happens and post the reports. All you can do is that, don't believe a word that I say. But try it for yourself because I was a sceptic who found that these things work, they have effects, strange things happen that don't quite fit our consensus.
On working on both Superman and Batman, and how the former is often changed while the latter is more consistent and why this is. And that in the New 52 Superman is being changed while Batman remains even with all his Robins:
Grant: But they happened in a week! [laughs] I think Batman's just simply been more popular at all times you know, and don't fuck with the billionaire [laughs]. Really Superman is open to a lot of change, Superman has constantly been in flux in a way, and I suppose Batman in each decade is a different person, but the basic history has always remained for Batman. Because it works, and it's always worked for them, and he's made money. Superman doesn't really make money, Superman goes through terrible periods of lack of success and you know as I said in the book, it's because he's a working class hero and people don't like that.
He grew up on a farm baling hay, he works in an office, he's got a boss who shouts at him and a girl who doesn't fancy him. And that's not necessarily a wish fulfilment figure any more. Whereas the idea of the man who sleeps in bed all day until 3 o'clock, then gets up and dresses in rubber and goes out and kicks the shit out of poor people [laughs], and is constantly pursued by sexy women also wearing rubber, he's now a fantasy figure for our culture that's obsessed with wealth and fame and that kind of billionaire success, and that kind of licence that lots of money gives us in this world. So I think that the character who was a champion of the oppressed and the working class and the poor, just gets short shrift you know. There are moments in time when he's in vogue and I think what I'm doing with Superman right now is to take it back to that a little bit. Because I think this is a good time to have a Superman who's kind of a little bit more like us, a bit more relatable, and who stands up against bullies for anyone who's threatened by bullies. And it's as simple as that. No matter how big the bully is, or if it's the President, Superman will go in and slap him around.
So I feel as if there's a chance for that to be back right now. But unfortunately that character fluctuates, and Superman also had the unfortunate problem of being connected to the flag and the government and to the idea of patriotism. Batman was always an outlaw, Batman was quite clearly a self-made man who worked for no one but himself. Whereas Superman was often seen as a government stooge, you know, Frank Miller did him that way, the idea of truth, justice and the American way suggests that he stands for something that is more entrenched and more conservative.
So I think that's been the problem with him and that's why he's always been open to reinterpretation. Batman works, the concept works really well and you know it was quite a synthetic idea, it was built from a lot of parts that already existed. But it was built so beautifully, you know, the thing runs like a Bentley, and they don't need to change it. It always sells. And the Batman comic is what DC comics and what all the sales of comics are usually based around, that's the base level that they calculate everything else around. If Batman's doing okay, which it always is, then that usually represents the higher end of the chart.
Interviewer asks what Grant thinks of how the new Superman film looks:
Grant: I don't know, I'm looking forward to it, I like what Christopher Nolan did with Batman, it will be interesting to see what they do with Superman, what choices they make, and what kind of Superman they create because it will be indicative of where we are right now and what we think about ourselves. Beyond that I've no idea. It looks okay, it looks pretty coo-ul [silly voice].
Back to the audience, and a question on whether comics can tackle political problems:
Grant: Superman's got a little more politics in it I guess but I just don't think that's necessarily how these characters work best. I think the way they solve our problems is to solve them on a symbolic stage. So rather than have Superman up against real poverty in say... there's so much real poverty in so many places that I can't decide where to send him. But rather than having him do that, as in the 70s it would be Superman versus pollution. But he can't solve that problem, the real world pollution will remain. What Superman can do is maybe fight some embodiment of why we create pollution and through that give us an idea, a symbolic idea of what to do in the real world.
These characters operate on the level of myth and of symbol, and I think that's where they can be powerful you know, rather than showing how would Superman solve the housing problem, well he'd knock down all the houses and build some good ones. So we now have to do that. But how does Superman fight grief, how does Superman deal with grief is much more useful to us I think. How does Superman deal with the emotions that give rise to our problems. Because he can deal with all of those things and if he deals with them on a symbolic stage then hopefully we can think how can we use our own resources and our own intelligence and transfer that notion of problem solving to the real problems that we have. I don't think we can expect him to turn up and lift the bridge but, you know, if lifting the bridge is the solution then we have methods that we can do, you know even if it takes a hundred of us to be one Superman then the way he solves problems, the way he looks at things as always problems to be solved and not things to give in to, is what I think is valuable and what we can learn from.
On how Grant has often used the full history of DC characters but not so much with the X-Men which was futuristic and whether that was a difference between DC and Marvel:
Grant: No, I think it was specific to X-Men. It just seemed to be that X-Men was about the future and what X-Men was about... X-Men's a lot of metaphors, it can stand for being gay, it can stand for being any kind of outsider, it can stand for being an immigrant. But I thought really what the ultimate metaphor in X-Men was about our children. And our children are mutants, and the things they do are scary, and ultimately they're here to replace us. No matter how much you love your children, you will die and they will take your place. And deep inside you know that, and that's what the X-Men are. You're all gonna die homo sapiens and you know the mutants, this homo superior will take your place. So I felt that because of that, it needed that kind of forward looking frame.
But Batman was different, I came to Batman with all these archives and I thought how can I make this all into one story because the one story is actually a really interesting development of Batman as a character, you know, how he starts out as this young angry vigilante, then he meets this little working class carnie kid who cheers him up a little. And it's like the emotionally frozen Bruce Wayne whose parents were killed when he was ten years old suddenly meets a twelve year old kid whose his best friend, because he's a kid. You know, but this kid laughs, he's had two parents shot dead and fallen into the sawdust, but he just starts laughing and gets on with it. So suddenly with the Batman stories, it all made sense. It's here's what would happen to an emotionally armoured twenty year old introvert who meets this crazy kid whose like "let's go do it! Let's kick the Joker's arse! Let's have a laugh!" and suddenly Batman's smiling all the time.
Looking at all those stories and watching the development of Batman, and then Robin leaves him and he moves into a penthouse in the city and starts shagging girls and stuff in the 60s and 70s [laughs]. It was actually like the biography of a person, and what that would do to him, and seeing you know how everything then goes wrong in the 90s, and those stories where Batgirl's getting crippled and the Joker's a psychopath again. And thinking, that's the real great story about Batman, |
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JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, White House spokesperson Sarah Sanders responded to the allegations against Trump during Monday’s press briefing. This is what she said.
PRESS SECRETARY SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS: As the president said himself, he thinks it’s a good thing that women are coming forward. But he also feels strongly that a mere allegation shouldn’t determine the course. And in this case, the president has denied any of these allegations, as have eyewitnesses. And several reports have shown those eyewitnesses also back up the president’s claim in this process. And again, the American people knew this and voted for the president, and we feel like we’re ready to move forward in that process.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Samantha, your response to Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ statement? Also, you initially raised these allegations, as did many of the women, last year during the campaign. What’s the change now, the decision now to come to this press conference yesterday?
SAMANTHA HOLVEY: You know, it was a tough decision to come back out, because I did get a lot of backlash last year when I spoke out, and so I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go through all of that again. But when the—the idea was that all of us would come together, that all 16 women would come together, and seeing us as a group, seeing us there supporting each other, as well as telling our stories, there’s power in numbers. And that’s what I was just hoping, that maybe this year it would be different, since the climate is different.
AMY GOODMAN: Yesterday, I went to the news conference, Samantha. You were there, along with Jessica Leeds, a woman who says Donald Trump attacked her, sitting next to her in first class in a plane, groping her, until she got up and left. And this is Rachel Crooks, who also spoke at the news conference with you, who said Trump forcibly kissed her, against her will, in 2005.
RACHEL CROOKS: About 12 years ago, as a young receptionist in Trump Tower, I was forcibly kissed by Mr. Trump during our first introduction. Mr. Trump repeatedly kissed my cheeks, and ultimately my lips, in an encounter that has since impacted my life well beyond the initial occurrence, in feelings of self-doubt and insignificance I had.
Unfortunately, given Mr. Trump’s notoriety and the fact that he was a partner of my employers, not to mention the owner of the building, I felt there was nothing I could do. Given this hostile work environment, my only solution at the time was to simply avoid additional encounters with him.
I do realize that, in the grand scheme of things, there are far worse cases of sexual harassment, misconduct and assault. But make no mistake: There is no acceptable level of such behavior.
That some men think they can use their power, position or notoriety to demean and attack women speaks to their character, not ours, which, believe me, is a tough lesson learned. In my case, I only felt the redemption of knowing it was not my own flaws to blame, when I read the account of Temple Taggart, whose story had so mirrored my own that I finally felt absolved of the guilt that I had somehow projected an image that made me an easy target. Instead, this was serial misconduct and perversion on the part of Mr. Trump.
AMY GOODMAN: Rachel Crooks. Now, Donald Trump has just fired back this morning on tweet. Five senators have called for him to resign. He fired back at New York Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, after she joined the four other senators and at least 56 lawmakers in the House who have called for a congressional investigation into the sexual misconduct accusations against him. This morning, Trump tweeted, “Lightweight Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a total flunky for Chuck Schumer and someone who would come to my office 'begging' for campaign contributions not so long ago (and would do anything for them), is now in the ring fighting against Trump. Very disloyal to Bill & Crooked-USED!”
I want to bring—I want to bring Cecile Richards into this conversation, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, CEO of the organization, as well. As you listen to Samantha and Rachel, some of the 16 women who have accused Donald Trump, and then see what he is tweeting today, attacking the senators, particularly the female senator, of the five—
CECILE RICHARDS: Correct.
AMY GOODMAN: —who are calling for him to resign, with sexual innuendo in his tweet, your thoughts?
CECILE RICHARDS: Well, first, I just think Samantha is extraordinarily brave, and the other 15 women, because you can see now why women don’t come forward. I think, obviously, it’s time for an investigation of Donald Trump. And the fact that he is in fact going after women, I think, is going to embolden women. I mean, you know, as difficult as this is to experience, the outpouring of women now supporting each other and telling their stories is like nothing I’ve ever seen in my lifetime, including women that we see at Planned Parenthood.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And the impacts across the spectrum in terms of Washington itself, in terms of lawmakers now, as more and more calls for investigations of individual lawmakers are occurring.
CECILE RICHARDS: Right. Well, I think this is—I mean, the story that Amy refers to this morning of now women in Congress finally saying, who have been—you know, have basically suffered this kind of treatment for their entire careers, are now saying it’s time to investigate this, and holding people to a standard, is incredibly important. I don’t think any of us saw this happening. And ironically, I believe the president is actually encouraging more women to now stand up and come forward, particularly—and I’m sorry that he said this about Samantha—the fact that he’s actually saying that he doesn’t even know who these women are, trying to essentially erase them in every way. And it’s because women are saying “Enough” and standing with each other that I think we’re going to see change.Rajon Rondo needed just a half a game to record 15 assists and extended his streak of games in which he recorded double digit assists to 24. Doing so secured his place at the top of the assists leaderboard for the year. He finished with an 11.7 per game average, beating out Steve Nash who finished with 10.7 per game. Last year Nash beat out Rondo with 11.4 to Rajon's 11.2.
Rondo becomes the first Celtic to lead the league in assists since the great Bob Cousy did it in 1959-60.
I'm very proud of our young star point guard. He's always had the talent to do this but he seems to have found out the key to producing on a consistent basis, which is the key to taking that next step.
More on Rondo's accomplishment.
Rajon Rondo's 11.7 apg most in NBA since John Stockton 12.3 in 94-95. Both Nash, Paul had 11.6 in last 6 years, so, yes,15 had significance. — Scott Souza (@scott_souza) April 27, 2012
And now for the playoffs,...where Rondo really shines. Giddyup.One of the country’s largest health insurers warned Thursday that it may leave the ObamaCare exchanges within two years, delivering a shock announcement that could ripple through the marketplace.
At a shareholder meeting Thursday, UnitedHealthcare cast doubt on its ability to carry plans on the healthcare law’s exchanges beyond 2016, offering a more grim financial outlook than it had previously expected.
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“In recent weeks, growth expectations for individual exchange participation have tempered industrywide," said Stephen Hemsley, the company's CEO.
"Co-operatives have failed, and market data has signaled higher risks and more difficulties while our own claims experience has deteriorated, so we are taking this proactive step,” he said.
The company's statement said it will be “evaluating the viability of the insurance exchange product segment and will determine during the first half of 2016 to what extent it can continue to serve the public exchange markets in 2017.”
It also projected that its fourth-quarter revenue will be $425 million less than expected — amounting to 26 cents in earnings per share.
The company also announced it has “pulled back” on marketing plans for 2016.
Hemsley's mention of the ObamaCare co-operatives, or co-ops, refers to the half-dozen startup insurers that have collapsed in the past few weeks.
Opponents of the healthcare law have seized on the closure of the co-op insurers, which were intended to increase competition, and highlighted the troubles in hearings on Capitol Hill.
Fewer than half of the original 23 co-ops are still running, and only a handful are on solid financial footing.Hockey players are fierce competitors. Warriors. But off the ice, we share a special bond that only those who played in the NHL can understand. This bond is even deeper among those who played the role of enforcers — their livelihoods dependent on fighting and protecting their teammates.
Last week, another one of our brothers passed away many years too early. Todd Ewen, a retired NHL enforcer like me, committed suicide, a victim of severe depression that haunted him for years. In the last five years, at least five other NHL alumni have died under similar circumstances.
Illnesses like depression have become a plague among retired NHL players who endured years of violent head trauma. These repeated blows have left hidden scars on many of us — and a growing number find that they are unable to cope with the damage. The most tragic part is that many of these lives could have been saved if the NHL had warned us that that the concussions sustained on the ice could lead to long-term damage — a fact they continue to deny to this day.
We trusted the NHL to protect us. We signed up to play hockey knowing that we might get injured and dinged, but we certainly did not sign up for avoidable brain damage and long-term disabilities. The league was responsible for informing us of the long-term neurological problems we might experience after suffering from concussive and sub-concussive injuries while playing professional hockey. However, league officials failed to comply with this duty, and instead encouraged and glorified fist-fighting and violence to advance its own financial interests — at the high price of player health.
During my 10 seasons with the NHL, I sustained a countless number of head injuries. But I am one of the lucky ones: despite suffering from severe depression, insomnia, dizziness and continuous seizures, I have learned to deal with these symptoms — although some days are better than others. On my worst days, I have trouble remembering the names of my friends and family, and I struggle to find the proper words to finish each sentence. This leaves me frustrated and embarrassed. And in fighting these physical and mental demons, I sometimes feel the need to isolate myself from my closest family and friends.
But despite all that, I feel lucky to be able to help other former players who come to me for advice on how to manage their similar symptoms and conditions. My fellow retired players tell me they do not know where else to turn and, although I do my best to help them, I am not a medical professional. They desperately need proper medical care, but many cannot afford it.
It is distressing to watch my former colleagues and friends suffer from these terrible symptoms, and it is infuriating that this situation could have been avoided if the league had stepped up and given us all the appropriate information while playing, and the care we needed after retiring from professional hockey.
The NHL has had years to significantly change its policies to protect players from the long-term risks of head trauma, as well as to provide care for retired players suffering from its consequences.
I joined the concussion lawsuit against the league because I, along with many other alumni, fear what our future holds. Today, I participate in one more fight to finally hold the league accountable and ensure retired NHL players receive the care and support they deserve.
Mike Peluso played 10 seasons in the National Hockey League for the Chicago Blackhawks, Ottawa Senators, St. Louis Blues, Calgary Flames and New Jersey Devils, including the 1995 Stanley Cup team. He lives in St. Paul, Minn.Google is inviting 100,000 testers to preview its hippie-on-stilts communications platform - Wave - from today.
Mountain View has extended its testing pool in preparation for pushing Wave out to many more users at some point soon. For now, though, Google isn’t revealing when the platform will be pumped out to the mainstream.
Instead it’s simply repeating the fact that Wave “isn’t quite ready for prime time”.
The company unveiled its new-age web platform at its I/O developer love-in back in May this year.
Wave crossbreeds email with IM and document sharing, and exhibits a particular talent for near real-time interaction.
In order to plump up usage of the platform, Google has already declared its intentions to open source Wave's underlying protocol as well as a big heap of its client and server code.
Following the project’s launch, Google pointed out in a blog post yesterday that wrinkles still needed to be ironed out of Wave before the platform is made available to everyone.
Google’s engineering manager Lars Rasmussen and group product manager Stephanie Hannon said its developers had been working on scalability, stability, speed and usability over the past few months.
“Yet, you will still experience the occasional downtime, a crash every now and then, part of the system being a bit sluggish and some of the user interface being, well, quirky,” they said.
Meanwhile, Wave is still missing a few key features such as draft mode, user permissions configuration and group definitions. All pretty integral stuff, you might agree, for a platform that isn’t dressed in orange and chanting with drums and cymbals quite yet.
Rasmussen and Hannon noted that all of those features are expected to be added to Wave over the next few months, but again was unable to be any more specific with its roadmap.
Separately, Hannon wrote on a blog post for developers that Google was mulling ways of making money from a wave extension store, presumably in the mould of Apple's Apps store.
"To help foster a strong developer ecosystem, we're exploring plans for a monetisable wave extension store," she said. ®Credit: Simon Cooper for Sight & Sound
To many of you it’s probably a familiar story. Every ten years, from 1952 onwards, Sight & Sound has conducted a worldwide poll of critics in order to decide which films are currently regarded as the greatest ever made. (Vittorio De Sica’s neorealist parable Bicycle Thieves won the first iteration only four years after it was shot. Famously, Citizen Kane has won ever since.) We’re proud that the longevity of this poll means that it’s widely regarded as the most trusted guide there is to the canon of cinema greats.
About a year ago, the S&S team met to consider how we could best approach the poll this time. Given the dominance of electronic media, what became immediately apparent was that we would have to abandon the somewhat elitist exclusivity with which contributors to the poll had been chosen in the past and reach out to a much wider international group of commentators. We were also keen to include many critics who had established their careers online rather than purely in print.
To that end we approached more than 1,000 critics, programmers, academics, distributors, writers and other cinephiles, and received (in time for the deadline) precisely 846 top-ten lists that between them mention a total of 2,045 different films.
As a qualification of what ‘greatest’ means, our invitation letter stated, “We leave that open to your interpretation. You might choose the ten films you feel are most important to film history, or the ten that represent the aesthetic pinnacles of achievement, or indeed the ten films that have had the biggest impact on your own view of cinema.”
Each entry on each list counts as one vote for the film in question, so personal rankings within the top tens don’t matter. And one important rule change compared to 2002 was that The Godfather and The Godfather Part II would no longer be accepted as a single choice, since they were made as two separate films.
What the increase in numbers has – and hasn’t – done is surprising, but we’ve certainly achieved a consensus on what represents ‘great cinema’ that now has a greater force of numbers behind it.
Since 1992, we have also conducted a separate directors’ poll, likewise dominated by Citizen Kane through 1992 and 2002. Over 350 directors have contributed. Leaving to one side what’s number one this time, I can say that you’ll find a pronounced difference between the filmmakers’ top tens and those of the critics – not to mention many more fascinating sub-themes…Bill O’Reilly’s ratings at Fox News were up last week as news that he paid $13 million to five women who accused him of sexual harassment and improper conduct made headlines.
“The O’Reilly Factor” averaged more than 3.7 million total viewers and 652,000 in the key 25–54 demographic last week.
When compared to the same week in 2016, O'Reilly's prime-time program was up 28 percent in total viewers and 42 percent in the key demographic that advertisers covet most, according to Nielsen Research.
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O'Reilly was also the top-rated basic cable show on Friday in both total viewers, with 3.8 million, and in the 25–54 demographic, with 759,000 viewers. Those numbers also beat NBC’s “First Date” and Fox’s “Rosewood” on broadcast television.
The positive Nielsen numbers come as 21st Century Fox, the parent company of Fox News, confirmed Sunday it will investigate a sexual harassment claim against the 67-year-old host.
The investigation follows a complaint by Wendy Walsh, a former periodic guest on “The O'Reilly Factor,” who phoned in a complaint to the network's workplace misconduct hotline last week. Walsh's complaint was recorded with her lawyer, former NBC contributor Lisa Bloom, and posted on YouTube.
“21st Century Fox investigates all complaints and we have asked the law firm Paul Weiss to continue assisting the company in these serious matters,” the company said in a statement.
Paul Weiss is the same law firm hired by 21st Century Fox to look into sexual harassment claims against former Fox News Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes following a lawsuit filed by former host Gretchen Carlson.
Ailes would resign just days after Paul Weiss launched its investigation.
More than 60 advertisers have pulled their advertisements from O'Reilly's program. The network indicated last week that ads have been shifted to other programs on the network.
Overall for the week of April 3 to 7, Fox News placed five programs in the basic cable top 10 ratings rankings for total viewers, with “The O'Reilly Factor,” “Hannity,” “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” “The Five” and “Special Report with Bret Baier” making the cut.
MSNBC's “Rachel Maddow Show” was the only other cable news program to qualify for the top 10, coming in ninth.April Fool's Day Atrocities
The Top 10 Worst April Fool's Day Hoaxes Ever
The Museum's list of the The Museum's list of the Top 100 April Fool's Day jokes celebrates the best of April 1st. But sometimes April 1st inspires attempts at humor that don't turn out so well. Some attempts are, in fact, truly awful. That's what this list explores.
#1: Hijinks of Hussein and Son Saddam Hussein and his sons may have been ruthless, power-hungry dictators, but that didn't stop them from trying to give the people of Iraq a good chuckle every April Fool's Day. On April 1, 1998 the Babil newspaper, owned by Hussein's son Uday, informed its readers that President Clinton had decided to lift sanctions against Iraq, only to admit later that it was just joking. One can imagine the knee-slapping guffaws when readers realized how they'd been taken for a ride. The laughs continued in 1999 when Uday mischeviously announced that the monthly food rations would be supplemented to include bananas, Pepsi, and chocolate. Again, just a joke. At this point, the Husseins appear to have run out of material, because in 2000 they recycled the sanction-lifting gag, and in 2001 trotted out the ration-supplement crowd-pleaser one more time. The merciless quality with which the same joke was repeated year after year had an almost surreal quality to it. In fact, it almost makes one sympathize with Saudi Arabia's chief cleric, the Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah Al al-Sheikh, who in 2001 decreed that the celebration of April Fool's Day should be banned altogether. It's not known if the Sheikh had his neighbor's hijinks in mind when he issued the ban. Saddam Hussein and his sons may have been ruthless, power-hungry dictators, but that didn't stop them from trying to give the people of Iraq a good chuckle every April Fool's Day. On April 1, 1998 thenewspaper, owned by Hussein's son Uday, informed its readers that President Clinton had decided to lift sanctions against Iraq, only to admit later that it was just joking. One can imagine the knee-slapping guffaws when readers realized how they'd been taken for a ride. The laughs continued in 1999 when Uday mischeviously announced that the monthly food rations would be supplemented to include bananas, Pepsi, and chocolate. Again, just a joke. At this point, the Husseins appear to have run out of material, because in 2000 they recycled the sanction-lifting gag, and in 2001 trotted out the ration-supplement crowd-pleaser one more time. The merciless quality with which the same joke was repeated year after year had an almost surreal quality to it. In fact, it almost makes one sympathize with Saudi Arabia's chief cleric, the Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah Al al-Sheikh, who in 2001 decreed that the celebration of April Fool's Day should be banned altogether. It's not known if the Sheikh had his neighbor's hijinks in mind when he issued the ban.
#2: Releasing The Prisoners Imagine reading that your husband or brother who has been held in a squalid Romanian prison for years is finally going to be released. You make the long journey to the prison and stand outside the prison gates, waiting desperately for the moment you'll be reunited with your loved one, only to hear... 'April Fools! No one's being released!' This experience happened to sixty people in April 2000 who read in the Opinia newspaper that their loved ones were going to be released from the Baia Mare prison in Romania. They made the long journey to the prison, only to learn that the paper had played an April Fool's joke on them. The Opinia later published an apology. Imagine reading that your husband or brother who has been held in a squalid Romanian prison for years is finally going to be released. You make the long journey to the prison and stand outside the prison gates, waiting desperately for the moment you'll be reunited with your loved one, only to hear... 'April Fools! No one's being released!' This experience happened to sixty people in April 2000 who read in thenewspaper that their loved ones were going to be released from the Baia Mare prison in Romania. They made the long journey to the prison, only to learn that the paper had played an April Fool's joke on them. Thelater published an apology.
#3: The Phony Deadline Glenn Howlett's colleagues at London city hall thought they had dreamed up a great gag. They sent him a memo informing him that the really big report he was working on was going to be due early, in just two weeks. The tip-off was that the memo was dated April 1st. Ha Ha. Except Howlett didn't realize it was a joke. He received the memo while on vacation and immediately cut his vacation short and phoned the office to tell everyone to start getting busy. But as he contemplated the new deadline he worked himself up into an increasing state of panic, until soon he began to experience heart palpitations. Finally he collapsed from the stress and had to take leave from work. As he was recovering he realized it just wasn't worth risking his health to finish the report, so he filed for early retirement. At which point someone told him the early deadline was just a joke. He responded by suing for damages. As a consequence of his lawsuit, city hall banned employees from pulling any more pranks. Glenn Howlett's colleagues at London city hall thought they had dreamed up a great gag. They sent him a memo informing him that the really big report he was working on was going to be due early, in just two weeks. The tip-off was that the memo was dated April 1st. Ha Ha. Except Howlett didn't realize it was a joke. He received the memo while on vacation and immediately cut his vacation short and phoned the office to tell everyone to start getting busy. But as he contemplated the new deadline he worked himself up into an increasing state of panic, until soon he began to experience heart palpitations. Finally he collapsed from the stress and had to take leave from work. As he was recovering he realized it just wasn't worth risking his health to finish the report, so he filed for early retirement. At which point someone told him the early deadline was just a joke. He responded by suing for damages. As a consequence of his lawsuit, city hall banned employees from pulling any more pranks.
#4: The Dead Dog The film National Lampoon's Vacation includes a scene in which Chevy Chase ties a dog to the bumper of his car, then forgets the dog is there and drives away. Inspired by this scene, Paul Goobie tied a dead chihuahua to the bumper of his co-worker's car. His co-worker, Kevin Meloy, got in the car and drove off, unaware that the chihuahua was there. Obviously passing motorists were horrified. But what made the situation even worse was that Meloy was deaf, so he couldn't hear the other motorists frantically honking at him. Happily he drove on for miles until finally someone was able to get his attention. Police charged Goobie with unlawful disposal of a dead animal. The filmincludes a scene in which Chevy Chase ties a dog to the bumper of his car, then forgets the dog is there and drives away. Inspired by this scene, Paul Goobie tied a dead chihuahua to the bumper of his co-worker's car. His co-worker, Kevin Meloy, got in the car and drove off, unaware that the chihuahua was there. Obviously passing motorists were horrified. But what made the situation even worse was that Meloy was deaf, so he couldn't hear the other motorists frantically honking at him. Happily he drove on for miles until finally someone was able to get his attention. Police charged Goobie with unlawful disposal of a dead animal.
#5: A Fake Hanging Randy Wood's marriage was over, but apparently he was still a little bitter about the divorce. So he decided to play a prank on his ex-wife. He called her up and asked her to come over, telling her that he had something to show her. Obligingly she drove over, only to find him hanging by a noose from a tree in his front yard. Terrifed, she immediately dialed 911. Emergency services, including firefighters, policemen, and paramedics, soon showed up. But when they went to cut Wood down they discovered he wasn't dead. He wasn't even hurt. He had strung himself up as a prank to scare his ex-wife, using a lineman's harness similar to those used by utility crews. The authorities warned that he would face a fine of up to $1,000 and a year in jail for his prank. Randy Wood's marriage was over, but apparently he was still a little bitter about the divorce. So he decided to play a prank on his ex-wife. He called her up and asked her to come over, telling her that he had something to show her. Obligingly she drove over, only to find him hanging by a noose from a tree in his front yard. Terrifed, she immediately dialed 911. Emergency services, including firefighters, policemen, and paramedics, soon showed up. But when they went to cut Wood down they discovered he wasn't dead. He wasn't even hurt. He had strung himself up as a prank to scare his ex-wife, using a lineman's harness similar to those used by utility crews. The authorities warned that he would face a fine of up to $1,000 and a year in jail for his prank.
#6: A Fake Robbery Sitra Walker was an employee at a clothing store in Columbus, Ohio. She had only been working there for two weeks, but already she felt that she knew the manager well enough to joke around with him. So on April 1, 2003 she called him up at his home and told him that armed men were robbing the store. The manager immediately called the police, who promptly dispatched four cruisers. Minutes later Walker phoned the manager again and screamed 'April Fools'. Too late. When the police arrived moments later they weren't amused and charged her with inducing a panic. Walker's manager fired her. Sitra Walker was an employee at a clothing store in Columbus, Ohio. She had only been working there for two weeks, but already she felt that she knew the manager well enough to joke around with him. So on April 1, 2003 she called him up at his home and told him that armed men were robbing the store. The manager immediately called the police, who promptly dispatched four cruisers. Minutes later Walker phoned the manager again and screamed 'April Fools'. Too late. When the police arrived moments later they weren't amused and charged her with inducing a panic. Walker's manager fired her.
#7: Revival of the Warsaw Pact In 1996 the Russian news agency Itar-Tass reported that the Russian parliament was debating whether to revive the Warsaw Pact. The startling report was immediately repeated by news agencies in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria, causing widespread panic. A few hours later Itar-Tass admitted that it had just been joking, and apologized for any confusion it might have caused. In 1996 the Russian news agency Itar-Tass reported that the Russian parliament was debating whether to revive the Warsaw Pact. The startling report was immediately repeated by news agencies in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria, causing widespread panic. A few hours later Itar-Tass admitted that it had just been joking, and apologized for any confusion it might have caused.
#8: Fake Death Report In 1986 Israel Radio broadcast that Nabih Berri, leader of the Shi'ite Amal movement, had been assassinated. The news caused an immediate flare-up of tensions in the region. However, Israeli officials quickly denounced the report as a hoax. The false report was traced back to an army intelligence officer who had planted the news item in the broadcasts of the Israeli Army's intelligence monitoring unit, from which it had been picked up by Israel Radio. Apparently the officer had meant it as an April Fool's joke (because hey, nothing says funny like stirring up tension in the Middle-East). Israel's Defence Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, announced that the unnamed officer would be court-martialed. "Berri Berri funny," one foreign correspondent wryly commented.
In the category of'really bad fake death reports' one must also note the time in 1998 when Boston DJ's Opie and Anthony announced that the mayor of Boston, Tom Menino, had died in a car crash. Because City Hall couldn't immediately reach the Mayor to confirm that he was actually alive, many believed the report, including members of the Mayor's family. The next day Opie and Anthony were suspended without pay. In 1986 Israel Radio broadcast that Nabih Berri, leader of the Shi'ite Amal movement, had been assassinated. The news caused an immediate flare-up of tensions in the region. However, Israeli officials quickly denounced the report as a hoax. The false report was traced back to an army intelligence officer who had planted the news item in the broadcasts of the Israeli Army's intelligence monitoring unit, from which it had been picked up by Israel Radio. Apparently the officer had meant it as an April Fool's joke (because hey, nothing says funny like stirring up tension in the Middle-East). Israel's Defence Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, announced that the unnamed officer would be court-martialed. "Berri Berri funny," one foreign correspondent wryly commented.In the category of'really bad fake death reports' one must also note the time in 1998 when Boston DJ's Opie and Anthony announced that the mayor of Boston, Tom Menino, had died in a car crash. Because City Hall couldn't immediately reach the Mayor to confirm that he was actually alive, many believed the report, including members of the Mayor's family. The next day Opie and Anthony were suspended without pay.
#9: Fake Disaster Warnings In 1999 DJs at Oregon radio station KSJJ announced that the Ochoco dam had burst, threatening downstream areas with massive flooding. What made the warning believable was that hundreds of houses in these areas had been damaged the previous year when the Ochoco Creek had flooded, so terrified homeowners who heard the news quickly prepared to flee. Later the DJs informed their listeners that it was all a joke. They had just been 'having a little fun'. The homeowners were not amused.
In the same genre of non-funny disaster warnings, there's also WNOR's 1992 April 1st report in which it warned that a large build-up of methane gas was about to cause a fiery explosion at Mount Trashmore, a landfill near Virginia Beach. Residents were warned to evacuate the area, causing the local 911 to be flooded with calls. The DJs responsible for the prank were suspended without pay for two weeks. In 1999 DJs at Oregon radio station KSJJ announced that the Ochoco dam had burst, threatening downstream areas with massive flooding. What made the warning believable was that hundreds of houses in these areas had been damaged the previous year when the Ochoco Creek had flooded, so terrified homeowners who heard the news quickly prepared to flee. Later the DJs informed their listeners that it was all a joke. They had just been 'having a little fun'. The homeowners were not amused.In the same genre of non-funny disaster warnings, there's also WNOR's 1992 April 1st report in which it warned that a large build-up of methane gas was about to cause a fiery explosion at Mount Trashmore, a landfill near Virginia Beach. Residents were warned to evacuate the area, causing the local 911 to be flooded with calls. The DJs responsible for the prank were suspended without pay for two weeks.As first reported by gerweck.net WWE has signed Australian wrestler Demi Bennett to a developmental contract with the company back in April. She has since been renamed to Rhea Ripley.
Demi was apart of the last set of Australian tryouts WWE had in Australia last December. She was scheduled to attend the tryout WWE held in Australia back in 2015 but was told she was too young to participate in it.
She wrestled her last match ever with her home promotion Riot City Wrestling back in April where successfully defended her RCW Women’s Championship against KellyAnne English, vacating the title afterwards.
In a evenly-matched, hot contest for the championship, Demi left nobody guessing as why she has been selected to show the world how good she is. Even with interference from Casey Johns, Demi walked away the winner.TREY: I don't think it's fair that I have to take this literature class. If I want to be a chemist, then literary analysis is pretty useless to me.
HOBO: You think literary analysis is useless?
TREY: Sure, you say a rock represents the oppressive life she's living, but maybe it's just a rock?
HOBO: Good point. Here, I use this rock as a paper weight. Science tells me if I drop this rock it will be because of gravity, correct?
TREY: Duh, but this isn't one of those things where you're going to try to prove or disprove God to me, is it?
HOBO: Not at all. So scientifically we know that dropping a rock results in it falling, and experience tells us if it hits someone it will hurt.
TREY: Duh, again.
HOBO: But science tells us nothing of why I dropped the rock.
TREY: Maybe the rock was too heavy? Maybe the rock is jagged and cut your hand? Maybe you're nervous and the sweating of your hand caused the rock to be too slippery to hold. I could go on, and all of this can be tested scientifically!
HOBO: True, but science wouldn't tell you it was a distraction and to check my other hand for another rock I'm about to beat you to death with. An understanding of humans would do that, and you learn that the hard way via rock, or the easy way by reading a story about it.OH HOOOONEY! Their names are Trixie and Katya, and they're here to make it clear. We know you love them baby, that's why we brought them here.... to SBS Viceland.
That's right, Rupaul's Drag Race royalty and stars of viral Youtube show UNHhhh, Trixie Mattel and Yekaterina Petrovna Zamolodchikova (but your Dad just calls her Katya) are heading to our screens with their new series The Trixie and Katya Show (fast tracked to SBS Viceland). And being the very kind queens they are, they took some time out of their enormously busy schedules to chat to us about it.
Being on the phone with Trixie and Katya is like sitting in on an episode of their show. Their unique, quickfire wit isn't scripted, it's just their natural dynamic - fast-paced to the point that, if you weren't laughing so much, you'd almost fear falling behind their wickedly funny eight ball. Luckily, they're also two of the nicest hell-dykes (Katya's term, not mine) you'll ever meet.
Trixie begins by explaining that a fundamental fact about The Trixie and Katya Show is that her name is first because it's a similar concept to Batman and Robin - the second name is always the sidekick. She continues by describing other similarities to Gotham's superheroes: "I have a very sculpted upper |
from states that Hillary Clinton won in 2016. And Heller is up for re-election next year. They have political and policy reasons to object to this legislation.
So let’s consider them two “no” votes. That means for the Senate bill to pass, McConnell needs all seven of the remaining critics of the legislation to back it. Right now, that looks very unlikely to happen.
Lisa Murkowski
While in Alaska last week, Murkowski suggested that she was being left in the dark about the legislative process by Senate Republican leaders. The Alaska senator also said that she, like Collins, is interested in working with Democrats on a bipartisan bill. Those are not great signs that she wants to work with McConnell on a revised version of a GOP-backed bill.
Ted Cruz, Mike Lee and Ron Johnson
We described last week a three-part plan for Republicans to pass the bill through the Senate: loosen some of the insurance requirements, as conservatives want; reduce the cuts to Medicaid and add money to fight the opioid crisis, as some moderates have urged; and appeal to party loyalty to get other reluctant Republicans behind the legislation.
Cruz is touting a proposal that would let insurers sell plans that do not include all the essential benefits mandated under Obamacare, as long as those insurers sell some plans that do include these benefits. (Health care experts say this approach is likely to result in cheaper plans for healthier people and much more expensive coverage for people who already have health problems.) Lee’s spokesman has said that the Utah senator will back McConnell’s bill if this provision is included. Johnson has said little publicly since his initial opposition, but he has allied himself with Cruz and Lee in this process and seems likely to back the bill with this change as well. (An op-ed that Johnson wrote in The New York Times echoes some of the general ideas of the Cruz proposal.)
It’s safe to assume that Cruz also would support the bill if this provision were included.
So that’s good news for McConnell: The conservative bloc could be placated.
Here’s the bad news: The conservative bloc may be becoming insistent on this particular provision. Lee’s spokesman told Axios that the senator would back the Senate bill only if this provision were added. Cruz has hinted that he has a similar view. Such absolutism is problematic for McConnell, who probably needs senators to stay flexible on the exact language of the bill.
But the bigger problem with the Cruz proposal is …
Shelley Moore Capito
Capito told the Charleston Gazette-Mail’s Jake Zuckerman that she opposes the Cruz proposal. She said it undermines protections for people with pre-existing conditions, who might be unable to afford premiums under the system that Cruz proposes.
This is significant. Typically, a change in a bill that would bring in three votes would be worth turning off one senator. But remember — if Collins and Heller are already against this legislation, McConnell can’t afford any more “no” votes. So if the Cruz proposal takes away Capito’s vote, McConnell probably can’t add it to the bill. This may explain why McConnell has not publicly committed to including the Cruz provision in the legislation.
Capito also suggested that she thinks the legislation cuts Medicaid too deeply.
And there’s another problem with getting Capito’s vote: her public vagueness. Cruz and Lee are being specific. They have discussed policy changes that they want to see in the bill and have laid those out in public. If the Cruz provision is in the bill, Lee has essentially committed publicly to voting for it.
In contrast, Capito’s concerns are more vaguely defined (at least publicly — she might have handed McConnell a detailed, specific list in private). It’s difficult to know whether she opposes the $772 billion in Medicaid cuts, compared to funding under existing law, that the Congressional Budget Office says is one outcome of the McConnell draft bill, but would be fine with $400 billion or $200 billion.
Rob Portman
Portman has allied himself with Capito in pushing for more funding to fight the opioid crisis and fewer cuts to Medicaid. He has been quieter about his views about the bill recently, but there is no indication yet that he will back it or that he has a list of specific changes that he wants.
Rand Paul
Paul has been as critical of the McConnell draft as Collins and Heller, but his criticism comes from the right. There is no indication that he thinks the Cruz provision will address his core argument, that the outlines of Obamacare will remain law if any version of the McConnell draft passes. He blasted the legislation on the Fox Business network last week.
I didn’t include him in the “no” group with Collins and Heller only because Paul has political incentives to back this legislation: Trump won by 30 percentage points in Kentucky.
A lot of news coverage over the last week has focused on comments from Republican senators like Chuck Grassley of Iowa and John McCain of Arizona that downplayed the likelihood of the bill’s passage. I don’t put much stock in these senators essentially playing pundit. Neither has laid out a deep, substantive critique of the bill’s contents, and I assume both would back it in a formal vote. I take their comments as lagging indicators of what I laid out above: Grassley and McCain can count votes the same way you and I can, and they see that the bill is well short of the support it needs.
There is likely to be a lot of news coverage the next few weeks that focuses on McConnell’s legislative skills or Trump’s strategy on health care. I would discount much of that. The fundamental question is whether at least seven of these nine Republican senators will accept a bill that is either more conservative or less conservative than they would like.
So far, these nine aren’t sounding like they will accept many compromises.Perhaps Steeltown is finally ready to put our Toronto rivalry behind us.
Tom Wynne and his partner have been toying with the idea of buying a house in still-reasonable Hamilton, and figured the bus trip would be a perfect opportunity to get a behind-the-scenes tour.
"Hamilton represents sort of this dream of accessible home ownership — it's impossible in Toronto," Wynne said.
But the event also drew people just looking to expand their GTA horizons for a day.
"I was very surprised. I think there's a lot more charm and character and forward-thinking than I had maybe expected," said tourist Hannah Iland.
McMaster grad Sira Vijenthira — who now lives in Toronto — used the road trip as an excuse to revisit her old stomping grounds.
As a university student, she lived mostly in the 'Mac bubble' of West Hamilton, venturing downtown now and again for special events or volunteer stints.
While she said the school did make some effort to introduce students to other areas of the city, she said "it was easy to get really busy focused on the day-to-day of being a student."
She was happy to revisit old haunts and was pleasantly surprised by some new discoveries — including the Windemere Basin wetlands and the newly-pedestrianized Gore Park.
The best part of the tour, she said, was the access to those personally involved in the city's revitalization.
"Even as a resident you don't get access to the people we did on this tour," she said.
Guides included local architect Graham McNally, activist Peter Hopperton, the city's urban renewal manager Glen Norton and transportation manager Peter Topalovic.
Topalovic said he was thrilled to spend the day talking about Hamilton's urban spaces and rich history: "people are genuinely interested, I've been pleasantly surprised…it's been fun."
Tour highlights included Webster's and Albion Falls, Van Wagner's Beach and artsy James Street North, before wrapping up down at the harbourfront.
mhayes@thespec.com
905-526-3214 | @MollyatTheSpecHaven't yet signed up for the MTG Arena Closed Beta, or interested in seeing how the next digital Magic game is progressing? Click here to learn more!
Welcome back to Play Design. For the last article of the year before the holiday break, and in honor of Magic: The Gathering Arena moving into the Closed Beta phase, this week I'm going to talk about how digital Magic—including MTG Arena and Magic Online—affects how we design and develop cards.
These days, Magic R&D works closely with both the MTG Arena and Magic Online devs and lets them know of any new mechanics that might require new code or extra development time, or anything else unusual coming up. The reason for this is that the Magic rules are very complex, and sometimes cards either need to be changed or require extra work and time. However, this has not always been the case.
Years ago, R&D didn't work with digital much at all. They just made their sets and then would ship them off to the Magic Online dev team when they were finished. R&D didn't know it at the time, but this process sometimes caused nightmares for the MTGO developers. Many of the issues players experienced with Magic Online back in the day started because of this significant process issue. Some cards were very difficult to code, some new cards caused bugs with existing cards, and all of this was done under deadlines that were very hard on the team. The nail in the coffin was a Born of the Gods card, Whims of the Fates.
Whims of the Fates did something that no Magic card had ever done before it: separate cards into three piles. Two piles had been done plenty of times, but Magic Online had never had a card that split cards into three piles. When the dev team started coding the set at their normal start time, this one card caused a ton of extra work. After the set was released on MTGO, R&D received feedback from the dev team about Whims of the Fates and the issues it caused. The funny thing about it was that Whims of the Fates was nothing more than a casual card, not aimed at competitive play and not a strong Limited card. Its effect could have easily been changed to something else.
After the Whims of the Fates issue, Magic R&D began working with the digital team much earlier in the process. They even hired a team of people known as "Magic Online R&D," whose job was to recommend digital implementations for cards and mechanics. Allison Medwin is our Magic Online and MTG Arena liaison, and she works with both digital teams daily and reports back to the design teams about any cards or mechanics that may cause issues in digital.
Play Design's Input
R&D has been working with the MTG Arena team closely since they started development. We've developed a system and a list of dos and don'ts when designing cards with digital in mind. Since the Play Design team develops cards for Limited and Standard, the most popular formats on MTGO, we always have to think about how things affect digital when making changes to cards. Here are some things we consider.
Click Counts
If you are a MTGO player and have been drafting Iconic Masters, you may have recently played a card with suspend. I bet you've never thought about everything you have to do to play that card. Add mana, click on the card, click to put the trigger on the stack every turn, click to resolve the trigger, click to remove the final counter, and finally click to cast the card. All that just to play a Search for Tomorrow. Each card requiring a high number of clicks increases gameplay time, causes confusion, and overall makes the game less fun to play.
Now consider what it takes to play a suspend card in paper. Tap lands, put the card on the table, put a die or coins on the card, move die or a coin each turn, resolve the spell. We are taking fewer physical actions and spending less time to play this card in paper, and that's something we take for granted when we think about how we play it in a digital platform. As members of the Play Design team, when we look through our card files and playtest in Future Future League, we think about ways cards can reduce clicks and make gameplay more enjoyable in digital.
Reducing Unnecessary Targeting
There are a number of things we look for to reduce click counts. One is reducing the amount of targeting when possible. One card that is harder to play in digital Magic than in paper is Blood Artist. Blood Artist's triggered ability targets any player. In paper, this trigger is easy to resolve. When a creature dies, you tell your opponent to lose 1 life. On MTGO, it's very unlikely that you'll want to target yourself with it, but MTGO will ask you to click on a player anyway. Compare that to Zulaport Cutthroat. These cards are functionally different, but in one-on-one paper Magic, you'd resolve this card the same way you'd resolve a Blood Artist—tell your opponent to lose 1 when a creature dies. However, in one-on-one digital Magic, there are a lot fewer clicks you have to go through to resolve a Zulaport Cutthroat trigger than that of a Blood Artist.
Reducing Triggered Abilities
I've talked about the templating of Adanto Vanguard in a previous article, and this template was the start of reducing unnecessary triggers to make digital Magic easier and more enjoyable to play. If Adanto Vanguard were worded as follows, "When Adanto Vanguard attacks, it gets +2/+0 until end of turn," this would cause a stop in digital Magic that both players must click through. Most of the time, players aren't going to respond to this trigger, so the card would slow down gameplay turn after turn. If the opponent does want to respond to the trigger, maybe with a Last Breath or another spell that you couldn't cast once the creature got the bonus, there are other opportunities to cast it, like in the beginning of combat step. Going forward, you'll see more creatures templated like this. Note that if the ability has a target, such as that of Battle-Rattle Shaman, we can't make the ability static.
Another example is the Amonkhet card Nest of Scarabs. Consider these two wordings:
Whenever you put one or more -1/-1 counters on a creature, create that many 1/1 black Insect creature tokens.
versus
Whenever you put a -1/-1 counter on a creature, create a 1/1 black Insect creature token.
Both of these templates function in the exact same way, but the second one causes a lot more separate triggers. In paper, these separate triggers are invisible to the players, but in digital, you're going to have to put each trigger on the stack and then resolve them all individually. For obvious reasons, we printed the card with the former wording, keeping digital in mind.
Another way we reduce triggers in Magic is by changing "you may" to "you must." If the ability is optional, it takes extra time to resolve. Not only do you have to choose yes or no, but if you don't want to use the ability, you still have to go through the motions by putting the ability on the stack and choosing targets, only to decline to use it, a problem that paper Magic doesn't have. "May" triggered abilities cause confusion for many players when playing in digital: "Why is it making me target? I don't even want to use it!"
While we consider the things I described above and much more, gameplay is more important to the Play Design team than making cards work better in digital. Although we consider our options, we don't always execute on them. I'm going to use Battle-Rattle Shaman as our example. It reads:
At the beginning of combat on your turn, you may have target creature get +2/+0 until end of turn.
If we were making this card again, the digital teams may have recommended that we remove "you may" from it. However, that makes gameplay with this card functionally different. With a forced target, if you cast this on an empty board, the Battle-Rattle Shaman will automatically become a 4/2 in combat. This opens it up to be killed by spells like Reprisal or Smite the Monstrous. If these cards were in the same Limited format together, it would mean that if you wanted to cast this on an empty board and your opponent had untapped mana, it would be correct to move past your combat step and cast this on your second main phase.
If Battle-Rattle wasn't a "may," you could have this scenario:
"Cast Battle-Rattle 2.0, go."
"End of turn, Smite the Monstrous it."
"But it's a 2/2."
"It triggered in combat."
"But..."
If we made this card a "must" trigger, players would be recommended to specifically announce their second main phase when casting the spell on an empty board, which wouldn't be an intuitive or natural line of play. We always look for ways to improve digital Magic, but we aren't going to make changes to cards that make gameplay worse.
MTG Arena just entered Closed Beta, and all readers of this column are encouraged to sign up. We want as many eyes on it as possible and are looking for all kinds of feedback. If you're not already in the Closed Beta, it's not too late. More information is available at this link. I'll be playing over the holiday break and I hope to see you there!
Thanks for reading and Happy Holidays.
See you in 2018,
Melissa DeTora
@MelissaDeToraOn Saturday, 19 March, the city’s ornamental fountains, the façade of City Hall and a number of monuments and emblematic buildings will be switching off the electricity from 8.30 pm to 9.30 pm as part of an initiative to combat climate change.
Barcelona City Council will be adhering to Earth Hour 2016 this Saturday by turning off lighting at the city’s ornamental fountains and some monuments and emblematic buildings, as well as the façade of City Hall, from 8.30 pm to 9.30 pm.
Earth Hour is a worldwide call initiated by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), encouraging cities, organisations and the general public to turn off electricity. This year’s campaign makes reference to the Paris agreement in December last year, when governments from around the world got together to try to combat climate change.
Earth Hour in Barcelona
The ornamental fountains to be switched off are in the city centre and operate until 9 pm. They are: the fountain at the junction between Pg. de Gràcia and Gran Via, the twin fountains in Pl. Catalunya, the fountain at the Francesc Macià monument in Pl. Catalunya, the Diana fountain at the junction between Gran Via and C/ Roger de Llúria, the fountain at the junction between Gran Via and Rbla. Catalunya and the Sis Putti fountain in Pl. Catalunya. Displays at the Magic Fountain in Montjuïc will not be affected as the last session of the day during the winter season is from 8 pm to 8.30 pm, when the fountain will be switched off along with the other ornamental fountains.
Apart from the façade at City Hall, lights will be switched off at the following buildings and monuments in the city: the Santa Maria del Mar basilica, the La Mercè church, the Pi church, the Columbus monument, the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA), the city wall in C/ Sotstinent Navarro, the Palau de la Virreina, Pl. Ramon Berenguer el Gran, the monument to Mossèn Cinto Verdaguer, the Sagrada Família, Montjuïc Castle, the light beams at the Palau Nacional, the Güell pavilions, the Sant Vicenç belltower, the clock in Pl. Vila de Gràcia, the monument to Anselm Clavé (Pg. Sant Joan), the sculpture of David and Goliath, the Park Güell (Turó de les Tres Creus), the Torre de la Llum, Can Fabra, the Tres Columnes del Litoral, the Abraham church, the Centre Moral i Cultural (C/ Pujades), the Formiga Martinenca (C/ Mallorca), the facades of all district offices, the Arc del Triomf, the Torre Baró and the Obelisc.Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, right, and Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas. The Associated Press
The new Palestinian unity government of Fatah and Hamas puts the lie to fundamental assumptions on which the U.S. approach to Israeli-Palestinian peace have long rested, most prominently within the Obama administration.
Washington has long assumed that a two-state solution is attainable, that “land for peace” is the formula for success, that the key remaining issue is final borders for a new “Palestine,” that the main obstacle is Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is the rare Palestinian leader who will make peace and deserves Israel’s support. With the terrorist group Hamas (which runs Gaza) now sharing power with Fatah, the ruling party of the Palestinian Authority (which runs the West Bank), the new Palestinian government undercuts all of these central assumptions.
Indeed, as this newly unified Palestinian leadership makes abundantly clear, the far more fundamental problem is broad Palestinian rejection of Israel to begin with and, with that, continuing Palestinian hopes of a new Palestine “from the [Jordan] River to the [Mediterranean] Sea.”
Almost certainly, apologists for the U.S. approach to Israeli-Palestinian peace-making, whether in the administration or outside it, will explain that the Fatah-Hamas agreement is something that it isn’t. They’ll tout the new government as a sign of Hamas’ moderation, or they’ll predict that a governing role will force Hamas to moderate its approach to Israel, or they’ll explain that Abbas’ willingness to team with Hamas proves his desire for a peace that includes both the West Bank and Gaza.
Don’t believe any of it.
Abbas, the former top aide to Palestinian terror mastermind Yasser Arafat, is now partnering with a terrorist group that remains dedicated to Israel’s destruction. That may surprise some U.S. officials, but it won’t surprise those who watch Abbas closely and track his activities in the West Bank. During his supposedly “moderate” presidency, Abbas has honored Israeli-killing Palestinian “martyrs” and “pioneers” – the latter of whom include Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Hajj Muhammad Amin Al-Husseini, who worked with Hitler during World War II and planned to adopt his “final solution” for the Middle East.
In addition, Abbas refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and promotes the “right of return” of all Palestinian refugees, which would end the majority-Jewish status of Israel. And for all his supposed eagerness to make peace, he consistently imposes preconditions on Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, whether a freeze on settlements or the release of more Palestinian murderers from Israeli prisons.
Nor, despite the theory of optimists, has the responsibility to govern moderated either the Palestinian Authority or Hamas. In the West Bank, according to the State Department’s latest annual human rights reports, the authority restricts the freedoms of speech, press and assembly, and it allows for abuses of women, children and people with disabilities. Meanwhile, Abbas, who was elected president in 2005, has subverted the democratic process as he continues to serve even though he was supposed to step down in 2009.
Nevertheless, the West Bank is a democratic paradise compared to Gaza under Hamas.
Founded in 1987 as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas won Palestinian parliamentary elections of 2006. Rather than operate within the system, however, it ousted the Palestinian Authority from Gaza in a violent coup a year later.
The Fatah-Hamas civil war not only left the Palestinian territories divided. It left Hamas free to pursue a strict Islamist state on its narrow strip of land on the Mediterranean, while harassing, jailing, torturing and killing its opponents.
Over the last seven years, Hamas has launched, or permitted other terrorist groups to launch, thousands of rockets into southern Israel, terrorizing the Israeli men, women and children of Sderot and elsewhere. In fact, the rockets continued to fly in recent days as Fatah and Hamas came together.
Now, Hamas plans to retain the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, its Gaza-based militia, leaving the terrorist group positioned to strike Israel. With Hamas sharing power and retaining its military, the Palestinian territories could come to resemble Lebanon, where Hezbollah shares power and operates militarily.
Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov famously cautioned, “A country that does not respect the rights of its own people will not respect the rights of its neighbors.” What was true of the former Soviet empire applies in spades to the new Palestinian unity government. It will not make peace with Israel, and neither borders nor settlements will change that reality.Thanksgiving, primarily celebrated in the United States and Canada, is traditionally a time for reuniting with friends and family and giving thanks for what we have. Here in Shenzhen, you don't have to be North American to use this day as an opportunity to bring your loved ones close and express your love and gratitude. Life and love are fleeting and Thanksgiving is just the time to enjoy it while we can.
We hope our 2017 Ultimate Guide to Thanksgiving will help enjoy this holiday to its fullest; whether you're alone, going out the friends and family, or preparing your feast at home.
We'll continue to add more Thanksgiving offers, events and activities here as we receive them so check back often.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving! Gobble, Gobble.
Where to Go For Thanksgiving Dinner
Every year, Promised Land (a local charity taking care of mentally disabled children) hosts a Thanksgiving Dinner to raise funds for their next year of activities. This is Promised Land's 7th Annual Thanksgiving Event and this year they're working towards a major expansion. A 5,000,000rmb renovation expansion to be exact. Promised Land is expanding to take their entire building. This will enable them to accept the younger kids ages 2 - 6 and more adolescents/adults who contact them weekly. You can help them achieve their goal buy guy a ticket to their Thanksgiving event for just 100 RMB. For more information, please call Corrinne at 13603081550.
Enjoy a Traditional Thanksgiving Dinner November 23rd from 5-9pm at X-TA-SEA. Their all you can eat buffet is just 198RMB for adults or 58 RMB for children under 120cm; Children Under 3 FREE. Mixed Drinks, Beer, Soft Drinks, Juice, Breezers and Coffee are 50% OFF from 3-9pm as well. Come in a group of six or more adults and get a free bottle of sparkling White Wine! The buffet Includes: turkey, stuffing, gravy, mashed potato, mix vegetables, green beans casserole, bread with butter, cranberry sauce, apple pie with ice cream (vanilla), pumpkin pie, garden salad, sweet potato, corn chowder, honey baked ham and fruit juice. For reservations, call: 26867649 or 13689541605.
George & Dragon's all-you-can-eat buffet, 198 RMB for adults or 98 for kids 12 and under, includes: Turkey, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, candied sweet potatoes, corn on the cob, garden salad, green bean casserole, apple pie, pumpkin pie and ice cream. Seniors 60 years of age and older enjoy a 25% OFF discount as well. You can enjoy it Thanksgiving night from 6pm till late, or it's also available on other nights upon request. George & Dragon British Pub is located behind the Taizi Hotel across from Sea World and can be reached at 2669 8564 or 15987949007.
OPEN Restaurant warmly welcomes you and your family to celebrate with them on the special Thanksgiving Day with roasted turkey and sweet pumpkin pie prepared by OPEN. November 23rd 18:00-21:30 RMB 388/person Early Bird Rate: purchase before Nov 20 can enjoy 25% off Including: Theme decorations for Thanksgiving Day Roasted Turkey with irresistible flavor Traditional food like pumpkin pie etc. available on buffet table Free flow of soft drinks and local beer and one welcome drink of Apple Cider. All prices are subject to 15% service charge. OPEN Restaurant is located in the Hilton Shenzhen Shekou Nanhai, at 1177 Wanghai Rd across from Sea World.
This year Brew Magic Pub & Chill's are joining forces to bring you what they say will be the greatest Thanksgiving dinner buffet Shekou has ever seen. 168 per person or 90 per child under 12 years old on Thursday and Friday at Brew Magic Pub. The all-you-can-eat buffet will include: Apple Smoked Turkey, Traditional Bread Stuffing, Homemade Italian Sausage, Grilled Vegetable & Butter Corn, Green Bean & Bacon, Mashed Potatoes & Squash, Macaroni & Cheese, Cranberry Sauce & Gravy, Homemade Dinner Rolls, Homemade Apple Pie and Drink specials from 4-11pm: Buy 1 Get 1 Free: -House Wine -Boulevard Single-wide IPA -San Miguel Draught (L). Call 0755-2667-3229 for reservations. Space is limited. Brew Magic Pub is located at Coastal Rose Garden 2 #52.
At Shark Sea World in Shekou, you can indulge in a Thanksgiving style buffet for 198rmb on Thursday 23rd and Friday 24th November. If you’re looking to celebrate with free flow house wine, you can do so for only 268rmb altogether. Shark Wine Bar & Grill is located at 1119 Sea World Square at and can be reached at 2602-9569.
Enigma presents Thanksgiving Dinner Nov. 23 Thursday & 24 Friday from 6PM -1AM. Adult 223RMB / Kid 98RMB. Enjoy the Early Bird Price 168RMB by Reserving Your Table 2 Days Before or Earlier. ** Hoegaarden Draft / Magners Apple Cider is NOT included in this menu. Home Delivery is Available. Just Reserve It 2 Days Before Enjoy the Beer Tower Special Offer at the Bar One FREE Chips & Pico De Gallo Will Be Given for each order. Enigma Bar & Restaurant is located at Shop No.6, Hai Bing Garden Business Centre and can be reached at 15118833945
Don't feel like carving a turkey? Why not try Baia Burger Concepts Thanksgiving on a bun? November's Burger of the Month is a beautiful 180 gr turkey patty, with pulled turkey, cucumber salad, cranberry sauce and pumpkin marmelade for just 125 RMB or 180 RMB for the set with Moolah Beer and Sweet Potato Fries. Available all month of November.
Celebrate your Thanksgiving Day at McCawley’s Sea World and or Peninsula with their traditional Thanksgiving Day Turkey Dinner on November, 23rd Thursday from 6:30pm for just ￥220 per person or Early Bird of just ￥200 ( Before 20th, Nov ). For reservations in Sea World call 2668 4496 or 2667 4361 for Peninsula.
Starter: Pumpkin Soup or Prawn Cocktail Main Course: Roast Turkey with Ham (Roast potato, vegetables, mashed pumpkin, stuffing, cranberry sauce and gravy) Dessert: Apple Pie Adults: 218. Children under 1.2m 168. Gold Coast is located at Hai Bin Commercial Bldg #118. Call for reservations: 2667-6968
On November 24th, Coyote's we will have their after ThanksGiving Party with a Mexican Buffet for just 100RMB! Mariachi Mezcal will be performing during the party to bring the FIESTA! They will have special promotions in Draft Beer, Tequila and Margaritas! Tequila Coyotes is located at No.113 in Seaworld.
Who to Call for Thanksgiving Catering
Want to enjoy Thanksgiving at home? Here are some places to buy the perfect turkey and even have it cooked, if you need.
Includes Gravy and Stuffing. Please give two days advanced notice 98 RMB/KG. 150RMB for Cooking. X-TA-SEA Sports Bar & Restaurant is located at First Floor Inside the Minghua Ship and can be reached at 0755-2686-7649
Includes stuffing, gravy, and cranberry sauce for 980 RMB (6kg) or 1280 RMB (8kg). If you prefer to dine on ham, we can offer a whole ham (5+kg) for 880 RMB. Please note at least 48 hours advance notice is required. George and Dragon British Pub is located at Shop No 3, Behind Taizi Hotel, Taizi Road and can be reached at 0755-26698564
65 RMB / KG uncooked, 105 RMB / KG Cooked. Free Delivery in Shekou. Call 2667-9057 to order. Silver Palate is located at Coastal Rose Garden 2.
That's it for now, but be sure to check back often as we're likely to add more special Thanksgiving events, activities or promotions over the coming days.Some countries are famous for the quality of their roads (and maybe also the speeds you may go on them). According to the Global Competitiveness Report, the UAE boasts the best roads. France, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, and Switzerland also have very high-quality roads—with a ‘quality of roads' score higher than 6—and yet none make the top 100 countries by land area and thus all fall outside the group of countries with the largest road networks.
If large countries with expansive road networks struggle to maintain high-quality roads, to what extent is the public maintenance of roadways hampered by corruption? We analyzed data for seven countries, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, India, Russia, and the United States, which combined account for 70 percent of the global roads network and roughly half of the world's land area.
Four of the seven countries have high road quality, scoring a 5 or greater on the 'quality of roads' subindex of the Global Competitiveness Index in 2017. This means that the length and quality of road network are not correlated. In fact, the data shows there is a slight positive relationship between road quality and length.
All seven countries also have different densities of roadways, which is reasonable given challenging topographies and climate conditions and potentially insufficient investment in infrastructure. But, again, investment issues could relate to corruption.
So, what about corruption and roadways? The data is absolutely inconclusive.The comments on "Life and Physics" vary wildly, but one recurring theme amongst some commenters is a perception that fundamental physics is too theory-led, that we are obsessed with proving beautiful, reductionist theories and really we should just explore. And that we spend too much time arguing about untestable things.
This is not a criticism to be lightly dismissed, and some of the time, for some physicists, it is almost certainly a fair one. However, I would like to make three counter points.
Thought experiments
In my piece about black holes and fuzzballs, some objected, correctly, that what goes on inside black holes is pretty much inaccessible to experimental test. So why even discuss it? For me, the interest in the discussion is the conflict, in what amounts to an "extreme thought experiment", between three amazingly successful theories, or "laws of physics" if you prefer. Quantum mechanics, gravitation and thermodynamics have their laws, and their underlying picture of the universe. They have credibility by virtue of each being able to describe a vast range of phenomena, ranging from steam engines through planets to the central processing unit in your computer. In a black hole, these laws come into apparent conflict. The territories of three giants overlap. By thinking through the contradictions which arise, we can find gaps in the theories, develop new understanding, and in the end hopefully derive observable predictions which would test such understanding. It is a hugely worthwhile exercise, unless you are utterly uninterested in understanding how things work or in benefiting from such understanding.
Electroweak symmetry breaking
To some it appears the Large Hadron Collider is a disproportionate investment of time, money and expertise in chasing some theorists' dream. I disagree, of course. While the Higgs is the headline, the LHC is genuinely exploring new territory for whatever might be there. The energy frontier (or if you like, the short distance frontier - we study nature at smaller distance scales than anywhere else) remains a frontier of knowledge, whether Peter Higgs says it is or not. Plus, we have very good reason, from experiment alone, to think this part of the frontier is special. Look at this plot:
electron-proton scattering: Credit DESY, ZEUS and H1 experiments.
What is shows is essentially the probability of an electron bouncing off a proton, with the energy of the bounce increasing as you go from left to right. The blue points show the times when it bounces because of its electric charge - the electromagnetic force. The red points are the times when it bounces by swapping a W boson - the weak force. You can see that at low energies (toward the left) the electromagnetic bounce is much more likely. But at high energies (on the right) the weak force is just as likely to be responsible as the electromagnetic. There is a symmetry between the two forces which is restored at this energy*. These are data. Measured. No theory. (The curves are theory, but ignore them.)
The LHC, for the first time in the history of science, allows us to explore properly above that energy, into the region where the symmetry holds. Our theory says the Higgs breaks the symmetry. But even without that theory, you might think exploring physics above this fundamentally important energy scale is an exciting thing to do, and might tell us how these forces work, and why they are sometimes the same and sometimes different.
Gloating
Finally, the LHC data have so far led to a bonfire of theories. While big ideas like supersymmetry or extra dimensions have not been disproved (yet), many many options for them have been closed off.
It is true many of us have our favourite theories, but in the end the data decide, and as an experimentalist I am seriously enjoying making myriad bright ideas face the music. We have waited a long time, theorising and guessing. Now, at last, we are able to look at some more of the answers.
* The scale on the horizontal axis is actually the distance in metres (very small). But where the curves meet is the equivalent of about 100 GeV in energy.(A) Schematic outlining the procedure for magnetic cell sort-based isolation (MACS) of human glial progenitors, tagging with EGFP, and xenografting at P1. The chimeric mice brains were analyzed in 0.5- to 20-month-old chimeric mice.
(B) Representative dot map showing the distribution of human nuclear antigen (hNuclei)+ cells in three coronal sections from a 10-month-old human chimeric mouse.
(C) The complex fine |
you a reliable backup and restore software and shows you how to restore to dissimilar hardware with a step by step guide shown below. Hope it is helpful!
>> Question: When and why do you need to restore system to dissimilar hardware?
1. Migrate/transfer system to a dissimilar computer
Trying to transfer your current system to a dissimilar computer with all programs and installed applications saved on your system C: drive. To recover to dissimilar hardware is just the efficient way for you to migrate the current system to dissimilar hardware with all necessities saved on the system partition.
2. Instant recovery of a failed system on different hardware (computer)
When one of your computers crashes with a failed system, to create a system backup from a healthy computer and restore to the dissimilar hardware will bring your dead computer back to life.
3. Prevent motherboard failure
No matter which operating system you use, there is still a risk of motherboard failure. With this special feature for restoring system to dissimilar hardware, there will be no trouble for you to replace hardware computer without motherboard failure issue.
>> How to recover to dissimilar hardware? Let a third-party backup software help
Frankly speaking, it is hard to restore to dissimilar hardware with Windows Restore feature. The key factor is that the hardware-dependent Microsoft Hardware Abstraction Layer drivers are embedded with the system's image.
Therefore, you need to try a professional backup software with recover to dissimilar hardware feature to assist you to restore the system to different hardware.
Here, EaseUS Todo Backup, a professional Windows backup utility with System Transfer function, is a second-to-none choice for you. It allows you to easily and safely restore your system to dissimilar hardware.
Here is the detailed guide for system dissimilar recovery between computers:
Step-by-step Guide： Transfer/Restore system to dissimilar hardware/computer in 5 steps
Note: Before restoring system image to dissimilar hardware or any PC, please ensure you have an image of Windows operating system.
Let's see how can you recover to a dissimilar hardware computer with OS and C drive installed programs now:
Step 1. Create an emergency disk on a healthy computer
To save your time and energy, we'd like to suggest you create an emergency disk to a USB or external hard drive rather on a healthy computer with EaseUS Todo Backup.
1. Connect an empty USB flash drive or external hard drive with over than 100GB space to your PC.
2. Run EaseUS Todo Backup and click Tools > Create Emergency Disk.
3. Choose USB as the disk location to create the emergency disk which will help you boot computer when it fails to boot or restore the system to dissimilar new PC.
4. Click Proceed.
Step 2. Create Windows system image backup for restoring to dissimilar hardware
1. Run EaseUS Todo Backup on the healthy computer and click System Backup on the left pane.
2. Choose the Windows OS and specify the USB flash drive which contains the emergency disk as the destination disk to save system image.
If you are worried about data loss issue by saving the system image to the emergency disk drive, you may also save system backup to another empty external hard drive with over 100GB free space.
This will help you create a full backup of the whole Windows system and all installed programs, applications on your C drive to the selected device.
3. Click Proceed to start creating system backup image to the target device.
Step 3. Boot the dissimilar hardware/computer from EaseUS Todo Backup emergency disk
1. Connect the USB flash drive or external hard drive with emergency disk and system backup image to the new computer.
2. Restart PC and press F2/F8 to boot into BIOS.
3. Change boot drive and set the computer to boot from the EaseUS Todo Backup emergency disk.
Then you'll enter EaseUS Todo Backup main interface.
Step 4. Transfer and recover the system to dissimilar hardware or new computer
1. On EaseUS Todo Backup main window, click System Transfer.
2. Select the system image on your drive and click OK to continue.
3. Specify the disk to save system image and tick System Transfer in Advanced options, click OK to save changes.
Then click Proceed to start transferring system and even some installed programs on system C: drive to the new hardware computer now.
Step 5. Restart PC with transferred system
1. Change boot sequence in BIOS to set the computer to boot up from the drive with the transferred system.
2. Save all changes and restart your computer.
3. Update all drive drivers and programs to ensure all things will work just fine on the new computer.
>> PLUS: Windows Reactivation Requests
If your computer asks you to reactivate the system after restoring or transferring to a new computer with dissimilar hardware, you can refer to provided resolutions here below for a guide:A politician in Mississippi has apologised for saying those who removed Confederate monuments in neigbouring Louisiana should be lynched.
Karl Oliver, a Republican state representative, said in a Facebook post that the destruction of monuments was "heinous and horrific" and accused the Louisiana state officials responsible of acting in a Nazi-like fashion.
He wrote: "The destruction of these monuments, erected in the loving memory of our family and fellow Southern Americans, is both heinous and horrific.
"If the, and I use this term extremely loosely, 'leadership' of Louisiana wishes to, in a Nazi-ish fashion, burn books or destroy historical monuments of OUR HISTORY, they should be LYNCHED!"
The comments were made after three Confederate monuments and a monument to white supremacy were removed in New Orleans.
Mr Oliver later deleted the post and issued a statement apologising.
He said: "In an effort to express my passion for preserving all historical monuments, I acknowledge the word 'lynched' was wrong. I am very sorry.
"It is in no way, ever, an appropriate term. I deeply regret that I chose this word, and I do not condone the actions I referenced, nor do I believe them in my heart. I freely admit my choice of words was horribly wrong, and I humbly ask your forgiveness."
Mr Oliver, a funeral director, represents a Mississippi district that includes the small town of Money, where black teenager Emmett Till was kidnapped before being lynched in 1955.An HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles
RFC 7725
Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) T. Bray Request for Comments: 7725 Textuality Category: Standards Track February 2016 ISSN: 2070-1721 An HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles Abstract This document specifies a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) status code for use when resource access is denied as a consequence of legal demands. Status of This Memo This is an Internet Standards Track document. This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). It represents the consensus of the IETF community. It has received public review and has been approved for publication by the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG). Further information on Internet Standards is available in Section 2 of RFC 5741. Information about the current status of this document, any errata, and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7725. Copyright Notice Copyright (c) 2016 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License. Bray Standards Track [Page 1] RFC 7725 HTTP-status-451 February 2016 Table of Contents 1. Introduction........................ 2 2. Requirements........................ 2 3. 451 Unavailable For Legal Reasons.............. 2 4. Identifying Blocking Entities................ 3 5. Security Considerations................... 4 6. IANA Considerations..................... 4 7. References......................... 4 Acknowledgements........................ 5 Author's Address........................ 5 1. Introduction This document specifies a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) status code for use when a server operator has received a legal demand to deny access to a resource or to a set of resources that includes the requested resource. This status code can be used to provide transparency in circumstances where issues of law or public policy affect server operations. This transparency may be beneficial both to these operators and to end users. [RFC4924] discusses the forces working against transparent operation of the Internet; these clearly include legal interventions to restrict access to content. As that document notes, and as Section 4 of [RFC4084] states, such restrictions should be made explicit. 2. Requirements The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119]. 3. 451 Unavailable For Legal Reasons This status code indicates that the server is denying access to the resource as a consequence of a legal demand. The server in question might not be an origin server. This type of legal demand typically most directly affects the operations of ISPs and search engines. Responses using this status code SHOULD include an explanation, in the response body, of the details of the legal demand: the party making it, the applicable legislation or regulation, and what classes of person and resource it applies to. For example: Bray Standards Track [Page 2] RFC 7725 HTTP-status-451 February 2016 HTTP/1.1 451 Unavailable For Legal Reasons Link: <https://spqr.example.org/legislatione>; rel="blocked-by" Content-Type: text/html <html> <head><title>Unavailable For Legal Reasons</title></head> <body> <h1>Unavailable For Legal Reasons</h1> <p>This request may not be serviced in the Roman Province of Judea due to the Lex Julia Majestatis, which disallows access to resources hosted on servers deemed to be operated by the People's Front of Judea.</p> </body> </html> The use of the 451 status code implies neither the existence nor nonexistence of the resource named in the request. That is to say, it is possible that if the legal demands were removed, a request for10/21 UPDATE: Video's creators admit to staging NYPD profiling episode
OCTOBER 21--In a cynical and duplicitous attempt to capitalize on New York City’s documented racial profiling problems, a pair of bloggers have created a video purporting to show an NYPD officer stopping and frisking a pair of Muslim men for the crime of wearing traditional Islamic garments.
But the viral video is a sham, a staged production aimed to go viral and pile up views and YouTube channel subscriptions for its young creators, Brooklynites Adam Saleh and Sheikh Akbar, who get a piece of the revenue generated by ads that run before their videos play.
The duo’s video operation--which is named “TrueStoryASA”--has racked up 60 million YouTube views and has more than 661,000 subscribers on the video-sharing site. While most of the pair’s videos involve pranks, sidewalk attempts at comedy and social commentary, or “Muslim-related stuff,” their latest clip seeks to latch onto an issue that has troubled many New Yorkers and tainted the NYPD.
Titled “Racial Profiling Experiment,” the 2:53 video (seen above) was uploaded Sunday to YouTube, where it has already been viewed in excess of 135,000 times. The clip has received coverage in several publications, including the British newspaper The Independent and The Huffington Post.
[Akbar (left) and Saleh are pictured in the adjacent photo.]
The video opens with Saleh and Akbar loudly arguing as they walk down a Queens street. The men, dressed in jeans and t-shirts, shove each other and appear on the verge of exchanging blows. While this is transpiring, a purported NYPD officer stands just feet away. With his arms folded, the impassive cop--whose face has been blurred--does nothing as the pair seems on the verge of fighting. The scene is apparently being filmed from a parked car by a friend of Saleh and Akbar.
The video then jumps ahead 20 minutes, when Saleh and Akbar are again seen arguing on the same sidewalk. This time, however, Saleh is wearing a headdress and a white robe. Akbar has on a keffiyeh scarf and an abaya, a long shirt. In their YouTube description of the video, the men describe these garments as their “cultural clothes.”
This time, the quarreling duo is immediately confronted by the cop, who asks, “What’s all the arguing about? Why are you dressed like this?” Motioning to their clothes, he demands, “What is this?” In short order, the patrolman shoves Saleh up against the wall and directs him to put his hands up and “open your legs.” During the cursory search that follows, the cop feels something in Saleh’s pocket and yells, “What is this? What’s in your pocket?” When Saleh responds that it is his phone, the officer asks, “Is this a gun? Is that a knife?”
Oddly, the officer never bothers to remove the item to confirm that it is a phone and not a deadly weapon. Also, the cop does not appear concerned that Saleh’s friend is hovering directly behind him.
After Akbar is later subjected to a similarly perfunctory frisk, Saleh does the reveal. Removing the headdress, he tells the officer, “I’m the same guy from before. I came 20 minutes earlier, we had an argument, we hit each other, and you didn’t do anything.” Then, referring to the pair’s new clothes, Saleh added, “And now when we have this, you gonna come and do something to us?”
Confronted about his racial profiling and illegal searches, the cop appears befuddled and stripped of his bravado. He is left to warn a passerby--whose timing is impeccable--to “Take a walk before I arrest you for obstruction.”
The video is a marvelously tidy example of the NYPD’s supposedly wicked ways. At the clip’s end, Saleh and Akbar appear to explain, “What you just saw is what we always go through when we’re filming with our culture clothing on.” Saleh then claims that the pair had been out shooting another video when “police happen to, like, follow us and racial profile us. So we stopped filming that video and we decided to make this video for you guys. And it happened in one chance.”
The video ends with a request for viewers to give it a “thumbs up” vote on YouTube, as well as a pitch for new subscribers to the duo’s video channel.
The purported “Racial Profiling Experiment” undertaken by Saleh and Akbar was filmed on 126th Street in the Willets Point section of Queens, across from Citi Field, home to the New York Mets. The video was shot on a street where many of the businesses--tire outlets, auto repair firms, muffler shops--have been closed or relocated as part of a city redevelopment effort.
An NYPD source who last night viewed the clip at TSG’s request said that an officer from the local police precinct (the 110th in nearby Elmhurst) would not be standing patrol by himself on a deserted street in the middle of the day. As for the purported officer’s frisking technique, the NYPD veteran laughed, “That’s not how they teach you in the academy.” He also remarked that it was “inconceivable” that an officer would ask a Muslim man, “Why are you dressed like this?”
By obscuring the purported cop’s face, Saleh and Akbar have sought to avoid the immediate debunking of their clip, which has already garnered in excess of 30,000 “thumbs up” on YouTube and more than 5200 comments. In their supposed effort to expose racial profiling, the video’s creators have inexplicably--yet conveniently--provided cover for the rogue patrolman, now an electronically blurred boogeyman.
A second source, a recently retired NYPD detective who also watched the “profiling” video at TSG’s request, branded it an “obvious hoax” intended to “smear” police.
If that was the intent of Saleh and Akbar, they appear to have succeeded. According to The Huffington Post, the video provides a “small glimpse into the ugly world of racial profiling.” The news site later updated its piece to indicate that the clip’s authenticity could not be verified, and that NYPD officials are reviewing the video.
Since the video was uploaded to YouTube, Saleh, Akbar, and their friends have been aggressively promoting the clip on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. “Spread the word and bring an end to Racial Profiling,” Saleh wrote. Sheikh told his followers that, “Racial Profiling goes against all equal rights.” He added, “Never expected a reaction like this.”
Saleh and Akbar have not responded to TSG messages sent via Facebook, where each man describes himself as an "Actor/Director."
10/21 UPDATE: In an interview yesterday with Capital New York, a spokesperson for Saleh and Akbar claimed that he had “behind the scene footage” proving that the profiling episode was not faked. Asked for additional details, the flack told reporter Azi Paybarah, “We can't give out details for follow ups--it breaches confidentiality.”
However, despite that shaky assurance, the videographers copped to their perfidy (albeit sneakily) after TSG exposed their hoax this morning. They edited the video’s YouTube description to report that the clip was a “Dramatization of previous events that occurred with us in our tradition clothing while filming in NYC. This video is not against the NYPD.” The video’s original description claimed that Saleh and Akbar were prompted to expose the NYPD after “we kept getting followed by Police. So we decided to film this social experiment on racial profiling.” The duo added that, “Too many innocent people get stopped and frisked” daily due to their clothing and skin color.Bill Murray can make anything humorous, however this student’s condition is no laughing matter (Picture:Columbia Pictures)
A student has baffled doctors after a chronic and apparently ongoing case of déjà vu has led him to believe he has already experienced his entire life.
Just like Bill Murray’s character in the film Groundhog Day, the 23-year-old cannot watch TV or read a paper because he thinks he has seen it all before.
Doctors who are trying to treat the man say he doesn’t suffer any of the neurological conditions usually exhibited by people experiencing continual déjà vu.
The unfortunate man told doctors he was ‘trapped in a time loop’, and has been forced to drop out of university due to the condition which has blighted his life for the past eight years.
Although the unnamed student had a history of anxiousness, brain scans and psychoanalyses showed no visible issues in his brain.
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Some neuroscientists say that prolonged experiences of déjà vu are usually sparked by panic attacks, epileptic fits, and even ingesting LSD.
Dr Christine Wells, who published a report on the student in Journal of Medical Case Reports said: ‘Rather than simply the unsettling feelings of familiarity which are normally associated with déjà vu, our subject complained that it felt like he was actually retrieving previous experiences from memory, not just finding them familiar.’
Sadly it seems unlikely that the student will develop any abilities like Mr Murray here:It’s getting closer. It’s been sort of like making a big meal for your friends or family. We have been sweating the details in the kitchen and now we are anxious and excited to share our creation with you.
Some of you have been in the kitchen with us. You’ve have done a great job of guiding us so far. Across Japan, Australia and New Zealand, Pokémon GO field testers have been collecting and battling with impressive regularity and we’re learning a lot from them. And today, we’re expanding that field test to the United States to get more feedback to improve the game.
It’s been exciting to hear stories from our testers as they explore the world around them in their quest to collect Pokémon and recently we’ve added a ton of new features to expand gameplay even further. Trainers can now help Pokémon evolve, opening up a whole new area of gameplay. Trainers can also find and collect Pokémon Eggs in addition to fully grown Pokémon. Trainers will get a good workout as you must walk a preset distance in order to hatch the Egg and find out what Pokémon will emerge. Incubators are provided to help with this process.
Trainers also will encounter Pokémon Gyms at real-world locations. Pokémon Gyms are special locations where Trainers can test their Pokémon in battles as they compete to win control of the Gym for one of three Pokémon Trainer teams. Empty Gyms are claimed by a team when a Trainer places a Pokémon there to claim it. Friendly Gyms grow in prestige when their defending Pokémon are trained in battles. Higher level Gyms have room for more Trainers to deploy Pokémon to defend them. Rival Gyms can be challenged by Trainers who can use their Pokémon to attack the defending Pokémon. Groups of players can work together to challenge rival Gyms.
Fun fact - After many hours of field test gameplay, the Venusaur hasn’t been spotted yet. Who will be the first field tester who catches or evolves their Bulbasaurs or Ivysaurs into Venusaur? There’s much to explore and many Pokémon to find! :)
Our team is learning and iterating, and we can’t wait to share Pokémon GO with everyone. Stay tuned for more details.
-- The Pokémon GO Development TeamWhen the Lawndale Theater of North Lawndale, IL closed permanently in the early 2000s, it had been in use primarily as a church. This end to the theater very much resembles its beginning — after a series of architectural control changes, it is generally believed that the design responsibilities finally fell to William P. Whitney, a local architect known mostly for designing churches. However, there is no hard evidence for Whitney’s involvement in the project. The Lawndale’s resemblance to Whitney’s Symphony Theater in Chicago suggests his influence on the Lawndale’s design.
The 2,200 seat Lawndale opened on October 19, 1927 with a screening of “A Girl from Rio.” Like several other theaters at the time, the Lawndale’s ceiling covered with twinkling “star” lights to resemble the night sky. In most atmospheric theaters the ceiling is devoid of any detail work to help further the illusion that their patrons are sitting under the night sky, but this was not the case at the Lawndale. The dome in the center was the only portion of the theater to have the twinkling lights, so in that sense it was not a true atmospheric theater.
In the mid 1930s the theater was purchased by a company controlled by Frank ” The Enforcer” Nitti, one of Al Capone‘s cohorts. During the 1940s, the Lawndale was used primarily as a movie theater, occasionally being rented out for various functions.
The theater changed hands several more times before it reopened as the Rena Theatre in 1949. During the week the Rena showed films; it had stage shows on the weekends. It closed permanently in 1961 after a gang leader was shot and killed in one of the main stairwells. The Lawndale was demolished in the summer of 2014.
If you’d like to help with my exploring/research efforts, please consider purchasing a print, all support is very appreciated.Parramatta chairman Steve Sharp claims he was urged to take out an apprehended violence order against former teammate Terry Leabeater due to "constant, personal and intense" attacks as political infighting again rocks the wooden spooners.
Another Eels director, Tom Issa, has also taken out an AVO against Leabeater, with both matters scheduled to be heard at Parramatta Local Court next month.
Parramatta Eels Chairman Steve Sharp (right) has talken out an AVO against former teammate Terry Leabeater Credit:Dallas Kilponen
Sharp and Leabeater were teammates in the all-conquering Eels sides which dominated during the early to mid-1980s. However, the pair have fallen out over the direction of the club and the dramas will now spill over into the courtroom.
It's not the only courtroom drama to rock the club – former CEO Bob Bentley is taking legal action after being sacked as boss of the Leagues Club, while former assistant Matt Parish is also suing for unfair dismissal.By Stephen Leahy Nov 2 ’06 (IPS) – Every single commercial fishery in the world will be wiped before 2050 and the oceans may never recover if over-fishing continues at its current rate, a four-year scientific investigation has found.
“By the time my nine-year-old son is my age, there would be no wild seafood left,” said Emmett Duffy, a scientist at the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences in the United States.
In this grim, not-to-far-off future, not only will there be no fish to eat, humans will also lose the vital services oceans provide, including processing wastes, cleaning beaches, controlling flooding and absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
The world’s oceans are already in a precarious state, hammered by extensive coastal pollution, climate change, over-fishing and the enormously wasteful practice of deep-sea trawling, in which heavily weighted nets dragged along the sea floor scoop up everything in their 100-metre-wide paths, including vast amounts of unwanted sea creatures, the so-called bycatch.
The only way to reverse this slide into an abysmal future is to stop fishing out one species after another to ensure there is an abundance of biodiversity in the seas, researchers have found.
For complete article see — Ocean Life on the Brink of No ReturnA new poll released just in time for Brexit Day has shown that half of Leave voters want the death penalty brought back.
As Article 50 is triggered, signifying the start of two years of negotiations before Britain’s exit from the EU, those who voted for it have signalled how else they want the country to change.
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The YouGov survey showed that 53% of those who voted for Brexit want the death penalty brought back once the UK is officially out of the European Union.
When Britain leaves the EU what should the government look to bring back? @YouGov provided the list and this is what we found. #BrexitDay pic.twitter.com/uL1jX2PzT1 — Joe Twyman (@JoeTwyman) March 29, 2017
This compares to 20% of Remain voters who want capital punishment reinstated in 2019.
Leave voters also want a return of one or two other long-gone institutions.
A return to corporal punishment in schools is supported by 42%, while 52% want dark blue passports to replace the current maroon ones that show we are part of the EU.
MORE: Brexit begins… but how will it affect you?
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However, Leave voters are happy with health issues, with just 11% wanting to see smoking in pubs and restaurants made legal again.
This figure is still around four times higher than the wishes of Remain voters (3%).
The YouGov survey also showed that 69% of people want Brexit to go ahead – whether they voted for it or not.
Just 21% of all voters want to see the referendum reversed or overturned.
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The poll also showed that 27% of voters want a second referendum on the terms of the deal once it is finalised.
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When a driver is so good at one particular track such as the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course that he has earned the nickname “Mr. Mid-Ohio,” anything short of a victory is unacceptable.
Scott Dixon entered Sunday’s Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio with five Verizon IndyCar Series wins in 10 races at the 13-turn, 2.258-mile road course nestled in Ohio’s Amish Country.
Shortly after the start of Sunday’s race, Dixon noticed something was wrong in his Honda machine that lined up sixth on the grid.
“I think something was broken,” Dixon told Autoweek. “The car was just so loose. We’ve never had the car like that. We didn’t change anything from the morning warmup. There was something wrong from the rear of the car. We had to take out a huge amount of front wing just to make it drivable.”
Dixon fought his way to a ninth-place finish and dropped out of the Verizon IndyCar Series points lead. He entered the contest with a three-point lead over Team Penske’s Helio Castroneves and is now third in the standings, eight points behind the new leader, Josef Newgarden, and one point behind second-place Castroneves.
“It’s one of those situations where we’ve had days like this before and we will have them again in the future,” Dixon said. “We have to keep after it, make sure we keep our head down and get the most out of it in the next races.
“You can’t rest on previous results at any track. You have to take each race as it comes and get the most out of it that you can.
“Overall, it just not our weekend. We held in there and fought, but need to regroup and get ready for Pocono in a few weeks. Points are really at a premium now with four to go."Digicel Cup champions, the Gurias, will have the crowd behind them.
They also boast several national representative players, Watson Boas, Chris Jerry and captain Albert Patak.
Gurias coach Steven Nightingale has indicated he will use the same 17 that beat the Simbu Lions in last month’s grand final.
“We’ve been in camp for about two weeks now. The boys have been playing in the local leagues in Rabaul and are all in good shape and ready to go,” said Nightingale.
Gurias captain Albert Patak added that the team were all looking forward to tomorrow.
“We will give it our best and play our best,” said Patak.
Fiji tomorrow celebrates 45 years of independence. This will be the driving factor for the Vodafone Cup champions, the Roosters, to surge home to a win.
Roosters coach, Voate Naravu says his boys are all geared up with preparations running smoothly leading into the game.
For the Roosters captain, Viliame Rakuli Vuki, tomorrow’s game will be the biggest as this is their first time to travel out and play in PNG.
“I am confident the team will rise to the occasion and play good rugby league. I am hoping we all get something out from this game,” said Vuki.
Tomorrow’s game kicks off at 7pm and is expected to be played in front of more than 15,000 fans.Over the past several years, virtually every kind of Catholic institution has come under threat. To name just a few of many possible examples: Catholic adoption agencies have been forced to either place children with same-sex couples or close; Catholic grade and high schools have faced protests and some lawsuits for firing teachers who were living in clear violation of the Church’s sexual teachings; Catholic charities and universities have been engaged in a legal battle over the HHS contraceptive mandate; most recently, the ACLU has started pushing lawsuits to force Catholic hospitals to provide abortion and contraceptive procedures that go against Catholic teachings.
But why are there so many Catholic institutions in America in the first place? How were they founded, and how have they changed over time?
America’s Catholic institutional ministries – those we still have (such as schools, colleges, hospitals, charities) as well as those which have disappeared (orphanages, industrial schools, homes for expecting mothers – mostly came into being out of necessity. This “necessity” was of two kinds.
One kind was simply factual: there was a need among Catholics for education or for custodial care of abandoned children (in fact, the majority of “orphans” in Catholic institutions had at least one living parent), and the Church stepped forward to meet it because no one else was present, willing, and able.
The other kind of “necessity” was pastoral: available institutions presented unacceptable risks to the faith because they were, or were tantamount to, Protestant. In the mid- to late-nineteenth century this latter type of “necessity” often extended to public institutions, especially to grade schools and other institutions (orphanages, for example) which had custody of children. The Church then was so keenly concerned to preserve and transmit the faith intact to young people, and so concerned about the designs of many Protestants upon the faith of Catholic children, that Catholics undertook to construct parallel school and charities systems so that Catholic children would not be proselytized by Protestants, or at least deprived of the positive benefits of being reared and educated in a Catholic environment.
(Hospitals were a different case, for then they were then more like hospices than what we now know as acute care facilities, and the central pastoral concern there was, obviously, to spiritually assist in a Catholic manner persons facing terminal illness and death.)
Evidence of suspected Protestant designs is easy to come by. It should be kept in mind, though, that they stemmed as much from a very dim view of Catholicism (as superstitious, corrupt, benighted) as it did from a very evangelical possession of Protestant beliefs. Among the most probative evidence would be those many instances where Catholics fought hard to garner equal opportunity to minister to their own in public settings, such as prisons or the military. In these contexts and up into the twentieth century, the Church was often denied the kind of access to Catholic inmates that Protestant ministers enjoyed when tending to their flock. Similarly, it was often a struggle to secure Catholic chaplaincy positions in the military proportionate to the number of Catholics in the ranks. And at the turn of the century, the United States phased out funding for Catholic missions on the Indian reservations, notwithstanding (indeed, perhaps because of) the undeniable effectiveness of those missions.
This keen and admirable (even of at times a bit overdone) pastoral concern was evident in the hierarchy up to and through the 1950s, and even with regard to college students. There was a lively debate among the bishops early in the twentieth century about the pastoral wisdom of establishing what we call “Newman Centers” at non-Catholic colleges. More than a few bishops opposed the idea, on the view that doing so would only encourage Catholics to attend these colleges, which was itself a choice mightily to be discouraged.
After WW II, when Catholics among the “greatest generation” could and did use the GI Bill to attend college in unprecedented numbers, many new Catholic colleges were founded so that the returning GIs would not have to attend non-Catholic institutions, some of which were indeed still unwelcoming of Catholics. Of course, all through this century or so (from 1850 to 1950) it was a principle of Catholic pastoral care, often articulated by the Pontiff himself, to discourage fraternal and religious “mixing” of Catholics and non-Catholics, a concern rooted in a sound worry about promoting indifferentism, but (again) very often overdone. And it was often overdone at least partly because of the clericalism of the hierarchy, in the specific sense that pastors did not think that the laity possessed the intellectually discriminating grasp of the faith and the spiritual maturity which would have protected them against indifferentism. Perhaps so, to a great extent, but that has to partly do with the pervasive clericalism which infected the Church throughout this era.
This effort was nothing short of heroic. There are countless stories of saintly dedication to the spiritual welfare of Catholics under very trying conditions. And the laity made incredible sacrifices for the faith and would have given their lives for it, as so many did for their country during these years.
About this nearly incredible story, which amounts to the saga of how a whole Catholic sub-culture was envisioned and then built, I would add that, notwithstanding the deserved admiration which we feel towards those who made it happen, they responded creatively and faithfully to the circumstances in which they found themselves. So should we.
Just some examples of the contingency of selection and survival of Catholic institutional ministries: Fewer than one-third of the 194 Catholic colleges founded in the U.S. before 1900 survived into the 1950s. There are about 222 of them now listed in the Kennedy Directory, and most of them are scarcely recognizably Catholic. Many Catholic colleges came into being as places for the sponsoring religious orders to educate their own novices or seminarians. This was especially the pattern for women’s colleges, as religious superiors undertook to educate legions of teaching Sisters. From the late nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century, local bishops typically did not permit Sisters to attend non-Catholic institutions, and discouraged and occasionally forbade men to do so. Even in 1940, one of every five graduates of Catholic women’s colleges was a nun at graduation, a proportion that did not decline until the collapse of vocations in the 1960s. Lay Catholics were often admitted to these colleges initially to help pay the bills.
Our circumstances are radically different than theirs. Our national culture is, like theirs, inhospitable to Catholic faith. But two of the many radical differences are these: first, in days gone by, there were enough faithful Catholics around to staff these arrays of institutional ministries, and so many of these faithful were professed religious; second, now the government and its frequently pernicious understanding of many important moral norms (about the family, life, healthcare, sexual activity, etc.), and its almost total lack of understanding of what a Catholic institutional apostolate |
been super-sensitive to opinion polls in the past, it was a remarkable rejection of the public will. The people consistently prefer Kevin Rudd to Julia Gillard as Labor leader by a factor of about two to one. But Labor has gone the other way by a factor of more than two to one. For a party that is on a steady trajectory to electoral defeat, it was an extraordinary act of steely resolve. Or suicidal madness. Sky News is reporting Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is also likely to hold a press conference before Question Time kicks off at 2pm. There is speculation he will move a motion of no confidence in the government. 12.56pm: Rudd takes no questions as he steps down, giving his wife Therese Rein a quick hug and kiss for the cameras.
His last words were a repeat of his pledge to throw "every effort" into securing the re-election of Julia Gillard. "I dedicate myself to working fully for (Ms Gillard's) re-election as the prime minister of Australia. I will do so with my absolute ability dedicated to that task." 12.52pm: Rudd is now thanking all his staff. He gets a giggle out of the room when thanking the head of Australia's secretive overseas spy agency: "I'd like to thank ASIS and its director Nick Warner... and that's about all I can say about that."
12.48pm: I'm getting a strong sense of deja-vu as Rudd sets out all his and the government's achievements, each presaged by the phrase "I'm proud of the fact..." - the same phrase he wheeled out last time he was rolled. 12.43pm: Kevin Rudd is on now. "I congratulate Julia on her strong win today. The caucus has spoken and I accept their verdict. "To those who did not vote for me, can I thank them for their friendship and civility. To those who have been a little more willing in their character analysis of me, can I say the following: I bear no grudges. "I bear no one any malice and if I've done wrong to anyone with what I've said and what I've done, I apologise.
"It's well past time that those wounds were healed. Our purpose is to serve the nation, not ourselves
Our purpose is to serve the people of Australia, not ourselves. "To Julia I would say the following: I accept fully the verdict of the caucus and I dedicate myself fully to her re-election as prime minister of Australia." 12.39pm: Katharine Murphy in the Pulse blog writes that one of Kevin Rudd's most vocal backers, Doug Cameron, has said it's now time to "wash the walls down" and get back on with life. This coming from the man who said Labor tried to assassinate Kevin Rudd twice. He's got such a charming way with words. 12.32pm: Brisbane Times Deputy Editor Danielle Cronin reports that Queensland Premier Anna Bligh appealed for Labor to heal the rift and come together as an organisation in the aftermath of today's challenge.
She also congratulated Prime Minister Julia Gillard after the "decisive outcome" in today's leadership ballot. Campaigning on the Gold Coast, Ms Bligh said this has been a difficult and emotionally painful time for the caucus and Labor's supporters. She wanted the party to heal the rift and come together, saying she was confident Labor had the political maturity and will to recover. Ms Bligh described the unsuccessful challenger, Kevin Rudd, as a "friend of mine" and remarked it was "never easy to watch a friend go through something like this". Mr Rudd and other federal Labor members would be welcome on the Queensland campaign trail. But Ms Bligh said the federal leadership showdown had damaged the state campaign because Queensland voters had not had the chance to look at state issues and scrutinise the major parties' leaders and policies. She was yet to speak to long-time Labor strategist Bruce Hawker, who temporarily quit her campaign to help Mr Rudd mount his challenge for the federal leadership. She expected Mr Hawker would rejoin Queensland Labor's campaign soon.
12.23pm: Kevin Rudd is due to speak about 12.30pm according to the latest reports. We will bring the press conference to you live when it happens. 12.10pm: Julia Gillard's chief backers, acting Foreign Affairs Minister Craig Emerson and Treasurer Wayne Swan, stick close by as she emerges triumphant from the Labor caucus room. Kevin Rudd still manages a smile in defeat, as do his supporters Janelle Saffin and Justine Elliot:
11.55am: Fingers still smouldering off the keyboard, Sydney Morning Herald Chief Political Correspondent Phillip Coorey has filed this breaking analysis of the thumping endorsement delivered to Julia Gillard: Julia Gillard's caucus has backed her emphatically. Now she must return the favour. Between now and the next election, Gillard's fortunes will rest on the opinion polls. Despite Labor's best efforts to destroy itself, its support in the major polls - Nielsen, Newspoll and Galaxy - has been creeping upwards since the start of this year. Gillard needs to maintain this trend. If not, many of those who have backed her this time may not be so loyal closer to an election and their own survival starts staring them in the face.
The onus is on both camps to lift Labor out of this mire. 11.52am: Anyone feel like a step back in time? Here's the results from Labor leadership challenges past, to see how today's ballot stacks up against the rest: July 16, 1982 - Bob Hawke challenged Bill Hayden unsuccessfully (Hayden 42; Hawke 37)
- Bob Hawke challenged Bill Hayden unsuccessfully (Hayden 42; Hawke 37) February 3, 1983 - Hawke became leader without a ballot.
- Hawke became leader without a ballot. June 3, 1991 - Paul Keating challenged Hawke unsuccessfully (Hawke 66; Keating 44)
- Paul Keating challenged Hawke unsuccessfully (Hawke 66; Keating 44) December 19, 1991 - Keating challenged Hawke and won (Keating 56; Hawke 51)
- Keating challenged Hawke and won (Keating 56; Hawke 51) March 19, 1996 - Kim Beazley became leader unopposed following Keating's resignation
- Kim Beazley became leader unopposed following Keating's resignation November 11, 2001 - Simon Crean became leader unopposed following Beazley's resignation
- Simon Crean became leader unopposed following Beazley's resignation June 16, 2003 - Beazley challenged Crean unsuccessfully (Crean 58; Beazley 34)
- Beazley challenged Crean unsuccessfully (Crean 58; Beazley 34) December 2, 2003 - Mark Latham defeated Beazley in ballot following Crean's resignation (Latham 47; Beazley 45)
- Mark Latham defeated Beazley in ballot following Crean's resignation (Latham 47; Beazley 45) January 28, 2005 - Beazley became leader unopposed following Latham's resignation.
- Beazley became leader unopposed following Latham's resignation. December 4, 2006 - Kevin Rudd challenged Beazley and won (Rudd 49; Beazley 39)
- Kevin Rudd challenged Beazley and won (Rudd 49; Beazley 39) June 24, 2010 - Julia Gillard challenged Rudd, but ballot did not occur.
- Julia Gillard challenged Rudd, but ballot did not occur. February 27, 2012 - Rudd challenges Gillard. (Gillard 71; Rudd 31) 11.50am: Canberra journalists are tweeting that Kevin Rudd will hold a press conference shortly before he zips off to the backbenches. 11.31am: Sydney Morning Herald Political Editor Peter Hartcher says the final tally is similar to the estimate of what Kevin Rudd was facing when he chose not to contest Julia Gillard for the Labor leadership in 2010.
"It tells us that one of the basic laws of leadership challenges has not worked for Kevin Rudd. There is usually momentum for the challenger, that has not happened today. "[The Labor Party] have damaged themselves a lot. The main victim seems to be Julia Gillard's approval rating. Rudd's standing as preferred Prime Minister has not changed. "It is essentially the same outcome that they would have got 20 months ago." But Hartcher was doubtful there would be any repeat of the bloody saga that has dominated the past week of politics. "If 20 months of dire polling and the loss of a majority government [won't shift sentiment towards Rudd], this tells you that something dramatic will have to shift for any future challenge [to succeed]. It's going to have to be a pretty serious shift of circumstances to change a 40-vote margin."
Former Sydney morning Herald and ABC reporter Paul Barry offers this insight: 11.26am: The Age Political Editor Michelle Grattan says this result is an overwhelming endorsement of Julia Gillard by her party. "It has basically said we are going to stick with what we've got and this means it is unlikely Kevin Rudd is going to have any sort of resurrection later on. "We will hear a lot of talk about unity and that will come from both camps. What's important is how Julia Gillard settles down the government."
11.18am: Returning officer Chris Hayes is accompanied by Dick Adams to deliver the result THE FINAL RESULT IS 71 GILLARD 31 RUDD So the final result is marginally better for Rudd than the early numbers that leaked out of the caucus room. Coorey immediately 'fesses up via Twitter: Contrary to reports there was no recount. So Rudd has made the magic number. And now we await the breakdown of who voted for whom?
A question fielded by a member of the press pack: "Do you think there will be a unified party heading forward?" The answer from Mr Hayes: "Absolutely"
11.09am: Hello, David Speers on Sky News says he has just got a message saying they are still counting inside the caucus room. Could Rudd be demanding a recount? That's what Phillip Coorey has just tweeted: We still have no official word on the numbers, but the same division was sent to Coorey, Fairfax online political reporter Jessica Wright and it is understood a reporter from the ABC was also sent similar information.
11.02am: We are still waiting for the returning officer to deliver the official result, so Sky are continuing to give Mark Latham free rein to deliver his form of analysis. Latham says that this is a "dismal result" for Kevin Rudd, who should not have contested this ballot and should have waited for the party to come to him in desperation next year. Meanwhile for Rudd, the condolences begin, this from the managing editor of Foreign Policy magazine (could be be upset because his only reader didn't deserve such a fate...?): And the sympathy is hard to find in this Rudd spoof Twitter account:
10.54am: The predictions were that Kevin Rudd would have to score a vote in the 30s to give him any hope of further leadership aspirations. A vote in the 20s would be considered a very disappointing outcome for the Rudd camp, according to The Age National Affairs Editor Michael Gordon. But will it succeed in galvanising support behind Prime Minister Julia Gillard. And more importantly, we had the early vote at 72-30 - who switched camps? 10.47am: Sydney Morning Herald Chief Political Correspondent Phillip Coorey reports an early text from inside the caucus room says GILLARD HAS WON 73 VOTES TO 29.
Coorey is calling it: 10.40am: It's long been wondered how long Sky News's David Speers and Kieran Gilbert can talk about politics when nothing is happening. Now we know - they have crossed to ex-Labor leader Mark Latham, surely a sign of the ultimate desperation. And Latham is in his best snarky form. In speculating about the tone of the speeches being delivered to the faithful inside the caucus room, he chances himself to venture an idea on the tone of the challenger's pitch: "The speech will be full and frank, in the best Rudd tradition."
Latham also says the "group therapy" that the party is currently undergoing in the caucus room will have a very liberating affect on Julia Gillard, finally freeing her of the Rudd legacy once her inevitable victory is announced. 10.24am: Chris Hayes, the Labor MP for Fowler, has the job of returning officer and will deliver the much-anticipated result to the hoards of media gathered in the corridors of Parliament House. The result shouldn't take long now - both candidates are only allowed to speak for five minutes before the vote is taken. And here is the box in which the fateful ballots will be cast, being brought into the caucus room by the party whips: 10.16am: We have a LAST MINUTE DEFECTOR. Sydney Morning Herald chief political correspondent Phillip Coorey gets a text message from inside the caucus room confirming Queensland Senator Mark Furner has switched from Rudd to Gillard.
Rudd is poised on either 29 or 30. The big question now - will he get to the big 3-0? Former Rudd adviser Lachlan Harris is resorting to bribery to get the results everyone so desperately seeks: Therese Rein is standing by her husband to the death and gives one last shout out to the people:
10.04am: Julia Gillard strides down the corridors of Parliament House into the Labor caucus room in fighting red, surrounded by her closest supporters in a scene reminiscent of Reservoir Dogs. Kevin Rudd has a similarly goon-like cohort around him as he makes his entrance - also sporting the fighting red of the Labor movement. And the predictable barbs flow forth on Twitter:
9.56am: There is a steady stream of Labor MPs filtering into the caucus room now. They may want to pay heed to the thoughts of NSW Labor elder statesman and former premier Bob Carr, who posted this entry on his personal blog this morning. "If after Julia Gillard's expected victory today there is a revival of white-anting against her, the whole Party will explode with anger. Especially as this challenge has done so much profound harm; part of which will be reflected in the Queensland result on March 24, 2012. The public reaction against Labor if after today leadership speculation is resumed will be catastrophic." 9.42am: Fairfax columnist Michael Duffy has hit on one of the most perplexing things about this whole leadership contest - How do you explain Rudd's persistent public popularity?
Why are voters so fond of Kevin Rudd, the man who as prime minister turned Canberra into a First World Pyongyang minus the smooth running? Without this popularity, today's vote would not be happening. Yet it has not been explained. Some say the people like Rudd because they've never met him. This is true enough, but it fails to tell us why they like the unmet Rudd, the one they're familiar with from television. TV Rudd, I suggest, is a pretty unusual creature when compared with most other politicians we see on the screen. My theory is that, strange as it seems, it is this difference that many people are attracted by. 9.35am: Some more contributions from the political twittersphere. The serious:
And the silly: 9.23am: Canberra is abuzz this morning as Labor MPs prepare to decide who should be prime minister, but over the past few days a different poll has been taking place on Twitter. The Age has been archiving tweets associated with the leadership spill since Thursday. An hour-by-hour analysis tracking the popularity of keywords "Rudd" and "Gillard" shows no contest - Gillard has out-tweeted Rudd only twice in that time - once when she called the leadership spill and again, very briefly, when Industry Minister Anthony Albanese declared support for Kevin Rudd. There have been nearly twice as many tweets containing the word "Rudd" as there have been containing the word "Gillard" since Thursday.
9.13am: Confirmation from Labor Chief Whip Joel Fitzgibbon that the caucus will be down one body, to 102, with new mother Michelle Rowland absenting herself from the vote today: 9.04am: Tony Abbott has managed to compose himself long enough to give an interview to Channel Seven in which he reiterated his message that a full election was the only way to sort out the Labor mess. "We need an election not because I like elections but because the people, and not the faceless men, should be choosing the prime minister. "The problem with this ballot today is that nothing much will change: there will still be a poisonously divided government, we'll still have the carbon tax, the boats will keep coming, the faceless men will still be in charge.
"The one message that is coming loud and clear from the public is not so much Kevin or Julia, it is give us the power,let us make this choice." 8.58am: Echoes of the infamous Howard/Latham handshake in this awkward meeting between Gillard backer Stephen Smith and Rudd supporter Martin Ferguson. 8.51am: Here's some more from Kevin Rudd's first interview of the day, with Kochie and Mel on Seven's Sunrise: "Think carefully about the survivability of this government at the next election. Today's the day that you simply ask yourself: how do we best ensure that Tony Abbott doesn't become prime minister."
Mr Rudd also repeated his promise that he would get on with the job if, as predicted, he loses today's leadership ballot. "I won't be initiating any challenge against Julia. As a backbencher there's plenty to do." And there was time for one last shot at the outpouring of poison that has been spewed at Mr Rudd by many of his former cabinet colleagues. "There's been a pretty large bucket of bile heading in the direction of yours truly. I've chosen not to respond to what various people have said. "Obviously those things are never fully and finally healed but people get on with the business because it's more important than what happens in the Canberra beltway."
8.37am: This word cloud published on Twitter by @tweeveetv covers a quarter of a million #respill-related tweets. No surprise what's on everyone's mind: 8.20am: Sydney Morning Herald online reporter Amy McNeilage is keeping her eyes on the money and the bookies are overwhelmingly backing a Gillard landslide today. Online betting site Sportsbet has taken the biggest bet in Australian political history, with one punter placing $300,000 on Julia Gillard to win today's leadership ballot. The return, should she win, won't be huge, with odds yesterday of $1.08. The margin has widened further this morning, with Sportsbet offering just $1.03 on Julia Gillard and $10 on Kevin Rudd. Rudd has interested the smaller backers, taking four times as many individual bets, but all the big money has been for Gillard.
After a weekend of solid backing Gillard's odds are almost completely flat across the board today. Centrebet is offering just $1.02 with Rudd blowing out to $12, while Tom Waterhouse has taken their market down after Gillard's odds got as low as $1.01 yesterday. Sportsbet is capitalising on the interest, even opening novelty books for what colour tie Rudd will wear and the colour of Gillard's Jacket. Sportsbet:
Julia Gillard- $1.03
Kevin Rudd- $10 Centrebet:
Julia Gillard- $1.02
Kevin Rudd- $12 Sportingbet Australia:
Julia Gillard- $1.02
Kevin Rudd- $11
8.16am: There seems to be a strange compulsion among some sectors of the media to convince a "psychic" crocodile to forecast Australia's political fortunes, whether it be "Harry" from the Northern Territory or Solly, who has been drafted in to install some sense into the Queensland election campaign:
Please turn off the auto-refresh at the top of the page before playing this video. 8.14am: Many voters may be frustrated they don't have a say in today's contest. But as a rather cheeky Malcolm Turnbull reminds us, there are alternatives: 8.10am: Sky News is now saying there are no more undeclared voters - Ms Gillard is set to win the leadership contest 73 votes to 29. But will it be enough?
Kevin Rudd has now arrived at Parliament House, all smiles and sunshine in the crisp Canberra morning. He is now revisiting some tried and trusted territory, facing a "grilling" at the hands of Sunrise's Kochie and Mel on the front lawn of Parliament House. "It's going to be tough but I'm absolutely confident this is the right course of action. It was the right thing to do to challenge." 7.45am: Just how will Labor cope with the ugly decision it is facing today? Online Political Editor Tim Lester interviews The Age Political Editor Michelle Grattan and Sydney Morning Herald Chief Political Correspondent Phillip Coorey about their predictions for the day's bloodletting.
Please turn off the auto-refresh at the top of the page before playing this video. 7.25am: Ms Gillard's backers have already taken to Twitter today to spruik their candidate's case: And the leadership spat is a gift that keeps on giving for the wits of Twitter:
7.20am: With today's result almost a given, what next for Labor is the key question on the lips of the nation today.
The latest Nielsen Poll conducted exclusively for Fairfax Media last week shows Kevin Rudd continues to be the overwhelming public favourite for the top job, preferred by 58 per cent of voters compared with Julia Gillard's 34 per cent. This continues a long trend and there are still grave doubts about whether Gillard can reverse this position in time for the next election, due in 2013. But a key finding was that public opinion was almost evenly divided about whether the party should actually change leaders, with 48 per cent saying Labor should make the swap, while 47 per cent said it should stay with Ms Gillard. A Newspoll published in News Ltd newspapers also shows Mr Rudd holds a big lead over Ms Gillard in public popularity 53 per cent to 34. But despite many commentators predicting the vicious public infighting within the party would be damaging to its public profile, voting support is at its highest in 12 months with the party's primary vote rising three points to 35 per cent from two weeks ago, compared to the coalition which is steady at 45 per cent. 7.05am: Defence Minister Stephen Smith - one of a cohort of Labor frontbenchers who have publicly sworn to never again serve under Kevin Rudd - is striking a triumphal tone on Sky News this morning. "I am confident that the PM will ghave a convincing win and she will get the strong support of caucus."
Mr Smith, often nominated as a third candidate for Labor leader, also dismissed suggestions he might be conscripted to the top job if voters remain dissatisfied with Ms Gillard. "It's not going to happen." He is also just one of many in the Gillard camp who already seems to be taking a win as a given, stressing that the important thing is the events beyond today and that the party gets on with the job of running the country, once it has finished spewing out bile from its rather painful and public exorcism. In contrast, Housing and Emergency Services Minister and Rudd backer Robert McClelland was striking a very conciliatory note on ABC radio this morning, seemingly resigned to a Gillard win. Labor backbencher and Rudd supporter Doug Cameron told ABC radio a resounding win for the Prime Minister in today's Labor leadership ballot might not be the end of the matter.
"If Julia Gillard wins today and we end up in the same position as we are now, in terms of the polls, in several months time, then my view is the same people who installed Julia Gillard will be looking for a candidate to replace Julia Gillard." Communications Minister and Gillard backer Stephen Conroy has also done the rounds of TV and radio this morning and acknowledged the painful truth that Labor would not win an election if one was called now. But free of a "destabilisation campaign" of the likes that has been run by the Rudd camp, the government still had time to turn things around.
6.52am: Some biting analysis around from Fairfax writers this morning. Sydney Morning Herald Political Editor Peter Hartcher doesn't hold back, declaring that Labor will be the loser, regardless of who wins: Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd have called for Labor unity after today's ballot, but it won't happen because it will not solve the central problem - that the party is locked in a death roll with itself. Gillard's central problem is that she is widely considered illegitimate and all polling for a year suggests she's unelectable; Rudd's main problem is that most of the caucus would rather lose government than work under him.
The Prime Minister is unacceptable to the people; the alternative leader is unacceptable to the people who choose the prime minister. Or, as a party official put it yesterday: "She'll still be illegitimate and he'll still be a bastard." Meanwhile The Age columnist and Pulse blogger Katharine Murphy writes that this is the dogfight we had to have: So what now for Labor? What to do in the wreckage of all the fighting words? Nuclear explosions are followed by a lengthy period of radioactivity. Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd may have destroyed themselves, and each other, in this swinging, pitiless fight.
6.30am: It comes down to this - Prime Minister Julia Gillard and former leader and foreign affairs minister Kevin Rudd will put their fates down to their colleagues as the Labor Party leadership is put to a ballot at 10am. Mr Rudd's backers seem resigned to the fate of their candidate, with the latest count showing he will struggle to attract a third of the 103-strong caucus vote. Loading The Sydney Morning Herald Chief Political Correspondent Phillip Coorey has set the stage for today's showdown, with a cover story of today's newspaper saying the Prime Minister is heading for a bitter-sweet victory. Coorey writes: "With the realisation setting in that Labor has inflicted enormous damage on itself, Ms Gillard said yesterday that the ballot must end the infighting for good." The Age's Political Editor Michelle Grattan has looked forward to the murky future for the party. Grattan writes: "Julia Gillard faces the huge challenge of pulling together her deeply divided government after Kevin Rudd's certain defeat in this morning's Labor leadership ballot."Top 20 Things Most Dangerous to Children
Came across this article today and thought it was well put together and contained great info!
Understand that what we have been lead to believe by much of mainstream media and mainstream medicine about these things may be different so please take the time to look into things further if you question what is being said.
In my reading, I have read numerous articles on most of the items listed and they for the most part concur but I encourage you to do some of your own digging as well!
FYI (** = my – (the poster) – added comments)
1. Mercury fillings
Often called “silver fillings” to hide the fact that they’re made from mercury, these highly toxic fillings are placed directly into the mouths of children where they are inhaled (mercury vapor) and swallowed, causing systemic mercury poisoning to the child and leading to long-term neurological damage. Visit www.IAOMT.org and watch the “Smoking Teeth = Poison Gas” video to learn more.** (Not that long ago dentists were the most likely profession to literally go crazy – mercury poisoning)
2. Vaccines
Think vaccines are safe? You’ve been hoodwinked by the popular media parroting drug company propaganda. Vaccines are preserved with methyl mercury, one of the most dangerous chemical forms of the toxic heavy metal. This mercury is injected directly into the bodies of children where it causes severe neurological damage. And yes, it does cause Autism, despite what you’ve read in the dumbed-down press. Only a fool would inject their child with mercury-preserved vaccines.** (Not that long ago dentist were the most likely profession to literally go crazy – mercury poisoning)
3. Hot dogs
Hot dogs are made with horrifying processed meat parts (click here to see shocking photos of processed meat products, then preserved with a cancer-causing ingredient called sodium nitrite. As detailed in my book Grocery Warning, this ingredient causes brain tumors in children, not to mention leukemia, pancreatic cancer, colon cancer and other cancers. Hot dogs are far more dangerous to a child’s health than lead paint in my opinion, and yet parents keep feeding them to their children!
4. Antibacterial soap
How about a little nerve toxin in your soap? That’s what’s found in antibacterial soap. It’s a toxic cocktail of chemicals designed to kill life. That’s how it kills bacteria. The problem is that it also harms people — especially infants and children who are trying to develop healthy nervous systems. Avoid all products claiming to be “antibacterial.” You’re better off using natural soap (like Dr. Bronner’s soap, www.DrBronner.com ) and letting your child’s immune system fight off common bacteria. The world isn’t sterile, after all. You can’t turn your house into a germ-free bubble. (** You don’t want too either – children need to play in dirt and be exposed to the real world so their immune system is challenged so it becomes developed. It is our first and best line fo defense. If you are already a parent, the anti- bacterial craze probably was in it’s infancy when you were very young. You survived and thrived with just plain soap and water. If you want extra protection – do lots of research on colloidal silver and choose that. It will allow the immune system to be exposed and develop because of how it works. Had I known about it when my kids were tiny. I am positive we would never have needed antibiotics.)
5. ADHD drugs
Would you give your child street drugs like speed or meth? Probably not, but what if your doctor wrote you a prescription for speed and said your child needed it because he was ADHD? If you’re like most parents, you’d fall in step and start giving your child speed. But wait, you say: ADHD drugs are not speed, are they? But of course they are. They belong to a class of drugs called amphetamines. They used to be illegally sold as speed. Now they’re prescription drugs, and they’re given to children in schools all across America (and elsewhere). Psychiatrists and drug companies are making a killing dosing up kids and infants on substances that used to be considered illegal street drugs (and that have no legitimate medical use whatsoever)..(**We used a light and sound therapy for our son who was labeled very high level ADHD – it was extremely effective. He has the courses and the marks that would allow him to take almost any degree he chooses – they said he would never sit still long enough to make it past grade 9. He was and to this day is the only child to be kicked out of Special Ed in our school division because he no longer needs it. )
6. Sports drinks
For some reason, parents irrationally believe sports drinks are healthy because they contain the word “sports.” Didn’t they notice the neon green artificial coloring? Sports drinks are, in my opinion, a nutritional joke. Made from salt water, processed sweeteners and petrochemical coloring, many of their ingredients are actually harmful. Drinking water would be smarter, and feeding your child some healthy trace minerals would be even better. Low on potassium? Eat a banana. (**Many teenagers are experiencing extreme adrenal fatigue from drinks like the Redbulls etc. of the world. One of the products of an amazing heart health product line that I market is an energy drink that is all natural amino acids and B vitamins. If you want info on a good for you energy drink, just e-mail me or let me know in an e-mail or comment. It fits my simple, safe, affordable solution prerequisites.)
7. Cough syrup and over-the-counter medicines
Nearly all children’s over-the-counter medicines contain multiple toxic substances such as chemical sweeteners, preservatives and additives. Cough syrup, in particular, has been scientifically proven to be absolutely worthless in preventing coughs. Many “children’s” medicines are actually more toxic than their adult counterparts because they’re sweetened up and cosmetically enhanced with artificial colors made from petrochemicals. Yet parents poison their children every day with over-the-counter medicine.(**Please look through my blog – there are now a number of natural cough, cold and flu remedies to be found here.)
8. Sunscreen
The sunscreen industry is a huge scam. Most popular sunscreen products actually cause skin cancer due to the numerous toxic chemicals they contain (which are quickly absorbed into the skin where they cause DNA mutations that lead to cancer). Even worse, sunscreen blocks the UV radiation that allows the skin to manufacture all-important vitamin D — the most powerful anti-cancer nutrient yet known to modern science. It prevents over a dozen different cancers, yet parents block it by slathering toxic sunscreen on their children, all while mistakenly believing they’re “protecting their children from cancer!” What a scam.
9. Fluoride in the water
I’ve always found it amazing that city water officials were dumb enough to actually buy a toxic waste substance and arrange to have it dripped into the public water supply where it would be ingested by infants and children. The result? Mass fluorosis and toxicity to children everywhere. Didn’t these people realize that fluoride only works topically? (That is, it only works if you rub it on your teeth, then spit it out, and even that only works if you’re using natural fluoride, not the chemicals spit out as byproducts of the fertilizer industry, which is what city water departments are buying and dripping into the water supply.) Click here to see my CounterThink cartoon on this topic.
Whoever heard of drinking a topical medication in the first place? It’s like swallowing sunscreen to prevent sunburn. Even worse, putting this into the public water supply effectively mass medicates everyone with a bioactive chemical substance that no one has been given a prescription for. This is all done with no regard for the level of natural fluoride children might already be ingesting from other sources. The situation is so crazy that it’s difficult to find a more insane example of medical tyranny than the mass fluoridation of public water supplies. The fact that doctors and dentists so vehemently support it demonstrates just how crazy they really are.(** I am really happy to live on a farm with well water.)
10. Processed milk
Children as young as 10 years old are now being diagnosed with heart disease and clogged arteries. Ever wonder how it happened? It’s due in part, I believe, to all the processed milk children are swallowing these days. Not only is the milk contaminated with pus, blood and detectable levels of pesticides and other chemicals, it’s also homogenized, meaning the fats are artificially modified in a way that makes them stay in suspension. This homogenization also makes milk fats dangerous to cardiovascular health. While I support the consumption of raw, unprocessed milk, I think that consuming processed, homogenized milk is dangerous to the health of infants, children and adults alike!(**Countries that do not have an abundance of dairy products, have significantly lower diabetes and heart disease rates.)
11. Fast food
Fast food is extremely unhealthy for children. Not only are the foods often fried, homogenized, hydrogenated and otherwise altered, they’re also laced with chemical additives, taste enhancers, processed sugars, petrochemical food coloring and other unhealthy substances. Strangely, many parents actually reward their children for good behavior by buying them unhealthy fast food meals, thereby creating a psychological association between good feelings and junk food. (Fast food restaurants further exploit this psychological link by building playgrounds and running feel-good advertisements that emphasize friends and fun, then link those good vibes to their food products.)
12. Antidepressant drugs
Children as young as six months old are now being put on psychotropic drugs such as SSRIs (antidepressants). These drugs, we now know, cause suicidal thoughts and violent behavior, especially in young boys. They imbalance brain chemistry and even alter the body’s metabolism of sugar, promoting diabetes and leading to rapid weight gain. These drugs are so dangerous that feeding them to children should be considered a crime. Every single school shooting involving a child in the United States in the last 15 years has been linked to antidepressant drug use. Need I say more? (** and how many school shootings since this article was originally written?)
13. Chemical laundry detergents
Parents are shown fancy ads on television depicting how wonderful and clean their clothes will be if they wash them in brand-name laundry detergent. What they’re not shown, however, is the toxicity of all the synthetic chemicals that go into most laundry detergent products. The fragrance chemicals alone are often carcinogenic, and they’re just as bad for the environment as they are children’s health. A new alternative has appeared, however: Soap berries! It’s laundry soap that grows on trees. We offer it at www.BetterLifeGoods.com (**Use a natural laundry ball.- I am in the process of trying a new one out, that I am really liking so far.)
14. Flame retardant chemicals
Did you know that new mattresses for infants and children are often sprayed with extremely toxic flame retardant chemicals? These are easily absorbed through the skin of infants and children where they contribute to numerous neurological disorders and immune suppression. Many clothing products are also sprayed with flame retardants, as are some carpeting products. In the push to make everything fireproof, state regulators (who have mandated the flame retardant chemicals in states like California) have created a toxic environment for everyone. I suppose if you’re a politician, it’s always better for a million people to die of a mysterious disease that can’t be linked to you than to have one baby burning up on the evening news with fingers of blame pointed directly at you. (**All brand new clothes are very toxic and need to be washed before worn! Living on a farm i have a cloths line, so mine also get aired out outside overnight. )
15. Soda
Aside from directly promoting diabetes and obesity, sodas also contain high amounts of phosphoric acid, a substance that dissolves bones and causes a loss of bone mineral density. This causes massive tooth decay as well as a shrinking jaw bone and overall skeletal fragility. Diet sodas are even worse, since they contain chemical sweeteners linked to neurological disorders and learning disabilities. (** Have you noticed the price of a 2 liter Coke can still be found at 99 cents on sale but you seldom see milk on sale and never never that cheap.)
16. Air fresheners
Air fresheners contain cancer-causing chemicals. Unleashing them in the house exposes children to these chemicals, promoting asthma and other respiratory problems. If you value the health of your children, avoid air freshener products and just use |
all this is done, and even then I'll probably wear a glove.
I hope to have progress photos and reports soon. For years I have wanted a Blade Runner blaster that would shoot. I've probably owned one of each version of Rich Coyle's beautiful replicas and he and I have traded ideas and engineering concerns over the years.First off, I am a middle aged policeman so I am fully aware of the legalities involved. On the side I am a fully licensed gun dealer, I sell real guns and I design and build prop guns (inc. some that shoot).When making or modifying a real firearm, you need a working knowledge of metallurgy, physics, ballistics, etc. as you can easily turn a pistol into a hand grenade that goes off in your hand. The Blade Runner blaster is built on a.44 caliber revolver. That's.44 caliber. Alot of bang that, if not contained and channeled properly, can easily blow up the Charter Arms top strap, cylinder wall, etc.So, kids, do not try this at home. It is not for amateurs and you truly need a machine shop to do it properly and safely. Having a grinder, a Dremel and a vice will not do it. To get this far, it took an experienced machinist (who builds semiauto rifles out of aluminum billets) using computer controlled industrial lathes, milling machines, etc.This thread is for entertainment and informational purposes only. It is not a how-to, it is not a tutorial. It is a show and tell. Here we go:Here's my Coyle Worldcon Blade Runner Blaster that will eventually house my Charter Arms Bulldog:I took the barrel off my Charter Arms.44 special Bulldog. Note the two shoulders (unthreaded portions, only one highlighted) where the barrel screws into the gun:The two shoulders are critical and must be matched to ensure proper fitting to the frame. The frame itself is designed for the unthreaded shoulders. I took.44 cal barrel stock (a rifled blank, unfinished barrel material) and had it turned to the proper diameter on a lathe, cut it to length, turn down the threaded area, threaded it and shouldered it and cut the crown to specs. It was then placed in the frame. It is not simply a matter of screwing a barrel into a frame. Remember,.44 cal. is a significant load. You need to consider the leade (sic), the "flash gap" or gap between barrel and cylinder, the torque spec for tightening the barrel, the amount of contact spec'd by the factory for thread contact, etc.Then there is the matter of cutting off part of the ejector rod and a cosmetic/dust cover on the crane as shown here:Here is the Bulldog with the new barrel:The next parts of the project will be to:1. Fit the Bulldog into the Coyle replica and secure it so that it will hold together under the stresses of firing, recoil, gas and heat venting, etc. Remember Newton's 3rd law of motion!2. Removing the bluing to better simulate the look of the original.3. Deciding on a Coyle replica Steyr, a real Steyr or different replica Steyr to stack on top.4. "Dust" testing. Blowing powder (dust) to determine the course of the flash and heat when the gun fires to determine if modification to the side panels is needed. Doc3d IIRC did indicate he modified those panels on his Blade Runner shooter. Will need to determine if containment or release is the way to go re. the venting.5. Assembly and test firing. Staring with talcum loads using a primer only and working up to using a bullet. This will be done remotely using a Ransom Rest. I'm not willing to risk my hand until all this is done, and even then I'll probably wear a glove.I hope to have progress photos and reports soon. Back to topNC man bitten by cobra in critical condition; anti-venom administered Copyright by WNCN - All rights reserved Ali Iyoob on "My Carolina Talk" last May. [ + - ] Video
Copyright by WNCN - All rights reserved PHOTOS: SNAKES THAT ARE FOUND IN NORTH CAROLINA
Copyright by WNCN - All rights reserved PHOTOS: SNAKES THAT ARE FOUND IN NORTH CAROLINA
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (WNCN) - A North Carolina man is being treated at UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill after being bitten by a cobra, officials confirmed.
Ali Iyoob was brought to the hospital for a cobra bite and is listed in critical condition.
Iyoob was featured on "My Carolina Talk" last May to talk about copperheads. Iyoob is a member of the Reptile Rescue of the Carolinas.
Bob Marotto, director of Animal Services in Orange County, said Iyood had received anti-venom as part of his treatment.
Marotto said the cobra and other snakes that were in Iyoob's possession are secure.
Copyright by WNCN - All rights reserved Iyoob's car was still where EMS workers found him on the side of Highway 54 near Timothy Lane.
Copyright by WNCN - All rights reserved Iyoob's car was still where EMS workers found him on the side of Highway 54 near Timothy Lane.
"Our goal is to work to ensure that no one else is harmed by this snake or any other snake that was in possession of the person who was bitten," Marotto said.
Orange County officials are working with the North Carolina Zoo and the Museum of Natural Sciences to remove and safely house the more than 20 snakes in Iyoob's possession.
Marotto said venomous and constrictive snakes were in Iyoob's possession along with non-venomous snakes.
Officials believe there has been a violation of state law and will review with the district attorney on whether charges will be filed against Iyoob.
Marotto said an Orange County deputy alerted Animal Services about the snake bite.
The Queen A post shared by Ali Iyoob (@aliiyoob) on Apr 9, 2016 at 8:11pm PDT
North Carolina law pertaining to venomous reptiles states:Twenty years later, we still haven’t come to terms with the scope of our deliverance. Francis Fukuyama famously described the post-Communist era as “the end of history.” By this, he didn’t mean the end of events — wars and famines, financial panics and terrorist bombings. He meant the disappearance of any enduring, existential threat to liberal democracy and free-market capitalism.
This thesis has been much contested, but it holds up remarkably well. Even 9/11 didn’t undo the work of ’89. Osama bin Laden is no Hitler, and Islamism isn’t in the same league as the last century’s totalitarianisms. Marxism and fascism seduced the West’s elite; Islamic radicalism seduces men like the Fort Hood shooter. Our enemies resort to terrorism because they’re weak, and because we’re so astonishingly strong.
Yet nobody seems quite willing to believe it. Instead, we keep returning to the idea that liberal society is just as vulnerable as it was before the Berlin Wall came down.
Photo
On the right, pundits and politicians have cultivated a persistent cold-war-style alarmism about our foreign enemies — Vladimir Putin one week, Hugo Chavez the next, Kim Jong-il the week after that.
On the left, there’s an enduring fascination with the pseudo-Marxist vision of global capitalism as an enormous Ponzi scheme, destined to be undone by peak oil, climate change, or the next financial bubble.
Meanwhile, our domestic politics are shot through with antitotalitarian obsessions, even as real totalitarianism recedes in history’s rear-view mirror. Plenty of liberals were convinced that a vote for George W. Bush was a vote for theocracy or fascism. Too many conservatives are persuaded that Barack Obama’s liberalism is a step removed from Leninism.
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These paranoias suggest a civilization that’s afraid to reckon with its own apparent permanence. The end of history has its share of discontents — anomie, corruption, “The Real Housewives of New Jersey.” And it may be that the only thing more frightening than the possibility of annihilation is the possibility that our society could coast on forever as it is — like a Rome without an Attila to sack its palaces, or a Nineveh without Yahweh to pass judgment on its crimes.
Humankind fears judgment, of course. But we depend on it as well. The possibility of dissolution lends a moral shape to history: we want our empires to fall as well as rise, and we expect decadence to be rewarded with destruction.
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Not that we want to experience this destruction ourselves. But we want it to be at least a possibility — as a spur to virtue, and as a punishment for sin.
This was how the Soviet threat often played on the home front. Remove the stain of segregation, liberals argued in the 50s, or the Communists will win the world. Repent of your hedonism and pacifism, neoconservatives urged Americans in the 70s, or the West will go the way of Finland.
Neither group wanted the United States to lose the cold war. But they wanted to inhabit a world where America could lose, and pass into history, if we failed to live up to our ideals.
This could be why we don’t celebrate the anniversary of 1989 quite as intensely as we should. Maybe we miss living with the possibility of real defeat. Maybe we sense, as we hunt for the next great existential threat, that even the end of history needs to have an end.In a first for Congressional hearings, James Comey, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, was asked to say under oath on Monday if the official Twitter feed of the President of the United States was lying about the testimony he was still giving. The extraordinary moment came after Comey had confirmed to the House Intelligence Committee that there is indeed an ongoing counterintelligence investigation of Russian interference in the election of Donald Trump as president and “whether there was any coordination” between the Trump campaign and the Russian effort.”
BREAKING: FBI Director Comey confirms the FBI is investigating any possible links between the Trump campaign and Russia pic.twitter.com/tCukCbB3ol — Bradd Jaffy (@BraddJaffy) March 20, 2017
Comey also stated categorically that there was no evidence to support the conspiracy theory that former President Barack Obama had ordered the wiretapping of Trump Tower, speculation Trump himself had stated as fact in a moment of Breitbart-induced delirium earlier this month. After those revelations, Comey and Michael Rogers, the director of the National Security Agency, were asked by Rep. Devin Nunes, the Republican chair of the intelligence committee and a former member of Trump’s transition team, if they had any evidence that Russian hackers had tampered with the counting of votes in the small number of states that swung the electoral college in Trump’s favor. Both men replied that they did not. Video of that exchange was soon posted on the president’s official Twitter account, @POTUS, which is managed by Trump’s former caddy and current social media director, Dan Scavino. The president’s Twitter spokesman, however, added a caption which mischaracterized the testimony of the two men as proof that “Russia did not influence electoral process.”
The NSA and FBI tell Congress that Russia did not influence electoral process. pic.twitter.com/d9HqkxYBt5 — President Trump (@POTUS) March 20, 2017
That was incorrect. Comey and Rogers had instead both made it plain that they stood by their earlier assessment, in a report that was partially declassified on January 6th, that Russia had indeed hacked the email accounts of Democratic officials, and provided stolen messages to WikiLeaks, in order to damage the electoral chances of Trump’s opponent, Hillary Clinton. A short time later, the two men, who were appearing before the committee largely to clear up confusion caused by the president’s earlier tweets — about “the Russia story” being “fake news” and President Obama “tapping my phones in October” — were asked by Rep. Jim Himes, a Connecticut Democrat, if the new @POTUS tweet was a fair summary of their testimony. Comey and Rogers replied that they had offered no judgement as to the effectiveness of the Russian campaign on the opinions of American voters when they said that there was no evidence of tampering with the actual vote-counting in the swing states.
Comey on Trump tweet that he testified Russia "did not influence electoral process": "It certainly wasn't our intention to say that today." pic.twitter.com/21ASPvFzh1 — ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) March 20, 2017
As the New Yorker correspondent Ryan Lizza noted, the White House seemed to have shot itself in the foot by live-tweeting its misleading account of the testimony before the hearing was over.
Good lesson for the president: wait until your top intelligence officials are finished testifying before mischaracterizing their testimony. — Ryan Lizza (@RyanLizza) March 20, 2017
The same official government account was also used to misrepresent Comey’s refusal to go along with Rep. Trey Gowdy, who seemed intent on planting the baseless theory that former President Obama could have leaked the news that Trump’s disgraced national security adviser, Michael Flynn, had lied about discussions with Russia’s ambassador to the United States.
FBI Director Comey refuses to deny he briefed President Obama on calls made by Michael Flynn to Russia. pic.twitter.com/cUZ5KgBSYP — President Trump (@POTUS) March 20, 2017
Before the hearing was over, Trump’s Twitter spokesman also falsely claimed that Comey had agreed with the premise that there was “no evidence of collusion between Russia and Trump Campaign.”
FBI Director Comey: fmr. DNI Clapper "right" to say no evidence of collusion between Russia and Trump Campaign. #ComeyHearing pic.twitter.com/MqBG2xd4s7 — President Trump (@POTUS) March 20, 2017Former New England Patriots center Bryan Stork retired from the NFL after only two seasons, but he has found his second career as a college football coach.
Stork announced via Twitter that he has accepted a graduate assistant position coaching offensive line at Southern Miss.
Related: Former Super Bowl winner has retired at the young age of 26
Stork retired after only two seasons due to suffering several concussions during his career. He started at center for the Patriots during the 2014 season, and he won a Super Bowl with the franchise that year.
David Andrews beat Stork out for the starting center position the following season, and the Patriots traded Stork to the Washington Redskins. Stork failed a physical with the Redskins and then he retired from football.
The Patriots selected Stork in the fourth round of the 2014 NFL Draft.
Stork played collegiately at Florida State, where he helped the Seminoles win a national title in 2014.
(h/t WEEI)Tomorrow night the Giants will play the Cowboys and officially kick off a new season in the NFL. At the conclusion of the game, one team will be 1-0 and the other will be 0-1. Unless they screw us all over and tie, as hilarious as that might be.
But after tomorrow night's game, there will be standings. Records. One NFC team will get off to a good start and one will erupt into a full-scale panic for their respective fan base. Today, there isn't any of that. Just like has been for much of the last seven months, the records are 0-0.
Today, the Seahawks and every other team are undefeated. By the end of Monday Night Football, less than a week away, we'll all have a record. Today is, in a way, the last official day that I simply get to believe whatever I want to believe about the Seahawks and their 2012 season. More accurately, Sunday morning will be the last official time that Seattle is 0-0 and the last official time that belief won't be replaced by reality.
Until then, I get to believe.
We've had as interesting of an offseason as I can ever remember. Signings, draft picks, and trades to put together a somewhat consistent 90-man roster that was just recently taken down to the necessary 53. Training camp, practices, and preseason games to give us an idea of who stood where. What Seattle did good. What they did bad. How they improved or in the case of some players, how their progress seemed to become stagnant and so they're no longer here.
All of that leads up to the week one game at the Cardinals with certain expectations. Those expectations have turned from what seemed like two evenly matched teams not long ago, to a belief that the Hawks should be a better team than Arizona and win, even if it's on the road. The performance of Russell Wilson so far has seemed to ignite positive belief throughout the fan base, whether justified or short-sighted or however you want to see it, a lot more people think Seattle can win this year.
Maybe even win the division.
More and more stories seem to be coming around from writers all across the country that the Seahawks could win 10 games and the division. Not something that I was hearing much of a month ago. Things quickly changed after being the most dominating team in the preseason, even if it was only the preseason, more and more people liked what they saw.
Well, this isn't really about other people. This isn't about predictions, prognostications, or who's picking who. This isn't about what they think, this is about what I think. And about what you think. This is about the 2012 offseason coming to an end and meeting the beginning of the 2012 regular season. This is my last chance to say, "Screw it" and believe whatever I want to believe.
Belief
Today I feel good. Today I know that anything is possible. That's not just the case for Seahawks fans, that's the case for the fan of any NFL team. Today, if you want to believe that your team can do anything this year, go for it. Nobody can point to any stat or win-loss record to tell you that your wrong. Those will start to come in mostly on Sunday. Take advantage of this time to feel as positive as you want and believe whatever you'd like to believe.
Nobody believed that the Bengals were a playoff team last year.
Nobody called out that the 49ers would go 13-3.
Nobody was putting big money on the Giants to win the Super Bowl after a 9-7 record that saw them sneak in the playoffs on the last day of the season.
One of the main reasons we follow sports at all is because we don't know what's going to happen. We might have an idea, a gut feeling, or thousands of pieces of evidence that point to one side being a 99% favorite. But 99% is not 100%. If it were, why would we play at all? We hold a belief that something might be improbable or impossible, up until the moment it happens but new things become possible every day.
Look around at the world of sports where a barely 21-year-old kid might be the best position player in baseball. Or even closer to home where a King became even more perfect. I had waited my whole life to see a Mariner throw a perfect game, even counted the outs as far as I could for every game I watched. If you were really lucky, the pitcher would make it to the third with a perfect game intact. Eventually you start to believe that it's never really going to happen, even if you did have the best pitcher in the game on your team. And then it does happen and you wonder why you ever doubted it was possible.
It's funny how even in science, we don't know what's going to happen next. Pluto was a planet in most of our lifetimes. The brontosaurus was a dinosaur. We are surrounded by dark matter and we don't even know what it really is. I was watching How The Universe Works on Science channel last night and they spoke about how only fifty years ago, Black Holes were science fiction.
Science fiction.
Ideas like that make you realize that if we can turn science fiction into science fact, why is it so crazy to believe that your favorite team is going to win a championship in any given season? Look back at baseball this year and you'll see that the Baltimore Orioles are in position to make the playoffs and only a game back of the Yankees. The O's weren't only supposed to be bad going into the year, they're still not really very good this year but their record goes against everything we understand and is nearly as good as any in the American League. We can't make sense of everything that happens in sports. We can't make sense of a 7-9 team running rampant on the defending Super Bowl champions. That's why sports are sports and not a predictable movie where the guy gets the girl in the end.
In sports, sometimes that extra standing over there that had no lines gets the girl.
Family
The word "family" gets thrown around a lot but I think people tend to start to forget what "family" really means. We know who our family is. We have our parents, grandparents, siblings, and so forth. The people we're related to. That's obvious. But we have other groups in our life that we call "family" and do we really know the significance of using that word?
When I think of my family, the people whom I share blood and a bond with unlike what I can share with anyone else, I think of people that I'll die in support of. It's unconditional. Most of my friendships haven't even been unconditional, many of them dissolved as I got older and we grew apart. As silly as it might seem to a non-sports fan, my fanhood of the Seahawks is absolutely unconditional.
That's family.
Maybe it's just a word on a jersey, but I know that whether I die tomorrow or I die fifty years from today, I'll die as a Seahawks fan. If you have been a Seattle sports fan for your entire life, you know exactly what the word "unconditional" means because it's not like they've given us much in the way of rewards. If the Seahawks were our son, he is still living at home in his thirties. If the Seahawks were our dad, he'd have seemed distant for most of our lives coming back once in awhile saying "I want to try to be your dad again."
And unconditionally we come back every year and say, "I'll give you another chance."
In a way that makes us all extended family, which is probably why we bicker and argue so much. At the end of the day though, I hope we all want the same thing. We may have different ideals, viewpoints, and opinions on how to get there, but we all want what's best for Seahawks. I can't say that I like some of the malicious negativity I see towards one another from time to time, I'd be content with never having a confrontation again in my life, but I still hope we can see that we're in this together. Just like any group of fans.
"Rah Rah"
This wouldn't be the first time I was accused of a "rah rah" article in regards to a Seahawks team that perhaps isn't as good as I think it is. It's true that I am an optimist. A believer. Perhaps dreaming too big and just spouting off nonsense at the expense of rationality. But that's what I am trying to say about the moments leading up to the start of another season:
F%$* rationality.
When we were kids, we were nothing but idealists. Stupid? Yes. Ignorant? Absolutely. Happier? Very likely.
If the Mariners were 12 games back with 15 games to go, you couldn't tell me that the season was over. I just learned in math class that 12 is less than 15, so that means we are still in this. If we were headed into another year with a mediocre Seahawks team, coming off of a mediocre season, I certainly would've told you that the Super Bowl was in our future. Why? Because we had Jon Kitna, maybe. Or Joey Galloway. Or hell, Christian Fauria. It wasn't about being rational, it was about "This is my team. We can do it."
There wasn't critical thinking, rationality, perspective, or frame of reference. We were eight. Or ten. Maybe even eighteen. We were floating around in a sea of irrationality because we didn't have bills, man. We didn't pay the rent. Our real world was "The Real World." Our hopes were endless. Our favorite player was Felix Fermin. Go into a season and ask your dad how the Seahawks were going to do and he'd say "Bad, because they're the Seahawks."
Be asked that same question when you're twelve, going into that same season and you'd say, "Awesome, because they're the Seahawks!"
I think a lot more critically these days. I have a frame of reference. I know the players and the chances and I could throw out dozens of predictions for the year and feel confident that I'm somewhat on par with reality. I could even tell you that critically-thinking, the Seahawks stand a good chance to do well in 2012.
But in the days leading up to the last chance to be 0-0, before the wins and losses matter, before we know who is actually going to surprise and who is going to disappoint, I'd rather just sit here for just a little while and tell you that the Seahawks are going to do great because they're awesome.
Am I a "Rah Rah" fan? An idealist and optimist? Sure, I'm fine with being accused of that. Because I will believe in this team until the day that I die. I will see great things for this team until the end. I know that one day we will break this streak of not finishing the year as champs eventually and I'll be overcome with joy because this team, this city, is like my family.
Until the records are set and the standings are done, anything is possible. I believe.
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(Addition to this: Is this an "answer" to what Jacson wrote yesterday? No. One thing has nothing to do with the other. If you think that Jacson's piece is the opposite of hopeful, you read it wrong. I have been working on this since before yesterday and I read Jacson's article the same time that you did. They are unrelated.)[new_royalslider id=”210″]
Hanley Ramirez’s 2014 season has gone the way the first half of 2013 did — hampered by injuries. After being bothered by his shoulder and receiving a cortisone shot, Ramirez may be headed to the disabled list as he’s also been battling calf tightness.
Manager Don Mattingly stated on Tuesday Ramirez wouldn’t be placed on the DL. However, that may change by Thursday, according to ESPN LA’s Mark Saxon:
Dodgers manager Don Mattingly called Thursday a “drop-dead date,” for making a decision on Ramirez’s short-term future.
Placing Ramirez on the DL Thursday would be an optimal date as it would mean the shortstop would be eligible to be reinstated immediately after the All-Star break.
Ramirez made another pinch-hit appearance in Wednesday’s loss, but he’s been out of the starting lineup in eight of the last nine games. Mattingly discussed some of the Dodgers’ hesitation to place Ramirez on the DL:
We don’t want to DL anyone and, obviously, we’re better with Hanley, but we also want him healthy.”
With the time he’s missed as of late, Ramirez has just three plate appearances since June 23. As Mattingly notes, while the Dodgers miss Ramirez’s bat in the lineup, his health moving forward is ultimately what is most important.
Ramirez is currently set to be a free agent in winter and has not been able to play in a full season for the Dodgers. The 30-year-old shortstop played in 86 games last season after dealing with hamstring and thumb issues.
These questions regarding his health could very well affect his value on the market and may have an impact on how the Dodgers or other teams, may proceed with contract negotiations. Should Ramirez be placed on the DL, Ersibel Arruebarrena, currently with Triple-A Albuquerque, may re-join the Dodgers.
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Dodgers Pull “Hot Foot” Prank On Scott Van Slyke
Please enable Javascript to watch this videoKeith Thurman has a purse of $1.5 million for tomorrow night's PBC on NBC premiere, the high purse of the card, which will see three fights televised on NBC at 8:30 pm EST from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The Nevada State Athletic Commission has Thurman's opponent, Robert Guerrero, at $1.225 million, the third-highest purse on the show.
The second-highest belongs to Adrien Broner, whose $1.25 million purse for his co-feature bout with John Molina just slightly puts him ahead of Guerrero. Molina will make $450,000, which is a little less than opening TV fight A-side Abner Mares, who will earn $500,000 for his fight with Arturo Santos Reyes, whose purse is a mere $20,000 to serve as a stay-busy/tune-up foe for Mares.
Bad Left Hook will have full live coverage for tomorrow night's card, with round-by-round results for all three televised fights. If you've missed anything, check out the Fight Week StoryStream.The real Fast & Furious: Paul Walker 'was in a STREET RACE when he died in fireball crash', as parents tell of family's heartache
Police are now probing whether the supercar was racing at the time of fatal crash
The driver of the vehicle was former race car driver Roger Rodas, Paul Walker's friend and financial adviser
Father Paul Walker Snr has paid tribute to his son: 'His heart was so big. I was proud of him every day of his life.'
The 40-year-old starred in five of the six Fast & Furious films about illegal street racing and heists
A teaser leaked online for the franchise's latest DVD chillingly includes Walker's co-star Tyrese Gibson saying the line : 'Promise me, no more funerals', before Walker replies: 'Just one more.'
Walker leaves behind daughter, Meadow, 15, and long-term girlfriend Jasmine Pilchard-Gosnell, 23
Officials confirm speed WAS a factor in the crash as so urces say a steering-fluid leak may have also caused the driver to lose steering
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The supercar that actor Paul Walker was in when he died was racing another vehicle at speeds of more than 100mph when the fatal crash occurred, witnesses claim.
Police are investigating tip-offs from possible witnesses that the Porsche's owner Roger Rodas, who also perished in the crash, was in the middle of a street race at the time, TMZ reports.
Other reports today claim the former Pirelli World Challenge race car driver was going 100mph just moments before the crash despite traveling through a 45mph zone.
'Though the investigation is in its early stages, investigators from the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department believe the Porsche was going over 100 mph,' a source close to the investigation told Radar.
Detectives are now appealing for anyone who may have video of the car to come forward.
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Fans gather and place flowers on Sunday at the scene of a fiery crash that killed Fast & Furious star Paul Walker in the Santa Clarita area of Los Angeles
Horror crash: First responders gather evidence near the wreckage of a Porsche sports car that crashed into a light pole on Hercules Street near Kelly Johnson Parkway in Valencia on Saturday, November 30, killing actor Paul Walker
In this photograph actor Paul Walker, best known for his role in the Fast & Furious action movies, is seen stepping into his friend Roger Rodas' Porsche GT just moments before the horrendous crash in which the pair lost their lives
It is understood the fatal incident took place in an area popular with street racers.
The new twist in the case comes as Paul Walker Snr, the Fast & Furious film actor's father, paid an emotional tribute to his son, saying: 'His heart was so big. I was proud of him every day of his life.'
Choking on his tears, Mr Walker told website JustJared: 'I'm just glad, that every time I saw him, I told him I loved him. And he would say the same thing to me.'
Describing how friends and relatives had rallied around to support the family in their time of grief, he added: 'You can’t beat friends at a time like this. His brothers are all taking it pretty hard.'
Mr Walker also told how his son had been determined to cut back on filming commitments to spend more time with his daughter just before he died.
He said: 'He told me "I want to take a hiatus", his daughter Meadow is just 15 and "I don’t have much more time to be with her" and then boom, he got another movie. He would say, "I don’t know what to do."
No survivors: The remains of the Porsche Carrera GT lie where the vehicle came to rest. The steering wheel shows the driver's position, meaning that Walker would have been sitting at the point where the vehicle struck the trees
Heartbroken: Paul Walker's father, Paul Walker Senior paid tribute to his son today as family members joined fans to mourn at the makeshift memorial at the crash site
Today co-star Tyrese Gibson wept as he visited the crash site to lay flowers. Hundreds of fans have turned the site into a makeshift shrine.
Meanwhile, a haunting clip of tragic actor Paul Walker promising there would be 'just one more' funeral in the next Fast & Furious film was leaked online just three days before he died in the smash.
In the teaser scene, from Fast & Furious 7 but released as an extra on the DVD and Blu-ray versions of Fast & Furious 6, Walker’s character, Brian O’Conner, makes the remark to co-star Tyrese Gibson’s character, Roman Pierce, at the funeral of Han and Gisele.
Standing in the graveyard, Gibson turns to Walker and says: 'Promise me Brian, no more funerals.'
'Just one more,' responds Walker, a reference to Jason Statham’s villainous character Ian Shaw.
The clip was leaked on film website Movies.com on November 27. Fast & Furious 6 is to be released on DVD and Blu-ray on December 10 in the U.S.
Foreboding: In the teaser scene, from Fast & Furious 7 but released as an extra on the DVD and Blu-ray versions of Fast & Furious 6, Walker's character Brian O'Conner (left) makes the remark to co-star Tyrese Gibson's character, Roman Pierce (right), at the funeral of Han and Gisele
Disbelief: Damian Diaz writes on a Racer's Prayer board as people gather around a make-shift memorial site at the spot Write caption here
Sheriff's deputy Peter Gomez said investigators are continuing to work to determine how fast the car was traveling and what caused it to lose control, Fox News reported. They will be investigating whether the driver was distracted or if he swerved to avoid something in the road.
It comes amid claims the crash may have been caused by a steering malfunction in the high-performance sports car.
Sources linked to Always Evolving - the shop co-owned by Walker and the Porsche driver Roger Rodas - told TMZ they saw evidence of a fluid burst and subsequent fluid trail before the skid marks at the accident site.
They said the noticeable lack of skid marks until just before the crash site suggest the driver may have lost control of the steering. On top of that, they appear in a straight line, not in a swerve pattern as normally occurs when a driver loses control of a car.
The sources also told the website that the flames spread so quickly to the front of the car reinforces their theory of a steering fluid leak. The engine of a Porsche Carrera is at the back of the vehicle.
It was also revealed today that the eight-year-old son of Rodas was one of the first to the site of the horrific car crash.
Before the flames had even died down, Rodas's son heroically came rushing to try and pull his dad from the inferno.
'His son had jumped the fence and gone over, he was trying to get his dad out,' said witness Jim Torp.
The tragic detail emerged after footage surfaced of the Fast & Furious actor stepping into his friend's ill-fated sports car just 30 minutes before the horrendous crash in which the pair lost their lives.
According to Radar Online, the crash happened so close to the charity event Walker was attending that Rodas's son was on the scene in mere seconds.
'There was nothing he could do,' Torp said.
TMZ reports that the crash occurred as the friends were on their way back from a 20-minute drive.
Prior to that drive, Rodas had personally taken the wheel of the vehicle after one of the former race car driver's employees at the upscale auto shop he owned was having issues backing the car up into the garage. The vehicle reportedly kept stalling for the employee.
As Rodas took control, Walker hopped in because he hadn't yet had a chance to take a spin in the impressive sports car.
The crash occurred just yards away from the auto shop as the friends returned.
The county coroner has revealed that the bodies of Walker and Rodas were so badly burned that they are currently unidentifiable.
'There was a post-collision fire and bodies are not visually identifiable,' said LA County deputy coroner Dana Bee.
Tragic loss: Paul Walker, 40, leaves behind a 15-year-old daughter, Meadow, pictured with him above left, who had recently moved to California from Hawaii to be closer to him. Walker was killed in the crash along with his friend and business partner Roger Rodas, pictured with Walker above right
The LA County Coroner's office has requested dental records for both victims before they can identify the bodies. Autopsies on both bodies have been delayed until later this week, reports TMZ.
Walker, who appeared in six of the seven films about illegal street racing and heists, had been at an event for his charity Reach Out Worldwide before deciding to take the car, a cherry-red Porsche, out for a drive with his friend.
Walker was a self-confessed |
, which sits 135 miles southeast of Minneapolis, employs 4,500 workers and has now been placed in the Severe Violator Enforcement Program for failure to address the cited safety hazards.
Timothy Kobernat, a retired OSHA district supervisor who runs his own safety consulting business in Eau Claire, Wis., said the fine “is the largest I have ever heard of in Wisconsin. Normally a $200,000 fine is a big deal around here. So this citation is big, even for a $3 billion company.”
OSHA cited the Arcadia facility after one employee suffered a partial finger amputation. In July, another employee lost three fingers on a woodworking machine that did not have its safety guards employed. Five other employees suffered amputations over three and a half years, department officials said.
The government also cited Ashley for other injuries that occurred because of lack of training or carelessness. For example, the company failed to safeguard against woodworking machines unintentionally starting when workers were making tool and blade changes, the OSHA report said.
OSHA officials had visited the Arcadia plant several times and kept finding the same problems of missing machine guards and workers pushed to the limit, said Michaels of the Department of Labor.
Ashley “intentionally disregarded OSHA standards and its own corporate safety policies by pushing workers to increase production and meet deadlines” at the expense of safety, he said.
Michaels also accused the company of “blaming the victims for their own injuries because it was the employees’ fingers that were stuck in the machines. But, in reality, there is clear evidence that injuries were caused by the unsafe conditions created by the company.”
Ashley Furniture, privately held with about 20,000 workers, 30 locations and $3.8 billion in revenue, has 15 business days to formally contest OSHA’s ruling and the $1.77 million fine.
If done, the formal appeal and evidence on both sides of the case would be presented to the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, said Labor spokeswoman Rhonda Burke.
A final decision or potential settlements in cases such as these can take a year or more to be resolved, she said.When it was announced on Monday that Matt Harvey had a partially torn UCL in his pitching elbow, most people (fans and media alike) immediately predicted that Harvey would need Tommy John Surgery to repair the injury. After nearly everyone erased Harvey from the 2014 roster, he tweeted that he planned to be ready for April 1, 2014, which would only be possible if he opted for a non surgical option.
Yesterday, Terry Collins chimed in during a radio interview and basically said that the Mets would prefer for Harvey to not jeopardize his 2015 season. Tranlsation: Collins wants Harvey to get the surgery.
The problem here (and it’s a huge one), is that nobody knows the severity of Harvey’s partial UCL tear. Therefore, making reactionary statements at this point regarding the potential need for surgery is a bit foolish.
According to Will Carroll, who’s an expert when it comes to baseball injuries, the decision regarding whether or not Harvey should have Tommy John Surgery will likely be based on the percentage of the tear in his UCL.
Carroll noted after news of the injury broke, that if Harvey’s UCL was less than 33 percent torn (his tear has been reported as being “low grade”), rehab – which could include platelet-rich plasma injections (PRP) – may be a better choice than surgery. The severity of the tear won’t be known until after the swelling goes down and Harvey is examined again (in about two weeks).
Caroll went on to note numerous pitchers who have pitched through the injury Harvey has:
Several pitchers have been able to avoid surgery after a low-grade UCL sprain. The best known is Takashi Saito, who was the first known MLB player to have PRP therapy. Others include Zack Greinke, Adam Wainwright, Ervin Santana and Scott Atchison, as well as a number of minor leaguers. In the vast majority of cases, the pitcher does end up having surgery. While there are no studies on this that I could find, the rate is probably well above 75 percent. While this doesn’t bode well for Harvey, the chance that he could become one of the successes is certainly worth the effort of the six-week rehab.
As Carroll points out above, while the likelihood of Harvey avoiding surgery isn’t terribly high, he and the team have nothing to lose by holding out hope that he’ll be able to take the rehab route instead.
One pitcher who had an injury similar to Harvey’s, and who Carroll didn’t list, is Roy Halladay. Earlier this week, Halladay reached out to Harvey to discuss the injury with him. Wrote Jim Baumbach in Newsday:
The Phillies’ Roy Halladay revealed Wednesday he believes that he faced a similar fate at the end of the 2006 season, and he managed to dodge any type of surgery thanks to a long-term strengthening program that was designed to take the pressure off his elbow. ‘And you know,’ Halladay said Wednesday, ‘I’ve had some pretty good years after that…just from him explaining where his soreness is, what he felt and where he felt it, it was very similar to what I felt,’ Halladay said. ‘I’m no doctor. I don’t know what he has, but it just sounded similar to what I went through.’ Left unsaid at the time was that Halladay’s MRI results ultimately made its way to noted orthopedic surgeon Dr. James Andrews, who had bad news for the hard-throwing righthander. ‘Andrews had told me that they felt like at some point they would have go in and repair it,’ Halladay said of his elbow, ‘and that was eight years ago and I’ve never had an issue since.’
Halladay’s story, and the stories of the other pitchers who avoided what was seemingly inevitable Tommy John Surgery, present a glimmer of hope for Harvey.
That’s not to say that opting for rehab over surgery isn’t a risk. However, depending on the percentage of the tear in Harvey’s UCL, rehab might be a smart risk to take.
It’s understandable that the Mets are wary of Harvey potentially jeopardizing his future by not having the surgery now. Still, with the severity of his injury still unknown, now is not the time to pressure him into surgery. Rather, it’s a time to weigh every option before the full scope of the situation is determined.
Harvey clearly wants to pitch next year, and he certainly has the work ethic to rehab in the same manner Halladay did if it comes to it. There’s no need to write him off at this point. Rather, we should be doing the opposite.
Thanks for reading! Be sure to follow@RisingAppleBlog on Twitter and Instagram, and Like Rising Apple’s Facebook page to keep up with the latest news, rumors, and opinion.In our second tutorial, Strictoaster shows the advantages and disadvantages of zoning and plopping. Knowing when to zone or plop growable assets will help you take your detailing to the next level!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7491Q3_7-USubscribe for more Tutorials by clicking here: https://pdxint.at/SubscribeFollow Strictoaster here!🏙️MODS🏙️Find It! https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfile...Plop the Growables https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfile...Move It! https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfile...----------------------------------------------------------------------Zoning is the primary method of building up RCI, or Residential, Commercial, and Industrial zones. By using various brushes, you can paint areas with a specific zone thus enabling that type of building to "grow" and develop.Plopping refers to manually placing buildings and assets in your city. This method gives you much more precision in your city detailing. In this tutorial, Strictoaster shows how to plop down growables, which are buildings that are setup to grow and develop in RCI zoning.After weeks of protests and deliberations, the controversial statue of Cecil John Rhodes was removed from its plinth at the University of Cape Town. Watch the historic moment. WATCH
Port Elizabeth - The statue of Queen Victoria in Port Elizabeth was vandalised overnight, HeraldLive reported on Friday.
The statue in front of the public library was covered in green paint on Friday morning.
Queen Victoria was targeted on the same night that the University of Cape Town removed its statue of Cecil John Rhodes after weeks of protests by students.
On Thursday, News24 reported that two members of the Economic Freedom Fighters were arrested for defacing the Louis Botha statue outside Parliament in Cape Town.
The party’s Godrich Gardee said he agreed with what was done to the Botha statue because “you cannot every day be subjected to the mind of the warmonger”.
Other statues vandalised recently include the Paul Kruger statue on Church Plein in Pretoria, the Horse memorial in Port Elizabeth and the Anglo-Boer War memorial in Uitenhage.
BREAKING: Queen Victoria statue in #PortElizabeth vandalised. We are on the scene http://t.co/bco2dimmui pic.twitter.com/Efx2iTMf4O — The Herald PE (@HeraldPE) April 10, 2015This article is over 6 years old
Technology giant plans to relocate two offices and move into new 2.4 acre complex by 2016
Google has completed a £1bn property deal to move its UK headquarters to a brownfield site in London's King's Cross area.
The US technology giant has purchased a 2.4 acre site between King's Cross and St Pancras stations and plans to build a seven and 11 storey complex due to be complete in 2016.
Google already has two central London offices – one in Victoria and one on St Giles High Street – from where staff are expected to be relocated.
The move forms part of the regeneration of the King's Cross area following the opening of the Eurostar terminal at St Pancras in 2007. Organisations that have moved into the area since then include Guardian News & Media, publisher of MediaGuardian, and art college Central St Martin's.
Google's purchase mirrors its property strategy in Dublin, where it bought a building outright for 2,000 staff in 2011.
• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediatheguardian.com or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".
• To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and FacebookOle Miss officials have been notified that they will receive their long-awaited ruling from the NCAA committee on infractions Friday morning, a source familiar with the situation confirmed to ESPN.
The Rebels, who are accused of 15 Level I violations, including lack of institutional control, appeared in front of the NCAA committee on infractions in Covington, Kentucky, on Sept. 11-12.
The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Mississippi, first reported that the Rebels had received their 24-hour notice from the NCAA on Thursday.
The NCAA committee on infractions can either accept the self-imposed penalties that Ole Miss levied against itself or add additional penalties.
Former Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze, who resigned in July because of off-field issues, is also charged with failure to monitor his staff. He might face a suspension or show-cause from the NCAA, which would require any school wanting to hire him to appear before the infractions committee.
Ole Miss officials had previously announced that the school had self-imposed a one-year postseason ban for this season, as well as the loss of 11 total scholarships in football over a four-year period from 2015 to 2018, including a reduction of three initial scholarships in each of its next three recruiting classes, which would allow the school to sign a maximum of 22 players in each class.
The Rebels also agreed to forfeit their share of SEC postseason revenues for this coming season, which could be as much as $7.8 million.
Ole Miss officials are hoping that the NCAA tosses out the testimony of Mississippi State linebacker Leo Lewis, who told NCAA investigators that he received between $13,000 and $15,600 from an Ole Miss booster while the Rebels were recruiting him. Ole Miss also disputed charges that Lewis and Mississippi State defensive end Kobe Jones received free merchandise from Rebel Rags, a sporting goods store in Oxford, Mississippi.
Jones and Lewis made the allegations after they were granted partial immunity by NCAA investigators. Lewis even testified in front of the NCAA committee on infractions.
Ole Miss fans contend that the Bulldogs coerced their players into making the allegations against their in-state rival and that the players aren't telling the truth.Jean-Yves Soucy, a Montreal writer who was co-author with the three sisters, said, "This is a story not just of sexual abuse, but harassment and physical and verbal power abuse."
The five girls were born May 28, 1934, in Corbeil, Ontario, near the Quebec border, to Elzire Dionne and her husband, Oliva. Mr. Dionne, a dirt-poor farmer before the birth of the quints, died in 1979.
As the first quintuplets on record to survive more than a few days, the infant girls were taken from their parents and made wards of the Ontario government, which turned them into what the Canadian Encyclopedia calls a "$500 million asset to the province." Three million people trekked to "Quintland" in North Bay in northern Ontario to watch the babies at play behind a one-way screen. Oliva Dionne fought a nine-year battle to regain custody of his children.
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In the 1960's the four sisters then surviving -- Emilie died in 1954 -- told their often bitter story in a book titled "We Were Five." But there was no mention of sexual abuse until the new book, "The Dionne Quintuplets: Family Secrets."
The mistreatment the women now describe took place after they rejoined the family in the 1940's.
The incidents of sexual abuse occurred when they went for car rides with their father, the sisters said. Their father took them for rides one at a time, and touched them in a sexual way, they said.
The sisters never told their mother "so as not to aggravate the situation," Annette said. But when they did try to discuss the abuse with a school chaplain. Annette said, they were told "to continue to love our parents and wear a thick coat when we went for car rides."
Other brothers and sisters of the quintuplets are denying that their father ever abused any of his children.
"We assert that we had good parents, and that to our knowledge our father was certainly not a sexual abuser," said Therese Callahan, an older sister, in a statement to the newspaper The North Bay Nugget. "That's all I want to say right now because it hurts too much."
She said she was speaking on behalf of three brothers and two sisters: Oliva Dionne Jr. and Claude Dionne, both of nearby Corbeil; Victor Dionne and Pauline Dionne, both of North Bay, and Rosemarie Girouard of St. Catharines, Ontario.News in Science
Stem cells point to space ills
Stem cells exposed to microgravity express different proteins than those grown in normal gravity, say Australian researchers.
The finding may explain why long-term exposure to microgravity causes astronaut health issues such as loss of bone density and muscle wasting.
The research, led by biologist Dr Brendan Burns of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, will be presented this week at the 9th Australian Space Sciences Conference.
Burns, along with graduate researchers Elizabeth Blaber and Helder Marcal, used a NASA rotating-wall vessel to simulate microgravity, which is experienced by astronauts in low Earth orbit, to analyse its effect on human embryonic stem cells.
Stem cells are cells that have yet to differentiate into cells with specialised functions.
The researchers isolated and identified proteins expressed by the cells and compared these to proteins from cells grown under normal gravity conditions.
Their results showed 75% of the proteins from the cells exposed to microgravity were not found in those grown under normal gravity.
"A lot of work has been done on microgravity at a systemic level, such as the effects on the immune system. No one has really looked at the effect of microgravity at a cellular level and we think that is a huge gap," says Burns.
Less antioxidants
"What we've found is a range of different proteins that are potentially important for astronaut health were more or less predominant in terms of different gravity."
In particular, cells exposed to microgravity produced more proteins that negatively regulate bone density. In the human body, these changes in bone tissue could result in decreases in bone density, leading to osteoporosis.
"Although it has long been known that microgravity affects bone density, what kinds of genes and proteins that are affected by microgravity to cause this condition isn't known," says Burns.
The microgravity-exposed cells also produced fewer proteins with antioxidant effects, he says. Antioxidants protect the body from reactive oxidants that can damage DNA.
"We're trying to get down to the nuts and bolts of what is causing these issues at a cellular level," says Burns.
Novel approach
Associate Professor Ernst Wolvetang of the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology at the University of Queensland says while it's difficult to judge the research prior to publication, it is a "novel idea".
"If the right controls were done, and they find 75% different protein expression, especially if they include bone morphogenic proteins [such as those that regulate bone density], that would be a significant discovery," says Wolvetang.
He says as far as he knows microgravity studies had been done mostly on functional bone building cells, and in that sense the research is novel.
"How relevant this will be to space flight itself is a whole different matter, because we don't have embryonic stem cells in our adult bodies anymore," he says.Among the media, academia and within planning circles, there’s a generally standing answer to the question of what cities are the best, the most progressive and best role models for small and mid-sized cities. The standard list includes Portland, Seattle, Austin, Minneapolis, and Denver. In particular, Portland is held up as a paradigm, with its urban growth boundary, extensive transit system, excellent cycling culture, and a pro-density policy. These cities are frequently contrasted with those of the Rust Belt and South, which are found wanting, often even by locals, as “cool” urban places.
But look closely at these exemplars and a curious fact emerges. If you take away the dominant Tier One cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles you will find that the “progressive” cities aren’t red or blue, but another color entirely: white.
In fact, not one of these “progressive” cities even reaches the national average for African American percentage population in its core county. Perhaps not progressiveness but whiteness is the defining characteristic of the group.
The progressive paragon of Portland is the whitest on the list, with an African American population less than half the national average. It is America's ultimate White City. The contrast with other, supposedly less advanced cities is stark.
It is not just a regional thing, either. Even look just within the state of Texas, where Austin is held up as a bastion of right thinking urbanism next to sprawlvilles like Dallas-Ft. Worth and Houston.
Again, we see that Austin is far whiter than either Dallas-Ft. Worth or Houston.
This raises troubling questions about these cities. Why is it that progressivism in smaller metros is so often associated with low numbers of African Americans? Can you have a progressive city properly so-called with only a disproportionate handful of African Americans in it? In addition, why has no one called these cities on it?
As the college educated flock to these progressive El Dorados, many factors are cited as reasons: transit systems, density, bike lanes, walkable communities, robust art and cultural scenes. But another way to look at it is simply as White Flight writ large. Why move to the suburbs of your stodgy Midwest city to escape African Americans and get criticized for it when you can move to Portland and actually be praised as progressive, urban and hip? Many of the policies of Portland are not that dissimilar from those of upscale suburbs in their effects. Urban growth boundaries and other mechanisms raise land prices and render housing less affordable exactly the same as large lot zoning and building codes that mandate brick and other expensive materials do. They both contribute to reducing housing affordability for historically disadvantaged communities. Just like the most exclusive suburbs.
This lack of racial diversity helps explain why urban boosters focus increasingly on international immigration as a diversity measure. Minneapolis, Portland and Austin do have more foreign born than African Americans, and do better than Rust Belt cities on that metric, but that's a low hurdle to jump. They lack the diversity of a Miami, Houston, Los Angeles or a host of other unheralded towns from the Texas border to Las Vegas and Orlando. They even have far fewer foreign born residents than many suburban counties of America's major cities.
The relative lack of diversity in places like Portland raises some tough questions the perennially PC urban boosters might not want to answer. For example, how can a city define itself as diverse or progressive while lacking in African Americans, the traditional sine qua non of diversity, and often in immigrants as well?
Imagine a large corporation with a workforce whose African American percentage far lagged its industry peers, sans any apparent concern, and without a credible action plan to remediate it. Would such a corporation be viewed as a progressive firm and employer? The answer is obvious. Yet the same situation in major cities yields a different answer. Curious.
In fact, lack of ethnic diversity may have much to do with what allows these places to be “progressive”. It's easy to have Scandinavian policies if you have Scandinavian demographics. Minneapolis-St. Paul, of course, is notable in its Scandinavian heritage; Seattle and Portland received much of their initial migrants from the northern tier of America, which has always been heavily Germanic and Scandinavian.
In comparison to the great cities of the Rust Belt, the Northeast, California and Texas, these cities have relatively homogenous populations. Lack of diversity in culture makes it far easier to implement “progressive” policies that cater to populations with similar values; much the same can be seen in such celebrated urban model cultures in the Netherlands and Scandinavia. Their relative wealth also leads to a natural adoption of the default strategy of the upscale suburb: the nicest stuff for the people with the most money. It is much more difficult when you have more racially and economically diverse populations with different needs, interests, and desires to reconcile.
In contrast, the starker part of racial history in America has been one of the defining elements of the history of the cities of the Northeast, Midwest, and South. Slavery and Jim Crow led to the Great Migration to the industrial North, which broke the old ethnic machine urban consensus there. Civil rights struggles, fair housing, affirmative action, school integration and busing, riots, red lining, block busting, public housing, the emergence of black political leaders – especially mayors – prompted white flight and the associated disinvestment, leading to the decline of urban schools and neighborhoods.
There's a long, depressing history here.
In Texas, California, and south Florida a somewhat similar, if less stark, pattern has occurred with largely Latino immigration. This can be seen in the evolution of Miami, Los Angeles, and increasingly Houston, San Antonio and Dallas. Just like African-Americans, Latino immigrants also are disproportionately poor and often have different site priorities and sensibilities than upscale whites.
This may explain why most of the smaller cities of the Midwest and South have not proven amenable to replicating the policies of Portland. Most Midwest advocates of, for example, rail transit, have tried to simply transplant the Portland solution to their city without thinking about the local context in terms of system goals and design, and how to sell it. Civic leaders in city after city duly make their pilgrimage to Denver or Portland to check out shiny new transit systems, but the resulting videos of smiling yuppies and happy hipsters are not likely to impress anyone over at the local NAACP or in the barrios.
We are seeing this script played out in Cincinnati presently, where an odd coalition of African Americans and anti-tax Republicans has formed to try to stop a streetcar system. Streetcar advocates imported Portland's solution and arguments to Cincinnati without thinking hard enough to make the case for how it would benefit the whole community.
That's not to let these other cities off the hook. Most of them have let their urban cores decay. Almost without exception, they have done nothing to engage with their African American populations. If people really believe what they say about diversity being a source of strength, why not act like it? I believe that cities that start taking their African American and other minority communities seriously, seeing them as a pillar of civic growth, will reap big dividends and distinguish themselves in the marketplace.
This trail has been blazed not by the “progressive” paragons but by places like Atlanta, Dallas and Houston. Atlanta, long known as one of America's premier African American cities, has boomed to become the capital of the New South. It should come as no surprise that good for African Americans has meant good for whites too. Similarly, Houston took in tens of thousands of mostly poor and overwhelmingly African American refugees from Hurricane Katrina. Houston, a booming metro and emerging world city, rolled out the welcome mat for them – and for Latinos, Asians and other newcomers. They see these people as possessing talent worth having.
This history and resulting political dynamic could not be more different from what happened in Portland and its “progressive” brethren. These cities have never been black, and may never be predominately Latino. Perhaps they cannot be blamed for this but they certainly should not be self-congratulatory about it or feel superior about the urban policies a lack of diversity has enabled.
Aaron M. Renn is an independent writer on urban affairs based in the Midwest. His writings appear at The Urbanophile.On Tuesday, the Russian RBC outlet dropped a bombshell report regarding Russia’s fake social media operations during and after the U.S. election. Confirming dozens of accounts as Russian, and revealing even more accounts that haven’t yet been named, the report drew back the curtain on operations out of Russia aimed at stirring socio-political tensions across America.
However, a handful of questions remain – namely, regarding coordination with Americans, either within the broader public or in Donald Trump’s campaign itself.
While the Americans thus far identified as part of the Russian operations, approximately 100 in total, appear unwitting accomplices in the Russian attempts to organize on-the-ground rallies – some of which saw participants bring heavy weaponry – there’s indication that at least one American company may have also been involved in the operations.
At least three websites identified so far share names with Russian accounts already identified: BlackMattersUS.com, affiliated with “Black Matters US”; DoNotShoot.us, affiliated with “Don’t Shoot Us”; and Blacktivist.info, which shares the same name as “Blacktivist,” the most popular Russian account identified by RBC. (For good measure, the landing page for Blacktivist.info is in Russian.)
The IP information for Blacktivist.info shows the site was registered by a company called ITL in Dec. 2015, while IP information regarding DoNotShoot.us and BlackMattersUS.com both involve a company called “Greenfloid Llc.”
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According to ITL’s website, the company’s North American branch is called Green Floid LLC, a Florida-based company founded in 2015 by a trio of individuals based in Staten Island.
Attempts to reach the three individuals behind Green Floid LLC – Sergey Kashyrin, Iurii Udovenko, and Iryna Volokhai – were unsuccessful. ThinkProgress spoke briefly with Kashyrin, who confirmed that he runs Green Floid LLC and requested that ThinkProgress call later. Follow-up phone calls went unanswered, and questions sent to Green Floid LLC’s email received no response. ThinkProgress also reached ITL’s Dmitry Deineka, whose LinkedIn lists him as ITL’s CEO, via email. Deineka declined to answer ThinkProgress’s questions, writing that “we do not give any information about our customers. This is contrary to the rules of the company and the NDA.”
Andrew Weisburd, a non-resident fellow at the Alliance for Securing Democracy, first traced one of the Russian-controlled sites to Deineka, following ThinkProgress being the first outlet to highlight the links between Russia and “Black Matters US.”
Per Weisburd, the links between the Russian-linked sites and ITL/Green Floid LLC center on two likely possibilities. “If we assume the [operator of these sites] is Russian, and that [Deineka and ITL] are Ukrainian, I would not rule out that they were chosen for exactly that reason so that in the event of discovery blame might be shifted away from Russia, at least a little,” Weisburd said. Another possibility centers on Deineka and ITL having “some personal connection to person/persons involved in setting up the faux … sites. So they hosted the sites for a customer, but they know the customer. Maybe [they] owed someone a favor? There are many possible variations on that scenario.”
Another site, BlacktoLive.org, shares many of the trappings of other sites revealed to be Russian, like BlackMattersUS.com. A search through the site’s IP history reveals that the associated IP address for “Black to Live” – whose news portal website says it’s based in an apartment complex in Manhattan – is also owned by “Greenfloid Llc.” While “Black to Live” has not been confirmed as another Russian-run site, its Twitter and Facebook accounts have both been suspended. Questions sent to the email address featured on the “Black to Live” site went unanswered.
The site’s Medium account remains live, although a spokesperson for Medium told ThinkProgress they are “investigating the matter.” The Tumblr page for “Black to Live” – which reads that “We want to live in a world where is no room for bigotry and racism [sic]” – also remains up. Neither the Medium nor the Tumblr accounts have posted since September.
It remains unclear why ITL and Green Floid LLC were involved with these fraudulent sites, or what role the company and its American subsidiary played in producing and directing content on these sites, if any. Regardless, as we sift through the latest revelations surrounding the fake Russian sites and social media accounts, the breadth of operations appears far larger than initially assumed – and questions about American involvement remain unanswered. As Weisburd said, “Welcome to the wilderness of mirrors.”Your browser does not support HTML5 video tag.Click here to view original GIF
Unless protect yourself, as soon as you open up an internet browser, you begin to leave digital footprints behind you that the sites you visit can use to track your activities and recognize who you are. We’re not talking about some crazy government data mining operation. This is totally legal, above board tracking done by the sites and services you use every day. Data collected includes your current location, which links you’re clicking on, whether you’re on desktop or mobile. And that’s just the beginning.
What your browser reports
The information leak starts with your browser, which reports various bits of basic data to the sites you visit by default. As soon as you appear online, for instance, you start reporting an IP address, your particular entry point to the internet, which can be used to approximate your location.
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Your browser also reports its name, so sites know whether you’re a Chrome devotee or a Firefox user, as well as information about the computer system it’s running on, including your desktop or mobile OS, the CPU and GPU models, the display resolution, and even the current battery level if you’re using a laptop, tablet, or phone.
To see some of this data for yourself, open up the Webkay site and scroll down. If the Webkay site can read this information, so can any other page on the web.
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Sites can also choose to monitor your inputs much more closely. To see some of this tracking in action, head to Click, which will report your mouse movements, mouse clicks, and other browser actions back to you.
These nuggets of data are just the first that help sites identify who you are. Your browser revealing that you’re running Microsoft Edge from somewhere in New York doesn’t tell a website much about you, but it can be combined with other data points to pick you out from a crowd.
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Open up the Panopticlick test from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and you can learn more about how your browser can broadcast a unique fingerprint to the web—your very own specific mix of browser software, hardware, default language, even the fonts you have installed—which can identify you even without any other information.
In other words, it’s unlikely that anyone else is using your special combination of monitor color depth, screen size, combination of browser plugins, and so on. Even if you haven’t typed in a single personally identifiable piece of information, a website can make a good guess about whether you’re the same guy who swung by last Tuesday, and can market you some relevant advertising accordingly.
Browser-reported data is just the beginning. The next layer is the data sites can gather for themselves.
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What sites can collect
Most sites are very keen to find out as much about you as possible, whether to personalize their services to you or to target you with advertising. To help log this data, they’ll usually drop what’s called a cookie on your system when you turn up for the first time—these cookies are little files that act as markers to identify you.
Like breadcrumbs in a forest, they tell a site that you’ve been there before. They can also hold little bits of data: A cookie might save you the trouble of having to pick a particular city every time you visit a weather website, because the site knows what you picked last time; a cookie can also store items in your shopping basket so they’re still waiting for you when you come back days later.
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This is all very useful for sites and users alike. But cookies can go further and help to add more and more pieces to that personal profile puzzle that first started to take shape with the data reported by your browser.
Browser security protocol dictates that sites can only access their own cookies—a fairly essential safety measure—but you also have what are called third-party cookies, which aren’t associated with a particular site but get injected across multiple pages through ad networks and other tracking technologies.
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It’s these cookies that result in you seeing ads for fishing gear for a whole week just because you opened up a fishing website a couple of times, and it’s these cookies that Apple is fighting hard against in the latest version of its Safari web browser, much to the chagrin of advertisers.
Fundamentally, this is all being used to recognize who you are and better target advertising. Data from website visits, searches, cookies, and your browser is put together with some educated guesswork to try to figure out the ads you’re going to be most interested in seeing.
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What’s more, a recent study from Princeton University found that cross-site trackers embedded in 482 of the top 50,000 sites on the web were recording virtually all of their users’ browser activity for analysis. These recordings are ostensibly for the purpose of website management and optimization; but while sensitive information is supposedly redacted from them, it’s another case of users having to put their trust, and their data, into the hands of third-party companies.
And another group of firms are adding to this pile of data: Our internet service providers, which can now make money by selling your browsing history, letting advertisers know where you’ve been and what you’re interested in. None of this data works in isolation, with marketing firms trading details and combining details to put together a very detailed profile. And it gets even more detailed...
Other information you’re giving up
So far, so much information, but we haven’t yet talked about the data you’re giving up voluntarily: The searches you run while signed into Google, the venues you check into while using Facebook, the date of birth details you give to Twitter, and so on.
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Sites have their own privacy policies about how this data can be used—usually to target you with advertising, and maybe to improve the actual products and services at the same time—and the usual deal you make is to put up with this data collection if you want to use the services in question.
So if you feel like you must have a Tumblr account, for example, then you’re essentially giving Tumblr permission to monitor everything you do on the network. That’s partly just common sense, so that sites can police user behavior and fix bugs, but it’s yet more data to add on top of everything else we’ve talked about
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Add all of this personal information together with the data that’s already been harvested from your online sessions, and the biggest operators like Google and Facebook can easily know you better than you know yourself.
Last year Google amended its privacy policy so that data from its DoubleClick ad network could be merged with the other data it knows about you—like your name and your favorite YouTube channels—to build up a very comprehensive picture of you and your tastes. Not every company has the reach of Google or Facebook, but data can be easily bought and sold between firms specializing in this kind of profiling.
On Facebook alone you could well be revealing who your closest friends are, the places you like to visit most, how often you order pizza, and the top bands living or dead that you’d want to put in your dream gig line-up.
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Thanks to the information you offer up to Facebook, and the data it collects as you browse, it knows when you’re expecting a baby, who you’ve worked for in the past, which way you probably lean politically, the times of day you like to browse the internet, and more besides—you can see some of the information it thinks it knows about you by visiting this page.
The world’s biggest social network might be an outlier in terms of how much personal data it can tap into, but the principles are the same on other sites, whether it’s ones you use for shopping, or travel, or reading the news.
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It’s really down to the privacy policies of each individual site as to how all of this collected data gets logged and used, if at all. And while these policies are usually easy enough to access, they’re generally couched in very broad terms that give sites a lot of leeway when it comes to handling the profiles they’ve built up on you.
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ues on the metal legs.
Shortly, Harold Carroll, proprietor in chief, called “You’re in charge, Charles. Do take your nose out of that magazine, please. Inventions and Inventors. Try ‘initiative’. That’s what will get you far.” He left to post letters in the Cotswold village. This would take 53 minutes.
Charles was decades younger than Harold Carroll, yet aware that he was not the last word in authoritative methods for getting far in life. Charles had worked for Harold for a number of years, and would for many more. Dust was gathering on his future like it coated the headboards lined six or seven deep along the back wall of the Shoppe.
But these 53 minutes were his. Once Charles had sipped tea from a porcelain cup – its dangling paper ticket claimed it had been used by Admiral Horatio Nelson. In a floor length oval mirror, Charles toasted with his left hand. He hoisted the other across his chest, a medal pinned sideways, not a stump. The mirror added six inches to his 5’6” frame. His cinnamon hair looked soaked by ocean spray, not pasted to his forehead from neglect. Once he spent the entire hour undersea in a diving helmet a Cousteau had used in a search for Atlantis. In the mirrors, his long nose showed purpose. His chipped uneven teeth looked earned.
Charles flipped up the edge of a tablecloth, revealing a brown box. A single brown wire reached to the wall. Charles pointed the mirrors at the old television. When he pressed a button, the box sprayed black and white dots. “Men Into Space” began playing. Charles kneeled before Ed McCauley as he went to space yet again. Charles studied the hero’s long nose, and his flattened hair, post-landing. When he grinned his teeth folded on each other. Charles crouched beside the screen and faced the mirrors. In each, the same man looked back. In some he wore black scuffed brogues, but in others, spaceboots.
The doorbell chimed. Charles ripped the cord out of the wall. It snapped. His doppelganger faded into black and white spots.
Harold sighed. “See you tomorrow, Charles. Lots to do, lots to do.”
There never, ever was. Charles hung his head. He shuffled to the back of the shop where he had tucked his bicycle early that morning. He backed it into the small courtyard and swung his leg over the seat. He began pedaling. Then he pushed a button below the handlebars. Six horizontal wheels began to turn. The bike lifted into the air, Charles atop it. He would be home to his stone cottage on the other side of the village in time for tea, and would return to the Shoppe the next morning.
Future Commodities
Kyle B. Stiff
Niles, majority stock owner of Honkersdotcom, sat on a park bench waiting for delivery of his animated portrait. He couldn’t wait to see what his old friend, the great artist Ishikawa, had created.
Niles thought about other animated portraits made for Ishikawa’s wealthy clients. All were simple, elegant, melancholic, and expensive beyond belief. The CEO of Peacetime Arsenal (and inventor of the militarized electric flying bicycle) owned a tasteful piece that showed him viewing a lush Martian garden. His profile, marked by a sense of contentment, slowly turned away from the viewer before looping. And the power-broker behind Obscurity Inc., makers of cutting-edge, all-new black and white dramas designed to fit seamlessly alongside “actual” older vids, owned a piece that showed her standing in a stark, artfully lit foyer, where she gracefully touched a mirror before the image looped and the viewer was left with a sense of timeless space and curiosity concerning the value of the piece. Niles desperately longed to own a serene image of himself engaged in some inscrutable activity!
Niles saw Ishikawa approach, but his excitement waned when he realized it was only Ishikawa’s doppelganger, a reduced-intellect clone created to run errands for a genetic donor. Niles himself had dozens of doppelgangers finalizing deals all around the globe.
The doppelganger handed Niles his piece, then stared at him. Shaking, Niles took the black tablet and powered it on, heart fluttering at the thought that he would soon witness something so elegant that only a fortune could acquire it.
The portrait showed Niles strapped to a table in a dark, filthy restroom. He saw masked figures adjust a hose trailing upward from his stomach and leading to a glass jar. Someone turned a crank, an engine roared, Niles wailed and strained at his bonds, then his intestines were sucked into the jar with a sickening splat. While more innards collected through the high-pressure hose, spittle flew from his blubbering lips.
Then the image looped.
“This isn’t what I ordered!” Niles shouted at the doppelganger. “There’s nothing elegant about this! It’s revolting!”
The doppelganger blinked. “Every client says that. My owner told me that you wanted something that matched your preconceptions. Instead you got something unexpected. But your preconceptions are free, right? If you’re handing over money, why not expect something unexpected? Why not view the image and try to imagine the smell of your insides as they burst forth?”
Niles watched the awful image repeat once again. “Listen, clone. This won’t do. Your owner and I are friends. We used to-”
The doppelganger quickly shook his head. “My owner sold many memories from his younger days to collectors. An artist doesn’t get to live an easy life bloated with happy memories. Not like you do.”
Niles felt himself sinking because he knew he would show the piece to acquaintances and praise its daring statement. They would nod thoughtfully and his real opinion would be lost in a typhoon of stupid chatter. Like Atlantis he would sink and be forgotten. As if on cue the doppelganger smiled.
World of Wonders, Episode Six
Tony Jaeger
Ang leapt from the top of the building, cursing as he did. Unconsciously, his grip tightened on the sack holding the stolen God Machine. The world stretched below him, seeming much, much further down than ten stories. More like a hundred stories, which would still kill him, but Ang didn’t like waiting for death.
As he plummeted, he turned his body to face the river, hoping his timing was right. Otherwise, no matter how far he actually fell, the result would be the same. Wind whipped at his hair, threatening to take the Stetson from his head. The sidewalk rushed upward, seeming eager to welcome him.
Nine Atlantis-series fliers sped by beneath him, one of them flaring its fans to stop. Ang smiled. He landed squarely on the seat behind Ang Number Four. The flier whined, its engines straining to compensate for the extra weight.
The flier carrying Ang and Number Four sped forward, easily catching up with the pack. Ang Number Sixteen had retrofitted the gang’s fliers with advanced mech, powering the flying ‘cycles with electric power – an advantage over what the police, with their diesel fliers, would send after them.
Sirens blared in the middle distance, rushing closer. “Speak of the devil and he shall appear, huh, Number Four?”
“Affirmative.”
“Gods above, I can’t wait to get you plugged into the Machine.”
“Affirmative.”
Ang shook his head, smiling. “Well, we’re not home yet. Let’s get there, shall we?”
“Orders received: escape and evade. Evasion pattern Delta.”
The speeders around him tightened into a triangle formation, its point forward and low – the formation optimized the engine output, speeding up the unit. Buildings whipped by, faster and faster. Amazed people stood at windows, mouths agape, watching the formation of seventeen Ang doppelgangers – cyborgs, really – speed by, faster than any fliers they’d ever seen.
“Disperse in 3…2…1… Execute Command.” Ang Number Four said calmly.
Formation broke as the first gunshots cracked. Eight fliers dispersed, some weaving between buildings, some pulling sharply up, and others diving. Angs Three and Eleven spun out, crashed into a building and exploded. Shrapnel from Eleven’s body cut into Ang’s chest, but he only felt pain in his heart.
Bullets whizzed past Ang’s head. Number Four juked and weaved, his movements erratic but precise. Ang looked back, seeing that the police fliers had taken the bait and dispersed, following his doppelgangers. With their cybernetic brains, the other Angs would have no problem ditching them.
A bullet caught the left engine. The flier spun, losing altitude. Ang Four reached back, bracing Ang against the impact on the street. Despite Number Four’s effort, Ang was thrown from his seat and impaled through his belly on a rod from the engine casing broken free.
“Master!”
“Take the God Machine…” Ang gasped, struggled for breath. “Become... Human... Live.”
“Command Accepted,” Number Four said, and dashed away.
Ang didn’t have to wait long for death. He greeted it with a smile.
The world faded from grays to black. The voice of God said “WORLD OF WONDERS WILL BE RIGHT BACK, AFTER THESE COMMERCIAL MESSAGES.”
He’ll Have To Go
Jim Wright
Fergus gazed over the coruscating expanse of the Persian Gulf. From his vantage point, high above the Atlantis, Palm Hotel in Dubai, he could take in the marvel of the palm-shaped manmade islands. His face broke into a mad grin as he experienced the exhilaration of flying. Dozens of airplane and helicopter flights paled in comparison to soaring above the glittering landscape on his nuclear powered electric flying bicycle. He knew he’d never wait in security queues or exchange boarding passes for a seat again!
A quick glance at his wrist told him it was time. After months of surreptitious watching, he knew the man’s habits as well as he knew his own. Everyone knows about doppelgangers, but Fergus was shocked when he first saw him. He’d been looking in a shop window at television sets after his died in the middle of a particularly exciting episode of Whirlybirds, an old black and white adventure series. At first he thought it was his reflection staring back at him, but then the man moved quickly out of sight.
Why had he moved so quickly? Was he trying to hide from Fergus? The malignant seed of suspicion was planted and grew as he saw the man every day. Suspicion grew into mistrust, evolving into a plan to get rid of the interloper. He didn’t belong. He had to go. With the idea firmly established he had only to plan the deed.
Fergus landed the bicycle on the roof. Time was passing quickly. He had to get to the beach before the stranger arrived. He watched the sunset every night from the same desolate stretch of rocks. This would be his last one.
Sitting on the bench a few hundred feet away, the voice of Reason returned. “Why do you want to harm that man? He’s never done one thing to you, Fergus!”
“True, he hasn’t. But he’s up to no good I tell you. Why is he always in the same place as me, looking as much like me as I do myself, even down to the very clothes on his back? Answer me that and I’ll be off quick as a wink!”
The voice of Reason fell silent. “Sure he’s quiet; he didn’t have a leg to stand on, did he? Ah, there comes the devil now. Just let him get settled in his place and I’ll be behind him before he knows it!”
Fergus reached around furtively and slipped the knife neatly below the rib cage and gave a quick upward thrust, just nicking the aorta. He felt an odd sympathetic pain as the blade did its work. Holding him close, he could feel the man’s life force leaving him. Why was he feeling weak, too? He dropped the limp body to the ground.
“I’ll just have a quick lie down. The heat of the day must’ve gotten to me. Just for a minute. What’s all this wetness on my shirt? I’m sure to be seen on the way home!”NORTH BEND, Ore. (AP) - A Coast Guard helicopter crew rescued three surfers in distress near Devil's Punchbowl State Park.
Lincoln County 911 dispatchers received a call at 1:40 p.m. Saturday reporting that a surfer was in trouble.
Dolphin helicopter co-pilot Lt. Matthew Poore says two other surfers tried to reach that surfer but they exhausted themselves.
Poore says when the Coast Guard arrived, they picked up two surfers near the rocks and brought them to safety. They returned to find a third surfer who was unable to get himself away from the rock so they hoisted him out of the water.
Since January, the Coast Guard has responded to cases involving six people at Devil's Punchbowl. They're warning that this year's weather has been intense, especially at this location.
All three men were checked by local EMS and were released in good condition.
Watch a video of the rescue below:Scott Van Pelt and Louis Riddick react to NFL vice president of officiating Dean Blandino's statement that the referees incorrectly handled the K.J. Wright batted ball that gave the Seahawks a touchback. (1:05)
Seattle apparently received another Monday night break from NFL officials in the same end zone where the infamous "Fail Mary'' took place.
With the Detroit Lions closing in on a touchdown, which could have capped an improbable comeback against the Seahawks late in the fourth quarter, the officials incorrectly gave Seattle possession after a Calvin Johnson fumble was batted out of the end zone by Seahawks linebacker K.J. Wright.
The Lions trailed 13-10 with 1:51 left when Johnson lunged for the end zone from the 1 yard line, but Seahawks safety Kam Chancellor punched the ball out of his hands just short of the goal line. Wright then knocked the ball out of the back of the end zone, which is illegal, according to NFL vice president of officiating Dean Blandino.
"We'll review all the angles," Blandino said on Monday Night Football. "On TV it looked like the Seahawks player intentionally hit the ball. That is a foul. The result of the penalty would give Detroit possession enforced at the spot of the fumble. With half the distance to the goal line, Detroit would have had a first down."
"I have spoken to the referee [Tony Corrente]. He did not see that part of the play because that is not his area. The back judge [Greg Wilson] felt it was not an intentional act, that it was inadvertent," he added.
Wright, however, admitted that it was an intentional act.
"I wanted to just knock it out of bounds and not try to catch it and fumble it," he said. " I was just trying to make a good play for my team.
"You can't hit it backwards, and you can't intentionally, I guess, knock it out. But at the time, I wasn't thinking that. I was just trying to not mess up the game. So I know now."
"In looking at the replays it looked like [an illegal] bat so the enforcement would be basically we would go back to the spot of the fumble and Detroit would keep the football." NFL head of officials Dean Blandino
The officials ruled a touchback with no flags thrown. The Seahawks took over on their own 20. Russell Wilson subsequently found Jermaine Kearse for 50 yards on third down and Seattle held on for a 13-10 win to improve to 2-2 on the season. Detroit, meanwhile, fell to 0-4.
Blandino said Wright should have been called for an illegal bat for hitting the ball out of the end zone. The penalty would have given the ball back to Detroit at the Seattle 1.
He said the batted ball part of the play is not reviewable, even though the play resulted in a turnover.
"The back judge was on the play and in his judgment he didn't feel it was an overt act, so he didn't throw the flag,'' Blandino said. "In looking at the replays it looked like a bat so the enforcement would be basically we would go back to the spot of the fumble and Detroit would keep the football.''
The latest NFL rulebook is pretty simple on what constitutes a penalty for illegally batting the ball out of the end zone:
Here's the rule that states Seattle illegally batted the ball and Detroit should have had 1st-and-goal. pic.twitter.com/GS3DVVfr4L — SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) October 6, 2015
Lions coach Jim Caldwell was asked about the call.
"I'm not going to even go there. Talk to Blandino and the rest of the guys, they'll explain," he said.
"What can you do? You're not going to cry about it that's for sure."
It's the second time this calendar year the Lions have been on the wrong side of a key officiating decision. In their playoff loss to Dallas in January, the Lions had an important pass interference flag against Dallas late in the fourth quarter picked up.
"It's unfortunate, but you can't put the game in the referee's hands,'' Detroit's Johnson said.
Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll was asked if his team caught a break.
"Now that you look at it, we're fortunate on that one," he said. "The game wasn't over. It didn't mean the game was over. We just might have had to keep playing."
K.J. Wright celebrates after a fumble by Detroit's Calvin Johnson is ruled a touchback. AP Photo/Scott Eklund
The non-call provided another memorable Monday night moment in Seattle.
It was three years ago when replacement officials credited Golden Tate with a disputed touchdown reception on the final play in nearly the same spot as Seattle beat Green Bay.
Now it was Tate, playing for Detroit, on the opposite side of a strange play in the Emerald City. Detroit is off to its worst start since it also started 0-4 in 2010.
"We can't change it now,'' Seattle linebacker Bobby Wagner said. "It is what it is. We won and we're going to move on.''
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.The party room might sign off on anti-lobbying legislation as soon as Monday. It was going to consider it this Monday, before the parliamentary session was postponed. It'll be dressed up as a move against foreign influence. Every organisation that gets even some of its income from overseas (GetUp gets 3 per cent of its income from overseas) would be prevented from spending more than a certain amount on political advocacy during the lead-up to elections. It echoes the Transparency in Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act introduced by Britain's Conservative prime minister David Cameron. That act bans spending above a threshold during the 12 months before polling day on activities that could be "perceived as intended to influence how people vote". Registered organisations have to keep records and face audits. The United Nations Special Rapporteur has described its effect as "chilling", saying many organisations opt for silence. Few people know exactly what's in Australia's draft bill prepared by Special Minister of State Scott Ryan, although the word is its provisions have been made extensive in the expectation the Senate will cut them back.
Australian charities are already (appropriately) limited in what they can do during elections. They are not allowed to promote or oppose a political party or candidate, but they are allowed to advance public debate, including "promoting or opposing a change in the law". They can put out scorecards, helping us work out how to vote, which is what some in the Coalition don't like. One minister is said to have been incensed at a mobile billboard that paraded around his electorate comparing his record of voting on the environment to the stance of the candidates that opposed him. Pew Charitable Trusts is an international philanthropic organisation, but in Australia is a registered charity that promotes Australia's Indigenous Ranger program. The government program creates jobs for locals to protect natural and cultural values of their lands. It's backed by both the government and the opposition. But if Pew was to go public during the next campaign about which side backed it most, it could fall foul of the proposed law. Or not. David Crosbie whose Community Council for Australia is running the Hands Off Our Charities campaign, says the proposed law's real power would lie in what it made uncertain. "Our concern isn't so much that it would mean Pew wouldn't be able to do its work, although it would be bizarre to stop people advocating for Aboriginal rangers," he says. "It's that every charity would be asked those questions about what it did, and would be inclined to pull back. That's the chilling impact. If we don't want to be audited and don't want to be asked those questions, during the next 12 months or so we are going to have to shut up about housing or animal welfare or whatever it is we exist for. It would have an impact on all of us."
Which might be the idea. Quietly, with just as little publicity, the government has been moving against 'political' charities on another front. In April last year, a government-backed inquiry into the register of environmental organisations (there is such a register) recommended that environmental charities be stripped of tax-deductible status unless they spent more than 25 per cent of their income on "environmental remediation work". Organisations like the Australian Conservation Foundation would be allowed tax deductibility only if they cleaned up oil spills or collected rubbish in addition to doing what's most effective: lobbying to prevent the environment being damaged in the first place. Leading the push for the limit was the Minerals Council of Australia, whose members include coal miners and doesn't mind the odd bit of lobbying itself. If the government wanted to, it could do it now. It doesn't need legislation. And although it hasn't said what it will do, it might have started. This year, the 600 environmental organisations on the register were asked two new questions when they completed their statistical return. The first was how much of their income was spent outside of the country. The second wanted their spending divided by categories, among them "campaign/advocacy" and "on-ground environmental remediation". Loading
Because many don't keep those sort of records, many didn't answer. But down the track they might be made to, under the threat of having their charitable status stripped from them. That's if the government doesn't back down, which given its political problems it might well do. But it's instructive to look at what some of its members would like to do if they could. They would like to narrow the number of voices out there at election time, to make it harder for us to choose.Image copyright Getty Images Image caption President Goodluck Jonathan faces tough opposition from Muhammadu Buhari
Nigeria's presidential election, postponed until 28 March, promises to be a closely fought rematch between incumbent Goodluck Jonathan and former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari.
The rise of Islamist group Boko Haram in the north-east has put security at the centre of their election campaigns, but the candidates are at odds over how to handle the insurgency in Africa's biggest oil producer. Boko Haram has recently pledged allegiance to Islamic State.
The elections were postponed for six weeks, just a week before they were originally due to be held in mid-February.
Image copyright Reuters Image caption Violence erupted in the northern state of Gombe ahead of an election rally by President Jonathan
The Independent National Electoral Commission (Inec) said this was because the military had advised it would be unable to provide security as its soldiers were committed to the fight against Boko Haram.
Past elections have been marred by violence and allegations of vote-rigging. Since campaigning began in mid-November, both the ruling and opposition camps have reported violent attacks which have killed a number of their supporters.
Who are the main candidates?
Fourteen candidates are contesting the election but only Mr Jonathan and Gen Buhari have a realistic chance of winning.
President Jonathan is seeking a second four-year term. His People's Democratic Party (PDP) has dominated Nigerian politics since civilian rule was restored in 1999 but now faces its toughest election challenge, from the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Supporters of Goodluck Jonathan turned out in large numbers for a rally in Port Harcourt, south Nigeria
Mr Jonathan is expected to do well on his home ground in the mainly Christian south. But his government has been fiercely criticized for its failure to combat Boko Haram in the north-east.
President Jonathan told the BBC on 20 March that Boko Haram was "getting weaker and weaker every day" and that their territory could be recaptured within a month.
The government claims that major gains have been made with the help of Cameroon, Chad and Nigeria.
Gen Buhari has lost the last three elections but some sections of the Nigerian media are predicting a win this time. He has described the PDP's 16-year rule as "a disaster for the country and its citizens".
He is said to be extremely popular in the mainly Muslim north and has in the past supported the implementation of Islamic law there.
Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Supporters of the All Progressive Congress (APC) candidate Muhammadu Buhari in Kaduna
Gen Buhari has made security a priority during his presidential election campaign. He has promised to crush the Islamist insurgency within months if elected.
He has publicly denounced Boko Haram repeatedly, branding them "bigots masquerading as Muslims." Last July, he survived an attack on his convoy allegedly carried out by the group.
Fears are rife that Boko Haram's insurgency may disenfranchise voters in the north, seen as a Buhari stronghold.
Gen Buhari is also expected to do well in the south-west around the commercial capital Lagos.
But former militants in the oil-rich southern Niger Delta have endorsed Mr Jonathan's candidacy and warned of violence if Gen Buhari wins. The APC party has condemned their threats as "barbaric".
Where they stand on key election issues
While the personalities of the two main candidates have been at the forefront of this election campaign, certain key issues - namely insecurity, elite corruption among high-profile politicians and business leaders and the state of the economy - have become increasingly important to voters.
Goodluck Jonathan Muhammadu Buhari Security Says Boko Haram can be defeated in April. Seeks greater regional and international cooperation to tackle the insurgency, terrorism, piracy and organised crime. Says the government has been ineffective and lacks the willpower to fight Boko Haram. Pledges to end the insurgency within months if elected. Economy Says he will continue with his economic blueprint known as the "2011-2015 Transformation agenda". Views economic diversification as a key step towards addressing the fall in global oil prices. Says government's economic policies have worsened the lives of Nigerians. Promises to pick "competent hands" to run the economy. Pledges to tackle poverty by closing the wealth gap through shared economic growth. Corruption Says "we are fighting corruption. It is not by publicly jailing people. Yes, we believe in suppressing corruption, but our emphasis is in prevention." Says one of his key priorities is to wipe out corruption. "If Nigeria doesn't kill corruption, corruption will kill Nigeria". Employment Promises to create 2 million jobs each year. Launched YouWIN scheme for young entrepreneurs and Sure-P initiative aimed at helping graduates find jobs. Promises to create 20,000 jobs per state, totalling 720,000. Pledges support for the agricultural sector and soft loans for small manufacturers to boost job creation. Infrastructure Credits his administration with reviving the railway system and improving road infrastructure. Pledges to complete stalled road projects and improve infrastructural development nationwide, especially in the north-east. Energy Says government's privatization of the power generation and distribution companies will ensure regular power supplies in the future. Says he will tackle a sector "riddled with corruption and mismanagement" and adopt a market-based approach. Favours exploration of non-oil sector.
Profile: Goodluck Jonathan
Profile: Muhammadu Buhari
How does the electoral system work?
The Independent National Electoral Commission (Inec) has promised a clean ballot. All 14 candidates have signed an agreement binding them to credible and non-violent elections. Official campaigning is due to end on 27 March - 24 hours before polling day.
The candidate with the most votes is declared the winner in the first round, as long as he gains at least 25% of the votes in two-thirds of Nigeria's 36 states.
Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Permanent Voters' Cards are being used for the first time in Nigeria
Biometric cards will be used for the first time. Inec says more than 80% of the nearly 70 million eligible voters have obtained their identity cards. The minimum voting age is 18.
An extra 30,027 polling stations have been set up, bringing the total to 150,000 nationwide.
Polls will open at 08:00 local time (07:00 GMT). All voters must be present at their designated polling station by 13:00 local time to be allowed to cast their ballot. Polls will close when the last person in the queue has voted.
The authorities say 360,000 police officers will be deployed at strategic areas, along with sniffers dogs.
Inec has approved the presence of international and local observers to monitor the elections, although the European Union says its observers will not deploy in the north-east due to security concerns.
Image copyright Reuters Image caption Women fleeing Boko Haram violence queue at a camp for displaced people in Borno State
Parliament amended the electoral law on 15 January, allowing an estimated one million people displaced by the insurgency to cast their votes. They can vote at specially-provided facilities near or within camps in their states of origin.
When will we get the results?
In Nigeria, as in many parts of Africa, exit polls are rarely used to call elections as results are so often disputed.
Once votes have been counted, the results from each polling unit will be uploaded to the electoral commission's website. Inec says it expects to announce the final results within 48 hours.
In reality though, the final outcome may not be known for some time.
And judging by previous elections, it is likely that the results will be challenged.
What happens if there is a run-off?
If there is no outright winner in the first round, the law states a run-off election must be held within seven days. But Inec has said it is doubtful whether a run-off vote could be organized in a week. Victory in a run-off election is by simple majority.
What about the parliamentary and gubernatorial elections?
Parliamentary elections have also been put back to 28 March, with 739 candidates vying for a place in the 109-seat Senate and 1,780 seeking election to the 360-seat National Assembly.
Nigerians will vote again on 11 April to choose new governors and state assemblies for 29 of the 36 states.
Like the president, governors are limited to two four-year terms, so this election will see new occupants in many states.
Governors hold huge sway because they allocate federally disbursed revenue and shape policy on development and security in their states.
Among the key states to watch are Lagos, Kano and Rivers - currently in APC hands - because of their large populations and economic power.
Some of these states have budgets larger than those of neighbouring countries, meaning there is fierce competition to run them.
BBC Monitoring reports and analyses news from TV, radio, web and print media around the world. You can follow BBC Monitoring on Twitter and Facebook.For Asians And Latinos, Stereotypes Persist In Sitcoms
toggle caption Cliff Lipson/CBS
I was flipping around TV channels one evening, and I noticed something amazing. There was a glorious absence of black actors playing maids, sassy, streetwise pimps or bug-eyed buffoons.
And then I saw Han Lee.
On CBS' hit comedy 2 Broke Girls, he owns the diner in Brooklyn where the show's sassy heroines just happen to work. He's a walking bundle of stereotypes: Broken English. Socially awkward. Mostly asexual. His heavy accent is always good for a laugh or two.
And I'm left to wonder: Why are we still discussing this? TV producers got this memo years ago about black characters. But Asians like Han Lee — and Latinos — haven't been so lucky.
Consider this scene from ABC's quickly-canceled sitcom Work It — a comedy where one pal explains to his buddy that he's not sure the friend has what it takes to fit in at the pharmaceutical company where they're hoping to land a job.
"I'm not sure you'd be up for everything this job requires," says Guy A.
"What, I'm Puerto Rican — I'll be great at selling drugs," says Guy B.
And then there's Rob. Rob is a new CBS comedy starring ex-Saturday Night Live star Rob Schneider, based on his real-life marriage into a Latino family. But his character, also named Rob, doesn't do well in his first meeting with his new wife's relatives. First Schneider cracks that his new relatives looks like the audience at a Julio Iglesias concert. Then his undocumented uncle-in-law tries to borrow $7,200. There were gags about siestas, and how they lead to big families.
Lately, Rob just looks like a badly written show, told from the perspective of its white star, surrounded by thinly developed Latino supporting players. But still.
It's taken a long time to wean writers off the easy jokes provided by stereotypes of black people. It shouldn't take nearly as long to travel that road for Latino and Asian characters.
I say it's time for writers and producers to remember the lessons taught by The Cosby Show, Chappelle's Show and Treme — sometimes landmark success comes not from echoing stereotypes, but helping talented performers of color transcend them.
Eric Deggans is the TV and media critic for the Tampa Bay Times.All roads lead to Baghdad and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is following them all, north from Syria and Turkey to south. Reading Western headlines, two fact-deficient narratives have begun gaining traction. The first is that this constitutes a “failure” of US policy in the Middle East, an alibi as to how the US and its NATO partners should in no way be seen as complicit in the current coordinated, massive, immensely funded and heavily armed terror blitzkrieg toward Baghdad. The second is how ISIS appears to have “sprung” from the sand dunes and date trees as a nearly professional military traveling in convoys of matching Toyota trucks without explanation.
In actuality, ISIS is the product of a joint NATO-GCC conspiracy stretching back as far as 2007 where US-Saudi policymakers sought to ignite a region-wide sectarian war to purge the Middle East of Iran’s arch of influence stretching from its borders, across Syria and Iraq, and as far west as Lebanon and the coast of the Mediterranean. ISIS has been harbored, trained, armed, and extensively funded by a coalition of NATO and Persian Gulf states within Turkey’s (NATO territory) borders and has launched invasions into northern Syria with, at times, both Turkish artillery and air cover. The most recent example of this was the cross-border invasion by Al Qaeda into Kasab village, Latikia province in northwest Syria.
In March, ISIS withdrew its terror battalions from Latikia and Idlib provinces and repositioned them in the east of Syria, now clearly in preparations for invading northern Iraq. The Daily Star reported in a March 2014 article titled, “Al-Qaeda splinter group in Syria leaves two provinces: activists,” that:
On Friday, ISIS – which alienated many rebels by seizing territory and killing rival commanders – finished withdrawing from the Idlib and Latakia provinces and moved its forces toward the eastern Raqqa province and the eastern outskirts of the northern city of Aleppo, activists said.
The alleged territorial holdings of ISIS cross over both Syrian and Iraqi borders meaning that any campaign to eradicate them from Iraqi territory can easily spill over into Syria’s borders. And that is exactly the point. With ISIS having ravaged Mosul, Iraq near the Turkish border and moving south in a terror blitzkrieg now threatening the Iraqi capital of Baghdad itself, the Iraqi government is allegedly considering calling for US and/or NATO assistance to break the terror wave. Adding to the pretext, ISIS, defying any sound tactical or strategic thinking, has seized a Turkish consulate in Mosul, taking over 80 Turkish hostages – serendipitous giving Turkey not only a new pretext to invade northern Iraq as it has done many times in pursuit of alleged Kurdish militants, but to invade Syrian territory where ISIS is also based.
Turkey Has Already Attempted to Use Al Qaeda False Flag Attacks to Justify Invading Syria
It had been revealed that NATO has been planning a false flag attack against Turkey to justify the Turkish invasion of northern Syria, the International Business Times reported in its article, “Turkey YouTube Ban: Full Transcript of Leaked Syria ‘War’ Conversation Between Erdogan Officials.” It released the full transcript of a leaked conversation between the head of Turkish intelligence Hakan Fidan and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu. The Times reported:
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ban of YouTube occurred after a leaked conversation between Head of Turkish Intelligence Hakan Fidan and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu that he wanted removed from the video-sharing website.
The leaked call details Erdogan’s thoughts that an attack on Syria “must be seen as an opportunity for us [Turkey]”.
In the conversation, intelligence chief Fidan says that he will send four men from Syria to attack Turkey to “make up a cause of war”.
The report would also state:
In the leaked video, Fidan is discussing with Davutoğlu, Güler and other officials a possible operation within Syria to secure the tomb of Suleyman Shah, grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman empire.
Instead of four men carrying out a false flag to secure a tomb, it appears now that an entire mercenary army will be used as a pretext to secure all of northern Iraq and eastern Syria.
Banks Robbed After Invasion Funded the Invasion? Western Media Puts Cart Before the Horse
Tales of ISIS looting armories, vehicle depots, and banks are being carefully planted throughout the Western media in an attempt to portray the invasion as a terrorist uprising, sustaining itself on plundered supplies, weapons, and cash. In reality, ISIS already possessed all that it needed before beginning its campaign from Syrian and Turkish territory.
The International Business Times in its article, “Mosul Seized: Jihadis Loot $429m from City’s Central Bank to Make Isis World’s Richest Terror Force,” claims:
The Islamic |
had to deal mostly with horse and cattle rustlers and bootleggers. Even at age 70, Williams wore a pair of pearl-handled pistols hung low on his hips with the holster straps tied around his leg.
Whenever Williams had to chase down a rustler or bootlegger, he gave them the opportunity to come in quietly. If they refused, he shot them dead. So they always came back, hence his nickname “Bring ‘Em Back Alive Sid.” After Williams, William McKnight was a piece of cake.
In his later years, whenever Nerud thought of his parents and his childhood and all the hardships he faced, his voice would crack and he would start to tear up.
“I’m blessed with a good, strong body, which I inherited from my mother,” he said recently. “She was a wonderful woman. When we went through the The Depression, if there was a few dollars around she wouldn’t buy herself anything. She would buy clothes for the children. She always thought of us before herself. When we had the flu or smallpox or whooping cough she never caught it. Everybody in the family came down smallpox but her. For some reason she always avoided sickness and took care of us. She was a strong woman and a wonderful person. And there were nine of us, so she had her hands full. She devoted her entire life to us.
“When I became successful, I carried out my father’s wishes before he died that she never have a care in the world. She never got into any trouble or had any arguments, because if anyone gave her trouble I’d get in the middle of it and they’d have to answer to me. My father was like me. He was pretty tough. Whatever you wanted in life you had to earn it. If you needed any extra money, he’d tell you to go out and trap a muskrat or a coyote and sell the hide. I trapped many of them.
“It was rough. We had a farm to feed the cattle and a big ranch that was about 13,000 acres. My father bought all the land and all the cattle with borrowed money. One time I took 100 cows up to the ranch. It was getting late and we didn’t have enough feed on the farm. When I was 13 years old a horse fell on me and broke my foot. I had a cast on it for a month and my father said, ‘You’re going to miss a year of school, so take these 100 cows up to the ranch and foal them. I had to cook my own meals and watch these cows every day to make sure they foaled. If I saw one that was ready to foal and she didn’t I had to rope her and see what was wrong with her. I was only 13 and I’d get so Goddamn lonely I’d cry. My father came up every seven or eight days and would bring up some food and talk to me for a while. But most of the time I was up there all by myself and I tell you, it was too much for a kid. It was tough, but it was The Depression. When it hit, my father owed more than the land was worth, but they didn’t foreclose on him because we kept paying the interest. We didn’t know we were poor because everyone else was poor. We finally grew out of it and when my father died he was free of any debt.”
Nerud would go to the local fairs and ride races and broncs. At first he was riding bulls for $3, but his friends the Johnson boys were riding horses for $5, so he stopped riding bulls and buckin’ horses and went to race riding, eventually becoming a jockey at age 13.
“When I was 18 I’d go around and buy some cows or horses from the farmers and take them up to the sales ring to make a buck and I made a little money that way,” Nerud recalled. “My father was 63 when he died. My mother lived to be in her 80s and I get my longevity from her. Her father was with (General) Sherman when he marched through Georgia. My father’s father came here from Prague in 1862. Both families settled in Nebraska, so we we’re all pioneers. My mother was Pennsylvania Dutch. She was half Dutch, a quarter English and a quarter Irish. She got her toughness from the Dutch.”
When World War II broke out, Nerud and two of his brothers went overseas. One went to Germany, but came down with pneumonia and was sent home. Nerud spent three years carrying troops, equipment, and ammunition back and forth in the South Pacific, and never had an escort. If his ship got hit with a torpedo there’d be nothing left, because the first two holds were filled with ammunition. His other brother was in combat for four years. He was sent to the desert in North Africa to fight Rommel and then to Anzio and Salerno, up through Italy and on to Normandy. For the rest of their lives, Nerud and his brother never said a word to each other about the war. Nerud knew nothing of his brother’s escapades, but when he passed away Nerud found out he had been issued the Bronze Star and the Silver Star, which was right below the Medal of Honor. But he never once mentioned it.
John Nerud, attired in a plaid sport jacket and tie, settled into his chair at La Pace restaurant in Glen Cove, N.Y. for his 98th birthday lunch with several friends. Nerud may have slowed down in recent years, battling an assortment of physical issues, but that didn’t stop him from polishing off a plate of fusilli pasta and veal sauce and a hefty slice of three-layer birthday cake.
Nerud was 98 in numbers only. His mind remarkably retained its sharpness, and he still could tell a story like it happened yesterday and discuss all of Thoroughbred racing’s problems and how to fix them. And his solutions and knowledge of the sport still bordered on genius.
While most people his age would trudge through each day, Nerud kept constantly busy, going about his daily routine just as he has for the past several decades. And he has been able to do so, despite the huge void in his life left by the death of his wife of 69 years, Charlotte, who he always credited for a great deal of his success. Charlotte held the family together, and he often seemed lost as he talked about her with great pride and admiration.
“She’s cleaned up more dirty apartments over the years,” Nerud said. “We’d be following those Chicago races and they would never rent horsemen anything decent. But Charlotte could smell real estate a mile away. She bought us four houses and we didn’t lose money on any of them. She was a great hostess and for $37 would entertain the entire the whole Goddamn press. She knew you just put out a lot of booze. It didn’t matter what the hell you fed them.
““She was beautiful, she was smart, and she was classy. She carried me, because I was a little rough around the edges. But she taught me to be a gentleman. She always pushed me and sold me and was marketing me in the late ’50s when my big horse was Switch On. I couldn’t have accomplished what I did without her.”
For the 98-year-old Nerud, his day began early, getting up at 7 o’clock and having breakfast at 8:30, then coming down to his office and reading the mail and go through the newspapers. But the first things he’d look at while having his coffee are the results and the handle at the racetracks in the Thoroughbred Daily News. He would compare the handle at Santa Anita, Gulfstream, and Aqueduct and also compare the number of claiming and allowances races they have at those three tracks. He wanted to see how New York in the winter compared to Santa Anita and Gulfstream. He also would check on the stewards rulings that had been handed out.
“After breakfast I take care of anything that needs to be taken care of with the estate,” he said. “It’s a big estate and it takes a lot of management. I’m still in charge of my money. I have an accountant and two organizations – Bessemer and Merrill Lynch – and nothing happens that I don’t OK. I stay pretty busy in racing. I have two horses in training and I breed a couple of mares a year. I have one mare in foal and I’ll be 100 when the foal runs if I’m lucky, so that’s not too smart.”
Nerud doesn’t believe in sitting home and remaining stagnant. When he’s not taking care of his affairs he finds time for leisure.
“Three afternoons a week I go to the club and play gin and I still drive myself there,” he said. “If the weather is very bad or it gets dark early, I’ll have a driver, but when the weather is nice I’ll drive myself.”
In front of Nerud’s house, closer to the road, his son Jan (a former trainer) and his wife and children live in a miniature version of the main house.
“I give money out to people now and I’ve taken care of my family;” he said. “All my grandchildren are taken care of and I bought my son two airplanes and he runs an air taxi business.”
Nerud admits he wouldn’t be able to function as well as he does without his live-in help, Selso and his wife Britez, natives of Paraguay who have been working for the Neruds for the past 25 years.
“Selso does everything in the house and some of the outside work like cutting the grass and clearing out the snow,” Nerud said. “Britez was a Spanish cook but Charlotte taught her to cook American. She’s a great cook.”
Nerud has become more sentimental in recent years as he reflects on his childhood and his life with Charlotte. And as he did during lunch, he often will become emotional, his eyes welling up with tears.
So, how do you sum up the life of a man so unique there surely will never be anyone like him, and whose accomplishments will live on for as long as horses race and breed?
You can still hear his booming voice bombarding listeners with a vast repertoire of profound, witty, and insightful comments on every aspect of the Thoroughbred industry and just about any other subject one wishes to discuss. Right up until the end he was able to utilize his razor-sharp tongue that, for so many years, has lashed out at ignorance and inertia. There has been no one more qualified to expound on the virtues and pitfalls of Thoroughbred racing than Nerud.
His accomplishments are beyond compare, and he did it with savvy, brains, tenacity, and a gift for seeing into the future. He spoke from the gut, whether it was to grooms and hotwalkers or the nation’s most powerful tycoons. He didn’t care who you were. He looked you in the eye and said what he felt without any thoughts of repercussions.
When Nerud first met with William McKnight about building him a successful operation, McKnight’s staff members told Nerud he could have 15 minutes. They wound up talking for four hours.
McKnight asked Nerud if the game could be beaten and Nerud told him, “Yes it can. You’re a factory man, so you have to start a factory. You buy a farm, buy broodmares, and breed and raise your own horses.”
When asked how much it would cost, Nerud said, “Well, you give me a million dollars, and if it don’t work, you give me two million. If that don’t work, you give me three million.” It didn’t take long for Tartan to take off and be successful, thanks in part to Nerud buying up all the shares of Rough n’ Tumble, a stallion no one wanted to breed to, for rock bottom prices. In his first crop for Tartan, Rough n’ Tumble sired the legendary Dr. Fager, considered by many as the fastest horse ever to step foot on a racetrack; a horse who ran with reckless abandon and who set new standards of speed and weight carrying ability. The foundation of Tartan Farm had been built in only a few years.
Just before his 98th birthday, Nerud visited the National Museum of Racing to see the collection of trophies and paintings he had recently donated to the museum. On a plaque he had written the inscription: To be inducted into the Racing Hall of Fame is a horseman’s ultimate dream! It is a statement of your ability and your integrity. Charlotte, my beautiful wife of 69 years, was by my side every step of my career. Without her class and encouragement I could not have accomplished what I did.”
Nerud then recalled the day he was at Charlotte’s house, where he had rented a room, and was sitting on the couch when Charlotte came over and squeezed in between him and the arm of the couch. “That was the happiest day of my life,” he said. When she married me I had $450 to my name and no job except being a lone jock’s agent. We went to Florida and she stood by me and has been with me all these years.
“To be here and see all these trophies and see my Hall of Fame plaque in a great honor. It travels with you the rest of your life. This is not just a Hall of Fame, it’s a keeper of history and the holder of the torch. All of us in the Thoroughbred business have an obligation to make sure the Hall of Fame survives and prospers. Without it we have no history.”
A true visionary, Nerud said after purchasing a yearling just short of his 99th birthday, “Racing is all about dreams, and you always have to keep dreaming. At my age you have to have something to look forward to, and I even have a broodmare in foal. You can’t worry about when you’re going to die. It’s going to come, so you just go ahead and live for today and think about tomorrow and not worry about the day after tomorrow.”
At his 100th birthday party, Nerud told a story he felt best described who he was at that stage of his life: “There was an old avid golfer who used to come to church Sundays when it was raining and he couldn’t play. On this day he happened to be in church, and the minister said to the congregation, ‘I’m going to make you all feel good and have you forgive your enemies. All you people who will forgive your enemies raise your hand.’ Everybody raised their hand except the old golfer. The minister said to him, ‘You don’t want to forgive your enemies?’ The old golfer said to him, ‘I don’t have any enemies. I’ve outlived all the bastards.’”
Nerud wrote his own epitaph at that same party. “I’m old and I’ve traveled a long ways and have seen a hundred years,” he said. “And the way I’d like to be remembered is, ‘I did it my way.’”
One thing is for certain; we will never see the likes of John Nerud again. When he was pronounced dead several days ago, his son Jan called Nerud’s longtime publicist Lance Bell and said simply said, “He’s gone.” A few minutes later, Jan called back and said, “You’re not going to believe this…he’s back.”
In many ways John Nerud will always be back, and that high-pitched resounding voice will always be heard, telling us and teaching us just how it’s supposed to be done.Yesterday the British Parliament voted overwhelmingly (274-12) to recognize a Palestinian state, and if you listened to the debate, one theme above all else explains the crushing victory: The British public has been horrified by Gaza and its opinion of Israel has shifted. Even Conservative members of Parliament cited pressure from the public. As Labour’s Andy Slaughter said, Britain has witnessed a new “barbarism”:
I think that the British people have been on the same sort of the journey as the right hon. Member for Croydon South [Conservative Sir Richard Ottaway] described—it is certainly true of the Labour movement—from being very sympathetic to Israel as a country that was trying to achieve democracy and was embattled, to seeing it now as a bully and a regional superpower. That is not something I say with any pleasure, but since the triumph of military Zionism and the Likud-run Governments we have seen a new barbarism in that country.
Slaughter and a fellow Labour member, Kate Green, said that just as the British Parliament sent a message to Obama a year ago in voting to oppose the Conservative Prime Minister on attacking Syria, a vote Obama heeded in reversing course on a Syria attack, today the British Parliament aims to influence U.S. policy on Palestine.
The Parliamentary debate was conducted in moral terms throughout, a fact that the parliamentarians described as historic. And the discussion was astonishing in its contrast to the stifled debate on these issues in the US Congress. (The debate can be found online: Section one here. Section two is here. Section three is here.)
Below I have made excerpts of the debate, emphasizing the powerful ideas the parliamentarians sounded that you would never hear in Washington. One lawmaker says that the occupation is “much worse” than apartheid in South Africa. Another says that the Balfour Declaration of 1917 now seems like a “sick joke,” because it never guaranteed freedom to Palestinians. Many members offer frank descriptions of Israeli detention of children and unending settlement expansion. Several describe Israeli actions in Gaza as war crimes. One mentions the use of terrorism by Mandela and Begin long before Palestinians used the tactic. Labour and Conservative members alike speak about the role of the Israel lobby in the United States. I should note that all these pols also supported the two-state solution. (I’ve largely ignored those portions because I believe the 2SS is a dead letter. But you can find the arguments at the links.)
Here are my excerpts. First, the sponsor of the legislation, Grahame M. Morris, Labour, on Britain’s historical responsibility, and the failure of Oslo:
As the originator of the Balfour declaration and holder of the mandate for Palestine, Britain has a unique historical connection and, arguably, a moral responsibility to the people of both Israel and Palestine. In 1920, we undertook a sacred trust—a commitment to guide Palestinians to statehood and independence. That was nearly a century ago, and the Palestinian people are still to have their national rights recognised. This sacred trust has been neglected for far too long. As the hon. Lady has just said, we have an historic opportunity to atone for that neglect, and take this small but symbolically important step… It is now more than 20 years since the Oslo accords, and we are further away from peace than ever before. An entire generation of young Palestinians—the Oslo generation—has grown up to witness a worsening situation on the ground. We have seen a significant expansion of illegal Israeli settlements, heightened security threats to both sides, punitive restrictions on Palestinian movement, economic decline, a humanitarian crisis in Gaza of catastrophic proportions and the construction of an illegal annexation wall through Palestinian land. It is clear that both Israel-Palestine relations and our foreign policy are at an impasse, which must be broken…
Morris emphasized the Israeli responsibility for the crisis:
Let us make no mistake about this: to make our recognition of Palestine dependent on Israel’s agreement would be to grant Israel a veto over Palestinian self-determination…Recognition is not an Israeli bargaining chip; it is a Palestinian right. It is one that has to form the basis of any serious negotiations. Indeed, the lack of equity between Israel and the Palestinians is a structural failure that has undermined the possibility of a political settlement for decades. As it stands, Israel has little motivation or encouragement—perhaps little incentive is a better way of putting it—to enter into meaningful negotiations. The majority of Israeli Government politicians flat-out reject the notion of a Palestinian state. There are currently no negotiations and, as Secretary of State John Kerry admitted, it was Israeli intransigence that caused the collapse of the latest round of talks… Those Palestinians who have pursued the path of diplomacy and non-violence for more than 20 years have achieved very little. We need to send them a message and give them encouragement that it is the path of peace and co-operation, and not the resorting to force of arms, that will actually lead to a lasting and just peace….
Richard Burden, Labour, describes Palestinian persecution in ways you would never hear in the US congress:
Over the years, I have spoken about the things I have seen for myself, whether that has been settlements growing in violation of international law and successive resolutions; the barrier that snakes in and out of the west bank, cutting Palestinian communities off from each other and farmers from the land; or Palestinian children being brought in leg irons into Israeli military courts, accused of throwing stones, and being subject to laws that vary depending on whether one is Palestinian or Israeli. I have sat with Palestinian families in East Jerusalem who have had their homes destroyed and who are no longer allowed to live in the city of their birth. I have seen for myself the devastation of homes, schools and hospitals in Gaza. I have met fishermen who are fired on if all they do is try to fish. Yes, I have been to Sderot as well and know that Israelis have spoken about their real fear about rocket attacks from Gaza. I also know the fear that Palestinians in Gaza feel daily because of the constant buzz of drones overhead, 24 hours a day, that could bring death at any moment. I have not merely read about such things; I have seen them for myself. They are why a negotiated settlement is so important...
Sir Alan Duncan, a Conservative, echoed Conservative Richard Ottaway (whose speech on Israel-has-finally-lost-me we excerpted yesterday) in describing the personal journey that many have had to make to support Palestinian rights, as well as the political “intimidation” factor:
I cannot think of any other populous area of the world that is subject to so many resolutions but is not allowed to call itself a state. After the civil war, albeit two years after 1948, we recognised the state of Israel. It was still not the tidiest of Administrations. Its borders were not clear; they still are not. It had no agreed capital—it wanted Jerusalem; at the moment, it has Tel Aviv—and no effective Government… So many of us go on a personal journey on this issue, as I have done over the past 20 years. Recognition of statehood is not a reward for anything; it is a right. The notion that it would put an end to negotiations, or somehow pre-empt or destroy them, is patently absurd; Palestine would still be occupied, and negotiations would need to continue, both to end that occupation and to agree land swaps and borders. Refusing Palestinian recognition is tantamount to giving Israel the right of veto…
A lot of people feel intimidated when it comes to standing up for this issue. It is time we did stand up for it, because almost the majority of Palestinians are not yet in their 20s. They will grow up stateless. If we do not give them hope, dignity and belief in themselves, it will be a recipe for permanent conflict, none of which is in Israel’s interests.
Jack Straw, former foreign secretary, now a Labour MP, says Israel pays no price for the settlements:
Israel has been occupying Palestinian land for nearly 50 years. It fails to meet its clear international legal obligations as an occupying power. In the last 20 years, as we have heard, it has compounded that failure by a deliberate decision to annex Palestinian land and to build Israeli settlements on that land. There are now 600,000 such Israeli settlers in East Jerusalem and the west bank. The Israelis are seeking to strangle East Jerusalem by expropriating land all around it, and two months ago, they announced the illegal annexation of a further nearly 1,000 acres of land near Bethlehem. The Israeli Government will go on doing this as long as they pay no price for their obduracy. Their illegal occupation of land is condemned by this Government in strong terms, but no action follows. The Israelis sell produce from these illegal settlements in Palestine as if they were made or grown in Israel, but no action follows. Israel itself was established and recognised by unilateral act. The Palestinians had no say whatever over the recognition of the state of Israel, still less a veto. I support the state of Israel. I would have supported it at the end of the 1940s. But it cannot lie in the mouth of the Israeli Government, of all Governments, to say that they should have a veto over a state of Palestine, when for absolutely certain, the Palestinians had no say whatever over the establishment of the state of Israel….
Andrew Bridgen, Conservative MP, businessman, talks about the Israel lobby:
Does my hon. Friend agree that, given that the political system of the world’s superpower and our great ally the United States is very susceptible to well-funded powerful lobbying groups and the power of the Jewish lobby in America, it falls to this country and to this House to be the good but critical friend that Israel needs, and this motion tonight just might lift that logjam on this very troubled area?
Gerald Kaufman, Labour, says what Rev Bruce Shipman lost his job at Yale for saying, that Israeli actions foster anti-Semitism:
The Israelis, with the checkpoints, the illegal wall and the settlements, are making a coherent Palestinian state impossible. That is why it is essential to pass this motion, because it would be a game changer. The recognition of Palestine by the British House of Commons would affect the international situation. This House can create an historic new situation. I call on right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House to give the Palestinians their rights and show the Israelis that they cannot suppress another people all the time. It is not Jewish for the Israelis to do that. They are harming the image of Judaism, and terrible outbreaks of anti-Semitism are taking place. I want to see an end to anti-Semitism, and I want to see a Palestinian state.
Nicholas Soames, Conservative, says that the conflict exacerbates tensions in the region, and the legislation will put pressure on the United States:
Ninety-seven years later, the terms of the Balfour declaration are clearly not upheld with respect to the Palestinians, and in Britain that should weigh very heavily upon us indeed. It is in our national interest to recognise Palestine as part of a drive to achieve lasting peace. We face so many dire emergencies in the middle east today; we cannot afford to add to them the continuing failure of the middle east peace process and the inevitable death of the two-state solution…. What does impede peace is a dismal lack of political will to make the necessary concessions and a tendency in Israel to believe that it will always be sheltered by the United States from having to take those difficult steps. Recognition by the United Kingdom would be a strong signal that the patience of the world is not without limit.
Mike Wood, Labour, explains that conditions in Palestine are much worse than under apartheid in South Africa.
The situation is far worse than that in apartheid South Africa, which has been mentioned. It has been regularly referred to as a parallel to what is going on in Palestine, but the situation in Palestine is much worse than apartheid. The white junta in South Africa accepted that somewhere in the country—preferably not near them —there would be land for black people. It was the worst possible land and a long way from the ruling white group, but none the less the junta accepted that there would be a place for the blacks. A one-state solution in Israel does not accept such a thing. There is no place in Israel and Palestine for the Palestinians…. What Israel is looking at in a one-state solution is a continuation, year after year, of war and violence such as we have seen building in the past 20 years. The Israelis have just finished a third incursion into Gaza in 10 years. Are we suggesting that every two years another 1,500 people should be killed and another 100,000 people rendered homeless as a continuation of the process of driving everybody who is not Jewish out of what is considered to be greater Israel?
David Ward, Liberal Democrat, described Jewish desire for safety in the wake of the Holocaust and Israel’s inability to ever have security so long as Palestinians resist:
Quite apart from the Zionist agenda, the need for a place to be safe somewhere was so important because of the failure to find safety from persecution in many other places. All that is perfectly understandable, but what I do not understand is why the Palestinians should have had to pay such a terrible price for the creation of the state of Israel, where it was believed that security could be created, or why the Israelis believed that the brutal expulsion and continued suppression of the Palestinians would ever lead to the sense of security that they seek. I remember a meeting not too long ago in one of the big Committee rooms in the House of Commons at which there were lots of members of the Palestinian community. I said that the Israelis were winning; I was in despair at the lack of progress. I said that they will not negotiate and asked why should they when the immense support
of the US and the inaction of the international community at large meant that they were gaining, day in and day out, and could ignore international law, continue to act with impunity, and, of course, increase their holding of Palestinian land. But a Palestinian rebuked me, saying that they were not winning because “We have not forgotten and we never will forget.” How can the Israelis believe that they can ever have security, because the Palestinians will never forget?
Bob Stewart, Conservative, immediately brought up the right of return:
My wife, who is a delegate of the International Committee of the Red Cross, met many Palestinians in south Lebanon who still have keys round their neck on a string from the house that they were ejected from in the late 1940s. They will not forget.
Ward mentions the Nakba:
Israel is in breach of the contract set out in the Balfour declaration stating that “nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine”. In the light of the Nakba and everything since, that seems like a sick joke. The failure of the international community to recognise the state of Palestine has helped Israel to ignore this commitment.
Anas Sarwar, Labour, emphasized the global attention on the vote:
There are moments when the eyes of the world are on this place, and I believe that this is one of those moments. What message will we send to the international community? There will be those living in Palestine who keep hearing that word, “peace”, while at the same time seeing a continued occupation, an ongoing blockade, further expansion of illegal settlements, and the never-ending cycle of violence and bloodshed, causing fear on both sides of the conflict. To go back to the issue of previous false dawns in Palestine, the people there have been hearing warm words for decades, but I am sorry to say that words are no longer enough. Our best chance of seeing a rejection of violence and militant forces is by rekindling hope so that people can stop hearing the word peace and start living its true meaning…
Neil Carmichael was one of many Conservatives who spoke of self-determination and justice:
If we believe in internationalism and self-determination, is it not wholly unacceptable, unjust and illogical not to allow the Palestinians to have a state?..
Tobias Ellwood, a Conservative, was unflinching in his description of the shocking nature of the Gaza blockade.
I will start by addressing the terrible situation in Gaza, which I visited last week. I was profoundly shocked and saddened at the suffering of ordinary Gazans. More than 100,000 people have been made homeless by the conflict, and 450,000 people—about a third of the population—have no access to water….Let me be clear: we do not want to see a return to the status quo. This is the third time in six years that conflict has broken out in Gaza and reconstruction has been needed. To illustrate the problem, in 2000, more than 15,000 trucks of exports left Gaza. In 2013, the figure had dwindled to only 200 trucks. The UN estimates that it could take 18 years to rebuild Gaza without major change. It says that Gaza could become unliveable by 2020. If the underlying causes are not addressed, it risks becoming an incubator for extremism in the region.
Mike Hancock, Independent, emphasized the historic nature of the vote:
If we give this motion our blessing, there is not a single thing that will harm Israel, but it will send a powerful message which is crying out to be heard for the people of Palestine, whether they are in the refugee camps—where four generations have now lived—or in Gaza, the west bank, Lebanon, or wherever. The people of Palestine have waited 65 years to get the justice they deserved. We did not listen then: when we could have given a two-state solution in ’48, we chose not to do it. People made that biggest mistake.
Julie Elliott, Labour, told a personal story about statelessness:
For me, the issue is very straightforward and very simple and I am going to keep my comments brief and end on a personal story. I have a friend who came to Sunderland—my city—in the early ’80s to study at what was then the polytechnic and is now the university. He was born in Gaza and on his travel documents his nationality is given as “Palestinian”, but his brother, who was born in precisely the same place seven or eight years later, had “stateless” on his travel documents. No child should have that on their travel documents; it is wrong, it is immoral and it should stop. That is why, on a personal level, I will support the amendment and the motion. It is the right and the moral thing to do.
A moving speech on terrorism as a political tool, from Mandela to the Irgun, by Andy McDonald, Labour:
My father served with the Army in Palestine from 1945 to 1948 during the currency of the British mandate. He did not say much about it, but he did tell me that, at the end of his tour of duty, he had a chit for leave to spend a last night in Jerusalem. However, his comrade pleaded with him to let him have the chit as he wanted to see a girl in town. He had fallen in love with her and did not know when he might see her again, so he was desperate. My dad let him have his chit, but sadly the vehicle that took the soldiers into town that night was attacked by terrorists and the seat that the love-struck soldier sat in bore the brunt of the attack and he was killed outright. That could have been my dad’s seat. There were other terrorist attacks—on trains and, famously, on the King David hotel. Among the terrorists were Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, both of whom went on the hold the highest office in the newly formed state of Israel. The point I am making is that committed individuals and groups who pursue self-determination might at one time be deemed to be terrorists but then perceived as freedom fighters and, ultimately, statesmen. We need look no further than the journey made by the great Nelson Mandela, as well as taking a glance across the water to the island of Ireland.
Andy Slaughter, Labour, on the shift in British public opinion, to viewing Israel as a bully:
I think that the British people have been on the same sort of the journey as the right hon. Member for Croydon South (Sir Richard Ottaway) described—it is certainly true of the Labour movement—from being very sympathetic to Israel as a country that was trying to achieve democracy and was embattled, to seeing it now as a bully and a regional superpower. That is not something I say with any pleasure, but since the triumph of military Zionism and the Likud-run Governments we have seen a new barbarism in that country. We have seen it in the Lebanon invasion, in the attack on the Mavi Marmara and the flotilla, and, above all, in the three attacks on Gaza, Operation Protective Edge, Operation Cast Lead—
Kate Green of Labour emphasizes the American role, and notice Slaughter saying that the Parliament influenced America/Obama on Syria a year ago.
Does my hon. Friend agree that the message sent from the British Parliament tonight will also be noted by the American Government and the American people, and that although our influence may not be strong directly on Israel, our relationship with America enables us to use its influence with Israel also to convey that sense of horror?
Slaughter:
I agree with my hon. Friend; I think this will be exactly as the vote in Syria was last year. As I was saying, Operation Protective Edge, Operation Cast Lead and Operation Pillar of Defence have all been, despite how the names sound, attacks by a major military power on a civilian community.
Karen Buck, Labour, talks about Palestinian rage:
My hon. Friend and I went to Gaza together in 2009, in the immediate aftermath of Operation Cast Lead. Does he agree that, in addition to the staggering level of destruction wreaked on Gaza then, which has now tragically been repeated, one abiding story is the frustration and rage that the people feel about the peace process no longer being a realistic option and about how something needs to be done to break the logjam? I hope that we are starting to do that tonight.
Slaughter says public opinion demands action:
The motion is a positive step, but my constituents wish to see more. They would like us to stop supplying arms to the Israelis when those arms are being used for the occupation and to kill people in Gaza. They would like us to stop importing goods from illegal settlements—illegal under international law. They cannot understand why, if the settlements are illegal, the goods should not be illegal as well. The motion does not ask for any of that. It was supposed to be consensual motion that simply proposes giving the same rights to the Palestinians as we extend to the Israelis. This is about equity.
Sarah Champion, Labour, on the dignity of Palestinians and their right to recognition:
The Palestinian people have been arguing for self-determination for more than 50 years and that is a request that we cannot and should not ignore. More than 100 states have already recognised Palestine, joined by Sweden only two weeks ago. It is now our turn. It is our moral duty to treat Palestinians as the people they seek to be treated as. That should not be conditional on negotiations, the views of Israel or those of any other state. It should be conditional only on the views of the Palestinian people…. This is not an issue for the Israelis to decide, even if they want to. It is not an issue for negotiations. It is an issue for the Palestinian people and the Palestinian people alone. Israel should have no veto over the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination. This is a right that is not contingent on the views of other states. There is a practical issue here as well: the recognition of the state of Palestine would mirror our historic recognition of Israel. It has been 54 years since |
was needed to get the very best doctors for the very best surgeries and experiments. Richmond had gone the mundane route, and mundane remained very, very impressive, paling only in comparison to the likes of the Duke. The Twins had been taken down the experimental route, more monstrous than a self-respecting noble would allow, riskier and more questionable.
But still the very best sort of work that was out there. The sort of work I suspected Ibott wanted to do.
Fear, respect, and anger mixed in equal quantity as we reunited with the other group, all the while approaching the carnage the golden-haired gargoyle-twins had wrought. I could see the holes the spikes had punched in neck, chest, and stomach, and the places where slashing cuts hadn’t just torn throats out but had destroyed them.
Explosive strength in a small package.
One opened its mouth wide, and with only a dark membrane of flesh, there wasn’t much to keep that skull-face from opening all the way, sharp teeth bared. The tongue stuck out and waggled at me, two feet long.
The other only huffed for breath, the thin covering of gray-black skin at the two nostrils on the noseless face flaring open and closed repeatedly. Neither had been hit by the shots from the advanced rifles.
Don’t think about the fact that you have two more nobles you effectively have to kill, I told myself. Look for the clues.
The eyes, if there were any, were small and dark, in eye sockets filled with shadow. No expressions beyond mouth opening and mouth closing, a unique language of gurgles and hisses. Not social creatures.
They were killing machines. Fast, strong, with explosive strength.
The nobles wanted to show their strength off. She’d held my neck. They had mounted this attack when it wasn’t absolutely necessary.
Jamie was tense, hunched over a bit, his neck held firmly by the Twin that had him, like mine was by the one that had me. I was shorter, so I wasn’t forced down, but Jamie had an inch or two on me, and because the Richmond Twins kept their arms in the same place and at the same angle, Jamie was forced lower.
Symmetry, always symmetry.
Except for the younger twins. One opening its mouth, waggling its tongue, the other breathing.
Keep the anger cold and efficient, I told myself. Being unfocused now could be disastrous. I was already slipping, things falling to pieces around the edges. I could retain memories I focused on and build up a repertoire of facts and observations, and those facts and observations could be the only way to escape, if we were even that lucky. But if I slipped, then I’d lose track, and I’d miss a detail, and I’d find myself kicking myself for it over and over while Jamie and I were fed to the younger Twins.
In an instant, both sets of Twins turned their heads to look in the same direction. Two sets of eyes and two sets of skeletal eye sockets remained pointed in the same direction.
A moment later, the younger twins were dashing through the darkness, never in a straight line.
We continued our brisk walk, the Twin letting go of my neck to keep one hand on my head instead.
Three civilians, dead before we even reached them, still-dripping blood painting the road and the faces of buildings on either side of them. The same savage, efficient killing we’d seen with the plague men.
On par with Dog and Catcher, or the Hangman, in terms of quality, if not stronger. But there had to be drawbacks. A reason the Richmond twins didn’t have the younger twins out at every opportunity. If the Academy could make experiments that dangerous, there had to be a reason there weren’t a handful on every battlefield.
That kind of explosive strength… perhaps a lack of stamina.
Not enough to warrant them being this uncommon. They probably needed a stern hand, too. Or a particularly loving one. Being raised with a sister, it was effectively full time care with a trainer. One they were dependent on? Were the elder twins a food source? An absolute necessity?
We found another pile of bodies that the younger twins had assaulted. More civilians of Lugh, though these ones had guns. Militants, enemy soldiers that might have fired on us. They hadn’t even had a chance to pull a trigger before the six of them were cut down.
The twin to my right raised a hand, finger extended, then pointed to her sister.
“Are we close, Lambs?” the elder sister asked. She pointed to her sister.
“I’m feeling impatient,” the one to my right said. “We could amuse ourselves with this one. Break the fingers on one hand, perhaps?”
“We’re close, miladies,” Jamie said. He turned his head my way.
“I saw that,” the one to my left said. “Please do a better job of lying to us in the future. I’d so hate to have to kill you for your bald-faced dishonesty before anything interesting has unfolded.”
“We are close, my lady,” Jamie said. “They were around here.”
He was telling the truth.
“I’ll keep an eye out, miladies,” I said.
And he wasn’t looking at me. His eyes were fixed on a point in the distance.
I didn’t dare look in the same direction, for fear of tipping them off. I waited, continuing to walk.
The Duke was my barometer, the yardstick by which I measured and made guesses about the nobles’ behavior. Holding the Richmond Twins against him as a comparison, something rang as off about their impatience, wanting to find the twins sooner than later.
Impatience suggested I was right. That the younger twins couldn’t be out and about for too long before they needed sustenance, rest, and the security of nestling into their elder sisters.
There was a window of opportunity here. Within a few minutes, maybe five, but no more than fifteen, the killing spree would end, and so would the elder twins’ patience. But with the younger twins called back and put away to rest.
All we had to do was figure out a way to deal with the elder twins, their soldiers, and the two monsters, while shackled, within that span of time.
Enough time had passed.
I looked to my left, under the guise of searching the environment. I nearly missed him on the first view.
There, under the eaves, lying on his side as though dead, was the body of a dog, partially dusted in snow.
Hubris.
Dead? He wasn’t moving an inch, lying there. His eyes were open, staring, and unblinking.
I looked, and I didn’t see signs of violence, but not all gunfights would have them. I couldn’t see any other hiding places for Lillian and Gordon.
Not long ago, I’d been ruminating on how I had to trust the other Lambs.
I extended that trust, moving my hand in gestures. It was easier because I wasn’t signaling Jamie.
Wait. Signal. You. Hide. Help.
And then I couldn’t see him anymore, and he certainly couldn’t see me anymore. I hoped his eyes hadn’t clouded over an hour ago.
We were close, if Hubris was there, I told myself.
We were close, and there was only so much time to plan. The problem was, it wasn’t a plan where I decided the first move. It was reactive, and so much about it was sensitive. I tried to remain aware of where the guns were, which soldiers had guns out and ready, and what things in the environment might provide cover or help us get away.
Puddles, ice, trash, crates, lanterns sitting around here and there, abandoned by their owners.
Not having peripheral vision was another thing that was ticking the ‘fucking with Sy’s head’ scale up in fractions and increments. The appearance of the younger twins startled me, both landing a matter of feet ahead of us with clack sounds of spike against roadtop.
It was one thing to tell myself to have a plan ready at any moment, but after maintaining a juggling act of keeping my mind focused on immediate cues and useful terrain while simultaneously keeping track of what was coming up and looking for more things to use, I pulled a little too hard on the reins and brought the thought track to a stumbling halt.
I needed more Wyvern.
I needed to get us out of here. This was the window.
“Dear sister, did you have fun?” one twin asked.
“So pretty, look at you. You’ve made yourself up,” the other spoke. The only makeup I could see was the congealing blood that covered the younger counterpart.
“Come,” the elder twin said, letting go of my head, leaving me for a soldier to grab. “Inside me.”
She spread her arms wide, coat parting, and the younger sister stepped through the gate of fur and heavy cloth, still slick with blood, merging into a single body, other people’s blood squeezing out of the golden seam to run down bare skin.
Think, Sy. A lantern, two escape routes. The men with guns looked to be holding the sort that fired six shots each. Too many of them were young. Less experienced.
Think, and don’t make the mistake you always make. Don’t overthink, don’t put the brakes on as you think of a different plan or track. Any hesitation, and we die.
The moment mattered. I watched the transition, waiting, seeing how far along they were, waiting-
The man behind me shifted his weight, turning his head.
The moment wasn’t right, but the fact that this was an opportunity made up for that.
“Sir,” I said, turning around. In that same moment, he grabbed me by the shoulder.
The Twins both looked at me, heads snapping around. Alert, aware that I was trying something.
With that simple fact, the plan had failed. The lantern I wanted was behind me but out of reach of the hands that were shackled there. I couldn’t pull away, grab it and make a move all at once, not without him reacting.
I didn’t have an answer. I gestured. Help.
“They’re communicating,” the twins spoke, their voices out of sync. They could barely move while they took in their sisters. “They’re using their hands. Break their fingers.”
“Yes, miladies,” the voices sounded in unison.
The ruse was up. I whistled, as loud as I was able. With nothing to lose, Jamie stuck a leg out, kicking the lantern toward me. I gripped the handle at the top, and then dropped, ducking out of the grip the man had on my shoulder.
Twisting, I swung the lantern out and as far up as I could manage. The weight of the shackles threatened to damn me, keeping the lantern too low.
Glass caught the rifle at the man’s side. Glass shattered, and fire made contact with oil. He and his weapon caught fire. I let go of the handle so the remains of the lantern could dance in Jamie’s direction.
The young soldiers had been grabbing for his wrists to follow the Twins’ orders. As the burning oil scattered toward their boots, they took a step back, he took a step in the opposite direction, and tore free.
The oil was spent by the time the top end of the lantern came to a rolling halt at the edge of the Twins’ coat. Two soldiers in the retinue turned their attention to the coat, making sure there wasn’t damage and there were no flames. Priorities, when a noble was involved.
One twin spoke, “The coat doesn’t matter.”
The other spoke, “Grab the Lambs.”
They were already separating again from their uglier halves, reversing the process.
In a minute, we would have the lightning-fast younger twins on our heels.
Soldiers moved to cut us off, weapons in hand. They didn’t shoot with the nobles behind us, but they did jab the points of bayonets at us, attempting to slow us down so the group could collapse in on us.
I’d hoped for more chaos, for the coat to catch the spray of flame and burn. There hadn’t been enough oil in the lamp.
I’d hoped for a gap in the lines, or a weakness I could exploit. The soldiers had backed up, guns in hand, and were blocking the way.
Now I faced having to choose to sacrifice myself to let Jamie go.
Except that wasn’t allowed. Only if we saved two Lambs, the rule was.
My memory was bad, but I’d stuck to that one.
Run, five paces to find an opening, before you’re running headlong into a bayonet blade.
Two paces.
A shadow moved behind the men. A small object rolled between the soldier’s legs. He and his comrades backed away once they saw what it was.
A grenade.
Not an explosive grenade, but still a grenade. One with the pin still in it.
At a headlong run, I let myself fall to the ground, rolling over the thing. I didn’t manage to grab it with my shackled hands, but I did catch it in between my crossed forearms.
Rolling to my feet, I didn’t entirely have my balance, and staggered a little to one side as I heaved myself to a standing position.
While I’d been on the ground, they’d been aiming at me. The accidental stumble saved my life. Gunshots sounded.
I started to think of options, and then remembered. Hesitation could kill.
I pulled the pin, and I dropped the grenade so it would fall behind me.
That done, I charged forward, using the gap that had opened when the grenade had come rolling down the road.
I had to trust Jamie to do the same. I couldn’t hold his hand, I couldn’t pull him along. I had to extend that Lamb’s trust that he would be as competent as he needed to. It was the only way this could work, if it could work at all.
The grenade detonated. Smoke billowed out. The vision-obscuring effect wasn’t limited to the smoke itself – as it billowed forth, it covered light. The side street was thrust into darkness.
I expected to get slashed or stabbed as I charged straight for the soldier who’d stood straight in my way. Instead, I nearly tripped over him. Hubris had him, silent, gripping the man by the throat.
I whistled, once, short, and Hubris fell into stride beside me, a blur. Jamie was only a few steps behind.
It wasn’t over. The danger had only started. I’d estimated one minute for the younger sisters to make their appearance. Fifteen or twenty seconds had already passed.
We didn’t have long.
Hubris pulled ahead. Leading the way.
The asymmetry mattered. The tongue sticking out, the nostrils flaring. The symmetry as the group had turned their head, all four Twins at once. Their senses were altered. They’d been aware of every threat well ahead of time. Taste, smell, with enhanced hearing across the board.
We needed a river to wash away the telltale smells. Lugh didn’t have one. It had gutters.
I snapped my fingers to get attention, then gestured. Stop.
Jamie and I stopped. Hubris didn’t. He turned, and for a second I thought he would bark.
I took a moment to bring my arms down, working foot over and scraping shin against the chain of the shackle, until I straddled it. I brought my other leg over.
Hubris approached me, tugging on my pants leg.
I indicated the gutter.
He tugged again.
Trust the Lambs?
He’d given us the smoke grenade. I hoped he could give us something else.
I grimaced, and ran, following him again.
The younger sisters were already free, they had to be. They would be chasing us. Tired, but with enhanced noses.
We made it only a few more houses down that street before Hubris stopped.
Immediately, I brought my hands to my face, reaching under bandage and belt. The amount of fluid was daunting and almost unbelievable.
I smeared Hubris’ side.
He watched, his expression placid, huffing a little from the run.
Run. I gestured.
He ran, carrying the strongest scent we had with him.
Jamie and I, meanwhile, headed to the gutter. Fires were burning down the street, and the fire melted the thin ice into water. That water flowed through the gutter at the street’s edge, the channel narrow enough that even I had to draw my shoulders together to fit inside the gap.
We crawled within, with me convinced the Twins would happen upon us at any moment. Water ran over us, beneath us, and soaked us through. I could barely breathe.
This was what the Twins wanted, I knew. The hunt. The challenge.
I would have to answer it.
I just had to stay underwater, freezing.
It was timeless, the chill, the pull as all warmth and strength inside of me sapped out and disappeared.
I felt like I might black out. Maybe I had to black out, to stay under long enough, and if Jamie had more strength, he could haul me out, find the nearest fire-
A hand seized me.
I rose up out of the water. The cold had sapped the strength from me.
It was Jamie, with Lillian beside him. Her hand went out, touching bandage.
So warm.
Her face so sad, so miserable. From the look on her face, I knew.
Go, quick, I gestured with numb hands for the house that Hubris had had us stop at.
I could read the hesitation of Lillian’s movement.
I stumbled into her, pressing my head against her shoulder. With my shackles, I couldn’t hug her. She hugged me.
As a trio, we made our way inside.
The fire was on low, more for comfort than for warmth. Lying on the floor was Gordon.
He turned his head to look at me, and I heaved out a heavy, sad sigh. He’d been made comfortable. The bag was open. All the signs were there that she’d dug through it several times over to find things she knew weren’t inside it. Or to keep busy during long minutes and hours.
We took our seats by the fire, around Gordon. It was clear by context. When we left, he wouldn’t be leaving with us.
Previous NextThe Province of New Jersey was one of the Middle Colonies of Colonial America and became New Jersey, a state of United States in 1783. The province had originally been settled by Europeans as part of New Netherland, but came under English rule after the surrender of Fort Amsterdam in 1664, becoming a proprietary colony. The English then renamed the province after the Isle of Jersey in the English Channel. The Dutch Republic reasserted control for a brief period in 1673–1674. After that it consisted of two political divisions, East Jersey and West Jersey, until they were united as a royal colony in 1702. The original boundaries of the province were slightly larger than the current state, extending into a part of the present state of New York, until the border was finalized in 1773.[1]
Map showing the borders of West New Jersey (left) and East New Jersey (right)
Background [ edit ]
The relative location of New Netherland and New Sweden in eastern North America.
The Province of New Jersey was originally settled in the 1610s as part of the colony of New Netherland. The surrender of Fort Amsterdam in September 1664 gave control over the entire Mid-Atlantic region to the English as part the Second Anglo-Dutch War. The English justified the seizure by claiming that John Cabot (c. 1450 – c. 1508), an Italian under the sponsorship of the English King Henry VII, had been the first to discover the place, though it was probably to assert control over the profitable North Atlantic trade. Director-General of New Netherland, Peter Stuyvesant, (unable to rouse a military defense) relinquished control of the colony and was able in the articles of transfer to secure guarantees for property rights, laws of inheritance, and freedom of religion. After the surrender Richard Nicolls took the position as deputy-governor of New Amsterdam and the rest of New Netherland, including those settlements on the west side of the North River (Hudson River) known as Bergen, and those along the Delaware River that had been New Sweden.
Proprietary government [ edit ]
In March 1664, King Charles II granted his brother, James, the Duke of York, a Royal colony that covered New Netherlands and present-day Maine.[2] This charter also included parts of present-day Massachusetts, which conflicted with that colony's charter. The charter allowed James traditional propriety rights and imposed few restrictions upon his powers. In general terms, the charter was equivalent to a conveyance of land conferring on him the right of possession, control, and government, subject only to the limitation that the government must be consistent with the laws of England. The Duke of York never visited his colony and exercised little direct control of it. He elected to administer his government through governors, councils, and other officers appointed by himself. No provision was made for an elected assembly.
Later in 1664, the Duke of York gave the part of his new possessions between the Hudson River and the Delaware River to Sir George Carteret in exchange for settlement of a debt.[3] The territory was named after the Island of Jersey, Carteret's ancestral home.[4] The other section of New Jersey was sold to Lord Berkeley of Stratton, who was a close friend of the Duke. As a result, Carteret and Berkeley became the two English Lords Proprietors of New Jersey.[5][6] The two proprietors of New Jersey attempted to attract more settlers to move to the province by granting sections of lands to settlers and by passing the Concession and Agreement, a 1665 document that granted religious freedom to all inhabitants of New Jersey;[7] under the British government, there was no such religious freedom as the Church of England was the state church. In return for the land, the settlers were supposed to pay annual fees known as quit-rents.
In 1665, Philip Carteret became the first Governor of New Jersey, appointed by the two proprietors. He selected Elizabeth as the capital of New Jersey. Immediately, Carteret issued several additional grants of land to landowners. Towns were started and charters granted to Bergen (1668) Woodbridge (1669), Piscataway (1666), Shrewsbury, Middletown (1693) and Newark (1666).
The idea of quitrents became increasingly difficult because many of the settlers refused to pay them. Most of them claimed that they owed nothing to the proprietors because they received land from Richard Nicolls, Governor of New York. This forced Berkeley to sell West Jersey to John Fenwick and Edward Byllynge, two English Quakers. Many more Quakers made their homes in New Jersey, seeking religious freedom from English (Church of England) rule.
Meanwhile, conflicts began rising in New Jersey. Edmund Andros, governor of New York, attempted to gain authority over East Jersey after the death of Proprietor George Carteret in 1680. However, he was unable to remove the position of governorship from Governor Phillip Carteret and subsequently moved to attack him and brought him to trial in New York. Carteret was later acquitted. In addition, quarrels occurred in between Eastern and Western New Jerseyans, between Native Americans and New Jerseyans and between different religious groups. In the largest of these squabbles, the New York-New Jersey Line War some 210,000 acres (849.8 km²) of land were at stake between New York and New Jersey. The conflict was eventually settled by a royal commission in 1769.
East Jersey and West Jersey [ edit ]
1706 Map of East and West Jersey
From 1674 to 1702, the Province of New Jersey was divided into East Jersey and West Jersey, each with its own governor. Each had its own constitution: the West Jersey Constitution (1681) and the East Jersey Constitution (1683).[8][9]
The exact border between West and East Jersey was often disputed. The border between the two sides reached the Atlantic Ocean to the north of present-day Atlantic City. The border line was created by George Keith and can still be seen in the county boundaries between Burlington and Ocean Counties, and between Hunterdon and Somerset Counties. The Keith line runs NNW from the southern part of Little Egg Harbor Township, passing just north of Tuckerton, and reaching upward to a point on the Delaware River which is just north of the Delaware Water Gap. Later, the 1676 Quintipartite Deed helped to lessen the disputes. More accurate surveys and maps were made to resolve property disputes. This resulted in the Thornton line, drawn around 1696, and the Lawrence line, drawn around 1743, which was adopted as the final line for legal purposes.[10]
Dominion of New England [ edit ]
The Dominion of New England was a short-lived administrative union. On May 7, 1688, the Province of New York, the Province of East Jersey, and the Province of West Jersey were added to the Dominion. The capital was located in Boston but, due to its size, New York and the Jerseys were run by the lieutenant governor from New York City. After news of the overthrow of James II by William of Orange in the Glorious Revolution of 1688 reached Boston, the colonists rose up in rebellion, and the dominion was dissolved in 1689.
Royal colony [ edit ]
On April 17, 1702, under the rule of Queen Anne, the two sections of the proprietary colony were united and New Jersey became a royal colony. Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury, became the first governor of the colony as a royal colony. However, he was an ineffective and corrupt ruler, taking bribes and speculating on land. In 1708, Lord Cornbury was recalled to England. New Jersey was then again ruled by the governors of New York, but this infuriated the settlers of New Jersey, accusing those governors of favoritism to New York. Judge Lewis Morris led the case for a separate governor, and was appointed governor by King George II in 1738.[11]
New York–New Jersey Line War [ edit ]
Provincial Congress [ edit ]
First state constitution [ edit ]
New Jersey's first state constitution was adopted on July 2, 1776.[12] The American Revolutionary War was underway and General George Washington recently had been defeated in New York, putting the state in danger of invasion.[12] The 1776 New Jersey State Constitution was drafted in five days and ratified within the next two days to establish a temporary government, thereby preventing New Jersey from collapsing and descending into anarchy.[13] Among other provisions, it granted unmarried women and blacks who met property requirements the right to vote.[12]
Judiciary [ edit ]
The Supreme Court was established in 1704, to sit alternately at Perth Amboy and Burlington, consisting of a Chief Justice, a Second Judge and several Associate Judges.
Chief Justices [14]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Colonial Charters, Grants and Related Documents (at "New Jersey"). The Avalon Project: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy. Lillian Goldman Law Library (Yale Law School). Retrieved 2010-03-14. This website has links to the following documents: 1664 – The Duke of York's Release to John Ford Berkeley, and Sir George Carteret, 24 June 1664 – The Concession and Agreement of the Lords Proprietors of the Province of New Caesarea, or New Jersey, to and With All and Every the Adventurers and All Such as Shall Settle or Plant There 1672 – A Declaration of the True Intent and Meaning of us the Lords Proprietors, and Explanation of There Concessions Made to the Adventurers and Planters of New Caesarea or New Jersey 1674 – His Royal Highness's Grant to the Lords Proprietors, Sir George Carteret, 29 July 1676 – The Charter or Fundamental Laws, of West New Jersey, Agreed Upon 1676 – Quintipartite Deed of Revision, Between E. and W Jersey: July 1 1680 – Duke of York's Second Grant to William Penn, Gawn Lawry, Nicholas Lucas, John Eldridge, Edmund Warner, and Edward Byllynge, for the Soil and Government of West New Jersey-August 6 1681 – Province of West New-Jersey, in America, The 25th of the Ninth Month Called November 1682 – Duke of York's Confirmation to the 24 Proprietors: 14 March 1683 – The Fundamental Constitutions for the Province of East New Jersey in America 1683 – The King's Letter Recognizing the Proprietors' Right to the Soil and Government 1702 – Surrender from the Proprietors of East and West New Jersey, of Their Pretended Right of Government to Her Majesty 1709 – The Queen's Acceptance of the Surrender of Government; April 17 1712 – Charles II's Grant of New England to the Duke of York, 1676 – Exemplified by Queen Anne 1776 – Constitution of New Jersey
Further reading [ edit ]
Cunningham, John T. Colonial New Jersey (1971) 160pp
(1971) 160pp Doyle, John Andrew. English Colonies in America: Volume IV The Middle Colonies (1907) online ch 7–8
(1907) online ch 7–8 McCormick, Richard P. New Jersey from Colony to State, 1609–1789 (1964) 191pp
(1964) 191pp Pomfret, John Edwin. Colonial New Jersey: a history (1973), the standard modern history
Coordinates:Graphic convention in comics for representing speech
The four most common speech balloons, top to bottom: speech, whisper, thought, scream.
Speech balloons (also speech bubbles, dialogue balloons or word balloons) are a graphic convention used most commonly in comic books, comics and cartoons to allow words (and much less often, pictures) to be understood as representing the speech or thoughts of a given character in the comic. There is often a formal distinction between the balloon that indicates thoughts and the one that indicates words spoken aloud: the balloon that conveys thoughts is often referred to as a thought bubble.
History [ edit ]
[ specify ] speech was depicted using bands, flags, scrolls, or sheets of paper.[1] Before the 20th century,speech was depicted using bands, flags, scrolls, or sheets of paper.
1775 cartoon printed in Boston
In this 1807 political cartoon opposing Jefferson's Embargo, the form and function of speech balloons is already similar to their modern use.
One of the earliest antecedents to the modern speech bubble were the "speech scrolls", wispy lines that connected first-person speech to the mouths of the speakers in Mesoamerican art between 600 and 900 AD.[2] Earlier, paintings, depicting stories in subsequent frames, using descriptive text resembling bubbles-text, were used in murals, one such example witten in Greek, dating to the 2nd century, found in Capitolias, today in Jordan[3].
In Western graphic art, labels that reveal what a pictured figure is saying have appeared since at least the 13th century. These were in common European use by the early 16th century. Word balloons (also known as "banderoles") began appearing in 18th-century printed broadsides, and political cartoons from the American Revolution (including some published by Benjamin Franklin) often used them.[4][5] They later fell out of fashion, but by 1904 had regained their popularity, although they were still considered novel enough to require explanation.[6] With the development of the comics industry in the 20th century, the appearance of speech balloons has become increasingly standardized, though the formal conventions that have evolved in different cultures (USA as opposed to Japan, for example), can be quite distinct.
Richard F. Outcault's Yellow Kid is generally credited as the first American comic strip character. His words initially appeared on his yellow shirt, but word balloons very much like those in use today were added almost immediately, as early as 1896. By the start of the 20th century, word balloons were ubiquitous; since that time, few American comic strips and comic books have relied on captions, notably Hal Foster's Prince Valiant and the early Tarzan comic strip in the 1930s. In Europe, where text comics were more common, speech balloons slowly caught on, with well-known examples being Alain Saint-Ogan's Zig et Puce (1925), Hergé's The Adventures of Tintin (1929) and Rob-Vel's Spirou (1938).
Popular forms [ edit ]
Speech bubbles [ edit ]
The most common is the speech bubble. It comes in two forms for two circumstances: an in-panel character and an off-panel character. An in-panel character (one who is fully or mostly visible in the panel of the strip of comic that the reader is viewing) uses a bubble with a pointer, called a tail, directed towards the speaker.
When one character has multiple balloons within a panel, often only the balloon nearest to the speaker's head has a tail, and the others are connected to it in sequence by narrow bands. This style is often used in Mad Magazine, due to its "call-and-response" dialogue-based humor.
An off-panel character (the comic book equivalent of being "off screen") has several options, some of them rather unconventional. The first is a standard speech bubble with a tail pointing toward the speaker's position. The second option, which originated in manga, has the tail pointing into the bubble, instead of out. (This tail is still pointing towards the speaker.) The third option replaces the tail with a sort of bottleneck that connects with the side of the panel. It can be seen in the works of Marjane Satrapi (author of Persepolis).
In American comics, a bubble without a tail means that the speaker is not merely outside the reader's field of view but invisible to the viewpoint character, often as an unspecified member of a crowd.
Characters distant (in space or time) from the scene of the panel can still speak, in squared bubbles without a tail; this usage, equivalent to voice-over in film, is not uncommon in American comics for dramatic contrast. In contrast to captions, the corners of such balloons never coincide with those of the panel; for further distinction they often have a double outline, a different background color, or quotation marks.
Thought bubbles [ edit ]
Thought bubbles come in two forms: the chain thought bubble and the "fuzzy" bubble.
The chain thought bubble is the almost universal symbol for thinking in cartoons. It consists of a large, cloud-like bubble containing the text of the thought, with a chain of increasingly smaller circular bubbles leading to the character. Some artists use an elliptical bubble instead of a cloud-shaped one.
Often animal characters like Snoopy and Garfield "talk" using thought bubbles. Thought bubbles may also be used in circumstances when a character is gagged or otherwise unable to speak.
Another, less conventional thought bubble has emerged: the "fuzzy" thought bubble. Used in manga (by such artists as Ken Akamatsu), the fuzzy bubble is roughly circular in shape (generally), but the edge of the bubble is not a line but a collection of spikes close to each other, creating the impression of fuzziness. Fuzzy thought bubbles do not use tails, and are placed near the character who is thinking. This has the advantage of reflecting the TV equivalent effect: something said with an echo.
Writers and artists can refuse to use thought bubbles, expressing the action through spoken dialogue and drawing; they are sometimes seen as an inefficient method of expressing thought because they are attached directly to the head of the thinker, unlike methods such as caption boxes, which can be used both as an expression of thought and narration while existing in an entirely different panel from the character thinking. However, they are restricted to the current viewpoint character. An example is Alan Moore and David Lloyd's V for Vendetta, wherein during one chapter, a monologue expressed in captions serves not only to express the thoughts of a character but also the mood, status and actions of three others.
Other forms [ edit ]
The shape of a speech balloon can be used to convey further information. Common ones include the following:
Scream bubbles indicate a character is screaming or shouting, usually with a jagged outline or a thicker line which can be colored. Their lettering is usually larger or bolder than normal.
indicate a character is screaming or shouting, usually with a jagged outline or a thicker line which can be colored. Their lettering is usually larger or bolder than normal. Broadcast bubbles (also known as radio bubbles ) may have a jagged tail like the conventional drawing of a lightning flash and either a squared-off or jagged outline. Letters are sometimes italicised without also being bold. Broadcast bubbles indicate that the speaker is communicating through an electronic device, such as a radio or television, or is robotic.
(also known as ) may have a jagged tail like the conventional drawing of a lightning flash and either a squared-off or jagged outline. Letters are sometimes italicised without also being bold. Broadcast bubbles indicate that the speaker is communicating through an electronic device, such as a radio or television, or is robotic. Whisper bubbles are usually drawn with a dashed (dotted) outline, smaller font or gray lettering to indicate the tone is softer, as most speech is printed in black.
Another form, sometimes encountered in manga, looks like an occidental thought bubble.
are usually drawn with a dashed (dotted) outline, smaller font or gray lettering to indicate the tone is softer, as most speech is printed in black. Another form, sometimes encountered in manga, looks like an occidental thought bubble. Icicle bubbles have jagged "icicles" on the lower edge, representing "cold" hostility.
have jagged "icicles" on the lower edge, representing "cold" hostility. Monster bubbles have blood or slime dripping from them.
have blood or slime dripping from them. Colored bubbles can be used to convey the emotion that goes with the speech, such as red for anger or green for envy. This style is seldom used in modern comics. Alternatively (especially in online-published comics), colours can be used to provide an additional cue about who is speaking. Main characters often have individual thematic colours, and their speech bubbles are frequently tinted with their colour; especially in situations when there are no characters visible for speech bubbles to point to.
Captions [ edit ]
Captions are generally used for narration purposes, such as showing location and time, or conveying editorial commentary. They are generally rectangular and positioned near the edge of the panel. Often they are also colored to indicate the difference between themselves and the word balloons used by the characters, which are almost always white. Increasingly in modern comics, captions are frequently used to convey an internal monologue or typical speech.[7]
Artist-specific |
” program to root out and unmask potential leakers, but it makes it easier for the government to openly justify surveillance of investigative reporters and their communications with confidential sources. That can seriously chill investigative reporting while at the same time encouraging access journalism like, for example, the publishing of stories that simply repeat without any skepticism what anonymous officials have to say on matters of national security.
And, finally, it is one thing to be more neutral and promote what establishment media consider “professional journalism” by calling Snowden a “leaker.” It is quite another to cast him as “The Dark Prophet,” who engaged in the “most spectacular heist” in the “history of spycraft.”
That is far from neutral or objective, and, if Snowden is ever brought back to the United States for trial, one could easily picture a government attorney having this feature story entered into evidence so prosecutors could say, “Even a magazine that recognized him as a runner-up ‘Person of the Year’ understood that what he had committed was theft.”
No matter what great and positive impact he had, he still committed a crime and deserved to be brought to justice.Todd Palin seated behind a White House desk and shaping national policy could be one of the most dangerous aspects of a potential Sarah Palin presidency.
An overlooked part of the Alaska state trooper investigation is its finding on the influence of Gov. Palin’s husband, Todd — the “First Dude” or, as he is known around the Alaska statehouse, the “First Gentleman.”
This is crucial in view of the age of the Republican nominee, John McCain, 72, and the fact that he has suffered from melanoma skin cancer. His doctors have pronounced him in excellent health, but his age and the serious nature of this type of cancer should focus attention on his running mate and her operating methods.
A fascinating picture of Todd Palin’s influence in Alaska’s capital is provided in the report of a legislative investigation that concluded that Gov. Palin unlawfully abused her power in seeking the firing of a state trooper once married to her sister. The report, released Friday, also criticized Palin for allowing Todd Palin to push hard for the dismissal of Trooper Mike Wooten.
Wooten had been married to the governor’s sister. Their divorce was messy. So, apparently, was Wooten’s career as a trooper. He had been accused of illegally shooting a moose, drinking beer in a patrol car and using a Taser gun on his stepson. He was disciplined before Palin became governor and was allowed to remain a trooper.
When Palin took over, the Wooten case was high on the family agenda, with Todd Palin leading the effort to get rid of the trooper. As Associated Press writer Mike Apuzzo put it in his story on the report, Todd Palin had “extraordinary access to the governor’s office” and he “used that access to try to get [Wooten] fired.”
His target was Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan, who said he lost his job because he refused to fire Wooten.
The report, by investigator Stephen Branchflower, a retired state prosecutor, shows how Todd Palin operates.
Monegan’s secretary, Cassandra Byrne, said that on Jan. 4, 2007, she received a phone call from the governor’s office. An aide told her “the First Gentleman would like to have a meeting with Commissioner Walt Monegan. At the time, I was not familiar with the term ‘First Gentleman.’ … So I kept asking ‘Who?’ and she eventually said ‘Todd Palin.’ I said, ‘Oh, OK,’ so we set the time and the place which was the governor’s office in Anchorage. … ”
Investigator Branchflower said that when Monegan arrived there he was directed into the governor’s office. Todd Palin, wearing a business suit, was alone, waiting for him. “Mr. Palin was seated at a large conference table and invited Mr. Monegan to sit,” the report said.
Monegan said, “What I recalled was Todd sitting there. He had three stacks of paper in an array in front of him” dealing with the Wooten case. One was from the Department of Public Safety, under which Alaska state troopers serve.
Monegan told Branchflower that he got “the impression that Todd was not happy with the investigation [that the department had made before disciplining Wooten].
“He told me that he [Wooten] just got a few days off [suspension] and didn’t think that was enough. And this guy shouldn’t be a trooper.”
Describing Todd Palin, Monegan said, “I saw someone who was somewhat animated. Not certainly out of control but he was passionate about how he was addressing the issue.
“And my impression was that he was venting. I mean there was a complaint, the troopers investigated it and that they had come up with a conclusion and that he was not happy with the conclusion.”
The telling vignette shows Todd Palin’s position in the governor’s office. Dressed in a business suit, seated behind a big conference table with state documents in front of him, he tried to tell the state’s top cop how to do his job.
This is a man who was a member of the Alaskan Independence Party, a radical group advocating Alaskan secession from the United States. Gail Fenumiai, director of the Alaska Division of Elections, told TPM Muckraker that Palin registered as an AIP member in October 1995 and continued in that status until 2000, when he registered as undeclared for a few months. He registered as an AIP member again and remained with the party until 2002, when he registered as undeclared.
What other radical ideas are percolating in the mind of a man who is now portrayed in the media as sort of a lovable guys’ guy?
If Sarah Palin ever becomes president, it is safe to assume that the First Gentleman of Alaska will slip into the role of First Gentleman of the United States with as much access to the Oval Office as he has to the governor’s office in Anchorage.
That is a truly scary thought.Iqbal Masih (Urdu: اقبال مسیح) was a Pakistani Christian boy who became a symbol of abusive child labour in the developing world.[1][2][3][4]
Childhood [ edit ]
Iqbal Masih was born in 1983 in Muridke, a commercial city outside of Lahore in Punjab, Pakistan, into a poor Christian family.[4][1][2][3] At age four, he was put to work by his family to pay off their debts.[5] Iqbal's family borrowed 600 rupees (less than USD$6.00) from a local employer who owned a carpet weaving business. In return, Iqbal was required to work as a carpet weaver until the debt was paid off. Every day, he would rise before dawn and make his way along dark country roads to the factory, where he and most of the other children were tightly bound with chains to the carpet looms to prevent escape. He would work 120 hours a week, seven days a week, with only a 30-minute break. He made 1 rupee a day for the loan, but the loan continued to increase because of his family and interest.
Escape and activism [ edit ]
At the age of 10, Iqbal escaped his slavery, after learning that bonded labour was declared illegal by the Supreme Court of Pakistan.[6] He escaped and then went to the police to report Arshad, but the police brought him back to Arshad, who told the police to tie him upside down if he tried to escape again. Iqbal escaped a second time and he attended the Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF) School for former child slaves and quickly completed a four-year education in only two years.[7] Iqbal helped over 3,000 Pakistani children that were in bonded labour to escape to freedom and made speeches about child labour throughout the world.
He expressed a desire to become a lawyer to better equip him to free bonded labourers, and he began to visit other countries including Sweden and the United States to share his story, encouraging others to join the fight to eradicate child slavery.[8]
In 1994 he received the Reebok Human Rights Award in Boston and in his acceptance speech he said: "I am one of those millions of children who are suffering in Pakistan through bonded labour and child labour, but I am lucky that due to the efforts of Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF), I go out in freedom I am standing in front of you here today. After my freedom, I joined BLLF School and I am studying in that school now. For us slave children, Ehsan Ullah Khan and BLLF have done the same work that Abraham Lincoln did for the slaves of America. Today, you are free and I am free too."[9]
Death [ edit ]
"Iqbal Masih, a brave and eloquent boy who attended several international conferences to denounce the hardships of child weavers in Pakistan, was shot dead with a shotgun while he and some friends were cycling in their village of Muridke, near Lahore".[10]
Iqbal was fatally shot by Ashraf Hero, a heroin addict, while visiting relatives in Muridke, Pakistan on 16 April 1995, Easter Sunday.[3][11][12][13] He was 12 years old at the time. His mother said she did not believe her son had been the victim of a plot by the "carpet mafia".[14] However, the Bonded Labour Liberation Front disagreed because Iqbal had received death threats from individuals connected to the Pakistani carpet industry.[14]
His funeral was attended by approximately 800 mourners. The Little Hero: One Boy's Fight for Freedom[15] tells the story of his legacy.
Following his death, Pakistani economic elites responded to declining carpet sales by denying the use of bonded child labor in their factories and employing the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to brutally harass and arrest activists working for the Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF). The Pakistani press conducted a smear campaign against the BLLF, arguing that child laborers receive high wages and favorable working conditions. [16]
Legacy [ edit ]
Ehsan Ullah Khan visits the Iqbal Masih Square in Santiago de Compostela.
References [ edit ]Yogurt has a surprising number of carbs, which totally sucks because it is one thing that I don’t mind eating for breakfast. This low carb yogurt recipe is a richer, yummier version of “yogurt” as far as I am concerned and it is perfect when you need to do a fat fast.
What’s a fat fast, you ask?
Some of us are more resistant to losing weight than others. I have nearly zero metabolism because of not having a thyroid and I can tell you that the medication just isn’t a perfect substitute. So, when you are having trouble getting into ketosis OR you have plateaued then a fat fast can get you jump started.
Basically it is exactly what it sounds like. You eat mostly fat and minimal amounts of protein — you also need to stay under 1,000 calories a day. This is not a long term plan, and you should only do it for 3-5 days at most. Usually I only need a day or two to get things started again.
You’d think you’d be starving but you really are satiated because of the amount of fat you are eating. You eat four 250 calorie mini meals, or you can break it down into five 200 calorie ones. 90% percent of the calories should come from fat.
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On a happy note, what other time in your life can you get away with eating things like cream cheese, whipped cream, and bacon?
This “yogurt” is made from sour cream, your favorite sweetener, and vanilla or maple flavoring. It is pretty much all fat. It fits into the fat fast really well. Macadamia nuts are a good substitute for the almonds. It might sound a little weird but really, try it. I find that it cuts cravings really fast.
Here is more information about the fat fast.Despite the outbreak of deadly anti-police violence in Dallas yesterday evening, Twitter has chosen today to reward the Black Lives Matter movement with their own custom emoji.
When users go to type in the hashtag, Twitter automatically inserts the icon, consisting of white, brown, and black fists alongside it.
The emoji was introduced today and users started reporting its visibility at around 10AM PST. Twitter did not respond to a request for comment regarding the precise time it installed the emoji.
Given the fists’ resemblance to the “black power” symbol, the emoji lends the hashtag a positive connotation. The hashtag can also not be tweeted without the emoji, which makes expressing negative opinions regarding the #BlackLivesMatter movement more awkward and difficult for users.
Twitter has still yet to take action regarding the users threatening and inciting violence against cops, who have been allowed to broadcast their incitement unopposed by Twitter both in the days preceding the Dallas shootings and afterwards.
Rob Shimshock is a Campus Reform correspondent, Breitbart contributor, and satirist. Follow him on Twitter (@ShimshockAndAwe) for mischief, sarcasm, and truth.It's plainly wrong for a member of Congress to collaborate with a public relations firm to produce knowingly deceptive testimony on an important issue. Yet Representative Tom Lantos of California has been caught doing exactly that. His behavior warrants a searching inquiry by the House Ethics Committee.
Mr. Lantos is co-chairman of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. An article last week on The Times's Op-Ed page by John MacArthur, the publisher of Harper's magazine, revealed the identity of a 15-year-old Kuwaiti girl who told the caucus that Iraqi soldiers had removed scores of babies from incubators and left them to die.
The girl, whose testimony helped build support for the Persian Gulf war, was identified only as "Nayirah," supposedly to protect family members still in Kuwait. Another piece of information was also withheld: that she is not just some Kuwaiti but the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to the U.S.
Saddam Hussein committed plenty of atrocities, but not, apparently, this one. The teen-ager's accusation, at first verified by Amnesty International, was later refuted by that group as well as by other independent human rights monitors. But the issue is not so much the accuracy of the testimony as the identity and undisclosed bias of the witness.
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How did the girl's testimony come about? It was arranged by the big public relations firm of Hill & Knowlton on behalf of a client, the Kuwaiti-sponsored Citizens for a Free Kuwait, which was then pressing Congress for military intervention. Mr. Lantos knew the girl's identity but concealed it from the public and from the other caucus co-chairman, Representative John E. Porter of Illinois.Tragically, Aaron Swartz, hounded by an apparently over-zealous prosecutor, committed suicide in early 2013. His just-unveiled major open-source privacy project, DeadDrop, lives on in a citizen and press protection program, The New Yorker's Strongbox.
Strongbox is the first use of DeadDrop technology. The New Yorker magazine will use it so that its readers can "communicate with our writers and editors with greater anonymity and security than afforded by conventional email". With the Department of Justice's questionable seizure of over two months of Associated Press phone records, the First Amendment's free speech right and its corollary, freedom of the press, is under attack. DeadDrop couldn't have been released at a better time.
Specifically:
DeadDrop is a server application intended to let news organizations and others set up an online drop box for sources. It's open-source software written by Aaron Swartz in consultation with a volunteer team of security experts. In addition to Aaron's code, the project includes installation scripts and set-up instructions both for the software, and for a hardened Ubuntu environment on which to run it. DeadDrop was created with the goal of placing a secure drop box within reach of anyone with the need. But at this point, expertise is still required to safely deploy this software. And the software itself needs more work. DeadDrop is free software: You can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the license, or (at your option) any later version. The code is a Python application that accepts messages and documents from the web and GPG encrypts them for secure storage. Essentially, it's a more secure alternative to the "contact us" form found on a typical news site. In operation, every source is given a unique "code name". The code name lets the source establish a relationship with the news organization without revealing her real identity or resorting to email. She can enter the code name on a future visit to read any messages sent back from the journalist — "Thanks for the Roswell photos! Got any more??" — or submit additional documents or messages under the same persistent, but anonymous, identifier. The source is known by a different code name on the journalist's side. All of that source's submissions are grouped together into a "collection". Every time there's a new submission by that source, their collection is bumped to the top of the submission queue. DeadDrop was designed to use three physical servers: A public-facing server, a second server for storage of messages and documents, and a third that does security monitoring of the first two. The New Yorker's public-facing server also has a USB dongle called an Entropy Key, plugged attached to generate a pool of random numbers for the crypto.
To use it, users need to first download and install software to access the Tor network. This is a combination of free software and internet-connected computers that help enable anonymity on the internet. Once you're on Tor, you'll need to go to the Strongbox website.
Once there, you will be assigned a randomly generated and unique code name, and you'll be able to post information to The New Yorker. If a writer or editor then wants to contact you about the information you have submitted, he or she will leave a message for you in Strongbox. These messages are the only way they will be able to reach you, and can only be accessed using your code name.
When you visit or use their public Strongbox server, The New Yorker and its parent company, Condé Nast, promise that it will not record your IP address or information about your browser, computer, or operating system, nor will they embed third-party content or deliver cookies to your browser.
The Strongbox servers themselves are under the physical control of The New Yorker and Condé Nast in a physically and logically segregated area at a secure datacenter, but they otherwise have no elements in common with Condé Nast, The New Yorker's publisher. As Amy Davidson, a New Yorker senior editor wrote, "Over the years, it has also become easier to trace [email] senders, even when they don’t want to be found. Strongbox addresses that. As it's set up, even we won't be able to figure out where files sent to us come from. If anyone asks us, we won’t be able to tell them."
Aaron would have been proud.
Related storiesWikimedia Commons Iain Duncan Smith, the UK's Work and Pensions Secretary, has reportedly been butting heads with the British civil service in his efforts to reform the country's large benefits system for a new austerity-led economy.
It hasn't always been polite.
A column published today in the Times of London revealed that when Duncan Smith heard a member of his staff being "berated" by a member of the Treasury, he grabbed the phone and shouted:
"If you ever speak to my officials like that again I'll bite your balls off and send them to you in a box."
The controversy seems to surround a key part of his benefits plan — a pilot scheme called "Universal Credit" launched this week, which aims to use higher standards and more accurate data to ensure benefits payments only go to those that really need it.
Some people at the Treasury, however, were apparently stalling in hopes of killing off the plan — part of the UK's cilvil service's " institutional resistance to reform", the Times writes. In particular, complicated technical aspects to the plan may have led to the civil service dragging their feet.
The Daily Mail reports that the comment is believed to have come back in 2010, though sources said that Duncan Smith did not say "bite".
Duncan Smith has been a regular feature in the British press recently, after his claim that he could live on£53 ($80.60) a week led to widespread criticism and an online petition demanding he actually do it.President Barack Obama tours Gyeongbok Palace in central Seoul, the first U.S. president to do so, guided by Park Sang-mi, professor of multiculturalism at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. Park, a member of the Cultural Heritage Committee, has been active in spreading Korean culture and food abroad, such as pushing for kimchi to be included in the Unesco Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity last year. Park explained to Obama the history of the 600-century palace and also the significance of the royal and national seals that the U.S. president returned to Korea yesterday. [AP/NEWSIS]
President Barack Obama yesterday returned a set of nine national treasures taken from Korea over 60 years ago, including Joseon Dynasty royal seals, to President Park Geun-hye.The seals, stamps used to authorize documents in lieu of signatures, are from the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910) and the Korean Empire (1897-1910). Obama handed the seals over to Park personally yesterday after a bilateral summit at the Blue House. He is on a two-day Seoul visit, the second stop of a four-country Asia tour.Although this was Obama’s fourth visit to Seoul since his inauguration as president, it was his first trip to Gyeongbok Palace.He is the first U.S. president to visit the palace.Perhaps the most significant of the returned treasures is the Hwangjejibo Seal of the Emperor, a national seal made in 1897 to mark the establishment of the Korean Empire, sometimes called the Daehan Empire, referring to the final years of the Joseon Dynasty when the country declared itself an empire in an attempt to defend its sovereignty.The nine seals were taken out of the country by a U.S. Marine lieutenant during the 1950-53 Korean War. The Marine said he found them in a ditch near Deoksu Palace in Seoul in 1950 after it was ransacked by Chinese and North Korean soldiers.Last November, agents from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations’ directorate received the seals from the family of the deceased former Marine.Since then, the Cultural Heritage Administration has been negotiating the return of the seals. Experts estimate their value at tens of billions of won in art markets, but they are priceless to the country because of their historical value.One of the royal seals, the Sugangtaehwangjebo, was made in 1907 when King Sunjong (1874-1926) bestowed the title of “Great Emperor” on his father King Gojong (1863-1907).Others royals seals include the Yuseojibo, stamped on documents when regional government officials were appointed by the king, and the Junmyeongjibo, used on letters containing the king’s orders sent to chunbang, or the government branch in charge of educating the crown prince.Earlier yesterday, Obama visited Gyeongbok Palace in central Seoul for the first time, guided by Park Sang-mi, professor of multiculturalism at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, a member of the Cultural Heritage Committee. Obama made a speech at Hankuk University during his 2012 visit.Park shared with Obama the 600-year history of the palace and explained the significance of the returned seals to the president. She said that being a Joseon Dynasty king was not always an easy position, and Obama replied that the U.S. president’s position is the same.Gyeongbok Palace was built in 1395 as the main royal palace during the Joseon Dynasty. Its main premises were burnt down during the Imjin War, the Japanese invasion of the Korean Peninsula from 1592 to 1598, but were restored between 1865 and 1867 under Kim Gojong.Obama also paid a visit to the War Memorial of Korea in Yongsan, central Seoul, where he laid a wreath and led a naturalization ceremony for 20 military service members and their spouses from 14 countries.BY SARAH KIM [sarahkim@joongang.co.kr]Mr Yamauchi, the great-grandson of Nintendo's founder, led the company from 1949 to 2002, transformer what was a maker of Japanese playing cards into the world's biggest maker of video games. He died in hospital following complications of pneumonia.
A spokesman said the firm was in mourning over the "loss of the former Nintendo president Mr Hiroshi Yamauchi, who sadly passed away this morning."
The one-time richest man in Japan, in 2008 he had a net worth of £4.85 billion amid surging sales of the Nintendo Wii console.
Mr Yamauchi was the company's second largest shareholder with about 10 per cent of the stock, according to Bloomberg
After succeeding his father as president in 1949, the company was almost forced to file for bankruptcy in the late 1960s after several failed attempts to expand its product line-up into toy guns, baby carriages and even to fast food, according to several books written on Nintendo's history.
Chastened by the experience, Mr Yamauchi vowed then not to borrow money to fund Nintendo's operations. More than a decade after he stepped down, that remains with the company holding about $8.7 billion (£5.4 billion) of cash and equivalents and no debt as of June 30, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
His business philosophy was that the quality of video games is more important than the hardware on which they're played. That point was driven home in 1977 when he met and hired Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo's chief game designer, who went on to create game characters Mario the plumber, Donkey Kong and Zelda.
In 1980, Nintendo released Game & Watch, the world's first hand-held game player. Next came the release of Famicom, or the Family Computer console, in 1983, a home video-game console system.
That was followed by the introduction of the "Super Mario Bros." game in 1985 and the unveiling of Famicom in the US as the Nintendo Entertainment System.
Throughout the 1990s, Nintendo released a series of successful consoles including the Super Nintendo in 1991 in the US, the Game Boy and in 1996 the Nintendo 64, its first fully 3D console. The last console he oversaw was the Nintendo GameCube.
Of Super Mario 64, released on the Nintendo 64 in 1997, the Official Nintendo Magazine ranked it as the No1 Game that Changed the World.
"Super Mario 64 became Nintendo's showcase title for the N64 and it demonstrated perfectly why the console's controller looked the way it did, with its analogue stick and button layout; after half an hour with the game, few people would dare to argue with Shigeru Miyamoto's joypad logic. And analogue control is one of three reasons why this game changed the face of gaming," the website said.
"You cannot underestimate the influence the man had on the games industry," Rob Crossley, associate editor of Computer and Video Games magazine, told BBC news.
Outside Nintendo, he became the majority owner of the Seattle Mariners baseball team in 1992 – and never attended a game.Prepping takes a certain level of investment, in effort, time and resources. Those resources usually take the form of cash. Even minimalist prepping with an emphasis on skills is plenty expensive enough, and full-tilt end-of-the-world readiness can easily equate to an additional mortgage payment every month. But there are no two ways around it: for some things, if you want to play you have to pay.
For some, the idea of paying too much is simply anathema. For others they need to make their dollars go farther so they can get all the things they need. A few unlucky preppers will have spouses that, ah, do not see the value proposition of stockpiling guns, ammo, food and other supplies. Whoever you are, unless you are truly wealthy, funds will always be a factor for your prepping plans.
That’s where I come in. In this article, I am going to give you a few tried and true ways to get the gear you need and do it cheaply, stretching your dollar to meet your objectives. Think of it like a financial force multiplier. It does not matter what you need and where you are, there are always ways to wheel, deal, scrimp, barter and save on the stuff you need. Keep reading, and let’s make some deals!
Yonder, a Deal!
The things you need are all around you, and with some diligence and patience, available at deeply discounted prices, or even free! So how do we find these sweet, sweet bargain? That part is simpler than you think, it just takes a mindset adjustment and a little bit of extra effort.
For starters, stop assuming that the things you want are only to be had in some nice store with an equally nice price tag. Nothing wrong with buying retail, but it is a poor strategy for making your bucks do more work. Instead, we will depart from the big-box store promised land in search of our own, one where the goods come easy and the gear comes cheap. Avoiding retail establishments is one of the central tenets of our new buying strategy (with an exception, see below).
There other most essential facet to our new strategy is simply good old fashioned networking. Beating the bushes you might say. We want to go directly to the people that have what we want, and find out what they want for the thing we want. Right? Right. Value is never arbitrarily fixed: An expensive generator or hoard of survival meals may be worth thousands to you, but could be someone else’s pain in the ass. If you can get rid of it for them, you’ll be helping them. Remember this.
Also bear in mind that you may not need hand over any cash for goods. Someone may be willing to trade something you want for something of yours they need. Similarly your skills and talents may be able to solve a problem of theirs and see them part with the item you need in payment. This is the kind of outside the box thinking that will solve your own supply and acquisition problems.
Read on below for the scoop on several avenues that can net you needed equipment and supplies on the cheap.
Swap Meets, Garage Sales and Flea Markets
It will take some time pushing the pavement and perusing the aisles, but cruising a swap meet, garage sale or flea market is often an excellent way to find some items you need on the cheap. Anything from camping items to tools, electronics and more can be had, often for dirt cheap.
None of these venues are without their warts: You will need to be careful of what you are buying at flea markets as many vendors simply stock and mark up the cheapest of the cheap Chinese garbage, things that literally are not worth a look. Swap meets may wind up being a waste of time as quite a few more local ones are very clannish in their dealings and often not very big. Garage sales are simply hit and miss- you may snag a great piece of kit, or waste your time looking at Precious Moments figurines. At least you won’t burn too much time wandering at a garage sale.
Even so, I have scored plenty of quality, useful gear at all of these venues with nothing more than a little time out of my weekend, things like my nice chainsaw, a couple of high-end battery powered lanterns, and a large mortar shell can with excellent seals that made for a very nice cache container.
You never know what you’ll find, but whatever it is you can likely snag it for a sweet price. All of the above venues foster an “end of the line” mentality among many of the sellers at them, most of whom will move their wares for pennies on the dollar.
Army-Navy Surplus Stores
Talk about a slice of Americana. While the glory days of the stuffed-to-the-rafters surplus store are over, there is still plenty to recommend them to a prepper on the hunt for hard use gear and good prices. Surplus stores can be a boon when you need to buy in quantity or are looking for a specialty item.
True, surplus stores often don’t have a ton of bonafide military surplus anymore; back when I was a youngster in the 90’s, they seemed packed with all manner of awesome gear, and even then my elders were telling me how great they used to be. Part of this comes from the government not opting to auction these items off to commercial dealers quite so often anymore and the other part is simply the explosion of big-box outdoor stores, many of them more akin to toy stores for adults. For some shoppers, they’ll spend their coin at a shiny, clean superstore instead of a dank, musty cave-like storeroom.
That is a major shame, because surplus stores still have the goods when you need hard use clothing like boots, parkas, rain gear, tents and more, all on the cheap. You will need to pay attention to the wear of the individual items you are buying, and some items should not be bought surplus at all; the genuine military issue items for sale are surplus after all, meaning they are being sold off for being obsolescent or past their service life so the government can recoup some of our tax dollars.
You don’t want to buy something dry rotted and moth-eaten only to have it fail you in the middle of a long stay in the wild when bugging out. Similarly, you should never, ever trust an essential piece of safety or life-support gear bought used/surplus unless you know precisely what you are doing and looking at. Things like military issue gas masks are often attractively priced, and sold alongside sealed filtration canisters, but gas mask material degrades readily with time and use, and canisters have a finite shelf life, even when sealed. Don’t trust them; buy new, modern models instead.
Nonetheless, a good surplus store hookup is a boon, as there is nowhere else you could hope to walk in and walk out with a full set of specialty clothing and shelter equipment of modest quality for so cheap. Make it a point to hunt down a good surplus store in your area.
Trade or Barter
This boils down to one crucial thing: talk to people! Talk. To. People! Everyone has something you want, if only you can solve one of their problems or make it worth their while to part with it. If someone has an item or supplies you need, ask if there is anything they want in trade, or some service you can provide in exchange. This may seem a little awkward or weird working your requests into conversation, or feel like you are prying, but with a little practice it will be as natural as saying ‘hello.’
Start by shaking down friends and family. Then move on to other people in your social networks. Ask friends and associates if they know anyone that has “x” item and looking to sell or part with it. Most people will be more than happy to strike up a conversation about it in the interest of helping their relative or friend. If the answer is in the affirmative, setup a call or meeting.
Once you have exhausted your social network, move on to strangers. You can hit up different boards on places like Craigslist and other local or special interest forums for easy leads, as most sites like that have section dedicated to trade and exchange among members. You can even strike up small talk with strangers you bump into out in the world and after some chit-chat hit them with the “Hey, I know this sounds a little weird, but…” opener.
It sounds completely out of the blue, and it is, but so long as you preface the question accordingly most folks won’t miss a beat. You’d be surprised what you can come up with in these conversations. I once bought 12,000 of British L2A2 7.62 ammo off a gentleman I made conversation with while waiting in line for a table at a restaurant, and got it at a very good price per round.
Talk to everyone!
“Free” Sections of Forums, Online Classifieds and Newspapers
While you are tooling around on your forums looking for people to barter and trade with, spin into the dedicated “free” sections. There are tons of people who have stuff and want it gone, no questions asked. Now, much of the stuff listed in these sections will be junk that these people are praying someone will come along and remove, but others will have legitimately valuable things they simply need gone, things like firewood, old cars or parts, soil, rock, lumber, all kinds of things.
When scoping out some free loot, whatever it is, be wary of bait and switch tactics, or sketchy sellers. If it seems too good to be true it probably is. Most people aren’t giving away brand new Corvettes, big flat panel TV’s or loads and loads of ammo. Don’t get hustled into hauling off useless junk unless you know you are picking up useless junk.
If in doubt, get plenty of pictures from the seller showing you exactly what you are looking at. Don’t waste time or gas on anything you cannot reasonably verify ahead of time. It should go without saying but I’ll say it anyway: if you are ever in doubt, take a friend with you. Plenty of scumbags use Craigslist and social media to set up the unwary to get rolled.
Big-Box Retailer Clearance Sections and Sales
I told you we’d be talking about our favorite retailers just a little. While you will never be getting the best buys on anything paying full-ride retail at your preferred outdoor or preparedness megastore, you can still get good stuff for a song if you hit them when they are having a big sale, offering good coupons or have a juicy clearance section under roof. Same goes for your favorite online retailers. Many of them even have a scratch-and-dent or demo model section on a variety of goods.
Another option is to shop online using a browser extension or service that automatically scours the web for coupons to get you the best deal. Honey is one such extension and works wonderfully and quickly on all kinds of sites. If you are a regular online shopper and not using Honey or a similar app, you are wasting money.
If you are patient, and a little lucky, you might just get one of those big-ticket items you have had your eye on for drastically less than the sticker price. Or maybe you will not get the exact brand or model you want but can snag a similar or competitors model for cheap. Sometimes you |
create good jobs and support small businesses. Beyond that, ‘The Late Show’ has always been an iconic presence of New York City’s rich entertainment industry. The history between this city and ‘The Late Show’ is a defining characteristic which viewers all over America recognize and appreciate. What better place for ‘The Late Show’ than The City That Never Sleeps? I look forward to many more years of the relationship between our city and ‘The Late Show.’ Sincerely, Melissa Mark-Viverito Speaker
James Crugnale contributed to this article.X Under Armour (UAA) has a stronger brand than three years ago and people still love wearing activewear — those are the main take-aways from Jefferies' upgrade of the Nike (NKE) rival that are sending shares up early Friday.
"The bottom has formed," declared the report's headline, as Jefferies analyst Randal Konik upgraded the stock to buy from hold and upped his price target to 27 from 19. He also added Under Armour to the firm's franchise picks list.
Why? For one thing, athleisure is a trend that's got stamina: The research firm's survey of 2,000 consumers found that about 25% more of those polled are wearing activewear four to five times a week, almost a third are buying more athletic apparel for themselves, and a quarter more are purchasing more such apparel for their kids.
Nike's mixed results Tuesday had some on the Street pointing to competition from Under Armour and, in particular, a resurgent Adidas (ADDYY). Jefferies' poll agrees that Adidas ate into Under Armour's market share, "but gains are moderating" as the Kevin Plank-helmed company makes inroads with children and finds more popularity.
IBD'S TAKE: Under Armour got a buy rating from Jefferies, but the stock is in a long downtrend, hitting a 3 1/2-year low as recently as Wednesday. Sales growth has slowed and Wall Street expects the company to post outright losses in the first half of this year. Focus your attention on top-rated companies with strong, even accelerating growth whose stocks are setting up in bullish bases.
"We were guarded on UA during '16 given Adidas, and UA EPS and stock are down 75% and 50%+, respectively, in 6 mo. predominantly due to share transfer," wrote Konik.
But Street estimates aren't taking into account stabilization in the North America market, flattening gross margins, expansion into international markets and category extensions, he said.
Konik said his research indicates that "an inflection has formed and the buying (opportunity) is now."
Under Armour shares rose 3.6% to 19.66 on the stock market today. On Wednesday, Under Amour fell to 18.40 intraday, its lowest level since September 2013.
Nike shares rose 1.8%, regaining their 50-day line after tumbling 7% Wednesday following its weak Q3 sales and margins. Adidas edged lower.
Skechers (SKX), which was upgraded to outperform by Cowen & Co., climbed 5.2%. Mall-based athletic shoe retailer Finish Line (FINL), which reported dismal earnings and guidance early Friday, tumbled 19.5% to its worst levels since August 2010.
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Foot Locker Sprints As Earnings Growth Continues To AccelerateDiscover how Pittsburgh affected World War II – and the war affected our region – as part of the new exhibition, We Can Do It! WWII. Developed by the History Center, this 10,000 square-foot exhibition focuses on Pittsburgh’s role on both the home front and the battlefield during World War II.
The exhibition explores the development of the jeep, a uniquely American invention produced by the American Bantam Car Company in Butler, Pa., and reveal the stories behind real-life “Rosie the Riveters” and local Tuskegee Airmen whose contributions made an unquestionable impact on the war effort.
Featuring nearly 300 artifacts, four life-like museum figures, interactive displays, and immersive museum settings, We Can Do It! brings the 1940s to life as the nation commemorates the 75th anniversary of the start of WWII.
The History Center partnered with several organizations to develop the exhibit, including the Smithsonian Institution, Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Soldiers and Sailors Museum, Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh, Veteran’s Voices, Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival, Association of the United States Army (AUSA) Fort Pitt Chapter, the Tuskegee Airmen of the Western Pennsylvania Region, Zippo/Case Museum, First Frontier Mechanized Cavalry, and more.
The History Center’s Detre Library & Archives contains many more great WWII photos and stories than we could squeeze into a 10,000 square foot exhibition. Dozens more have been offered during the course of our research, some of which are featured below.
Pittsburgh’s WWII Photo Album allows local residents to share their family stories and show how the region banded together to help win WWII.States Rebellion Pending
By Walter E. Williams
March 27, 2009 " CNSN " -- - Our Colonial ancestors petitioned and pleaded with King George III to get his boot off their necks. He ignored their pleas, and in 1776, they rightfully declared unilateral independence and went to war.
Today it’s the same story except Congress is the one usurping the rights of the people and the states, making King George’s actions look mild in comparison. Our constitutional ignorance—perhaps contempt, coupled with the fact that we’ve become a nation of wimps, sissies and supplicants—has made us easy prey for Washington’s tyrannical forces. But that might be changing a bit. There are rumblings of a long overdue re-emergence of Americans’ characteristic spirit of rebellion.
Eight state legislatures have introduced resolutions declaring state sovereignty under the Ninth and 10th amendments to the U.S. Constitution; they include Arizona, Hawaii, Montana, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington. There’s speculation that they will be joined by Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Nevada, Maine and Pennsylvania.
You might ask, “Isn’t the 10th Amendment that no-good states’ rights amendment that Dixie governors, such as George Wallace and Orval Faubus, used to thwart school desegregation and black civil rights?” That’s the kind of constitutional disrespect and ignorance that big-government proponents, whether they’re liberals or conservatives, want you to have. The reason is that they want Washington to have total control over our lives. The Founders tried to limit that power with the 10th Amendment, which reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
New Hampshire’s 10th Amendment resolution typifies others and, in part, reads: “That the several States composing the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their General (federal) Government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Government for special purposes, delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.” Put simply, these 10th Amendment resolutions insist that the states and their people are the masters and that Congress and the White House are the servants.
Put yet another way, Washington is a creature of the states, not the other way around.
Congress and the White House will laugh off these state resolutions. State legislatures must take measures that put some teeth into their 10th Amendment resolutions. Congress will simply threaten a state, for example, with a cutoff of highway construction funds if it doesn’t obey a congressional mandate, such as those that require seat belt laws or that lower the legal blood-alcohol level to.08 for drivers. States might take a lead explored by Colorado.
In 1994, the Colorado Legislature passed a 10th Amendment resolution and later introduced a bill titled “State Sovereignty Act.” Had the State Sovereignty Act passed both houses of the legislature, it would have required all people liable for any federal tax that’s a component of the highway users fund, such as a gasoline tax, to remit those taxes directly to the Colorado Department of Revenue. The money would have been deposited in an escrow account called the “Federal Tax Fund” and remitted monthly to the IRS, along with a list of payees and respective amounts paid.
If Congress imposed sanctions on Colorado for failure to obey an unconstitutional mandate and penalized the state by withholding funds due, say $5 million for highway construction, the State Sovereignty Act would have prohibited the state treasurer from remitting any funds in the escrow account to the IRS. Instead, Colorado would have imposed a $5 million surcharge on the Federal Tax Fund account to continue the highway construction.
The eight state legislatures that have enacted 10th Amendment resolutions deserve our praise, but their next step is to give them teeth. Click on "comments" below to read or post comments Comment (0) Comment Guidelines
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See our complete Comment Policy and use this link to notify us if you have concerns about a comment. We’ll promptly review and remove any inappropriate postings. Send Page To a Friend In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information ClearingHouse endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)From Against the Grain: Mad Artist Wallace Wood. ©2003 Bhob Stewart
Wallace Wood photo was taken by Bhob Stewart.
“See you in the funny papers.” — 1930s catchphrase
“See you in the darkness.” — Gary Gilmore, January 1977
Worlds were created while the radiator clanked. On the crescendo streets below, junkies trudged beneath crimson neon toward Needle Park. But, in the silence of Wood’s Studio on West 74th Street, in 1968, ink flowed in perfect curves with no ragged edges.
One night I broke the silence: “Why do you do this?” I saw Wood’s back twitch, startled, as he realized what I was getting at, but he continued inking Superboy and didn’t turn around. Ralph Reese remained silent, delicately bringing up a background on another page.
“Why do I do what?” asked Wood.
“This superhero crap. My God, you’re as great as any of the world’s greatest humorists. No one can do what you do the way you do it in your writing and your art. It’s your own. So isn’t this inking job just a waste? What does it have to do with you?”
The truth of this hung in the air, and then spiraled away. There was no prolonged response or discussion because there was, we all knew, no answer that quite fit the circumstances. Later, a country music station played “Streets of Laredo.” The ink flowed into the night.
Wallace Wood would have loved the headline the Los Angeles Times ran above his obituary: “Gut-Level Characters Made Him Famous,” a pun referring to his ad for Alka-Seltzer. I can imagine him clipping this obit, leaving it on the upper-left corner of his drawing table, and squinting at it occasionally while continuing to quietly ink panel after panel after panel. Someone who leaned over his shoulder to glance at the headline might make a remark about the importance of media attention; this would prompt only a smile and a muttered, “Yeah, but they got that part about the TV commercial wrong.” Later, the clipping would vanish from the drawing board into one of the dozens of file folders of work by and about Wood — all labeled “ME” — in his filing cabinets.
I remember the week Wood sketched the storyboard for that commercial (which LA Times writer Dana Kennedy calls his “best-known work,” while confusing it with the printed advertisement). The full-color “Stomachs get Even at Night” ad, showing angry vegetables preparing for a midnight attack inside a stomach, had caused a sensation at the ad agency after publication. Had Wood picked that moment to acquire a top agent, possibly, he could have ridden the wave all the way in — but even when the surf was up, what he sought was that perfect, impossible wave.
For TV, the agency wanted the vegetable characters to do something, despite the frozen moment of anticipation that gives the print ad its tension. And so the storyboard — which looked like he had whipped it together in an hour — introduced a human character, a shocked guy in striped pajamas, leaping off the sheets as vegetables march across the bed. The dark strangeness of the original concept had been sanitized for TV. The difference bothered me, but I didn’t remark on it.
“Are you going to follow through on this?”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, are you going to protect it? Make sure they animate it in your style?”
“No,” said Wood. “Why bother?”
I was baffled by this attitude, but said nothing. The board was delivered to the agency, and Wood moved on to other projects. Months later, at an impromptu party in Washington, I glanced at a TV set flickering the opening of the commercial I had not yet seen. I quickly explained to everyone present that it was by Wood, and we all watched. No one reacted. Whatever was artful in the storyboard — already a dilution of Wood’s original, imaginative concept — had now dissipated completely.
Many of Wood’s projects were like this — a brilliant flash of intensity that soared and skyrocketed before arcing downward to sputter into nothingness. Compared to the famous R.O. Blechman Alka-Seltzer commercial about the talking stomach, and the other popular Alka-Seltzer commercials of that period, this one was disappointing and forgettable. The animation was TV-routine, and the characters had lost Wood’s comic malevolence, replaced by mere cuteness and silliness. Did Wood, I wondered, know the battle was lost even before he drew the storyboard? He once said to me, “An editor is someone dedicated to destroying the work of a creator.” His interest in self-publishing developed out of a genuine feeling that he was being victimized in the commercial world.
The first I learned of Wood’s problems was in the early ’60s. “Wood has these terrible migraines,” said Larry Ivie. “He draws for an hour or so, gets a headache, lies down and then does no work for the rest of the day.”
But this wasn’t evident to me when I started working with Wood a few years later. Free-floating in 1967 — after leaving an editorial job at TV Guide — I mailed him some samples, and he invited me over. At that first meeting I was shown a stack of pencil sketches — psychological cartoons was the only thing to call them — that indicated how his talent outstripped his markets. (One of these sketches was his “Mother” drawing, later incorporated into his “My Word” story for Flo Steinberg’s 1975 Big Apple Comix.)
He was in the process of separating from his first wife, Tatjana, and often worked and slept in his small two-room studio a block away from their West 70s apartment. Juggling jobs — and temporarily minus his regular assistant, Ralph Reese — he faced a sudden, two-week deadline on a Jungle Jim comic book. Nothing had been done. His solution to the problem began, I learned, with me. I was to write three Jungle Jim stories in two days, he told me. Then, in 15 minutes, he outlined how to do it. I have never encountered a more basic and lucid explanation of writing/designing comics, and I paraphrase it here for the benefit of those curious about Wood’s methods:
(a) Work with pencil on 8 1/2” x 11” typing paper (to approximate the size of a comic book page).
(b) Conceive a main visual or peak action for each page. Then write the rest of the page around it. In layouts, this visual could dominate the page.
(c) Forget about tricky layouts — since the most important aspect of comics is the story within the panels. Work with the four or five simplest arrangements of panels on a page.
(d) Begin page one in the middle of a situation or action scene. Lengthy establishing material or a deep-background opening will impede the reader.
(e) Write finished dialogue and position exactly (to guide the letterer) in relation to the characters.
(f) Since comics are storytelling-in-pictures, few or no captions are actually necessary.
(g) Work as rough as possible to expedite the writing. This could be so rough that even a circle can be used to represent a character.
Following this “no frills” comics guide, I was able to meet Wood’s deadline. But they were terrible stories. With no time to research the original Alex Raymond characters, and no time to even think, I had resorted to a sort of semi-parody based on half-buried memories of the early ’50s, Johnny Weissmuller Jungle Jim film series. And I also broke one of Wood’s rules — wasting valuable time by executing the pages in extremely tight roughs. To my surprise, Wood made only a few changes, eliminating the more obvious satire in certain lines of dialogue, and then he immediately sent them to the letterer. A few nights later I learned why Wood had expressed little concern about the tight deadline: Artists from all over the city converged on his two tiny rooms. Someone sat in every available inch. In one corner Roger Brand was penciling a story. As he completed pages, they were passed to Dom Sileo and other inkers — who were adding finishing touches to the stories penciled by Tom Palmer and Steve Ditko. Wood, at his drawing table, meticulously inked faces for a while, and eventually vanished. He returned shortly with Tatjana, grinning as he showed her the white heat of activity, leading her into that maelstrom of flying brushes.
It was an exhilarating evening, one that Wood obviously enjoyed manipulating as much as I enjoyed seeing panel after panel of mine coming to life exactly as I had designed them. And — true to the pattern I was just beginning to observe — it was doomed. He called me one night: “Bhob, looks like we’re out of a job.” King Comics decide to withdraw from comic books, passed the finished art and a lone undrawn story on to Charlton … and that was that: no chance to even try to escalate the quality of the stories. The fact that we had all worked our asses off, late into the Broadway night, meant nothing in the business Scheme of Things. Wood’s cynicism about the field he worked in was not only understandable, but contagious. In the weeks that followed, I heard tale after terror tale of each cul-de-sac in his career, all delivered in a sardonic monotone.
His 1967 Bucky Ruckus strip, Bucky’s Christmas Caper, ranks alongside Pogo as the finest humor-strip brushwork ever done, but the deal had a Catch-22: It ran as a Christmas strip, and the syndicate promised to continue it after December if it could pick up a certain number of newspapers. The catch was that the number they named was a figure impossible for any strip to achieve in only a few weeks.
Wood was the Master Cartoonist — but something was wrong. Potential work was elusive, sliding through his fingers like grains of sand. What Wood hoped to do was divorce himself totally from the commercial comics markets, but barricades were everywhere. Pipsqueak Papers was submitted to Evergreen Review. Reject. Samples were prepared to sell Nabisco on Topps-like humor inserts, and Woody left that day in uncharacteristic suit and tie. No sale. The 16-page Wallace Wood Portfolio, displaying a diversity of styles and printed in the witzend format, was mailed with much anticipation to, as he put it, “every art director in New York.”
“How much work did that printed portfolio bring in?” I asked some months after I had exited the Wood Studio.
“About one or two jobs.”
Still, there were art directors outside the comics field who had grown up admiring Wood work. When certain jobs arose, they phoned him. “I’m trapped by my style,” he said once, referring to the length of time he felt was necessary in completing a page. But his identification with comics was so total and his style so much in that vein, that even his non-comics assignments fell into the comics category — such as the time the agency handling the New York Times Magazine London Fog raincoat ads decided to switch one week from thriller/mystery-type atmospheric photographs to a comics page. A rough was sent over. He handed it to me and stretched out on the sofa to sleep. I worked furiously, attempting to pencil the entire page before he woke up. I waited for the verdict. “Now that’s the way I like a job to look,” he mumbled — his way of noting that my penciling had progressed. Then he carried the page into the next room and began inking. By this time so many work plans had gone awry that I somehow believed the ad was eventually killed by the agency, and never appeared. Years later, I learned from Wood that it did appear, but to this day I have never seen the published ad.
A half-hour animated TV series, with a science-fiction humor concept, held the most promise. At that time, such a show would have been unique, and his juxtaposition of diverse, bizarre, funny characters made the idea appealing. Paramount was interested. After I penciled the presentation from Wood’s character sketches, Wood inked and delivered. And Paramount chose that same month to close down its cartoon studio (Dec. 1, 1967): end of brilliance.
Wood was immediately suspicious, believing that Ralph Bakshi, who had headed the Paramount cartoon studio, was secretly selling the Wood concept elsewhere. “We have to copyright the characters, Bhob, so write a story that includes all the characters, and we’ll publish it in witzend.” I wrote and designed a three-pager, “The Rejects” (witzend #4), and Wood, before sending it to the letterer, made two changes. He eliminated a complicated, labored pun on a line from the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life,” and added, in the splash, a simple, wonderful phrase spoken by the lead character, I.Q., directly to the reader: “There are Good Guys and Bad Guys and the job of the Good Guys is to kill the Bad Guys!”
Wood was enamored of such mirth-maxims and philosophical-aphorisms. He devised or recalled them constantly, proclaiming them (in his near-whisper) as he worked at the drawing table. But his “Good Guys” line struck me then, and still does, as multileveled: On the surface it is a satirical reduction of a basic premise in genre fiction. It served as an insightful self-commentary on Wood’s own encounters and conflicts with art directors — and it also stands as Wood’s summation of the true nature of life on Earth.
There were the rejects and there was Topps. Ah, Topps was faithful, sending over huge batches of gag-sheets to be cartooned. And while the whirl of Wood’s electric eraser expressed his dissatisfaction with my inking, he was pleased with the way I designed and roughed these gags.
Like many artists, his commercial work and his “real” work fell into separate categories. Wood’s reliance on assistants freed him from thinking about the work he did for money. If roughs and penciled art were put in front of him, fine — he could ink them automatically, and his mind was free to fantasize and plan his own personal creations, his “real” work. But the distinctions between the two categories seemed to blur somehow. Often it seemed that Wood had assistants for no other reason than to escape the isolation of the work and to act as sounding boards for his continual flow of ideas, fantasies, future projects — and problems. Conversations at many art studios dwell on business transactions, but at the Wood Studio talk more often ranged over psychological transactions, an interest that surfaced in his work.
The studio atmosphere was akin to group therapy. Dom Sileo, between jobs at Harvey Comics and then inking regularly at the Wood Studio, was disturbed by these introspective interludes; and once, when Woody was not present, he asked me, “Why does he have to tell us all that?” The studio was often like a Grand Central of artists. They came and went. One night, Augie Scotto arrived. Scotto had worked on 1949-53 Western and crime comics before settling in as an artist on Will Eisner’s PS magazine for many years. We were working our way through a pile of Topps’ Travel Posters, and Scotto was there to assist for a few hours. I was in the back room, and Woody appeared at the door with a big grin. “Bhob, come watch this.” Scotto sat down at a board while Woody, Dom and I looked on. He clicked the snaps on his briefcase, pulled out a brush and dipped it in the ink. Silence. Then, with a single deft stroke, Scotto moved his hand across the paper. He lifted the brush, leaving a 14” long, perfectly straight line on the paper. It played like a magic trick, but it was for real. Woody then went back to work, still grinning.
On another occasion, he was grinning his Woody grin and chuckling his Woody chuckle when, without any prior discussion, he pulled open a suspension file and hauled out tearsheets of “Ivan’s-Woe,” Howard Nostrand’s parody of Wood’s “Trial by Arms” (Two-Fisted Tales #34). Nostrand, for some reason, had the notion that Wood was not happy about “Ivan’s-Woe”; but my memory is that Woody was flattered and pleased by the homage—obvious not only in the art, but in the opening line, which had with bold italics emphasizing Wood’s name: “Yield now, Sir Knight! Thy lance will be but kindling wood beside my own!”
When Woody introduced me to Wayne Howard in 1967, it was pretty clear that he was impressed by the 18-year-old’s Wood-like reflected highlights, and other brush effects. During his senior year of high school, Wayne Howard had won the National Scholastic Press Association’s Best Student Cartoonist Award and, throughout the late ’60s and early ’70s, he continued to use Woodwork as a model while he whipped out pages for Marvel, DC and Charlton. Wood was fascinated by the efforts of Howard and the other artists who emulated him. And the closer they got, the more intrigued he became. So, naturally, he was still somewhat amazed, 13 years later, by the work that went into Nostrand’s “Ivan’s-Woe.” He knew that it was work, not any kind of a rip-off, and he perceived that it was a genuine homage, not a mockery.
I remember standing in the center of the Wood Studio as he handed me the torn Witches Tales page of Nostrand’s nine-panel, pantomime joust-and-mace combat. I remember him standing behind my right shoulder, pointing at the panels, indicating how Nostrand had duplicated the “Trial by Arms” layout and the story situation carrying the combatants from horses to the ground. And mainly I remember his delight at the fact that Nostrand had not copied the combat sequence, but had redrawn all the figures (with two or three exceptions) into completely new poses, setting up totally different angles, yet still maintaining a faithful simulation of the Wood look. And I also remember that at that moment I asked the only logical question.
“Did you ever meet Nostrand?”
“No.”
No? I was dumbfounded. Perhaps I had naïvely thought such a pastiche and the mutual respect of these two men would have brought them together. Surely in 13 years? But no: never. They had only met on paper. I left Wood’s studio thinking that Nostrand had picked, even if unconsciously, an apt metaphor: the two combatants could have been Wood and Nostrand jousting it out (“KLONG! CLANG! CRACK!”) with brushes and egos instead of lances and mace.
Having already established witzend as a forerunner to the underground comics, Woody now wanted to do something grandiose. He had launched witzend in the summer of 1966 — the same summer that I had coined the term “underground comics” while on a panel with Ted White and Archie Goodwin at an early comics convention. “Do you mean fanzines, Bhob?” asked Ted. I drew a parallel with the underground film movement, and predicted the birth of a new form. Since there were no such things as underground comics then, only a few people present — Paul Krassner, Art Spiegelman and Wood — grasped what I was talking about.
The arrival of the undergrounds confirmed for Wood that his notion of a magazine that offered artists a forum for personal expression had been on target. And in 1968, when the undergrounds were aborning, he was ready to throw himself into a project that would outdo his previous work for witzend. But what? One night, while Dom inked in the next room, Woody sat on the sofa and outlined it to me — a Tolkienesque, Arthurian saga of great complexity, which he wanted me to write. (According to his Woodwork Gazette #1, he had actually been formulating this material since the age of 10, when he had called it King of the World.) I took notes at a mad pace, but no sooner did I get one of his plot thoughts down than he would backtrack, interrupting with a different approach or restructuring. I left, notes in confusion, and returned the next night, empty-handed. “The problem here,” I said, “is that you have so many ideas that it’s just a matter of getting it down in the sequence you want — which I can’t figure out and can’t do. I can’t catch up with you. And whatever I come up with, you’re almost certain to change — since this is your story and you feel so strongly about it. The solution is you’ve got to write this yourself. I really don’t think you’ll ever get what you want any other way.” He stared at me, listening, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, and a few minutes later we had moved on to another subject. My statement was somewhat in the nature of a challenge, but there were other things I did not say. By this time I had become disillusioned to a degree by what I considered Wood’s own misdirection of his talents.
During the next few days, Wood spent little time in the studio. Then, at the end of the week, he reappeared, clutching a stack of paper. He was excited. “I’ve got it,” he said enthusiastically, handing me the stack. “It’s all there, Bhob.” This was only a handful of notes, plot fragments, ideas, long lists of character names — but, yes, it was all there, and, as he talked out the interweaving plotline, I saw he now had the beginning for a work of scope and ambition. “I intend to be working on this for the rest of my life, Bhob.” He called it The World of the Wizard King, and it appeared originally in witzend with appropriately rough-hewn illustrations accompanying chapters in a written text form. Because this suggested a typeset illustrated novel rather than comics, I later attempted to agent the early witzend version to the first publishers of Tolkien in this country, Houghton-Mifflin. The Houghton-Mifflin editor who rejected it called it “pornography.”
Shortly after beginning Wizard King, he also negotiated the Military News strips that eventually developed into his Overseas Weekly comics sections—and a regular money flow. Both areas, personal and commercial, were suddenly nailed down. It all looked promising and secure, and turning witzend over to Bill Pearson freed him from licking stamps and the other time-consuming chores of small-press publishing. Simultaneously, I had my own breakthrough, as the Topps roughs led Topps to offer me a job — probably on Wood’s recommendation. If so, he never mentioned it. I didn’t see him as much then, although I dropped by the studio occasionally. Ralph Reese had returned. Reese was the ideal assistant, since he fit into Wood’s scheme of total perfection: Reese’s pencil art, although it did not look like Wood art, had every line and detail precisely placed for Wood’s brush. One week, they faced a curious task. Howie Post, having just sold his Dropouts strip, had turned in to DC an unfinished Anthro book, and it was passed on to Wood. But Post had not actually penciled the book — every panel was a very loose rough. Wood, undaunted, began inking. It was like the old joke: “He’s so sure of himself he does crossword puzzles with a pen.” But it wasn’t a joke; it was just a way of getting the work done faster. Wood was inking lines that weren’t there — he was drawing with the brush.
He knew that I had worked as a staff editor at TV Guide, and shortly after his full-color TV Guide illustration appeared (March 23, 1968), he asked me if I was somehow responsible for the assignment. Since the picture, showing animated superheroes chasing funny animals, was a surprise to me, I immediately said no. But it’s possible this was not exactly the correct answer; I’m not sure. Years later, pulling together my memories of Woody, I thought about this question and suddenly remembered that one day in 1966, with a brief moment to spare, I had dashed off an inter-office memo to one of the magazine’s senior editors recommending Wood as a possible illustrator.
By 1968, a friendship had developed between Woody and myself, one that had a somewhat frightening foundation — each of us had perceived the other’s seeds of self-destruction. We remained wary, even as we became more open and honest with each other. Further, although neither of us knew it, because we never discussed it, there were several striking parallels in our family backgrounds.
I had taken to walking in Central Park regularly. One day early that summer, when he did not seem busy, I suggested he join me and I saw an odd confusion flash momentarily across his face. Reluctantly, he agreed, and we walked the few blocks to the park. Woody squinted in the sunlight, appearing curiously out of place and uncomfortable there, as if anxious to return to his natural habitat of smoke-filled room with ink-stained drawing board.
Later that year, he turned up at Topps, arriving during the lunch hour when the Product Development offices were empty. I was there working alone, and he came into my cubicle. He seemed detached and depressed. Dressed in wrinkled, baggy clothes, it wasn’t clear to me whether he was picking up a Topps job, simply visiting, or what. I offered him a chair, but instead he settled down on the floor and began eating out of a brown paper bag. It was, I thought to myself, a reversal of the way he had looked the day he had neatly set out to conquer Nabisco. He mentioned that he had only been to Topps twice in eight years, which I found odd, considering the overwhelming amount of work he had done for this company. (I was constantly finding older printed work of his in the Topps metal file drawers.) I was struck by a certain irony: here was a man, at that moment strangely giving the appearance of being only one step removed from a street bum, whose artwork had helped write the paychecks for the well-dressed people throughout the building. I had to know how he felt about walking into companies that had profited for years from his talents. His answer was what I expected: he felt exploited and used, and he expressed this in a sudden rush of deep bitterness. A short time later, the others returned to the office from lunch, and I studied their faces as they talked with their star cartoonist, crumpled in a sad heap on the floor.
In 1970, he remarried and lived with his second wife, Marilyn, in Woodmere, Long Island, with the Wood Studio of the early ’70s located in nearby Valley Stream. After The EC Horror Library of the 1950s (Nostalgia Press) was published in 1971, Wood felt that my choice of stories had overlooked his early EC horror work. My article in this book resulted in various phone calls from editors, who tracked me down through Nostalgia Press. Monster Times wanted to reprint the article; I refused, so they wrote their own — while plagiarizing my last paragraph. A small-press literary publication, Shantih, asked me to write a brief history of EC; instead, I mailed them a short piece about visiting Wood’s Valley Stream studio, titled “His World,” which Shantih reluctantly published. I mailed Wood a copy and received the following cryptic postcard:
Thanx for the mag. Very literary, impressive, and your article on me was quite genuinely artistic, touching and apt. You have a knack. I wouldn’t change a word of it for anything, so don’t worry. Nothing new here, nothing ever changes. Am seeing a shrink again, so maybe in a year or so I’ll be able to do something, I don’t know what. Keep in touch.
At a Manhattan studio with Ron Whyte, screenwriter of MGM’s Sidelong Glances of a Pigeon Kicker (1970, starring Jordan Christopher), prospects were on the upswing for Wood. I wrote him a long letter analyzing and praising his unusual fantasy story, “The Curse” (Vampirella #9), and he wrote back:
You are an incurable fan, but I forgive you. Thank you for the kind words about my recent stuff. You apparently missed the Big One, though. I personally thought a little epic I did called “Of Swords and Sorcery” for Marvel was the best thing |
That’s when a shattering earthquake hit on 27 July 1963. Inside is The City Museum, filled with artefacts found during excavations at Kale; some amazingly well preserved, almost intact.
I gaze at reconstructed faces based on preserved skulls found in the fortress. One of them looks eerily like one of my old teachers. I wonder what their lives were like and what they thought about. Also, I can’t help but wonder if the men of medieval Skopje peed everywhere. I bet they didn’t. They probably had designated areas for that, so as not to gross out the women folks and be smacked about the ears.
In conclusion, Skopje is mostly a charming city with friendly people; a city with potential. I’ll take the liberty of suggesting a few improvements to the city authorities, though: put up rubbish bins and set severe fines for throwing rubbish in the streets and the river, prohibit plastic bags, and last, but not least, outlaw and severely fine urinating in public. Take care of that and Skopje will soon see more visitors than KFOR soldiers.
This is an excerpt, somewhat reworked – of my Boots’n’All article Passing time in Skopje.“The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.” So said Antonio Gramsci. And there are few more obvious signs of political morbidity than the collapse, intellectual as well as organisational, of those moderate sections of the Labour party that did not back Jeremy Corbyn.
His victory was both remarkable and total. So now, every member has a duty to engage with the Corbyn-led debate about the future of the left and his rethink of our political method. As Peter Mandelson’s memo put it, the old labels and past fights need to be forgotten. Because last week the awful consequences of our failure to renew was made plain when the Tories rammed through savage cuts to tax credits alongside an ugly assault on trade union rights.
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First of all, we need to accept that the old ways are dying. The command-and-control, disciplinarian message of 1990s political management is incompatible with the coming age of individualism and authenticity.
More than that, part of the attractiveness of the Corbyn campaign was the perception that an open conversation was central to his politics. This tapped into the same raw hostility towards the closed political habits of a technocratic elite that has emboldened so much European populism on both left and right.
For Podemos in Spain or the Five Star Movement in Italy, the pluralism of the movement has been a vital recruiting tool. All of which means that the messy, open, often contradictory process of Labour party democracy can no longer be regarded as an unwelcome impediment to pure policy delivery. Discussion of politics and development of policy need to become one and the same.
Social media also played a large part in Corbyn’s victory. And here the virtues are more circumspect. Because at a time of weakening ideological ties among much of the public, Twitter and Facebook increasingly intensify tribal sentiment among the already convinced. This is a new landscape of algorithm politics: Google’s skill at offering you what it knows you like is now directing you towards what you want to hear, from people like you.
But, as we found to our cost at the general election, the social media echo chamber doesn’t always win you actual votes in ballot boxes.
Progressives never bought into the ‘Washington consensus': now we need to be more forthright about the limits of markets
The truth is, some traditional values – leadership and policy – still matter. But once again we need to move on from the 1990s. Just as the modern Labour party rarely seeks to revive the political solutions of James Callaghan and Harold Wilson, we also have to move on from the Blair and Brown prescriptions. More than ever, the party needs to reconcile itself with the achievements and flaws of that great Labour government. Then, finally, we can stop obsessing about Blair and his legacy.
Not least because the social and economic context has changed so dramatically. Globalisation and the digital revolution have upended the world of work. Five million workers are now self-employed. The relationship between productivity and wages has been severed, with miserable consequences for household income. Only 8% of under-25s belong to a trade union – and the vast majority of those are in the public sector. Above all, the identity politics of nationhood and belonging, Englishness and Scottishness, has completely transformed our political culture.
For the Labour party to remain relevant and electable requires a new politics of patriotism, alongside a political economy up to the job of tackling inequality. This cannot be a miserabilist rant about the state of contemporary Britain. It needs to have, as Eric Hobsbawm used to say, ‘the future in its bones’: a socialism that embraces technology and modernity and sees the function of the state as supporting and empowering citizens in an age of insecurity.
The quickening pace of globalisation, changes to the labour market, the rise of robots and supercomputers, and the urgent need for social security reform are here to stay. And we need credible answers, which embody our values, to all these challenges.
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Despite some reservations about Jeremy Corbyn’s policies, I am convinced there is room for greater intellectual convergence across the party. Progressives never bought into the so-called Washington consensus of neoliberal economics. But given the chronic wage stagnation and falling living standards for so many people, we now need to be much more forthright about the limits and failures of markets.
Across time and place, capitalism takes on multiple forms, and Labour has now to lead the thinking on what forms of corporate governance, finance and ownership are fit for the digital age. When the British chancellor flies to Beijing to offer government securities to Chinese investors to support the French state in building a UK nuclear power station, our economic model is bust. On housing, asset inflation, pension and mortgage policies for the self-employed, land tax rates and even basic income guarantees, there are radical options to explore.
But what we also found out at the general election is that even if Labour is asking the right questions – about inequality, labour market reform, the squeezed middle – we will not be trusted to deliver the answers if we fail to convince on the economy, welfare and immigration.
To be radical, you first need to be credible. If the Labour party doesn’t rid itself of its morbid symptoms and start to convince the public it is interested in government, then we could see something else Gramsci was familiar with: the grisly spectre of Conservative hegemony. And it will be the trade union members and working poor who will suffer most.It appears that the name has been chosen, and Milan want Mateo Musacchio to accompany Alessio Romagnoli in defence.
According to various reports, the rossoneri have an agreement with the player, and a fee may have been agreed with Villarreal for the services of the 25-year-old.
At this age, it would be fair to consider Musacchio as a long-term option, but who exactly is Mateo Musacchio?
Musacchio was born and raised in Rosario, Argentina and he made his first-team debut as a 16-year-old during the 2006–07 season after coming through the youth system at River Plate, making four appearances. He was part of the squad that won the Clausura in the following year, but did not feature in any games.
In summer 2009, Musacchio moved to Villarreal, initially being assigned to the B-team in the Segunda Division. He made his debut for the second team on 5 September in a 1–3 loss at Córdoba CF.
On 13 February 2010, Musacchio made his La Liga debut by playing the last 15 minutes in a 2–1 win for the Yellow Submarine against Athletic Bilbao.
His rise from that point has been impressive, as overtook Iván Marcano and Gonzalo Rodríguez – the latter his compatriot – in the defensive pecking order to become Villarreal’s most important defender since the departure of Eric Bailly.
At just 6ft tall, the Argentine may not be the biggest or the tallest centre-half in the league, but his ariel ability is still a strong point of his game. According to Squawka, he was victorious in 42.68% of total, and just over 40% of ariel duels. Alex meanwhile won over 53% of total duels, and 71.4% of ariel duels.
Squawka go on to state that Mateo Musacchio made no defensive errors in his 13 La Liga games last season, while Alex had two (one of which led to a goal) in 25 Serie A apperances.
Over 90 minutes, Musacchio averaged more blocks (2.92 to Alex’s 2.64) and more interceptions (0.54 to 0.4) in 2015/16.
As seen in the graphic above, Musacchio comes out on top in just one stat amongst the defenders selected.
SempreMilan’s Oliver Fisher spoke to Miguel Quintana from the Spanish football website Ecos del Balon about what the player can bring.
“Musacchio is a central figure that has long been installed in the elite of Spanish football. He has always been highly valued in the league.
“In fact, when the Tata Martino was the coach of Barcelona, it was rumored that Barcelona would sign him, and no one found it strange.
“Sadly, last season he suffered a fairly serious injury that has kept off the pitch for months, but there is no doubt that he is one of the best centre-backs in the league.
“At Villarreal, he has always stood out for his placement. He is a defender that is very neat; it is his great quality.
“Then also he marks well, wins ariel duels and plays the ball better than most defenders, but the highlight is that he is always in the right place. That reminds me of Gerard Pique.
“He has a lot of defensive talent, he knows his craft and also makes very few mistakes. This past year, with Marcelino, Villarreal have defended much deeper than usual. In Ecos del Balon (my website) we used to say that the team was more suited to the Italian league than La Liga, and Musacchio, when he recovered, was also key in improving this defensive system.
“He is a player that makes his teammates better. He does not shine or have the physicality of some of his ex-partners (Gabriel of Arsenal or Bailly at United), but he is very good.”
If Milan can seal the deal, Musacchio could just be the right man to partner Romagnoli.Abstract Background State-level estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) underestimate the obesity epidemic because they use self-reported height and weight. We describe a novel bias-correction method and produce corrected state-level estimates of obesity and severe obesity. Methods Using non-parametric statistical matching, we adjusted self-reported data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) 2013 (n = 386,795) using measured data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) (n = 16,924). We validated our national estimates against NHANES and estimated bias-corrected state-specific prevalence of obesity (BMI≥30) and severe obesity (BMI≥35). We compared these results with previous adjustment methods. Results Compared to NHANES, self-reported BRFSS data underestimated national prevalence of obesity by 16% (28.67% vs 34.01%), and severe obesity by 23% (11.03% vs 14.26%). Our method was not significantly different from NHANES for obesity or severe obesity, while previous methods underestimated both. Only four states had a corrected obesity prevalence below 30%, with four exceeding 40%–in contrast, most states were below 30% in CDC maps. Conclusions Twelve million adults with obesity (including 6.7 million with severe obesity) were misclassified by CDC state-level estimates. Previous bias-correction methods also resulted in underestimates. Accurate state-level estimates are necessary to plan for resources to address the obesity epidemic.
Citation: Ward ZJ, Long MW, Resch SC, Gortmaker SL, Cradock AL, Giles C, et al. (2016) Redrawing the US Obesity Landscape: Bias-Corrected Estimates of State-Specific Adult Obesity Prevalence. PLoS ONE 11(3): e0150735. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150735 Editor: Manuel Portolés, Hospital Universitario LA FE, SPAIN Received: November 16, 2015; Accepted: February 18, 2016; Published: March 8, 2016 Copyright: © 2016 Ward et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability: Data used in the analysis are publicly available from the CDC. (http://www.cdc.gov/brfss/ and http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nhanes.htm). Funding: This work was supported in part by grants from The JPB Foundation (http://jpbfoundation.org) and the National Cancer Institute (www.cancer.gov) (Grant No. 1R01CA172814-01A1). Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Introduction Overweight and obesity are among the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in the United States [1,2]. The adult state-specific obesity maps developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) highlight the magnitude of this problem, as well as the large disparities that exist by state [3]. These maps and related local prevalence data have galvanized state leaders to take action, and have been used to prioritize federal obesity prevention resources [4]. However, despite the alarmingly high obesity rates depicted in recent CDC maps, these figures may substantially underestimate the true state-level burden, as they rely on self-reported height and weight data from the telephone-administered Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) [5]. Bias in self-reported body measures is well-documented [6], and results in underestimates of body mass index (BMI, kg/m2). Data from in-person interviews reveal that on average, women underestimate their weight by about 1 kg, and adults in general overestimate their height by about 1 cm (see Table A.1 in S1 File); similar biases exist for telephone respondents (see Table A.2 in S1 File). These relatively small individual-level biases can result in large differences for population estimates—especially since height is squared to calculate BMI. Nationally, obesity prevalence based on self-reported data from BRFSS 2013 was 29%, in contrast to 34% using objectively-measured height and weight data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). While NHANES is useful for monitoring national trends in obesity, its relatively small sample size (and lack of data collection in every state during each survey) is insufficient to produce yearly state-specific estimates of obesity prevalence [7]. As a result, no nationally-representative, objectively-measured BMI surveillance system exists that can provide unbiased estimates of state-specific obesity prevalence. This lack of accurate data limits states’ ability to evaluate the health and economic effects of the obesity epidemic and to plan preventive policies and programs. Previous efforts to address self-report bias have used regression models to analyze the relationship between self-reported and measured height and weight data from NHANES [8–11]. However, we show that these approaches underestimate obesity prevalence compared to objectively measured estimates. We describe a novel method of bias correction using non-parametric statistical matching to combine all available data to generate more accurate estimates of the entire BMI distribution. We compare the obesity prevalence results from our method to uncorrected estimates, and to regression-based approaches to bias correction [9,11–13].
Methods Statistical Matching We developed a non-parametric statistical matching algorithm [14–16] to adjust state-specific, self-reported height and weight from BRFSS 2013 (n = 386 795) using the relationship between self-reported and measured data from individuals in NHANES 2007–2012 (n = 16 924). Statistical matching combines data from separate datasets (i.e. BRFSS and NHANES) that are based on the same underlying population (i.e. non-institutionalized civilian adults in the US aged 18 and older), but that do not have an individual identifier in common [15]. It has been used in fields such as economics, ecology, health, and social policy to synthesize comprehensive datasets from a range of sources [17–21]. One advantage of this approach is the preservation of the marginal distributions of imputed variables from the underlying datasets. This allowed us to maintain the measured national distribution of BMI from NHANES while incorporating the self-reported state-level variation from BRFSS. The statistical matching algorithm was developed as part of the CHOICES (Childhood Obesity Intervention Cost-Effectiveness Study) project, a larger model-based initiative in which the US population is simulated to evaluate a range of obesity prevention policies and programs. We developed the model in Java, an object-oriented programming language. Datasets The Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) is a nationally-representative telephone survey of adults which completes more than 400 000 interviews each year and is the foundation of the CDC obesity prevalence maps [22]. BRFSS collects data from US residents regarding their health-related risk behaviors and self-reported height and weight. We used survey data from 2013 which had 491 773 responses. After ensuring that no data were missing for demographic variables of interest and self-reported height and weight (n = 102 339), and after excluding pregnant women because of possible effects on weight (n = 2639), data for 386 795 individuals remained. The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) assesses the health and nutritional status of adults and children, and is unique in that it is the only ongoing national survey of adults that has both self-reported and measured height and weight [7]. In 1999 the survey became a continuous program and examines a nationally representative sample of about 5000 people each year. We pooled NHANES data from 2007–2012, which included observations from 18 619 adults. After excluding pregnant women (n = 182) and respondents missing data for the variables of interest (n = 1513), the final sample included 16 924 respondents aged 18 and older. Pooled sample weights were calculated following the NHANES analytic guidelines [23]. The complex survey designs were taken into account for both BRFSS and NHANES. We re-categorized race/ethnicity and household income to ensure that these variables had common definitions across the BRFSS and NHANES datasets (see Table B in S1 File). Due to its smaller sample, NHANES has more limited detail on race/ethnicity compared to BRFSS. In order to make the datasets comparable, we included individuals in the BRFSS dataset who reported their race/ethnicity as “American Indian or Alaska Native”, “Asian”, “Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander”, “Other”, and “Two or More Races” in the “Other” category in the matched dataset. While the latest round of NHANES (2011–2012) does include a race/ethnicity code for “Asian,” we coded this category as “Other” so that these data could be combined with previous waves of NHANES. For estimates in Hawaii, matching was performed across all races for non-Black minorities to avoid biasing the BMI distribution by failing to distinguish between Native Hawaiian and Asian individuals. Matching Algorithm Individuals in NHANES and BRFSS were matched by national-level percentiles of self-reported height and weight within demographic subgroups (defined using age, sex, race/ethnicity, and income) with probability proportional to their sample weight [24]. Measured values of height and weight were obtained for each sampled NHANES individual, and up to 1% of random variation was added in order to smooth the distributions [25]. Because the same subgroups were used across datasets, we controlled for differences in demographic composition, thus estimating the state-level geographic effect on obesity within subgroups. This approach also controlled for any differential self-report bias of height or weight by age, sex, race/ethnicity, and household income. Although matching can be done with greater precision within tightly-defined subgroups, a balance must be sought—over-stratifying the matching may fail to preserve heterogeneity in the synthesized joint distribution, and may lead to no possible matches. On the other hand, defining the subgroups too loosely may lead to inappropriate matches. To address this issue, we used dynamic subgroup definitions contingent on a minimum sample size, which we varied empirically to yield the desired balance between sample heterogeneity and matching precision. Specifically, we used age- and sex-specific thresholds that yielded BMI distributions statistically similar to NHANES. These thresholds were selected using a grid search that minimized the maximum distance between the cumulative distributions. If the subgroup sample was below the specified size, the matching restrictions were gradually loosened until the threshold was met (see Table C in S1 File). Within subgroup samples, percentile-matching bandwidths were initialized to zero and expanded in a similarly iterative way until a match was found. Since matching is a stochastic process [14,15], in order to explore uncertainty and arrive at stable estimates, individual-level BMI in the final dataset was calculated using the mean adjusted values over 100 iterations of the matching process. Sample-weighted state-level estimates of the BMI distribution and the prevalence of obesity (defined as BMI≥30 kg/m2) and severe obesity (defined as BMI≥35 kg/m2) were then calculated, accounting for the survey design in the original BRFSS dataset. Model Comparison We compared the statistical matching method to previously published approaches to bias correction. A method described by Cawley [9] uses individual-level regression models comparing self-reported to measured heights and weights within NHANES. An alternative approach described by Dwyer-Lindgren [11] regresses aggregate-level estimates to align self-reported mean BMI with the measured mean from NHANES. This approach forms the basis of obesity maps hosted by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation [26]. For direct comparability, we re-estimated these models with our datasets (see Tables D and E in S1 File). We evaluated the bias-corrected BRFSS datasets from all methods against the measured BMI distribution and prevalence of obesity and severe obesity from NHANES. The adjusted prevalence estimates were compared to NHANES using χ2 tests, and the adjusted age/sex-specific BMI distributions were compared to the distributions from NHANES using two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests—a non-parametric, distribution-free test sensitive to differences in the location and shape of cumulative distributions [27].
Discussion While the existing maps and prevalence estimates based on self-reported data have been useful in highlighting trends in obesity, bias in self-reported height and weight causes current CDC maps to substantially underestimate state-specific obesity prevalence in the US. Although these maps have been critical tools for the public health community in raising awareness about the state-level burden of obesity, their lack of accuracy limits the ability of state policymakers to base obesity prevention policies on accurate state-level estimates of obesity-related mortality, morbidity, or healthcare costs. Previous regression-based efforts go some way to addressing self-report bias. However, as the results of this study show, although regression adjustment produces reasonably accurate estimates of mean BMI, it still significantly underestimates national obesity prevalence. Since regression works by estimating the average value of the dependent variable, the resulting distribution of BMI is thus concentrated around the expected value [15]. This shrinking of the distribution tails is especially problematic for producing prevalence estimates of severe obesity, a condition associated with substantially increased risks of morbidity, mortality, and health services utilization [31]. The economic implications of undercounting millions of cases of obesity are large. For example, assuming incremental obesity-related healthcare costs of $1,000 per individual (which is likely a conservative estimate [31–33]), undercounting 12 million cases of obesity would result in missing $12 billion of costs. Regression-adjusted estimates would still miss $2–3 billion of healthcare costs. In contrast, we have shown that our statistical matching approach preserves the entire BMI distribution while correcting for self-report bias. This approach accounts for the geographic variation in self-reported obesity while yielding valid national-level estimates compared to NHANES data. To our knowledge, no other adjustment method has been validated against measured data. The corrected 2013 estimates of state-specific obesity (Fig 1b) and severe obesity (Fig 2b) paint a more accurate picture of the obesity epidemic, and highlight how small biases in individual-level BMI can result in substantial shifts in population-level prevalence estimates. In addition, statistical matching is flexible with respect to variables of interest, and other datasets. Individual-level matching allows us to control for differential self-report bias by salient factors such as race/ethnicity and income, thus capturing any latent obesity gradients with respect to the matched variables. The approach is also extensible to multiple datasets, allowing the CHOICES model to synthesize information from a range of sources to create a richer virtual population. As a reproducible, computationally feasible method, it is also straightforward to update estimates as newer data become available. Limitations Although statistical matching is a powerful approach, it is not without limitations. To increase sample size, we pooled NHANES data from 2007–2012, which did not allow us to model trends that may have occurred within this period. However, we found that mean BMI and obesity did not change significantly over this period (data not shown), suggesting that pooling these years did not substantially bias our estimates. Similarly, we found no significant change in self-report bias over this period, suggesting that the percentile calculations of self-reported data were largely unaffected by pooling. However, the potential for differential or secular trends to bias the results highlights the tension between increasing sample size and the validity of pooling data across time periods. Although past rounds of BRFSS reported age in single years, the 2013 dataset only reports 5-year age groups, with the lowest group collapsed across 18–24 year olds and age top-coded at 80. We therefore used the midpoint of each age group to match individuals in BRFSS to those in NHANES. While these broader age groups limited the precision of the matching process, the resulting estimates of BMI distributions within sex-specific age groups were similar to observed distributions in NHANES (see Table C in S1 File). While our approach controlled for geographic variation in self-report bias due to demographic composition, it did not eliminate potential residual variation within subgroups. A recent paper by Le et al. reported differential self-report bias in obesity prevalence by region based on a comparison of self-reported height and weight from BRFSS and NHANES within Census regions [34]. However, because the authors focused on obesity prevalence rather than BMI, it is unclear whether the observed variation was due to actual regional differences in self-report bias, or was simply the result of different underlying BMI distributions across regions. As we have shown, the effect of self-report bias on obesity prevalence varies greatly depending on the location of the underlying BMI distribution relative to the specific cut-point used; estimates for states with high obesity prevalence are generally less sensitive to adjustments for self-report bias since a bulk of the self-reported BMI distribution is already over 30. While we cannot rule out residual regional variation in self-report bias, the matching methods used were applied within demographic strata (defined by age, sex, race/ethnicity, and household income), so we eliminated any regional variation in self-report bias due to compositional differences in these factors. Future studies could improve upon these methods by matching BRFSS to restricted regional NHANES data, although the smaller sample size within regions may be an issue.
Conclusions The corrected estimates of adult obesity reveals that in many states, the obesity epidemic is worse than previously reported. Although self-report bias has been well-documented, the extent to which it affects population-level estimates of obesity has not always been fully appreciated. The argument that “everybody knows” that state-level estimates based on self-reported data are too low is of little help in actually producing defensible estimates which are necessary for any realistic analysis aimed to inform policy. Knowingly underestimating millions of cases of obesity and billions of dollars of associated costs is a misleading exercise. While commonly used regression-based approaches can mitigate the effects of self-report bias, they still result in underestimates of obesity prevalence. In contrast, we have shown that non-parametric statistical matching can generate valid national estimates of obesity prevalence compared to measured data while retaining the state-level variations observed in self-reported data. Accurate state-specific obesity estimates are necessary to help officials plan appropriately for the medical capacity and economic resources needed to address this epidemic, and institute preventive measures where they are needed most.
Supporting Information S1 File. Table A, Self-reported vs measured height and weight in NHANES 2007–2012 and BRFSS 2013. Table B, Dataset crosswalks for matching individuals from BRFSS to NHANES. Table C, Dynamic subgroup definitions. Table D, Individual-level linear regression of measured height and weight on self-reported data in NHANES 2007–2012. Table E, Aggregate-level comparison of measured mean BMI in NHANES 2007–2012 to self-reported mean BMI from BRFSS 2013. Table F, Two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests comparing age- and sex-specific BMI distributions from NHANES to BRFSS by adjustment method. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150735.s001 (PDF)
Author Contributions Conceived and designed the experiments: ZW ML SR SG AC CG AH YW. Performed the experiments: ZW. Analyzed the data: ZW. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: ZW. Wrote the paper: ZW ML SR SG AC CG AH YW.Syria will start handing over information on its chemical weapons to international groups a month after it signs the Chemical Weapons Convention, President Bashar Assad has told a Russian TV channel.
Damascus has agreed to a Russia proposal to put its chemical weapons stockpiles under international control.
“Syria is handing over its chemical weapons under international supervision because of Russia,” Assad said in an interview with state-run news channel Rossiya-24. “The US threats did not influence the decision.”
Within days Damascus promises to submit to the United Nations all documents required for joining the chemical weapons ban treaty. A month after Syria signs the Chemical Weapons Convention it will start handing over information on chemical weapons to international organizations.
“I believe the agreement will come into force a month after the signing and Syria will start submitting data on its chemical weapons stockpile to international organizations. These are standard procedures and we are going to stick to them,” he said.
Meanwhile, the UN says that it has received a letter from Syria on the country’s intention to join the treaty banning the production of chemical arms, their stockpiling and use. The Syrian government’s letter of accession is being translated, AP cited UN associate spokesman Farhan Haq as saying Thursday. Signing the letter accession begins the process for a country to become party to the international agreement, the official said.
“It doesn’t mean that Syria will sign the documents, fulfill the obligations and that’s it. It’s a bilateral process aimed, first of all, at making the US stop pursuing its policy of threats against Syria,” Assad said, adding that a lot would also depend on the extent to which Russia’s proposal is accepted.
“Terrorists are trying to provoke American strike against Syria,” Assad said. Rebel forces are receiving chemical weapons from abroad, he added.
Countries that provide “terrorists” with chemical weapons should be held accountable, Assad said.
“We should thoroughly investigate the [chemical weapons used in the attack] to discover their components and which side used them,” Assad said.
“All states claim that they do not cooperate with terrorists, but we know for sure that the West provides them with logistical support,” he said, adding that the West and some countries in the region, including Turkey and Saudi Arabia, “maintain direct contacts with terrorists and supply them with all kinds of arms.”
Both the Syrian government and rebel forces have blamed each other for the chemical weapon attack in a Damascus suburb on August 21.
Talking to the Russian TV channel, Assad reiterated that the US has failed to present evidence that the Syrian government was behind the incident.
No country in the Middle East, including Israel, should possess weapons of mass destruction, Assad said. That would protect the region and the world from devastating and expensive wars in future, he said.
“If we want stability in the Middle East, all the countries in the region should stick to [international] agreements," Assad said. “And Israel is the first state that should do so, since Israel possessed nuclear, chemical, biological and all other kinds of weapons of mass destruction.”
The president recalled that a project on the elimination of WMD had been proposed, but the US opposed it “to allow Israel” to have such weapons.
Any kind of a war against Syria would “destroy the entire region” and lead to decades of instability in the Middle East, Assad said.
“Syria is making serious efforts so that our country and other states in the region will not be involved in a new crazy war that some proponents of the war in the US are trying to unleash in the Middle East,” he said.
Earlier in the week, RT, citing unnamed sources, reported that rebels could launch a chemical attack on Israel from government-controlled territories as a “major provocation.” Assad did not rule out such a scenario. Toxic agents “were used against Syrian Army soldiers and civilians” and that therefore rebel forces did have these weapons, he said.
“Everyone is aware that terrorist groups and those who control them are trying to provoke an American strike. Earlier, they attempted to draw Israel into the Syrian crisis,” Assad said.
On Monday, as the White House was pushing for congressional approval of the military strike against the Syrian regime, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov urged Damascus to put its stockpile of chemical weapons under international control.
Moscow also called on the Syrian government to join the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
Syria accepted the proposal and agreed to sign the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Moscow’s initiative was also welcomed in Washington. President Barack Obama urged the US Congress to postpone a vote to authorize military action, and said he was seeking a diplomatic solution to the Syrian conflict.
US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russia's foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, accompanied by groups of experts, are scheduled to meet in Geneva late Thursday to discuss in detail Moscow's plan to dispose of Syrian chemical weapons.Margaret Chiu, Escrow Manager of Sincere Escrow, has been in the escrow profession for more than 28 years. When she first immigrated to USA, she worked for the bank executive at East West Bank, China Town Branch. During that time, she was recruited by the Escrow Manager of East West due to her bilingual ability, diligence, sincerity, and good relationships with clients. She worked for Eastern Bank as Escrow Manager in 1986. She has also been qualified as a Certified Escrow Officer through California Escrow Association in 1988.
She has been an active member of California Escrow Association, American Escrow Association, and East San Gabriel Valley Escrow Association. She has also been helping, promote new Real Estate agents increase their knowledge regarding the escrow process. Currently, she serves as the Director of the California American Real Estate Professional Association, and also serves as the director of the Hong Kong Schools Alumni Federation. Established in 1992, Sincere Escrow has a staff of experienced Escrow Officers who are prepared to assist you in all your escrow needs. Founded by an already well experienced escrow agent and a management professional with engineering background, Sincere Escrow has built its foundations upon efficiency, promptness, and of course --- sincerity. Margaret's many hobbies include Chinese painting, singing, dancing (especially Latin dance), going to concerts and crafts. She is not an athlete herself but she enjoys watching tennis tournaments, NBA basketball, ice-skating, and many many more. When she was younger, she wanted to be an interior designer. Well, maybe she will still find time to become one.Rape and sexual assault are crimes, unless they occur on college campuses.
Then, the federal government believes untrained college administrators only need to be 50.01 percent sure that an accuser is more believable than the accused to brand a student as a rapist for life.
In a federal probe of Princeton University, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights faulted the Ivy League university for violating the federally recommended standard of proof for cases of rape and sexual assault. Read that again: the “recommended” standard of proof, not an actual law.
Princeton was using the “clear and convincing evidence” standard for its proceedings, which is a higher burden of proof than the federally recommended “preponderance of evidence” but not as high as the criminal standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
That’s not the only way Princeton supposedly violated the rights of the accuser (forget the rights of the accused).
“OCR determined that the higher burden of proof was one of a number of examples in which Princeton tilted the scales in favor of the accused,” Tyler Kingkade wrote in the Huffington Post. “For example, accused students at Princeton could appeal a decision made by the university committee investigating sexual assault cases, but students who reported an incident could not.” In the U.S. court system, retrials for exonerated defendants are forbidden as "double jeopardy."
Also, Princeton let accused students know what the charges were against them – an apparent “no-no” to OCR. Accused students were also told the names of the committee members who would decide their fate, were allowed to call witnesses and have an adviser at the hearing.
Accusers had these same rights, but OCR claimed they were not as obvious as the rights of the accused. A Frequently Asked Questions document laid out the rights of accusers and accused, and was referenced in the school’s sexual misconduct policy, but that was apparently not enough for OCR.
OCR also faulted Princeton for not finding men guilty in three cases.
Because remember, these sexual assault hearings aren’t about the truth, they’re about branding people as rapists.Arsenal’s proposed capture of Yaya Sanogo is not yet complete, but the fact that the club are so close to securing a deal for the 20-year-old striker could have significant ramifications for a forward of the same age.
Once the deal goes through it is expected that Sanogo will automatically become a member of the first-team squad, even if he may feature more heavily for the U21s during his initial months at the club. The capture |
that he was too ill to travel.Eventually we, on the airfield, saw a little cavalcade of motor cars approaching us. On the bonnet of the leading car we spied the royal flag of Brunei, fluttering bravely in the breeze. Then within the car we recognised the dark goggles of the Sultan's sunglasses perched on his thin, pale face. So Aikman had won. Hamlet was after all to make a personal appearance in the leading role in the week's drama.When the Sultan stepped out of the car, I saw the ravages of illness on his person. His body seemed to have grown smaller than ever. He was shrivelling up. His face appeared haggard and its colour was bad. The wings of the angel of death did indeed seem to be brushing his hollow cheek.He walked towards us like a man in a trance. Then, as we shook hands, his lack-lustre eyes brightened with sudden recognition. He gave me a wan smile, and for a brief moment a mischievous sparkle lit his eyes, as if he and I were fellow-conspirators in some dark plot. It dissolved as quickly as it had formed and he turned away mechanically to ascend the steps into the jaws of the waiting aeroplane.The Tungku Ampuan looked sour. She evidently regarded with extreme distaste our expedition.But there was no turning back now. The aeroplane's doors closed sternly behind us. A few minutes later we were poised in position to start at the end of the runway. Then the propellers buzzed into violent activity, the machine raced madly along the ground, and with its inmates were hurled like pebbles from a catapult into the air.[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]The next morning broke fair, after a night of rain. There was a freshness in the air, and a slight breeze blew, bringing welcome hints of coolness to us...[pages missing]... the Sultan mounting the steps. There, on the threshold of the hall, he was met by the Penghiran [sic] Bendahara and the Pengiran Pemancha, who bowed solemnly to him, With his consort he walked with stately pace along the carpet towards the dais. The whole audience rose in salutation.The interior of the pavilion was tastefully decorated with flags and bunting, sprays of foliage and bouquets of flowers. But its most beautiful [sight] was the many coloured costumes worn by some of the distinguished people in it. [C.W.] Dawson [Acting Chief Secretary of Sarawak] and I contributed little to the array, striking a sober note in the white drill and gold braid of the sartorial adornment of tropical Governors. But the leading Malays in particular indulged in an orgy of colour which lent the scene a sparkling brilliance.I have already mentioned that the Sultan himself was clad in a rich regal Malay dress of emerald green silk and gold thread, its stuff was of the finest shimmering and glittering quality. Possibly the complete dignity of his appearance was a little marred by the fact that he wore his crown at a slightly rakish tilt; yet this seemed to be charmingly in character. Moreover, it was more the crown's fault than this. The crown was too tight, not the Sultan. The head measurements which had been sent to the Goldsmiths Company to ensure an exactly fitting crown omitted to mention the fact that space should be allowed for a cloth skull-cap to be inserted between the circle of metal and the Sultan's skin. The net result was that the crown was too small; and His Highness had to wedge it over his forehead at a slight angle in order to prevent it from rolling off.As I have also mentioned before, the Sultana was dressed that day in dark blue and gold, with yellow and gold scarf around her shoulders. The Penghiran Bendahara wore a magnificent suit of oyster and gold from the tip of his turban to the toes of his slippers. It had been especially woven for the occasion by his young wife. The Belabub Besar did not attend the ceremony, having fallen into disgrace as the result of some joyous escapade scarcely in keeping with the status of a married woman; but her two pretty sisters, the Belabub Lua and the Belabub Daunit, were sitting side by side in the front row. The former dressed in Cambridge blue and the latter in Oxford blue, each with a flowered pattern of gold on the silk. The Penghulu Pemancha was in a white uniform and wore a pork-pie hat with almost as many colours in its make-up as graced Jacob's coat. The Penghiran Mohamed had on a black velvet cap, dark brown baju and trousers and a purple and gold sarong. Inche Hassan, on the other hand, wore a pink baju and trousers offset by a white and gold turban and sarong. The Orang Kaya de-Gadong [sic] sported a red and gold turban and sarong over his white uniform. Several Hajis wore many-hued turbans and long, close-fitting, grey or brown 'frock-coats' which often distinguish those who have made the pilgrimage to Mecca. Other Muslim personalities were clad in costumes of varied shades; the Chinese towkays came in black and white; and the Iban chieftains from up-country enlivened the show with caps of fur or feather, loin cloths of bizarre designs and, for the rest, gleaming brown flesh decoratively spattered with blue tattoo.[pages missing]... utterly exhausted at the winning post; the rest of my crew seemed completely fresh, and gave loud war- whoops of triumph.A tea-party in the Residency garden followed. Amongst the large company were the Sultan and his four daughters. An even more interesting arrival was his mother. I already knew her astonishing and sinister reputation and looked at her with curiosity as we all sat down at a table to eat cakes and sip tea.She appeared to be an affable old lady, gentle and dignified. He small, slight frail figure seemed the incarnation of feminine weakness, and her serene, wrinkled face and trim grey hair had perfect air of ladylike gentility. Could this be (1 thought) the notorious regent, the cold-blooded tyrant, the unnatural mother of the scandalous tales which had circulated in the region? It seemed strange--although her smile, if gracious and sweet, was at the same time a trifle enigmatic. Perhaps the secret lay in her eyes. Occasionally they betrayed a quality in contradiction to the rest of her appearance. They had an imperious glance, cold, calculating and selfish. Then the embers of some fire within her glowed through them, and I felt instinctively that they could kindle easily into passionate fury and hate.Noticing the fine, long deft fingers on her delicate hands, I realised that they had probably not lost their cunning. If the whispered insinuations of her enemies were true, these beautiful claws had dabbled in poison. Perhaps even now--if she felt so disposed--she could slip by some incredible, invisible sleight-of-hand grains of fatal powder into my tea. I looked at my cup and saucer, but they appeared untampered with. The fact that I am still alive to tell this tale is no doubt proof that she was innocent of guile that sunny afternoon. Perhaps in nay case the darkest rumours spread about her past conduct were the idle, scandalous inventions of disgruntled courtiers. But I felt as if I were privileged to sit at table with an aged, two clawed Imperial dragon on its best behaviour.I shall have more to write about her in due course.As we sipped our tea and toyed with cakes we chatted about this and that. The Sultan understood a certain amount of English, but lacked confidence to speak it. John Peel acted as interpreter between us. His Highness was extremely talkative. He spoke of the miseries which he and his people suffered under Japanese rule. And of their joy at the return to Brunei of their British protectors and friends. He made sly, ingratiating, flattering remarks about my visit, with some kind and courtly phrases which warmed my heart towards him. They indicated a certain sense of diplomatic nicety in him, which no doubt sprang from impulses little more than skin-deep, but which was none-the-less engaging in a rascally, Oriental sort of way for that. I liked his artful quality. Frequently his smooth words were accompanied by a wistful, boyish smile of what appeared to be sincere friendship. Moreover his utterance occasionally showed a pretty turn of humour. His smile would then break into a healthy laugh, the sounds of which contained mischievous, hilarious notes.The ladies took no oral part in the conversation. Moslem women are usually silent in the presence of strangers. But they spoke plenty with their eyes. The Sultan's mother gazed upon us with kindly yet lofty tolerance, as an all-wise, well-mannered elder does when compelled to listen to the chatter of half-witted children. The Belabub Besar rolled her huge, sultry eyes at me with the frank, familiar come-hither stare of a street walker at dusk in Piccadilly Circus. The two little Belabubs ogled and simpered like a couple of shy but rather sophisticated children; whilst the princess kept shooting towards me glances charged with bored and bad-tempered resentment.The Sultan did not seem to be wildly enthusiastic about the tea. In fact he left a full, steaming cup of it untasted. Every now and then his hand moved instinctively towards the cup, but at the first contact with this unfamiliar object it drifted vacantly away again, whilst His Highness's eyes roved a trifle wildly in vain search of other refreshment.As soon as he finally abandoned hope of any such sustenance coming to his rescue he rose, stretched out his hand to mine, bowed so low that you saw the tonsured circle, like a small full moon on the top of his head, and took leave. His mother and daughters followed him like a drove of hinds and fawns silently attending a royal stag.I dined early at the Residency, for the reveling [sic] that day was a nonstop performance and would continue throughout the evening on the padang in the town. Immediately after the meal the Sultan called to take me to it. He was dressed now in faultless tail-coat, white waistcoat and the suitable accompanying garments. Round the neck of his boiled shirt dangled the ribbon and accolade of a Companion of the Noble Order of the British Empire, and on the lapel of his coat hung the two little medals which he had gained on the battlegrounds which were so hotly contested when authority had to decide who should get Jubilee and Coronation medals. He looked much too small and--in spite of his incredible pretence at a moustache and beard young for this adult garb and finery, like some prodigious child conjurer dressed up for a Command Performance.His eyes shone with gaiety. If there was just hint of glassiness in their glitter, it was of no account. No doubt he had been making up for the lack, at the afternoon tea party, of beverage to his taste, but he had done this wisely, not too well. He was in natural, spontaneous high spirits. Almost every sentence which he spoke twinkled with jest, and every now and again he gave a hilarious laugh. He was like a boisterous youngster, a child who had never properly grown up. I felt a strange sympathy for him, a sadness at this rather charming yet pathetic royal figure who seemed somehow so untrained to the responsibilities and dignities of rule.We motored to the town. The night was dark, but heaven's high vault was brilliantly lit with the candles of...[pages missing]The presence of the Sultan and two of the Belabubs was a remarkable innovation. Before the war the attendance of females at such a function would have been unthinkable. But in some respects, even in conservative Brunet, ancient custom was breaking down. Amongst others, the strict taboo against women in such public social gatherings was loosening its hold. Its power had not completely disappeared. Much argument had preceded the attendance of the Sultan's ladies, and although in their case this act of emancipation was urged and permitted, in other cases the old restraint had prevailed. For example, the Penghiran [sic] Bendahara had pleaded with his wife to come to the Jubilee celebrations; but she obstinately refused, on the grounds of impropriety. Other wives and daughters also had to stay away.The Sultan's old nurse, however, had cast her vote for the new custom, and came to witness the ceremony. This withered hag occupied a place of honour, squatting on the floor close beside the throne. With her were two other aged and ugly harpies. Clad in dirty clothes with unkempt grey hairs and wrinkled, toothless faces, they looked like the three witches from 'Macbeth'. It was as if that infamous trio had met round their cauldron on the blasted heath near Forres, mixed a vile concoction of obscene spells and drams, and after chanting, 'Where shall we three meet again?' decided on Brunet as the site of their next tryst.Certain well known local characters were however, positively refused admittance to the audience. They were the Evil Spirits who, unless forbidden, were apt to haunt and spoil pleasant sociable gatherings in Borneo. Ancient custom decreed how they could be prevented from attendance. In the middle of the red-carpeted aisle through the centre of the audience was propped a strange-looking object like a large model of Neptune's trident. On the end of its long wooden shaft was set threateningly a three-pronged fork, worthy to be in the armoury of some horrific torture chamber. This weapon was a warning to all ill-disposed Spirits to keep away. If they intruded, they would be impaled upon these sharp and twisted spikes.That was why the ceremony passed off without any untoward incident.The Sultan and Sultanah advanced with regal tread to their thrones on the dais. These pieces of furniture were as much like bits of stage property for an amateur theatrical performance as were their swords, shields and lances of the Royal Bodyguard. They had been knocked together, planed and chiseled a few days earlier out of some common planks, and the black and gold paint on them still smelt fresh. They stood under a domed canopy also newly fashioned of painted wood, with an embroidered ceiling, silk side-hangings and a carpeted floor. On either side of the thrones, stood a large, shining, brass Brunei cannon.When the Sultan and Sultanah reached this bower and seated themselves, the audience also sat down. Then an expectant hush was shattered by the Royal Orchestra, which broke into an astonishing musical shindy. The half-dozen solemn performers crowded on the floor near the thrones, lugging their instruments. These consisted of three ancient drums of stretched snake-skin, two colossal gongs and a wood-wind instrument with the wide mouth of trumpet. They thumped, crashed and wailed at the tops of their voices all together and at what seemed to be interminable length.They would have continued indefinitely, if ancient custom had been observed. The uproar of this orchestra on special occasions is supposed to have had semi-sacred imports, and the longer it lasts the more virtue it imparts to a ceremony. However, the Sultan did not, apparently, share that view. It was only with the greatest difficulty that he was persuaded to allow his trusty bandsmen to take any part in the proceedings at all. He could not abide them. To borrow a descriptive expression, he hated their guts, and their drums, gongs and flute as well.I could not blame him. In accordance with time-honoured tradition, they had been playing continuously, with scarcely pause to draw breath, all the previous day, half the night, and all that morning They started in a room next to his living room. He cursed the infernal noise, and commanded silence; only to be told that ill luck would dog his Jubilee if it were not accompanied by this customary music. He almost went insane. After a while--unable to strangle them--he dismissed them to the verandah, then to the lawn outside and finally to an out-house beyond the lawn. So great was their prowess with wind and fist that even from there faint, maddening strains of their hullaballoo irritated the royal ear. The Sultan declared that he never wanted to hear another peep or squeak from them, and ordered that their performance should be struck from the programme prepared for the Jubilee Pavilion.Once more the pundits pointed out to him that this would presage some awful disaster...May 30 1952Sultan of Brunei lunched with me at Bukit Serene [the High Commissioner's official residence] today. He is on his way to England, to pay his respects to the King and thank him for his 'K' [knighthood]. I wonder whether he will ever get there. He looks like a doomed man to me, much thinner, weaker, frailer than at his jubilee. His head seems narrower, his flesh thinner (almost nothing beneath the skin), his eyes with death in them.He was sober and rather silent, not lacking in dignity except to those awful, bulgy, telltale eyes and a general sense of a living corpse, a human body where decomposition has started before death has claimed it. But he talks in spasms. He drank whiskey-and-soda. Before lunch he drank three-quarters of a tumbler full, and then hesitated over the rest. Tunku Mahkota, who was a fellow guest, told him to swallow it so that we could go and eat.The little Sultan professed inability.'I drink whiskey very little', he said with a sheepishly naughty laugh.'Hardly a drop', I said encouragingly.H.H. smiled in friendship at me and then said 'I used to drink to excess'.He gave his gay, infectious laugh which is like that of a boy who is being extremely naughty but who knows that he will get away with it because no one dare say him 'nay'.Afterwards he drank two more full whiskeys and-sodas.June 9thThe little Sultan died this morning at 9 o'clock. He had a haemorrhage last night, was taken from Raffles Hotel to the Hospital, and never had a chance of recovery. So passed away the last of the mediaeval Sultans.May 29-June 1stIn Brunei for the Coronation.Arrived with Abell on the Mermaid after two days at sea from Kuching.....The house party at the Residency, where Pretty--the greatest British Resident ever in Brunei, and the 'last of the Nineteenth Century Residents in Malaysia'--is entering on his last month:--[Revd P.H.H.] Howes, Abell, Prettys, Andrey and me.The lit-up kampong at night like a long procession of glow worms. An occasional firefly above in the form of a lamp on a pole.The Bendahara's eyes were popping [more] than ever as he raises his arm with its drawn sword and shouts 'Sambah', looking around at his audience with a glance that would be penetrating if they were not half-blind...APPENDIX I: Robert Irvine, "Report of Visit to Brunei for the Coronation of H.H. the Sultan on the 17th March, 1940"[NA CO 717/143/20]I embarked on m.v. Marudu on Saturday the 9th March, 1940, and reached Labuan at about 5 p.m. on Wednesday the 13th March. I spent Wednesday night with Mr. Jakeman, the Resident, Labuan, at the Labuan Residency and about 12 noon on the following day I left for Brunei on the launch Kittiwake, arriving there at about 4.45 p.m.My formal landing in Brunei took place the following morning, the 15th March, at 9.30 a.m. It had been arranged for me to present the British Resident, Major E.E. Pengilley with his Efficiency Decoration at this formal landing. Accompanied by R.W. Jakeman, Resident, Labuan, and by Lieutenant Harun bin Mohamed Amin, Federated Malay States Volunteer Force (Superintendent of Education, Brunei) I traveled by the launch Muara from the Residency jetty to the Customs jetty, a distance of about 1 1/2 miles, and was met on arrival by the British Resident. Mr. Jakeman and I were in Civil Service uniform and Major Pengillcy and Lieut. Harun in Volunteer uniform. We ascended the Customs wharf and were accorded a salute by a Guard of Honour of 21 men of the Brunei Police under the command of the Chief Police Officer, Mr. W. Martin. The Guard was drawn up at the head of a hollow square facing my point of arrival, on one side were stationed the principal residents of Brunei town and on the other a number of privileged spectators. After inspecting the Guard of Honour I took up position behind a small table draped with a Union Jack near the middle of the hollow square, with Mr. Jakeman on my right and Lieut. Harun on my left and Major Pengilley stationed himself in front facing me at a few paces distance. Mr. Jakeman read out Major Pengilley's record of service in English and Lieut. Harun a Malay translation. Major Pengilley stepped forward and I pinned on his Decoration. I was then introduced to each of the principal residents. This concluded the formal landing and Major Pengilley, Mr. R.F. Evans (the representative from British North Borneo), Mr Jakeman and I left the Customs wharf and proceeded to the Astana [sic] Mahkota, 3 miles away, for a formal call on His Highness the Sultan.We arrived at the Astana at l0 a. m. and were shown upstairs by the A.D.C. and the Private Secretary to His Highness. In the room upstairs were the two wazirs (Duli Pengiran Bendahara and Dull Pengiran Pemancha), the Pengiran Shahbandar, several other Brunei Chiefs and Tengku Klana Jaya Petra, who had come to represent the Sultan of Selangor at the Coronation. The Sultan appeared almost immediately, in white uniform. He greeted us all very affably and invited us to sit. We conversed together for about a quarter of an hour and then tIn their desire to return the nation to the Gilded Age, the Right has long targeted the one effective tool the rest of us have had--organized labor. They're getting a big assist by this economy, which makes too easy the job of drumming up resentment against anyone who might have a bit of job protection or--gasp--the promise of a pension to make the prospect of old age just a little less frightening. Just check out Glenn Beck to see it in action.
Now, that war is going to be waged in the House.
In January 2011, some number of Republican congressmen are planning to issue an ultimatum to states: There will be no additional aid, and you have to balance your budgets.
"I'm going to introduce a resolution when the new Congress begins, stating that the House will not bail out state budgets," says Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah. "The message is: States, don't think the federal government is going to bail you out. Pay attention to this now."
McHenry is one of several congressmen who'll be empowered to demand transparency from states, especially on the shortfalls in their pension funds. This is something that public-employee unions see as a coordinated attack on their members, but Republicans say the unions are going to lose.
"The potential here," says McHenry, "is that we're facing a generational shift based on economic realities, based on our expectations for government, on what government does, and how government delivers services."
....
What could the pension fund people and the public sector unions be so worried about? Right-leaning Reuters columnist James Pethokoukis laid it out for them. If the states aren't bailed out, they're going to have to start cutting budgets. If there's total transparency about pension funds—and voters are already in the mood to shave the benefits and numbers of public workers—then that's where you can cut. Republicans might even be able to pass legislation that would allow states to declare bankruptcy, which would move the pension debate from politics to court, zapping all of the unions' leverage. "From the Republican perspective," wrote Pethokoukis, "the fiscal crisis on the state level provides a golden opportunity to defund a key Democratic interest group."
How would that work, exactly? House Republicans aren't talking about it yet. But Newt Gingrich, who those Republicans take seriously, laid it out clearly in a Nov. 11 speech to the Institute for Policy Innovation.
"I also hope the House Republicans are going to move a bill in the first month or so of their tenure to create a venue for state bankruptcy," said Gingrich, "so that states like California and New York and Illinois that think they're going to come to Washington for money can be told, you know, you need to sit down with all your government employee unions and look at their health plans and their pension plans and frankly if they don't want to change, our recommendation is you go into bankruptcy court and let the bankruptcy judge change it, and I would make the federal bankruptcy law prohibit tax increases as part of the solution, so no bankruptcy judge could impose a tax increase on the people of the states."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
A packed holiday jet had a near-miss at 1,500ft with a rocket made from FIZZY DRINKS bottles, it has emerged.
The Airbus A321 flight was leaving Birmingham Airport when the pilot spotted a UFO from the cockpit.
It passed "very close" to the starboard side of the aircraft but did not make contact, said air safety body UKAB which investigated the incident.
In a report, it was described as "rocket shaped and the size of 2 x 2litre fizzy drink bottles."
The pilot said it passed just 100ft vertically and 200m horizontally from his aircraft.
It is believed the UFO was probably a DIY water bottle rocket sent up in to the air by an amateur enthusiast.
VIDEO: Bang Goes the Theory explores how to make a bottle rocket at home - please adhere to Air Traffic Control guidelines and do not fire near airports
INSTRUCTIONAL: How to make a bottle rocket at home
But is thought to be the first time any has reached such height as to encounter an aircraft.
Local rocketing groups were contacted by the UKAB and said there were no meetings held at the time of the incident at around 9.50am on August 18 last year.
By law, anyone wanting to fire a rocket which has a motive power exceeding 160 Newton-seconds has to contact Air Traffic Control.
(Image: BPM MEDIA)
Making water bottle rockets is a popular science experiment.
A large bottle is partially filled with water or another liquid and then compressed with a pump until the pressure fires it into the air.
The world record height reached for a water bottle rocket 2,723ft.
The air watchdog said it had ultimately been unable to trace the source of the rocket.
The near-miss was categorised as a Category B incident, the second most serious on the watchdog's scale.This week, we learned that former FBI Director James Comey will probably be a witness in any proceeding brought by his close friend Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Rod Rosenstein, a former Mueller staffer, appointed Mueller because Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who handed the oversight of this matter to his Deputy Rosenstein, had recused himself and that recusal was based on a misreading of the law by career Department of Justice attorneys. Sessions’s recusal, moreover, was engendered by illegal leaks. And the investigation by Mueller is being fanned by more of them.
At the center of the narrative is James Comey, who, in a girlish recital, testified about a brief conversation he had with the President in which he was told General Flynn was a “good guy” and that the President hoped the FBI investigation would “let this go.”
Comey has a long history of prosecuting questionable obstruction cases. Among other overreaches, it was Comey, who with almost certain knowledge (as I have explained previously) that there was no leak of a covert CIA agent by Dick Cheney or any of his staff, sicced former colleague, Southern District of New York (SDNY) prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald on Lewis Libby and got a conviction on a dubious process crime.
He also confessed to having leaked through a third-party friend, Columbia University Law Professor Daniel C. Richman, his version of the discussion with the President.
His explanation was self-serving and inconsistent. Linda Shelley writes:
Comey wanted to prevent the appointment of a special counsel for Hillary Clinton, who was the subject of an FBI investigation, but he wanted to “prompt” the appointment of a special counsel for President Trump, who was not the subject of an FBI investigation. He understood that the appointment of a special counsel “would send the message, ‘Uh-huh, there’s something here’” and that it would be “many months later or a year later” before the special counsel would announce that, in fact, “there was no case there.” Any questions? Here’s one: Is President Trump alleged to have done anything illegal or is this investigation just war, by any means necessary, against someone who has put a lot of swamp creatures out of power and out of work? Comey testified that while he was FBI director, Trump was not under investigation by the FBI -- not in a criminal investigation, and not in a counter-intelligence investigation, which, in Comey’s words, “tend to be centered on individuals the FBI suspects to be witting or unwitting agents” or “covertly acting as an agent” of a hostile foreign nation, or “targeted for recruitment.” In the FBI’s judgment, Trump was none of those. Comey revealed to Congress in March that the bureau was investigating “possible coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign,” yet he flatly refused to tell the public, until his testimony on Thursday, that Trump wasn’t under investigation. Comey testified that after he was fired, he orchestrated a selective leak in order to prompt a lengthy special counsel investigation of the president, knowing full well that the FBI had found no reason to place the president under investigation. That is genuinely deplorable.
Sessions' Recusal Was Based on an Erroneous Reading of the Law
Sessions was misled by the Department of Justice lawyers upon whom he relied into recusing himself from any matter involving “Russian” interference with the election.
Sessions had no conflict warranting his recusal.
Andrew McCarthy, also a former attorney with the SDNY U.S. Attorneys Office explains:
Sessions says that he recused himself, on the advice of career ethics experts at the Justice Department, because he thought this was required by the federal regulation controlling “Disqualification arising from personal or political relationship” (28 CFR Sec. 45.2). But judging from the public testimony that former FBI director James Comey has given about the investigation into Russia’s election-meddling, the regulation did not mandate recusal. Section 45.2 states that an official is disqualified from “a criminal investigation or prosecution” if he has a personal or political relationship with a “subject of the investigation or prosecution,” or with a person or organization whose interests would be affected by the outcome “of the investigation or prosecution.” … The probe of Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential campaign is not a criminal investigation or prosecution. Moreover, when the reg[ulation] speaks of the “subject of the investigation or prosecution,” it is using “subject” as a criminal-law term of art. A “subject” is a person or entity whose actions are being examined by a grand jury with an eye toward a possible indictment. There are no “subjects” in that sense in a counterintelligence investigation because the objective is not to build a criminal case and there is no grand jury.
“Russian Collusion”: Not a Crime in any Event
In the first place, the "Russian collusion" accusation is utterly pretextual, concocted by the media and the Democrats, and it began when President Obama ordered the intelligence chiefs to compose a report on Russian Interference. The Obama administration then spread the flimsy report, hastily put together across the intelligence community, through a supine if not complicit media.
According to the pertinent federal regulation, a special counsel should only be appointed when the Justice Department’s leadership “determines that criminal investigation of a person or matter is warranted,” and that “investigation or prosecution of that person or matter” by the Justice Department “would present a conflict of interest or other extraordinary circumstances.” (Emphasis added.) So, what is the crime based on which Trump’s deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, authorized the appointment of a special counsel? There isn’t one. When Rosenstein named Mueller special counsel on May 17, he cited as grounds for the appointment Comey’s testimony at a March 20 House hearing. Here is the pertinent testimony: the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election and that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts. As with any counterintelligence investigation, this will also include an assessment of whether any crimes were committed. Again, a counterintelligence investigation is not a criminal investigation. And the regulations do not authorize the appointment of a special counsel to perform “an assessment of whether any crimes were committed.” There is supposed to be evidence showing the need for a criminal investigation before a special counsel is appointed. Prior to this March 20 testimony, Comey had assured Trump that he was not under investigation. These assurances continued after this testimony, even though the testimony happened more than a month after the February 14 meeting in which Trump had lobbied Comey on Flynn’s behalf -- you know, the “Obstruction!” Moreover, in closed session in connection with his testimony, Comey told members of Congress that Trump was not under investigation—a detail omitted from the director’s public testimony. Thus, what Comey informed Congress about was a counterintelligence investigation, which had generated no evidence of Kremlin coordination with the Trump campaign, and no suspicion of wrongdoing by Trump. Based on that, Rosenstein appointed a special counsel.
McCarthy elaborates on why a counterintelligence investigation (not a legal basis for a special counsel appointment) is not a criminal investigation:
This is a huge problem with defining Mueller’s jurisdiction in terms of the counterintelligence investigation, as deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein did, in violation of the governing regulation. A counterintelligence investigation is not a criminal investigation. The latter focuses on specified factual transactions in which there is reasonable suspicion that a specified crime has been committed. A counterintelligence investigation, in stark contrast, is an information-gathering exercise. There are no limiting parameters to an information-gathering exercise -- intelligence agents always want to know more. Unlike criminal investigations, in which investigators need to prove exactly what happened under rules that limit the kinds of evidence that may be considered, intelligence is all about probabilities. It is a predictive discipline in which all manner of information is gathered since you never know what morsel of triple-hearsay (that would never be admissible in a criminal trial) may help you figure something out down the road. The counsel called for him to “determine that a criminal investigation of a person or matter is warranted.” He did not do that. As a rationale for appointing a special counsel, he cited the investigation then-FBI director James Comey had described in his March 20 congressional testimony. Comey said the investigation was a counterintelligence probe -- not a criminal investigation. He described it as a counterintelligence investigation focused on Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, including any ties between Trump associates and Putin’s regime, as well as any “coordination” between the Trump campaign and Russia’s interference efforts. None of what Comey described -- other than the hacking that has been attributed to the Russian efforts -- is necessarily, or even probably, criminal. Having ties to Russians is not a crime, and “coordination” with Russians is not a crime unless it rises to the level of a criminal conspiracy to violate a federal criminal statute. In sum, Rosenstein has failed to describe, in a “specific factual statement,” the basis for the criminal investigation that purportedly triggered the need to appoint a special counsel -- as the regulations require him to do. That description is supposed to state the parameters of the special counsel’s jurisdiction so that we don’t end up with a fishing expedition.
There are some who argue that Mueller is, in fact, going after the illegal leaking and “unmasking” that formed the basis of the “Russian collusion” story, notably Sundance at Conservative Treehouse. But given Mueller’s prior history with respect to the raid on Congressman William Jefferson’s office, in which he -- like Comey -- showed insufficient respect for constitutional prosecutorial limits, I have my doubts.
The Unending Leaks About the Investigation from Anonymous Sources
From Bloomberg:
Leakers are essentially liars. They want the benefit of being trusted with confidences without suffering the cost of keeping what they know to themselves. They sit in meetings and review documents and implicitly promise to keep the secrets, but their actual plan is to decide for themselves which juicy nugget to share with others. In philosophical terms, the leaker always does a moral wrong to the person who entrusted him with the secret. But like most moral wrongs, the leak can be excused if the cause is sufficiently vital. Consider the corporate whistle-blower who brings to the authorities details of horrific misfeasance by his employer. I argued last time that one might plausibly excuse, for example, the leaks by former FBI Director James Comey, who explained his conduct as an effort to force the appointment of a special counsel to look into links between Russia and the Trump campaign. 1 Perhaps others in the rash of leakers in recent months had the same motive. You can decide for yourself whether the motive is sufficient to justify the underlying lie. In any case, now that special counsel Robert Mueller III has begun his investigation, that rationale no longer exists. The individual who leaks what’s going on inside the investigation has no excuse. To share the special counsel’s secrets with a reporter is self-indulgence. To go to work the next day is to intensify the underlying wrong. One might object that the public has the right to know what the prosecutor is doing, but this seems to me mistaken, at least in the short run. The reason to have an investigation is to take the time to work out what’s happened. Leaks from within make the job of finding the truth that much harder. In other contexts, prosecutors have rightly been sanctioned by judges for leaking to the press details of their investigations. Here, |
and for dinner, and if you have spare time in between, you go to an office off Capitol Hill and you dial for dollars. Then the weekend rolls around, and you get on a plane and travel the countryside with a tin cup in your hand. And it gets worse each cycle."
The problem, he argued, isn't just that raising money is unpleasant, or just that it gives the rich too much sway, or just that it makes the public cynical ("You want to be engaged in an honorable line of work," Bayh said, "but they look at us like we're worse than used-car salesmen"). The real problem is that it means lawmakers can't do their jobs.
"When candidates for public office are spending 90 percent of their time raising money," Bayh said, "that's time they're not spending with constituents or with public policy experts."
So, why don't the politicians do something about it? If raising money is so miserable and corrupting and distracting and discrediting, why not publicly finance campaigns? Or strip away the anonymity of outside groups? Or pass a bill that matches small-donor contributions, thus making it easier for politicians to fund their candidacies by exciting voters rather than lobbyists?
The answer is depressing: Few politicians in office like the current system, but they're better at it than everyone else is. They've got donor networks, relationships with lobbyists, corporate friends and activist groups that will help them out. Their potential challengers don't.
"The people in the position to make these rules have succeeded in the system as it exists," Bayh said. "Asking them to change the rules from which they've benefited is difficult."
Consider the lifestyle Bayh outlined: fundraisers three times a day and more on the weekends. Dialing for dollars. And we've not even talked about the money you're supposed to raise for your party to help others get elected.
"The United States Senate is a dues-paying organization now," Bayh lamented. "Junior members have to raise this much, committee chairs have to raise that much. Find that in a civics book."
Who would want to run for office, if that's what running for - and holding - office means? How many people want to give up that much time with their family, that much dignity, that much autonomy? If you're a successful businessman or a local teacher, why would you want to give up a good life to do this?
From the perspective of the incumbent, that's all for the better: The more impressive challengers who back off when they realize what's involved, the fewer impressive challengers they have to face. That helps keep them safe until a wave election like this one will probably be. But for the rest of us, it means the candidates whom the waves bring in are worse than they'd be if running for office was a more attractive proposition.
So for all that the incumbents dislike the system, they tend to like the idea of reforming it even less. Dave Durenberger, a Republican who represented Minnesota in the Senate from 1978 to 1995, told me about his experience trying to reform campaign finance laws. "Phil Gramm was our campaign committee chair back then," he remembered, "and he tore my picture down in the campaign committee office. Connie Mack and Mitch McConnell came to me and said, 'You're going to kill us.' "
That sort of reaction not only makes it hard for campaign finance reform to pass, it makes it hard for any individual legislator to even propose it.
I asked Bayh if he saw any hope on the horizon. His answer wasn't what I'd categorize as hopeful, but it had the ring of truth to it: "There'll be a major scandal at some point that'll shock the public," he predicted. "It'll be worse than what happened with Abramoff. And at that point, the system will be changed."
Here's hoping.
Ezra Klein blogs about economic and domestic policy for The Washington Post.We may have been a bit quiet over the past two months, but you'll be happy to hear we've spent the time not only recovering from launch, but also preparing improvements and new content for Divinity: Original Sin. We figured: how better to break the silence than with an exciting update chock full of much-asked-after features?
Today, we're launching a content-heavy update to D:OS players, featuring two totally new companions, each ready (if you play your cards right) to help save Rivellon. Also included in the newest update is a big quality-of-life improvement and another coat of polish.
Below, Swen discusses more about the added content, as well as future updates and what the team's been up to since our last update (hint: Divinity: Original Sin isn't the only game we're working on!).
Read the update's full change list here.
Download this free additional content!
As promised, we're ready to launch two more companions into Rivellon, both of which you can meet in Cyseal. Bairdotr, a curious and loyal ranger, has gotten herself into some trouble at the Legion barracks, while the silent rogue Wolgraff has found himself a nice hustle stealing coins from the wishing well in the Cyseal hinterlands (accessible through the graveyard tunnel).
Check out their concept art and a short description of each companion below:
"You seem strong as mother, though your chest is not quite so hairy. Your sword may come in handy when we find who I seek."
Armed with her bow on her back and her claws at the ready, Bairdotr refuses to fail: She must navigate your world-- a world of wonder and mysteries both fantastic and terrible-- if she's to save Homeforest. The druid of the forest has been kidnapped, and Bairdotr must follow a scant trail of clues if she's to bring him back-- clues that take her to the very heart of Rivellon's Source conspiracy.
"Wolgraff gives you a knowing look. He seems to think the mayor is a few arrows short of a quiver."
Dark Sourcery deprived Wolgraff of his voice when he was but a kid, and with it his dream of becoming a Source Hunter. Refused by the Order, he grew up to become a rogue, stealing from the rich and giving to... just himself actually. His is a world of silence, but if need be he lets his dagger do the talking for him.
---
If you convince one or both to join your party, you'll learn more about their histories and missions for the future.
Download "The Bear and the Burgler" DLC via Steam, or simply update your game on GOG to receive the new content. Note: The new companions will appear in Cyseal once you start a new game after downloading the update.
Follow the Dialogue: A significant improvement for co-op players
It's no secret that the old system for following other players' dialogues in co-op needed a makeover; fortunately, the latest update will do just that.
Now, instead of reading lengthy dialogues displayed over your teammate's head or in the journal, you'll be able to see the conversation in its own dialogue box with the toggle of a button.
What's next?
This certainly will not be our last update on Divinity: Original Sin. We're still working on a slew of new skills and a variety of difficulty modes to ramp up the challenge-- keep an eye out for those in the coming weeks!
If you're curious where Larian is heading over the next couple of years, check out Swen's latest blog entry - Thoughts after releasing Divinity:Original Sin and what comes next.
Wasteland 2: Are you as excited as we are?
Clear your calendars, because Wasteland 2 is ready to launch on September 19th! Not only are we huge Wasteland fans, but we also owe a debt of gratitude to Brian Fargo, who paved the way for RPGs on Kickstarter and convinced us of the merits of Steam Early Access (and oh how right he was). We wish the inXile team the best of luck with their launch and can't wait to play the game ourselves. If you haven't already gotten yourself a key, you're sure to miss out!Ludovisi Gaul, H. 2.11 m (6 ft. 11 in.), Palazzo Altemps, H. 2.11 m (6 ft. 11 in.), Palazzo Altemps
The Ludovisi Gaul Killing Himself and His Wife (sometimes called "The Galatian Suicide") is a Roman marble group depicting a man in the act of plunging a sword into his breast, looking backwards defiantly while he supports the dying figure of a woman with his left arm. It is a Roman copy of the early 2nd century AD, of a Hellenistic original, ca 230-20 BC, one of the bronze groups commissioned from Greek sculptors by Attalus I after his recent victories over the Gauls of Galatia. Other Roman marble copies from the same project are the equally famous Dying Gaul, and the less well-known Kneeling Gaul.
The sculpture group made its first appearance in a Ludovisi inventory taken 2 February 1623, and was possibly found in the grounds of the Villa Ludovisi, Rome, shortly before that. The area had been part of the Gardens of Sallust in Classical times, and proved a rich source of Roman (and some Greek) sculpture through the 19th century (Haskell and Penny, 282). Among the last of the finds at Villa Ludovisi, before the area was built over, was the Ludovisi Throne.
The sculpture, now in the Museo Nazionale di Roma, Palazzo Altemps, Rome, was greatly admired from the 17th century. It appeared in engravings in the repertory of sculpture in Rome by Perrier[1] and was codified by Audran[2] as one of the sculptures of Antiquity that defined the canon of fine proportions of the human body. Nicolas Poussin adapted the figure for the group in the right foreground of his Rape of the Sabine Women, now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Friedlaender 19 and fig. 108). Visitors and writers of guidebooks found many subjects drawn from Roman history to account for the action: the 1633 Ludovisi inventory lists it as "a certain Marius who kills his daughter and himself",[3] drawing upon the story of a certain patrician Sextus Marius, who in seeking to protect his daughter from the lust of Tiberius, was accused of incest with her.
Giovanni Francesco Susini rendered the group in a small bronze. The marble was copied by François Lespingola for Louis XIV and may still be seen paired with the Laocoön at the entrance to the Tapis Vert at Versailles; the cast prepared in preparation for the copy was retained at the French Academy in Rome (where it remains). The Ludovisi heirs prohibited further casts, but in 1816–19 Prince Luigi Boncompagni Ludovisi sent plaster casts to the Prince Regent; the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Prince Metternich; and the diplomat at the Congress of Vienna, Wilhelm von Humboldt (Haskell and Penny 284).
Notes [ edit ]
^ François Perrier, Segmenta nobilium signorum et statuarum que temporis dentem invidium evase, 1638, pl. 32. ^ Gérard Audran, Les proportions du corps humain mesurées sur les belles figures de l'Antiquité, 1683, pls 8 and 9. ^ "un certo mario ch'ammazza sua figlia e se stesso" (quoted Haskell and Penny 282).
References [ edit ]Facebook is trying to thwart hackers based out of countries like Saudi Arabia and Indonesia from flooding pages with likes to fraudulently gain friends for spamming purposes, the social media giant’s care team announced in a statement.
© REUTERS / Dado Ruvic Hard Time: Egyptian Lawyer Given Ten Years for Facebook Post
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The scheme involved inauthentic "likes" and comments that appeared to come from accounts located in Bangladesh, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, and a number of other countries, the statement explained.
"By disrupting the campaign now, we expect that we will prevent this network of spammers from reaching its end goal of sending inauthentic material to large numbers of people," Technical Program Manager Shabnam Shaik said in the statement on Friday.
The statement noted that Facebook has been working to combat the scheme for the past six months and had removed most of the abusers before the spamming had begun.
"We observed that the bulk of these accounts became dormant after liking a number of pages, suggesting they had not been mobilized yet to actually make connections and send spam to those people," the statement noted.
Facebook and other social media sites are under growing pressure to clean up content, especially following the 2016 US presidential campaign in which fake news reports proliferated in partisan attempts to sway voters.The financial crisis likely cost at least a year's worth of U.S. economic output, a new Fed study finds. Worse, it's hurting the economy even now and will hurt it for years to come.
That is the cheerful conclusion of a new study by economists at the Dallas Federal Reserve, entitled "How Bad Was It? The Costs and Consequences of the 2007–09 Financial Crisis."
So how bad was it? Really, really bad: The economists say a "conservative" estimate of the damage is $14 trillion, or roughly one year's U.S. gross domestic product. This is based on how much output was lost during the crisis and Great Recession, along with all the damage done to potential future economic growth.
This is a factoid worth keeping in mind the next time bank lobbyists and flaks warn, as they habitually do, that new rules and regulations could slow the U.S. economy. Will rules to safeguard the economy vaporize $14 trillion in GDP? No? Then they're probably worth doing.
"Given our range of estimates, the tepid economic recovery, and the litany of other adverse effects stemming from the Second Great Contraction, we suggest that the total domestic cost is likely greater than the equivalent of an entire year's output," the Dallas Fed economists write. "Thus, it is crucial to identify the primary causes and implement effective policy to avoid future episodes whose magnitude could exceed even the staggering costs and consequences of the most recent financial crisis."
The Dallas Fed's numbers are consistent with a handful of other recent studies that have found crisis costs of anywhere from $13 trillion to $17 trillion to $22 trillion.
The chart below, taken from the Dallas Fed study, shows just how pitifully far below potential economic growth the economy has been and will be, no matter how you define "potential economic growth." (Story continues below chart.)
It does not help, as the Dallas Fed points out, that the recovery from the financial crisis has been much, much slower than any other recovery since World War II. This is painfully illustrated in the chart below. (Story continues below chart of pain.)
The ugliness of this recovery has to do in part with the fact that the crisis and Great Recession arose from a massive credit bubble, which tends to sap an economy's future strength. It also has to do with the fact that Washington, amazingly, has spent most of the recovery fighting over just how much to slash government spending despite this badly hobbled economy.
The problem is that all of this lost economic activity is doing permanent damage to the economy's productivity, forever lowering future growth. It is felt most directly in the job market, where the median length of unemployment is still far, far longer than at the worst of any other post-Depression recession. (Story continues below chart of misery.)
When people sit out of the job market for too long, they lose skills and become unemployable, taking them out of the labor force forever. That costs the economy in future consumption and output. The economic activity that will not happen in the future due to the wrecked job market is incalculable, the Dallas Fed economists say.
There are lots of other side effects of the crisis that the economists say are also impossible to quantify, including the loss of trust in capitalism and public officials, the moral hazard of bailing out the big banks and the potential costs of the Fed's extraordinary and risky measures to keep the economy alive.The Chicago Bulls take on the Cleveland Cavaliers on Thursday night in a TNT matchup that will go down in history. A Bulls win will mean that they’ve won 20 straight TNT home games and 19 straight Thursday TNT home games – enter the TNT Bulls.
The TNT Bulls comprise the biggest thing that Bulls fans have to look forward to at the moment, so please humor us. What follows is a methodical, exhaustive guide to the entire saga. Let’s get right to it.
In life, and in basketball, it’s tempting to try to remove uncertainty. If we could just find the right statistic or the magic lens to see the game through, maybe we could unlock the key to “solving” the NBA. We could predict outcomes, say definitively who’s the best and, most importantly, we could explain what might seem inexplicable. This is a story about why that will never happen.
Sometimes, things happen in this game that we will never fully understand, no matter how deeply we engross ourselves in real plus-minus or the four factors. Despite all of our analysis and research, despite the hours and hours we spend watching this game, it can still mystify us. Sometimes, the odds are defied and it doesn’t make sense. Sometimes, it’s even downright crazy.
Sometimes, the Chicago Bulls win 19 TNT Thursday night home games in a row.
The TNT Bulls began as just a casual observation on Twitter by FanRag Sports’ Jason Patt back in late 2015, but since then, they’ve stretched the streak from 12 games to 19 and found new and exciting ways to win games. In this story, we’ve got buzzer beaters and game winners. We’ve got awe-inspiring performances and confusing choke jobs. Giants are felled, Nate Robinsons are obnoxious and heroes are born, but I’m getting ahead of myself. We begin on Feb. 21, 2013 with two very familiar characters.From Eric Garner to Michael Brown, it has become more and more apparent to more and more Americans that the police state in this country is out of control. Despite endless attempts by police, their cop apologist friends and families, politicians, corrupted media and overt racists, thoughtful people cannot explain away a seemingly endless array of “isolated incidents” in which cops murder unarmed people.
The events in Ferguson, MO are forcing a national debate on the appropriate role of police and their use of force. We believe that conversation must happen if we are going to move toward a more peaceful society. And yes, we believe that there are many factors at play beyond criminal cops. We believe that racism, poverty, corporate interests and public union interests, and a society that is conditioned to blindly respect authority are all factors that have helped increase the aggression and criminality of so many cops. In fact, we believe that the problem is systematic; many well-meaning cops end up becoming the criminals they thought they would be fighting.
While the murder of unarmed people should be unacceptable in an advanced civilization, there are tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of crimes committed by police against the public each year. These crimes run the gamut from bad to horrible. These crimes include false arrests, assault, rape and framing people for crimes they didn’t commit, among others. With tens to hundreds of thousands of victims of police abuse each year, one might expect there to be tens of thousands of police officers sitting in prison; however, cops are able to brazenly commit crimes in front of witnesses and video cameras and get away with those crimes almost every single time. Sadly, innocent people don’t have such good luck. It is estimated that between 2.3% and 5% of all prisoners in the U.S. are innocent, meaning there may be 100,000 innocent people in prison in America. Layer on top of that all of the people who are in prison for non-violent, victimless crimes (such as drug use) and it becomes apparent that justice is a joke.
While we encourage people to get mad over the senseless killings of unarmed people such as Eric Garner and Michael Brown, we also want people to get mad over the constant harassment, victimization and imprisonment of people who manage to escape a police encounter with their life still intact. These victims are everywhere to be seen, however they are often hiding their struggles because they live in a society where victims of police abuse are blamed for their misfortune.
We also encourage people to step forward and fight back whenever they can. It is a shame that more people don’t sue police and their municipalities when they are victimized. We understand, though. Filing civil suits is hard work and there are far too few civil lawyers willing to take cases against the police; particularly if there isn’t serious bodily injury. Further, if a victim doesn’t win their criminal case, most lawyers won’t even consider a civil suit.
John Pharr of Austin, TX is a recent victim of police abuse who has had the resources and courage to fight back. On August 14, 2012, APD officer Christopher Willie pulled over John Pharr under suspicion of driving while intoxicated. When Pharr didn’t obey Willie’s arbitrary orders quickly enough, Willie ordered Pharr out of the vehicle. Willie then threw Pharr on the ground, and landed a few punches on Pharr.
Fortunately, Pharr survived his encounter with this violent cop, and now has filed a civil suit against the cop and the city of Austin. In pursuing the civil suit, Pharr and his lawyer realized that not only did the cops commit multiple felony crimes by assaulting him, but they also perjured themselves in their affidavit. And while the cops will never be charged with their felony crimes, this civil suit might raise awareness with a few more people.
While we recognize that not everyone can file suit against the cops who abuse them, we hope more and more will take the path that Pharr has taken. Winning the fight against violent, criminal cops will not be easy, and there is no silver bullet. Voting won’t solve the problem, nor will filming police. Civil suits, won’t either. However, by using every peaceful means available to us, we can help drive the national debate further, put a human face on the issue of police abuse, and begin to make more and more people aware of the out of control police who have destroyed the lives of millions of Americans.Breaking – Trump Admin to Hit Iran With New Sanctions as Tehran Threatens Attacks on US Bases
The Trump administration is reportedly increasing pressure on Iran with new sanctions targeting their ballistic missile program.
Iranian leaders threatened attacks on U.S. forces and bases in the Middle East. Iran has been bulking up their military forces with the cash that Obama delivered to them on pallets. Somewhere, Obama shed a tear over the news of these new sanctions on his Iranian friends.
Washington Free Beacon reported:
The Trump administration is expected to ratchet up pressure on Iran with a slew of new sanctions targeting the Islamic Republic’s illicit ballistic missile program and regional support for terrorism as the landmark Iranian nuclear deal hits its two-year anniversary, according to senior U.S. officials who deemed Iran in violation of the agreement’s “spirit.” News of the new sanctions comes on the same day that Iranian military leaders threatened attacks on U.S. forces and bases in the Middle East should America move forward with new sanctions, particularly ones targeting the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, or IRGC. The new sanctions are part of a larger White House effort to counter Iran’s massive military buildup and rogue militant activities across the Middle East, specifically in Syria, where Iranian-backed forces have launched a series of direct attacks on American forces in recent weeks. The new sanctions are being leveled outside the purview of the nuclear deal, meaning that they are all non-nuclear related and do not violate conditions of the deal barring the United States from engaging in such activity. As part of the effort to combat Iran’s activities, the Trump administration is expected to announce an additional package of sanctions that includes 16 Iranian entities and individuals found to be supporting Tehran’s illicit and criminal activities in the region. This includes seven entities and five individuals found to be supporting the Iranian military and criminal organizations.
Read the full report by the Washington Free Beacon here.Videos are now broadcast in very high definition, on devices ranging from large TV screens to smartphones. To keep up the pace, scientists are developing ultra-sophisticated image compression tools—such as those from a French laboratory working with Netflix.
“On average, performance doubles every three years.” That is how Patrick Le Callet, who is a professor at the Université de Nantes and a researcher at the Laboratory of Digital Sciences of Nantes (LS2N), summarizes the evolution of video streaming technology. Increasing performance by a hundred percent makes it possible to double or even quadruple the number of points of an image at the same data rate, or to divide the rate by two for the same resolution. This is why it is now possible to watch videos on a smartphone with a quality that compares very favorably to that of old DVDs.
Researchers in Nantes working with Netflix
French teams have acquired globally recognized know-how in this field, and that is why the video-on-demand streaming giant Netflix—with more than one hundred million subscribers worldwide—approached LS2N two years ago. The laboratory has developed skills in three areas, which is fairly rare: the development of methods—or algorithms—for compression, automatic prediction of the video quality for the audience, and the creation and standardization of protocols for evaluating subjective video quality, which are applicable to all image compression technologies. During the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona (Spain) last March, Netflix presented a new tool for video coding produced in collaboration with LS2N, one that offers high quality images at a rate of 100 kilobits per second —40 times less than High Definition (HD) television—and is compatible with mobile telephone networks. Beyond this contractual collaboration, Netflix is also a patron of LS2N, a first for the industrial actor outside the US. It has provided financing for research, at the sole condition that the results be released under a "free license" in open access.
1001 ways to encode images
Compression is necessary because an HD camera’s raw images constitute a stream with a rate of a few hundred megabits per second, which is incompatible with the capacity of storage media as well as the bandwidth of both landline and mobile telecommunication networks. Compression involves eliminating as much unnecessary or redundant data as possible, while limiting image distortion. This process requires such heavy calculations, that the quality on a live televised video stream will never be the same as for an on-demand film, where the distributor had plenty of time to compress! Of course, the chosen method must conform to industry standards in order to ensure that devices are able to decode the videos. Over the last twenty years, coding algorithms have enabled image size to increase sharply, with content producers now starting to broadcast in "4K," which is approximately 4,000 pixels wide, and includes 8 million points—or pixels—per image. This is a long way from the 400,000 pixels in the MPEG-2 from our old DVDs, even though the data rates are very similar, on the order of 5 Mbit/s!
“The most recent HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) standard is like a toolbox,” explains Le Callet. Engineers and researchers have complete freedom for coding, as long as their video streams ultimately conform to the standard. As a result, everyone is developing their own formula. “There are millions of ways to proceed for each image or fragment of an image, with each one impacting the quality of that image as well as the ones that follow.” Furthermore, our processing must be able to distinguish between a static or moving scene: “When the camera is not moving, the texture of the grass in a stadium is visible. But when the camera moves, if we’re not careful the grass will suddenly look like a billiard cloth with no relief!” The encoding method therefore has to constantly adapt—and must do so automatically—as it processes the images, while predicting the impact a coding choice will have on the viewing quality of the ensuing images. “Optimization is an art that requires finding, at each and every moment, striking the right balance between the information rate and perceptual image distortion.”
Relying on visual experience
LS2N has turned to sample groups of users in its efforts to model image perception. Such tests feed into databases that can test and validate compression algorithms. “We are also studying aspects related to artistic intention, for instance to prevent compression from betraying the emotion that the images were meant to convey. To do so, we use an instrument known as an oculomotor to follow the viewer’s gaze, in an effort to improve our understanding of the quality of experience, a research area with a bright future.” The laboratory is also studying, among other things, a technique for increasing the contrast of images known as HDR. “We’ve observed, for instance, that depending on HDR rendering, certain screens can make some details more prominent, or on the contrary reduce their perception.”
Netflix_Visual attention and eye-tracking About Share About Close Description: Cet enregistrement issu du laboratoire LS2N permet d’observer et d’analyser le regard d'un utilisateur lorsqu'il visionne une vidéo. Durée: 09s Réalisateur: IRCCyN/IVC Producteur: IRCCyN/IVC
HDR (High Dynamic Range) is, along with compression, one of the specializations of the Laboratory of Signals and Systems (L2S) located in Gif-sur-Yvette (Paris, France), where Frédéric Dufaux works as a CNRS senior researcher. This technique, which is also used in photography, uses more bits to code each pixel in order to show more detail in the dark and light areas of an image. “The challenge for television and video on-demand is to combine this improvement with the broadcasting of 4K images, without slowing the rate,” Dufaux explains. “We based ourselves on the characteristics of human vision, and therefore devoted more information to what the eye perceives better, and less to what it sees less. We also took different situations into consideration since light conditions can change rapidly, for example when a camera emerges from a building into broad daylight.” L2S has therefore developed an algorithm that combines HDR and HEVC. “It offers the same performance as conventional methods in non-complex lighting conditions, and provides better results for images with high contrast changing over time.” The laboratory is also studying the coding of 3D images, which requires specific compression methods as well.
Applications from the defense industry to healthcare
Compression is not limited to the broadcasting of television and on-demand video streams. “It is also widely used in video surveillance, defense, and medicine, and plays an increasing role in the automotive industry with reversing cameras, collision alerts and lane departures, as well as for the detection of road signs,” Dufaux points out. Each application requires specific compression methods, as a television viewer will not accept distortion, but a member of the military analyzing a surveillance drone image will adapt, as long as it allows him or her to make the right decision. “In medical imagery, doctors did not want to hear of image compression for fear of losing details important for establishing a diagnosis. Yet with progress, compression has become widely accepted!” Just as it has in our devices, for any smartphone today can do a much better job in this area than the large computers from the end of the last century!First Nations volunteers are launching a regular patrol of the river banks in Thunder Bay, Ont., and non-Indigenous residents are joining the chorus of criticism about police practices in the city after the death of a seventh Indigenous teen.
Josiah Begg, 14, was found dead in the McIntyre River on May 18, less than two weeks after Tammy Keeash, 17, was found dead in the floodway of the same river. Both teens were from remote First Nations. In all, seven Indigenous teens have been found dead in rivers that run through the city since 2000.
No one knows how the teens wind up in the river, but there are growing concerns about racially motivated violence.
"For me, the anti-Indigenous racism in this city has become so normal and it's so troubling and it creates this atmosphere of heaviness and unrest and unsafeness," said Jana-Rae Yerxa, a member of Couchiching First Nation who lives in Thunder Bay.
'I don’t know what’s happening but it scares me. It concerns me and I just think about if these weren’t Indigenous youth, how would we be looking at this?' says Bear Clan patrol volunteer Jana-Rae Yerxa. (Martine Laberge/Radio-Canada) "A few months ago we had an Indigenous woman that was hit by trailer hitch and all of this makes me want to do this," Yerxa said Friday night as she joined the Bear Clan, a First Nations-led volunteer group that has vowed to regularly patrol the river banks.
News of the recent river deaths prompted Tara Lewis to ask questions about how police in her hometown are dealing with a situation she encountered last fall.
Lewis told CBC News she was closing up her downtown business on Thunder Bay's south side on Oct. 22, 2016, when she encountered a First Nations man in distress.
"He was completely drenched and bleeding from the head," Lewis said.
'I feel like this is the time to talk about it,' says Tara Lewis, who encountered a First Nations man who said he'd been thrown in a river by two white men. (Martine Laberge/Radio-Canada) "In a nutshell he told us he had just crawled out of the river because two — in his words — white men, had come down to the river in a blue truck, had beat him up, assaulted him and thrown him in the river and he struggled to get out, got out of the river and noticed they came back in the truck and put him back in the river," she said.
Lewis alerted police and gave a statement. Now she's left wondering why police didn't treat the case with more urgency or see a connection to the river deaths.
"It seems to be the opinion of a lot of people..in the Indigenous community, but also people like myself who have borne witness to something that is clearly troublesome," she said.
2nd report of assault at the river
Thunder Bay police confirmed the report of an assault on that date last fall. In an emailed statement, a spokesperson said the criminal investigations branch "followed up on the case and it remains unsolved and open."
It's the second report of a First Nations person being thrown in a river. In 2016, an inquest into the deaths of seven Indigenous students heard evidence about a teen from North Caribou Lake First Nation who survived a 2007 attack by a group young males who were not known to him. No one has been charged for that assault.
Ontario's civilian police oversight body launched an unprecedented systemic review of the way Thunder Bay police investigate the deaths of Indigenous people last fall. Results aren't expected until the end of the year.
That's in part because the two recent deaths have been added to the review. Police say Begg's death remains under investigation while Keeash's death has been handed over to the coroner to examine.
Police role critical
Dr. Kona Williams, with Ontario's Forensic Pathology Service, said the role of the police is critical for collecting clues about what happens before someone drowns. (Williams is not involved with either case).
She acknowledged it can be difficult to determine how people end up in the river.
"If somebody had been pushed into the water, versus someone who slipped in the water, there would generally not be any signs on the body that we would be able to tell or make that differentiation," she said. "It can be very difficult for us to say this person was pushed, this person slipped, or this person was held under the water."
The river bank is a dangerous place for any child, regardless of race, Thunder Bay Mayor Keith Hobbs says. (Jeff Walters/CBC) Thunder Bay Mayor Keith Hobbs says he doesn't believe there is a criminal element to the deaths near the river, nor does he accept that racism plays a role.
The river bank is a dangerous place for any child, regardless of race, Hobbs said, and Indigenous teens who come to the city must be taught to avoid it.
"We have to street-proof those youth coming down [to the city from remote First Nations] and I think we have to do a better job at it. Obviously we haven't done a good enough job," he said. "We get reports all the time, police get reports that kids are hanging out down the rivers. There are parties underneath the bridges."
That response smacks of stereotypes for Yerxa on the Bear Clan patrol.
"There's always this talk of youth and drinking and the stereotype of the drunk Indian and that's what I mean about the anti-Indigenous racism being so prevalent in this city," Yerxa said.
"Because the truth is, young people, they experiment, they might drink sometimes — all youth — not just Indigenous youth, but for some reason it's our youth that end up dead in the river. How do you make sense of that?"The ongoing political scramble over how to avoid the fiscal cliff has put everybody in a somewhat wondrous mood about the level of US government debt, currently hovering around $16 trillion. How did it get that big? Did the US always have it? Has the US ever paid off its debt before?
On that last point, it’s worth noting that yes, the US did indeed hammer its debt-load down to nearly nothing. As you might have spotted if you looked at our recent complete history of US debt in one chart, President Andrew Jackson’s single-minded focus on debt reduction knocked the US debt load from more than $58 million in the year of his election, 1828—mostly a hangover from the obligations incurred to fight the War of 1812—down to essentially nothing. It was just $38,000 on Dec. 31, 1834 (pdf—see table 19). As a share of GDP, the debt load went from about 5% in 1828 to effectively, well, bupkus in 1834-36.
In the context of the current US economy, that would be more than $800 billion of debt reduction. That’s impressive, but that was still a smaller amount than the $1 trillion that the Congressional Budget Office says the US needs to trim its debt load by over the next 10 years just to stabilize its borrowing. Also in the context of the current fiscal cliff debate, Goldman Sachs says allowing tax rates to rise and other policies to expire for people with incomes over $250,000 would boost revenues by a bit more than $800 billion over a decade beginning in 2013.
So how did Jackson do it? Well, for one thing, he collected more cash—sorry, raised revenue—by jacking up import tariffs. But something else also happened. Uncle Sam balanced his budget on the back of an unsustainable, wildly-speculative land-buying frenzy that occurred during Jackson’s |
: ‘Pro-choice’ at a record low
There is “evidence that the practice of sex selection abortion is demonstrably increasing here in the United States, especially but not exclusively in the Asian immigrant community,” Arizona Republican Rep. Trent Franks, the bill’s main sponsor, said Wednesday on the House floor.
“I refuse to believe that we cannot find enough humanity in this body to conclude together that it is wrong to knowingly kill unborn children because they are baby girls instead of baby boys.”
It is “hypocrisy to say that one is pro-woman and that it’s OK to end the life of an unborn child just because of its gender,” argued Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tennessee. “Since when did America subscribe to the idea that males are worth more than females? … It’s sick, it’s discriminatory, it’s sexist and it is blatantly anti-woman and anti-human.”
Women’s rights: Nuns’ fight with Vatican highlights Catholicism’s global struggle
Rep. Chris Smith, R-New Jersey, declared, “Today the three most dangerous words in China and India are: It’s a girl. We can’t let that happen here.”
Supporters of the measure cited multiple studies to back claims of a growing pattern of abortions based on the sex of the fetus. Opponents, however, took issue with certain interpretations of the studies and warned of negative ramifications for women’s health if the bill becomes law.
Michigan Rep. John Conyers, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said the bill “tramples (on) the rights of women under the guise of nondiscrimination, while doing absolutely nothing to provide women with needed resources for their babies, female and male.”
Citing opposition to the bill from groups such as the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, Conyers said, “If this measure is passed into law, we will then require that medical and mental health professionals violate … doctor-patient confidentiality” and report suspected violations to law enforcement authorities.
Rep. Barbara Lee, D-California, said the bill’s backers were “exploiting serious issues like racism and sexism (as part of) a backdoor attempt to make abortion illegal.”
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, said nobody he has talked to favors abortion based on sex preferences, and the proposal was brought up simply “because somebody decided politically it was a difficult place to put people in.”
Drew Hammill, a spokesman for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-California, called the debate over the bill “yet another distraction and yet another day that this Republican majority fails to act on job creation.”
Asked why the Republican-controlled House is taking up an abortion bill at a time when GOP leaders have called economic recovery their top concern, a spokesman for Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said the party’s priorities had not changed.
Planned Parenthood’s new ad zeroes in on Romney
“House Republicans are focused on the American people’s top priorities: jobs and the economy,” spokesman Michael Steel said. “Dealing with a bill to prevent sex-selective abortion … doesn’t change that.”
The bill is being considered under an expedited legislative process that requires a two-thirds vote of approval for passage. While Republicans wouldn’t say why they were intentionally setting up a higher hurdle for House approval, the procedure avoids an extended argument over a divisive social issue with the potential to sidetrack the economic debate.
Franks’ bill is coming to a vote at a time when abortion, a perennial hot button topic, has re-emerged as a political focal point. The anti-abortion rights group Live Action released an undercover sting video this week showing a Planned Parenthood staffer offering advice to a woman involved in the sting on how best to proceed with an abortion if her fetus is female.
Franks and several other House Republicans are scheduled to hold a press conference Thursday morning with the head of Live Action to “address the growing trend of the abortion industry targeting baby girls in the United States,” according to a news release from Live Action.
A spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood, which provides a range of medical services for women, responded to the video’s release with a statement noting that the staff member in question lost her job because she failed to follow proper procedures for the organization.
“Planned Parenthood opposes racism and sexism in all forms, and we work to advance equity and human rights in the delivery of health care,” said spokeswoman Leslie Kantor. “Planned Parenthood condemns sex selection motivated by gender bias, and urges leaders to challenge the underlying conditions that lead to these beliefs and practices.”
Planned Parenthood’s leadership jumped into the presidential contest on Wednesday, unveiling a roughly $1.5 million ad campaign targeting presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. The ad, which claims Romney would deny women critical medical services, is set to run in the battleground states of Florida, Iowa, and Virginia.
— CNN’s Kate Bolduan and Deirdre Walsh contributed to this report.GENESIS/ Written by NATHAN EDMONDSON/ Art by ALISON SAMPSON/ Colors by JASON WORDIE/ Letters by JONATHAN BABCOCK/ Published by IMAGE COMICS
Edmondson and Sampson tell the story of Adam, an idealistic, yet failed architect. After growing up believing that he would change the world with his ideas, Adam realizes his ideas have changed nothing. He attempts to kill himself, which he fails at too. Upon waking up in the hospital, however, Adam finds that he has the power to imagine anything into existence. What develops from his newfound power brings Adam’s worst nightmare to life.
Edmondson takes his writing to a new level with this one-shot. While comic fans may be familiar with the fairly recent Black Widow series, Genesis shows that Edmondson can handle philosophically challenging subject matter as well as superhero storylines. The slow, skillful development of Adam’s descent into terror creates suspense and wonder. The reader can connect to Adam’s desire to impact the world around him as well as the fantasy of gaining the supernatural gifts to actually make that happen.
Adam is just a normal guy with normal problems, yet he is given an extraordinary power to create anything that comes to mind. As he begins to solve the world’s problems, like anyone would, Adam falls prey to the power. Edmondson forces the reader to think about how he or she would handle such great authority. As things turn nightmarish, the reader begins to understand that no one person should have the ability to alter the world on such a great scale. It is the small changes that make a difference.
There is a significant surrealism to the story as well. The path that Adam chooses for himself takes some very strange turns as he alters and destroys everything around him. He eventually comes across a Cheshire-like bear that pokes and prods at Adam’s confusion and weakness, while a strange bald man admonishes Adam for his lack of strength. These guides force the reader to realize Adam may not actually have the power to restructure the world around him, but is simply dealing subconsciously with his failed life.
Sampson’s art also aids the surreal undertones of Edmondson’s story. Each page of the story is a maze in itself. Sampson does not adhere to a logical panel order as smaller panels become engulfed in larger panels. This organizational structure helps support a dream-like image as the story develops. This structural choice also helps aid the more gruesome aspects of Adam’s descent to resonate in the readers’ minds. The blurred artwork combined with Wordie’s coloring bleeds objects into one another and also makes one feel like they are witnessing a dream sequence that the individual can’t quite remember clearly.
With Edmondson’s deeply philosophical plot and the dream-like artwork, Genesis easily becomes one of the most thought provoking comics this year. With the level of critical thought required to grasp Adam’s struggles and the surreal artwork, Genesis should challenge the reader to think about his or her life and the changes they wish to make.Japan’s currency has gained 12% against the dollar this year, increasing pressure on the Bank of Japan to take action
Fears that Japan’s anti-deflation strategy is unravelling have intensified after a sharp rise in the value of the yen against the dollar prompted a concerted attempt by policymakers in Tokyo to talk down the value of the currency.
Japan's economic plan 'backfiring' as yen surges Read more
Japan’s finance minister, Taro Aso, raised the prospect of intervention on the foreign exchanges to counter what he called the “excessive” rise in the yen, which has gained 12% against the dollar since the start of 2016 to stand at a 16-year-high.
Yen v dollar Yen v dollar.
A weaker yen formed a central plank of the so-called Abenomics programme launched by prime minister Shinzō Abe in late 2012, since a depreciating currency pushes up inflation by making imported goods dearer.
But in recent months the yen has been climbing as a result of two factors. Financial markets believe that the Federal Reserve is wary of further increases in US interest rates and were unimpressed when the Bank of Japan failed to respond at its March meeting to the weakness of the dollar.
The result has been a flow of money out of the dollar and into the yen, which will make it even harder for the government in Tokyo to raise inflation – currently 0.3% – to the target of 2%.
“A rapid move toward either yen rise or yen fall is not desirable. It is desirable that currencies are stable at levels that match the economy’s fundamentals,” Aso said on Friday.
“As the G20 confirms, excess volatility and disorderly moves in the exchange market hurt (the economy), so we are watching currency moves with a sense of urgency. We will take necessary steps under certain circumstances,” he added.
Analysts at Capital Economics described Aso’s comments as “sabre-rattling” and said they were unlikely to be backed up with intervention on the foreign exchanges, in which Japan would buy dollars or sell yen to influence the level of the exchange rate.
The consultancy firm noted that Japan had signed up to a joint G20 pledge to refrain from competitive devaluations – attempts to secure a trading advantage at the expense of another country.
Instead, the Bank of Japan is expected to take further action to stimulate the economy in the hope that higher levels of activity will push up prices.
The options are limited, and amount to driving interest rates deeper into negative territory or expanding Japan’s quantitative easing (QE) programme.
But producing a package that will “shock and awe” the markets is not going to be easy. QE is becoming less and less effective, while the decision to push interest rates below zero has not gone down well with Japanese voters.
As a result, the risk is that the Bank of Japan’s response to a rising yen will be underwhelming when it meets at the end of the month.
The upshot of that would be a continuation of the yen’s rise, a threat of a further dose of deflation and the prospect of direct action on the foreign exchanges. With protectionism sentiment rising globally, that could start a currency war.Oceana, the largest international advocacy group working solely to protect the world’s oceans, uncovered widespread seafood fraud across the United States, according to a new report released today. In one of the largest seafood fraud investigations in the world to date, DNA testing confirmed that one-third, or 33 percent, of the 1,215 fish samples collected by Oceana from 674 retail outlets in 21 states were mislabeled, according to U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) guidelines.
“Purchasing seafood has become the ultimate guessing game for U.S. consumers,” said Beth Lowell, campaign director at Oceana. “Whether you live in Florida or Kansas, no one is safe from seafood fraud. We need to track our seafood from boat to plate so that consumers can be more confident that the fish they purchase is safe, legal and honestly labeled.”
Oceana found seafood fraud everywhere it tested, including mislabeling rates of 52 percent in Southern California, 49 percent in Austin and Houston, 48 percent in Boston (including testing by The Boston Globe), 39 percent in New York City, 38 percent in Northern California and South Florida, 36 percent in Denver, 35 percent in Kansas City (MO/KS), 32 percent in Chicago, 26 percent in Washington, D.C., 21 percent in Portland (OR) and 18 percent in Seattle.
Oceana’s study targeted fish with regional significance as well as those found to be frequently mislabeled in previous studies such as red snapper, cod, tuna and wild salmon. Of the most commonly collected types of fish, snapper and tuna had the highest mislabeling rates across the country at 87 and 59 percent, respectively. While 44 percent of all the retail outlets visited sold mislabeled fish, sushi venues had the worst level of mislabeling at 74 percent, followed by other restaurants at 38 percent and then grocery stores at 18 percent.
“Some of the fish substitutions we found are just disturbing,” said Dr. Kimberly Warner, report author and senior scientist at Oceana. “Apart from being cheated, many consumers are being denied the right to choose fish wisely based on health or conservations concerns.”
Among the report’s other key findings include:
Mislabeling was found in 27 of the 46 fish types tested (59 percent).
Only seven of the 120 red snapper samples collected nationwide were actually red snapper.
Between one-fifth to more than one-third of the halibut, grouper, cod and Chilean seabass samples were mislabeled.
84 percent of the white tuna samples were actually escolar, a species that can cause serious digestive issues for some individuals who eat more than a few ounces.
Fish on the FDA’s “DO NOT EAT” list for sensitive groups such as pregnant women and children because of their high mercury content were sold to customers who had ordered safer fish: tilefish sold as red snapper and halibut in New York City and king mackerel sold as grouper in South Florida.
Cheaper farmed fish were substituted for wild fish: pangasius sold as grouper, sole, and cod, tilapia sold as red snapper and Atlantic farmed salmon sold as wild or king salmon.
Overfished and vulnerable species were substituted for more sustainable catch: Atlantic halibut sold as Pacific halibut and speckled hind sold as red grouper.
About Seafood Fraud
Seafood fraud can come in many different forms – from mislabeling fish and falsifying documents, to adding too much ice to packaging.
Today, more than 90 percent of the seafood consumed in the U.S. is imported, while less than 1 percent is inspected by the government specifically for fraud. With more than 1,700 different species of seafood from all over the world now available for sale in the U.S., it is unrealistic to expect consumers to be able to independently and accurately determine what they are actually eating.
Despite growing concern about where our food comes from, consumers are frequently served the wrong fish – a completely different species than the one they paid for. Oceana and others have found that seafood mislabeling often disguises fish that are less desirable, cheaper or more readily available.
Our fish often travels through an increasingly complex and obscure seafood supply chain, making it difficult to identify if fraud is occurring on the boat, during processing, at the retail counter or somewhere else along the way.
Oceana is calling on the federal government to require traceability of all seafood sold in the U.S. Tracking fish from boat to plate would not only significantly reduce seafood fraud and help keep illegally caught fish out of the U.S. market, it would also give consumers more information about the fish they purchase, including the species name, where, when and how it was caught, if it was farmed or previously frozen and if any additives were using during processing.YouTube beauty sensation Michelle Phan, whose channel boasts more than 6.5 million subscribers, is being sued by Ultra Records and Ultra International Music Publishing for copyright infringement.
The electronic dance music label, which represents some of the biggest DJs in the world including Steve Aoki, Benny Benassi, Calvin Harris, and David Guetta, is alleging that Phan used a host of its artist's songs in her videos without a license -- and is profiting from them. The complaint, filed Wednesday in Los Angeles, names Kaskade as an artist she frequently uses (her video "Night Life Favorites," which offers tips about what to wear when you go out at night, uses his song "4AM" and has been viewed 1.4 million times).
According to a report from Reuters, Ultra says Phan was made aware she'd need to obtain a license in order to continue implementing the songs into her videos, but that Phan never did.
It's no secret that Phan makes serious cash from her vlog, with some magazines and news outlets reporting she made upwards of $5 million in 2013. Some of Phan's most popular videos, in which she teachers viewers how to look like Lady Gaga and Barbie, have been viewed more than 50 million times.Actor Bryan Cranston has a profanity-laced warning for anyone hoping the Trump presidency doesn't succeed.
"It would be egotistical for anyone to say, 'I hope he fails,'" Cranston told the Hollywood Reporter in an interview published Monday, referring to President Trump. "To that person I would say, fuck you. Why would you want that? So you can be right?"
Cranston, best known for his turn as Walter White in AMC's "Breaking Bad," was a vocal critic of Trump in the lead-up to the 2016 elections.
But he admitted "it’s just astonishing" how his opinion has morphed since the president's inauguration.
"President Trump is not the person who I wanted to be in that office and I’ve been very open about that," he continued. "That being said, he is the president. If he fails, the country is in jeopardy."
Cranston said hyper-partisanship was preventing lawmakers from solving pressing policy problems, adding there needed to be a paradigm shift away from "this idea that our country is [a] political football and someone with a different opinion is the enemy."
Instead, he said people should "assume they love this country as much as you do.''
"If you’ve got a good idea that helps the country, oh man, I’m gonna support you," he said. "I don’t care if you’re a Republican and I’m a Democrat or whatever, I don’t care. A good idea’s a good idea."
Cranston is currently promoting his new film, "Last Flag Flying."One of the disorienting things about technological change is the way it can take people who would otherwise be on the same side and pit them against each other. Consider the fight that’s broken out this week. In this corner: A responsible and intelligent college radio DJ who loves Big Star and Yo La Tengo. In the other corner: Semi-famous indie rocker whose career playing skewed songs like “Sad Lovers Waltz” and "Teen Angst” depends on DJs and record buyers very much like his adversary. Were this the ‘80s or ‘90s, the two might have shown up mugging in a photo tacked to the radio station’s cluttered wall.
But instead of being allies, Emily White, an NPR intern and general manager at American University’s WVAU, and Camper van Beethoven/Cracker singer David Lowery, are after each other.
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The dissonance here between fan and musician emerges from one of the key conflicts of our time: How should we pay for culture in the Internet era, and if we don't pay, what happens to the producers of culture? It was only a matter of time before an exchange like this would make the terms of the debate clear.
Over the weekend, White posted a piece on NPR’s All Songs Considered blog called “I Never Owned Any Music to Begin With,” in which she explains, in a reasonable, matter-of-fact tone, that despite being an enormous music fan, with a library of more than 11,000 songs, she has paid for almost none of it. Part of what’s striking is that she is not a culture-wants-to-be-free zealot, an unrepentant pirate or a feckless, that’s-just-the-way-I-roll Millennial. She seems to suspect there’s something wrong with this picture, but is not sure how wrong, and not sure how to fix it.
Lowery, a singer/guitarist whose profile was highest back when indie rock was called college radio, in the mid-'80s to early ‘90s, responded with a long post on the Trichordist, a community blog run by “Artists for an Ethical Internet.” He argues that by taking and listening to music without paying a record store or label or Internet service like Spotify, she and her generational peers are effectively cheating musicians out of the value of their work. (I’ll shock nobody by saying that as a Gen X’er who’s worked for many years as a sometime rock critic, and runs with writers, DJs and record store folk, I’ve got my share of music I didn’t pay for. But since I turned 16 or so, a large part of my disposable income has gone to recordings, whether vinyl, CD or download. We’re the transitional generation on this count, and everybody I know who loves music practices the kind of tithing I describe.)
Lowery writes that if it’s not literally piracy, even folks who copy songs from friends, libraries or radio station collections are depriving musicians of their property. And what’s worse, he says, many of them are doing it with the assumption that the only damage they’re inflicting is to the hookers-and-blow business model of the record industry. What you’re doing instead, he says, is taking from artists – many of whom struggle – and giving it to corporations bigger than anything left in the music industry.
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So who’s right? In the broad sense, they both are: White is describing the way music sharing works among her generation, one that came of age after the fetishism of cover art, liner notes and the physical qualities of records and CDs. (It would be interesting here to look at the generational makeup of the vinyl revival, which is driven in part by a longing for sound vastly warmer and more expansive than that on MP3s but also by the old-school ritual of a brick-and-mortar shop, an informed and/or forbidding clerk, and the tangibility of the physical object.) She comes across as wanting to do what’s right.
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But Lowery’s argument – despite a few misspellings and the jumble of well-considered and rushed thoughts that the Web all but requires – is one of the most important meditations on the state of music in our time. He drops some crucial statistics here, among them that “Recorded music revenue is down 64 percent since 1999,” and that “The number of professional musicians has fallen 25 percent since 2000.” He refers indirectly to something equally important: The money being spent on music is not ending up in the hands of musicians, or even labels, or members of the creative class, from the record store clerk to a label president. It's going to Apple – which could, thanks to iTunes, buy every surviving label with pocket change – and other technology companies.
Perhaps the most effective argument of Lowery’s is an extended metaphor about a lawless urban neighborhood – shades of the strange days during the L.A. riots -- that never raised a police force.
So in this neighborhood people simply loot all the products from the shelves of the record store. People know it’s wrong, but they do it because they know they will rarely be punished for doing so. What the commercial Free Culture movement (see the “hybrid economy”) is saying is that instead of putting a police force in this neighborhood we should simply change our values and morality to accept this behavior. We should change our morality and ethics to accept looting because it is simply possible to get away with it. And nothing says freedom like getting away with it, right? But it’s worse than that. It turns out that Verizon, AT&T, Charter etc etc are charging a toll to get into this neighborhood to get the free stuff. Further, companies like Google are selling maps (search results) that tell you where the stuff is that you want to loot... Further, in order to loot you need to have a $1,000 dollar laptop, a $500 dollar iPhone or $400 Samsumg (sic) tablet. It turns out the supposedly “free” stuff really isn’t free. In fact it’s an expensive way to get ‘free’ music… And none of that money goes to the artists!
There’s a contrarian buzz on the blogosphere toward debunking Lowery’s argument, calling him an old fogey or someone who won’t let go of the old days.
But his metaphor of the neighborhood that funnels money to technology corporations and takes it from the artists actually writing and producing the music just about sums up the state of the art in the 21st century. And that tattered, corporate-sponsored neighborhood that’s like one of Italo Calvino’s bad dreams represents more than just the record industry.
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The damage to culture by digital technology, the struggling economy and changing habits can be seen in an almost infinite number of places – the film market in Spain, where illegal downloads have made it almost impossible to sell DVDs, or New Orleans, where the newspaper that gave perhaps the most courageous coverage of Hurricane Katrina just laid off half of its staff. That abstract neighborhood is as real as the bookstore that used to exist down the street from the place you live or work, or the clerks and managers who used to work there.
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When you ask people why they steal music, or why they don’t care about the collapse of the record industry, the more informed ones talk about the decadence of the labels themselves. Lowery describes the point of view of his students at the University of Georgia this way: “It’s OK not to pay for music because record companies rip off artists and do not pay artists anything.” Nonsense, he says – some labels were crooked, but most allowed musicians to make a living making music. As bad and wasteful as the labels could be, he’s essentially right about this, and our new model, with its mix of iTunes and piracy, is no improvement.
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But part of the blame for the awful state of affairs that White and Lowery are arguing over goes to the record industry itself, which slept as technology changed, then responded with lawsuits against Napster and luckless downloaders rather than finding a way to accommodate new appetites and new capacities.
“The labels were the ones faced with this fork in the road,” says Steve Knopper, a Rolling Stone contributor and author of "Appetite for Self-Destruction," about the record industry’s suicide. “Come up with a new model, or ride CDs down into the ground. People on their own staffs were telling them, ‘Do something with Napster, make a deal with them.’
“The labels, from top to bottom, said, 'We are going to rely on our CD-selling model, screw all these punk Napster people.’“
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And the real damage, he says, was done in a brief window of time: From the emergence of Napster, in 1999, to 2003, when the iTunes store opened. “There was almost no legal way in that period, anywhere in the world, where someone could buy a download. That four-year period killed the labels. They had a deal on the table with Napster, but that deal collapsed. The majority of the people running the labels said, ‘Screw this Internet stuff, we sell CDs. We’re big, they’re small.’"
Part of what made labels vulnerable was the insularity of their leadership, Knopper says. “You had to prove that you went to clubs, had ‘cred,’ had worked with Elvis, that you had solid-gold ears, that you could hear a hit when no one else could.” Not exactly the type given to thoughtful restructuring in the face of technological innovation.
Of course, the record industry was not alone: It resembles, among other things, the newspapers that covered it, as media companies allowed themselves to be upended by Craigslist and actually paid to transfer content to the Web, where ad rates drop tenfold.
For a long time, the model for record labels and newspapers alike involved giving away something for a larger gain. With papers, “You’d sell your content incredibly cheap – like for 25 cents – but you’d also sell advertising. For decades, in music, the model has been, you listen to the music for free on the radio, and then it becomes, ‘Oh, I love the single, I’ll buy an expensive record or CD.’”
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The anger and frustration, and plummeting revenues, we get in Lowery’s blog post show what happens when life changes and the leadership sleeps through it.
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So with the music industry dropping the ball, is it fair to beat up on the musicians? Of course not, and that’s why Lowery’s argument resonates. Most of our pop images of musicians – whether Zeppelin trashing hotel rooms, Ozzy Osbourne in his Beverly Hills mansion or hip-hoppers with Bentleys, bling and bottles of Chivas – involve wealth leading to irresponsibility. Rock music – unlike the folk and blues it came from – has always been aspirational and its rebel stance has often translated into materialism and narcissism. Elvis walked into Sun Studios a shy, bashful truck driver; a few years later he was before the movie cameras, in a gold lamé suit.
But rock ‘n’ roll fantasy aside, the vast majority of musicians in any genre are working hard to get by, and touring almost constantly for shrinking yields. And the Internet has, with a few exceptions – Radiohead, Amanda Palmer – not made things easier.
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Lowery, who teaches the business of music, quotes a statistic that the average income of a musician who files taxes is about $35,000, without benefits. Similarly, he writes, “Of the 75,000 albums released in 2010 only … 1,000 sold more than 10,000 copies … the point where independent artists begin to go into the black on professional album production, marketing and promotion.”
It’s the kind of thing you don’t hear from Internet Utopians who crow about the “democratization” the Web encourages and the way digital technology keeps us all “connected.”
In February, the New York Times’ Eduardo Porter wrote about what all this Internet democratization means: “According to Nielsen, 75,300 albums were released in 2010, 25 percent more than in 2005. But new releases that sold more than 1,000 copies fell to about 4,700 from 8,000 during that time.” That’s selling more than just 1,000 copies.
If, writes Porter, “professional musicians, movie directors and writers can’t make money from their art, they will probably make less of it. Independent producers say piracy is already making it harder to raise money for small and mid-budget movies. Stopping piracy is about protecting creativity — and the many occupations it supports (think pop band or sound mixer). If we value what creative industries produce as much as we say we do, Congress will have to find a way to protect it without limiting speech.”
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Is there a way to make government regulations satisfy Lowery – who wants artists to get paid for their intellectual property – and White, who closes by asking for “the ability to listen to what I want, when I want and how I want it”? Probably. It may take a few more public arguments – some perhaps less polite than this one -- to get there.100,000 years ago modern human’s left their African cradle to explore pastures new. Initially they hugged the coastline, taking advantage of a tropical paradise, with rich and abundant food and resources. By 60,000 years ago, humans had reached the Indian subcontinent; at the time the Ice Age was in full swing, with immense glaciers covering large swathes of the Northern hemisphere. With so much water locked up in Ice, sea levels around the world were much lower than they are today. It’s possible that the ancestors of the Sentinelese reached their island home on foot by taking advantage of newly exposed beaches; it’s also possible they reached the Island via canoe. In any case, once the sea levels rose again, the people became cut off and totally isolated from the rest of the world.
Around a thousand years ago, Chinese and Arabian travellers stumbled upon the island and attempted to land, but were met by fierce resistance in the form of arrows and javelins. Later on, the travellers described the Sentinelese as ‘3 feet tall, with human bodies and bird beaks’. The great explorer Marco Polo also experienced a brief encounter which must have left a bitter taste in the mouth, judging by this description he gave them: ‘They are a most violent and cruel generation, who seem to eat everybody they catch’ no evidence of cannibalism has ever been recorded.
From the 18th century onwards a steady stream of Christian missionaries attempted to get onto the island in order so that they could civilise the savages and convert the heathens to the way of God, but all of these attempts were met with failure, as they were subjected to the usual hostile response. Finally, in the mid 19th century, the British seemed to have made a breakthrough, when they managed to establish a penal colony on the neighbouring South Andaman Island, the Brits were ruthless in their attempts to convert the tribes of the archipelago, including the Sentinelese into ‘decent civilised people’. They accommodated them in modern houses, dressed them in western clothes and taught them to read and write. The civilising met with complete disaster, as the indigenous people succumbed to imported western diseases, and epidemics of pneumonia, measles and influenza.
The next serious attempt to make contact with the Sentinelese came in 1967. Indian authorities based in Port Blair laid out plans to carry out a series of visits, in order to try to establish friendly relations. The decision was made to shower the Sentinelese with gifts such as coconuts to try and quell their fiery hostility. However, these friendly encounters also ended in failure, despite the generosity of the Indian government, the tribe continued to resist, killing several people along the way. In 2004, the whole of South-East Asia was rocked by a massive tsunami that caused wholesale damage and killed tens of thousands, in the aftermath of the disaster, the Indian government, who by now had made the wise decision to leave the Sentinelese alone, feared that they had been wiped out by the huge waves that caused great devastation to the area. So they sent out a helicopter to see what fate had befallen the tribe. The crew were astonished when their presence was acknowledged by a lone warrior standing proudly on the beach, shooting arrows up at the chopper. In a way, it was no great surprise that they had survived. After all, if they've managed to survive alone for 60,000 years, then it’s likely that the people possess knowledge of how to deal with a tsunami, passed down orally through the generations. According to experts, it seems that the Sentinelese survived by retreating inland, finding the highest ground possible.
In 2006, the Sentinelese came to the attention of the wider world. Media outlets around the world, reported the deaths of two Indian fishermen, Sunder Raj and Pandit Tiwari. Their boat accidentally drifted onto the shore of North Sentinel Island, the two men reported by eyewitnesses to be drunk were attacked by warriors wielding axes. Later on, a helicopter was sent to the island in order to retrieve the bodies, but was met with the usual welcoming reception, forcing them to abandon the mission. Despite the failure, the crew did observe that the Sentinelese had buried the two fishermen in shallow graves on the beach, thus refuting their belief that ‘they roasted and ate their victims’. This extraordinary incident saw a division of opinion between the two victims’ families. The relatives of Sunder Raj pressured the authorities into delivering justice and compensation. However, the Indian government were conscious of the special status of the Sentinelese, and also the pressure they would come under from international preservation groups, who fight to guarantee Sentinelese survival and also the survival of the other Andaman tribes, they were reluctant to pursue the matter. Amazingly the government and the Sentinelese found an unlikely supporter in the form of Pandit Tiwari’s father, who stated that his son got the justice he deserved, as he was breaking the law. He also stated that he believes that the Sentinelese are the real victims in all of this. A people that live in constant fear of poachers and other intruders, he understood that the people were defending themselves in the only way that they knew. He did say though, that what he would like his son’s body back, so that he and his family can bury him properly. Five years later, the bodies have yet to be recovered; the authorities are reluctant to attempt another retrieval operation, knowing all too well, what they can expect.As Vladimir Putin’s Russia continues to threaten Ukraine, having stolen Crimea in the spring and exerted de facto Kremlin control over much of the Donbas this summer, war worries are mounting on NATO’s eastern frontier. New reports of Russian troop movements on the Ukrainian border this week are not reassuring to those Atlantic Alliance members who suffered Soviet occupation for decades, and still live in Moscow’s neighborhood.
Neither are Russian air force incursions into Western airspace calming nerves with their reborn Cold War antics: yesterday, NATO fighters intercepted no less than nineteen Russian combat aircraft, including several heavy bombers. No NATO countries are more worried about Kremlin aggression than the Baltic states, with their small militaries and lack of strategic depth, which are frankly indefensible in any conventional sense without significant and timely Alliance assistance.
But Poland is the real issue when it comes to defending NATO’s exposed Eastern frontier from Russian aggression. Only Poland, which occupies the Alliance’s central front, has the military power to seriously blunt any Russian moves westward. As in 1920, when the Red Army failed to push past Warsaw, Poland is the wall that will defend Central Europe from any westward movement by Moscow’s military. To their credit, and thanks to a long history of understanding the Russian mentality better than most NATO and EU members, Warsaw last fall, when the violent theft of Crimea was still just a Kremlin dream, announced a revised national security strategy emphasizing territorial defense. Eschewing American-led overseas expeditions like those to Iraq and Afghanistan that occupied Poland’s Ministry of Defense (MoD) during the post-9/11 era, this new doctrine makes defending Poland from Eastern aggression the main job of its military. Presciently, then-Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski, contradicting optimistic European and NATO presumptions of our era that conventional war in Europe was unthinkable, stated in |
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‘We are tying personal assistants like Siri, Cortana, and Google Now with SDB. These assistants understand user behavior and the user’s schedule and by using this information, an OS can perform better parameter selection,’ the paper reads.
The study goes on to quote a solution to wearables charging which often struggles to manage the need for bendable batteries, which have excellent low power handling, with consumer demand for high power applications. The researchers claim that a hybrid battery system which combines a bendable battery with a Li-ion battery and uses an SDB algorithm, could allow a wearable OS to minimise inefficiency, utilise strap space and maintain the ability to execute high power workloads such as GPS tracking.
Additionally, the technology is able to monitor charging behaviour, recording when a user typically plugs in their device and how long for, in order to improve efficiency. Power for a user who rarely unplugs an external battery, for example, would be best drawn simultaneously from both internal and external batteries, reducing internal losses and increasing the energy delivered to the system. In this usage case, results of the simultaneous power parameter showed a 22% average improvement in battery life. However, this gain would not be achieved for a user who only plugs in for short periods of time – hence the importance of SDB adaptation to specific user behaviour.
The cost of the SDB system, according to Chandra, will not be ‘significant’ as weight and volume are not compromised. The system can be implemented by simply expanding the functionality of a device’s micro-controller and exposing existing battery packs to the OS – ‘there is no additional cost or bulk because of SDB.’
The team is expected to present their findings at the Symposium on Operating Systems Principles this week, along with working prototypes. Although the system remains in the field of research for now, the researchers hope to have it installed in consumer products in the near future.
Looking even further ahead, Chandra suggests the technology could be applied to smartphones, electric vehicles, data centres and any other use case powered by a battery.
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.The television show “Friends” saved my life.
It was the year of 2000, late October. Friends was at its prime having aired for the past six years with four more approaching.
My mother was pregnant with me, her first born child. It was a smooth pregnancy up to date, and as she was approaching her due date, the doctor had told her to come to the hospital on x day at x time.
My mom, being the wonderful Friends geek she was (is), politely asked if it would be alright to check into the hospital an hour or two prior to the time Friends would air, as this was on a Thursday. She wanted to be settled in and situated in her hospital room so that she could view that nights episode with as little distraction as possible. The doctors humorously agreed, and so the pregnancy went on healthily and normally as she waited for the date to approach.
So, October 26th, 2000 comes and my mom checks into the hospital, early as expected. She gets situated in her room, hooked up to all the machines and monitors, with the slight ‘swish swish’ of my heartbeat portrayed on a monitor calmly in the background. The Friends theme-song played shortly after, all was right in the world.
Swish swish “So no one told you life was gonna be this way-” *mother claps to theme song probably* swish swish “your jobs a joke you’re broke-” swish swish “your love life’s DOAAAAA” swish swish “It’s like you’re always stuck in second gearrrrr” *swishing stops* *mother notices, nurse notices*
Well shit…
As told by my mother, the next two minutes were a blur. Like the movies, she said nurses and doctors flooded into the room and rushed her bed down the hall. She still remembers the time I was born due to the doctors screaming out the time as they ran down the hallway.
So an Emergency C-Section proceeds to take place at the speed of light. I was pulled from the womb with all five fingers tightly wrapped around my umbilical cord.
Yeah… I cut my own circulation off, almost killing unborn self. What a dork.
Not only were my fingers wrapped around my umbilical cord, but they were wrapped so tightly the doctors had to pry them off.
The scary thing is, had my mom not asked to go into the hospital a few hours early to catch Friends, she would’ve been at home when my heart stopped beating. No doctors, no medical equipment. I would’ve died then and there.
But I ended up being a healthy baby and was very blessed that Friends happened to exist at that point in time.
As for myself, I fell in love with Friends. In fact it’s on most nights in the background while I browse Quora and such. Currently:
Thanks for reading :)A man asked, “You’re coming now after everything was destroyed?”
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, although the attack bore the hallmark of Islamist militants fighting President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi who have previously targeted minority Christians over their perceived support for his government.
It was the second major attack in the Egyptian capital in three days, marking a jarring return to violence after months of relative calm. An Islamist militant group claimed responsibility for an explosion at a security check post on Friday that killed six police officers.
Mr. Sisi’s strongman rule has come under economic pressure in recent months amid high inflation and a sharp drop in the value of the Egyptian pound. Threatened street protests last month did not materialize, but the surging attacks may be an attempt to stoke opposition through violence.
Egyptian security officials, quoted by state media, said that an explosive device containing about 26 pounds of TNT had been placed in the chapel. It went off during Mass around 10 a.m.
Most of the dead and wounded were women and children, Sherief Wadee, an assistant minister for health, said in a television interview. Mr. Sisi declared three days of mourning, state media said.Vancouver composer Bob Smart has been given a very interesting mission: put together a choir of screamers.
What does that mean?
Well, instead of singing a masterpiece, his choir will scream it.
Smart has been commissioned to create the group for a project for Vancouver's Playland.
"I don't know why, but I'm the guy [to do it]," Smart said.
Although he says this is the most difficult and "craziest thing" he's been asked to do, it's not the first time he's been asked to do something ridiculous.
"I've been tasked with making a pop song out of frogs, an orchestra of car horns, songs made out of dolphins and seals, even one that I won an award for was with a sex toy playing All by Myself on a vibrator."
Smart is currently at the recruitment stage.
"The ideal screamer is someone who can scream in tune," he said.
He admits harmony might not be possible for the choir as screaming generally has far more tones than a clear, single sung note.
"But I'd like to have it so you can recognize what we're screaming rather than sounding just like a bunch of people screaming," he said.
"I'm thinking [the screaming] will be done mostly in unison and take the choir into two or three parts so that they don't have to constantly scream because you'll fatigue really quick."
Talented screamers can submit an audition tape until Sunday, June 18. Rehearsals and a public performance are scheduled for July.
Listen to the interview with Bob Smart on CBC's The Early Edition:Nearly 300 British personnel who served in Iraq have been contacted by investigators looking into allegations of war crimes, with some of them facing interrogation on their doorsteps, officials have said.
The Iraq historic allegations team (Ihat), the government-established criminal investigation into claims of murder, abuse and torture during the Iraq war, said it has written to veterans a week after it warned that some may face prosecution.
In some cases the letters were hand-delivered and it suggested that investigators had taken the opportunity to “ask a few questions” where possible. In a statement released on Friday, it defended its actions, saying their investigators had carried out “standard police practice”.
About 280 veterans have been sent documents telling them they were involved in an incident under investigation by the Ihat, a spokeswoman for the unit said.
“It is standard police practice to send letters as a means of contacting potential witnesses.
“Sometimes, the letters are delivered by hand and it may be that, if a potential witness is at home, then the investigator will take the opportunity to ask a few questions. Again, this is standard police practice. In this situation there is no obligation to respond to such enquiries – it is very much a matter for the individual,” the spokeswoman said.
The MoD said: “The vast majority of UK service personnel deployed on military operations conduct themselves professionally and in accordance with the law. The MoD takes all allegations of abuse or unlawful killing extremely seriously. That is why we are ensuring that they are investigated to establish the facts.”
Ihat’s workload includes more than 1,500 possible victims, of whom 280 were alleged to have been unlawfully killed. Last week, Mark Warwick, the former police detective in charge of the unit, told the Independent that his team had identified cases where he felt there was “significant evidence to be obtained to put a strong case before the service prosecuting authority to prosecute and charge”.
He said he expected to make progress within the next 12 to 18 months. “Then I think we can say whether [finalising investigations by] 2019 seems realistic,” he added.
On Friday night, the Independent reported dozens of cases in which British service personnel were accused of unlawfully killing Iraqis had already been referred to prosecutors.
Police chiefs and MPs have called the investigation a “despicable witch-hunt”, according to the Daily Mail.
The news comes after the law firm Leigh Day was referred to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal over complaints about its handling of legal claims brought by Iraqi detainees against the MoD. The claims, which crumbled when it emerged that some of the Iraqis were members of the rebel Mahdi army, centred on allegations that detainees had been abused and murdered by British soldiers.
The chairman of the Al-Sweady inquiry, which was set up to look into the claims, called the most serious of them “deliberate lies, reckless speculation and ingrained hostility”.THE NEW MINISTER for Education, Ruairi Quinn, has said that he wants to identify ways in which to transfer schools out of Catholic patronage.
At an address to the annual conference of the Catholic Primary School Management Association (CPSMA), Quinn said that he wanted to transfer the schools out of Catholic patronage in order to “create greater diversity and choice.”
The establishment of a ‘Forum on Patronage and Pluralism in the Primary Sector’ was set out as part of the coalition’s programme for government.
Quinn said he would be establishing a forum to identify ways in which to do this and said it would focus not on whether this was a good idea but how to make it happen.
And he added that he would be looking to make it happen as soon as possible, and to complete the process in nine months’ time:
We have to provide for an array of choice in our education system and ensure that different forms of patronage reflect the diversity of our modern society and the choices of parents. Of course, all of this must be done within the context of the restraints on the public finances.
The initiative has been welcomed by the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference which said it welcomes the new forum’s “expeditious establishment and conclusion.”A retired NYPD officer is under arrested Tuesday, accused of running 58 escort service websites that led to an income of millions of dollars.Michael Rizzi was taken into custody at his home on 81st Street in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, by Homeland Security Investigations agents and police officers.He was charged with prostitution and money laundering, and immediately after being released on $500,000 bond, he was re-arrested by the NYPD after an apparently unlicensed weapon was found in his house.Rizzi retired on medical disability and receives a city pension. He allegedly ran the business out of his home over the past four years.In the criminal complaint, Rizzi is quoted discussing his service. He reportedly told one prospective female employee to Google "escorts in nyc" and "I'm number one for a reason...I get the most business, my girls make the most money, my clients are the wealthiest people in the world.""At the end of the day, we're focused on the money laundering and organized crime connections to this investigation," Homeland Security Investigations Assistant Special Agent in Charge Steven Schrank said. "Moved multiple millions of dollars through shell corporations that operated in and out of New York, and in the financial crime arena, we're very concerned about the movement of illicit proceeds through shell corporations."It is also mentioned in the complaint that two female employees "knew they were interviewing to be prostitutes and believed that was clear. At the interviews, Rizzi commented that they could decide what sexual acts to engage in with the clients. Neither believed she was a non-sexual time companion when working for Rizzi."One client reportedly requested an eight-hour appointment at the Park Central Hotel. The client was provided with prices -- $600 per hour, $7,200 for a 12-hour appointment (6 p.m. to 6 a.m.) and $8,400 for a 14-hour appointment (6 p.m. to 8 a.m.).The escorts he is accused of providing charged anywhere from $400 to $2,000 an hour.Federal authorities will seize his 58 websites related to the charges.His attorney argues he ran a legitimate escort business.So DivX Corporation's Stage6 has croaked. The service's 'goodbye, cruel word' note says it was a victim of its own success, but that it proved 'it's possible to distribute true high definition video on the Internet'. What it really showed is how deliriously inefficient streaming video is, whether it's high def or otherwise.
It cost at least $1m a month to run Stage6 with its 17.4 million unique users a month, whereas (at an informed guess) The Pirate Bay costs about $50,000 a month all-in for its 92.5 million. That’s $57,000 per million users for Stage6; $540 per million for The Pirate Bay (not including people using its tracker without visiting the site, which adds a lot of Mininova‘s traffic as well, not to mention the other big indexes.) So at the very least, The Pirate Bay is a hundred and five times more efficient than Stage6 was.
But inefficiency is not the only reason the service is no more, while the vilified Pirate Bay, Mininova et al. are still with us. Stage6 was also a lot more illegal than a BitTorrent tracker — whether it pretended to be complying with the DMCA or not. Surprisingly under reported after the abrupt demise of the service was the 6th Feb US court ruling against DivX’s attempt to establish its protection under the DMCA’s safe harbour provisions ahead of a legal battle with Universal Music Group. My reading of the company’s consequent, speedy exit from the stage (and correct me if you think I’m wrong) is that Stage6 didn’t have the cash or confidence to test its luck any further. (How much this affects DivX as a whole remains to be seen. But only six days after the court decision, Jerome Vashisht Rota, the inventor of DivX and a major shareholder in DivX corporation, was openly dumping stock.)
It’s not hard to read the tea leaves. While GooTube (famously being sued by Viacom on pretty much the same grounds) probably won’t lose sleep, smaller players eating their lunches off of pirate content will be paying very close attention. VCs burning money on pushing streaming media to the masses will at least want to imagine some returns on their investment rather than the further expense of executives in the dock.
So why is the exit of Stage6 a step in the right direction? Because for all the hyperbole in the mainstream (and sometimes online) media about the YouTube or Google Video or Stage6 ‘revolution‘, the relationship to media they offer us is far too traditional. Come to this place. Be served your media (and suck down your advertising along with it). Go away again. Yes, we can upload material, but I’m not the only one who feels that this wasn’t the primary function of Stage6, even if it did distribute about 50,000 copies of STEAL THIS FILM II before its demise. No need to share, no need to understand the technology, no need to think. It’s what they called ‘lean back’ media: millions of people slouching thoughtlessly in front of an marketing-emitting portal.
The promise of P2P is a thorough breakdown of the kind of power that congeals in a portal like Stage6. A user-owned, user-operated infrastructure that doesn’t require massive investment, doesn’t by default allow oligarchs to make more money from us. A disruptive, mutable infrastructure that brings media to us in the context we choose, forcing a massive re-think about what, why and how we create — as individuals, as businesses, as a society.
It is lazy for us to rely at all on portals like Stage6, but worse than lazy, it’s dangerous. It suggests we don’t value the potential autonomy P2P offers us. Our old media masters profited from control of content: are we really so happy to swap them for new ones who profit from control of our eyeballs? However lazy we are, I think that most of us are able to see that that this isn’t a model that we want to encourage. The demise of Stage6 and the portals that will follow gives us cause to think about strengthening our infrastructures: and that can’t be a bad thing.Looking for news you can trust?
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I have a really bad idea.
Let’s push farmers to plant as much as they possibly can of our most ecologically devastating crop. Maybe we’ll even get them to plow up some erosion-prone grasslands to do so. Then we’ll take a huge portion of the bounty (say, 40 percent) and subject it to a Byzantine, energy-intensive process that will turn it into something (barely) suitable for internal-combustion engines. (Never mind that internal-combustion engines, powering private pods over roads always in need of extravagant maintenance, are a rotten way of converting energy into mass locomotion.)
The production process generates a heaping amount of a byproduct tainted with antibiotics and industrial chemicals. No worries—we’ll feed that stuff to livestock on vast factory farms, even though it increases deadly pathogens in beef and does terrible things to pigs. Since the whole idea is so clearly misbegotten, we’ll need to deploy serious government support to keep it from stalling. How about decades of lucrative tax breaks, bolstered in recent years by upward-spiraling usage mandates? We’ll need a bit of PR, too, to keep the public from squawking. Let’s just pretend that the product we’re peddling is a green, job-creating machine that will “wean us from foreign oil.”
You in?
That, in a nutshell, tells the story of America’s corn-based ethanol boondoggle over the past three decades. (For the rollicking tale of how the whole thing got started in the first place, go here). Over the same time span, we’ve allowed our national rail-transport system to wither into self-parody; watched as cities defunded or neglected mass transit; failed to make necessary investments in clean energy sources like wind and solar while also declining to force fossil energy producers to pay for the massive damage they cause; and, most recently, elected a Democratic president who seems hell-bent on putting Sarah Palin’s “drill, baby, drill” energy vision into place. And through it all, our government’s blind, deep-pocketed loyalty to corn-based car fuel has endured.
But that may be changing … at least partially. Last week, the Senate voted 73-27 to remove one of the industry’s oldest and most-cherished pillars: the tax break gasoline blenders get for every gallon of the corn-based fuel they mix.
There’s no doubt that the tax break is a massive waste of resources that must end. This year alone, the ethanol tax credit will cost the Treasury $6 billion—equal to about 65 percent of the annual federal outlay for public school lunches. That means instead of propping up a crappy fuel source, we could boost our annual investment in child nutrition by two-thirds without increasing the deficit by a penny.
Another way to look at it is this: Ethanol sucks in about 75 percent of the total tax breaks granted to alternative energy, leaving wind and solar to fight for scraps. By pulling the plug at long last on the ethanol tax break, we could make significant investments in energy sources that actually reduce carbon emissions (unlike ethanol, which doesn‘t).
But here’s the kicker: Even if the Senate’s move makes it through the House and the White House—both hotbeds of ethanol boosterism—it will do nothing to stem the flow of industrially produced corn from Midwestern farms to distillers to gas tanks. That’s because the tax break became utterly redundant when President Bush signed the 2007 Energy Act, which stipulated that gasoline makers inject a large and ever-growing amount of ethanol into the fuel mix. Take the tax break away, and the ethanol juggernaut will lurch on, sucking in billions of bushels of resource-intensive corn and spewing out billions of gallons of low-quality car fuel.
Moreover, savings from ending the ethanol tax break will not go to crucial programs like school lunches or clean energy. Instead, they’ll almost certainly vanish into the maw of Washington’s deficit hysteria.
In short, the Senate’s move to revoke ethanol’s multi-billion dollar annual grab from the national trough is both long overdue and futile. Support for ethanol is too ingrained—so to speak—in our political culture to be ended simply by taking away a redundant tax subsidy. To put corn ethanol in its rightful place—the compost pile of history—would require the Democrats to do something they have utterly failed to do, under Obama or before: spell out a coherent national energy/transportation policy that transitions us from fossil fuels to true renewables. And that will happen not with draconian budget cuts, but rather by spending money to build out a proper renewable-energy/green-transportation infrastructure.The leftists are trying to spin a narrative about the Harvey “C’mon the Ficus” Weinstein that somehow, it’s a story of brave women and brave liberal media operatives exposing a great wrong. The facts do not support this narrative. The ‘brave women’ kept quiet for decades about it because their careers were more important. Ronan Farrow is one who exposed the story and, though it’s an easy mistake to make, Ronan Farrow is not a woman. Nor is the Democrat Media Complex covering itself in glory. NBC News had the story as long ago as 2016, but spiked it. No way were they going to break a story about a major Democrat donor being a sexual predator in the middle of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. The New York Times had the story in 2004 but again, chose to spike it to cover for a wealthy, powerful Democrat.
According to Kurt Schilchter, the real Weinstein Narrative is that while America’s leftist elite portray themselves as our moral superiors, the “Conscience of Our Nation,” they are, in real life, a bunch of self-serving scum-buckets.
They knew. They all knew, and they didn’t care. Meryl Streep’s Sophie’s choice was between her career and her conscience, and let’s just say she didn’t agonize over her pick. Others took his cash to shut up, leaving other ingenues to his sweaty clutches because getting the gigs trumps sisterly solidarity every time. Hillary Clinton managed to put down her super-sized Chardonnay goblet long enough to issue a 38-word comment/cliché on her pal and benefactor’s icky adventures in gardening. In her defense, she was probably thinking, “I was married to Bill. This guy’s an amateur.” So why should we normal Americans respect these people? Why should we submit to being constantly scolded, lectured, and treated as morally bankrupt simpletons anymore? We shouldn’t, and we aren’t, not anymore.
All I can say is ‘Welcome to the Party.’ A lot of us got fed up with Hollywood’s Pious Sanctimony a long time ago.Umbraco (https://umbraco.com/) is a lean and powerful CMS built on top of current.NET technologies and Javascript frameworks. It provides developers with a varied and simple to use collection of APIs, it is easy to customize and doesn’t get in the way between the coded markup and the HTML that is actually rendered.
The next series of posts will show how to build plugins that extend the default Umbraco backoffice capabilities.
How is it built?
The release of Umbraco’s version 7 presented a completely redesigned backoffice. It went from a typical MVC website to a single page application built using AngularJS. Umbraco custom WebAPIs are used by Angular controllers in order to read information from the backoffice.
How can we change it?
A typical Umbraco 7 backoffice extension requires:
Creation of Angular controllers, views and probably models; Umbraco WebAPI extensions in order to access Umbraco’s backoffice and for custom server side development; Extension of some Umbraco classes to customize common backoffice functionalities.
What to do?
These series of posts will gradually present a way to build a new backoffice section, that will provide content managers with a centralized area where they can approve changes made to content. This backoffice extension was named Approve It. Natively, Umbraco sends an email to each content approver when changes are made to content nodes but, if an approver wants to see what nodes were updated just by visiting the backoffice, he must traverse every node to see which ones present a change waiting approval. This gets harder as the number of content nodes increase, and the changed nodes can be difficult to spot as we can see from the image below:
Preparing the development environment
Download the latest and greatest version of Umbraco 7 (currently at v7.3.1): https://our.umbraco.org/contribute/releases/731/ Download and setup WebMatrix: http://www.microsoft.com/web/webmatrix/ Create a new web site in WebMatrix selecting the folder which contains Umbraco’s downloaded.zip file contents and go through the Setup Select customize Use a SQL CE database Choose any starter kit (I chose Txt Starter Kit) Create a new Empty ASP.NET project in Visual Studio (I’m using VS2015) and add folders and core references for MVC
Creating a new backoffice section
Creating a new section in Umbraco is easy:
Add references to the following three assemblies available in the bin Umbraco directory: businesslogic.dll
interfaces.dll
System.Web.Mvc.dll (need to replace the one Visual Studio automatically referenced) Create a new.cs file in the project with the following code:
[Application("approveIt", "ApproveIt", "icon-people", 15)] public class Section : IApplication { }
Simply implementing the IApplication interface, creates a new Umbraco backoffice section with the properties defined above.
The next step is translating the section name. If we don’t translate it, it will show up as [approveIt]. So, we must edit the file \Umbraco\Config\Lang\en.xml (for the UK version), and append the “approveIt” line in the “sections” area:
&lt;area alias="sections"&gt; &lt;key alias="concierge"&gt;Concierge&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="content"&gt;Content&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="courier"&gt;Courier&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="developer"&gt;Developer&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="installer"&gt;Umbraco Configuration Wizard&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="media"&gt;Media&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="member"&gt;Members&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="newsletters"&gt;Newsletters&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="settings"&gt;Settings&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="statistics"&gt;Statistics&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="translation"&gt;Translation&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="users"&gt;Users&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="help" version="7.0"&gt;Help&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="forms"&gt;Forms&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="analytics"&gt;Analytics&lt;/key&gt; &lt;key alias="approveIt"&gt;Approve It&lt;/key&gt; &lt;/area&gt;
Note: for the new section to appear you must add it to the available sections your user can see. Furthermore, because of caching, you probably need to restart the website and open a browser window in private mode in order to see the new section.
This is how it looks:
So, we have a new section, but there’s nothing we can do with it. The next post in the series will show how we can add some content to this newly created Umbraco backoffice area.
The Approve It extension can be found here: https://our.umbraco.org/projects/backoffice-extensions/approve-it/. The complete source code can be found here: https://github.com/ViGiLnT/ApproveIt.HOUSTON -- Andre Johnson might be close to breaking his stalemate with the Texans.
Editor's Picks Ganguli: Johnson return benefits teammates No matter what's happened to this point, Andre Johnson's presence at the Texans' facility is a good sign -- especially for his teammates, writes Tania Ganguli.
The seven-time Pro Bowl receiver arrived at the Texans' facility to learn the team's new offense on Monday, sources told ESPN.com.
It's unclear whether Johnson will report to training camp with the other veterans on Friday, but his appearance at the facility was a positive development.
Rookies and injured players were required to report on Monday. The first practice of training camp will be Saturday at 8:30 a.m.
Andre Johnson was at the Texans' facility Monday to learn the team's new offense, sources told ESPN. AP Photo/Patric Schneider
Johnson skipped organized team activities and a minicamp, both of which were voluntary, and missed the Texans' mandatory minicamp in June. He was frustrated at the prospect of entering what he thought might be another rebuilding season for the Texans.
He is the longest-tenured player on the team, having been drafted third overall in 2003. In May, Johnson made his frustrations public, saying he wasn't sure he still wanted to be part of the Texans organization.
Despite his absence, Johnson remained in contact with first-year Texans coach Bill O'Brien, whose public comments about Johnson have been consistently positive. O'Brien said he had no concerns about Johnson being able to pick up the team's offense when he did arrive.Hesy-Ra in hieroglyphs Personal name:
Hesy-Re
rʳ-ḥsj
Blessed by Ra Nickname:
Hesy
ḥsj
Blessed Honorary title:
Rekh-neswt
rḫ-nsw.t
Confidant of the king Cedar wood panel depicting Hesy-Ra.
Hesy-Ra (also read Hesy-Re and Hesire) was an Ancient Egyptian high official during the early 3rd dynasty. His most notable title was Wer-ibeh-senjw, meaning either "Great one of the ivory cutters" or "Great one of the dentists", which would make him the earliest dentist whose name is known to us. His tomb is noted for its paintings and cedar wood panels.
Identity [ edit ]
Thanks to several clay seal impressions found in Hesy-Ra's tomb, it is today known that this high official lived and worked during the reign of king (pharaoh) Djoser and maybe also under king Sekhemkhet.[1]
Hesy-Ra's name is of some interest to Egyptologists and historians alike, because it is linked to the sun god Re. Hesy-Ra, alongside a few high officials at this time, belongs to the first high officials who were allowed to link their names to Re. However, they were not allowed to use the sun disk hieroglyph to write Re's name. This was permitted to the king only.[1][2]
Titles [ edit ]
As a high-ranking official and priest, Hesy-Ra bore several elite and pious titularies:[3][4]
Confidant of the king (Egyptian: Rekh-neswt ).
(Egyptian: ). Great one of the "ten of Upper Egypt" (Egyptian: Wer-medi-shemaw ).
(Egyptian: ). Great one of Peh (Egyptian: Wer-Peh ).
(Egyptian: ). Great one of the dentists (Egyptian: Wer-ibeh-senjw ).
(Egyptian: ). Elder of the "Qed-hetep" (Egyptian: Semsw-qed-hetep ).
(Egyptian: ). Chief of the scribes (Egyptian: Medjeh-seschjw ).
(Egyptian: ). Brother of Min (Egyptian: Sen-Min ).
(Egyptian: ). Magician of Mehit (Egyptian: Hem-heka-Mehit).
Career [ edit ]
Hesy-Ra is well known for certain, unique titles. The most discussed title is Wer-ibeh-senjw, which can be translated in many ways. Ibeh can be translated as "dentition" and/or "ivory" as well. Senjw is a plural for "arrows", "cutters" and/or "physicians" alike. Thus, the full title Wer-ibeh-senjw can either be translated as "Great one of the ivory cutters" or as "Great one of the dentists". If the former translation was correct, Hesy-Ra was a professional ivory-cutter and artist - a profession that was fairly common and already attested in early dynastic inscriptions. If the latter translation was correct, Hesy-Ra would be the very first person in Egyptian history to be officially entitled as an occupational dentist.[3]
Hesy-Ra is also well known for his richly decorated cedar wood panels found in his tomb. On these panels, Hesy-Ra is depicted in several stages of age. Indeed, the panels close to the entrance show Hesy-Ra as a pretty young man at the start of his career. Closer to the remembrance chapel, Hesy-Ra is depicted as a middle-aged man at the heyday of his career. Finally, in the remembrance chapel, he is depicted as an old man, sitting on an offering table and being stuffed in a tight gown. The artist of the panels even accentuated facial mannerisms of age: Hesy-Ra's face changes from pretty smooth to wrinkled and saggy, depending on the stage of age that was meant to be depicted.[5][6]
Furthermore, Hesy-Ra is known for the colorful wall paintings discovered inside and outside his tomb. Colors such as black, white, yellow, green and red were used. The ornaments include rhomboids, stripes and a green-yellowish reed mat imitation. The paintings were in such a good state when found, that the excavators decided to fill the painted corridors with high quality rubble in attempt to preserve the colors. Close-by reliefs depict daily life goods and even game accessories, such as Mehen game boards and a Senet play set.[5][6]
Possible contemporary office partners included Netjeraperef, Akhetaa,[7] Khabawsokar, Pehernefer and Metjen,[8] who were also holding office under Huni and Sneferu. All their tomb inscriptions reveal that the time of both kings must have been a very prosperous one and economy and office administration flourished.[9]
Tomb [ edit ]
Archaeological excavation at the Mastaba of Hesy-Ra in November 2010
Hesy-Ra's tomb, mastaba S-2405, is situated in Saqqara; it was discovered in 1861 by French archaeologists Auguste Mariette and Jacques de Morgan. Excavations started in 1910 and ended in 1912, organized and performed by British archaeologist James Edward Quibell. Hesy-Ra's tomb is squeezed in between dozens of others, approximately 260 m north-east of king Djoser's pyramid complex. In its original state, the mastaba was 43 m long, 22 m wide and 5 m high. It was made of hardened mud bricks. Inner and outer walls were once completely and smoothly covered with white limestone. The inner room structure consisted of a long, niched corridor and several rooms and chapels.[10][11]
References [ edit ]For the members of bureaucracies, see apparatchik
Apparatjik ( ap-ə-RAT-chik) are a multi-national band formed in 2008. The band is a supergroup that consists of bassist Guy Berryman from Coldplay, guitarist/keyboardist Magne Furuholmen from A-ha, singer/guitarist Jonas Bjerre of Mew and drummer/producer Martin Terefe. The band's name literal translation is "agent of the apparatus". Apparatjik is based on apparatchik, which is a word of Russian origin and is used to describe "an official or bureaucrat in any organization"[1] but has in the past had other meanings, including "Communist agent or spy".[2]
History [ edit ]
The band first came together for a charity album for Survival International called Songs for Survival. The album was produced by Martin Terefe and Molly Oldfield, and the band produced the first track on the album, "Ferreting".[3] This track was used as the theme music for the Amazon series on BBC 2.[3] Subsequently they continued to work together |
white caps covering the Left: LC/PC connectorsRight: SC/PC connectorsAll four connectors have white caps covering the ferrules
For indoor applications, the jacketed fiber is generally enclosed, with a bundle of flexible fibrous polymer strength members like aramid (e.g. Twaron or Kevlar), in a lightweight plastic cover to form a simple cable. Each end of the cable may be terminated with a specialized optical fiber connector to allow it to be easily connected and disconnected from transmitting and receiving equipment.
Fiber-optic cable in a Telstra pit
Investigating a fault in a fiber cable junction box. The individual fiber cable strands within the junction box are visible.
An optical fiber breakout cable
For use in more strenuous environments, a much more robust cable construction is required. In loose-tube construction the fiber is laid helically into semi-rigid tubes, allowing the cable to stretch without stretching the fiber itself. This protects the fiber from tension during laying and due to temperature changes. Loose-tube fiber may be "dry block" or gel-filled. Dry block offers less protection to the fibers than gel-filled, but costs considerably less. Instead of a loose tube, the fiber may be embedded in a heavy polymer jacket, commonly called "tight buffer" construction. Tight buffer cables are offered for a variety of applications, but the two most common are "Breakout" and "Distribution". Breakout cables normally contain a ripcord, two non-conductive dielectric strengthening members (normally a glass rod epoxy), an aramid yarn, and 3 mm buffer tubing with an additional layer of Kevlar surrounding each fiber. The ripcord is a parallel cord of strong yarn that is situated under the jacket(s) of the cable for jacket removal.[3] Distribution cables have an overall Kevlar wrapping, a ripcord, and a 900 micrometer buffer coating surrounding each fiber. These fiber units are commonly bundled with additional steel strength members, again with a helical twist to allow for stretching.
A critical concern in outdoor cabling is to protect the fiber from contamination by water. This is accomplished by use of solid barriers such as copper tubes, and water-repellent jelly or water-absorbing powder surrounding the fiber.
Finally, the cable may be armored to protect it from environmental hazards, such as construction work or gnawing animals. Undersea cables are more heavily armored in their near-shore portions to protect them from boat anchors, fishing gear, and even sharks, which may be attracted to the electrical power that is carried to power amplifiers or repeaters in the cable.
Modern cables come in a wide variety of sheathings and armor, designed for applications such as direct burial in trenches, dual use as power lines, installation in conduit, lashing to aerial telephone poles, submarine installation, and insertion in paved streets.
Capacity and market [ edit ]
In September 2012, NTT Japan demonstrated a single fiber cable that was able to transfer 1 petabit per second (1015bits/s) over a distance of 50 kilometers.[4]
Modern fiber cables can contain up to a thousand fibers in a single cable, with potential bandwidth in the terabytes per second. In some cases, only a small fraction of the fibers in a cable may be actually "lit". Companies can lease or sell the unused fiber to other providers who are looking for service in or through an area. Companies may "overbuild" their networks for the specific purpose of having a large network of dark fiber for sale, reducing the overall need for trenching and municipal permitting.[citation needed] They may also deliberately under-invest to prevent their rivals from profiting from their investment.
The highest strand-count singlemode fiber cable commonly manufactured is the 864-count, consisting of 36 ribbons each containing 24 strands of fiber.[5]
Reliability and quality [ edit ]
Optical fibers are very strong, but the strength is drastically reduced by unavoidable microscopic surface flaws inherent in the manufacturing process. The initial fiber strength, as well as its change with time, must be considered relative to the stress imposed on the fiber during handling, cabling, and installation for a given set of environmental conditions. There are three basic scenarios that can lead to strength degradation and failure by inducing flaw growth: dynamic fatigue, static fatigues, and zero-stress aging.
Telcordia GR-20, Generic Requirements for Optical Fiber and Optical Fiber Cable, contains reliability and quality criteria to protect optical fiber in all operating conditions.[6] The criteria concentrate on conditions in an outside plant (OSP) environment. For the indoor plant, similar criteria are in Telcordia GR-409, Generic Requirements for Indoor Fiber Optic Cable.[7]
Cable types [ edit ]
OFC: Optical fiber, conductive
OFN: Optical fiber, nonconductive
OFCG: Optical fiber, conductive, general use
OFNG: Optical fiber, nonconductive, general use
OFCP: Optical fiber, conductive, plenum
OFNP: Optical fiber, nonconductive, plenum
OFCR: Optical fiber, conductive, riser
OFNR: Optical fiber, nonconductive, riser
OPGW: Optical fiber composite overhead ground wire
ADSS: All-Dielectric Self-Supporting
OSP: Fiber optic cable, outside plant
MDU: Fiber optics cable, multiple dwelling unit
Jacket material [ edit ]
The jacket material is application-specific. The material determines the mechanical robustness, chemical and UV radiation resistance, and so on. Some common jacket materials are LSZH, polyvinyl chloride, polyethylene, polyurethane, polybutylene terephthalate, and polyamide.
Fiber material [ edit ]
There are two main types of material used for optical fibers: glass and plastic. They offer widely different characteristics and find uses in very different applications. Generally, plastic fiber is used for very short range and consumer applications, glass fiber is used for short/medium range (multi-mode) and long range (single-mode) telecommunications.[8]
Color coding [ edit ]
Patch cords [ edit ]
The buffer or jacket on patchcords is often color-coded to indicate the type of fiber used. The strain relief "boot" that protects the fiber from bending at a connector is color-coded to indicate the type of connection. Connectors with a plastic shell (such as SC connectors) typically use a color-coded shell. Standard color codings for jackets (or buffers) and boots (or connector shells) are shown below:
Connector boot (or shell) colors Color Meaning Comment Blue Physical Contact (PC), 0° mostly used for single mode fibers; some manufacturers use this for polarization-maintaining optical fiber. Green Angle Polished (APC), 8° Black Physical Contact (PC), 0° Grey Physical contact (PC), 0° multimode fiber connectors Beige White Physical contact (PC), 0° Red High optical power. Sometimes used to connect external pump lasers or Raman pumps.
Remark: It is also possible that a small part of a connector is additionally color-coded, e.g. the lever of an E-2000 connector or a frame of an adapter. This additional colour coding indicates the correct port for a patchcord, if many patchcords are installed at one point.
Multi-fiber cables [ edit ]
Individual fibers in a multi-fiber cable are often distinguished from one another by color-coded jackets or buffers on each fiber. The identification scheme used by Corning Cable Systems is based on EIA/TIA-598, "Optical Fiber Cable Color Coding." EIA/TIA-598 defines identification schemes for fibers, buffered fibers, fiber units, and groups of fiber units within outside plant and premises optical fiber cables. This standard allows for fiber units to be identified by means of a printed legend. This method can be used for identification of fiber ribbons and fiber subunits. The legend will contain a corresponding printed numerical position number or color for use in identification.[11]
EIA598-A Fiber Color Chart[11] Position Jacket color Position Jacket color 1
blue 13
blue/black 2
orange 14
orange/black 3
green 15
green/black 4
brown 16
brown/black 5
slate 17
slate/black 6
white 18
white/black 7
red 19
red/black 8
black 20
black/yellow 9
yellow 21
yellow/black 10
violet 22
violet/black 11
rose 23
rose/black 12
aqua 24
aqua/black Color coding of Premises Fiber Cable[11] Fiber Type / Class Diameter (µm) Jacket color Multimode Ia 50/125 Orange Multimode Ia 62.5/125 Slate Multimode Ia 85/125 Blue Multimode Ia 100/140 Green Singlemode IVa All Yellow Singlemode IVb All Red
The colour code used above resembles PE copper cables used in standard telephone wiring.
In the UK the colour codes for COF200 and 201 are different. Each 12 fibre bundle or element within a Cable Optical Fibre 200/201 cable is coloured as follows:
Blue
Orange
Green
Red
Grey
Yellow
Brown
Violet
Black
White
Pink
Turquoise
Each element is in a tube within the cable (not a blown fibre tube) The cable elements start with the red tube and are counted around the cable to the green tube. Active elements are in white tubes and yellow fillers or dummies are laid in the cable to fill it out depending on how many fibres and units exists – can be up to 276 fibres or 23 elements for external cable and 144 fibres or 12 elements for internal. The cable has a central strength member normally made from fiberglass or plastic. There is also a copper conductor in external cables.
Propagation speed and delay [ edit ]
Optical cables transfer data at the speed of light in glass. This is the speed of light in vacuum divided by the refractive index of the glass used, typically around 180,000 to 200,000 km/s, resulting in 5.0 to 5.5 microseconds of latency per km. Thus the round-trip delay time for 1000 km is around 11 milliseconds.[12]
Losses [ edit ]
Typical modern multimode graded-index fibers have 3 dB/km of attenuation loss (50% loss per km) at a wavelength of 850 nm, and 1 dB/km at 1300 nm. Singlemode 9/125 loses 0.4 dB/km at 1310 nm and 0.25 dB/km at 1550 nm. Very high quality singlemode fiber intended for long distance applications is specified at a loss of 0.19 dB/km at 1550 nm.[13] POF (plastic optical fiber) loses much more: 1 dB/m at 650 nm. Plastic optical fiber is large core (about 1 mm) fiber suitable only for short, low speed networks such as within cars.[14]
Each connection made adds about 0.6 dB of average loss, and each joint (splice) adds about 0.1 dB.[15] Depending on the transmitter power and the sensitivity of the receiver, if the total loss is too large the link will not function reliably.
Invisible infrared light is used in commercial glass fiber communications because it has lower attenuation in such materials than visible light. However, the glass fibers will transmit visible light somewhat, which is convenient for simple testing of the fibers without requiring expensive equipment. Splices can be inspected visually, and adjusted for minimal light leakage at the joint, which maximizes light transmission between the ends of the fibers being joined.
The charts at "Understanding wavelengths In fiber optics"[16] and "Optical power loss (attenuation) in fiber"[17] illustrate the relationship of visible light to the infrared frequencies used, and show the absorption water bands between 850, 1300 and 1550 nm.
Safety [ edit ]
The infrared light used in telecommunications cannot be seen, so there is a potential laser safety hazard to technicians. The eye's natural defense against sudden exposure to bright light is the blink reflex, which is not triggered by infrared sources. In some cases the power levels are high enough to damage eyes, particularly when lenses or microscopes are used to inspect fibers that are emitting invisible infrared light. Inspection microscopes with optical safety filters are available to guard against this. More recently indirect viewing aids are used, which can comprise a camera mounted within a handheld device, which has an opening for the connectorized fiber and a USB output for connection to a display device such as a laptop. This makes the activity of looking for damage or dirt on the connector face much safer.
Small glass fragments can also be a problem if they get under someone's skin, so care is needed to ensure that fragments produced when cleaving fiber are properly collected and disposed of appropriately.
Hybrid cables [ edit ]
There are hybrid optical and electrical cables that are used in wireless outdoor Fiber To The Antenna (FTTA) applications. In these cables, the optical fibers carry information, and the electrical conductors are used to transmit power. These cables can be placed in several environments to serve antennas mounted on poles, towers, and other structures.
According to Telcordia GR-3173, Generic Requirements for Hybrid Optical and Electrical Cables for Use in Wireless Outdoor Fiber To The Antenna (FTTA) Applications, these hybrid cables have optical fibers, twisted pair/quad elements, coaxial cables or current-carrying electrical conductors under a common outer jacket. The power conductors used in these hybrid cables are for directly powering an antenna or for powering tower-mounted electronics exclusively serving an antenna. They have a nominal voltage normally less than 60 VDC or 108/120 VAC.[18] Other voltages may be present depending on the application and the relevant National Electrical Code (NEC).
These types of hybrid cables may also be useful in other environments such as Distributed Antenna System (DAS) plants where they will serve antennas in indoor, outdoor, and roof-top locations. Considerations such as fire resistance, Nationally Recognized Testing Laboratory (NRTL) Listings, placement in vertical shafts, and other performance-related issues need to be fully addressed for these environments.
Since the voltage levels and power levels used within these hybrid cables vary, electrical safety codes consider the hybrid cable to be a power cable, which needs to comply with rules on clearance, separation, etc.
Innerducts [ edit ]
Innerducts are installed in existing underground conduit systems to provide clean, continuous, low-friction paths for placing optical cables that have relatively low pulling tension limits. They provide a means for subdividing conventional conduit that was originally designed for single, large-diameter metallic conductor cables into multiple channels for smaller optical cables.
Types [ edit ]
Innerducts are typically small-diameter, semi-flexible subducts. According to Telcordia GR-356, there are three basic types of innerduct: smoothwall, corrugated, and ribbed.[19] These various designs are based on the profile of the inside and outside diameters of the innerduct. The need for a specific characteristic or combination of characteristics, such as pulling strength, flexibility, or the lowest coefficient of friction, dictates the type of innerduct required.
Beyond the basic profiles or contours (smoothwall, corrugated, or ribbed), innerduct is also available in an increasing variety of multiduct designs. Multiduct may be either a composite unit consisting of up to four or six individual innerducts that are held together by some mechanical means, or a single extruded product having multiple channels through which to pull several cables. In either case, the multiduct is coilable, and can be pulled into existing conduit in a manner similar to that of conventional innerduct.
Placement [ edit ]
Innerducts are primarily installed in underground conduit systems that provide connecting paths between manhole locations. In addition to placement in conduit, innerduct can be directly buried, or aerially installed by lashing the innerduct to a steel suspension strand.
As stated in GR-356, cable is typically placed into innerduct in one of three ways. It may be
Pre-installed by the innerduct manufacturer during the extrusion process, Pulled into the innerduct using a mechanically assisted pull line, or Blown into the innerduct using a high air volume cable blowing apparatus.
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]DEERFIELD, Va. (CBS/AP) — A military jet from Massachusetts crashed in the mountains of western Virginia Wednesday morning, but the pilot has not been found.
The F-15C jet left Barnes Air National Guard Base in Westfield on a mission to New Orleans but controllers lost radio communication with the single-seat aircraft just after 9 a.m. over the Shenandoah Valley.
The pilot, who has not been identified, reported an in-flight emergency at a high altitude before radio contact was lost, Col. James Keefe, 104th Fighter Wing Commander, told reporters at an afternoon news conference in Westfield.
Keefe said there is an ongoing rescue mission and they have not had contact with the pilot yet. He would not say if the pilot was able to eject before the crash.
Augusta County dispatcher Becky Coynter says witnesses reported an explosion-like noise around 9 a.m.
“It’s the loudest noise I’ve ever heard,” 63-year-old Rebecca Shinaberry, who lives on a farm about two miles away, told The Associated Press. “(It) just shook the ground, and from my house we could just see a big plume of smoke.”
No injuries were reported on the ground, but authorities are searching the crash site — located through its heavy smoke coming from a mountainside — in Deerfield, about 135 miles northwest of Richmond.
The pilot was with the 104th Fighter Wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard in Westfield.
The jet was on a standard training exercise with no munition onboard, Keefe said.
Krista Johnson, who lives in Augusta, Va., about five or six miles from the crash site, spoke on the phone with WBZ-TV’s Kate Merrill. Johnson was at work but her son was home and called her.
“He said he heard a really loud explosion and everything in the house rattled,” she said. “Then he walked outside and said he could see the smoke.”
Johnson’s son took a photo from their house of smoke rising above the mountainside.
She said she understood that traffic was being diverted from the area of the crash.
“The last I heard is they were just telling everyone to be on the lookout for the pilot and to help him and assist him in any way necessary if needed,” Johnson said.
WBZ-TV’s Lauren Leamanczyk reports:
F-15s are maneuverable tactical fighters that can reach speeds up to 1,875 mph, according to the Air Force website.
The F-15C Eagle entered the Air Force inventory in 1979 and costs nearly $30 million, the website says.
(TM and © Copyright 2014 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2014 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
MORE LOCAL NEWS FROM CBS BOSTONYesterday I noted here that the dust-up over Mitt Romney’s claims about female job loss are premised on a much larger falsehood that is central to Romney’s whole case against Obama.
To wit: Romney has been arguing that the way to judge Obama’s policies is to look at the net number of jobs lost since he took office. But that metric includes the huge amounts of jobs hemorraghed during the months when the economy was in free fall, just after Obama took office — and before those same policies took effect.
Romney has been using this metric for months and months, regularly adjusting the number of net jobs lost on Obama’s watch downward to keep pace with good economic news, with virtually no scrutiny from major news orgs.
Today Steve Benen comes up with the clearest explanation for this fallacy I’ve seen yet:
Imagine you could go back to March 1, 2009, when the global economy was on the brink of collapse. The White House’s Recovery Act had just been signed into law, but the investments had barely even begun, and Obama, still unpacking, did not yet have his full economic team in place.
Then imagine a Republican arguing, just six weeks into Obama’s term, “Mr. President, the economy has lost 726,000 jobs on your watch, and we’re blaming you for the losses.”
Would any serious person find this fair or reasonable? Of course not. And yet, it’s the basis for the Romney campaign’s entire economic critique of the Obama administration.
....if we start the clock on March 1, 2009, after Obama’s first full month in office, the net change for his presidency is -102,000 (or +484,000 looking only at the private sector).
If we say Obama walked into a nightmare and the first six months of 2009 shouldn’t count against him, the economy, combining all the jobs lost and all the jobs gained, had added 2.24 million overall (2.8 million looking only at the private sector).
When we start counting makes all the difference. To make Obama look like a “failure,” Republicans want the earliest possible point to start the clock.
Exactly. One of the central premises of Romney’s entire case against Obama is completely ridiculous. Yet aside from a few pointy-headed fact checkers, no media figures are writing about it or questioning it. If I ruled our media universe, every reporter and commentator writing about this campaign would look at the chart Steve has drawn up illustrating the point. Politico’s Ben White is also good on the topic today.
By the way, it may soon get harder and harder for Romney’s mega-distortion to escape notice for much longer. Here’s why: If the recovery doesn’t sputter — which is anything but assured — the next positive jobs report may mean that even the net jobs gained/lost number Romney uses will slip into positive territory, if you start the clock in February, the first month after Obama took office.
At that point, if Romney continues to argue that this metric proves Obama’s policies failed, his case will have to undergo some serious scrutiny. Right?Chicago police currently have four people in custody over a Facebook Live video that showed a group of young black adults holding a mentally disabled young white man hostage and torturing him.
Police were made aware of the video on Tuesday afternoon. The video, shot by a young black woman, shows multiple people kicking and hitting the victim while he was tied up. They also cut his scalp and burn him with cigarettes. Police say the young man has special-needs and had been reported missing from a nearby suburb.
According to Chicago police, the young man was held captive for at least 24 hours and perhaps as long as 48. He also knew one of the assailants but it doesn’t appear to be a situation involving buying drugs. The four involved are considered adults but still in their teens.
During the beating, you could hear the attackers yelling “f*** Donald Trump! F*** white people!” along with other racial slurs. The victim is now being treated at the hospital for his injuries. Meanwhile, no charges have yet been filed but police anticipate charges within next 24-48 hours. They’ll also investigate on whether this is defined as a hate crime.
Below is a copy of the unedited video.
WARNING: Video is extremely disturbing.
The Chicago PD released a statement on the situation:
While on patrol Officers observes a disoriented male walking 3400 W. Lexington on January 3, 2017 who was then transported to an area hospital for treatment. At 5:26 p.m. officers then responded to a battery at a residence on the 3300 block of W. Lexington where they discovered signs of a struggle and damage to the property and where able to link this evidence to the disoriented male. Officers later became aware of a social media video depicting a battery of an adult male which is believed to be the same individual. At this point CPD believes the video is credible and detectives are questioning persons of interest in the case. The victim, whom CPD believes is from a neighboring suburb, was transported to an area hospital in stable condition. The investigation is ongoing.
Regarding the disturbing video that surfaced on social media of a battery: Incident is under investigation/suspects are being questioned pic.twitter.com/GGi3qs9rGv — Chicago Police (@Chicago_Police) January 4, 2017
Watch the presser below:
CPD press conference regarding disturbing live social media video depicting a battery ; victim was tied up https://t.co/jDrjfz4sJV — Chicago Police (@Chicago_Police) January 5, 2017
Also, it appears that early on, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson is the only one nationally who has covered this story. Check out video below, via Fox News.
A few minutes before 9 PM ET, CNN devoted a segment on the story, providing updates from the recent police press conference. Fox again covered it during Megyn Kelly’s hour. Below are the videos from Fox & CNN.
We will update this story as more comes in.
[image via screengrab]
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Follow Justin Baragona on Twitter: @justinbaragona
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com01 02
thomasina pidgeon: Inquiries of a climber
darkrooms
Cedar crushing
The timing of their arrival was with that of my visit to the
darkside
. How unfortunate that they had to put up with my tortured soul!!! But he is an old friend, a status normally carrying with it acceptance of another in any state. Witnessing a friend in the darkest of places while at the same time, showing complete acceptance, non-judgement and love is beyond what words can describe. It instilled in me a level of trust and respect and redefines the meaning of unconditional and true friendship.
Coming out of the darkness
Classic roof top beauty
Doro going high on a very nice new line
Always exciting things happening on the streets of Ausserferra
Visiting the huge dam on the Italian/Swis border
Labels: belfast climbing, Belfast Exposed, climbing frustration, climbing passion, Dorothea Karalus, Juf, Magic Wood, patience in climbing, success and failure in climbing, why we climbThomas James Sinito, also known as "The Chinaman" (September 18, 1938 − December 21, 1997), was a powerful Caporegime in the Cleveland crime family who was once accused of plotting the assassination of then mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, Dennis J. Kucinich in 1979. Kucinich later became a candidate for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States in the 2004 and 2008 elections.
Early life
Sinito was born on Woodland Ave in Cuyahoga, in Cleveland. His Father was a maternal cousin of the convicted corrupt Cleveland municipal prosecutor, Thomas Longo who represented the Bedford, Highland Hills and Chagrin Falls townships and was a candidate for the Bedford Municipal Judgship in May 1997. Sinito was the nephew of (Giuseppe Antonio Berardinelli) Joey Maxim by marriage, the legendary Italian-American boxer who became the 1952 Lightweight Boxing Champion of the World.
Thomas Sinito married Irene B. Mitroff in 1960 and they had two children. In 1990, Irene died in a Lake Erie boating accident. After divorcing Irene, Sinito took a second wife, Kristine, with whom he had a daughter.
Early association with the Cleveland family
Thomas Sinito's involvement with the Cleveland family Capo, Angelo "Big Ange" Lonardo began when he worked as a bartender at Angelo's Highlander Restaurant and Lounge on Northfield Road. Prior to this acquaintance, he had served many years as an errand boy for the mob, tending various vending machine routes. Later, Sinito had several of his own ventures, including part ownership in a Valley Forge, Pennsylvania amusement park. This amusement park provided an ingenious way to launder money undetected, which came from various gambling, drug trafficking and loansharking pursuits, through the amusement park’s cash flow.
Sinito had a wide assortment of interest and investments in both legitimate as well as illegitimate businesses. Sinito cautiously invested in many illegitimate business holdings, and greatly profited from the investments he made. Locally, he entered the vending machine business with lucrative washer and dryer accounts at numerous apartment buildings. Sinito also ran some coin-operated vending machine routes, from which he derived a significant bulk of his earnings. His business front was a gift basket company, on Chagrin Boulevard, once a favored area for Mob business and socialization.
In addition to the gift basket shop Sinito opened in Beachwood, Ohio, he also co-owned the Appliance Mart with his brother Chuck. The Appliance Mart was a business front for the Cleveland family. The mart, which opened in 1972, had two locations, one in Euclid, Ohio and the other in Bedford, Ohio on Northfield Road. The Bedford store soon became a major base of operations for Sinito, from which he regularly met with Lonardo and other mobsters, discussed various illegal activities, short term as well as long term criminal plots, schemes and scams, and operated various illegal activities. Detailed plans for drug trafficking, conspiracies to kill police informers and other violent measures were conceived and acted on from meetings in the back rooms of Appliance Mart.
Sinito was a talented extortionist and operated a lucrative loansharking scheme out of Appliance Mart. Appliance Mart would extend credit to customers it knew wasn’t credit worthy and then use forceful extortion tactics to make good on the payment. One of the victims of this loansharking scheme included a small-time career criminal named Carmen "Jinglebells" Zagaria, who would later become a partner with Sinito and manage a major drug trafficking ring. Zagaria owed Sinito a large amount of money, the interest on which, grew larger and larger. Sinito and the other mob leaders controlled Zagaria as a result of the high interest on his loan shark debts.
The nickname
There are many stories on how Sinito acquired the nickname "The Chinaman". One version said that nickname derived from his eyes, which allegedly look slanted "like a Chinaman’s". Another version stated that the nickname described his silent, calm, stoic, disciplined and inscrutable demeanor, the stereotypical qualities of a Chinese man. Another version cited a resemblance to actor David Carradine to the television show Kung Fu, and to a claim that Sinito made karate chops when angry. However, the most popular story was that in either 1973 or 1974 Sinito allegedly threw 10 to 30 people out of a bar on Cleveland’s West Side during a brawl.
Cleveland’s Model Cities scandal
Sinito was a minor figure involved in the 1973 Cleveland’s Model Cities scandal. In August 1973, Robert Doggett was the director of the Model City program, which was a federally federal initiative created under President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society Program during the 1970s. The program funneled millions of dollars into major cities in an effort to help the poor. Local Cleveland area civic and community groups were to determine how to use these funds. Originally the first planned amount was to be $45 million. A federal audit later undertaken by the GAO showed much of the Federal funds were wasted. The General Accounting Office's audit showed at least as much as $9.2 million were misspent on fraud and waste.
A prominent Cleveland mobster and drug trafficker Ronald Bey was hired by then Mayor Ralph J. Perk, into a high level administrative staff position, for the purpose of conducting a drug control feasibility study. An investigation of the corruption and graft in the Model Cities program lead to Mayor Perk’s administration. Bey worked in Mayor Perk’s administration, and appeared in several photographs alongside Mayor Perk. In spite of Perk’s protests that he didn’t know Bey worked for the City of Cleveland, the photographs of both men decorated city hall.
The mob wanted its front companies to receive the biggest contracts. While walking to his office on St. Clair, Doggett was shot in the belly and nearly died. His would-be assassin was found a few days later, floating facedown in the Ohio River. The shooter's name was Gerald "Chick" Johnson, a former employee of a shady contractor who was seeking a city contract.
Bey became a suspect in the Robert Doggett shooting. Cleveland Police investigators uncovered information, that three days earlier, Doggett had refused to pay Bey’s $3,111 fee on his service contract. A Special Grand Jury was convened to Investigate the Model Cities shooting. Its purpose was to investigate Doggett’s shooting and how the Model Cities program was administered.
Sinito was one of the witnesses subpoenaed to testify. According to Sgt. Edward Kovacic, of the Cleveland Police intelligence unit, Johnson's car was leased from a dealership where Sinito worked. Although Sinito was granted immunity from any charges that might result from this Special Grand Jury’s findings, he refused to cooperate, and testify before a grand jury. No individuals, including Bey, were ever indicted from the results of this Special Grand Jury.
Conflict with Danny Greene
In 1975, the legendary Irish-American mobster, Danny Greene began asserting himself in the vending machine racket, which had traditionally been a Mafia racket, and began muscling into many of the Cleveland Mafia's gambling operations. This greatly angered the Cleveland family leadership. According to a mob informant, this move brought him into conflict with Sinito. Sinito considered Greene an extortionist and felt that Greene’s coined operated laundry contracts with their excessive fees were nothing more than extortion.
Danny Greene controlled some of the more lucrative laundry contracts which Sinito was competing for. Sinito and mob associate, Joseph "Joey Loose" Iacobacci soon murdered one of Greene’s associates. Greene’s response was to have one of his gang, possibly his cousin Kevin McTaggart, wire a bundle of dynamite to the frame of Sinito’s car. Sinito found the bomb in his car, attached to the frame. He removed the bomb, disarmed it and later destroyed it. This act of war by Greene drew Sinito into the Mafia war with Greene in Cleveland during the 1970s, where he would play a significant role.
Kucinich assassination plot
As the Cleveland family waged its gang war against Danny Greene, newly elected Mayor Dennis J. Kucinich fought hard to sever the Mafia's old ties to local government. In 1977, Kucinich mandated that all city contracts Cleveland had with various companies would be re-evaluated. In an effort to save money for the financially strapped city, he would have these contracts re-bid on, with the contracts going to the lowest bidder. This decision put him at odds with the Cleveland Mob. That same year, Kucinich refused to sell Municipal Light, Cleveland's public power plant, to private interests that stood to financially gain from the purchase.
The Cleveland family didn’t care whether or not Kucinch sold the Municipal Light system to the highest bidder, its sale didn’t affect them. Re-bidding on the city contracts they held through various front companies would, however, adversely affect the Cleveland family's interests. The most coveted deal was the garbage-hauling contract once held by Danny Greene, before an associate of his named James Palladino took it over. Palladino made no secret of his contempt for Kucinich, after the mayor awarded the contract to another businessman not directly connected to organized crime.
Some city contracts, especially in garbage hauling, had been under total mob control since the late 1940s. When Kucinich announced in both daily papers, the Plain Dealer and the now defunct Cleveland Press, that he planned to review all city held contracts and open them to the lowest outside bids, it greatly infuriated the Cleveland family hierarchy. Kucinich also began reviewing all of the garbage hauling contracts after coming to office. Every mob-held front company having any city contracts were to be investigated and criminal charges brought against the racketeers. This meant being convicted on federal racketeering charges under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, with its stiff penalties, such as long jail sentences.
These aforementioned reasons propelled mob boss, James Licavoli, with the advice of Lonardo to order a hit on Kucinich in 1978. In face of some opposition by lower level associates, Sinito stubbornly defended Licavoli's decision and it was then decided to use the services of an outsider professional hitman, since using local associates for the job could trace back to them.
Sinito’s uncle Joey Maxim, who worked in an Atlantic City casino helped him contact a contract killer. However, the supposed killer was, in fact, an undercover Maryland State Police officer using the name Gene, who specialized in posing as a contract killer. The two met in the Atlantic City casino where Maxim worked. Gene walked into the casino’s lounge where he’d been told to meet Sinito. During the meeting, Sinito introduced himself only as Tommy and successfully hired Gene for the Assassination plot. Gene was initially paid $25,000 for his services. After the meeting, Gene informed Cleveland Police who soon made a connection to Sinito, after checking police records.
Several bizarre plans were discussed. One was to kill Kucinich as he left Tony’s Diner on West 117th and Lorain Avenue. Gene would perch on an outside steel fire escape across the street, armed with a sniper rifle and shoot Kucinich when he came out of the diner. A second plan was to shoot Kucinich as he marched down Euclid Avenue in the 1979 Columbus Day Parade. But the hit didn't happen because an ulcer inside Kunicich's stomach burst before the event, and the mayor was rushed to the hospital. The assassination plot continued for three long years, but never came to fruition.
When Cleveland Trust called in long-standing debts in retaliation for Kucinich's refusal not to sell Municipal Light, the city went into default and Kucinich's popularity plummeted. The hit was eventually called off when Kucinich did not win reelection in 1979. Gene returned to Maryland. In 1984, the Kucinich plot would result in a probe into the Cleveland Mafia’s part in the assassination plot. The plot to kill Kucinich was not made public until 1984. Even Kucinich had been kept in the dark. In the past, Kucinich has implied he believes it was divine intervention that kept him from the parade that day.
Made man
Due to his business savvy and tremendous money-earning abilities, Sinito soon acquired a reputation as an earner and gained a high level of trust in the Cleveland Family. His refusal to testify in the Model Cities scandal, as well as his active role in the Mafia's war with Danny Greene helped to |
just part of a bigger problem.
"It felt like we've been going in the right direction, but then something like this happens," he said. “It's like you take five steps forward then two steps back."
Fisher says he's still planning to go. Airbnb has given him a list of other options for that weekend in August.
He just hopes people who open their homes to others are more accepting of people needing a place to stay.
Airbnb has a zero tolerance policy for discrimination of any kind. On Wednesday, it immediately removed the lister and said he can no longer put properties onto Airbnb.A number of community groups will be getting less from the province in next year's budget.
Some groups, including the Deafness Advocacy Association of Nova Scotia, FEED Nova Scotia's Metro Food Bank and Youth Voices of Nova Scotia Society won't be getting any money in the 2016-2017 budget.
The Nova Scotia Division of the Canadian Mental Health Association went from getting $79,000 in the 2014-2015 budget to $39,500 in 2015-2016. In 2016-2017, it won't get any funding.
"All groups do good work, I'm really focused on the priorities that are associated with the Department of Community Services," said Community Services Minister Joanne Bernard, adding that those priorities include child welfare and people with disabilities.
"I'm not looking at funding advocacy groups which some of these are," she said. "I'm not looking at funding national organizations that have millions of dollars in bank accounts nationally that they can filter down into the provinces as need be."
The Canadian National Institute for the Blind received $507,800 from the province in 2014-2015. In the next two budgets that drops to $355,460.
"When you have to make tough decisions, it's easy to do it when you know, for instance, like the Canadian National Institute for Blind has a $10-million endowment fund nationally," Bernard said, adding the group isn't going to be hurting from the loss of provincial funding.Will spring bring abundance to the housing market?
Spring, historically, is a season of renewal – and real estate. But in some regions of the United States this spring, the housing market could be somewhat sluggish. On the coasts, for instance, there’s a relatively low inventory of homes, which could be a consequence of strict zoning laws that limit the construction of new homes, among other reasons.
But at the same time, more people in those areas are starting households. That combination – more households and not enough homes for sale – means that home prices are rising. As home prices rise, more people opt to rent – so rents are rising, too.
So are home prices out of reach for many?
Rising prices don’t necessarily mean homes are unaffordable, as long as wages keep pace. In places like Illinois’s Lake County and Alabama’s Jefferson County, home prices and wages are shifting almost in tandem, as you can see in the map below.
Still, a smaller portion of Americans own homes today than a decade ago – 64 percent in the last quarter of 2016 versus 69 percent at the same time in 2004.
Jacob Turcotte/The Christian Science Monitor Non-seasonally adjusted homeownership rates, 1995 - 2016.
This, despite a strong economy, job and wage growth, and relatively low (though rising) mortgage interest rates.
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Fewer people are applying for mortgages and refinance loans, though those numbers are creeping up.
Jacob Turcotte/The Christian Science Monitor Mortgage applications and denials for the purchase of one- to four-family homes, 2004 - 2015.
Analysts have speculated about a few potential reasons for the lower homeownership rate. One key reason is crushing student debt among Millennials that's delaying their home buying.
The hope is that new-home construction, particularly of affordable homes, will rise enough to meet growing demand over the next several years.When Montee Ball went down with a groin injury Sunday against the Cardinals, concern over the Broncos’ run game seemed to increase 10-fold.
The team’s young running back corps had struggled to produce in the first three games, and now their starter, who already missed time because of an appecdectomy during training camp, would miss several more weeks.
Things won’t get any easier Sunday, when the Broncos take on the Jets at MetLife Stadium.
Despite their 1-4 record, the Jets own one of the league’s toughest defenses, especially against the run. It ranks No. 6 in the league in rushing defenses, allowing an average of 83 yards per game. The Broncos’ rushing offense, meanwhile, ranks No. 29, putting up only 79.5 yards per game.
Unlike everyone else, Adam Gase isn’t worried.
The Broncos’ offensive coordinator said Thursday that he is confident in three running backs, Ronnie Hillman, C.J. Anderson and Juwan Thompson.
“I like that group,” Gase said. ” It’s a sharp group and they run hard, and we just got to make sure we’re on it this week because this is probably one of our tougher matchups scheme-wise.”
Hillman, who had 14 carries for 65 yards in the second half of last weekend’s victory against the Cardinals, will make his first start Sunday for the Broncos. Although he’s smaller than Anderson and Thompson, standing 5-foot-11 and weighing 195 pounds, Hillman’s power gives him an edge.
Gase thinks he’s a bit underrated.
“I don’t think Ronnie gets enough credit for the fact that he’ll go up there and meet a guy and he doesn’t get rocked back,” Gase said. “For his size, a lot of guys think they’re just going to run over him. But, for whatever reason, he’s got that power to be able to sustain his blocks.”
The difficulty in facing the Jets, though, comes with coach Rex Ryan’s controlled chaos. There’s no telling what he’ll do.
“You can be in four wides and he’s in base defense. You could be in 12 personnel and he’s in dime. You don’t know what he’s going to do and you’ve got to prepare for a lot of stuff,” Gase said. “He’s been very successful for a long period of time for a reason.”
Having played for Rex’s brother Rob Ryan while in Dallas, DeMarcus Ware is familiar with the “chaos” approach the two use on defense.
“You never know who’s going to be dropping, who’s rushing and it’s like one of those chaotic defenses where, at the end of the dya, you don’t know who’s coming,” Ware said. “You have to sift through the mess.”
Footnotes:Thompson was limited in practice Thursday, but is expected to play Sunday … OL Michael Schofield was still out because of a death in the family and Ball remains out with a groin injury.
Nicki Jhabvala: njhabvala@denverpost.com or at twitter.com/nickijhabvalaThe Canadian dollar finished above 77 cents US today on an oil rally that's lasted for the past week and a weaker greenback.
The loonie rose 0.43 of a cent to 77.26 cents US at the close, its strongest showing since mid-August.
Oil continued its climb on confidence that U.S. shale drillers are cutting back on production. A report earlier this week by the U.S. Energy Information Agency forecast lower global oil production and an increase in demand.
Later in the day, the Baker Hughes rig count showed that 14 more U.S. rigs had been pulled out of production this week, for a total of 795 drillers still at work. It was the sixth consecutive week of declines.
West Texas Intermediate crude, the main North American contract, was up seven cents to $49.50 US a barrel. It moved as high as $50.92 in morning trading.
Oil has been rising since Oct. 2, in part on news of Russian airstrikes in Syria and Iran.
Brent, the main international contract, was at $52.52 and Canadian crude contract Western Canada Select was up five cents at $34.48.
"One development that is significant is what's happening in the Middle East with Russia starting military operations there," said Robert Mark of MacDougall, MacDougall & McTier,
He says the rebound in oil prices at this time of year is a positive as energy prices tend to weaken in autumn. MacDougall, MacDougall & MacTier is predicting oil will settle at or above the $50 market in the next few weeks, but won't hit $70 until the second half of 2016.
"The next big hurdle in terms of analyzing supply and demand is the impact of Iran returning to the market. We're not going to know that until early next year," Mark told CBC News.
TSX down today, but up on the week
The TSX was down 14 points to 13,964, but is up 630 points since last Friday in its best week of the year.
After being beaten down for six weeks by concern over China's economic slowdown, stocks around the world have rallied this week.
Part of the optimism in oil and stock trading is based on the Federal Reserve minutes released yesterday, which seemed to indicate the U.S. central bank would wait to raise rates until the impact of China's economic slowdown is more fully known.
That helped push down the U.S. dollar, which has become stronger on anticipation that rates would soon rise.
A boost in gold and metals prices helped buoy the market, though financials and energy stocks ended lower.
Today's Canadian jobs report showed unemployment rising to 7.1 per cent as full-time jobs were eliminated in the economy in September.
Further bad news followed in the Bank of Canada's quarterly business survey, which showed a "tepid" outlook with some cautious optimism about the year to come.TAMPA — Veterans are gaining support from a Google-backed program that aims to increase the number of veterans who attend and graduate from selective colleges and universities such as Vassar College.
The Veterans Posse Program, a first-of-its-kind initiative, provides funding and support for veterans seeking to attend elite institutions. As the first partner school, Vassar enrolled 11 veterans last fall in its freshman class, including a Purple Heart recipient, a tank commander and a medic. The college committed to admit similarly sized groups of veterans in at least its next three freshman classes.
"Our president realized we were really missing veterans on campus," Vassar professor Benjamin Lotto said. "We're indebted to this country, so we owe it to our veterans to make Vassar a welcoming place."
Lotto, the faculty adviser for Vassar's first veterans posse cohort on campus, spoke to alumni and representatives from MacDill Air Force Base at a reception Thursday evening at the Tampa Club.
Google awarded the Veterans Posse Program a $1.2 million Global Impact Award in November, which will help the program expand to other colleges and universities. Wesleyan University will welcome its first Veterans Posse in fall 2014, and the Posse Foundation hopes to expand to at least 10 institutions in the future.
"It's great we're doing this at Vassar, but I consider this program a failure if it doesn't expand," Lotto said. "The more people that know about this the better. The program's not a success unless it scales."
Noticing a communications gap between selective schools and veterans, Vassar tried for several years to recruit veterans, but was unsuccessful before this program.
"Those veterans' voices were missing from our campus, so we needed to work as hard as we could to recruit those veterans to our campus," Lotto said.
The college, which is in New York, receives a lot of federal money and felt it owed it to those who served in the military to open its doors and provide an equal chance at a high-end education, Lotto said.
The veterans arrive on campus in groups of about 10, forming a cohort that provides a community and sense of inclusion, a key aspect of the posse model.
Some of the challenges the students faced were more specific to their status as veterans. For instance, many must balance schoolwork while also raising children or caring for a family. One unexpected difficulty was working with the local Veterans Affairs office so veterans could schedule appointments that didn't interfere with classes.
But for the most part, the hurdles veterans faced their first semester were similar to any other freshman: learning the layout of campus, improving time management or figuring out how to plan when they have three papers due the same week.
An increase in veterans also would help grow the diversity of the school as the students bring different perspectives and experiences to the campus and classrooms.
"It's phenomenal to see any institution take the opportunity to bring more diversity to their population," said Maj. Josh Hawkins of the force support squadron at MacDill.
Lotto said he had already seen examples of the students helping to change the conversations on campus.
He told the story of a parent who was elated to learn that her son was in an urban studies class with a 30-year-old veteran who had worked full time in New York. Think about the experience and perspective that veteran brings to classroom discussions, she told Lotto.
MacDill will have information about the Veterans Posse Program available to all members on base at the education office, Hawkins said.
"You can almost feel the patriotism of America in welcoming back veterans, and Vassar is only emulating that with this program and opening its arms to veterans," retired Brig. Gen. and former MacDill Wing Cmdr. Chip Diehl said. "Their success is going to see more veterans migrate to the warmth of Vassar."
Caitlin Johnston can be reached at [email protected] or (813) 661-2443.8. Where will Sen. Lindsey Graham be next week? A. Traveling to different swing states to promote immigration reform B. In his home state campaigning for reelection C. In Egypt D. In Russia, lobbying for the extradition of Edward Snowden Graham 'glad' NSA tracking phones
Frequent critic of the White House Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is defending the National Security Agency’s reported collection of millions of Americans’ phone calls, saying he’s more concerned about terrorism.
“I’m glad the NSA is trying to find out what the terrorists are up to overseas and in our country,” Graham said Thursday morning on “Fox & Friends.”
Story Continued Below
As a customer of Verizon, the subject of the court order, Graham said he and others had nothing to worry about.
( PHOTOS: Pols, pundits weigh in on NSA report)
“I’m a Verizon customer. I don’t mind Verizon turning over records to the government if the government is going to make sure that they try to match up a known terrorist phone with somebody in the United States. I don’t think you’re talking to the terrorists. I know you’re not. I know I’m not. So we don’t have anything to worry about.”
And Graham assured the hosts that the surveillance was limited to terrorism.
( Also on POLITICO: Obama administration defends Verizon records order)
“I’m glad that activity is going on, but it is limited to tracking people who are suspected to be terrorists and who they may be talking to,” Graham said. He was asked whether he was sure: “Yes, I am sure that that’s what they’re doing.”
Prodded further by Gretchen Carlson as to whether the report of millions of phone calls being collected was true, Graham said: “I’m sure we should be doing this.”
The supportive remarks from the Republican stand in contrast to a number of Democrats who have been highly critical of the administration in light of the report.
This article tagged under: NSA
Surveillance
Lindsey GrahamCanada’s information watchdog is cautiously optimistic as the Liberal government begins focusing its so-called sunny ways on the clouds of obfuscation that have enveloped the country’s much-maligned access to information system.
“I will judge the actions of the government on its concrete steps,” Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault said Tuesday. “So far there are positive messages, and we will see what the concrete actions are going to be. And then I will comment on those concrete actions if and when they happen.”
The Liberals promised during the election campaign to bring in significant changes to the access to information system, including making government information open to the public by default. They also promised to expand the access law to include ministers’ offices, which are currently exempt from such public scrutiny, and to give Legault more power.
The promises come after years of complaints from Legault and others about the growing level of secrecy inside federal departments and agencies, and amid calls to update the 30-year-old Access to Information Act. Legault reiterated those concerns Tuesday as her most recent annual report on the system was released.
“It really is time to completely overhaul this piece of legislation,” she said. “The act as it stands really does not strike the right balance between the public’s right to know and the government’s legitimate secrecy of its operations.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has signalled that he intends to follow through on his promises by ordering Treasury Board Secretary Scott Brison to lead a review of the act, likely to start next year, that ensures the Liberals’ promises are implemented. The order was revealed in a mandate letter to Brison made public last month.
“The disclosure of the mandate letter was certainly a very strong message from the government. It was something I applaud,” Legault said, adding that the Liberals’ promise to give her office more power and extend the law to ministers’ offices fit with her own recommendations on how to fix the system.
While the legislation is a mainstay for many Ottawa journalists, Canadians from all walks of life use the federal access to information law every day to find data about government programs and decisions that affect their daily lives.
Some real-life examples include a Canadian seeking more information about a family member who died in federal prison; a man trying to find out what Canada Post did with his lost parcels; and a historian examining security measures implemented for the 1976 and 1988 Olympics in Montreal and Calgary.
The Liberal promise to reform the act could coincide with an important anniversary for open government, Legault said. That’s because 2016 marks the 250th anniversary since the first access to information law was adopted in Sweden, which the United Nations and other organizations plan to mark throughout the year.
“So I think 2016 is a year of opportunity for access to information for this government,” Legault said. “And I think it could be the year that Canada reinstates itself as a leader in access to information. That’s my hope.”
Legault had her first face-to-face meeting with Brison on Monday, which she described as a courtesy call. The information commissioner said her hope is that the government will consult with her office as it moves to reform the system.
“I don’t know if the government intends to do a full review of the act or what process they’re going to follow,” she said. “I have not been privy to any conversations about that.”
In the meantime, Legault said her office is struggling with a backlog of about 3,000 complaints, which she described as the most in recent history.
It is also in a constitutional court battle with the government after the Conservatives rewrote the access to information law to clear the RCMP of any wrongdoing for destroying long-gun registry data in 2012. The case has been delayed three months so the Liberals can decide what to do.
lberthiaume@ottawacitizen.com
Twitter.com/leeberthiaumeRyan Tannehill has been consistently inconsistent in his time in Miami, evidenced by the Dolphins record 17-19 record in Tannehill's time as the team's starting quarterback.
Tannehill has suffered from unfortunate circumstances in his time in Miami. Lack of weapons to throw to was the excuse in his rookie season, then lack of a legitimate, scheme-fitting offensive line unit hindered his second year.
Still, Tannehill showed flashes of greatness at times in these years, such as fourth quarter comeback wins against the now-NFL-dominating Seattle Seahawks in 2012 and the Patriots last season.
It's these flashes that leave many who're involved with the organization yearning for simple consistency, to see winning performances week in and week out from the Dolphins starting quarterback (the position that most affects the rest of the offense, and the position most dependent on the rest of the offense).
But for every great game, Tannehill has an astonishingly bad game. Tannehill has had 13 games with less than an 80 passer rating, 11 of those with a rating less than 72. That is a losing performance from the quarterback.
It seemed that Tannehill was building consistency towards the end of 2013 when he was able to string together seven straight starts with a rating over 84. Unfortunately, Tannehill, along with the entire Dolphins offense, sputtered in the final two games of the season. Tannehill earned ratings of 45.6 against the Buffalo Bills and 42.1 against the New York Jets. The Dolphins' offense only put up seven points in those two games.
Tannehill has continued the path of inconsistency that was carved when he had two losing performances in two of the biggest games of the season in 2013. Tannehill's first three games of 2014 left him rated under 80.
While Tannehill has suffered the largest volume of drops from his receivers in the NFL, and passer rating is a bit of a flawed stat, Tannehill's inconsistent throws throughout the first three games of the season shows up in the stat sheet and the win/loss column.
Fortunately for Tannehill and Dolphins fans, we may see an upswing on Tannehill's play. Tannehill, in the midst of questions about whether his starting spot was in jeopardy, put on a masterful performance against a defensively-confused Oakland Raiders team in London. Tannehill completed nearly 75% of his passes and finished with a 109.3 passer rating in his best game of the season.
Sunday, Tannehill will have an opportunity to start a string of winning performances. The Dolphins need Tannehill to perform well in this next stretch of games as many will likely be shootouts. Games against the Green Bay Packers, Chicago Bears, San Diego Chargers and Detroit Lions all come within the next five weeks. All four of those games could be shootouts, which means Tannehill would need to be the cause of victory.
Tannehill will need play well for each of these games in order for the Dolphins to pull out a victory. In fact, Tannehill needs to string together some admirable starts in order to simply keep his job long-term and prove inconsistency is not his calling card.
Improving his third down play and redzone efficiency will pay huge dividends in Tannehill's quest for consistency.
Tannehill has all the tools to be an excellent quarterback. He has everything working in his favor now-- an innovative offensive coordinator, a slew of weapons and an above average offensive line. It's up to Tannehill to consistently make good decisions and precise throws to have his team in a position to pull out a victory every Sunday.
Tannehill must not only start a path of consistency Sunday, he must start of path of being consistently good.
Follow @DWPhinsiderMH370: Debris found in Maldives not from missing flight, Malaysia's transport minister says
Updated
A Malaysian team inspecting debris that washed up in the Maldives has so far found nothing that came from missing flight MH370, Malaysia's transport minister says, as Reunion island officials prepare to wrap up their search.
Malaysia sent experts to the Maldives this week to check on reported debris found on the coral atoll nation after a wing part from the ill-fated plane was found on Reunion island in the Indian Ocean.
Transport minister Liow Tiong Lai said his team had examined the Maldives debris and found no connection.
"They are not related to MH370 and not even plane material," he told The Star newspaper.
Mr Liow said the investigators would continue to examine any further unidentified flotsam found on the Maldives for links to the Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777, which disappeared in March last year.
Malaysia last week said the wing part that washed ashore on Reunion had been confirmed by experts as coming from the missing jet.
The confirmation marked the first confirmed evidence the plane, which was carrying 239 passengers and crew, had met a tragic end in the Indian Ocean.
After that discovery, the Malaysian authorities alerted nearby Madagascar and the South African coast to be on the lookout, saying it was possible debris would wash up in those locations.
Mauritius also launched search operations.
So far, no further debris from MH370 has been confirmed.
The Boeing 777 disappeared on March 8 last year, sparking the largest multinational search operation in history.
The hunt for MH370 has been focused on the southern Indian Ocean based on satellite data hinting at the plane's path.
Reunion island search to end on Monday
Meanwhile, Reunion island authorities have announced active air and sea searches off the tiny island's shores will stop on Monday after just over one week.
Local official Dominique Sorain said if no objects were found by next Monday, "we will move to a phase of heightened surveillance".
"No object has been found in the sea that could belong to an airplane," Ms Sorain told reporters, adding that "a certain amount of debris" had been found on land and handed over to investigators.
She said the searches, which began last Friday, had covered nearly 10,000 square kilometres of ocean and involved 200 police hours.
AFP
Topics: disasters-and-accidents, air-and-space, maldives, malaysia, reunion
First postedLast year Dontnod Entertainment received mass critical acclaim for their breakout hit adventure title Life Is Strange. With that game Dontnod perfected the modern adventure game formula with a very relatable human story, now they look to do something similar with their new RPG Vampyr. Vampires have taken on many incarnations over the years, from sparkling angst ridden teens in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight to ravenous beasts in Robert Rodriguez's From Dusk Till Dawn. With Vampyr, Dontnod want to bring us back to the romanticized beginnings of these mythological creatures. At E3 2016 we had the pleasure to speak to Dontnod's narrative director Stéphane Beauverger further on what it is they are doing to return to the roots of the vampire.
RPG Site: Vampyr has a very dark, somewhat frightening aesthetic to it. Are there any sort of horror elements to it?
Stéphane Beauverger: I wouldn't say horror. It's about a tragic figure - the vampire - which we wanted to bring back to its gothic and romantic roots. So it's dark, but it's not horror in the sense of the 'jumpscare' or anything like that. It's gothic.
RPG Site: In myth, vampires are often portrayed as elegant and beautiful, which seems to reflect in this game's combat where there seems to be a bit of grace to how the protagonist finishes its prey. Was preserving that romantic vision of the vampire a goal when designing the combat?
Stéphane Beauverger: You have that option, but actually you can specialize in different branches of combat. One specialization might be more animalistic and raw, while others may be more subtle where you emulate shadows and things like that. The vampire's figure is very complex, you can have a wide range of vision as to what a vampire is. From Twilight, to Nosferatu (Dracula), to brainless blood drinking creatures à la '30 Days Of Night. We want to go back to the roots of the vampire figure, to the gothic figure. For us it's half-human, half-elegant, half-seducing, half-complete beast; made mad by the thirst for blood.
That's why we have a "y" in the name in fact - because that's the option you will have as you play the game. The protagonist is torn between being a doctor and being a vampire, you save lives & you take lives, you believe in science but are also a supernatural creature. These dilemmas are who you are and you have to make up for it. One moment you could have a very polite conversation with someone, the next you're savage in a fight because some vampire hunters found you.
RPG Site: Where did the idea for this game come from, what inspired you?
Stéphane Beauverger: From the outset we wanted to make a game that made players face tough choices, and from that came the setting and the gameplay. 'Cause it was a setting that we believe plays to our strengths as a studio. As for references for vampires, Dracula of course, but also other gothic horror stories like Frankenstein. Anne Rice works such as 'Interview With A Vampire' is a favorite of mine as well that helped influence the game.
RPG Site: How does progression and leveling work in Vampyr?
Stéphane Beauverger: In Vampyr, you can build up your character with levels by fighting, taking part in combat, and doing quests. That's totally ok, I'm a huge fan of Skyrim and games of that ilk. However, you gain much more experience when you take a life - as in draining a citizen of their life force the way a vampire would. It is much more rewarding and risky than just fighting enemies as each time you take a life, there is weight to your decision. I think this is very new as you can level up easily just by feeding on people. It is part of the vampire nature and what the project is really about. There might be terrible consequences for taking a life, you must be careful with the decision.
RPG Site: Is stealth an element to the game at all?
Stéphane Beauverger: It is not really about stealth. You have a working cover as a human, as a doctor, and you came from the highest point in society. You already have a lot of influence over people. So you can use your cover to go about acting like a normal human, or you can use that cover to your benefit as a vampire. It is much more pretending that you are still human, not literally hiding like in a stealth game, you are just hiding your true nature.
RPG Site: One thing in the demo we really enjoyed was the mesmerize ability which allowed you to subdue a citizen and have them listen to your instructions. How deep does this ability go in terms how utilization?
Stéphane Beauverger: Mesmerize is probably the most important vampire ability in the game. Each time you want to take someone to feed on them, you have to match their mind resistance. So you have to increase your Mesmerize skill, as this is how you can get much more interesting prey into the shadows to feed on them. You can also use it to enter houses, as a vampire cannot enter someone's home without being formally invited. So you can mesmerize someone and get them to invite you into their house. You can also use this ability to interrogate someone and get them to reveal information to you. There are a wide variety of vampire abilities besides mesmerize however, including one that allows you to listen to conversations from a distance or behind a wall. The more information you get on your target, the more you will know who it is you are supposed to kill.
RPG Site: For our readers at RPG Site, do you have any sort of parting message you would like to give fans for the genre and what should they look forward to with Vampyr?
Stéphane Beauverger: Well it has been a very long time since there was a RPG with a vampire as the protagonist, so hopefully RPG fans enjoy it. We really wanted to give a vampire the opportunity to get back into games, cause there have been just too many zombies!
We would like to thank Stéphane and Dontnod Entertainment for giving us the opportunity to speak with them. Vampyr is shaping up to be something special and it is most certainly a passion project for the studio. Lets hope it all turns out when Vampyr releases next year!Arturia MatrixBrute Synth Now Shipping Share: Language English
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It's almost been one year since the Arturia MatrixBrute analog synthesizer was announced. And from today the first units have begun shipping. Here's a video of a 2 MatrixBrute performance to celebrate
Arturia today announced that their much anticipated MatrixBrute analog synthesizer is now shipping! It was first announced on 21st January 2016 at NAMM. But in the past year Arturia haven't been silent about this big beast of a synthesizer. There are now many videos showing its different capabilities on the Arturia YouTube channel.
And now the €1999 EUR analog synthesizer is really here. Yes. Really.
Here's a real-time performance made with 2 MatrixBrute and listen to its amazing sound palette:
More info: https://www.arturia.com/…/hardware-syn…/matrixbrute/overview
Here's some info on the MatrixBrute with numbers on the images to make it easier to see what's what.
1. Three Analog Oscillators: Sawtooth, Pulse, Triangle, waves with the unique waveshapers that have become the trademark of the 'Brute' sound. There is also a sub-oscillator on each of the two Brute oscillators.
2. Combination VCO/LFO oscillator: The third Osciallator can be used for both audio signals and LFO modulation at the same time. You do not have to choose either operation here so you can always have that big 3 oscillator sound.
3. Noise Generator: Noise generator with White, Pink, Red and Blue noise types. The most versatile on the market.
4. Audio Mod: The AUDIO MOD section allows for complex oscillator and filter FM possibilities bringing whole new tonalities to your sound.
5. Performance Controls: Pitch bend and mod wheels and 4 Macro encoders which can be assigned to any of the modulation destinations for instant hands on performance playing.
6. Voice Modes: Multiple keyboard modes for mono, paraphonic and duo-split modes. Split oscialltors for paraphonic mode or use the duo split mode to play a sequence while playing notes over the top of it.
7. Three LFOs: Two standalone LFO’s with 7 waveforms and trigger modes allow for complex modulations. The combination VCO/LFO adds a 3rd LFO in the system.
8. Mixer: Mix and blend Oscillators 1, 2, 3, as well as the noise generator and EXTERNAL input sources. Route each mixer input to the filter of your choice using the FILTER assign buttons.
9. Steiner-Parker filter: We have upgraded our Steiner Parker filter to support both 12db per octave and 24db per octave slopes as well as a DRIVE control for making thicker sounds. The 4 modes, Low pass, band pass, high pass, and notch allow for a vast array of sound making possibilites.
10. Ladder Filter: We have included a traditional beefy Ladder filter with both 12db and 24db per octave slopes as well as Low Pass, High Pass & Band Pass modes and a Drive control. This filter design is known for making punchy bass and thick lead sounds.
11. Filter routing: The two filters can be patched in series or in parallel configurations.
12. 3 Envelope Generators: The two ADSR envelopes and the 3rd DADSR envelope give you plenty of sound sculpting tools.
13. 256 Memory locations: Store and recall your favorite sounds at the touch of a button. You can organize, save and load new banks of sounds using the free MIDI Control Center editor application. We deliver MatrixBrute with 128 factory presets.
14. The Matrix: The matrix is the heart of Matrixbrute. It allows for complex modulation routing, step-sequencing and instant preset recall. Modulation Routing: You can assign any of 16 modulation sources to any of 16 mod destinations. 4 destinations are user programmable and can be seen in the e-ink display. Set amounts of each modulation routing using the data encoder. Step Sequencer: The matrix can be used as a 64 step sequencer with separate STEP, ACCENT, SLIDE and MODULATION steps. Preset Recall: In Preset mode the matrix allows you to recall any of 256 presets at the touch of a button.
15. True Analog Effects: To enhance your sonic pleasure we have added an analog and Delay/ Chorus/ Flanger to the output. Choose from any of 5 operation modes. And YES! the controls in the analog effects can be set as modulation destinations in the Matrix.
16. Sequencer/Arpeggiator controls: The sequencer and arpeggiator add to the playability of the Matrixbrute. Multiple modes of both the seq and arp allow for unlimited musical ideas to be realized.
17. Keyboard: The 49 note keyboard features both velocity and aftertouch for a musical feel with plenty of expression.
18. Master Audio Outputs: Stereo ¼” jacks for your master audio outputs.
19. Control Voltage Interfacing: 12 CV Inputs and 12 CV Outputs allow the Matrixbrute to interface with your standard 1V per octave modular synth gear.
20. Audio Input: Line and instrument levels allow for adding an external oscillator from your favorite modular synth or processing a guitar or bass through the filters, VCA and analog effects.
21. Gate I/O: The Gate inputs and outputs allow you to trigger external gear or trigger the internal envelopes remotely.
22. Sync in and out: This allows you to synchronize the MatrixBrute’s sequencer and arpeggiator with external devices.
23. Pedal Inputs: Experssion and Sustain pedal inputs give you real-time control to expand on your expressive capabilities control.
24. MIDI Interfacing: Standard MIDI in, out and thru will connect you to both modern and vintage gear alike.
25. USB: USB I/O allows you to interface to a computer DAW directly. This is also the link to use our free editor/librarian software provided for the MatrixBrute.
Price: €1999 EUR Review: Coming soon Read the manual here: https://www.arturia.com/products/matrixbrute/resources Web: https://www.arturia.com/…/hardware-syn…/matrixbrute/overviewDunkirk is a wonder.
Christopher Nolan movies are an experience. They aren’t structured in typical narrative fashion; they’re visually rich; they’re puzzle boxes, requiring investment of time and energy. “Dunkirk” is no different in these respects. What makes it different is one thing Nolan has never truly explored: quiet.
That’s an odd word to describe a film with a booming score, sound design ratcheted up so that every gunshot stuns the audience, explosions that |
but when you do have some narrow wins and losses in some of these states, it could make a difference.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchettDogs only behind motor vehicles as cause of wildlife injuries and deaths.
A recent study by a University of Tasmania Masters student has found that dogs may be a more serious problem than cats for native wildlife in some circumstances.
Mr Holderness-Roddam’s Master’s thesis analysed the records of native wildlife presenting for care through veterinary practices and the Resource Management and Conservation Division of the Tasmanian Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment (DPIPWE) for cause of death and injury.
“The results were quite clear cut”, said Mr Holderness-Roddam. “Whilst the overwhelming number of wildlife injuries and deaths were attributed to motor vehicles (1,256), the next highest cause of injuries and death was recorded for dogs (238), with cats at 152.”
“This should not be seen as a ‘get out of jail card’ for cats though”, said Mr Holderness-Roddam. “They still account for a considerable amount of wildlife mortality, and they spread a nasty disease called toxoplasmosis which kills bandicoots.”
A second set of records, provided by the Australian Wildlife Health Centre - Wildlife Hospital at Healesville Sanctuary in Victoria supported the Tasmanian findings. In that case dogs were reported as being responsible for 115 attacks on native wildlife and cats 79 attacks.
The types of areas where native wildlife is most likely to be at risk from domestic dogs are the urban and suburban bushland reserves, such as the Poimena Reserve in Austins Ferry and beaches when shorebirds are breeding or preparing for migration.
“Unfortunately many dog owners ignore the requirement to keep their dogs on leash. I frequently see dogs such as Jack Russell terriers being allowed to hunt through the bush by thoughtless owners.”
“The land managers for these areas, particularly local councils, need to take a stronger line with dog owners who choose to ignore the leash requirements. They also need to install more informative signs and provide fenced dog exercise areas with doggy gym equipment, water and poo bags”, said Mr Holderness-Roddam.
A full copy of the thesis is available at: http://eprints.utas.edu.au/12310/
Source: University of TasmaniaEminem has come under fire for glorifying rape in a new song for the movie Straight Outta Compton.
The 42-year-old father-of-three screams, 'I even make the b****es I rape c*m,' in a rap solo on Dr Dre's song Medicine Man.
The line has prompted a wave of backlash from anti-violence groups and among Twitter users after the movie's release this week.
Eminem, 42, screams, 'I even make the b****es I rape c*m,' in a rap solo on Dr Dre's song Medicine Man
The rapper (pictured at the height of his fame in the 2000's with Dr Dre) has said 'I made my monopoly off misogyny'. His 20-year career has included a plethora of songs with lyrics about degrading women
'How is eminem still making rape jokes in his verse though? You're like my parents age, please grow up,' wrote one teenage Twitter user.
One said: 'Eminem really almost the age where you gotta start getting your prostrate checked & he's still unnecessarily rapping about rape'
Another said: 'That Eminem verse came way to late in the album. By that point, the nostalgia had worn off, and i was in no mood for rape puns.'
And one wrote: 'Oh so more Eminem lyrics glorifying rape, time to grow up dude.'
Straight Outta Compton is a biopic of the rap collective the NWA, of which Dr Dre was a member. Eminem was not; he was a member of the hip hop group D-12 before going solo.
Karen Ingala Smith, chief executive of anti-rape group The Nia Project, told The Guardian such language misconstrues the meaning of consent.
'Women and girls who have suffered sexual violence often blame themselves or question whether they were really raped,' she told the paper.
'Peddling the lie that orgasm equals consent silences victims of sexual violence.'
Straight Outta Compton (pictured) is a biopic of the rap collective the NWA, of which Dr Dre was a member
Eminem, whose real name is Marshall Mathers, is not known for his family-friendly lyrics.
Many of his songs include homophobic and misogynistic lyrics.
And last week, he performed a freestyle rap on the radio show Sway In The Morning that agreed: 'I made monopoly off misogyny.'
He continued: 'No wonder you scoff at me, it’s obvious I’m as off-putting as Bill Cosby is / Treat women like property, possessive like a noun with an apostrophe.'
The rap also took aim at Caitlyn Jenner: 'I invented prick, and that’s a true statement, I see the d*** in you, Caitlyn / Keep the pistol tucked like Bruce Jenner’s d***.
'No disrespect though, not at all, no pun intended, that took a lot of balls.'According to ESPN Stats & Info, the Eagles have a.00002 percent shot at making the playoffs — so they're saying there's still a chance!
But how, you might ask? (Surely, there must be one of you.)
At best, the Eagles can finish 8-8 this season, and, at best, that would only be tied for one of the top six records in the NFC. Five teams are already guaranteed to finish with at least nine wins, including a pair of division rivals, all of which means there is no scenario where the Eagles wind up in the playoffs purely by virtue of records.
The Eagles need help. Granted, more than most, but it's possible. They just need one or two things to shake their way. Or 10, as it were.
And there's no getting around ANY of these.
Step 1
First and foremost, the Eagles must win all three of their remaining games: at Baltimore (7-6) on Sunday, then home against the Giants (9-4) the following Thursday and the Cowboys (11-1) in Week 17. The Giants and Cowboys have already beaten the Eagles once this season.
Step 2
The Buccaneers must finish in first place in the NFC South. The Bucs already have eight wins and own the tiebreaker over the Eagles for the second and final wild-card berth. That means Tampa Bay needs to win its division and leave that spot available.
Step 3
Atlanta cannot win another game. It's not enough for the Bucs to win the South. The Falcons still can't add to their victory total over the final three contests. A W over either the 49ers (1-12) on Sunday, at Carolina (5-8) on Christmas Eve or against the Saints (5-8) in Week 17 will put them club at nine. In case you didn't notice, none of those opponents are above.500.
Steps 4 and 5
Neither Washington nor the Packers can win another game. Thanks to their tie, Washington would then finish no worse than 8-7-1, which is better than 8-8. With another victory, Green Bay could do no worse than.500 and owns the tiebreaker over the Eagles by virtue of head-to-head victory.
Washington finishes at home against the Panthers (5-8), at Chicago (3-10) and at home against the Giants (9-4). The Packers are at Chicago (3-10), home against the Vikings (7-6) and at Detroit (9-4).
Step 6
The Vikings cannot win two more games. The Eagles do own the head-to-head tiebreaker, but two victories would get Minnesota to nine wins. Minnesota is home against the Colts (6-7) this week, then at Green Bay (7-6) and home against the Bears (3-10).
*Step 7
*To demonstrate how complex this begins to get, the Vikings MUST beat the Packers in order to fulfill Step 5, BUT also have to lose to the Colts and Bears in their own building, both teams with losing records, to fulfill Step 6. What a world.
Steps 8 through 10
Neither the Cardinals, Saints nor or Panthers can run the table and win their final three games. Arizona would get in over the Eagles by virtue of a better record thanks to its tie, while the Saints and Panthers would own the tiebreaker based on superior conference records.
The Cardinals are home against the Saints (5-8), then at Seattle (8-4-1) and Los Angeles (4-9).
The Saints are at Arizona (5-7-1), home for the Bucs (8-5), then at Atlanta (8-5).
The Panthers are at Washington (7-5-1), versus Atlanta (8-5) and at Tampa Bay (8-5).
So to summarize...
The simplest path is this: Eagles beat the Ravens, Giants and Cowboys. The Bucs beat the Saints and Panthers in Weeks 16 and 17. Washington, the Falcons and the Packers don't win another game the rest of the season. The Vikings defeat the Packers in Week 16, but lose to the Colts and Bears. And the Cardinals simply don't win all three of their games, although if they took out the Saints, that would put slightly less work on the Bucs.
It's crazy. It's outlandish. It's not going to happen.
And more has probably happened before.It looks like the cost of buying in Brooklyn is finally getting as terrifyingly high as Manhattan. In the second quarter of 2017, the borough set some serious price records: The median price of any apartment increased nearly 21 percent to $795,000, a record. And—this might give pause to the New Yorkers who still remember when Brooklyn was remotely affordable—the average sales price increased 22.1 percent, and is now "close to cracking $1 million," according to Jonathan Miller, author of the Douglas Elliman market reports. Yes, that’s another record.
Per Miller, this jump in price marks the third time in the past four quarters that Brooklyn’s average price has broken its own record; it’s the fourth consecutive quarter with a median sales price record. It's also the fastest paced market on record, with the number of sales jumping 50.7 percent and the listing inventory falling 15.5.
According to Douglas Elliman the median sales price for a condo was $900,000; for a co-op, it was $423,000; and for single- to three-family homes, it was was $1,046,440. The luxury median sales price jumped 32.6 percent to $2,520,168. Halstead, meanwhile, tracked a record average of $1,109,602 for townhouses prices, which comes out to $481 per square foot.
So what gives? According to Corcoran’s report, "this quarter was the season of the new development" for the borough. Closings at buildings like 550 Vanderbilt, 500 Waverly, 200 Water Street, and Pierhouse helped new development sales jump 127 percent over the same time last year; the median price for those properties rose 25 percent year-over-year to $971,000, as the average price increased 42 percent to $1.37 million. And while both the inventory and closed sales for new developments is on the rise, it’s actually decreasing for co-ops and resale condos.
Miller calls the Brooklyn market one that's "still figuring itself out," but says there’s still room to grow, likely in the condo market. "I don't think we give enough credit to how powerful this 'Brooklyn phenomenon is," he says. "We're not just seeing records in Brooklyn—it's also causing the neighboring borough to set similar records."
Oh yeah, Queens prices are up, too: The median sales price in the borough rose 9.7 percent to $510,000—another record—while the average sales price increased 12.4 percent to $592,245, also a record. The luxury median sales price increased to $1.2 million.
This is the fourth average sales price record set in past five quarters, and second median sales price record set in four quarters. Queens also saw its fastest paced second quarter in a dozen years, with the number of sales surging 47 percent.A 54-year-old Karen immigrant was fatally shot outside his home on St. Paul's East Side Monday night in what his family believes was a robbery attempt.
Htoo Baw was shot as he was retrieving a bag from his car on the 700 block of Orange Avenue E., a daughter said. He was taken to Regions Hospital, where he died.
The shooting occurred around 9:30 p.m., about 18 minutes after another man was shot in the arm a few blocks away, near Rose Avenue E. and Arcade Street, police said. That man was identified by police as Issac O. Maiden, an alleged gang member acquitted in 2013 in the near-fatal beating of Ray Widstrand, also on the city's East Side. Maiden's injury was not life threatening.
Htoo Baw had just returned from Iowa and was retrieving a backpack when he was shot, his 23-year-old daughter Ehgay Poe, said Tuesday.
She said her 13-year-old sister heard the gunshot, went outside and saw a man running away and her father on the ground.
"I think the guy was trying to rob him," she said.
Authorities identified a St. Paul man who died late Monday night after he was shot outside a home on the city’s East Side with his teenage daughter nearby as Htoo Baw, 54, of St. Paul.
Police have not released many details. As of Tuesday, they could not confirm whether the shootings were connected or whether Htoo Baw was targeted or was a random victim. Police canvassed the neighborhood for much of Tuesday, but made no arrests.
"The investigation goes on," said Sgt. Mike Ernster, a St. Paul police spokesman.
Ehgay Poe said her family, who are members of the Karen community, immigrated to the United States from Thailand almost seven years ago. Her father had not been working and was receiving disability benefits, she said.
Ehgay Poe described her father as a "nice guy," who was quiet and enjoyed spending time with his family. Htoo Baw had three daughters and lived in the East Side home with his wife, children, grandchildren and son-in law.
He also was a member of First Burma Christ Church for about a year, said his pastor Mehm Mya Thi. Htoo Baw had originally immigrated from a refugee camp.
"He's a good person," said the pastor, who visited Htoo Baw's home Tuesday morning to comfort his family.
Ehgay Poe said that the loss of her father made her feel "empty," and that her younger sister had cried all day.
In both shootings Monday, the assailant was on foot when he approached his victims, police said.
Maiden was shot in the 700 block of Rose Avenue E. but did not realize it until he was near the CVS on Maryland Avenue, police said. According to the police report, Maiden was "very uncooperative with officers." He was taken to Regions Hospital to be treated for his injury.
@nicolenorfleetImage copyright Reuters Image caption Germany's defence minister (C) says veneration for Hitler's armed forces has no place in the modern German army
Inspections have been ordered at every German army barracks, after Nazi-era memorabilia was found at two of them.
The defence ministry said the command came from the inspector general of the Bundeswehr (Germany's armed forces).
All barracks will be searched for material linked to the Wehrmacht, the army which served Adolf Hitler.
The move follows a growing scandal over far-right extremism within the army, with an officer accused of plotting an attack disguised as a Syrian refugee.
The army lieutenant, who had expressed far-right views, was arrested in late April.
Prosecutors in Frankfurt said the 28-year-old suspect had a "xenophobic background".
Germany's Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen cancelled a planned trip to the US and travelled to his garrison in Illkirch, northeastern France.
Officials found Wehrmacht memorabilia openly displayed there in the common room, despite a ban on Nazi symbols.
A second barracks, Fürstenberg in Donaueschingen, southwest Germany, was then sucked into the scandal on Saturday after a display cabinet was found containing Nazi-era helmets.
Spiegel online reported that pictures of Wehrmacht soldiers were found on a wall, along with Nazi pistols, more helmets and military decorations.
Image copyright EPA Image caption Graffiti reading "Nazis out!" on a fence at the Fürstenberg barracks in Donaueschingen
A Defence Ministry spokesman told Reuters the items found in Donaueschingen did not include Nazi objects punishable under German law, such as swastikas.
However, Ms Von der Leyen said last Wednesday that she would not tolerate the veneration of the Wehrmacht in today's army.
She said the latest scandals were no longer isolated cases, adding that "a misunderstood esprit de corps" had led senior officers to "look the other way".
The minister later apologised for the tone of her criticism, after political opponents accused her of smearing the whole army.Fluke or contender? Mirage or the real deal? These are the kind of questions that surround the St. Louis Blues for their upcoming season, and by all means they are legitimate.
After suffering through a span of six seasons where they appeared in the playoffs only once, the Blues surprised the hockey world by winning the Central Division in 2011-2012 and then by making it to the Western Conference Semis before being swept by the eventual champs, the L.A. Kings.
When there is sudden success combined with a lack of recent achievements there is only one possible question that emerges; are they legitimate or just plain lucky?
If their 2012-2013 roster is any inclination as to how good they will be then they are more than just legitimate, they are one of the favorites for Lord Stanley’s Cup.
Defensemen – Building Upon Strength
One of the Blues greatest strengths in 2011-2012 was undoubtedly their blue line. Alex Pietrangelo emerged as one of the top offensive defensemen in the entire NHL while Kevin Shattenkirk exceeded all expectations in his first full season with the Blues. Both are considerably young (Pietrangelo is 22 while Shattenkirk is 23) which means their development is still in motion. It’s hard to imagine this duo getting any more dynamic than it already is but it’s a reality that the entire NHL will have to cope with in the coming years.
Joining Pietrangelo and Shattenkirk on the blue line in 2012-2013 are Barret Jackman, Roman Polak and Kris Russell. Although none of these names will make your heart race or imagination wonder they are effective nonetheless. Jackman will look to rebound from a disastrous showing against the Kings in the playoffs and justify the new three year contract he received from the Blues in the offseason while Polak will continue to be the defensive enforcer that the group needs. Russell, who was acquired from the Blue Jackets midseason, will be given the opportunity to play consistent minutes in the top six and will have to prove that he belongs amongst one of the top defensive groupings in the league.
The one remaining question that surrounds the St. Louis Blues top six defensemen is who will be the last man to join the crowd? The competition essentially comes down to a battle between Ian Cole and Cade Fairchild. Cole has consistently received the nod over the past two seasons when it comes to being called-up, playing in 26 games for the Blues in both 2010-2011 and 2011-2012. At 6’1”, 225 pounds, Cole is a big and physical body that the Blues desperately need in order to control the big forwards that litter the NHL.
Cade Fairchild on the other hand has experienced a considerable amount of success since signing with the Blues after playing for the University of Minnesota. Not only was he selected to the AHL All-Rookie team in 2011-2012, he was selected to the AHL All-Star game as well. In 68 games with Peoria Rivermen he tallied 8 goals and 26 assists while posting an impressive 26 +/- rating, elevating his stock and increasing the temptation for the Blues to use him sooner rather than later.
Odds are that Cole will receive the nod over Fairchild considering his experience in the NHL as well as the Blues need of adding big bodied defensemen instead of a smaller, more offensive-minded blue liner like Fairchild. Cole will slide in nicely and give the defensive corps a more balanced look, increasing upon a strength for the upcoming season.
Forwards – Bandaging a Weakness
There is no denying that the main weakness that hindered the St. Louis Blues throughout the 2011-2012 season was their offensive output. Despite ranking 10th in shots per game (30.6) they were only able to muster 2.51 goals per game, good for 21st in the league. If the Blues are looking to increase their legitimacy for a Stanley Cup run this is where they need to elevate their game.
Luckily for the Blues that problem may simply fix itself. Instead of jumping into the free agency frenzy or making a trade for a high profile scorer they stood still, letting everything pass them by. The immediate reaction is to wonder why they wouldn’t make a move, but the truth is they didn’t have to make a move in order to get better.
One of the main reasons for the Blues lack of offensive prowess in the previous season was due to a string of injuries that decimated three very important offensive weapons. David Perron, considered to be one of most prolific players on the Blues roster when healthy, missed a total of 97 games between 2010 and 2011 after suffering a concussion at the hands of Joe Thornton. When he did finally manage to step foot onto the ice for the last 57 games of the 2011-2012 season he tallied 21 goals and 21 assists.
Andy McDonald, one of the veteran leaders on the Blues roster, was limited to just 25 games after suffering a concussion and then ashoulder injury. Despite his age he is still considered a threat in the offensive zone and showed that ability in his limited time this past season, managing 22 points.
Alex Steen also fell victim to the dreaded concussion which sidelined him for a total of 39 games. He has shown in the past that he is capable of posting solid numbers, scoring 24 goals in 2009-2010 as well as 20 goals in 2010-2011.
If even two of these three players manage to stay healthy for the entire season it would dramatically improve the Blues offensive production for the upcoming season. It would be comparable to adding two new free agents to the mix but the benefit would be that these players are already well rehearsed in the Blues system.
As if the addition of those three players was not enough there is also the debut of Russian prospect Vladimir Tarasenko. Although rookies always tend to struggle during their first year in the NHL, Tarasenko will have an advantage seeing as he is already considered a veteran in the KHL, playing four full seasons in the Russian league. Even if Tarasenko struggles he will add scoring depth on the third line that most organizations would die for.
Let’s not forget that David Backes will be looking to reassert his dominance as one of the best power centers in the NHL and T.J. Oshie will be coming off a career year in goals, assists and points. If the group as a whole can stay healthy and gel together then what was a weakness in 2011-2012 should become a considerable strength in 2012-2013.
Goaltending – Replicating the Impossible
The most impressive aspect of the Blues 2011-2012 season was their goaltending duo. Jaroslav Halak and Brian Elliot combined to post an NHL best 1.89 GAA. While a lot of credit should be placed upon the defensive unit seeing as they allowed a league low 26.7 shots per game, a lot of praise is being placed on Halak and Elliot due to both of them experiencing career years in 2011-2012.
Halak was the least surprising of the two considering his previous success with the Montreal Canadians. In 2009-2010 he posted 2.40 GAA and a.924 SV% but that still doesn’t compare to what he managed to produce this past year. Despite struggling for the early part of the season he rebounded to the tune of a 1.97 GAA (good enough to win the William M. Jennings Trophy) and a.926 SV%.
Brian Elliot on the other hand was a pleasant surprise. Prior to the 2011-2012 season, Elliot’s best season was in 2009-2010 when he managed a 2.57 GAA and a.909 SV% in 55 games. Compare that to this past season where he posted an incredible 1.56 GAA and a.940 SV% and you can see how much of a jump Elliot made this past year.
There is no denying that Elliot’s 2011-2012 stats are an irregularity. The chances of him posting similar numbers in the upcoming season are minuscule but the good news is that the Blues aren’t expecting that type of production once again. As long as Halak is healthy he will be the netminders in the majority of games while Elliot returns to the backup role. This will alleviate the pressure on Elliot and instead place it on Halak who has proven that he can carry the status on a number one goalie.Image copyright AP Image caption Ferdinand Marcos ruled the Philippines for 20 years before he was ousted
The burial of former Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the country's Heroes' Cemetery has prompted outrage from opponents.
Ousted and exiled in 1986, he died in the US in 1989. His body was brought back in 1993 and later put on display in his home city of Batac.
He is accused of torturing, abducting and killing thousands of opponents, as well as looting billions of dollars from the country.
The surprise burial angered opponents.
Planned in secret, the funeral in the capital Manila came earlier on the same day as nationwide protests against what were thought to be only plans to move the late leader's body.
Image copyright @samanthasotto
The burial is an emotive issue in the Philippines, where a large part of the country views Ferdinand Marcos' 20-year rule as emblematic of the worst abuses of power.
The country's vice-president, human rights lawyer Leni Robredo, was among the critics, flatly declaring "Marcos is no hero" on Twitter.
Activist Bonifacio Ilagan, who was tortured under Marcos, told the Associated Press news agency the former leader was being buried "like a thief in the night".
But the late leader's eldest daughter, Imee Marcos, governor of the family's home state Ilocos Norte, thanked the country's president on social media for allowing the burial to happen.
Image copyright Imee Marcos Image caption Mr Marcos' daughter broadcast parts of the event on Facebook
President Rodrigo Duterte, who was supported by members of the Marcos family in his presidential campaign, gave permission for the burial in August, calling Marcos a "Filipino soldier".
The Philippines' Supreme Court approved the move in November.
Image copyright EPA Image caption Mr Marcos' reign still divides Filipinos, decades after his death
The ceremony was described as "very simple" and "just a family affair" by Police Chief Superintendent Oscar Albayalde, who helped manage security for the event.
He said it was not a state funeral, although the late leader was given full military honours, including a 21-gun salute.
Reporters were barred from attending.
Image copyright @lenirobredo Image caption The Philippines vice-president split with President Duterte over the burial
Marcos and his wife, Imelda, ruled the Philippines for 20 years, with the country under martial law for much of that time.
More than a million people took to the streets in 1986 to overthrow them in what became known as the People Power Revolution.
Despite this, the family later returned to the Philippines and political life, portraying the former leader's reign as a period of security, order and grand construction projects.
It is an argument that has resonated with many. His son, Ferdinand "Bong Bong" Marcos Jnr, came very close to winning the vice-presidency in May's elections.
He told the BBC his father's reputation had helped, not hindered his campaign.Former Secretary of State Colin Powell woke up to a hacked Facebook page that had some colorful things to say about former President George W. Bush.
Earlier today, "Powell" started posting all-caps status updates that referenced the former president and the Ku Klux Klan, as well as the Illuminati.
The hack was first noticed by Gawker's Adrian Chen, who quipped that "either Colin Powell's Facebook was hacked or he has had a sudden change of heart about George W. Bush."
The page went offline briefly, and Powell later apologized for the posts. "Dear Friends, I'm happy to report that the hacking problem has been fixed. We have been working with fb this morning and they took immediate action to remedy the situation," he wrote.
According to The Smoking Gun, the breach was pulled off by a hacker known as Guccifer, who apparently has a thing for the Bush family. In February, Guccifer hacked the email accounts of the Bush family and publicy shared their personal communications.
Among the materials Guccifer published online were paintings by George W. Bushself portraits of the former president in the bath, taking a shower, and visiting a churchas well as a "confidential October 2012 list of home addresses, cell phone numbers, and emails for dozens of Bush family members," correspondence between the Bushes and well-known figures like Fox News broadcaster Brit Hume, and even an email containing the security gate code for a Bush family residence.
In other hacking news, meanwhile, the Reserve Bank of Australia said this morning that it too was the victim of a breach.
"The Bank has comprehensive security arrangements in place which have isolated these attacks and ensured that viruses have not been spread across the Bank's network or systems," the bank said in a statement. "At no point have these attacks caused the Bank's data or information to be lost or its systems to be corrupted. The Bank's IT systems operate safely, securely and with a high degree of resilience."
"There is ongoing rigorous testing of the Bank's IT systems and regular training of staff," the bank said.On her show Monday night, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow accused Republicans of hoping their own position regarding same sex marriage would be overlooked.
She noted that while same sex marriage had become widely accepted within the Democratic Party, elected Republicans were still by and large opposed to letting same sex couples wed. Even moderate Democrats such as Sens. Claire McCaskill (MO) and Mark Warner (VA) have publicly stated their support for same sex marriage. Meanwhile, prominent Republicans have become silent about the issue.
“Republicans are sort of getting to the point where they don’t want to change their policy position on these matters, they just don’t want to be known for what their policy position is on this matter,” Maddow remarked. “They just want people to stop noticing it.”
“So even though the party platform for last year’s election and the Republican Party chairman, Reince Priebus, and the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, and the supposedly modern new Republicans like Marco Rubio, are all on the record now as still now rigidly anti-gay rights and not planning on changing, even as pretty much everybody in active and high-level Republican politics who is not named Rob Portman continues to stand firm against the threat of gay people having equal citizenship rights, at the same time, they mostly just don’t want to talk about it.”
Conservative figures like Tony Perkins and Gary Bauer were the ones attempting to make a case against same sex marriage, Maddow observed, rather than elected Republicans.
“This is the de facto position of the Republican Party, but Republicans don’t want to argue for it,” she said.
Watch video, courtesy of MSNBC, below:
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economyOne of the best things about Netflix and other streaming services is the ability to take your content wherever you go, but one of the worst things is that you either have to find a Wi-Fi connection to watch or eat up a lot of your data allowance.
Binge watching on the go may be a little easier later this year though because reports are saying that the streaming giant will soon add an option for offline viewing.
While Netflix has said nothing about this feature on their end, the COO of Taitz, a “download and go” software company has indeed said they’re working on downloadable content Netflix, and that the feature will likely debut by the end of the year. For their part, a Netflix spokesperson simply said they have nothing to add at this time.
Here’s how it could work: Netflix users would download a specific video to their device while connected to Wi-Fi or data, and then pull up the videos later with no connection needed. It’s not clear if the downloaded content would be able to be transferred anywhere else. Comcast and Amazon already offer similar features, although the option is only available for a small portion of their material.
It’s not really known what Netflix shows this will apply to, but if they follow the lead of other providers, it won’t be everything. Many people are speculating that the option will only be available for Netflix originals, including all of Netflix’s new Marvel shows.Washington police believe a body found near a pistol and a pool of blood inside an underground bunker is that of murder suspect Peter Keller, Fox News confirms.
Authorities used an explosive to breach the roof of the heavily fortified bunker, which allowed enough access for the officers to enter.
Authorities discovered a body inside which they say appeared to be Keller, and it appeared as though he died of a self-inflected gunshot wound, according to a King County Sheriff's press release.
Police had surrounded the rugged underground bunker believed to belong to the Washington state murder suspect and had ordered negotiators to scene to try to lure its occupant outside.
King County Sheriff's Sgt. Cindi West says a team of the department's hostage negotiators were dropped Saturday morning by helicopter into the Cascade Mountain foothills east of Seattle where the 41-year-old was believed to be holed up.
More On This... Bunker of ‘survivalist’ accused in Seattle killings found
West says the negotiators were trying to contact whoever is in the bunker by bullhorn and other means. SWAT teams reported having seen lights go on and off inside
Keller is suspected of killing his wife and teenage daughter before setting his house on fire in an attempt to cover it up. Authorities maintained a perimeter early Saturday around an elaborate, underground bunker where he might be hiding in the woods of Washington state.
SWAT teams had surrounded the bunker Friday, and almost four dozen officers were at the scene at Rattlesnake Ridge, south of North Bend, where Keller is thought to be holed up.
Police pumped tear gas into the structure in the Cascade foothills east of Seattle and said they "heard and saw movement" in the structure.
Sheriff's officials said later Friday they weren't sure the gas penetrated deep enough to reach the person inside. They also believed the person inside likely has a gas mask.
Efforts were being made to communicate with the individual via a megaphone but cops had so far received no response.
"It could very well be that he's waiting for us to come in and get him. This is a very fluid and dangerous situation," Sheriff Steve Strachan said.
Strachan said that the standoff could last hours, days or even weeks.
According to court documents, Keller had been preparing for "the end of the world" and had stockpiled weapons and food in the woods. He was also described by people who knew him as a "survivalist" with a "distaste for authority."
Keller owned handguns, rifles, silencers and body armor, one of his colleagues at an IT firm told detectives.
Photos of the bunker "don't do it justice," SWAT officers told sheriff's spokeswoman Sgt. Cindi West.
"They said the fort appears to be amazingly fortified," she said.
It was believed that Keller had been building the bunker for some eight years. West said that police managed to locate the well-hidden structure from photographs found in his home.
SWAT teams began a systematic search of the area at 5:00 a.m. local time Friday, the Snoqualmie Valley Record reported. It was not immediately known what time they found the bunker.
The bunker is off trail at Rattlesnake Ridge and witnesses reported seeing Keller's pickup truck in the area in recent weeks.
Keller was charged Wednesday with two counts of first-degree murder and a single count of arson.
His wife Lynnettee Keller, 41, and teenage daughter, Kaylene, 19, were found shot dead inside a burning home in North Bend, about 30 miles southeast of Seattle, on Sunday.
The Associated Press and Newscore contributed to this report.WESTERN Sydney Wanderers chief executive John Tsatsimas has laid down the gauntlet to the club’s troublemakers, telling them: you are not welcome.
The A-League club on Thursday accepted Football Federation Australia’s sanction of a $50,000 fine and suspended three competition point deduction.
While disappointed for the club’s players, staff, owners and the majority of supporters, Tsatsimas re-iterated his comments from earlier this week, telling troublemakers to stay away.
“Show your passion as any true football fan would, but don’t do it as a hooligan,” he said on Thursday in response to David Gallop’s earlier announcement.
Round 21 Visit Match Centre Visit Match Centre Visit Match Centre Visit Match Centre Visit Match Centre
FFA RESPONSE: WANDERERS COP SANCTION
He added: “For those who do not and cannot comply, do not come back.
“You are not welcome...
“Stop using our club as a promotional vehicle for your own selfish narcissistic purposes.
“You’re not wanted, you never will be.”
The Wanderers came out strongly ahead of their 5pm Wednesday deadline set by the FFA, and Tsatsimas continued that theme. However, he continued to be sure to differentiate the club’s famous RBB active support group from the minority grabbing the headlines.
“It’s unfortunate that those who conduct themselves inappropriately put themselves in that group and it tarnishes that group,” he said.
“The RBB have been nothing but fantastic. We just hope (the minority) are weeded out.”
He also implored fellow attendees to be vigilant in helping to weed out the perpetrators.
“To the rest of our fans in this, please do not encourage them.
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ates that there will be around 7500 commercial and hobby drones flying over American airspace by 2018. The FAA expects that it may take several years to develop regulations for drone flights, but they have already opened up designated air space where drones can fly. These locations are being tested to see how drones affect air traffic control.
Critics of commercial drones have cited the high number of crashes by military drones to argue that commercial drones should be restricted. While most commercial and hobby drones are considerably smaller than military drones, the National Park Service is wise to exercise caution, and to ban drones from National Park airspace until further studies have been conducted.
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:I am impressed by the amount of knowledge in our communities. There are countless skills among those who are currently unemployed and underemployed and those who have been laid off during this recession.
In more and more businesses, the tasks and responsibilities are being piled up on smaller staffs and overworked employees, many of whom find themselves increasingly fed up with top-down management that doesn't appreciate them.
In fact, much of our recession can be attributed to the lack of input from workers and small businesses. Our economy has been at the mercy of too few hands over the last several decades. Now many folks are using whatever skill they have to get by in a world with fewer local jobs and many, many underemployed people.
Why should so much talent go to waste?
This is a perfect time for a cooperative economy. Considering the disproportionate struggles faced by women and people of color during a recession, the cooperative economy presents an opportunity for all people, to leverage more power by making themselves the bosses, sharing ownership, and taking a collective approach to good management. Many people have already been let down by a top-down corporate or non-profit model in a recession-ridden society. Now is the time to rebuild the system, and build a society founded on justice, dignity, and respect for people and the planet.
Finding Opportunity in Crisis: Inspiration From the Road Ahead
I was really inspired by the power of community in supporting local economies through a recession when I first visited Detroit in 2008 and again in 2010 for the US Social Forum. There is much more than a depressed economy in Detroit. There are pockets of vibrant community. There is food growing. There are queer-owned, women-owned, cooperatively run businesses getting together. And while there may be great stretches of empty blocks, between them, there are farmers markets, and neighbors who talk to each other. There are older communities and advocates working alongside young and aspiring activists and entrepreneurs. This is what I think of when I hear Detroiters refer to "opportunity in crisis."
SCROLL TO CONTINUE WITH CONTENT Help Keep Common Dreams Alive Our progressive news model only survives if those informed and inspired by this work support our efforts
Austin is doing far better, financially at least, than Detroit. But when it comes to competition in a cutthroat time of depressed profit and wages, women, immigrants, and people of color are getting the raw end of the deal left and right. Many in the city feel underemployment, under appreciation or both.
In this sense we are primed for an alternative. And the good news is, while any big, social or economic grassroots movement is a "marathon", so to speak, we are witnessing big change over the last couple of years.
Austin has already birthed more than one worker-owned cooperative business in recent years. Black Star Co-Op Pub & Brewery opened doors in the summer of 2010, with a large banner outside that reads "Community-Owned Beer." A consumer cooperative (owned by the community it serves) and also a worker-coop (run by its employees), Black Star is attracting a full house of business seven days a week. And the byproducts their brewery produces? They make great dog biscuits! Sold at the pub and at farmers markets and stores around town—green and delicious products for people and their pets.
Red Rabbit Cooperative Bakery has launched this year and is making donuts with local and organic ingredients. Their donuts also happen to be vegan, but the target audience includes meat and dairy eaters, since anyone can enjoy a good donut. The founding women of Red Rabbit used to work at a major grocery store chain bakery. They decided to take their skill set elsewhere, and make decisions collectively, so as to be truly appreciated as workers and owners. They started using all-natural, vegan, locally and organically derived ingredients, and using sustainable, environmentally friendly practices to create delicious donuts now being distributed all around town. Their demand is growing, and they are in the process of opening their own storefront, a green, worker-owned bakeshop.
One of the most beautiful things about building the movement for worker-owned businesses is that cooperatives, on principle, work to support each other. While Red Rabbit started small, with donuts, they are expanding to breads and other goods, and now sell sandwich loaves to Black Star Co-op Pub & Brewery as the Pub's menu expands. Black Star also collaborates with Third Coast Workers for Cooperation, an organization helping to develop green, worker-owned business and educating the community about the cooperative movement. Black Star helps the organization out in fundraising initiatives, so that TCWC can continue to offer free and low-cost assistance to emerging worker coops. All three organizations strive to make every element of the work green, local, and sustainable. And economically, a local support system offers more sustainability than the disconnected, global, corporate alternative. Much like the cradle-to-cradle ideology protects our natural resources, keeping our money in a cyclical change of hands that stays in our community and promotes justice and sustainability, is the way we will change the world, one town at a time.
The most exciting thing about discussing this work right now, is that more folks are realizing that this model can apply to their situations. Again, skilled people, underemployed, who know these businesses, are the perfect candidates to get together and organize their collective skills into local, economic power. It could be a valet company, a restaurant, a bike rental business, a car body shop, a construction team, insulation team, house-cleaning cooperative. The possibilities are endless, and in a town like Austin where the service industry employs a huge sector of our population, the possibilities stand to be lucrative.
Without getting too carried away, we must dare to dream up a new reality. Reviewing the disappointments of national news can only get us so far, but if we can immerse ourselves into transforming local business, then we can address movement building from a much more inclusive and meaningful place. When our communities are empowered by belonging to a movement that they see is growing with success, then we will be even more ready to plunge into the national dialogue. But this time, we will be empowered by our own local successes.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
A German woman who has lived in the UK for 43 years broke down today as she told how she is now "living in fear over race hate" since the Brexit vote.
The sobbing elderly woman - known only as Karen - called talk radio station LBC in tears about the xenophobia she has experienced since Friday.
In the distressing phone call which will shock, she explained how she is "so scared" and now "frightened" to leave her home - and has even been "told to go home" to Germany.
Karen - a widower who was married to a GP - says that since the UK voted to leave the EU, she has had dog excrement thrown at her house and that neighbours have said they can no longer be friends with her.
She also claimed to have called the German Embassy and Citizen's Advice Bureau for help.
She told the phone-in with presenter James O'Brien: "I came from Germany in 1973, my late husband was British. I have lived here for 43 years and I'm so scared now.
"Friends of mine say they can't be friends with me any more. I'm so frightened.
"I got dog poo thrown at my door on Friday. I've been told to go back home. I've got nobody in Germany.
"I phoned up the Germany Embassy and they just say 'you've made your bed, you lie in it'.
"I've phoned up the Citizens Advice Bureau and they told me I have to understand that people are frustrated.
"I'm so, so scared. I haven't been out of the house for three days because I don't know what to do."
Karen added that she is middle class and it is "middle-class pensioners" who are targeting her.
Read more: Shocking racism on tram as teenager tells man to 'get back to Africa'
She said: "My neighbours told me they don't want me living in this road and they are not friends with foreigners."
Karen also claims - in the audio above - a friend's seven-year-old grandson has been beaten up "for having a foreign grandmother".
She said: "My friend Rosemary got a grandson, who's seven, who got beaten up because he's got a foreign grandmother.
"I'm so scared because I don't know what is going to happen next.
"I never had any problems. I don't understand what is going on. I'm so sorry I don't want to be hysterical."
James was joined in studio by Simon Woolley from Operation Black Vote - as they discussed the reported rise in race hate crimes since the Brexit vote.
Simon reacted: "She needs support, she needs the authorities to ensure that she can be safe and feel safe in this country... because she and others deserve better having lived here, worked here and loved our country.
"It breaks my heart to hear her being subject to this level of nasty."
"What's happened is James is it's normalised. Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson..."
James interjects: "(Farage's) married to a white German."
Simon interrupts: "No, they've normalised this. And this is how it's translating. Fifty years we've fought for race equality.
"And you have on your programme - in 2016 - a good woman desperate in tears because she fears going out of her front door for no other reason than being German."
Read more:
The four-minue phone call ends with James trying to alleviate Karen's fears - assuring her that it is a minority of Brits - "10-15% of the population" - who think this way, and that she is not on her own.
He tells her: "You are not on your own - you might be physically alone, but you are not on your own spiritually, emotionally or politically.
"The huge majority of people in this country - however they voted on Thursday - are alongside you, they are with you.
"And they can't be in your sitting room at this moment - except through the speaker of a radio - but they are more representative of the country of which you are part and the people who your late husband tried to treat and cure... they are your compatriots and they are your true neighbours."
Listeners erupted on social media with consternation. One, Tony Carroll, posted: "Utterly shocked at the poor German lady calling @mrjamesob @LBC this morning. Time for a bit more leadership from a few politicians."
Another, Simon Grierson, posted: "Karen could have been my own German grandmother, who lived here most of her life. Very upsetting to hear. What is wrong with people?"
A spokesman for the German Embassy said: "I wish to emphasize how sorry we are to hear about the distress of the German lady phoning in to LBC and we wish to heartily apologise if any of this distress has been caused by communication with our embassy.
"We are investigating the case but haven’t found any clear evidence of it yet on our side.
"Let me stress however that the wording we heard does not represent the position of the German Embassy, and our employees are certainly not instructed to communicate along these lines."
Citizens Advice Director of Operations, Michele Shambrook, said: “We are very sorry to hear about Karen’s experiences of discrimination.
“At Citizens Advice we stand up and speak out for those who face inequality or disadvantage. Following the EU referendum result we are are actively monitoring any discrimination issues people are turning to us with so we can understand and help anyone who might be affected.
“We are following up with LBC in order to reach out to Karen and offer her further support.”FALLS CHURCH, Va. (WJLA) - One of the biggest nights of the year at one of the region's most historic venues was marred by an armed robbery just hours after the turn of the calendar.
Falls Church Police officials are looking for two young men who held an employee at the State Theatre at gunpoint Wednesday morning and got away with cash.
The robbery happened inside the North Washington Street theatre just before 7 a.m. on New Year's Day. Authorities say two men walked into the building and demanded cash from an employee. They both got away with an unknown amount of cash.
Officials say the theatre employee was not injured.
Just hours earlier, the State Theatre was rocking with New Year's Eve partiers at a sold-out concert put on by The Legwarmers, a 1980s cover band. One of the band's performers said that at least 1,000 revelers packed the building to ring in the new year.
Rebecca Tax, the owner of a restaurant and bar close to the State, says that it's alarming and upsetting to hear about the robbery.
"I'm just glad that they're all safe and that it was only money that was taken," Tax, the owner of Clare and Don's Beach Shack, said.
The State Theatre originally opened as a movie theater in 1936 and was closed in 1988. A renovation effort led to the venue's reopening in the late 1990s.
Anyone with information about the robbery should call the City of Falls Church Police Department at 703-241-5053.
{}Taliban insurgents stormed the Kabul international airport that houses a NATO headquarters setting off multiple explosions. Afghan forces reported the seven heavily-armed insurgents had been killed following a fierce gun battle.
Afghan officials announced that the insurgents had been neutralized a few hours after the siege began at around 4:30am local time (24:30 GMT) on Monday.
Two suicide bombers blew themselves up in an explosives-laden van, and five others took up positions in a building under construction next to the international airport, Interior Ministry spokesperson Sediq Sediqqi said. The remaining insurgents then engaged in a fierce gun battle for several hours before being killed by security forces.
The area was quickly sealed off by security forces, and helicopters patrolled the area. Local residents said they heard at least a dozen explosions coming from the military section of the airport. They described hearing rocket-propelled grenade blasts along with automatic weapons fire, AP reported.
“It started just after dawn prayers and I counted about a dozen explosions, mostly RPG fire, coming from the airport,”one resident told AP.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was part of a “spring offensive” they pledged last month to launch on alliance military bases and diplomatic centers.
"Today... there was a massive attack on the foreign military side of Kabul airport," Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said in a text message sent to reporters. "The enemy has suffered major casualties," he added, although no military casualties have yet been reported.
Embassies in Kabul were put on lockdown shortly after the attacks began, with several Western diplomatic missions sounding emergency alerts.
The so-called ‘spring offensive’ has seen an increase in attacks on alliance forces. In May, Afghan security forces battled Taliban insurgents in the center of Kabul following a massive blast.
US forces are scheduled to fully withdraw in 2014, when they will hand over security responsibilities to the Afghans. Concerns have been voiced that the Afghan forces are ill-prepared and too few in number to defend against the Taliban insurgency.
Photo of smoke from one the rocket inside the military airport. #KabulAttack twitter.com/AhMukhtar/stat… — Ahmad Mukhtar (@AhMukhtar) June 10, 2013According to GTM Research’s latest edition of the PV Pulse, the global blended average price for a tier-1 Chinese-produced multicrystalline PV module fell 10 percent year-over-year and reached 57 cents per watt in the fourth quarter of 2015.
“While underwhelming demand in 2014 left its trace on pricing in early 2015, supply-demand tightness and tariffs drove price trends in the second half of the year,” said Jade Jones, a senior solar analyst at GTM Research.
Here are GTM Research’s estimates for component prices as of the fourth quarter of 2014.
FIGURE: Selling Prices, Q4 2015
Source: GTM Research PV Pulse, March 2016
Assuming a stable supply-demand landscape, GTM Research anticipates that global blended prices will steadily fall at an annualized rate of 5 percent and reach 44 cents per watt by 2020.
Source: GTM Research PV Pulse, March 2016
In the near term, GTM Research’s initial outlook sees polysilicon and wafer prices up year-over-year. Jones notes that the polysilicon pricing forecast is driven by inventory and margin recovery, while wafer prices are driven by a tight supply-demand balance. Cell and module prices are both expected to be down this year.
***
GTM Research’s PV Pulse tracks monthly technology, supply and pricing trends in the global PV supply chain. Contact sales@gtmresearch.com for information on pricing.Trans-Pacific Partnership: Ministers and negotiators lock in major TPP trade deal, Government hails 'giant foundation stone' for Australia
Updated
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has hailed a new 12-country trade deal which covers 40 per cent of the global economy as a "gigantic foundation stone" for Australia.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was clinched in the US city of Atlanta overnight after days of marathon talks and could influence everything from the price of cheese to the cost of cancer treatments.
What's in it for Australia? The Government says the TPP deal will eliminate 98 per cent of all tariffs on everything from food to manufactured goods, resources and energy.
Sugar: Access into US to increase from 107,000 tonnes to 207,421 tonnes. Could see exports to US climb above 400,000 tonnes by 2019/20
Beef: Deal liberalises exports to Japan, and eliminates tariffs into Mexico, Canada and Peru
Dairy: Japan tariffs will be eliminated on a range of cheeses covering over $100 million in existing trade
Rice: For the first time in over 20 years, Australia will be able to export more rice to Japan
Resources and energy: Immediate elimination of tariffs on iron ore, copper and nickel to Peru
Manufacturing: Immediate elimination of tariffs on iron and steel products exported to Canada, and to Vietnam within 10 years
Intellectual property: TPP will not require any changes to Australia's patent system and copyright regime
Biologic medicines: Australia's existing five years of data protection for biologic medicines will not change.
Tobacco: Companies will not have extra power to challenge the plain packaging legislation under the TPP.
Source: Dept of Trade
The controversial deal involves Australia, Canada, the United States, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Singapore and Vietnam.
It is expected to face great difficulties getting through a hostile US Congress and is also looking shaky in Canada, which is facing an imminent national election.
The Australian Government also has to convince parliament to back the agreement, Labor is seeking a briefing about the closely held detail of the deal.
"There are winners and losers but overwhelmingly this will drive enormous job growth and create all sorts of wonderful opportunities," Trade Minister Andrew Robb said.
The exact details of the agreement remain under wraps, with the official text to be finalised in coming weeks before being released for scrutiny.
Under the deal, 98 per cent of tariffs across TPP countries will be slashed on products including beef, dairy, wine, sugar, rice, horticulture, seafood, manufactured products, resources and energy.
Last year, about a third of Australian exports - worth $109 billion - went to TPP countries.
"These deals are win-win," Mr Turnbull told Melbourne radio station 3AW.
The deal is seen as a legacy-defining achievement for US president Barack Obama but it still has to be ratified by a sceptical and often hostile Congress.
It is also looking shaky in Canada, which is facing an imminent national election.
Disagreement between Australia and the US on how long pharmaceutical companies could retain intellectual property rights over their products threatened to derail the talks, but a last-minute deal was struck.
"This deal has no impact on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. We believe we've got the balance right," Mr Turnbull said.
Opposition says TPP cannot impact medicine prices
The Federal Opposition said the deal had "significant potential benefits" but it wanted to examine the details when they are released before voting on the deal in Parliament.
"We said a red line for us was ensuring that there would be no impact on the accessibility and affordability of medicines in this country," Labor's trade spokeswoman Penny Wong said.
"I understand that Mr Robb has said that he's delivered on that. We'll look forward to seeing the detail of that agreement."
The Greens are critical of the secrecy surrounding the deal, sceptical about the economic benefits and worried Australia could be sued under investor-state dispute settlement provisions.
"They haven't stopped corporations taking strategic litigation through these shady tribunals in other parts of the world, and we don't expect they will work here," Greens trade spokesman Peter Whish-Wilson said.
Independent senator Nick Xenophon said the deal is a "Trans-Pacific dud", saying past deals had not delivered promised benefits, and concerns remained about medicine prices and Investor-State Dispute Resolution provisions.
Australia's two-way trade with TPP nations Japan $70 billion
US $55 billion
NZ $22 billion
Singapore $21 billion
Malaysia $18 billion
Vietnam $9 billion
Canada $3.4 billion
Mexico $2.5 billion
Chile $1.2 billion
Brunei $1 billion
Peru $223 million Source: DFAT Source: DFAT
"It seems the trade imbalance — that is the amount of exports that go to the other country we've signed up with compared to their imports — they've done much better," Senator Xenophon said.
"It is a dud deal because there's a lack of transparency and scrutiny over the whole process; the talks have been negotiated in secret."
In the US, the deal is seen as a legacy-defining achievement for president Barack Obama but it still has to be ratified by a sceptical and often hostile Congress.
Mr Obama said the deal "levelled the playing field" for farmers and manufacturers.
"It includes the strongest commitments on labour and the environment of any trade agreement in history, and those commitments are enforceable, unlike past agreements," Mr Obama said.
Critics have said the deal, negotiated over five years, threatens to hurt jobs and consumers across the globe.
However, the deal has already raised concerns from at least one Coalition backbencher, with LNP member George Christensen threatening to cross the floor.
The Queensland MP said the outcomes for Australia's sugar industry look to fall short of what was hoped for in terms of the deal with the US.
"I will be reserving my right to cross the floor on the deal, depending on the outcome of other factors plaguing the sugar industry," he said.
"I'm very disappointed at how the land of the free has determined to block free trade and deny our sugar growers access to their market."
Government spruiks benefits of trade deal
In agriculture, sugar producers will get more access to the US market and Australia will be able to export more rice to Japan.
Tariffs on wheat and barley exports to Mexico and Canada will be scrapped, as will those on wine to Peru, Malaysia and Vietnam.
When it comes to manufacturing, iron and steel product tariffs to Canada will be scrapped, paper and paperboard duties will be phased out to Peru.
Mr Robb said the deal was "particularly good" for Australian services, with better access for education, transport, telecommunications, financial advice and health providers to TPP countries.
The deal will also raise the foreign investment screening threshold for non-sensitive sectors from $252 million to over $1 billion.
All TPP countries are now "finalising arrangements" for the release of the text of the agreement, which then has to be approved domestically by each nation.
Final TPP negotiations focused on pharmaceuticals
In Australia, it will be tabled in Parliament before being reviewed by the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties.
The US allows pharmaceutical companies an exclusive period of 12 years to use clinical data behind the approval for a new biological drug, and was pushing for that in the TPP.
But Mr Robb said Australia would not move further than five years, despite the US pushing for a compromise eight-year period.
In the end, US trade representative Michael Froman said the deal would offer at least five years' protection for biologic drugs, plus some time for other measures.
He said the goal was to have a comparable outcome for such drugs across the 12 TPP countries.
Ruth Lopert, from George Washington University in the US, told the ABC that the medicines involved were often those derived from living organisms and were amongst the most expensive on the market.
"Many [of these] drugs are used for the treatment of various cancers, for multiple sclerosis, for many conditions, and because they're derived from living organisms they tend to be more complex to develop and they tend to carry much higher price tags," she said.
"So there is a lot of money at stake in any potential delay to getting these biologics onto the PBS."
Topics: international-aid-and-trade, trade, government-and-politics, united-states, australia
First postedState ranks 15th in tech employment
Columbus, Ohio – Ohio’s technology industry employment grew by nearly 3 percent in 2016, as employers added an estimated 5,000 new jobs, according to Cyberstates 2017™, the definitive annual analysis of the nation’s tech industry released today by CompTIA, the world’s leading technology association.
With nearly 184,000 workers, Ohio ranks 15th among the 50 states in tech industry employment.
Technology occupations across all other industries in Ohio – the second component of the tech workforce – reached an estimated 270,200 in 2016.
The tech sector accounts for an estimated 4.5 percent ($27.7 billion) of the overall Ohio economy.
The annualized average wage for an Ohio tech industry worker was an estimated $83,400 in 2016, 70 percent higher than the average state wage ($39,100).
Other Key Findings
Ohio ranks 33 rd among all states in the Cyberstates 2017 Innovation Score, which is based on an analysis of new tech patents, tech startups and new tech business establishments on a per capita basis.
among all states in the Cyberstates 2017 Innovation Score, which is based on an analysis of new tech patents, tech startups and new tech business establishments on a per capita basis. The state is home to an estimated 15,312 tech business establishments.
The tech industry employs an estimated 3.5 percent of the overall state workforce.
Leading tech occupations include application software developers (30,500), computer systems analysts (28,300) and computer user support specialists (17,190).
The strongest year-over-year job growth occurred in the categories of R&D and testing labs (+ 8.3 percent), Internet services (+ 5.6 percent) and computer systems design and IT services (+ 3.6 percent).
Employers posted an estimated 19,130 job openings for tech occupations in Q4 2016.
“The Cyberstates data affirms the strength and vitality of Ohio’s tech industry, and attests to its essential standing in the economy,” said Todd Thibodeaux, president and CEO, CompTIA. “Technology enables innovation and generates growth for companies, regardless of their size, locale or markets served.”
Cyberstates 2017 is based on CompTIA’s analysis of data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, EMSI, and other sources. Estimates for 2016 are subject to change as government data is revised and updated. The complete report with full national, state and metropolitan level data is available at http://www.cyberstates.org/.
CompTIA: Building the Foundation for Technology's Future
The Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) is the world's leading technology association, with approximately 2,000 member companies, 3,000 academic and training partners, over 100,000 registered users and more than two million IT certifications issued. CompTIA's unparalleled range of programs foster workforce skills development and generate critical knowledge and insight – building the foundation for technology’s future. Visit CompTIA online, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter to learn more.
Contact:
Preston Grisham
CompTIA
pgrisham@comptia.org
(202) 862-4458
Steven Ostrowski
CompTIA
sostrowski@comptia.org
(630) 678-8468LiAngelo Ball has spoken out for the first time on his arrest and detainment in China for shoplifting, and the picture he paints is one of a teenager who got swept up by others’ misdeeds and ended up in over his head in a hurry.
“We all went out one night, went to the malls, went to the Louis Vuitton store,” he told “The Today Show” on Tuesday morning. “People started taking stuff. Me just not thinking and being with them, I started taking stuff too.”
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It wasn’t until later that Ball realized he’d made a serious error in judgment: “We left thinking we’ll just get away. You know how kids think,” he said. “I didn’t realize till I got back to the hotel—‘that was stupid.’”
Ball and two teammates were arrested by Chinese authorities and spent a day and a half in a Chinese prison—a “horrible” experience, Ball said, in a cement cell where no one around him spoke English.
It was the UCLA players’ good fortune to be detained at the exact same time President Trump was making a visit to the region, and Trump helped engineer the players’ release. Ball and the other players thanked Trump—a bit too slowly for the president’s liking—but Ball’s father LaVar remains adamant that the president’s desire for gratitude was unseemly.
“If [he] did it genuinely,” Ball said, speaking of the players’ release, “do you really need to come up to me and say, ‘Boy, you better thank me?’”
LaVar Ball, naturally, turned the moment into a branding effort, noting that he’d sent the White House three pairs of Big Baller Brand shoes — “red, white and blue, to show him we patriotic!”
Story continues
LaVar pulled LiAngelo out of UCLA on Monday, sidestepping the suspension the university had handed down for the students’ shoplifting. The suspension could have been as long as three months, and as LiAngelo noted, “That’s the whole season, pretty much. That’s a long time doing nothing. I’d rather be playing.”
Over on CNN, during part of LaVar Ball’s media blitz, LaVar seemed to indicate that withdrawing was his decision, not LiAngelo’s. When asked what LiAngelo thinks of the withdrawal, LaVar said, “He doesn’t think anything. He said, ‘my dad’s going to do the right choice.’ We’re on the same page, trust me.”
LaVar Ball also doubled down on UCLA. “I’m not going to sit back and wait for a person to say ‘you know what, I think we’re going to let you guys play now,'” he said. “UCLA is not going to bring my boy down … You shouldn’t hang them on the cross this long for that.” Since one-and-done was always going to be the plan, LaVar said, they’ll just get started earlier on the next stage.
LaVar pledged to work LiAngelo into NBA-level shape, and then LiAngelo would follow in the footsteps of older brother Lonzo: “All these boys are going to get on the Lakers,” LaVar gloated. “Watch how I do this.” (The Lakers, who are already instituting rules to block LaVar’s access to the media, are surely thrilled with that idea.)
NBA scouts and observers don’t even project LiAngelo as a fringe prospect, but that doesn’t deter LaVar. “I ain’t got no fallback plan,” he said. “If I got a fallback plan, I’m going 80 percent this way and 20 percent to my fallback. I’m a hundred in, so I never get stopped.”
Oh, and LiAngelo’s withdrawal comes with another bonus for the Ball family: the opportunity to debut a new shoe in his honor. The Big Baller Brand G3 will hit shelves soon, with a retail value of $500. Don’t shoplift them; that would be stupid.
LiAngelo Ball returns to the United States after arrest in China for shoplifting. (AP)
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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter or on Facebook.
More from Yahoo Sports:
• NFL criticized for Steelers-Bengals violence
• Chris Mannix: Why EricBledsoe fits in so well with the Bucks
• Why UCLA should be glad LaVar Ball pulled son out of school
• NFL Power Rankings: Giants could turn it aroundLENNOXVILLE — There are times, Danny Anthrop admits, where he wonders what might have been had he not suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament during his junior year at Purdue.
The 6-foot, 193-pound receiver looked destined to become an impact player in the NFL before suffering the injury.
“I think it was probably, in the long run, good for me. I did a lot of growing up,” the 24-year-old, who’s trying to crack the Alouettes’ roster, said Thursday morning following the first of two practices at Bishop’s University.
“It was a tough time. Going through that kind of makes you stronger. It definitely didn’t help me on the field,” the native of West Lafayette, Ind., added. “It’s a huge adversity. I was having my best year in college. And then I had the injury in Game 9. There was a lot of damage. It was a long recovery.”
Anthrop had a slow recovery that hampered his senior season, although he still managed to catch a career-high 57 passes. He completed his collegiate career in 2015 with 113 catches for 1,384 yards and nine touchdowns in 41 games. He went undrafted, despite being timed at 4.40 seconds over 40 yards at his pro day, before signing with the Indianapolis Colts as a free agent.
“I was healthy, but I wasn’t quite myself on the field,” as a senior, he said. “But I learned I can get through just about anything. The body’s an amazing thing.”
Anthrop completed his college career with an appearance at the East-West Shrine All-Star Game in January 2016. He caught a 93-yard touchdown pass from Oregon quarterback Vernon Adams on their first series together and completed the game with five catches for 120 yards.
Adams, of course, was acquired by the Als in a May 2016 trade from British Columbia. After Anthrop was cut by the Colts, and following a workout late last season with the Chicago Bears, he reached out to Adams, attempting to ascertain whether he might resurrect his career in the Canadian Football League.
Anthrop sent tape to Adams, who forwarded it to Eric Deslauriers, the Als’ draft coordinator and a Canadian-based scout. That eventually led general manager Kavis Reed to put Anthrop’s name on the team’s negotiation list. Anthrop admits, without Adams’s assistance, it’s unlikely any of this would have come to fruition.
“He’s faster than I thought,” Adams said. “A lot of guys will look at him and be like, this little white receiver, I don’t know if he’s that good. But he’s fast and he’s out there making plays. He works hard and definitely impressed me.
“We’re both happy because we know each other. I can help him out with the offence as much as I can. He’s a good dude.”
The injury certainly affected Anthrop and forced him to alter the way he plays. He said he transitioned from a speed and elusive receiver into more of a possession-type ball catcher which, he believes, could prolong his career.
But right now he’s just trying to get one started. It’s never easy for any rookie, let alone an import, to crack a CFL team’s roster. There are only two exhibition games and the Als’ roster figures to be rookie-ladened next Thursday, when they meet the Argonauts at Toronto.
Reed signed Ottawa receiver Ernest Jackson as a free agent last February. Nik Lewis, B.J. Cunningham, Tiquan Underwood and Canadian Samuel Giguère are all returning, so it won’t be easy for Anthrop, who appears to be in a battle with former Buffalo Bill T.J. Graham.
“They’re both in the middle of a steep learning curve. That goes without saying,” head coach Jacques Chapdelaine said. “At the same time, they’re in a position in our offence where they can be showcased quite a bit.
“They’re getting quite a few looks. At the same time they have to learn quite a bit because you get to move around in that position. Both have great skill sets and are doing a great job. It’ll be exciting to see what they do.”
Chapdelaine said any new receiver doesn’t have to be perfect mentally, since the learning curve always will be steep. Instead, he’s seeking consistency.
“We want to see an element of consistency in catching the ball and performing some of the assignments that are core to the nature of that position,” Chapdelaine said. “Show that they fit well within the system.”
He might be new to Canada, but Anthrop has grasped the ratio dilemma quickly, realizing there are only so many openings for non-imports. Americans must stand out, and they must do so with expedience.
“You just have to mesh well with the quarterback and the other receivers,” he said. “You have to be consistent. There are a lot of good players on this team. They’re only going to keep so many American receivers. It kind of puts you in a tough spot. But you can’t worry about that. If you play loose and make plays, everything will work out fine.”
Adams, for one, believes Anthrop deserves a shot.
“He might be a little undersized, but I’m a little undersized. We’re both getting it done,” he said.
hzurkowsky@postmedia.com
twitter.com/HerbZurkowsky1Update: The bill was signed by President Obama January |
dynamic contrast ratios compared, and color gamuts critiqued – all in an effort to gauge performance, determine value, and quickly pit one product against one another. The only problem? In many cases, you'd better off consulting chicken bones and fingernail clippings. Not only are a growing number of published specs misleading and/or overinflated, some have become downright meaningless. And it's getting worse.
Remember how impressive something like Blast Processing sounded when you were 15? Made the Super Nintendo look downright wimpy, right? Well, spec cooking operates on more or less the same principle. Only instead of inventing empty marketing words manufacturers plop a bunch of faux math in our laps.
These lies and fabrications happen for a few reasons. First, numbers have tremendous sway over the decisions we make. A recent study in the Journal of Consumer Research suggests that quantitative specifications are so powerful that, even when given the ability to directly test the attributes of a given product ourselves, we still tend to choose the thing with the longer list and bigger numbers (ahem, megapixels).
Another reason for the proliferation of BS specs? Rivalry.
"The gadget world is loaded with gimmicks and lies because it's extremely competitive," says Raymond Soneira, president of DisplayMate Technologies. Soneira, who penned what many consider the debunking Bible for display specifications over at MaximumPC, says that as technological complexity increases in the gadget world, it gives manufacturers and marketers even more leeway to futz with the numbers. And futz they do.
"Most consumers don't understand the technologies anyway so they are easily misled, fooled and even swindled," he says.
More than anything though, there's one simple reason behind the rise of dubious specs: It's become an industry necessity. The temptation to exaggerate is now so overwhelming that attempting to stay out of the gimmick game is now seen as akin to product suicide. Try to anchor your specifications in the real world (with meaningful numbers) and your product will look inferior. Don't publish them at all, and you'll look like you're trying to hide something. It's an insidious Catch-22 for anyone with an ounce of integrity, so manufacturers and marketers simply make the easy choice.
David Moulton, a veteran audio engineer, musician and producer characterizes the gadget spec situation like this: "When engineers make a product they use specific tests to measure the performance. But when sales departments gets a hold of those test measurements, they start using those numbers as describers of value. They become, in essence, sales arguments."
So which "sales arguments" should you avoid, dismiss, or at the very least raise a skeptical eyebrow at? We've compiled a quick list of some of the more brazen spec gimmicks to be wary of this holiday season.
DISPLAYS ——–
Color Gamut
What it is: This spec represents the range of colors a given display can produce, and is usually expressed as a percentage of a particular color standard, like Rec.709 (HDTVs) or sRGB (computers and digital cameras).
Why it's bullshit: Manufacturers don't tell you this, but the color gamut you actually want on all of your displays is the same one that was used when the content you're viewing was created. If it's different, you'll see different colors than you're supposed to see. Nevertheless, most companies are happy to exploit the common misconception that a wider color gamut is somehow indicative of a better display. So what's up with those 145 percent color gamuts? Nothing special, really. Here's what a larger gamut will do: make everything look saturated. Indeed displays claiming to have more than 100 percent of any standard color gamut aren't able to show colors that aren't in the original source image, says Soneira.
Contrast Ratio
What it is: Divide the brightness of peak white by the brightness of black on a display (after it's been properly calibrated) and, voila, you'll get what's known as the contrast ratio.
Why it's bullshit: In the real world, this measurement typically falls between 1,500:1 and 2,000:1. And that's for the best LCDs, says Soneira. But those numbers are a thing of the past. The allure of bigger ratios has prompted manufacturers to bake this specification into a full-fledged nonsense soufflé. Today, we get what's known "dynamic contrast ratio." That's reached by measuring blacks when a display's video signal is entirely, well, black (when it's in a standby mode). As you can imagine, that significantly reduces the light output of the unit and is obviously much darker than what's actually used to determine the traditional contrast ratio with an actual picture present. Using this trick you'll get, in some cases, astronomical contrast ratios like 5,000,000:1 or, in Sony's case, "infinite." While still technically true, this spec is utter nonsense and completely unhelpful in gauging real world performance. The only information that dynamic contrast ratio can relay is how much brighter the whites can be than the blacks.
Response Time
What it is: Also referred to as latency or response rate, response time is a standard industry test that tries to quantify how much LCD motion blur you'll see in fast moving scenes. (It doesn't apply much to plasma displays). It's determined by measuring the time it takes for one pixel to go from black to peak white and then back to black (rise-and-fall). And it's not a particularly good indicator for real picture blur.
Why it's bullshit: Consider this. In the span of five short years, display response times have gone from 25ms (milliseconds) to, in some cases, 1ms. How did this magic happen? Well, it kinda didn't. The problem here, according to Soneira, is that most picture transitions involve much smaller, more subtle shades of gray-to-gray transitions, which usually take much longer (3-4 x) to complete. Those response times are far more important to a display's ability to handle motion blur. But consumers often have no way of knowing which response time is being measured (gray-to-gray or rise-and-fall). Because the published specifications can have a considerable impact on sales, it is often more important for a manufacturer to reduce the black–to–peak-white–to–black response time value rather than improving the visually more important gray-to-gray transitions. The result? The LCD display with the fastest response time specifications may not have the least visual blur.
Viewing Angle
What it is: Pretty simple stuff: the maximum angle at which a display can be viewed with acceptable visual performance. Yes, there are generalities about viewing angle that everyone should know: A plasma display, for instance, will yield a wider view angle. But when it comes to the listed angles that manufactures include in spec sheets, you can pretty much ignore them.
Why it's bullshit: Today, it's not uncommon to see 180-degree + (total) viewing-angle specifications for many displays. This has absolutely no bearing on the actual acceptable viewing angles, according to Soneira. What most consumers don't realize is that the angular spec is based on where the contrast ratio falls to a level of 10:1, hardly an acceptable (or visually pleasing) figure. More realistically, an angle of ±45 degrees may reproduce an acceptable contrast ratio, but only with very bright and saturated colors. Pictures that include a wide range of intensities, hues and saturations will appear "significantly degraded" at much smaller viewing angles. Of course, no one tells you this.
AUDIO —–
Dynamic Range
What it is: In the audio realm, this spec is measured in decibels and describes the ratio of the softest sound to the loudest sound a musical instrument or piece of audio equipment can produce. Audio engineers started worrying about this back in the days of analog recording when tape noise – the inherent noise embedded in magnetic recording – was a big problem. Today, with digital recording, it's pretty much irrelevant.
Why it's bullshit: Dynamic ranges are almost always over-represented, says Moulton. The main thing that consumers should known about dynamic range is that you'll want it large enough so that there are no annoying noise artifacts. And, mostly, in the realm of music and film, we're just fine. Moulton explains: "Electronically, we can manufacture much greater dynamic range than is available in the real world. When somebody claims 120db dynamic range, that's just silly. We don't get there. In the real acoustic world in which we live, our usable range is about half that, or 60db. What that means is that the really soft stuff can't be heard because of the sounds in the spaces that we're in. And the really loud stuff is so loud that if we played it back at that level we'd probably generate complaints and legal action."
Frequency Response/Bandwidth
What it is: There are two parts to this spec, really. First, there's another word for it, which is bandwidth, or the width of the spectrum we are hearing. Our ears happen to have a very broad bandwidth—ten octaves to be precise (or ten doublings of frequency…or a ratio of 1000/1). The lowest frequency humans hear is about 20 Hz. The highest frequency is about 20 kHz. And for educational and musical purposes we divide that into 10 octaves. Each octave is a doubling of frequency.
Why it's bullshit: When manufacturers make and sell audio gear, they cheat. Period. Today, it's very common to specify 20 Hz – 20 kHz bandwidth, which is ridiculous. First, very little audio gear will do that in really rigorous way. Second, you speakers definitely won't – unless they cost you about as much as the house in which they're installed. It's just beyond the capabilities of all but the most expensive equipment. "Frequency response is something that's kind of claimed and you have to take it with a grain of salt," says Moulton. "Everybody is going to claim good frequency response and everybody has, more or less, poor frequency response."
Power Handling/Wattage
What it is: Crank it up! For many of us, beefy power handling equates to house shaking sound. Yet when most of us listen to music we are actually using very little power – typically about 1 or 2 watts. Still, it's hard to discount that gorgeous pair of 1,200-watt speakers, right?
Why it's bullshit: Power is, more often than not, irrelevant to most people's music listening experience. Here's a nice rule of thumb to think about power when you're out shopping for a new sound system or speakers: Each doubling of power is barely audible (~3db). Put another way, ten times the power will make a woofer or loudspeaker sound almost twice as loud. So the difference between a 300-watt and a 1200 watt system…actually not so big.
So if more and more specs are offering less and less useful information, what's a gadget geek to do? When possible, it's always a good to try out gear yourself. The other option? Find a site you trust that reviews and plays with gadgets daily. You happen to be looking at one now.
Send an email to Bryan Gardiner, the author of this post, at bgardiner@gizmodo.com.
Photo credit: Tristan Nitot/Flickr
This story originally appeared on Gizmodo.If you visit any popular text-based site on the internet, you'll find articles that are lists of things. People like lists, but why? Here are 10 cool facts about lists that may explain the fascination
People like lists of things. They're everywhere on the internet. You name any subject matter you can think of, odds are there's a list about it. Nowhere is safe. Even here, on the Guardian Science section, one of the most popular articles in recent months is a list. But why are lists so popular? Well, here are 10 astonishing facts about lists that may help explain it.
1. People will tend to remember the first thing on a list
Lists are commonly used as tools for assessing people's memory. Word lists are a typical tool for testing someone's ability to remember and recall items, and can be designed and adapted to analyse a wide variety of human memory abilities. One of the things uncovered by this sort of research is the primacy effect, meaning people are more likely to remember the first thing they are presented with, due to the way attention works and the demands of memory formation. So when you try to tell someone about this list, you may end up saying "The first thing on the list was that you're more likely to remember the first thing on the list".
2. The human brain may automatically structure information in list form (although it may not)
Much research has been conducted into how humans store and structure their knowledge and thoughts. Collins and Quillan in 1969 proposed their Hierarchical Network model, where concepts and categories are stored at a certain level in the brain/mind and the properties of these are listed "below" (metaphorically). However, this view has met with some criticism, mainly based on how human memory or knowledge is rarely shown to be so rigidly organised. Still, it shows how fundamental lists may be.
3. Lists take advantage of a limited attention span
There is an increasingly common view that internet use shortens a person's attention span. While a lot of this is Greenfield-esque paranoia about new technology, evidence suggests our visual attention is attracted to novelty, and on the internet novelty is always only a click away. There is data to suggest that this is how internet use works, and much of the web is dedicated to exploiting this. Rather than paragraphs of narrative, pushing the limits of a typical attention span, lists offer novelty every few lines, and thus are more likely to avoid the dreaded TL:DR response.
4. You probably won't remember all the things on a typical list
A lot of lists are lists of 10, or some multiple thereof, given that the majority of humans have grown up using the decimal system. However, short-term memory, or "working memory" as it's known to psychologists, has an average capacity of 7 (+/-2). This means you can hold an average of 7 "things" in your short term memory. These can be letters, words, or even sentences, as long as they count as one "thing". This is the limit of your short term memory. These things can be transferred to the long term memory if you rehearse or encounter them enough, but this means that if you try to remember everything on this list to tell someone about later, you'll be unable to recall 3 items on average. This bit might be one of them, which would be ironic.
5. People are very good at grouping random things together, so lists can be about anything
Probability theories of category formation demonstrate that we tend to lump very different things together in the same category, (e.g. Football and Chess have very few features in common, but both would be considered a type of game). This tendency to group things together despite their differences mean lists with a nominal subject matter can include things that wander off topic quite bizarrely, like a list of scientific facts about the human body including a discussion of atomic structure.
6. Popular things can be listed
Lists are very popular, so logically lists about popular things would be more popular again. Bacon, sexy ladies, funny cats and tweets, all of these regularly end up on lists. You may say this point isn't scientific in any way, but I include it as evidence for the above point. Which means it is scientific in a very tenuous way.
7. Lists fit the way humans tend to read
It has been demonstrated many times, in scientific studies and Martin Robbins' blog, that the way people read things on the internet follows an F-shaped pattern. While this is detrimental to blogs and articles with continuous prose, this is obviously beneficial for lists of things, as the reader is reading in a pattern that largely follows a list structure.
8. There are many popular types of list, not just on the internet
Lists predate the internet by some considerable margin, and aren't necessarily constrained or dependent on it. Examples include shopping lists, bucket lists, guest lists and hit lists. These lists are invariably detached from the subject matter in some way; nobody ever buys a shopping list, bucket lists rarely feature buckets, a guest list is rarely seen inside a party/club, and there are no records of someone being killed with an actual hit list. Contrastingly, Craigslist was created by someone called Craig. To date, there is no evidence of a popular list of all the angles at which a ship may list, suggesting that list formats are incompatible.
9. Some entries on a list are likely to be just padding
As mentioned, most people use the decimal system. As well as using words like "amazing", "astonishing", "Incredible" etc. in the title (which are impressive sounding but technically impossible to disprove), the majority of lists will be a list of 10 things, or a multiple thereof. This will inevitably lead to someone preparing a list and including things that shouldn't really be in it in order to make it 10 items in length. This makes it look "proper". See the point before this one for a demonstration of this happening.
10. People will tend to remember the last thing on a list
Lists are commonly used as tools for assessing people's memory. Word lists are a typical tool for testing someone's ability to remember and recall items, and can be designed and adapted to analyse a wide variety of human memory abilities. One of the things uncovered by this sort of research is the recency effect, meaning people are more likely to remember the last thing they are presented with, due to the way attention works and the demands of memory formation. So when you try to tell someone about this list, you may end up saying "The last thing on the list was that you're more likely to remember the last thing on the list".
Dean Burnett is on Twitter as @garwboy and welcomes people with a short attention is it lunchtime yet or not?Fernando Alonso is at the centre of every rumour known to man. He’s going to Red Bull, McLaren, Lotus and Williams and, because he hasn’t denied being on the grassy knoll in Dallas in 1963, he is also thought to have been one of 13 shooters who assassinated President John F Kennedy. He may also have been responsible for the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland in 1985 on the basis that he once wore flippers.
Honestly, the stories one hears about Alonso… and it does not seem to matter if he denies them because it seems that few believe a word he says since the McLaren revelations of 2007 and, of course, Singapore 2008. I do actually feel sorry for the bloke sometimes, but as a farmer or a priest will tell you, you reap what you sow in life.
Anyway, whether he is believed or not, he is respected as a great driver and he continues to show his extraordinary abilities at each and every Grand Prix. He does not let the slow Ferrari get him down, he just drives the wheels off it, never gives up and currently lies fourth on the Drivers’ World Championship in z car that is good for ninth or 10th. The fact that he has still won only two World titles is astonishing, given his ability, although he has been rather good at being in the wrong place at the right time.
In theory, he’s going nowhere next year because of his Ferrari contract, but, as a pal of mine remarked recently, an F1 contract has as much value as toilet paper in this day and age. McLaren would now love to have him (ain’t that ironic) and the only team that seems not to want him that much is the one he currently drives for. Down Maranello way, they are into five-year plans and five years from now Alonso will be 38 and, according to F1 thinking, he will be over the hill.
He has been talking of late of buying a professional cycling team and is currently waiting to hear if he has been granted a licence by the Union Cycliste Internationale (the FIA without the horsepower). The funny thing is that I am now hearing the Alonso may also be considering buying himself a share of a Formula 1 team, for investment purposes. There is some sound logic in this as some of the teams have all you need but simply lack the money to run properly. If the running budgets can be found then there are assets to be had cheaply at the moment. F1 will eventually wake up to real world realities that there must be budget capping of some sort and when that happens the teams will all rise in value in dramatic fashion. It would be guessing to say which team might interest Ferdy, but the teams looking for help include Lotus (for which he won two World Championships), Sauber, Caterham and Marussia. He might also be interested in Toro Rosso as the word is that after five years being co-owned by Red Bull and Aabar, the time is coming when options must be taken up or dropped. Being a business partner with Dietrich Mateschitz might be a smart move for Fernando, and might perhaps one day open the door to a Red Bull drive…
Then again he might soon be arrested for Dallas 1963, so one must not take rumours too seriously…
(Oh, and for those of you who do not have a sense of humour, the JFK stuff is a joke, so please don’t write in saying that Fernando was not born until 1981.)It’s that time of the year again when we put red ink all over our March Madness brackets and complain about somebody at the office who doesn’t know shit about basketball winning the pool. But over at The Dopehouse, we decided to get in on the fun in our own special way. Rather than deal with the madness of broken brackets, we’d prefer to go the route of a tournament to decide what is the greatest diss track in the history of hip hop.
With that comes “Diss Track Madness,” where we selected 32 of the greatest diss tracks and pitted them against each other in a single elimination tournament.
FINAL FOUR!
From 32 to 16, to the Elite 8, and now, we’ve reached the FINAL FOUR! Check out how everything stacks up below and be sure to vote.
Tupac and Ice Cube never banged against each other on wax, but there has always been a “what if?” hovering. Well, in a sort of roundabout way, we can settle the case by pitting their greatest diss tracks against one another in the Final Four. Both California rappers took aim at multiple people on their respective tracks with Ice Cube completely annihilating N.W.A. and Jerry Heller on “No Vaseline” while Tupac spit vitriolic venom at Biggie, Lil Kim, Mobb Deep and Puff Daddy. Tupac’s path to the Final Four didn’t have much resistance as he stomped all over Snoop Dogg, Eazy E and Dr. Dre while Ice Cube met his match against Common’s “The Bitch In Yoo” but muscled his way through Boogie Down Productions and Nas on his way to this clash of West Coast luminaries. Who will make it to the championship round is truly up in the air as the road to the title game goes right through California.
Arguably the greatest battle in the history of hip hop that has always had fans (and non-fans) of rap split down the middle needs to decide a winner. You already know the story but we’ll break it down even further: Jay Z’s opening salvo against Nas and Prodigy sent the entire industry spiraling as Hov went bananas over a brilliant sampling of The Doors’ “Five To One” by Kanye West. It was an aim and shoot barrage of facts that had everyone wincing with each punchline and body blow landing with scintillating efficiency. Everyone thought Nas’ goose was cooked. To put it in perspective, given his recent track record of subpar albums, it should have been. However, Nasir Jones came back from the dead and unleashed a hellacious response in the form of the Ron Browz produced “Ether.” Never mind the vicious lyrical rounds of the dozens that the Queensbridge emcee played with his foe, but the fact that it impacted popular culture with a term that is now utilized on the norm to describe someone who gets destroyed is something we simply cannot ignore.Coal seam gas projects would be considered for Sydney's sensitive drinking water catchments and landholders will have no legal right to refuse drilling on their land under a state government plan for the controversial industry.
The government hopes the announcement will defuse community angst over coal seam gas mining ahead of the election next March. However voters will not be told where coal seam gas mining is allowed until after the election.
CSG projects in water catchments could get the go-ahead under the state government's plans for the industry. Credit:Robert Pearce
Announcing the plan on Thursday, NSW Nationals leader Troy Grant said coal seam gas was the "most polarising" issue facing the government. The plan would toughen regulation and take a more strategic and transparent approach to releasing land for gas exploration, including better science and data collection.
Resources and Energy Minister Anthony Roberts said the regime would secure the state's gas supplies and drive down prices.Emily The Strange to hit the big screen
Updated
Counterculture icon Emily The Strange is headed to the big screen with her four mysterious cats.
Dark Horse Comics, which has published several comic books detailing the goth teen's exploits, will produce a feature film that will detail her origins.
Skateboarder Rob Reger created the character among a multitude of designs he was printing up for stickers, T-shirts and skateboards in Santa Cruz, California, in the early 1990s.
The 'Emily' design took off and Reger's company, Cosmic Debris, went on to become a multi-million dollar business with toeholds in fashion, books, comics, toys, school supplies and accessories.
Reger has remained the creative director behind the character and is one of several artists who work on Emily.
The film will be produced by Mike Richardson, the founder of Oregon-based Dark Horse.
The project is not yet set-up at a studio, though Universal is a contender as Dark Horse has a first-look deal there.
"Emily herself is very appealing little girl, there's an edge to her," Richardson said.
"There is something very alluring to her image, people see it and respond to it immediately."
Richardson - who has been a producer on such films as Hellboy and its upcoming sequel, as well as 30 Days Of Night - says he and Reger will be looking for a filmmaker who "gets the character."
The filmmaker choice may in turn dictate what format will serve the story best - live-action, animation or a combination of the two.
The storyline is being kept under wraps, though Reger, who concocted it, says it will offer up some back story and will feature Emily's four cats - troublemaker Sabbath, schemer Nee-Chee, imaginative Miles and leader Mystery.
It will also have 13 new characters with names like Earwig, Umlaut, McFreeley and Officer Summers.
The story forms the basis of an Emily young adult novel, which will be published next year by HarperCollins.
- Reuters
Topics: popular-culture, arts-and-entertainment, books-literature, film-movies, united-states
First postedA TITAS lecturer has told his students that Osama bin Laden (pic) might not have existed and the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against the US could have been a conspiracy theory. — AFP pic
KUALA LUMPUR, June 28 ― An Islamic and Asian Civilisation Studies (TITAS) lecturer from a local private university taught today that Osama bin Laden might not have existed and the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against the US could have been a conspiracy theory, according to a student in the class.
The student who requested anonymity said the TITAS lecturer at the university’s Klang Valley campus told him and some 100 students in class this morning that the 2001 suicide airplane attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City were used by the West as an excuse to persecute Muslims.
“He said that Osama could have been a creation, that he didn’t really exist,” the student told Malay Mail Online.
“He commented on how in his videos, Osama only speaks ‘3 seconds of Arabic’ and then everything else was in English,” he added.
According to the student, the TITAS lecturer, when explaining the September 11 attacks, told students to “never believe everything Western media says, you should do your own reading on the matter”.
He also reportedly said “no religion is responsible for acts of terrorism or violence”.
Osama, founder of the militant group Al-Qaeda that claimed responsibility for the September 11 attacks which left almost 3,000 people dead, was killed in Pakistan in 2011 by US forces during a raid on his hideout.
The TITAS lecture today comes just as the dust has barely settled on another controversial lecture of the compulsory subject at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) that had slides portraying the Hindus as “dirty”.
The TITAS lecturer at the local private university today also purportedly criticised secularism in the West and said the by-product of the philosophy was the legalisation of gay marriage.
“‘Sperm and sperm cannot make babies’, ‘marriage is only for procreation’,” the student quoted him as saying.
When contacted by Malay Mail Online, the lecturer declined comment.
The TITAS module was made mandatory to all tertiary students regardless of religion in 2013.
Critics of the module had then alleged that it was a front to push an Islamic supremacy agenda in the country.The BMO Harris Bradley Center in Milwaukee, WI, home to the Milwaukee Bucks, has a lease that runs until September 30, 2017. The NBA has deemed the Bradley Center unfit by their standards (a bestowal that basketball fans in Seattle are familiar with). They have said that once that lease runs out, the Bucks will be playing in a new arena, if not in Milwaukee, than most likely in Seattle. However, what right does the NBA really have to make such threats?
The NBA is an LLC, a parent company to 30 different franchises, each one independently owned and operated. Leases are one facet that are negotiated by teams and cities, not by the NBA. So let's say September 30, 2017 comes and goes and Milwaukee has not built a new arena. What does the NBA do then?
They can not force Herb Kohl to sell his team. They can not take his team away from him (some people here might point to George Shinn and the New Orleans Hornets, but he was actually bought out. The team was not simply ripped away from him). So if Kohl and the Bradley Center Sports and Entertainment Corporation are both willing to extend the lease, what power does the NBA have?
What can Adam Silver do if Herb Kohl says "no, I'm not leaving. I'm going to stay right here in this arena until I die."? People might say, "well look at Seattle. The NBA forced them to move when they didn't build a new arena." The difference there is that by that point they already had an owner who was more than willing to move the team. Kohl is not as inclined.
So again I ask, if the NBA's deadline comes and goes and Kohl stands pat, what power does the NBA have? As far as I can tell, the answer is none. As Sonics fans, this is not a scenario we want to think about, as it would basically eliminate any leverage that we could provide the NBA. Although, it would seemingly be a resolution in Milwaukee, even if it's not one that NBA likes or agrees with, and could open the door to expansion for us. At the same time, it could also lead the NBA to continue to push Kohl to build a new arena and could drag the whole process out even further.
Granted, none of this seems likely, but the truth is that if the NBA's strong-arm tactics don't work, and Kohl is willing to lose money, there's nothing they can do to make him move.by Felix F. Seidler. Felix is a fellow at the Institute for Security Policy, University of Kiel, Germany and runs the site Seidlers Sicherheitspolitik”. This article was published there at first.
Major war in East Asia is a very unpleasant, but not unthinkable scenario. Of course, the US would be involved from day one in any military conflict in the East or South China Seas. However, Europe’s role would be less clear, due to its increasing strategic irrelevance. Most probably, except the UK, Europeans would deliver words only.
While Asia’s naval arms race keeps going, tensions are rising further in the East and South China Seas. Nevertheless, it is unlikely that any side will lunch a blitz-strike and, thereby, start a regional war. Although China is increasing its major combat capabilities, it is instead already using a salami-slicing tactic to secure its large claims. However, the worst of all threats are unintended incidents, caused for example by young nervous fighter pilots, leading to a circle of escalations without an exit in sight.
Hence, let us discuss the very unpleasant scenario that either there would be a major war between China and Japan or between China and South China Sea neighboring countries, such as Vietnam or the Philippines. Of course, the US would be involved in the conflict from day one. But what about Europe? The Old Continent would surely be affected, especially by the dramatic global economic impact an East Asian War would have. However, European countries’ reactions would very large depend on what the US is doing. The larger the US engagement, the louder Washington’s calls for a coalition of the willing and capable.
The UK would (maybe) go
The Royal Navy undertakes annual “Cougar Deployments” to the Indian Ocean. Therefore, the UK still has expeditionary capabilities to join US-led operations in East of Malacca. Disaster relief after Typhoon Haiyan by the destroyer HMS Daring and the helicopter carrier HMS Illustrious proved that British capability. While Daring is a sophisticated warship, the 34 year old Illustrious with her few helicopters and without fixed-wing aircraft would not be of much operational worth.
Moreover, since 2001, the Royal Navy always operates one SSN with Tomahawk cruise-missiles in the Indian Ocean, probably the most sophisticated high-intensity warfare platfrom the Royal Navy would have to offer for an East Asia deployment. In addition, the UK still has access to ports in Singapore and Brunei, although there is no guarantee that these countries, when not involved in the conflict, would open their ports for British ships underway to war. Hence, Darwin in Australia, which is likely to join forces with the US, could be an other option for replenishment.
Through the Polar Route (a route European airlines used while Soviet airspace was closed) and with aerial refueling or stops in Canada and Alaska, Britain could also deploy some of its Eurofighters to Japan. In consequence, Britain would be capable of doing, at least, something.
The question mark is, if Britain is willing to take action. Surely, UKIP’s Nigel Farage would not hesitate a minute to use the broad public reluctance to expeditionary endeavors for his’ own means. As in case of Syria, a lack of public support at home could prevent the UK from a military involvement. It would be hard for any UK Government to sell to the British voter to cut back public spending at home while signing checks for the Royal Navy heading towards East Asian waters.
France would not make a difference
Beside the US, France is the world’s only navy with a permanent presence through bases in all three oceans. Although, with one frigate, France’s Pacific presence of surface warships is relatively small. The one French Tahiti-based frigate deployed to an East Asian theater would not make a difference, but be a rather small show of force.
Like Britain, France permanently operates warships in the Indian Ocean, which it could also deploy to East Asia. Its nuclear-powered carrier Charles de Gaulle and SSN would also be able to tour beyond Singapore, however with a relatively long reaction time.
Paris’ main hurdle would be the same as London’s: The lack of public support. Le Pen would do exactly the same as UKIP and mobilize publicly against a French engagement and, thereby, against the government. Moreover, France has not the money necessary for any substantial and high-intensity engagement. In addition, a weak president like Hollande would fear the political risks. Given the operation ends in a disaster for the French, e.g. with the Charles de Gaulle sunk by the Chinese, Mr. Hollande would probably have to resign. Hence, do not expect an active role of France during an East Asian conflict.
No role for NATO and EU
On paper, NATO, with its Standing Maritime Groups, seems to be capable of deploying relevant naval forces across the globe. In practice, however, any mission with a NATO logo needs approval of 28 member states. Due to NATO’s present pivot to Russia, many members would object any new NATO involvement outside the Euro-Atlantic Area. As the US prefers coalitions of the willing and capable anyway, there would be no role for NATO in an East Asian war.
In addition, there is also no role for the EU. Since 2011, the rejections each year to the EU for observing the East Asia Summit are showing Brussels’ enduring strategic irrelevance in the Indo-Pacific. Moreover, neutral EU members, like Sweden and Austria, would never allow any active involvement. It is even questionable, if EU members could agree on a common political position or sanctions – something they have already failed to do often enough.
Dependent on the size and kind of US response, smaller European countries like Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway may join forces with the US Navy and send single vessels through the Panama Canal into the Pacific or replace US warships on other theaters. This is not far from reality, because these countries did already sent warships into the Pacific for the RIMPAC exercise. However, their only motivation would be to use these deployments to make their voices better heard in Washington.
First of all, Germany is the enduring guarantee that, when confronted with major war in East Asia, NATO and EU will do nothing else than sending out press releases about their “deep concern”. Being happy that ISAF’s end terminates the era of large expeditionary deployments, Germany’s political class would never approve an active military role in East Asia – left aside that Germany would not be able to contribute much, anyway.
Germany would first and foremost defend its trade relationships with China, which is in its national interests. Thus, the much more interesting question is, if the German government would develop the will to take on the initiative for a diplomatic solution. Germany has very good relationships with the US, China, Japan and South Korea. Vietnam and other South East Asian countries have frequently expressed greater interest in deeper cooperation with Germany.
Hence, Germany has the political weight necessary to work for a diplomatic solution. |
the Mage of Heart and Nepeta's dancestor.
She is deaf, and often uses sign language and mimes to express her thoughts. This is best seen in her conversation with Kurloz Makara, who also mimes. Her quirk is to add intricate catfaces to the start of her text, and to use cat puns (similar to the fish puns Meenah uses) in speech, most often replacing parts of words with 'purr'. The former two are similar to her dancestor's quirk and they also share their habit to replace "ee" with "33" Her text is also in all caps, indicating that due to her deafness, she cannot tell how loud she is speaking.
Her deafness may be a reference to Pedro Ponce De Leon, a monk who is credited as the first teacher for the deaf. He taught deaf people to speak, as well as to communicate in writing and simple hand gestures. This compounds on the reference in Nepeta's lusus, who Meulin shared and may have named identically as Pounce de Leon.
Contents show]
Etymology Edit
Meulin's name was suggested by McBatman for Nepeta. It is a French surname, as well as the name of a small town in Burgundy, France which is part of the municipality of Dompierre-les-Ormes. Her name was chosen as a pun on "mewling", which is a term for the sound cats make. "Meulin" also sounds and looks similar to "Merlin," fitting her title as a Mage.
Biography Edit
Upon exiting Terezi's hive as Meenah, a small "scene" (Aranea's exposition) gives more information about some of the post-scratch "ancestors".
The Mage of Heart as you know is an ardent disciple of the romantic sciences. She has a well earned reputation as a miracle worker when it comes to match making. But her own romantic history ironically has been riddled with trouble and heartbreak. Once, well before our session began, she and Kurloz were in a very loving matespritship. It really seemed to everyone they were made for each other. One day, they fell asleep together. Kurloz then had a nightmare so terrifying, he released the most dreadful sound imaginable. It truly echoed the horror of the Vast Honk itself. The noise was so loud and so awful, Meulin went completely deaf, and her hearing never recovered. Kurloz was undoubtedly devastated by what he'd done to her. He was so distraught, he sewed his mouth shut and has never spoken a word since. Though they have drifted apart as matesprits, Meulin never held it against him, and even seemed to take delight in learning new ways to communicate. They continued to remain very close to this day. Maybe a little too close if you ask me. It's clear that her sympathies have been gradually swayed in support of the Highblood's cult. She stays private about her beliefs, but now and then I'll notice she lets some tenet of mirthful doctrine slip out. I suppose I shouldn't be too concerned though, since it's almost certainly a lot of harmless superstition.
The version of Vriska who travels with Meenah in the dream bubble states that Meulin has a fascin8tingly dark history which her memories always seem to hint at.
Personality and Traits Edit
Meulin shares many traits with her dancestor Nepeta. Both are excitable and prone to emotional reaction, more extremely for Meulin than Nepeta. They both share interest in romantic speculation, and take efforts to ship their friends and acquaintances. Meulin has a specific knack for red romance, leaving the blacker quadrants to Kurloz. Fittingly, the heart key was found near her and the spade key near Kurloz.
Apparently she bears no resentments towards Kurloz over the loss of her hearing, forgiving him entirely. The two remain good friends after the incident, though she is seemingly oblivious to his more sinister intentions. This stems largely from Kurloz's secretive nature and the hypnotic powers of his chucklevoodoos, evidenced by her claims of her head feeling "foggy" if talked to after several conversations between her and Kurloz.
Relationships Edit
Kurloz Makara Edit
Kurloz and Meulin were matesprits until the incident. They maintain a close friendship.
Horuss Zahhak Edit
In the afterlife she and Horuss became moirails after meeting Nepeta and Equius and seeing the incredibly close relationship that they had.
Trivia EditFox’s drama pilot APB starring Justin Kirk is undergoing a creative overhaul. Production on the pilot, directed by Len Wiseman, has been shut down temporarily, and Burn Notice creator Matt Nix has been brought in as writer-showrunner. He replaces the project’s creator-writer David Slack, who has departed over creative differences.
Nix is currently rewriting the pilot script. Filming on the pilot, which was suspended earlier this week, is slated to resume Monday in Chicago. Given the extensive reworking of the script, reshoots are expected. For Nix, the assignment stems from his overall deal with 20th Century Fox TV, which is producing the project.
Inspired by the July New York Times Magazine article “Who Runs the Streets of New Orleans,” APB explores what happens when an enigmatic tech billionaire, Gideon Reed (Kirk), purchases a troubled police precinct in the wake of a loved one’s murder. Natalie Martinez and Ernie Hudson co-star.
Nix is executive producing the pilot with Wiseman, who remains the director. Also executive producing the project are David Bernardi, Dennis Kim, Todd Hoffman and Robert Friedman.Getting snipped and tying tubes isn't just for people anymore: Vasectomies and hysterectomies may be a solution for keeping free-roaming domestic cats in the United States in check, a new study says.
Over 80 million pet cats reside in U.S. homes, and as many as 80 million more free-roaming cats survive outside. How to deal with this feline explosion has caused much debate, especially between cat lovers and wildlife advocates who are concerned that cats are regularly killing birds and other animal species.
Using a computer model, the researchers found that colonies of feral cats that were trapped, given vasectomies or hysterectomies, and released (TVHR) shrank faster than colonies that were trapped, neutered, and released (TNR), a method of feral cat control promoted by many cat advocates.
Feral cats live in groups that are controlled by a dominant male. A vasectomy cuts the tube that carries sperm without removing a cat's testicles, so a vasectomized cat retains its sexual hormones. Thus, it can also keep its dominant position in the colony, so it's able to mate with females without producing kittens.
On the other hand, neutered or castrated—and thus sexually inactive—cats returned to a colony lose their position to the next most dominant breeding male. (Watch a video about the secret lives of cats.)
What's more, when a non-sterilized female cat mates with a vasectomized male, she undergoes a 45-day pseudo-pregnancy period, further reducing opportunities for reproduction, the study authors found.
The new study "looks like good science—it's kind of provocative," said John Hadidian, senior scientist for wildlife at the Humane Society of the United States.
"It has something more to add to this very controversial issue, which is what we're looking for: new ideas and new strategies."
Virtual Cats
For the study, the authors simulated a feral cat population of about 200 animals, observing them for about 6,000 days, or more than 16 years. That's longer than the typical lifetime of a feral cat—outdoor cats live an average of 3 years, while indoor cats typically reach an average age of 15 years—but the scientists needed a longer time period to observe trends.
As they ran the computer model, the team tracked each cat's behavior, adding and removing individuals as animals were born and died, according to the study, published August 15 in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association.
The results showed that if 35 percent of a cat population underwent TVHR, that population would be reduced by half and would disappear in 11 years. Alternatively, if the cat population underwent TNR, 82 percent of cats would need to be captured and neutered in order to eliminate the colony in 11 years.
"We were surprised at how much better [TVHR] worked," said study co-author Michael Reed, a biologist at Tufts University in Massachusetts.
"The results are promising—now someone needs to go and test it under proper controlled conditions."
That's exactly what Hadidian suggests: Ideally, scientists could begin testing TVHR—still an uncommon practice—in a real cat colony. "You want to see how well your data begin to fit the model you've generated," he said.
Not a Cure-All
However, a potential concern with leaving cats intact is that the males will still howl, fight, and spray to mark their territories—causing complaints by people who live near colonies of free-roaming cats.
Becky Robinson, president and co-founder of the animal-rights group Alley Cat Allies, also noted that reducing these behaviors is a benefit of TNR, which her group has promoted and carried out for two decades.
The virtual-cat-colony study "demonstrates non-lethal population control working," she said, adding that some programs still catch and euthanize feral cats.
"Neutering and spaying is now becoming the norm in the U.S., and Americans support humane and compassionate programs that also work to stabilize cat populations."
Sheilah Robertson of the American Veterinary Medical Association's Animal Welfare Division also noted that "it's unlikely a single tactic will be a cure-all" for the feral-cat problem.
"Instead, a multipronged approach will be required that includes TNVR; programs that use nonsurgical approaches, including immunocontraception and chemical sterilization of male cats; and trap-and-remove. Regardless of the method chosen, it may take 10-15 years of sustained effort to see a positive effect," she said.
In general, a lot of the feral-cat debate is actually a "human conflict" between people with differing visions on how to approach feral cats, added the Humane Society's Hadidian.
But some productive dialogue is occurring between people who care about cats and those who care about wildlife, as both seem to have a common goal: to have fewer cats outdoors, he said.Cannabis entrepreneurs and other invested everywhere in California are scrambling to meet the emergency regulations recently released by the state’s Bureau of Cannabis Control in anticipation of the January 1st rollout of adult-use cannabis sales. The effectiveness and ease of implementation of their current guidelines remains to be seen. We always knew there would be a lot of grumbling, but there is a LOT of grumbling. And rightfully so. Many players in the field both big and small are going to have major problems getting into and/or staying in the new adult use legalization market, and concerns around social justice are real. In an eagerness to ensure public safety, regulators are seemingly going overboard to make themselves feel better, if not to make things advance smoothly. High excise taxes and overburdensome, ever-changing rules lead to crippling or death of business and competition.
Debby Goldsberry, manager of Magnolia Wellness in Oakland, and longtime actor in the cannabis movement (including High Times Freedom Fighter of the Year!), recently opined to The Daily Californian just such concerns and calls on the cannabis community to continue its fight:
“I joined the effort to legalize marijuana way back in 1986 and co-founded my first dispensary, Berkeley Patients Group, in 1999 with goals and a vision in mind. The idea was to end cannabis arrests, to create jobs and to keep families together instead of being torn apart by a senseless war on drugs. My hope was that the barrier to enter the movement would be low enough that almost everyone could join, both those in the longstanding underground economy and new people getting involved with innovative ideas. The movement’s goal has been to creating an above-board cannabis industry, through which California could capture reasonable taxes and fair regulatory fees and where small family businesses, which make up the bulk of the industry’s backbone, could thrive. “Now, it looks as though survival of the fittest, and only experienced, well-funded business people will make it. Mid-sized dispensaries such as Magnolia will likely push through by bootstrapping costs and fees and keeping fingers crossed that enough cultivators and manufacturers will get licenses to meet the demand of the newly regulated market. After all, we have to get our supply from other licensed businesses, and the fear that our access to marijuana will soon be cut off is real. “… We can’t stop here. It will take years of effort to develop effective regulations and to create workable tax schemes. Thankfully, both the marijuana movement and the industry that was built from it are aligned to make changes. We won’t stop until the right to cultivate, manufacture, sell and use marijuana is an inalienable right, never to be taken away again.”
I agree with Debby. We CAN’T stop here. I’m grateful to her for her leadership on this. Let’s be like Debby and keep crafting a cannabis industry we can all be proud of.
Hear from California entrepreneurs and activists, like Debby Goldsberry, at the next International Cannabis Business Conference in San Francisco, California on February 1 & 2, 2018. Tickets are on sale now!The Buccaneers have a very promising quarterback to build around in Jameis Winston, but NFL Films senior producer Greg Cosell says the team that drafts Cal QB Jared Goff this year could end up even happier than the Bucs are with Winston.
Cosell said on Wednesday that Goff, a junior who intends to enter the 2016 NFL Draft, is a better prospect than Winston.
"My initial study of Goff tells me that I think (Goff is) a more natural and better overall thrower than (Titans QB Marcus) Mariota. I think he's a better prospect than Jameis Winston," Cosell told WGFX-FM in Nashville, Tennessee. "Where he goes? I can't answer that, but from studying it preliminarily, that's how I see it with Jared Goff."
That's high praise for Goff, who racked up spectacular numbers as a three-year starter for the Golden Bears. However, Cosell was far from smitten with Winston heading into last year's draft, saying in April that he'd take Titans QB Zach Mettenberger, a 2014 sixth-round pick, over Winston. Of course, the Bucs didn't give the Titans a chance to land Winston, selecting the FSU QB first overall before Tennessee chose Mariota at No. 2.
"Winston had a very nice rookie season and it looks like he'll be a solid player. How good? No one can answer that at this moment," Cosell said. "I'm just comparing Goff, and again, I haven't done as much work on Goff as I did on Winston when I was done with the process last year, but that's the basis of my comparison."
NFL Media analysts Daniel Jeremiah and Bucky Brooks both have Goff as the first QB off the board, going No. 2 overall to the Browns, in their first mock drafts of the year. The Titans aren't in the market for a QB after picking Mariota, but they certainly are open to listening to offers from any team interested in leapfrogging the Browns to ensure a chance to pick Goff before Cleveland gets the opportunity.
Cosell likes Goff as a fit for the Browns, or any other team, for that matter.
"I think Goff fits any system. I don't think Goff is system specific," he said. "I think his skill set, his throwing skill set, his looseness as an athlete, his light feet, I think he fits, theoretically, any system. He would be my choice right now (for the Browns). He could run (head coach) Hue Jackson's system no problem."
If Goff does indeed land in Cleveland and performs better than Winston did as a rookie, happy days will be here for long-suffering Browns fans. Then again, it could be heartbreak again if a team moves ahead of the Browns to snatch Goff before Cleveland gets a chance.
Yes, this draft process is beginning to get very interesting.
Follow College Football 24/7 on Twitter @NFL_CFB.Sci/Tech
Operative systems war
Open software group files complaint against Microsoft to EU
Reuters
Madrid
03/26/2013
Hispalinux, which represents users and developers of the Linux operating system, said Microsoft had made it difficult for users of computers sold with its Windows 8 platform to switch to Linux.
A Spanish association representing open-source software users has filed a complaint against Microsoft Corp to the European Commission, in a new challenge to the Windows developer following a hefty fine earlier this month.
The 8,000 member-strong Hispalinux, which represents users and developers of the Linux operating system in Spain, said Microsoft had made it difficult for users of computers sold with its Windows 8 platform to switch to Linux and other operating systems.
Lawyer and Hispalinux head Jose Maria Lancho said he delivered the complaint to the Madrid office of the European Commission at 0900 GMT on Tuesday.
Microsoft declined to comment and officials at the European Commission were not available for comment.
In its 14-page complaint, Hispalinux said Windows 8 contained an "obstruction mechanism" called UEFI Secure Boot that controls the start-up of the computer and means users must seek keys from Microsoft to install another operating system.
The group said it was "a de facto technological jail for computer booting systems... making Microsoft's Windows platform less neutral than ever". "This is absolutely anti-competitive," Lancho told Reuters. "It's really bad for the user and for the European software industry."
The European Commission has fined Microsoft, the global leader in PC operating systems, 2.2 billion euros ($2.83 billion)over the past decade, making it the world's biggest offender of European Union business rules.
The Commission found in 2004 that Microsoft had abused its market leader position by tying Windows Media Player to the Windows software package and relations have remained tense.
The company took a more conciliatory approach in recent years, settling another antitrust investigation in 2009 related to the choice of a browser in its Windows operating system.
It also lodged its own complaints to the Commission about the business activities of rival Google. But on March 6, the Commission fined Microsoft 561 million euros for failing to offer users a choice of web browser.POLICE Scotland have passed on "information" to the Crown Office having concluded a year-long investigation into allegations pro-Union campaigners breached electoral secrecy laws during the Scottish independence referendum.
The development comes nearly a year after police were instructed to launch an official probe over complaints surrounding comments made by Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson that postal vote "tallies" were being taken in the weeks before the referendum ballot closed at 10pm on September 18.
On televised coverage of the referendum results, 45 minutes after the polls closed, Ms Davidson said that the Better Together camp had been "incredibly encouraged" by the results of a "sample opening" of the postal ballot that she said had taken place around the country over the few weeks prior to the poll.
United front flashback: From left, Johann Lamont, Alistair Darling, Ruth Davidson and Willie
Complaints over her account of the postal vote "tallies" raised concerns the information may have helped inform the No campaign's decision to issue the "vow" of more powers for Scotland from the three main party leaders.
Police Scotland has confirmed that they have now completed their investigation which was launched after the Crown Office instructed that there should be a formal probe following the complaints.
The Herald revealed that police twice spoke to Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson as a potential witness over comments she made that the "tallies" were being taken in the weeks before the referendum ballot closed at 10pm on September 18 last year.
It is understood no arrests have yet been made and there are no outstanding warrants.
A Police Scotland spokesman said: "Police Scotland has completed enquiries and the matter now rests with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service."
A Crown Office spokesman added: “The Crown Office has received information regarding the investigation carried out by Police Scotland and will consider if further action is necessary.”
Political agents and campaigners are allowed to oversee the postal vote opening sessions, where checks are made to verify the signatures and dates of birth on postal voting statements against computerised records.
However, Elections Scotland instructions on postal votes in advance of the referendum stated that it is "an offence for anyone attending the opening of postal votes to attempt to ascertain how any vote has been cast or to communicate any such information obtained".
Failure to observe the secrecy requirement is a criminal offence punishable by up to 12 months in prison and/or to a fine of up to £5,000.
Guidance provided to electoral administrators and returning officers for the General Election, as a result of the experience of the referendum, were warned to keep the postal ballot secret and told that voting tallies by political agents is illegal.
Mary Pitcaithly, convener of the Electoral Management Board for Scotland recommended to returning officers in Scotland that they take particular care in making sure the law was complied with during the General Election and that the secrecy requirement was explained to all those attending postal vote openings.
The moves which the EMB said "draw on lessons learned from the Scottish independence referendum" include asking that ballot papers are handled face down so that no mark on the front of the paper is able to be seen by observers.
The postal vote, made up between 20% and 50% of the counted votes. Around 800,000 people, or 19% of participants, voted by post in the referendum.
The Electoral Commission has also advised all electoral administrators that the law prohibits tallying at postal vote opening sessions.
The advice states that under the Section 66(4)(d) of the Representation of the People Act 1983 it is "not permissible to attempt to ascertain the candidate for whom any vote is given in any particular ballot paper or communicate that information.
"This provision therefore prevents those present at the postal vote opening from attempting to ascertain the way individual ballot papers are marked."
Police have refused over the year of the investigation to comment on what progress they have made.
Some complainers raised concern that no police action had been taken in advance of the General Election.
Video footage of Ms Davidson talking about the ballot viewing was forwarded to both the police and the Electoral Commission.
In televised coverage she says: "Postal votes are going to be enormously important in this campaign; about 18 per cent of the vote is going to come out of postal ballots and we have had people at every sample opening, around the country, over the last few weeks, while that's been coming in. And we've been incredibly encouraged by the results."
Later, referring to postal ballots, she said: "Different local authorities have had openings around the country", adding, "there's people in the room that have been sampling those ballot boxes that have been opened and have been taking tallies and the reports have been very positive for us".Photo by Meg Pickard
Looking for a way to brighten up your Tube commute? An anoymous photographer is making quite a splash across the net right now by strategically using free newspapers to create some fun forced perspective pictures. "Photo bombing" fellow commuters means you can potentially get to see celebrities travelling with you every day.The photos are mostly on buses or on mainline train journeys but you can easily see how this would work for London Underground journeys.The photographer's choices for this are fun, but I loved a shot that I blogged about a few years ago where Meg Pickard captured a lady reading on the Tube. This wasn't set up but just a lovely spontaneous moment where everything worked together brilliantlyChutney Bannister's " The Surreal Line " set of photos on the Tube also show how cross platform ads can mingle with commuters to create some interesting perspectives.
Thanks to Thanks to @MichalD for initially alerting me the to current "photo bombing" photos and you can see the full set of them all on Shortlist
You might also likeToday we’re going to talk about the second to last original founding member of the Justice League.
On the bottom left of the above picture you can see a man in a yellow suit and a full face executioner style mask. That’s Atom
No not that one. This one.
Origin and career
If you’re wondering why the Atom looks like a 1930’s strong man that’s because he started out that way. Atom originally started off as an unassuming 98 pound weakling named Al Pratt. While studying at Calvin College he came across a vagrant in the streets and decided to buy him dinner. That man turned out to be a former boxing trainer Joseph Morgan
Joe decided to thank Al by training him to be a boxer and he turned out to be a great teacher. Al would eventually become so skilled that he finally decided to adopt the life of a costumed crime fighter during a time when hard work and a reasonable amount of training could still give you a reasonable shot at being a hero.
Al would adopt the name “Atom” and became a founding member of the Justice Society when President Roosevelt organized the Justice Society in order to fight the Nazis.
During the war Al served as a tank driver and in an interesting bit of continuity he became friends with fellow strong man Wildcat
which was all the more interesting since they were both trained by Joseph Morgan.
In 1948 Atom began to live up to his namesake and developed atomic based superpowers. It turned out the cause of his newfangled powers was a battle with the reluctant villain Cyclotron six years earlier during the war.
Side note: It turned out that Cyclotron was forced into becoming a villain by another JSA villain, the Ultra Humanite. He sacrificed himself by flying Ultra Humanite into the atmosphere and destroying himself.
As a reminder of Cyclotron’s deeds Atom changed his costume to resemble the deceased villain.
Thanks to this battle Atom developed an immunity to all forms of radiation and while pursuing a villain in the middle of a live atomic bomb test
He developed super strength as well. His story would further develop when Al Pratt took partial custody of the then deceased Cyclotron’s child Terri.
So what happened?
With his new super powers the Al Pratt devoted his life to studying radiation and its effects. However, the Atom and the rest of the JSA were disbanded in 1951 when a Senate Committee ordered them to reveal their identities in order to prove they weren’t Communist sympathizers.
Naturally the JSA refused to bow down to this obvious parallel to the real life Senator McCarthy and the House Committee of un American Activities and opted for an early retirement. Atom revealed his identity to his sweetheart Mary James and the two were married.
Al would eventually return with his old team mates as Atom on several occasions later on. However, his life would take a sudden and tragic turn when one of the JSA’s oldest foes, the immortal Vandal Savage, kidnapped his son and killed Mary James.
Al was devastated but managed to pull through with the help of his teammates. Unfortunately, he would later perish when battling the villain Extant during DC’s Zero Hour event in 1994.
While Al Pratt’s Atom was dead his legacy as a hero would live on in another hero named Atom Smasher, who was actually the grandson of the villain Cyclotron and Al’s god son.
While a huge portion of Al Pratt’s superhero career was marred by loss and tragedy his legacy lives on as one of the founding members of the JSA and as a hero to exemplified defying the odds to do the right thing.
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Written by: Matthew McGuire
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The Growlers, based out of Costa Mesa, California will be touring across the states this summer and fall with a laid back alternative rock sound to showcase for audiences. The band has called it a “Beach Goth” style of sound. Stream Chinese Fountain to experience their unique music, and catch them live on tour this summer.
Bonnaroo set on Thursday, June 11 from 9:30-10:15 p.m.
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the GROWLERS- “Big Toe” Live at the Hollywood Palladium
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Summer Tour Dates:
06.03.15 – Taos, NM @ Taos Mesa Brewing
06.05.15 – Dallas, TX @ Trees
06.06.15 – Ozark, AR @ Wakarusa
06.08.15 – New Orleans, LA @ One Eyed Jacks
06.09.15 – Atlanta, GA @ Terminal West
06.10.15 – Asheville, NC @ New Mountain Theatre
06.11.15 – Manchester, TN @ Bonnaroo
06.12.15 – St. Louis, MO @ Old Rock House
06.13.15 – Norman, OK @ Opolis
06.18.15 – San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall
06.19.15 – San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall
06.20.15 – San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall
07.11.15 – Ottawa, ON @ Ottawa Blues Festival
Fall Tour Dates:
09.11.15 – Las Vegas, NV @ Bunkhouse
09.12.15 – Las Vegas, NV @ Bunkhouse
09.16.15 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom
09.17.15 – Eugene, OR @ Cozmic
09.18.15 – Arcata, CA @ The Depot
09.19.15 – Sacramento, CA @ TBD Festival
09.26.15 – Boulder, CO @ Fox Theatre
09.27.15 – Lawrence, KS @ Bottleneck
09.29.15 – Milwaukee, WI @ Turner Hall
09.30.15 – Chicago, IL @ Metro
10.01.15 – Ann Arbor, MI @ Blind Pig
10.02.15 – Toronto, ON @ Horseshoe Tavern
10.03.15 – Toronto, ON @ Horseshoe Tavern
10.04.15 – Ithaca, NY @ The Haunt
10.05.15 – Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer
10.07.15 – Boston, MA @ Sinclair
10.08.15 – NYC, NY @ Irving Plaza
10.09.15 – NYC, NY @ Irving Plaza
10.10.15 – Washington D.C @ 930 Club
10.11.15 – Chapel Hill, NC 2 Cats Cradle
10.12.15 – Nashville, TN @ Exit In
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[av_one_half] Chinese Fountain by the Growlers [/av_one_half]
Bonnaroo News
[av_magazine link=’category,413′ items=’5′ offset=’0′ tabs=’aviaTBtabs’ thumbnails=’aviaTBthumbnails’ heading=” heading_link=’manually,http://’ heading_color=’theme-color’ heading_custom_color=’#ffffff’ first_big=’aviaTBfirst_big’ first_big_pos=’left’]Former Whip Philip Ruddock appeared on 2UE, where he emphasised his support
EXCLUSIVE
TONY Abbott was informed by former chief whip Philip Ruddock on multiple occasions that there was disquiet among his backbench about the direction of his government.
In a direct rebuke to the Prime Minister’s comments yesterday, News Corp Australia understands Mr Abbott was told on multiple occasions about the level of concern by his chief whip.
But even before things came to that, Mr Ruddock’s role was substantially muted in comparison to the chief whip’s position in opposition and under the former Howard government.
Mr Ruddock was cut out of key tactics meetings and full meetings of the ministry.
“In the Howard era the whip was included in everything like that,” one MP said.
“To cut Philip out of those meetings and then say it’s all his fault, that he didn’t tell us what’s going on is just stupid.
PHILIP RUDDOCK SACKED: Did Tony Abbott just break another promise?
“Philip has been treated like the rest of us — we don’t want to hear any problems, just do what we say.”
News Corp Australia also understands the Prime Minister began calling a large number of MPs directly in January to gauge how they felt about the direction his government was taking.
It is understood Mr Ruddock encouraged MPs to express any concerns they had directly with Mr Abbott.
On Friday, the Prime Minister sacked Mr Ruddock, who was elected in 1973, as chief whip and replaced him with Queensland Liberal National Party MP Scott Buchholz. Abbott loyalist Andrew Nikolic was promoted to one of the deputy whip positions.
Contacted today, Mr Ruddock would not comment further to what he said over the weekend about his sacking.
“I have nothing further to say on that, the decision was one made by the leader,” Mr Ruddock said.
“My expectation is that if the Prime Minister had concerns about the way I undertook the task, he would put them to me.”
During a radio appearance this afternoon, Mr Ruddock could not confirm that Tony Abbott still had his support to continue as Prime Minister.
“He had my support,” Mr Ruddock told Sydney’s 2UE radio referring to last week’s spill motion.
But pressed further on if that meant Mr Abbott still enjoyed his support, Mr Ruddock would not elaborate.
“He had my support,” he repeated.
Yesterday, the Prime Minister said he was blindsided by the level of discontent within his party, following 39 MPs in his party room voting in favour of a leadership spill last Monday.
“Plainly, I wasn’t as aware as I should have been of all of this. I never want to find myself in this position ever again,” Mr Abbott told Andrew Bolt when quizzed about Mr Ruddock’s sacking yesterday.
Today Mr Abbott compared the whip decision to his ministry reshuffle last year.
News Corp Australia has been told by more than a dozen MPs that they personally spoke with the Prime Minister in the lead up to last week’s vote on a leadership spill.
Many said they directly expressed concerns over the party’s direction and certain key policies such as Paid Parental Leave and the GP co-payment.
“I told him how I felt and that I wasn’t the only one,” one MP said.
Another MP said: “Prime ministers have telephones provided free of charge by the Commonwealth so they have plenty of time to ring plenty of people”.
Another MP said: “That statement (from Mr Abbott) doesn’t seem at all accurate. I know MPs were telling him about their concerns, and it wasn’t just backbenchers I must say.”
“The level of backbench angst and anger was continuing to rise for six months. Those calls we got in January were the first real chat many of us had had with the Prime Minister in the whole time we’ve been in government,” another MP said.
“You didn’t have to be Nostradamus to see what was coming.”
Several MPs have told News Corp Australia they have been fielding calls from the Liberal party membership and community leaders who were “particularly antsy” about Mr Ruddock’s sacking.
“Philip is Mr Multicultural. He is deeply respected and a lot of community leaders are really angry about how he’s been treated,” one MP said.
Another MP said: “The multicultural community is really upset about this decision. My office has been getting calls about it.”On July 23rd, at about 4:00 AM, two black males stormed a home near Piedmont, AL. Two white males, a grandfather, and his grandson were beaten and shot to death. A female hid and was not found by the attackers. A Nissan Altima was stolen and found burned a short distance away.
The victims are Joshua Dylan Moody, 23, and Travis Frost, 73. The female victim is Frost’s wife and grandmother of Moody.
Police have identified three suspects. Two black males and a black female. Their names are Jeffrey Jamall Briskey, Rhimington Otarivs Johnson, and Sicondria Michala Carter.
Briskey and Carter were just captured at an Econo Lodge in Petersburg, VA. Rhimington Otarivs Johnson is still at large.
The day after the murders, Calhoun County Sheriff Matthew Wade said: “we don’t think this is just a random act.” However, no more information has been provided.
The victims had a Confederate flag on their porch. It can be seen in a video taken by WBRC Channel 6. Piedmont is 85% white and only 10% black. The suspects are all from Anniston, AL, which is 52% black. The actual location of the home is in the Rabbittown community, which is about 95% white.
No local media outlets have shown pictures of the victims or stated their race. Friends of Frost erected a memorial near his favorite fishing spot. This was also not covered by local media. We believe that if the victims had been black, and the suspects had been white males with a Confederate flag, the same media would treat the double murder much differently.The NFL season ended less than two weeks ago, but teams are already beginning to make moves in advance of the new league year, and with the NFL combine sprouting up in Indianapolis next week, vacations are already over for many. In addition to the upcoming scouting bonanza, front offices are figuring out their free-agent plans and identifying which players they'll want to retain from their own rosters heading into the new league year on March 9.
A good offseason, naturally, starts with a good beginning. That's where we come in. Teams like the Broncos and Panthers probably don't need our help, but that's never stopped us before. We've run division by division and detailed the five moves each NFL franchise should make to kick off its offseason in the right fashion. That can include anything from cutting a longtime contributor to making a big splash in free agency -- or, in some cases, staying out of the pool altogether.
Some teams should be more active than others, so there are a few teams whose five moves extend all the way to draft day at the end of April. Other teams need to be more aggressive by the time the first day of free |
pressure from humans caused its range to contract solely to certain islands off eastern Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Ireland and Great Britain. It is known that, although graceful in water, great auks were slow and clumsy on land, and unafraid of humans, which made them easy targets for insatiable human appetites and cruelties. The last pair of great auks, discovered while incubating an egg on a small island near Iceland, were killed on 3 July 1844, for a museum collection.
Audubon's powerful rendering of the lovely Esquimaux curlew (also known as the Eskimo, or Northern, curlew), Numenius borealis, is sadly prescient, since this is the only picture where one of his main subjects is dead. In this portrait, the dead female lies on her back in the foreground, one wing open, while the male looks at her with what appears to be astonishment.
The Esquimaux curlew is currently classified as either critically endangered -- with a population estimated to be no more than 50 individuals -- or more likely, extinct. This elegant shorebird was a champion long-distance migrant that annually flew 20,000 miles or more from southern Argentina, stopping on the North American Great Plains to refuel before moving on to the northwestern tundras of Alaska and Canada to breed. Its population was decimated by an astonishing level of hunting where as many as two million birds were killed in a single year. The pressure from hunting was probably amplified by the extinction of the Rocky Mountain locust, its primary food source during migration. The Esquimaux curlew, once one of the most numerous of all North American shorebirds, is often mistaken for the still extant, but noticeably larger, Whimbrel, or Hudsonian curlew, Numenius phaeopus, which further confuses attempts to determine if this species still exists. The last confirmed sighting of the Esquimaux curlew was in 1963, in the Barbados.
Because there were between three and five billion living passenger pigeons -- 25 to 40 per cent of the total bird population of the United States -- at the time that Europeans discovered America, the passenger pigeon, also known as the wild pigeon, Ectopistes migratorius, is probably the most famous example of North America's sad saga of extinct birds. Audubon's painting depicts the female leaning down to feed the male, demonstrating the artist's skill at capturing the iridescent feathering on the birds' necks using watercolors.
The passenger pigeon's survival strategy was legendary and is also used by many migratory African mammals; by forming huge groups of hundreds of thousands of individuals, the species was rendered invulnerable to losses inflicted by wild predators. Nevertheless, the formally recognized cause of this species' extinction was rampant killing by humans, although it would probably have succumbed eventually to the ravages of uncontrolled destruction of the East Coast oak forests to establish farms.
But the sad echo of the loss of passenger pigeons still reverberates today because its extinction probably exacerbated the proliferation of Lyme disease. When the passenger pigeons existed in large numbers, they subsisted primarily on acorns. However, since there are no pigeons to eat acorns, the populations of Eastern deer mice -- the main reservoir of Lyme disease -- exploded far beyond historic levels as they exploited this unexpected food bonanza.
Audubon's knowledge of bird social behavior is demonstrated by a small group of playful and curious Carolina parakeets (also known as the Carolina parrot or conure), Conuropsis carolinensis. In this sweet painting, he captured a small group of these colorful parrots as they romped on their primary foodplant, the invasive cocklebur. The rapid movement of the birds' bodies through the vegetation is apparent from the different lifelike poses, and the birds' inquisitive nature is revealed by those individuals looking directly at the viewer. I was especially enthralled and saddened by their feather texture and coloring -- the birds seem so real and touchable, so near, and yet so far away.
For aficionados of parrots, like me, the senseless loss of the Carolina parakeet is an added insult in the long and sordid history of wanton human disregard for all life forms. The extinction of the Carolina parakeet resulted from loss of its forested habitat to farmers, who also shot the gregarious birds as agricultural pests. This pressure was exacerbated by the desirability of their colorful plumage for decorations on womens' hats and by the pet trade. Unfortunately, parrot owners of the past were not as enlightened as those today, so even though these birds bred easily in captivity, a captive breeding population was never established. Tragically, the final death knell for the tiny remnant population of these parrots was probably a disease found in captive poultry.
Several North American avian success stories were also included in this exhibition, most notably the California Condor, Gymnogyps californianus. This bird, the largest vulture in North America, was almost lost after its already small population declined dramatically in the 19th century due to the combined effects of poaching, lead shot poisoning, and habitat destruction. Federal laws and eventually, a conservation program that featured captive breeding efforts, were finally enacted to protect this species, whose numbers increased from an all-time low of only nine individuals to a population of 302 birds as of November 2007.
Another conservation success story is that of the beautiful brown pelican, Pelecanus occidentalis, which was nearly lost because of eggshell thinning caused by pesticides like DDT and dieldrin. Close examination with a magnifying glass reveals that Audubon beautifully captured this species in watercolor by using graphite shading on the solid regions of watercolor to provide added texture to this bird's plumage -- a subtle detail you will never see on any reproduction.
The exhibition also featured several of Audubon's sketches and paintings of people in his life, which he produced to improve his observational skills and drawing speed. Additionally, several books that Audubon illustrated with dissected birds, including a woodpecker (dissections of these birds are utterly fascinating), were also included.
The New-York Historical Society is the largest single repository of Auduboniana in the world. Besides cataloguing a variety of Audubon's personal effects, they hold 435 of Audubon's watercolors that were preparatory for 433 of the 435 plates in The Birds of America (1827-1838). (Unfortunately, no original watercolors for plates 84 and 155 are known to exist.) Because of the vulnerability of these paintings to the damaging effects of light, each one of these 435 works are exhibited for only a short period of time once every ten years. Forty paintings were displayed in Spring 2008, along with other drawings and books that are relevant to Audubon's life and work. The exhibition runs from 8 February to 16 March 2008 at the New York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West (SW corner of Central Park West and 77th street), New York, NY 10024.United Airlines has given out millions of frequent fliers miles to hackers who discovered security flaws in the company's system, Reuters reported.
The program, first announced in May, was launched amid growing fears that airlines, planes and the whole air traffic control system are sitting ducks for cyberattackers. So-called “bug-bounty” programs are common at major tech companies like Google, but United was the first airline to try such an approach to shoring up security.
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United said it has awarded at least two people 1 million miles each, which can be redeemed for dozens of free domestic flights.
One of the recipients, Jordan Wiens, tweeted last week that he had exposed a flaw that could have led to a remote takeover of United’s websites.
“It’s really interesting that United did what they did,” he told Reuters. “There actually aren’t that many companies in any industry outside of technology that do bug bounties.”
But United wants to get out ahead of the problem as evidence mounts that the airline industry is digitally vulnerable.
In recent weeks, both United and Polish airline LOT had to ground planes for hours after their computer systems went down. While United said the issue was merely a technical glitch, LOT acknowledged it had been hit by a digital assault from which the company said no airline was safe.
On another occasion, United’s check-in system went down, causing long lines and delays.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has acknowledged that serious cybersecurity concerns plague the industry.
In February, the agency itself admitted that hackers had spread malicious software through its systems. A government watchdog report also warned that cyber saboteurs could potentially disrupt U.S. flight routes.
In response, the FAA in June convened its first committee, made up of pilots and representatives from plane manufacturers and parts suppliers, to develop a set of cybersecurity protections for the industry.A 17-year-old transgender boy named Pax Enstad was denied medical care by his mother’s employer, a Catholic health organization called PeaceHealth St. Joseph Medical Center in Bellingham.
The civil rights lawsuit was filed Thursday on behalf of the family by ACLU of Washington. Pax, his mother Cheryl and father Mark, spoke at the ACLU press conference in Seattle about the lawsuit.
Pax was assigned female at birth, but never felt quite right about himself. He suffered severe anxiety starting when he hit puberty at age 11 and was eventually diagnosed with gender dysphoria, a serious medical condition marked by persistent and clinically significant distress caused by incongruence between an individual’s gender identity and that individual’s sex designated at birth. Gender dysphoria is a condition codified in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V) and International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10).
In order to properly treat Pax’s gender dysphoria, Pax’s doctor prescribed chest reconstruction surgery. Not only did PeaceHealth deny the request after his insurance approved it, they refused treatments on the basis of his admission of being transgender.
The lawsuit asserts PeaceHealth’s blanket policy of refusing to pay for medically necessary healthcare for otherwise covered transgender individuals simply because of who they are discriminates on the basis of sex and gender identity, violates the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the Washington Law Against Discrimination (WLAD), and is harmful to the health of transgender individuals.
Sarah Toce Cheryl Enstad addresses reporters at ACLU Washington Thursday.
“PeaceHealth’s blanket of exclusion of ‘transgender services’ is not based on standards of medical care,” said ACLU-WA Staff Attorney Lisa Nowlin. “This is discrimination, and it is plainly illegal. Under state and federal law, no company is allowed to single out and exclude one group of individuals from medical care that is prescribed for them by their doctors and that the company routinely provides for others.”
In the past, some public and private insurance companies excluded coverage for gender dysphoria (or “transition-related care”) based on the erroneous assumption that such treatments were cosmetic or experimental. Today, however, every major medical organization recognizes that such exclusions have no basis in medical science and that transition-related care is effective for the treatment of gender dysphoria.
Discrimination by health care providers routinely causes transgender people to delay or forgo preventative and necessary medical care, putting them at greater risk for debilitating anxiety, depression, self-harm, and even suicide.
As a result of PeaceHealth’s exclusion for “transgender services,” the Enstads were forced to remove $10,000 from their son’s college savings account and take out a second mortgage on their house in order to get the help Pax needed to live a full and healthy life.
“We were willing to do whatever it took to get Pax the medical care he needed - as any parent would,” Cheryl said. “When your child is singled out and rejected simply for being themselves, it’s heartbreaking, and it isn’t fair. We’re bringing this lawsuit to ensure no family has to go through what we did.”
Cheryl worked at PeaceHealth over 20 years in social work and continues to be employed at the facility on an on-call basis. She admitted that it has become a strained environment since her son was denied life-saving coverage. Her husband works as a marine engineer.
The lawsuit asks the court to declare PeaceHealth’s blanket exclusion of “transgender services” discriminatory and illegal. It also seeks unspecified damages for the Plaintiffs.
The lawsuit, Enstad v. PeaceHealth, was filed in U.S. District Court in the Western District of Washington. PeaceHealth operates 70 sites in Washington, Oregon, and Alaska and has approximately 16,000 employees.This February has not been good to Black folks. Big fashion brands are using problematic imagery to sell clothes that already cost too damned much. Jussie Smollett and R. Kelly are forcing us to hear more from the Chicago Police Department than we ever wanted to. Jordyn Woods is caught up in a cheating scandal with Tristan Thompson. Green Book won Best Picture at the Oscars. With only two days left in the month, things were looking bleak until Solange Knowles, first of her name, protector of sisters, and guardian of Black hair, swooped in to save the day with a BlackPlanet account.
Solange took to Twitter today with a simple directive: "find me on BlackPlanet!!!" She then included a link to blackplanet.com/solange which features never before seen pictures and videos; A pole dancer in clear heels, Solange in a clear top, and a Black man atop a horse are among the artistic offerings. There are little quotes embedded onto the page that I pray are song lyrics. "For the bad weaves and two days" and "Threw my earnings like offerings and prayed it made her feel good" are already bops as far as I'm concerned. Fans are hoping that this is part of a rollout for Solange's long-awaited follow up to A Seat At the Table. Her account also includes a tab with a list of festival dates where she's performing, starting in May.
A flood of new, creative Solange content is already enough goodness to turn our BHM luck around. But the messenger, in this case the platform that she chose to use, is just as important. BlackPlanet.com launched in 2001 as a social networking site that specifically targeted African-Americans. Before Twitter and Instagram, and even before MySpace, there was BlackPlanet. My friends spent hours coding their pages to include music, pictures, and other personalized elements. It was here where they dared DM the person they had a crush on in the hallways; It was today's Tinder and Facebook for a generation of Black millennials. It was started by Omar Wasow and is now owned by Radio One, a media conglomerate that also targets African-Americans and is owned by Cathy Hughes.
If this is Solange's new, permanent internet home, she just made a huge case for buying Black and diversifying tech at the same damn time. She's the hero we both want and need. BlackPlanet's servers better be ready for the influx of new accounts.Today, over 25 per cent of Uber rides are taken on uberPOOL.(Representational)
Ride-sharing app Uber has completed 500 million trips in its four-year journey in India, according to the company, adding that it posted a double digit growth in the country with almost 2.5 times Year-on-Year (YoY) growth as of June. Ride-sharing app Uber has completed 500 million trips in its four-year journey in India, according to the company, adding that it posted a double digit growth in the country with almost 2.5 times Year-on-Year (YoY) growth as of June.
Uber was launched in Bengaluru with just three employees four years ago.
"Today, we're over a 1,000 member team who share the common vision of redefining the future of urban mobility. Achieving new milestones and continuing our exponential growth journey is a reflection of a strong business we're building in India," read a statement by Amit Jain, President, Uber India and South Asia.
Uber has expanded its service to 29 cities across the country. It now has 450,000 registered driver partners.
Through its 'UberSHAAN' initiative, the company aims to create one million livelihood opportunities as micro-entrepreneurs in India by 2018.
With over five million weekly active riders in the country, India continues to be one of the biggest markets for Uber, outside the US.
Launched in Bengaluru in September 2015, 'uberPOOL' is now available in Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, Chennai and Pune.
"Today, over 25 per cent of Uber rides are taken on uberPOOL. This has resulted in saving over 480,00,000 km, 23,00,000 litres of fuel and prevented the emission of over 53,00,000 kgs of CO2," Uber said in a statement.
The company launched Asia's first engineering centre in Bengaluru in January 2016. With over 100 engineers spread across Bengaluru and Hyderabad, several India-first initiatives like 'uberDOST', 'Emergency Button' and 'Cash and Dial' an Uber have been launched in countries around the world.
In 2015, Uber also set up a Centre of Excellience (CoE) in Hyderabad with nearly 400 employees.Australian senator warns of war with China
By Oscar Grenfell
25 April 2017
Last Thursday, Nick Xenophon, a prominent “third party” senator in the Australian parliament, warned of the catastrophic consequences of a US war with China in an address before the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), a think-tank with close ties to Washington.
Speaking to a rarefied audience of diplomats, foreign policy analysts and intelligence personnel, Xenophon dwelt on the reality that has been systematically concealed from the population since the Gillard Labor government gave full backing to the US “pivot to Asia” in 2011—Australia is on the frontlines of advanced preparations for conflict with Beijing.
The right-wing populist senator, however, who leads the “Nick Xenophon Team,” was not seeking to warn working people of the dangers they confront. Rather, his remarks, published in an abridged form the next day by Fairfax Media, were part of an increasingly concerned debate within the political establishment over the dilemma facing Australian capitalism due to its strategic alliance with the US, and its growing economic relations with China, its largest trading partner.
Xenophon’s speech was published by Fairfax under the headline, “Are we truly ready for the consequences of a war with China?” It was given on the eve of an Australian visit by US Vice President Mike Pence, which was part of a broader campaign throughout the region to drum up support for the Trump administration’s reckless confrontation with North Korea.
Senior figures within the US government have warned that “all options are on the table” in their moves against Pyongyang, including preemptive strikes. The latest US offensive has underscored the imminent danger of a military clash in Asia, whether in the form of a US-provoked conflict on the Korean peninsula, that could kill millions and draw-in other nuclear-armed powers, or in other flashpoints that have been stoked by Washington’s confrontation with China.
Both the Liberal-National government and the Labor Party opposition have backed the Trump administration’s bellicose stance, with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and opposition leader Bill Shorten defining the US-Australia alliance in explicitly militarist terms during Pence’s visit.
Xenophon pointed to the ratcheting-up of tensions under the Trump administration, flowing on from the Obama administration’s massive military build-up in the region directed against China. He implicitly criticised recent remarks by Australia’s foreign minister, Julie Bishop, who called for the US to continue aggressively “calling the shots” in Asia.
The senator cited last year’s report by the RAND Corporation, a think-tank in the US, entitled “War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable.” He quoted a section of the document which stated that “war between the two countries [the US and China] could be intense, last a year or more, have no winner, and inflict huge losses and costs on both sides.”
In the version published by Fairfax, Xenophon warned: “As both sides’ technologies and doctrine create a preference for striking first, the potential for miscalculation is high.” He said that there was a danger that the US or Chinese military commands would seek to gain the initiative by launching a first strike.
Invoking the tensions that preceded World War One, Xenophon said, “this kind of thinking has uncomfortable parallels with Europe of a century ago, when the belligerents initiated their own military plans to attack before being attacked.” The senator pointedly noted that many pundits at that time had also declared that a war would be impossible because of the extensive trade links between the rival powers.
Xenophon warned of the consequences that could flow from any Australian “freedom of navigation” operation in the South China Sea.
The US has repeatedly carried out such provocations, in which warships or aircraft are dispatched near or within the 12-nautical-mile limit around Chinese-controlled islets in the South China Sea, where the US has inflamed longstanding territorial disputes. Under the Obama administration, the US placed intense pressure on the Liberal-National government to carry out a “freedom of navigation operation,” a move that could be considered an act of war by China.
Xenophon raised the specter of China responding to an Australian action by sinking “an Australian vessel to warn off the United States Navy.”
The senator stated that a US-China war would result in a massive contraction of the Australian economy. He raised the prospect of calls for the internment of the country’s substantial Chinese population. Xenophon declared that war would “rip … Australia’s social fabric apart,” a reference to the prospect of mass social upheavals. His heavy focus on trade, however, underscored that he is above all concerned with the implications of a bellicose posture for the financial interests and corporate profits of the business elite.
As with similar statements by other figures of the Australian political establishment, Xenophon’s speech was most striking for the contradiction between the extent of the dangers it outlined and the bankrupt perspective that it advanced as a response.
The senator called only for a parliamentary vote on action in the South China Sea, or any other military moves against China. He quickly made clear that this would be little more than a rubber-stamp. He stated: “I believe that parliamentary authorisation is workable and can be formulated in a suitably flexible way that takes a variety of contingencies into account, protects the security of classified information, and copes with the time-sensitive nature of emergency military deployments.”
Xenophon proceeded to contrast “wars of choice” with “wars of necessity,” stating that in the latter instance, where Australian aggression was justified by invocations of “self-defence,” the government should not require any parliamentary go-ahead.
In other words, Xenophon’s proposal is not aimed at preventing military action, but at providing it with a democratic veneer amid mass anti-war sentiment among workers and young people.
As Xenophon and his audience knew, Australia would be automatically involved in any US-led conflict in Asia due to the extensive basing arrangements and military integration with American forces.
The US-operated base at Pine Gap, in central Australia, is only one of the starkest examples. It plays a central role in military spying operations throughout the Middle East, Eurasia and the Western Pacific. Over recent weeks, the base has reportedly focused its attention on North Korea, and would inevitably be involved in the coordination of US strikes against Pyongyang. (See: “Australia’s role in US plans for war on North Korea”)
All the parliamentary parties are implicated in these moves, which take place every day entirely behind the backs of the population.
Xenophon and his right-wing formation are no exception. He has repeatedly joined in campaigns against Chinese investment in Australian infrastructure projects, which have been used to promote anti-Chinese paranoia and xenophobia.
Xenophon has been a vociferous proponent of the spending up to $50 billion on a new fleet of 12 conventional attack submarines in his home state of South Australia. He has explicitly linked the project to preparations for Australian involvement in a war in Asia. In an October 2015 column, he referenced the tensions with Beijing in the South China Sea, the Korean peninsula and throughout Asia and wrote: “In wartime, simply sending subs to sea causes chaos for our enemies. Not knowing where our subs are means our enemies have to assume they’re everywhere, stretching and weakening the enemy’s forces.”
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.Image: Toni Pitkänen / Yle
Last week Yle told the story of the adventurous young German student Charlotte Arnswald, who planned to spend her summer in Finland living off the bounty of the land.
Arnswald took up residence in a shack in a remote forest in northern Savo, where she embarked on her wilderness experience. In an interview with Yle, she described how she burned twigs for warmth in the chill of Finland’s late spring and foraged last season’s lingonberries as well as beetles and bugs for sustenance.
However, it wasn’t long before some Finns took to discussion forums to attack the young woman. According to Yle, the discussion threads were flooded with hundreds of comments harshly condemning her and calling for her to leave the country. Others even went so far as to threaten her with physical and sexual violence, however it is not clear why people objected to Arnwald's survivalist project.
Attempts to track shack
People engaging in the online witch hunt actively tried to trace the location of the shack where Arnswald was to spend the summer. When Yle originally reported on the wilderness buff, it used images of the young woman and her makeshift shelter. Amateur online sleuths used the photos to try and pinpoint Arnswald’s location and called on locals to come forward with information about her whereabouts.
Jaana Keränen, a resident and landowner in Sonkajärvi, had given Arnswald permission to stay on her forest property. On Sunday, she took to Facebook to publicly declare her feelings about the case.
"This is a guest of our family, who is living in our private forest, in our private shelter and is burning firewood provided to her from our stores," Keränen wrote.
Ashamed to be Finnish
Keränen told Yle that she was saddened and taken aback by the hate speech that she read online. She said that it was worrying that Finns are ready to resort to violence when confronted by diversity.
The landowner compared the situation to a Finnish woman staying alone in a forest in Germany and a local minority group planning to search for her on a public website.
"The idea that she would be living in that shack knowing that there are people in Finland who want to come there and teach her a lesson, is intolerable for us as hosts," she added.
She followed up by saying that Arnswald left Finland for personal reasons. Yle was unable to reach the German student for comment.The Lifting
Oskar Krawczyk Blocked Unblock Follow Following Dec 1, 2015
So this just happened, a JSFiddle update. There’s no denying that this doesn’t happen very often, to be more precise visual changes aren’t happening that often.
I’m calling this a lifting for a reason, as opposed to many backend changes that happened over the years, this is a purely visual (or front-endish) one.
There were a few ideas we were working towards with this update:
Squeeze every inch out of the UI for more editing space Make the interface super-light Optimize loading and rendering speed
We’ve removed some whitespace that was useless in the previous interface, like the gap between editors that was there purely for the the drag handles, which are now there but visually take just a single pixel (not it really is a pixel wide — there’s a 10 pixel overlay so it’s easier to grab the handle).American actor and producer
This article is about the American actor. For the seismologist, see Thomas C. Hanks
Thomas Jeffrey Hanks (born July 9, 1956) is an American actor and filmmaker. Hanks is known for his comedic and dramatic roles in such films as Splash (1984), Big (1988), Turner & Hooch (1989), A League of Their Own (1992), Sleepless in Seattle (1993), Apollo 13 (1995), You've Got Mail (1998), The Green Mile (1999), Cast Away (2000), Road to Perdition (2002), Cloud Atlas (2012), Captain Phillips (2013), Saving Mr. Banks (2013), and Sully (2016). He has also starred in the Robert Langdon film series, and voices Sheriff Woody in the Toy Story film series.
Hanks has collaborated with film director Steven Spielberg on five films to date: Saving Private Ryan (1998), Catch Me If You Can (2002), The Terminal (2004), Bridge of Spies (2015), and The Post (2017), as well as the 2001 miniseries Band of Brothers, which launched Hanks as a successful director, producer, and screenwriter. In 2010, Spielberg and Hanks were executive producers on the HBO miniseries The Pacific.
Hanks' films have grossed more than $4.6 billion at U.S. and Canadian box offices and more than $9.2 billion worldwide,[2] making him the fourth highest-grossing actor in North America.[3] Hanks has been nominated for numerous awards during his career. He won a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Philadelphia (1993), as well as a Golden Globe, an Academy Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and a People's Choice Award for Best Actor for Forrest Gump (1994). In 1995, Hanks became one of only two actors who won the Academy Award for Best Actor in consecutive years, with Spencer Tracy being the other.[4] In 2004, he received the Stanley Kubrick Britannia Award for Excellence in Film from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA).[5] In 2014, he received a Kennedy Center Honor, and in 2016, he received a Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama,[6] as well as the French Legion of Honor.[7]
Early life
Thomas Jeffrey Hanks[8] was born in Concord, California on July 9, 1956,[9][10] to hospital worker Janet Marylyn (née Frager)[11] and itinerant cook Amos Mefford Hanks.[10][12][13] His mother was of Portuguese descent (her family's surname was originally "Fraga"),[14] while his father had English ancestry.[15][16] His parents divorced in 1960. Their three oldest children, Sandra (later Sandra Hanks Benoiton, a writer),[17] Larry (an entomology professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign),[18] and Tom, went with their father, while the youngest, Jim (who also became an actor and filmmaker), remained with their mother in Red Bluff, California.[19] In his childhood, Hanks' family moved often; by the age of 10, he had lived in 10 different houses.[20]
While Hanks' family religious history was Catholic and Mormon, he has characterized his teenage self as being a "Bible-toting evangelical" for several years.[21] In school, he was unpopular with students and teachers alike, later telling Rolling Stone magazine, "I was a geek, a spaz. I was horribly, painfully, terribly shy. At the same time, I was the guy who'd yell out funny captions during filmstrips. But I didn't get into trouble. I was always a real good kid and pretty responsible."[22] In 1965, his father married Frances Wong, a San Francisco native of Chinese descent. Frances had three children, two of whom lived with Hanks during his high school years. Hanks acted in school plays, including South Pacific, while attending Skyline High School in Oakland, California.[23]
Hanks studied theater at Chabot College in Hayward, California, and transferred to California State University, Sacramento, two years later.[24] During a 2001 interview with Bob Costas, Hanks was asked whether he would rather have an Oscar or a Heisman Trophy. He replied he would rather win a Heisman by playing halfback for the California Golden Bears.[25] He told New York magazine in 1986, "Acting classes looked like the best place for a guy who liked to make a lot of noise and be rather flamboyant. I spent a lot of time going to plays. I wouldn't take dates with me. I'd just drive to a theater, buy myself a ticket, sit in the seat and read the program, and then get into the play completely. I spent a lot of time like that, seeing Brecht, Tennessee Williams, Ibsen, and all that."[26]
During his years studying theater, Hanks met Vincent Dowling, head of the Great Lakes Theater Festival in Cleveland, Ohio.[12] At Dowling's suggestion, Hanks became an intern at the festival. His internship stretched into a three-year experience that covered most aspects of theater production, including lighting, set design, and stage management, prompting Hanks to drop out of college. During the same time, Hanks won the Cleveland Critics Circle Award for Best Actor for his 1978 performance as Proteus in Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Verona, one of the few times he played a villain.[27] Time magazine named Hanks one of the "Top 10 College Dropouts."[28]
Career
1979–1986: Early work
Hanks at the Academy Awards after party in March 1989
In 1979, Hanks moved to New York City, where he made his film debut in the low-budget slasher film He Knows You're Alone (1980)[12][29] and landed a starring role in the television movie Mazes and Monsters.[30] Early that year, he was cast in the lead, Callimaco, in the Riverside Shakespeare Company's production of Niccolò Machiavelli's The Mandrake, directed by Daniel Southern. The following year, Hanks landed one of the lead roles, that of character Kip Wilson, on the ABC television pilot of Bosom Buddies. He and Peter Scolari played a pair of young advertising men forced to dress as women so they could live in an inexpensive all-female hotel.[12] Hanks had previously partnered with Scolari on the 1970s game show Make Me Laugh. After landing the role, Hanks moved to Los Angeles. Bosom Buddies ran for two seasons, and, although the ratings were never strong, television critics gave the program high marks. "The first day I saw him on the set," co-producer Ian Praiser told Rolling Stone, "I thought, 'Too bad he won't be in television for long.' I knew he'd be a movie star in two years." However, although Praiser knew it, he was not able to convince Hanks. "The television show had come out of nowhere," Hanks' best friend Tom Lizzio told Rolling Stone.
Bosom Buddies and a guest appearance on a 1982 episode of Happy Days ("A Case of Revenge," in which he played a disgruntled former classmate of Fonzie) prompted director Ron Howard to contact Hanks. Howard was working on the film Splash (1984), a romantic comedy fantasy about a mermaid who falls in love with a human.[31][32] At first, Howard considered Hanks for the role of the main character's wisecracking brother, a role that eventually went to John Candy. Instead, Hanks landed the lead role in Splash, which went on to become a surprise box office hit, grossing more than US$69 million.[33] He also had a sizable hit with the sex comedy Bachelor Party, also in 1984.[8] In 1983–84, Hanks made three guest appearances on Family Ties as Elyse Keaton's alcoholic brother, Ned Donnelly.[34][35]
With Nothing in Common (1986) – a story of a young man alienated from his father (played by Jackie Gleason) – Hanks began to extend himself from comedic roles to dramatic roles. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Hanks commented on his experience: "It changed my desires about working in movies. Part of it was the nature of the material, what we were trying to say. But besides that, it focused on people's relationships. The story was about a guy and his father, unlike, say, The Money Pit, where the story is really about a guy and his house."[36]
Forrest Gump (1994) Hanks on the film set of(1994)
1987–2003: Established Star
After a few more flops and a moderate success with the comedy Dragnet, Hanks' stature in the film industry rose. The broad success of the fantasy comedy Big (1988) established Hanks as a major Hollywood talent, both as a box office draw and within the industry as an actor.[8][12][37] For his performance in the film, Hanks earned his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor.[38] Big was followed later that year by Punchline, in which he and Sally Field co-starred as struggling comedians.
Hanks then suffered a run of box-office underperformers: The 'Burbs (1989), Joe Versus the Volcano (1990), and The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990).[12] In the last, he portrayed a greedy Wall Street figure who gets enmeshed in a hit-and-run accident. 1989's Turner & Hooch was Hanks' only financially successful film of the period.
Hanks climbed back to the top again with his portrayal of a washed-up baseball legend turned manager in A League of Their Own (1992).[12] Hanks has stated that his acting in earlier roles was not great, but that he subsequently improved. In an interview with Vanity Fair, Hanks noted his "modern era of moviemaking... because enough self-discovery has gone on... My work has become less pretentiously fake and over the top". This "modern era" began in 1993 for Hanks, first with Sleepless in Seattle and then with Philadelphia. The former was a blockbuster success about a widower who finds true love over the radio airwaves.[39] Richard Schickel of TIME called his performance "charming," and most critics agreed that Hanks' portrayal ensured him a place among the premier romantic-comedy stars of his generation.[40]
In Philadelphia, he played a gay lawyer with AIDS who sues his firm for discrimination.[12] Hanks lost 35 pounds and thinned his hair in order to appear sickly for the role. In a review for People, Leah Rozen stated, "Above all, credit for Philadelphia's success belongs to Hanks, who makes sure that he plays a character, not a saint. He is flat-out terrific, giving a deeply felt, carefully nuanced |
Nancy first arrives at the beach, she meets two Mexican surfers, who depart just as our heroine is first besieged by the shark. Nancy tries to stop them but to no avail. Luckily for her, the two come back again to surf the next day—but are killed trying to intervene. While Lively gets to play something resembling an actual human being, these men are nothing more than ciphers. They have little dialogue and no depth or dimensionality; you never learn their names. The film’s IMDb page is strangely unhelpful in this regard: The characters aren't even listed.
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There's, of course, a reason for that. The lives of these Latinos are merely props in the story of a privileged white woman learning an Important Lesson. Nancy has recently decided to drop out of school following the death of her mother from cancer. “Some people just can't be helped,” she explains to her father over the phone. He argues that Nancy’s mother was a fighter and would have wanted her daughter to keep, well, fighting. (The movie repeatedly stresses this point.) In facing down death, Nancy regains that scrappy spirit.
Such were also the lessons of Juan Antonio Bayona’s “The Impossible,” which tells the story of Maria Belón and her family, who survived the devastating tsunami of 2004 while vacationing in Thailand. Much attention was paid to the film’s casting: In real life, Belón and her family are Spanish. Naomi Watts and Ewan MacGregor, who are Australian and Scottish, respectively, were cast to play the couple instead.
This was pointed out by some as yet another instance of Hollywood whitewashing—the tendency to erase non-white people from their own stories by casting Caucasian actors in place of people of color. Recent examples include the Scarlett Johansson-starring “Ghost in the Shell” (in which she plays Japanese) and Ridley Scott’s “Exodus: Gods and Kings,” featuring Joel Edgerton and Christian Bale as Egyptians. The Belóns are European, so the case is a bit different. But what received less scrutiny who wasn't represented in the film: The thousands of non-white victims who died in the horrific tragedy, nearly all of whom are reduced to background actors and props in their own story.
As The Guardian’s David Cox explains, few of the those who actually died in the tsunami were white. “The Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 killed at least 227,898 people,” Cox writes. “Around a third of these were children.” Just 10 percent of those who died in the tsunami were Caucasian, a far cry from Naomi Watts’ assertion that half the victims were tourists. “Holiday paradise Thailand, with its 5,400 deaths, was actually at the margins of the tragedy,” Lee continues. “Indonesia alone suffered 130,700 deaths, largely of low-income Acehnese people; the figure for the U.K., whence [the film’s] family appears to hail, is 149.”
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The movie’s treatment of its non-white characters is distressingly similar to “The Shallows.” If the Latinos in Collet-Serra’s film exist to serve and save white people, “The Impossible” exhibits the same racial power dynamics. “Virtually everyone shown suffering after the tsunami is a European, Australian, or American tourist,” the New York Times’ A.O. Scott writes. “At one point Maria and Lucas are cared for by residents of a small village and later they are helped by Thai doctors, but these acts of selfless generosity are treated like services to which wealthy Western travelers are entitled.”
If Scott claims that the fact that “the vast majority of the dead, injured and displaced were Asian never really registers,” why do Hollywood movies keep making these mistakes? After all, these issues were replicated in John Erick Dowdle’s “No Escape,” in which Lake Bell and Owen Wilson play an American couple who relocate their family to a unnamed South Asian country (hint: it's probably Cambodia) on the eve of violent revolution and must flee the tumult. The rebels are depicted like zombies, a mass horde that craves the flesh of innocent Westerners. But instead of eating brains, they hack their victims to death.
The little humanity afforded to people of color is a product of a Hollywood that privileges the stories of white folks above all else; this is a system in which white actors are considered “bankable,” while even A-list black actors are treated like second class citizens. Since nearly winning an Oscar for “The Help,” Viola Davis has struggled to find roles on film worthy of her, scoring thankless parts in “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” and “Ender’s Game.” Kerry Washington has yet to find a breakout role in cinema to match her work on “Scandal” and HBO's "Confirmation."
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But if Hollywood devalues people of color, this is also indicative of how the lives, experiences, and even the pain of non-white people aren’t recognized in general. A groundbreaking 2013 study from the University of Milano-Bicocca described what researchers called an “empathy gap” along racial lines. When white people are shown images of both white folks and people of color being harmed, such as receiving a prick on the skin, the survey found that the respondents perceive non-white people as feeling less pain.
There have been a number of theories as to why that is. A separate study suggests that it has to do with privilege: Because respondents assume that people of color have experienced greater hardship, they unconsciously assume these subjects are accustomed to pain and can better deal with the occasional poke or pinch. But perhaps the more pertinent reason is that white people still struggle to relate to people of color at all; in Hollywood lingo, their struggles aren't “universal.” A 2012 study from Indiana University found that the more black actors a movie stars, the less likely white viewers are to want to see it.
It's telling that the costar who receives the most screen time in “The Shallows” isn't one of the Latino actors eaten by a shark but a seagull with a broken wing who hides out on the rock with Nancy. She nurses him back to health, popping his dislocated shoulder back into place so he can fly away. He’s still too weak to escape, so Nancy pushes him to shore on some debris. No one would dare wish harm to an injured animal, but it would have been nice if “The Shallows” cared about the pain of people of color as much as it does a bird.By Lawrence Hurley
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a victory for animal rights activists, the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed California to continue to ban foie gras, a delicacy produced from the enlarged livers of ducks and geese that have been force-fed corn.
Rejecting a legal challenge to the state law, the court declined to hear an appeal filed by restaurants and producers of foie gras. In doing so, the high court left intact an August 2013 ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholding the law.
California enacted the law in 2004 but it did not go into effect until 2012.
Foie gras means "fatty liver" in French. The product is produced by force-feeding corn to ducks and geese to enlarge their livers, which are harvested to make gourmet dishes. Animal rights groups contend that the force-feeding process is painful, gruesome and inhumane.
The law specifically bans any product created by “force feeding a bird for the purpose of enlarging the bird’s liver beyond a normal size.”
Los Angeles-based Hot's Restaurant Group, Canada's Association des Eleveurs de Canards et d'Oies du Quebec and New York producer Hudson Valley Foie Gras challenged the ban in a lawsuit filed last year.
They argued that the law violates the U.S. Constitution’s Commerce Clause, which prohibits states from interfering with interstate commerce. But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected that argument, saying the state was within its rights to impose the ban.
Animal rights groups welcomed the Supreme Court's action.
"The Supreme Court’s decision means that the people of California have the right to prohibit the sale of certain food items, solely because they are the product of animal cruelty," Jonathan Lovvorn, chief counsel for the Humane Society of the United States, said in a statement.
"The holding in this case - that states have the right to cleanse their markets of cruel products - is a precedent of enormous consequence for millions of animals," Lovvorn added.
John Burton, the former California state legislator who authored the law, added, "This effort was a long, hard fight. But it was worth fighting and worth winning."
The case is Association des Eleveur v. Harris, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 13-1313.
(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Will Dunham)A curious thing is happening at the National Post right now. During the course of a fortnight, the National Post has printed four articles on rape culture. Rape culture, for those of you who don’t know, is the idea that we live in a society whereby rape — of women — is an accepted practice. Evidence that we are living in such a culture comes from our apparent comfort with sexualizing and objectifying women, the prevalence of prostitution and pornography, victim-blaming, slut-shaming, and trivializing rape.
Quite often, statistics and facts accompany the theory – with feminists and activists quoting numbers that are, on the face of it, pretty terrifying. While there doesn’t seem to be a consensus as to exactly how many women are being raped or sexually assaulted (advocates of the theory never include data on male victims,) what is clear is that the numbers are absolutely huge. Indeed, they’re so big that they’re simply not credible. Many noted academics, critics, and commentators such as Christina Hoff Sommers have repeatedly argued this point but to little avail. While critics of feminism have been effective in ripping the theory to shreds, gender feminists plow on regardless – safe in the knowledge that neither politicians nor the mainstream media have any interest in confronting their claims.
That comfortable status quo, however, might be about to change.
Over the past two weeks, the National Post has aggressively challenged the concept of rape culture. Barbara Kay, long noted for her rejection of feminist thought, wrote two articles in which she critiqued the spurious tenets of rape culture theory. Brian Hutchinson penned a piece in which he investigated the origins and veracity of foundational “statistics” that underpin rape culture and, just days ago, the National Post Editorial Board threw their considerable weight behind the push to openly scrutinize the ideological feminist idea of “rape culture.”
Kay, speaking exclusively to A Voice for Men, sees the recent coverage as part of a greater awareness, and skepticism about the claims made by feminists.
I am very pleased to see the Post’s editorial board taking a definite stand on this issue[.] I think perhaps it is a sign that there is only so much fear-mongering you can generate without adducing evidence for it before public skepticism takes hold. According to rape culture claims, the risks to campus women of sexual assault are higher than the risk of any other crime on earth. And yet women walk around the campus seemingly blithely unaware of the terrible fate in store for them or their girlfriends (based on the one in four/five figure). There is a cognitive disconnect here, and ordinary Canadians are puzzled by it.
As well they should be – the idea that we live in a rape culture that normalizes rape of women clashes spectacularly not only with official crime stats, but also with the dim view that society in general takes of sexual assault and rape — a point that Margaret Wente of The Globe and Mail recently explored, saying that,“[the] manufacture of “rape culture” is a triumph of ideology over substance. It has inflated a serious but uncommon threat into a crime wave.”
The key word here is inflated. Feminists routinely buttress their theories with statistics that are not congruent with reality; they use definitions and methodologies that result in a hopelessly skewed picture. No reasonable person — even for a moment — would believe the “statistic” that one-in-four women are raped on university campuses, yet that is the conclusion that Mary P. Koss came to in her now infamous (and repeatedly debunked) research.
Amazingly, 73% of the women that Koss characterized as rape victims, did not share that view — they did not think that they were victims of rape. 43% of these supposed rape victims went on to date their “rapists.”
Clearly Koss’ definition of rape is just plain wrong and an honest scholar would address that. Koss chose not to address the problem, however, and so have the countless feminist academics who’ve since mimicked her methodology. What exists as a consequence is a strange form of hysteria across college campuses, and, to a lesser degree — across society. Kay believes that the success of the feminist propaganda machine, in popularizing the myth of a “war on women” is directly responsible for promulgation of rape culture.
Once you accept… that the urge to violence against women is a chronic and unabating evil, situated in the hearts of men, and ready to spring out at any opportune moment, you have created a moral panic with no basis in evidence, just a theory that violence against women is a continuum from a child’s stolen playground kiss on the cheek to the calculated rapes of women in Bosnia-Herzogovina. No amount of vigilance, therefore, is too much, and no woman is therefore really safe. In fact, a very tiny percentage of women are at actual risk of violence from men in our society, and of those who are, much of it is avoidable.
The recent debacle at Wellesley College is a perfect example of this hysteria. American artist Tony Matelli’s temporary art installation – a statue of a fairly ordinary looking man sleepwalking in his underwear was deemed by students as an “inappropriate and potentially harmful addition to our community.” Admittedly — the statue is unusual — and at a stretch unsettling — but it’s a statue. It doesn’t possess agency and has nothing to do with rape. Yet, these staggeringly obvious facts did not deter Wellesley students from setting up a Change.org petition to have the “triggering” statue removed from its location on campus grounds, which, depressingly, garnered some 988 signatories.
[T]hat is the point of it (rape culture) – to sow terror of men in order to convince authorities that women continue to need support, that the rape-crisis industry is not only necessary but in need of expansion, and therefore even more funding in this area is called for. The real beneficiaries are stakeholders in jobs created by the moral panic.
It is difficult to draw any other conclusion. Rape culture just doesn’t make any sense. It contradicts the general societal view of rape and sexual assault as a heinous crime; it contradicts how seriously the legal system views such crimes and relies on debunked, dishonest research. It also describes a picture that Kay says is completely at odds with crime statistics.
“The fact is that instances of rape have gone down in the general population. If they have gone up on campuses, there have to be other factors at work. Why has there not been more emphasis on facts and statistics around the phenomenon? Because the case for rape culture collapses when you start looking into the stats. Even if you multiply reported rapes by 100, you still don’t get figures that add up to a “culture.”
It is vital, according to Kay, to continue to put pressure on those that perpetuate such theories by asking questions, and demanding answers.
“[We should ask] the same questions we should ask of someone who promotes the idea that there are packs of stray dogs roaming the city and we are in danger of getting rabies from their bites: Show me the evidence. How many police reports of bites? How many hospital admissions for rabies? How many stories of bites and rabies turned out to be urban myths? Why are the rabid dogs only roaming around in this city and not in the nearby ones? Is “rabies” a misnomer in most cases for “infection”? Has “rabies” been redefined in this city and not in others? How is it that so many of the self-reporting victims were so drunk when they were bitten that they can’t remember feeling the pain of the bite?”
These are questions that feminists need to answer. There should be no more talk of “triggering,” no more ad hominem attacks or appeals to emotion. If feminists want their theories to be taken seriously then they should be made to publicly defend them. If they are not willing to do that then financial support should be withdrawn from programs that support such spurious theories. It is high time for a critical audit of rape culture theory, and the industry it supports.“New” economy another way to suppress workers’ rights
The emergence of Uber and other technology-driven, computer based corporations raise important issues for workers and their unions. Larry Rubin examines the changes in the US that are relevant to developments in Australia.
WASHINGTON: Progressive economists, policy strategists and labour representatives held a seminar here last week focusing on multi-billion dollar corporations that claim they’re not employers but merely managers of computer programs that allow customers to directly hire workers as needed.
These workers, the corporations say, are not employees entitled to rights under law. They are “independent contractors working for themselves” and entitled to virtually no rights at all.
Most participants in the seminar, sponsored by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) and other progressive think tanks, agreed that the so-called “new” economy is just another scheme by corporations to attack workers’ rights.
They also agreed that the key to workers getting better wages, protections and conditions in the “new” economy is old-fashioned collective bargaining.
Among the largest of the computer-based corporations are the Uber and Lyft taxicab companies. They offer consumers a computer app by which they can directly contact a taxi that’s on the road near them. The Task Rabbit and Up Work corporations offer similar apps through which customers can hire workers to do everything from highly complex technical jobs to handyman tasks.
The corporations contend they are the wave of the future; a future in which most people will “work for themselves.” They call this future by various names: the “on-demand economy,” the “gig-sharing economy,” or the “peer-to-peer economy.”
This “new” economy also includes “permatemps.” These are people who do the same work in manufacturing plants as full-time employees but are classified as “temporary” workers and “independent contractors.” They receive no benefits and less pay than their full time co-workers.
Employers try to get away with these schemes all across the economy. Walmart, for example, calls its warehouse workers “independent contractors” by paying low wage firms that it contracts to hire people for warehouse jobs, pay them low wages and allow itself to take no responsibility for working conditions, salary or benefits.
California truck drivers working on the docks have also been called “independent contractors” with no rights as workers. At the EPI seminar, economic researcher Steven Hill explained that workers in the so-called “new” economy are only paid for actual time worked. They must pay for their own training. Furthermore, they are often forced to bid against each other for jobs. The cheapest bid wins. The result: a spiralling race to the bottom.
Hill’s latest book is called Raw Deal: How the “Uber Economy” and Naked Capitalism Are Screwing American Workers.
Technology is not to blame – greed is
Many analysts say that the drift toward the “new” economy is an inevitable product of new computer technologies. However, at the seminar, EPI President Larry Mishel showed it is a product of policies that allow the wealthy and powerful to run roughshod over working people in order to pump up profits.
In fact, Mishel said, there are so many other ways that corporations are being allowed to destroy workers’ rights and to give lower pay and benefits that the so-called “new” economy has accounted for only 10 or 12 percent of the whole economy since 1995.
Mishel said that “new” economy workers can only be protected by policies that protect all workers.
These policies include enforcing existing state and federal laws that clearly define the differences between an “employee” and an “independent contractor.” In fact, many states are already cracking down on employers who try to avoid their responsibilities by mis-classifying workers as independent contractors.
Furthermore, Mishel said, “A necessary condition for ending wage suppression is economic policies that ensure every worker who wants a job can find one. In the absence of full employment, employers do not need to offer significant wage increases to attract and retain employees.”
Mishel said that the most important tool for protecting workers rights remains what it’s always been: collective bargaining.
“Collective bargaining,” he said, “is the central feature of a re-invigorated economy.”
Working people, he said, should continue to push for laws and regulations that encourage, instead of discourage, collective bargaining.
Participants in the seminar pointed out that even without new laws there is a resurgence of union organising in all sectors of the economy and that this will help workers who find themselves stuck in the “new economy.”
People’s WorldIt’s the weekend yet again, which means it’s time for Saturday Morning Sega for March 26th, 2016!
Saturday Morning Sega is our regular column designed to get you pumped up for the weekend with some of the best new creations from the Sega fan community. If you have something you’d like to submit for next week’s column, contact us!
•Kyoto University Electone Sircle members performing a live cover of Shenmue’s Shenhua Theme.
Shenhua Theme Live Performance (Kyoto University Electone Sircle)
Watch this video on YouTube
•Some Sonic and Tails fan art by エイムエフ (Eimuefu).
•Gum fan art by Hatsudayo.
•Some World End Eclipse fan art by Natsuko Watanabe.
•Bayonetta fan art by SplashBrush.
•SilverSlinger has created this dogtag featuring Sonic and his seven emeralds. He’s apparently selling them in his Etsy shop if you want one.
•This one’s an older piece from 2011, but someone just brought it to my attention. A nice piece of Musha Aleste: Full Metal Fighter Ellinor fan art by kawasaking.
•SegaBits has posted a piece from new writer Moody on composer Tomoko Sasaki, who worked on the NiGHTS series, Ristar, Burning Rangers, and Roommania #203.
•Ken Horowitz over at Sega-16 posted a great behind the scenes piece on the Genesis game Chakan The Foreverman.
•Overclocked Remix has released a new album titled BaddAss Volume III where you can find two fresh Vectorman remixes. Head over here to download the album for free.
•Soundole VGM Covers and Lord Bif collaborated on this relaxing cover of “Star Light Zone” from Sonic the Hedgehog featuring an Electric Wind Instrument.
Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis) - 'Star Light Zone' EWI Cover Ft. Lord Bif Music
Watch this video on YouTube
That’s it for this week’s column. You can check out all of the older editions here.San Francisco, United States — The US Justice Department is investigating whether Uber broke American laws against bribing foreign officials to promote business interests, the company confirmed Tuesday.
San Francisco-based Uber said it was cooperating with an investigation into possible violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, but did not disclose details.
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The act bars paying officials of foreign governments to get or keep business.
News of the US probe comes as Uber appears to have found a new hand to steady the wheel at the smartphone-summoned ride service, which has skidded from one controversy to another.
Uber has yet to confirm reports that Dara Khosrowshahi will replace ousted Travis Kalanick as chief at the world’s most highly valued startup.
However, Expedia board chairman Barry Diller appeared to confirm the choice in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“As you probably know by now, Dara Khosrowshahi has been asked to lead Uber,” read a copy of a memo from Expedia board chairman Barry Diller to Expedia employees included in an SEC filing.
“Nothing has been yet finalized, but having extensively discussed this with Dara, I believe it is his intention to accept.”
Uber and Expedia did not respond to AFP requests for comment regarding the CEO choice.
Whoever takes charge at Uber will face challenges including conflicts with regulators and taxi operators, a cut-throat company culture and board members feuding with investors over Kalanick.
The US government earlier this year was reported to have launched an investigation into Uber for the use of secret software that enabled the company to operate in areas where it was banned or restricted.
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A software program, called Greyball, first revealed by The New York Times in March, enabled drivers to avoid detection from the transportation authorities by identifying regulators posing as Uber customers in order to deny them rides.
Dents to Uber’s image include a visit by executives to a South Korean escort-karaoke bar, an attempt to dig up dirt on journalists covering the company and the mishandling of medical records from a woman raped in India after hailing an Uber ride.
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MOST READJoel McHale has joined many other notable names in protesting North Carolina’s recently passed HB2 law, which prohibits local governments from enacting anti-discrimination measures.
While performing a comedy show at the Durham Performing Arts Center on Friday, McHale wore a homemade LGBTQ T-shirt and announced that all proceeds from the show would go to the LGBTQ Center of Durham.
A video of the performance features a bewildered McHale expressing his distaste for the controversial law, which he calls stupid and “f—— crazy,” and making the commitment to donate “every single dime” he earned from the show to the city’s LGBTQ organization.
TLC’s Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Message for LGBT Teens
“Joel is vehemently opposed to HB2 and knows there are many in Durham (which recently passed a measure condemning the law) that share the feeling,” the actor’s rep said in a statement to PEOPLE. “He felt this was a good way to raise awareness and much needed funds for a local center that is on the front line of this important cause.”
Fans in attendance at Friday night’s show took to social media to praise McHale’s activism.
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@joelmchale @DPAC tonight in LGBTQ shirt & announced
1 Donating all $ from show to LGBT Center
2 He'll come back to NC after HB2 is repealed — Demetri Ravanos (@DemetriRavanos) April 9, 2016
On Friday, Bruce Springsteen canceled his Greensboro, North Carolina, concert in protest of HB2, CNN reports, joining PayPal, Apple, Facebook and other big names in criticizing the state’s law.
• Reporting by ELIZABETH LEONARDHillary Clinton's campaign has launched a website for Republican voters who oppose Donald Trump.
"Donald Trump is not qualified to be president. He does not represent my beliefs as a Republican and, more importantly, my values as an America. He does not speak for me and I will not vote for him," a pledge on the website says.
For the moment, the website, republicansagainsttrump.org, is just offering free Republicans Against Trump stickers and is set up to collect contact information and email addresses for Clinton's campaign. According to Politico, the website was registered on May 27 and launched last Thursday. The group's Facebook page had collected over 600 likes as of Wednesday morning.
Clinton declared victory in the Democratic presidential primary race on Tuesday night. She technically clinched the nomination on Monday after she secured the number of superdelegates needed to reach the nomination, CBS News confirmed. She won't officially be the nominee, however, until the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia this July.
Even though Bernie Sanders is still in the race, Clinton has shifted into general election mode, delivering a foreign policy speech last week that was largely devoted to pointing out Trump's shortcomings. And she also ripped Trump at in her victory speech Tuesday night.
"It's clear that Donald Trump doesn't believe we are stronger together. He has abused his primary opponents and their families, attacked the press for asking tough questions, denigrated Muslims and immigrants. He wants to win by stoking fear and rubbing salt in wounds. And reminding us daily just how great he is," she said.
"Whether you're a Democrat, Republican or independent, I hope you'll join us," she said.Turner Sports upgraded its home for the “NBA on TNT” and “Inside the NBA” this season, reworking Studio J with a sleek design from Jack Morton PDG.
The studio debuted to much fanfare on October 29, as the new NBA season tipped off.
New NBA on TNT studio is unveiled! The guys were surprised with a new set in Studio J for this season! We're excited for it! How's it look? Posted by NBA on TNT on Thursday, October 29, 2015
Lead Designer Andre Durette and Associate Designer Camille Connolly headed up the project for Jack Morton PDG, with fabrication by Jack Morton Exhibits and lighting design by The Lighting Design Group’s Niel Galen, with Programmer Dawn Borsella, Gaffer Sean Linehan and LDG Project Manager Mike Kemp.
“They wanted to elevate their set, to go from what they had to something more modern, slick and glossy, yet retain some of that warmth,” said Durette.
Working with some existing architectural elements, Durette envisioned a space that is a “skybox in the city,” providing a scenic view from the 40th floor of a skyscraper, matching the “NBA on TNT” graphics package.
To achieve this look, the set features a 360 degree skyline wraparound graphic along with many stainless steel frames that become windows into the world. Various backlit color-changing elements float in the arches of the set, which remain as a connection to the previous studio designs, which Jack Morton also completed.
The large anchor desk features a curving front with backlit TNT logo. Two areas provide space for sponsor logos or branding.
The set also includes a large LED screen floating in a silver frame with a series of steps, providing the main background for the desk. Inside the monitor, graphics and sponsor logos are displayed throughout the broadcast.
This area is also used for many of the shows gags, which were considered when designing the new space.
Speaking of gags, the set also includes many special elements for each of the co-hosts. Shaquille O’Neal received a robotic camera, which he can control from the main anchor desk.
An additional balcony was added along with a unique wood floor, which includes a dimensional TNT logo and 6mm LED video array. The array, located in the demo area, is branded as “Kenny’s Court” in honor of Kenny Smith, one of the shows analysts.
The set includes many moving lights, along with the various color-changing elements, giving the broadcast flexibility.
“There’s lots of moving lights in the set,” said Durette. “We wanted to have that energy (like the opening of a basketball game).”
The one thing viewers may notice a lack of, TNT branding.
“We really wanted to keep this devoid of a ton of logos,” said Durette. “We feel like the brand has gotten to a point where we don’t have to hit people over the head with it, people know they’re watching the ‘NBA on TNT.'”
This project continues a busy year for Jack Morton PDG, which has included redesigns of “The Late Show,” “The Daily Show,” “The NFL on CBS” and ESPN.It's a well known fact that that whilst being one of the most widely used battery technologies in the world, lithium-ion can be volatile and potentially disastrous if it overheats, as proved in recent years by hoverboards, airline pilots and the Samsung Galaxy Note7, all of which highlighted the hair-raising possibility of batteries catching fire or exploding because of something as simple as a manufacturing fault or a battery being charged too quickly.
Researchers at Stanford University, however, have found a solution, and it really could make future lithium-ion batteries inherently safer. Published in the journal Science Advances, researchers have created batteries which self-extinguish if the battery catches fire, and it works in as little as 0.4 seconds with a clever chemical reaction.
To make the batteries self-extinguish, a protective polymer shell is inserted at the core of each battery, which is designed to melt at temperatures of 150ºC (302ºF). The shell contains a flame retardant chemical known as triphenyl phosphate (TPP), which when released, quickly extinguishes the battery by suppressing the combustion of the highly flammable electrolytes inside.
Similar solutions using TPP within lithium-ion batteries have been trialed before, though in those cases TPP was mixed directly with the electrolytes inside the battery itself, degrading performance to an impractical level. In this latest example, it's unclear how much space is used inside the battery at this stage, and whether this will have a significant impact on battery performance, possibly making it an impractical solution in small form devices like mobile phones or tablet computers.
One thing's for sure though; if this technology does go mainstream, Samsung will snap it up.
Source: BBC | Image: iFixit (modified)Championship big dogs Norwich and Newcastle are reported to be tracking Swedish defender Filip Helander, according to Italian sources at GazzaMercato.
Currently away with his national team at the Olympics, they report that the Verona defender is using the Rio games as a chance to showcase his talents as he’s “pushing for an opportunity in the Championship”.
Helander is a young centre back with European pedigree, having amassed nearly 100 appearances at the age of 23 in his native Sweden with champions Malmo, and most recently in Serie A with Verona.
His success has been mixed, winning the league and qualify for the Champions League with Malmo, earning himself a move to Italy where he was relegated in his first season with the north-Italian club. Back in his homeland he was nominated for the Allsvenskan defender of the year and the Swedish defender of the year.
Helander is seen as an old-fashioned centre back, being a huge physical presence at 6ft 4 and strong in the air. But he also has a modern style when on the ball, similar to Norwich’s most recent defensive signing, Timm Klose.
Both Alex Neil and Rafa Benitez are believed to be in the market for defensive reinforcements as they look to make an instant return to the top flight, after the Toon’s former captain Fabricio Coloccini departed for his native Argentina and Norwich also likely to see defenders leave the club.Cork City legend Colin Healy hangs up his boots
Éamonn Murphy
Soccer
CORK City legend Colin Healy has retired from professional soccer.
The 37-year-old midfielder was a mainstay of the City team during two spells at Turner's Cross, and played a key role from the bench in last year's memorable FAI Cup victory over Dundalk.
Capped at international level for Ireland, as well as playing cross-channel with Celtic, Ipswich, Coventry and Sunderland, Healy was one of the most talented players of his generation. The Ballincollig native had offers to continue playing in the League of Ireland this season with City and Waterford United, which would also have tapped into his passion for coaching, but he has now officially retired from the game.
"I would today like to announce my retirement from professional football," he told the Evening Echo.
"For over the past 20 years I've felt extremely lucky to call a sport I love my job. Representing Ireland at senior international level and making my debut for Glasgow Celtic are honours that I will cherish forever.
"Returning home to play for my hometown club Cork City FC and winning the FAI cup in my final appearance was a very proud moment for me. It was a way to retire on a high. Throughout my career I’ve worked with some of the best managers and coaches, I would like to thank them for the opportunities they have given me."
Healy also paid tribute to his family for their support throughout his career, which included twice recovering from career-threatening leg breaks.
"I would however like to especially mention my parents Pat and Betty, along with my wife Kelly and my children Arran and Hollie. The strength my family gave me during some very tough periods in my career inspired me to keep going. I am so very grateful for their unwavering support."
Healy was a highly-rated teenage prospect with Ballincollig and Wilton United before moving to Glasgow to sign with Celtic and featuring heavily when the Bhoys won the treble under Martin O'Neill in 2001, including an outstanding display in that year's League Cup final. He forced his way into the international reckoning and was on standby for the World Cup 2002 squad.
While two serious leg injuries curtailed his time abroad, he was an inspirational player on, and off, the field with Cork City. Healy's tough-tackling and measured passing made him a fulcrum at midfield, but he was also set the tone at training with his no-nonsense approach and dedication to fitness.Introduction
Ransomware quickly gained national headlines in February after the Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles paid $17,000 in bitcoins to regain access to its systems. Since then, other hospitals have similarly been attacked with ransomware, leading some industry experts to proclaim it an industry-specific crisis. Although it is commonly associated with directed campaigns aimed at high-value targets such as hospitals, ransomware is actually becoming less targeted and more omnidirectional. As our latest research on TeslaCrypt demonstrates, ransomware not only is becoming more widespread, but it is also becoming more sophisticated and adaptable. TeslaCrypt 4.1A is only a week old and contains an even greater variety of stealth and obfuscation techniques than its previous variants, the earliest of which is just over a year old. Organizations and individuals alike must be aware ransomware is equally likely to be found in personal networks as in critical infrastructure networks, and that its rapid transformation and growing sophistication presents significant challenges to the security community and significant threats to users of all kinds.
History and Current Reality of Ransomware
Ransomware has been around for at least a decade, but its evolution and frequency have exploded over the last half year. In its early days, ransomware was relatively unsophisticated, uncommon, and more targeted. However, ransomware now largely involves code reuse, slight modifications to older families, and a variety of spam campaigns. Capabilities that once were the discrete realm of APTs are now accessible to attackers with fewer resources. TeslaCrypt 4.1A is indicative of this larger trend, integrating a variety of obfuscation techniques – such as AV evasion, anti-debugging, and stealth – into a powerful and rapidly changing piece of malware. Moreover, the incentive structure has shifted. Ransomware aimed at high-value targets depends entirely on getting one fish to bite, and so the ransom value is much higher. As the graphic below illustrates, with the proliferation of |
in "an obscurantist antisystematic tradition in Lacanian literature".[108]
Though a major influence on psychoanalysis in France and parts of Latin America, Lacan's influence on clinical psychology in the English-speaking world is negligible, where his ideas are best known in the arts and humanities. However, there are Lacanian psychoanalytic societies in both North America and the United Kingdom that carry on his work.[44]
One example of Lacan's work being practiced in the United States is found in the works of Annie G. Rogers (A Shining Affliction; The Unsayable: The Hidden Language of Trauma), which credit Lacanian theory for many therapeutic insights in successfully treating sexually abused young women.[109] Lacan's work has also reached Quebec where The Interdisciplinary Freudian Group for Research and Clinical and Cultural Interventions (GIFRIC) claims that they have used a modified form of Lacanian psychoanalysis in successfully treating psychosis in many of its patients, a task once thought to be unsuited for psychoanalysis, even by psychoanalysts themselves.[110]
Criticism [ edit ]
In Fashionable Nonsense (1997), Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont criticize Lacan's use of terms from mathematical fields such as topology, accusing him of "superficial erudition" and of abusing scientific concepts that he does not understand, accusing him of producing statements that are not even wrong.[111] However, they note that they do not want to enter into the debate over the purely psychoanalytic part of Lacan's work.[112]
Other critics have dismissed Lacan's work wholesale. François Roustang called it an "incoherent system of pseudo-scientific gibberish", and quoted linguist Noam Chomsky's opinion that Lacan was an "amusing and perfectly self-conscious charlatan".[113] The former Lacanian analyst, Dylan Evans, eventually dismissed Lacanianism as lacking a sound scientific basis and as harming rather than helping patients, and has criticized Lacan's followers for treating his writings as "holy writ".[44] Richard Webster has decried what he sees as Lacan's obscurity, arrogance, and the resultant "Cult of Lacan".[114] Others have been more forceful still, describing him as "The Shrink from Hell"[115][116] and listing the many associates—from lovers and family to colleagues, patients, and editors—left damaged in his wake. Roger Scruton included Lacan in his book Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left, and named him as the only 'fool' included in the book—his other targets merely being misguided or frauds.[117]
His type of charismatic authority has been linked to the many conflicts among his followers and in the analytic schools he was involved with.[118] His intellectual style has also come in for much criticism. Eclectic in his use of sources,[119] Lacan has been seen as concealing his own thought behind the apparent explication of that of others.[120] Thus his "return to Freud" was called by Malcolm Bowie "a complete pattern of dissenting assent to the ideas of Freud... Lacan's argument is conducted on Freud's behalf and, at the same time, against him".[121] Bowie has also suggested that Lacan suffered from both a love of system and a deep-seated opposition to all forms of system.[122]
Many feminist thinkers have drawn attention to faults in Lacan's thought. Philosopher and psychoanalyst Luce Irigaray accuses Lacan of perpetuating phallocentric mastery in philosophical and psychoanalytic discourse.[123] Others have echoed this accusation, seeing Lacan as trapped in the very phallocentric mastery his language ostensibly sought to undermine.[124] The result—Castoriadis would maintain—was to make all thought depend upon himself, and thus to stifle the capacity for independent thought among all those around him.[125]
Their difficulties were only reinforced by what Didier Anzieu described as a kind of teasing lure in Lacan's discourse; "fundamental truths to be revealed... but always at some further point".[126] This was perhaps an aspect of the sadistic narcissism that feminists especially detected in his nature.[127]
Noam Chomsky states "quite frankly I thought he was a total charlatan. He was just posturing for the television cameras in the way many Paris intellectuals do. Why this is influential, I haven’t the slightest idea. I don’t see anything there that should be influential."[128]
Works [ edit ]
Selected works published in English listed below. More complete listings can be found at Lacan Dot Com.
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Sources [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]
PracticeXiangyun International Project is a huge real estate project built in Shijiazhuang, Hebei Province.
Xiangyun International Project (祥云国际楼盘动态) covers an area of about 1800 acres. It was considered a strategic investment by the local government to support the real estate sector, tourism, and cultural sector. The overall project consists of two major parts: the south, an area with more than 1,300 acres of low density high-end residential communities, and the north area, covering 426 acres.
Related: China Suburbia
In 2014 Hebei Real Estate Development Group Co., Ltd., a well-known private company in Hebei Province, was put under investigations by local authorities. Since then, housing prices dropped, and the company accumulated billions of debts. Since the real estate project was seized, ten of thousands of owners are not allowed to move there, and the apartments cannot be used.
In 2017, Hebei Real Estate Development Group’s business has come to an end, undermining the original project, and leaving ten of thousands of people to deal with the controversial situation.
According to public reports, authorities have put under control the company due to the corrupt activities of Mr. Li Sheng, legal representative, and the actual controller.
According to the Shijiazhuang City Intermediate People ‘s Court notice, the first creditors meeting was held on March 17, 2017.
Photo: AnsticeLi/视觉中国
Source: news.163
Topic: Shijiazhuang ghost town,Hebei ghost town,ghost cities in ChinaArticle written by: Liza Picard
Liza Picard Published: 14 Oct 2009
From music halls and waxworks to freak shows and pleasure gardens, Liza Picard looks at the variety of popular entertainment available in the 19th century.
No matter how poor people were, they could usually raise a penny or so for some light entertainment.
Poster advertising the strongest man on earth, at the Royal Aquarium Poster advertising The Strongest Man on Earth, 1889. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Penny gaffs and music halls Just one penny admitted you to the back room of a public house thick with tobacco smoke. There a raucous singer delighted the audience with a repertoire of crude ballads, competing with shouts for more gin. The audience was mostly female, aged between eight and 20. An evening at a penny gaff made a pleasant change from their crowded slum rooms. By the late 1860s penny gaffs were giving way to more respectable, and comfortable, music halls and theatres. There you could sing along to your favourite popular songs, or watch entertainment as diverse as acrobats, trapeze artists, ‘operatic selections’, ‘black-face minstrels’, or can-can dancers.
Alcohol was still served during the performance but the audience was less riotous and the repertoire less gory. The price was still surprisingly low: a box at the Garrick Theatre cost only two or three pence.
Poster advertising Kairo and Olga, the black and white butterflys, at the Canterbury Theatre of Varieties, London Poster advertising Kairo and Olga, the Black and White Butterflies, 1882. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Poster advertising Modern Witchery at the Egyptian Hall, London Piccadilly Poster for Modern Witchery, an 'illusionist' show by the famous stage acts Maskelyne and Cooke, estimated 1894. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Magic, freak shows and waxworks Illusionists and spiritualists were popular attractions in theatres and exhibition halls: audiences could sit amazed as ghosts appeared on stage and automata solved mathematical puzzles. Renowned performers appeared to levitate, slice the heads off spectators and escape out of locked boxes.
Victorian audiences had no qualms about staring at human beings with disabilities or physical abnormalities. The income from being exhibited was often the only way for some of these people to live. The famous ‘Elephant Man’, whose face was badly deformed, was given sanctuary from a life of freak shows in the London Hospital, where he lived for four years till he died in 1890.
Poster advertising the 'royal American midgets', Piccadilly Hall, London Poster advertising the Royal American Midgets at the Piccadilly Hall, c. 1880. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
1834 saw a particularly horrid murder. Waxwork figures of the murdered woman and her four murdered children, dressed in their own clothes, had the public paying to see them in the very rooms where they had died. From 1843 Madame Tussaud’s ‘Chamber of Horrors’ documented current murders, exhibiting uncanny likenesses of the murderers within a few days of their executions. From 1888 Jack the Ripper could be seen in waxwork, even in penny peepshows.
Poster advertising Crecraft's Magnificent Collection of Animated Wax Dating from 1875, Crecraft's show promised to display waxwork figures of royalty, criminals and other famous people. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Circuses There were many small collections of animals, sometimes owned by a circus manager who trundled them along the country roads before erecting his ‘Big Top’ wherever he hoped for a profitable audience. The first famous circus proprietor, ‘Lord’ George Sanger, produced spectacular winter shows in Astley’s Amphitheatre, just over Westminster Bridge.
Poster advertising a performing elephant at Sanger's Grand National Amphitheatre, London Poster advertising Sanger's Grand National Amphitheatre, Lambeth, 1881. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
In 1884 his Gulliver’s Travels had a cast of 700 humans, 13 elephants, nine camels and 52 horses, with miscellaneous lions, buffaloes, ostriches and kangaroos thrown in. Phineas T. Barnum’s circus in Olympia specialised in themed spectacles, such as his Venetian pageant in 1891, when the vast arena was flooded and the spectators could take gondola rides down the canals, before watching a great sea battle involving over 1,000 performers.
Poster advertising F Ginnett's Hippodrome and Circus Poster advertising F Ginnett's hippodrome and circus, 1887. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Poster advertising the circus at Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, London Poster advertising Covent Garden Circus, c. 1880. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Street artists The Punch and Judy men preferred to perform outside gentlemen’s houses in the West End of London, by arrangement, rather than walking perhaps 20 miles in a day through the streets, carrying their ‘show’. Genteel evening parties might also be enlivened by the Fantoccini man’s marionettes – a type of puppet show. Companies of street acrobats could make as much as £100 a year. There were conjurors, ‘salamander men’ (fire-eaters) and sword-swallowers.
London Labour and the London Poor by Henry Mayhew Street acrobats performing from Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor, 1851.
View images from this item (14)
Usage terms Public Domain
Clowns strode high above the streets on stilts, and contortionists writhed on the ground. There were innumerable ballad singers and bands of differing musical abilities, but all able to produce such a noise that they were sometimes paid just to go away. As if they were not enough, Scots and Irish bagpipes wailed through the cacophony.
Zoos The Zoological Society’s collection in Regent’s Park had been open to the public since 1828 (and it still is). Among many exotic animals were two elephants, called Jumbo and Alice. The world’s first reptile house opened there in 1843. The Zoo became famous for its rattlesnakes and giraffes. In 1849 there were nearly 170,000 visitors.
Photograph of hippopotamus from The Photographic Album for the year 1855 The hippopotamus at the London Zoo, 1855. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
There was another zoo, not so grand, on the other side of the river in Walworth, where as well as watching the various feeding times you could enjoy all the usual facilities of a pleasure garden.
Pleasure gardens The heyday of the London pleasure gardens had been in the previous century. The mystery is how they managed to attract such huge crowds, despite the English weather, for they were mostly out of doors. Vauxhall struggled on until 1859. (The site is now covered by the south end of Vauxhall Bridge).
Poster advertising entertainment at the Royal Vauxhall Gardens, London Advertisement for the Royal Vauxhall Gardens, 1848. View images from this item (1)
Usage terms Public Domain
Cremorne Gardens in Chelsea opened in the 1840s, with a thousand flickering gas lights, a theatre, firework displays and an American bowling alley – claimed to be the first in London. The army made soldiers available to perform in massive pageants there. In 1855 they were re-enacting the storming of Sebastopol in the Crimean war. They advanced with their bayonets fixed. The scaffold collapsed, and they fell, impaling themselves on their bayonets. Nine years later in 1864 Goddard, the famous hot air balloonist, rose to 5,000 feet above Cremorne, but he misjudged his descent and his balloon landed fatally on a church spire in Chelsea. People being fired from cannons, ‘French female velocipedists’ (riders of early bicycles) wearing short trousers – they could all draw the crowds.
Illustration of Cremorne Gardens, Chelsea Illustration depicting crowds and entertainments at Cremorne Gardens, date unknown. View images from this item (0)
Usage terms Public Domain
By day Cremorne was thronged with respectable parties, but they went home by ten o’clock and hundreds of prostitutes took their places.
The Crystal Palace revived The building in Hyde Park housing the Great Exhibition had never been intended to be permanent. When the Exhibition closed, passionate public discussion broke out. What should be done with the famous Crystal Palace? Eventually a consortium of entrepreneurs, including Joseph Paxton, bought it outright. It was almost as great a marvel to disassemble it and move it to a new site, as it had been to build it in the first place. But frame by frame, pane by pane, it moved across London and up to the Surrey heights, at Sydenham. The new building, was half as large again as the Hyde Park building had been, and built to last. Its elaborate foundations housed 50 miles of hot water piping. The new building was opened by the royal couple in June 1854 just in time to catch fashionable London before the Season ended.
The aim of the promoters was to educate the British masses by a series of historical panoramas. There was an Assyrian palace, Pompeian and Roman courts, a Medieval court, an Alhambra court with a copy of the Lion Fountain, a Byzantine court and an Egyptian court containing authentic copies of the immense statues in Abu Simbel, standing 51 feet high. As well as these ‘Architectural Courts’ there was a vast interior space used for public meetings and concerts, such as the triennial Handel concerts attended by a total of 40,000 people. In 1857 Charles Spurgeon, the celebrated Baptist preacher, addressed a congregation of 23,654. Popular amusements included ascents by the official Crystal Palace Astronaut in his gas-filled balloon. For £5, a considerable amount in those days, you too could look down on London from a mile high, or more. From 1865 Charles Brock began his magnificent weekly firework displays. The 200-acre park contained three lakes, in one of which was an island housing models of ‘Extinct Animals’ made as lifelike as the then state of pre-historical knowledge allowed. The Iguanodon alone was 34 feet long, made of four iron columns, tiles, bricks, hardcore and 38 casks of cement. Paxton was given free rein in designing magnificent fountains and water works, but they were so expensive to operate that they were turned on only for very special occasions. His vast expenditure contributed to the growing financial problems of ‘The People’s Palace’. During its first 30 years the average annual attendance was two million people. But gradually the high-minded aims of the original promoters had to give way to commercial pressure. The People’s Palace was completely destroyed by fire in 1936.The Conservative peer, who advises William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, on energy and resource security, called for fracking to be concentrated in the North East because it has “large, desolate and uninhabited areas”.
He claimed that it could be a “mistake” to discuss shale gas drilling – known as fracking – in terms “of the whole United Kingdom in one go”.
In comments sure to cause controversy, he seemed to suggest that there are not “beautiful” areas in the North East and that it would be ripe for shale gas exploration.
“There are obviously in beautiful rural areas, worries not just about the drilling and the fracking, which I think are exaggerated, but about the trucks, the delivery and the roads and the disturbance,” Lord Howell said. “And those are quite justified worries.”
“But there are large uninhabited and desolate areas, certainly up in the North East where there’s plenty of room for fracking well away from anyone’s residence where it can be conducted without any kind of threat to the rural environment.”
He added that “a distinction should be made between one area and another rather than lumping them all together”.
A Government spokesman immediately slapped down Lord Howell, saying he "is not a minister and does not speak for the Government".
Downing Street immediately tried to distance itself from Lord Howell, saying he has not been an adviser since April. Lord Howell was until this afternoon still listed as an adviser on the Government's own website.
Lord Howell is father to Frances Osborne, the Chancellor’s wife.
The controversial comments by someone so close to the Chancellor will raise questions about the Government’s energy policies.
The Tories have also repeatedly faced accusations that they ignore the north of England because it is largely dominated by the Labour Party.
Lord Howell stepped down as a Foreign Office minister last year.
Environmental groups have previously raised questions about Lord Howell’s influence on the Government’s green policies because of his close relationship with Mr Osborne.
Lord Howell has also faced a series of questions about his links to companies.
He is a consultant to a Japanese high-speed train firm expected to tender when the controversial HS2 rail line is built.
The peer, who was Margaret Thatcher’s transport secretary, is being paid as a “European consultant” to JR Central, which could be a bidder for multi-million-pound contracts connected to HS2.
He is also an adviser to the Kuwait Investment Office.
David Cameron has said that shale gas drilling could help cut the cost of living for families struggling with average bills of more than £1,300 per year.
Earlier this month Mr Cameron gave some of his strongest ever comments in favour of shale gas.
"In America they are now almost self-sufficient in gas," he said. "Their gas prices to business are now less then half as much as ours are and the reason for this is they have put a lot of investment into unconventional gas.
"The figures are actually quite frightening. Europe as a whole has 75 per cent as much unconventional gas as America. So we’ve got less in Europe as America.
"But whereas they are digging 10,000 wells a year, so far in Europe we’ve dug just 100. So we are way behind, so I’m in favour of fracking, the government is making it easier."
Labour peer Jeremy Beecham, a councillor in Newcastle, said: “Neville Chamberlain spoke of pre-war Czechoslovakia as 'a far away country of which we know nothing'. Lord Howell clearly has a similar view on the North East – and his comments once again highlight the Tories problem with the North.
“Perhaps he’s forecasting the future the North East faces as a result of Government policy – a ‘largely uninhabited and desolate’ place where there’ll be few people to object?”.The program, used to cover tech labor shortages, also improved the sector's productivity and lowered the prices of its products, research indicates.
The H-1B visa program, often used to compensate for shortages of skilled workers in the tech industry, may bring down the wages of engineers, mathematicians and other specialty employees in the U.S., a study found.
The paper, by researchers at the University of Michigan and the University of California, San Diego, found computer scientists’ incomes would have been as much as 5 percent higher and employment for computer science workers would have increased as much as 11 percent in the absence of the program.
Read: Immigration Reform 2017: Trump Suspends H-1B Visa Program Premium Processing
Still, the authors highlighted the benefits of immigration within the industry: Consumer prices dropped, while information technology sector productivity rose by as much as 2.5 percent. The key beneficiaries were tech sector firms, which enjoyed higher profits as a result.
The study came with a major caveat, however. Its data covered 1994-2001 and, therefore, may reflect an entirely different tech industry landscape from that of 2017, given the rapidly changing nature of the sector.
The authors published their paper in the National Bureau of Economic Research just several weeks before U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services suspended the program’s premium processing service, which allowed companies to import a skilled worker quickly by reducing the monthslong waiting period to 15 days with a $1,225 fee. The move was ostensibly an effort to catch up on the high volume of incoming petitions and the significant surge in premium requests over the past few years, according to a USCIS press release.
For fiscal year 2017, 85,000 H-1B visas were reserved for foreign workers with a clear relationship to an employer and a bachelor’s degree or higher relevant to a “specialty occupation,” including engineering, business, math or other tech jobs.
Read: New H-1B Visa Rule Could Hurt High-Skilled Foreign Workers
The tech sector has long been an ardent supporter of freer immigration. Following the Jan. 27 issuance of President Donald Trump’s executive order banning travel to the U.S. by refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries — which, after a court blocked it, Trump’s team later revised to six, excluding Iraq in a new version of the measure — hundreds of tech leaders in New York City signed a letter urging him to rescind it.
Related ArticlesThe politics of outer space includes space treaties, law in space, international cooperation and conflict in space exploration, and the hypothetical political impact of any contact with extraterrestrial intelligence.
Astropolitics, also known as astropolitik, has its foundations in geopolitics and is a theory that is used for space in its broadest sense. Astropolitics is often studied as an aspect of the security studies and international relations subfields of political science. This includes the role of space exploration in diplomacy as well as the military uses of satellites, for example, for surveillance or cyber warfare.
An important aspect of the geopolitics of space is the prevention of a military threat to Earth from outer space.[1]
International cooperation on space projects has resulted in the creation of new national space agencies. By 2005 there were 35 national civilian space agencies.[2]
List of outer-space related international laws, treaties, and policies [ edit ]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
D. Deudney and M. Glassner; Political Geography
Further reading [ edit ]Milo Character Concept
❮❮ Newer Download | Full View Older ❯❯ Submission © 2014 Rrriley Main Gallery
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Milo Character Concept - by Rrriley Submission information:
Posted:
Category: Designs
Theme: All
Species: Hyena
Gender: Other / Not Specified
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evil hyena glowing killer that bitch cray Milo Riley character design concept
Just a little bit of fun making a good chaotic neutral/evil character. So once it was narrowed down to being a badass bitch, of course it had to be a hyena. Duh.
Theme song: Get Jinxed
Character Dossier
Birth Name: Unknown?
Alias: Milo
Age: 26
Gender: Female/Hermaphrodite (Hyena)
Species: Hyena
Height: ~6'
Weight: ~145 lbs?
Hair Color: Green highlights
Eye Color: Reddish gold
Identifying marks and features: Left ear torn. Glowing green scars across left eye, arm, chest, and torso.
Jewelry: Studs along base of both ears, bar across left ear, pierced naval and nipple
Occupation: Outlaw
Alliance: None
Accomplices: None
Property: None
Legal Status: Wanted for murder. Armed and dangerous. Contact unadvised.
Summary: Most historical documentation of Milo has been destroyed or is unrecoverable, thus information is based mostly on rumor and local lore. Milo used to be a low-sec security guard for outer-rim corporations before being attacked. She was infected by an neurotoxin that spread throughout her body and degraded her mental state. While this completely changed her personality, it also completely destroyed the pain center of her brain.
Shortly thereafter, she started a killing spree across the outer worlds, seemingly indiscriminate and random in nature. While any motives are unknown, observers note a maddened lust for power and any chance to dominate an opponent.
Personality: Dominant. Violent. Vulgar. Mentally disturbed. Bully.
Abilities: Will not stand down to fights. Pain and touch do not appear to register to her.
Likes: Blood, fighting, power
Dislikes: A lot
Conjecture: Rumors suggest that fresh blood calms her down by diluting the poison still flowing in her bloodstream, relieving the stress on her mind and body. Speculation suggests that this addictive effect is what drives her to kill in the first place.
Some hypothesize the reason she is killing is to take control of the outer rim herself, though the irregularity of her kills suggests otherwise.
She once ran into Riley (though the extent is unknown), later remarking she didn't kill him because he couldn't stand up for himself if he tried, saying he was "The worst excuse for a pilot in the known universe"Cartoon Network USA Yoursday Thursday 1st September
On Thursday 1st September, The Yoursday programming block on Cartoon Network USA will include a new episode of Steven Universe, the season five premiere of The Amazing World of Gumball and a new episode of The Powerpuff Girls, the fun begins at 5pm ET/PT.
The Amazing World of Gumball
The Stories
5pm ET/PT
Molly gets coaching from the guys to improve her story telling.
http://theamazingworldofgumball.wikia.com/wiki/The_Stories
The Powerpuff Girls
Odd Bubbles Out
5.30pm ET/PT
When Donny the Unicorn visits, Bubbles becomes jealous of his new friend.
http://powerpuffgirls.wikia.com/wiki/Odd_Bubbles_Out
Steven Universe
Future Boy Zoltron
7pm ET/PT
Steven tells people’s fortunes at Funland.
http://steven-universe.wikia.com/wiki/Future_Boy_Zoltron
Other Cartoon Network USA September 2016 Premiere Info
Cartoon Network USA will premiere Mighty Magiswords on Thursday 29th September at 6.30pm ET/PT, the first episode is called “The Mystery of Loch Mess”.
New episodes of Pokémon the Series: XYZ continue on Saturday mornings at 7am ET/PT.
New episodes of Clarence from Thursday 29th September at 5.30pm ET/PT.
The new We Bare Bears half-hour special – Captain Craboo will air during Cartoon Network’s Night of New Labor Day programming block at 5.30pm ET/PT. New episodes of We Bare Bears will continue to air every Thursday from Thursday 15th September.
New episodes of The Powerpuff Girls will air everyday between Monday 19th September and Friday 23rd September at 5.30pm ET/PT. Before the week of new episodes, Cartoon Network USA will air new episode of The Powerpuff Girls on Thursday 8th September at 5.30pm ET/PT.
New episodes of Uncle Grandpa will air from Monday 19th September.
There will be a new episode of Teen Titans Go! during Cartoon Network’s Night of New Labor Day programming block at 6pm ET/PT. New episodes of Teen Titans Go! will continue to air every Thursday at 6pm ET/PT from Thursday 8th September.
There will be two new episodes of The Amazing World of Gumball during Cartoon Network’s Night of New Labor Day programming block at 5pm ET/PT, the first new episode is the Season Four finale. New episodes of The Amazing World of Gumball will continue to air every Thursday at 5pm ET/PT from Thursday 8th September.
Cartoon Network USA will air a new episode of Lego Nexo Knights on Saturday 3rd September at 6.30am ET/PT.
A list of Cartoon Network USA’s September 2016 premieres can be seen on the link below, the list is updated as soon as new scheduling information is released:
http://www.toonzone.net/forums/threads/cartoon-network-september-2016-premiere-info.5561291/
Note: Scheduling is subject to change.Last month, around 2,500 people with some connection to hallucinogenic drugs gathered at the Oakland Marriott City Center in Oakland, California for what might best be described as the psychedelics state of the union. Psychedelic Science 2017, as it was more formally known, drew professionals of all stripes: chemists who make the hallucinogens, neuroscientists who study their effects on the brain, therapists who discuss their after-effects on patients, shamans and healers who administer the drugs, and anthropologists like Joanna Steinhardt, who are trying to make sense of the meaning of psychedelic culture.
At the conference, Steinhardt, a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, delivered a talk describing her research on a specific subset of amateur scientists within this world: DIY mycologists. Some of these mushroom enthusiasts who grow their fungi at home use them in recipes, or to make medicinal tinctures. But others get more creative, using them for citizen-science projects like myco-remediation (cleaning environmental toxins with fungi), myco-forestry (using mushrooms to maintain forest health), and doing DNA analysis on mushrooms to determine local strains.
It’s a good time to be a magic-mushroom fan. In the 1960s, hallucinogens like LSD were used by therapists to successfully treat patients with a range of mental conditions, a line of treatment that was ended with the Controlled Substances Act in 1970. But now, after years of research and advances in brain imaging, hallucinogens are being taken seriously again. Recent research has shown that psilocybin, the active ingredient in hallucinogenic mushrooms, can reduce anxiety in end-of-life cancer patients. The mushrooms are currently classified by the Drug Enforcement Agency as Schedule 1 drugs, meaning they are thought to have no medicinal value and a high potential for abuse. Nevertheless, advocates believe the opposite: that they are indeed medicinal, and not at all addictive. They also believe that they have the potential to become legalized therapeutic medicines within the next decade.
But many members of the DIY mycology community, which has emerged in the last decade or so, are more interested in the other things that mushrooms can do. The movement is based in part on the work of Paul Stamets, whose book Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World posits that mushrooms can, well, save the world. He argues that mycelium, the fine web of cells that branch out from the fruiting part of the mushroom and act sort of like the fungus’s nervous system and stomach, can break down and digest oil, plastic, and other toxic waste materials. As Vice noted in a 2015 profile, Stamet’s also found that some mushrooms contain compounds that can be used against certain viruses and bacteria, including E. coli, influenza, and smallpox, a finding that’s attracted the attention of scientists at the National Institutes of Health. Stamets, who is seen as somewhat of an evangelist for the fungal kingdom, also spoke at the conference, announcing that he hopes to one day create a psilocybin vitamin, a proclamation that was met with wild cheers from the crowd of mushroom-lovers.
Because the world of professional mycology is so small, many amateur mycologists feel their contributions to the understudied world of fungi can be of great use to the scientific community — according to Steinhardt, only about 5 percent of the world’s mushrooms are thought to have been identified. “Mycology is a world where the amateurs are really important,” she says. “They become obsessive hobbyists and can become experts themselves.”
Several of them also hope to turn their hobbies into scientific breakthroughs, she says. Amateur mycologists in the Bay Area are growing oyster mycelium to eat oil-soaked soil inside of a petri dish. Others are testing whether a type of mushroom called sulphur shelf can be used as an herbicide to stop invasive eucalyptus trees from re-sprouting, or trying to myco-remediate plots of land within Oakland for urban farming. Still others still are helping to classify various species of mushrooms, and making medicinal tinctures out of reishi, which boosts immunity, and cordyceps, which boosts energy and gives athletes endurance.
Although their work has nothing to do with hallucinations, she says, the DIY mycology movement owes much to psychedelic mushrooms — especially the famed psilocybe cubensis, the most common species of psychedelic mushroom, which served as an introduction for mushroom cultivation for many in the community. (Stamets in particular has called Psilocybe his “gateway” to the study of mycology.) In the late 1950s, R. Gordon Wasson, a vice-president at J.P. Morgan and an amateur mycologist, traveled to Mexico in search of fabled mushrooms that could induce visions, introducing them to the U.S. via a Life magazine article describing his journey. Throughout the following decade, American spiritual seekers traveled to Mexico in search of the psychedelic mushrooms — until, eventually, mycologists realized that the U.S. had its own magic mushrooms, growing throughout the Northwest and the Southeast, Steinhardt says.
A series of books followed over the later decades of the 20th century, teaching Americans how to grow psychedelic mushrooms in their homes, including Psilocybin: Magic Mushroom Grower’s Guide, co-written by Terence McKenna, the ethnobotanist and psychonaut, and his brother Dennis, the ethnopharmacologist; and Stamets’s Psilocybe Mushrooms and Their Allies and The Mushroom Cultivator. Around the same time, a “vast rhizomorphic web known as the internet was also growing,” says Steinhardt. “Websites like Shroomery and Mycotopia were founded in the mid-1990s with forums focused on psilocybe cultivation, allowing people to swap information, troubleshoot their failures and crowdsource solutions” for growing psychedelic and non-psychedelic mushrooms alike.
Along the way, many amateur mycologists began to think of their hobby in more spiritual terms. One member of Steinhardt’s study, who describes himself as a psychedelic naturalist, told her that psychedelics played a big part in shaping who he is today. “When I experienced a spiritual state [under the psychedelic’s influence],” she recalled him telling her, “what immediately became crystal clear to me is that all organisms are valid and alive and interconnected. And we all share life together … There is no me without the ecosystem. There is no me without the trees, or bacteria, or mountains and rivers, and there’s no me without the entire framework.”
Even foraging for mushrooms can be a transcendent experience to some mycologists, Steinhardt says. Another study subject described foraging as “a really deep connection … connection to myself, connection to community, and to the earth, and obviously, to mushrooms.” (Still, the subject believes there’s a limit to “the gospel and the dogma” of a psychedelic trip. “I have known a lot of people who have taken that … way too far,” he says.)
To Steinhardt, the most compelling part of the DIY mycology community is how broad it is: Although an interest in mycology often stems from the psychedelic underground, it opens people into the much larger world of fungi. Psychedelic mushrooms aren’t the only mushrooms with interesting powers, she says. There are also some mushrooms that eat oil spills, and some that glow in the dark, and, yes, some that taste really good.
“Psychedelic mushrooms are just one corner of the fungal kingdom,” she says, “that does all kinds of crazy things.”Please enable Javascript to watch this video
EAST ELMHURST, Queens — A plane carrying Republican vice presidential candidate Mike Pence slid off the runway while landing at LaGuardia Airport Thursday evening.
The plane slid off the runway around 7:50 p.m., near 82nd Street and Grand Central Parkway in East Elmhurst.
Please enable Javascript to watch this video
The plane made a rough impact when it landed. The pilot slammed on the brakes and travelers could smell burning rubber.
There were 37 passengers and 11 crew members on the plane.
Pence took to Twitter Thursday evening to address the scare.
So thankful |
a bank holding company, which made it, in the eyes of regulators, no different from Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, or any other retail bank. That gave the firm access to cheap capital through the Fed but would also bring increased scrutiny from regulators. The bank took a $10 billion bailout from the Troubled Asset Relief Program and another $5 billion from Warren Buffett, in return for an annual dividend of 10 percent and access to discounted company stock. The firm raised additional billions through a public stock offering.
The biggest threat to Goldman was the economic health of the American International Group. Among other products, AIG sold insurance to protect against defaults on mortgage assets, which had been central to Goldman’s big short. Of the $80 billion in U.S. mortgage assets that AIG insured during the housing bubble, Goldman bought protection from AIG on roughly $33 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal. When Lehman went into bankruptcy, its creditors received 11 cents on the dollar. Executives at AIG, in a frantic effort to avoid bankruptcy, had floated the idea of pushing its creditors to accept 40 to 60 cents on the dollar; there was speculation creditors like Goldman would receive as little as 25 percent. Goldman and its clients were looking at multibillion-dollar hits to their bottom line — a potentially fatal blow.
But as Goldman learned a century ago, it pays to have friends in high places. The day after Lehman went bankrupt, the Bush administration announced an $85 billion bailout of AIG in return for a majority stake in the company. The next day, Paulson obtained a waiver regarding interactions with his former firm because, the Treasury secretary said, “It became clear that we had some very significant issues with Goldman Sachs.” Paulson’s calendar, the New York Times reported, showed that the week of the AIG bailout, he and Blankfein spoke two dozen times. While creditors around the globe were being forced to settle for much less than they were owed, AIG paid its counterparties 100 cents on the dollar. AIG ended up being the single largest private recipient of TARP funding. It received additional billions in rescue funds from the New York Federal Reserve Bank, whose board chair Stephen Friedman was a former Goldman executive who still sat on the firm’s board. The U.S. Treasury ended up with greater than a 90 percent share of AIG, and the U.S. government, using taxpayer dollars, paid in full on the insurance policies financial institutions bought to protect themselves from steep declines in real estate prices — chief among them, Goldman Sachs. All told, Goldman received at least $22.9 billion in public bailouts, including $10 billion in TARP funds and $12.9 billion in taxpayer-funded payments from AIG.
Goldman, once again, had come out on top.
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. headquarters stands in New York City, on Oct. 12, 2016. Photo: Mark Kauzlarich/Bloomberg/Getty Images
4. THE VAMPIRE SQUID
Goldman Sachs repaid repaid its $10 billion bailout partway through 2009, less than 12 months after the loan was made. Other banks in the U.S. and abroad were still struggling but not Goldman, which reported a record $19.8 billion in pre-tax profits that year, and $12.9 billion the next. Gary Cohn went without a bonus in 2008, left to scrape by on his $600,000 salary. Once free of government interference, the Goldman board (which included Cohn himself) paid him a $9 million bonus in 2009 and an $18 million bonus in 2010.
Yet the once venerated firm was now the subject of jokes on the late-night talk shows. David Letterman broadcast a “Goldman Sachs Top 10 Excuses” list (No. 9: “You’re saying ‘fraud’ like it’s a bad thing.”). Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi described the bank as “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money,” a devastating moniker that followed Goldman into the business pages. After news leaked that the firm might pay its people a record $16.7 billion in bonuses in 2009, even President Barack Obama, for whom the firm had been a top campaign donor, began to turn against Goldman, telling “60 Minutes,” “I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat-cat bankers on Wall Street.”
“They’re still puzzled why is it that people are mad at the banks,” Obama said. “Well, let’s see. You guys are drawing down $10, $20 million bonuses after America went through the worst economic year that it’s gone through in decades, and you guys caused the problem.”
Goldman was also facing an onslaught of investigations and lawsuits over behavior that had helped precipitate the financial crisis. Class actions and other lawsuits filed by pension funds and other investors accused Goldman of abusing their trust, making “false and misleading statements,” and failing to conduct basic due diligence on the loans underlying the products it peddled. At least 25 of these suits named Cohn as a defendant.
State and federal regulators joined the fray. The SEC accused Goldman of deception in its marketing of opaque investments called “synthetic collateralized debt obligations,” the values of which were tied to bundles of actual mortgages. These were the deals Goldman had arranged in 2006 on behalf of John Paulson so he could short the U.S. housing market. Goldman, it turned out, had allowed Paulson to cherry-pick poor-quality loans at the greatest risk of defaulting — a fact Goldman did not share with potential investors. “Goldman wrongly permitted a client that was betting against the mortgage market to heavily influence which mortgage securities to include in an investment portfolio,” the SEC’s enforcement director at the time said, “telling other investors that the securities were selected by an independent, objective third party.”
Suddenly, Cohn and other Goldman officials were downplaying the big short. In June 2010, Cohn testified before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, created by Congress to investigate the causes of the nation’s worst economic collapse since the Great Depression. Cohn asked the commissioners how anyone could claim the firm had bet against its clients when “during the two years of the financial crisis, Goldman Sachs lost $1.2 billion in its residential mortgage-related business”? His statement was technically true, but Cohn failed to mention the billions of dollars the firm pocketed by betting the mortgage market would collapse. Senate investigators later calculated that, at its peak, Goldman had $13.9 billion in short positions that would only pay off in the event of a steep drop in the mortgage market, positions that produced a record $3.7 billion in profits.
Two weeks after Cohn’s testimony, Goldman agreed to pay the SEC $550 million to settle charges of securities fraud — then the largest penalty assessed against a financial services firm in the agency’s history. Goldman admitted no wrongdoing, acknowledging only that its marketing materials “contained incomplete information.” Goldman paid $60 million in fines and restitution to settle an investigation by the Massachusetts attorney general into the financial backing the firm had offered to predatory mortgage lenders. The bank set aside another $330 million to assist people who lost their homes thanks to questionable foreclosure practices at a Goldman loan-servicing subsidiary. Goldman agreed to billions of dollars in additional settlements with state and federal agencies relating to its sale of dicey mortgage-backed securities. The firm finally acknowledged that it had failed to conduct basic due diligence on the loans its was selling customers and, once it became aware of the hazards, did not disclose them.
In the final report produced by the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Goldman Sachs was mentioned an extraordinary 2,495 times, and Gary Cohn 89 times. A Goldman Sachs representative declined to respond to queries on the record.
President Barack Obama with Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., (C) and Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., (C-R) after signing the Dodd-Frank Act in Washington, July 21, 2010. Photo: Doug Mills/The New York Times/Redux
The investigations and fines were a blow to Goldman’s reputation and its bottom line, but the regulatory reforms being debated had the potential to threaten Goldman’s entire business model. Even before the 2008 crash, the firm’s lobbying spending had grown under Lloyd Blankfein and Cohn. By 2010, the year financial reforms were being drafted, Goldman spent $4.6 million for the services of 49 lobbyists. Their ranks included some of the most well-connected figures in Washington, including Democrat Richard Gephardt, a former House majority leader, and Republican Trent Lott, a former Senate majority leader, who had stepped down from the Senate two years earlier.
Despite all those lobbyists on the payroll, Goldman made its case primarily through proxies during the debate over financial reform. “The name Goldman Sachs was so radioactive it worked to their disadvantage to be tied to an issue,” said Marcus Stanley, then a staffer for Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer and now policy director of Americans for Financial Reform. Instead, Goldman lobbied through industry groups.
Goldman’s people likely knew that all of Wall Street’s lobbying might could not stop the passage of the sprawling 2010 legislative package dubbed the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. Obama was putting his muscle behind reform — “We simply cannot accept a system in which hedge funds or private equity firms inside banks can place huge, risky bets that are subsidized by taxpayers,” he said in one speech — and the Democrats enjoyed majorities in both houses of Congress. “For Goldman Sachs, the battle was over the final language,” said Dennis Kelleher of Better Markets, a Washington, D.C., lobby group that pushes for tighter financial reforms. “That way they at least had a fighting chance in the next round, when everyone turned their attention to the regulators.”
There was a lot for Goldman Sachs to dislike about Dodd-Frank. There were small annoyances, such as “say on pay,” which ordered companies to give shareholders input on executive compensation, a source of potential embarrassment to a company that gave out $73 million in compensation for a single year’s work — as Goldman paid Cohn in 2007. There were large annoyances, such as the requirement that financial institutions deemed too big to fail, like Goldman, create a wind-down plan in case of disaster. There were the measures that would interfere with Goldman’s core businesses, such as a provision instructing the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to regulate the trading of derivatives. And yet nothing mattered to Goldman quite like the Volcker Rule, which would protect banks’ solvency by limiting their freedom to make speculative trades with their own money. Unless Goldman could initiate what Stanley called the “complexity two-step” — win a carve-out so a new rule wouldn’t interfere with legitimate business and then use that carve-out to render a rule toothless — Volcker would slam the door shut on the entire direction in which Blankfein and Cohn had taken Goldman.
It was 5:30 a.m. on Friday, June 25, 2010, when a joint House-Senate conference committee approved the final language of Dodd-Frank. By Sunday, an industry attorney named Annette Nazareth — a former top SEC official whose firm counts Goldman Sachs among its clients — had already sent off a heavily annotated copy of the 848-page bill to colleagues at her old agency. It was just the first salvo in a lobbying juggernaut.
Within a few months, Cohn himself was in Washington to meet with a governor of the Federal Reserve, one of the key agencies charged with implementing Volcker. The visitors log at the CFTC, the agency Dodd-Frank put in charge of derivatives reform, shows that Cohn traveled to D.C. to personally meet with CFTC staffers at least six times between 2010 and 2016. Cohn also came to the capital for meetings at the SEC, another agency responsible for the Volcker Rule. There, he met with SEC chair Mary Jo White and other commissioners. “I seem to be in Washington every week trying to explain to them the unintended consequences of overregulation,” Cohn said in a talk he gave to business students at Sacred Heart University in 2015.
“Gary was the tip of the spear for Goldman to beat back regulatory reform,” said Kelleher, the financial reform lobbyist. “I used to pass him going into different agencies. They brought him in when they wanted the big gun to finish off, to kill the wounded.”
Democrats lost their majority in the House that November, and Goldman threw its weight behind the spate of Republican bills that followed, aimed at taking apart Dodd-Frank piece by piece. Goldman spent more than $4 million for the services of 45 lobbyists in 2011 and $3.5 million a year in 2012 and 2013. Its lobbying spending was nearly as high in the years after passage of Dodd-Frank as it was the year the bill was introduced.
Goldman lobbyists dug in on a range of issues that would become top priorities for Republicans in the wake of Donald Trump’s electoral victory. Records from the Center for Responsive Politics show that Goldman lobbyists worked to promote corporate tax cuts, such as on the Tax Increase Prevention Act of 2014 and Senate legislation aimed at extending some $200 billion in tax cuts for individuals and businesses. Goldman lobbied for a bill to fund economically critical infrastructure projects, presumably on behalf of its Public Sector and Infrastructure group. Goldman had seven lobbyists working on the JOBS Act, which would make it easier for companies to go public, another bottom-line issue to a company that underwrote $27 billion in IPOs last year. In 2016, Goldman had eight lobbyists dedicated to the Financial CHOICE Act, which would have undone most of Dodd-Frank in one fell swoop — a bill the House revived in April.
Yet defanging the Volcker Rule remained the firm’s top priority. Promoted by former Fed Chair Paul Volcker, the rule would prohibit banks from committing more than 3 percent of their core assets to in-house private equity and hedge funds in the business of buying up properties and businesses with the goal of selling them at a profit. One harbinger of the financial crisis had been the collapse in the summer of 2007 of a pair of Bear Stearns hedge funds that had invested heavily in subprime loans. That 3 percent cap would have had a big impact on Goldman, which maintained a separate private equity group and operated its own internal hedge funds. But it was the restrictions Volcker placed on proprietary trading that most threatened Goldman.
Prop trading was a profit center inside many large banks, but nowhere was it as critical as at Goldman. A 2011 report by one Wall Street analyst revealed that prop trading accounted for an 8 percent share of JPMorgan Chase’s annual revenues, 9 percent of Bank of America’s, and 27 percent of Morgan Stanley’s. But prop trading made up 48 percent of Goldman’s. By one estimate, the Volcker Rule could cost Goldman Sachs $3.7 billion in revenue a year.
When regulators finalized a new Volcker Rule in 2013, Better Markets declared it a “major defeat for Wall Street.” Yet the victory for reformers was precarious. “Just changing a few words could dramatically change the scope of the rule — to the tune of billions of dollars for some firms,” said former Senate staffer Tyler Gellasch, who helped write the rule. Volcker gave banks until July 2015 — the five-year anniversary of Dodd-Frank — to bring themselves into compliance. Yet apparently the Volcker Rule had been written for other financial institutions, not elite firms like Goldman Sachs. “Goldman Sachs has been on a shopping spree with its own money,” began a New York Times article in January 2015. The bank used its own funds to buy a mall in Utah, apartments in Spain, and a European ink company. Paul Volcker expressed disappointment that banks were still making big proprietary bets, as did the two senators most responsible for writing the rule into law. That June, Cohn appeared to reassure investors that Goldman would find a workaround. Speaking at an investor conference, he said Goldman was “transforming our equity investing activities to continue to meet client needs while complying with Volcker.”
Goldman had five years to prepare for some version of a Volcker Rule. Yet a loophole granted banks sufficient time to dispose of “illiquid assets” without causing undue harm — a loophole that might even cover the assets Goldman had only recently purchased, despite the impending compliance deadline. The Fed nonetheless granted the firm additional time to sell illiquid investments worth billions of dollars. “Goldman is brilliant at exercising access and influence without fingerprints,” Kelleher said.
By mid-2016, Goldman, along with Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase, was petitioning the Fed for an additional five years to comply with Volcker — which would take the banks well into a new administration. All Blankfein and Cohn had to do was wait for a new Congress and a new president who might back their efforts to flush all of Dodd-Frank. Then Goldman could continue the risky and lucrative habits it had adopted since traders like Cohn had taken over the firm — the financial crisis be damned — and continue raking in billions in profits each year.
Lloyd Blankfein, chair and CEO of Goldman Sachs, (L) stands on stage with former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the 2014 Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting in New York on Sept. 24, 2014. Photo: Stephen Chernin/AFP/Getty Images
Goldman’s political giving changed in the wake of Dodd-Frank. Dating back to at least 1990, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, people associated with the firm and its political action committees contributed more to Democrats than Republicans. Yet in the years since financial reform, Goldman, once Obama’s second-largest political donor, shifted its campaign contributions to Republicans. During the 2008 election cycle, for instance, Goldman’s people and PACs contributed $4.8 million to Democrats and $1.7 million to Republicans. By the 2012 cycle, the opposite happened, with Goldman giving $5.6 million to Republicans and $1.8 million to Democrats. Cohn’s personal giving followed the same path. Cohn gave $26,700 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in 2006 and $55,500 during the 2008 election cycle, and none to its GOP equivalent. But Cohn donated $30,800 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee in 2012 and another $33,400 to the National Republican Congressional Committee in 2015, without contributing a dime to the DSCC. Cohn gave $5,000 to Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown weeks after news broke that Elizabeth Warren — an outspoken critic of Goldman and other Wall Street players — might try to capture his U.S. Senate seat, which she did in 2012.
Goldman Sachs, under Cohn and Blankfein, was hardly chastened, continuing to play fast and loose with existing rules even as it plunged millions of dollars into fending off new ones. In 2010, the SEC ran a sting operation looking for banks willing to trade favorable assessments by its stock analysts for a piece of a Toys R Us IPO if the company went public. Goldman took the bait, for which they would pay a $5 million fine. An employee working out of Goldman’s Boston office drafted speeches, vetted a running mate, and negotiated campaign contracts for the state treasurer during his run for Massachusetts governor in 2010, despite a rule forbidding municipal bond dealers from making significant political contributions to officials who can award them business. According to the SEC, Goldman had underwritten $9 billion in bonds for Massachusetts in the previous two years, generating $7.5 million in fees. Goldman paid $12 million to settle the matter in 2012.
Just two years later, Goldman officials were again summoned by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations to address charges that the bank under Cohn and Blankfein had boosted its profits by building a “virtual monopoly” in order to inflate aluminum prices by as much as $3 billion.
The last few years have brought more unwanted attention. In 2015, the U.S. Justice Department launched an investigation into Goldman’s role in the alleged theft of billions of dollars from a development fund the firm had helped create for the government of Malaysia. Federal regulators in New York state fined Goldman $50 million because its leaders failed to effectively supervise a banker who leaked stolen confidential government information from the Fed, which hit the firm with another $36.3 million in penalties. In December, the CFTC fined Goldman $120 million for trying to rig interest rates to profit the firm.
Politically, 2016 would prove a strange year for Goldman. Bernie Sanders clobbered Hillary Clinton for pocketing hundreds of thousands of dollars in speaking fees from Goldman, while Trump attacked Ted Cruz for being “in bed with” Goldman Sachs. (Cruz’s wife Heidi was a managing director in Goldman’s Houston office until she took leave to work on her husband’s presidential campaign.) Goldman would have “total control” over Clinton, Trump said at a February 2016 rally, a point his campaign reinforced in a two-minute ad that ran the weekend before Election Day. An image of Blankfein flashed across the screen as Trump warned about the global forces that “robbed our working class.”
Goldman’s giving in the presidential race appears to reflect polls predicting a Clinton win and the firm’s desire for a political restart on deregulation. People who identified themselves as Goldman Sachs employees gave less than $5,000 to the Trump campaign compared to the $341,000 that the firm’s people and PACs contributed to Clinton. Goldman Sachs is relatively small compared to retail banking giants.
Yet, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, no bank outspent Goldman Sachs during the 2016 political cycle. Its PACs and people associated with the firm made $5.6 million in political contributions in 2015 and 2016. Even including all donations to Clinton, 62 percent of Goldman’s giving ended up in the coffers of Republican candidates, parties, or conservative outside groups.
President Donald Trump speaks to community bankers as Director of the National Economic Council Gary Cohn (2nd R) and White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus (R) listen during an event at the Kennedy Garden of the White House on May 1, 2017 in Washington, D.C. Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images
5. TROJAN HORSE
There’s ultimately no great mystery why Donald Trump selected Gary Cohn for a top post in his administration, despite his angry rhetoric about Goldman Sachs. There’s the high regard the president holds for anyone who is rich — and the instant legitimacy Cohn conferred upon the administration within business circles. Cohn’s appointment reassured bond markets about the unpredictable new president and lent his administration credibility it lacked among Fortune 100 CEOs, none of whom had donated to his campaign. Ego may also have played a role. Goldman Sachs would never do business with Trump, the developer who resorted to foreign banks and second-tier lenders to bankroll his projects. Now Goldman’s president would be among those serving in his royal court.
Who can say precisely why Cohn, a Democrat, said yes when Trump asked him to be his top economic aide? No doubt Cohn has been asking himself that question in recent weeks. But he’d hit a ceiling at Goldman Sachs. In September 2015, Goldman announced that Blankfein had lymphoma, ramping up speculation that Cohn would take over the firm. Yet four months later, after undergoing chemotherapy, Blankfein was back in his office and plainly not going anywhere. Cohn was 56 years old when he was invited to Trump Tower. An influential job inside the White House meant a face-saving exit — and one offering a huge financial advantage.
Trump spoke of the great financial price Cohn paid to join him in the White House during his speech in Cedar Rapids. But something like the opposite was true. A huge amount of Cohn’s wealth was tied up in Goldman stock. By entering government, he could sell his stake in the firm to comply with federal ethics laws. That way he could diversify his holdings and avoid roughly $50 million in capital gains taxes — at least until he sold the replacement assets.
A job in the White House might also prove an outlet for his frustrations with politicians and regulators intent on reining in the worst impulses of Wall Street. Trump was Trump, but he had also vowed to dismantle financial reform. “Dodd-Frank has made it impossible for bankers to function,” Trump said during the campaign. The new president had the potential to serve as a vessel for Goldman’s corporate interests.
“Maybe the one thing that holds this administration together is a belief that markets know best, and the least regulation is the best regulation,” said Dennis Kelleher of Better Markets. “Goldman’s interests fit with that very nicely.”
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin testifies before the House Appropriations Committee’s Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill on June 12, 2017 in Washington, D.C. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Trump had given Steve Mnuchin, his campaign finance chair, the grander title. But taking over as Treasury secretary meant being confirmed by the Senate. Mnuchin’s confirmation vote was delayed after it was revealed that he’d neglected to list $95 million in assets (including homes in New York, Los Angeles, and the Hamptons) on his Senate Finance Committee disclosure forms and failed to disclose his ties to an offshore hedge fund registered in the Cayman Islands. Mnuchin was not confirmed until mid-February. The president’s pick for commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, a financier who had bailed out several of Trump’s casinos a few decades earlier, was not confirmed until the end of February.
As a presidential aide, Cohn did not need Senate approval. He was part of the skeletal crew that arrived at the White House on day one, giving him a critical head start on wielding his clout and cultivating his relationship with the new president. At that point, Trump was summoning Cohn to the Oval Office for impromptu meetings as many as five times a day.
In early February, Trump signed an executive order giving his Treasury secretary 120 days to give him a hit list of regulations the administration could eliminate. But with Mnuchin yet to be confirmed, the task appeared to land in Cohn’s eager hands. He was standing at the president’s shoulder when Trump said, “We expect to be cutting a lot out of Dodd-Frank.” Shares in Goldman Sachs, which had jumped by 28 percent after the election, rose another $6 a share that day. Soon Cohn was coordinating Trump’s plans not only for rolling back regulations, but also for creating jobs and slashing taxes. He met with a health care specialist, along with House Speaker Paul Ryan and other Republican leaders, to discuss alternatives to the Affordable Care Act.
Proximity is power inside any White House, especially in this one, where policy often seems shaped by Trump’s last conversation. Treasury is several blocks away, while Cohn’s office was in the West Wing, directly across the hall from Bannon’s. Operating within a chaotic administration, Cohn was reportedly energized and focused, working around the clock. Cohn is a tenacious practitioner who, after ascending to the heights of Goldman Sachs, could teach a master class on the art of seizing a leadership vacuum and building alliances. On day 39 of the new administration, the White House sent out a press release introducing the “best-in-class team” Cohn had assembled “to drive President Trump’s bold plan for job creation and economic growth.” The 13 advisers included familiar figures who had worked for George W. Bush or his father, but they also included at least three former lobbyists so conflicted they would need an ethics waiver to work in the White House. For instance, Michael Catanzaro, the man Cohn chose to oversee energy policy, was until last year a lobbyist for such oil, gas, and coal companies as Devon Energy and Talen Energy. Shahira Knight had been a lobbyist for Fidelity, the mutual fund giant, before joining Cohn’s team.
Cohn’s strategy in those early months was to make himself indispensable to the new president. Cohn emerged as one of the few people around Trump comfortable interrupting him during a meeting or openly disagreeing on points of policy. The New York Times reported that Trump often turned to Cohn during a meeting and asked him directly, “What do you want to do?” Early on, Trump referred to Cohn as “one of my geniuses” — a quote Reuters attributed to a “source close to Cohn.”
Soon, major media were painting Cohn as a leading centrist inside the Trump White House because he had staked out positions on immigration, international alliances, and global warming at odds with Bannon’s hard-right nationalism. Bannon and his allies only bolstered this narrative by characterizing “Carbon Tax Cohn” and his allies, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, as interlopers — “the Democrats,” as some inside the White House called them. “Within Trump’s Inner Circle, a Moderate Voice Captures the President’s Ear,” read the headline of a Cohn profile in the Washington Post.
“Led by Gary Cohn and Dina Powell — two former Goldman Sachs executives often aligned with Trump’s elder daughter and his son-in-law — the group and its broad network of allies are the targets of suspicion, loathing and jealousy from their more ideological West Wing colleagues,” the Washington Post reported. Fueling the rage of the ideologues, Cohn and his allies were largely winning. Trump dropped Bannon from the National Security Council and elevated Powell to deputy national security adviser. When, after Charlottesville, false reports leaked that Cohn was so disgusted with the president he was resigning, blue-chip stocks slid down. Instead, Bannon was out. Cohn, despite reports that he invoked Trump’s wrath for critical remarks to the Financial Times, was still in and expected to deliver the president a win on corporate taxes.
National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn arrives at a Wall Street heliport while traveling with President Donald Trump on May 4, 2017 in New York City. Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images
On the day it was announced that he was joining the Trump administration, Cohn said on a goodbye podcast for Goldman Sachs, “You look at the size of our capital. You look at the size of our balance sheet. You look at the size of our people — it’s just enormous.” More than $40 billion had flowed into the bank in 2016, bringing the bank’s assets under management to a record $1.38 trillion. That meant pressure to find ways to put that money to work — an enormous challenge if regulators finally shut down Goldman’s prop trading arm.
How exactly could Cohn recuse himself from matters involving Goldman when almost every aspect of his job has the potential to either grow Goldman’s profits and inflate its stock price — or tank them both?
“To the extent Goldman Sachs is a direct party in a matter, Gary will recuse himself,” a source familiar with the situation said. But, the source added, “As NEC director, Gary is going to touch on matters on the day-to-day economy as a whole and Goldman Sachs is a participant in the economy, thus Gary will indirectly touch on things that affect Goldman Sachs along with other banks and institutions.”
Yet rather than publicly recuse himself on attempts to undo Dodd-Frank, Cohn has led the charge from inside the White House. On that matter, Cohn is a walking, talking conflict of interest.
While at Goldman, Cohn had personally met with officials at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to discuss the derivatives reform plank of Dodd-Frank, an arena in which Goldman is a dominant player. He had taken issue with rules imposed by Dodd-Frank that require banks to keep more capital on hand. Requiring banks to hold more money in reserve made them “unequivocally” safer than before 2008, he said in a 2015 interview while still Goldman’s president, but he complained that Goldman was now able to lend less money, hurting profits. And then there’s the Volcker Rule. Cohn, while still president of the firm, had traveled to D.C. at least twice to personally lobby regulators about its implementation.
These days, it can be hard to tell whether Cohn is speaking as a high-ranking White House official or a former Goldman Sachs executive.
In the wake of Trump’s February call for a rollback in financial regulations, Cohn vowed in an interview with Bloomberg TV, “We’re going to attack all aspects of Dodd-Frank.” The first example he gave: the Volcker Rule, which he cast as harmful to the country’s competitive advantage. In an interview that same day with Fox Business, he homed in on another Goldman obsession: Dodd-Frank’s capital requirements. “Banks are forced to hoard money because they are forced to hoard capital, and they can’t take any risks,” he said. Mortgage, auto, credit card lending, and commercial lending are all up since 2010. Yet Cohn told Fox viewers, “We need to get banks back in the lending business, that’s our No. 1 objective.”
Roy Smith, a former Goldman partner now teaching at the NYU Stern School of Business, argues that Cohn should avoid the administration’s effort to unwind Dodd-Frank altogether, but “at a very minimum he has to excuse himself whenever the discussion turns to Volcker.” But Smith said he has trouble imagining Cohn leaving the room when Volcker comes up. “The hard part for someone like Cohn is that he knows where all the pain points are with Volcker and other parts of Dodd-Frank,” Smith said. “His every instinct would be to get involved.”
Beyond deregulation, two other pillars of Trump’s economic plan — cutting taxes and investing in infrastructure — would have dramatic impacts on Goldman’s bottom line.
Thanks to loopholes, many Fortune 500 corporations pay little or no corporate income tax at all. By contrast, Goldman Sachs typically pays taxes near the official 35 percent federal tax rate. In 2014, for instance, Goldman paid $3.9 billion in taxes on profits of $12.4 billion, or 31 percent. Last year, the firm’s tax bill was $2.7 billion on profits of $10.3 billion, or 28 percent. In that same Fox Business interview, Cohn said that “lower corporate taxes” was the White House’s “starting point” on tax reform; cuts to personal income taxes were a secondary concern.
Under the plan Cohn and Mnuchin announced last spring, what Cohn called “one of the biggest tax cuts in the American history,” corporate taxes would be capped at 15 percent. If Cohn succeeds, Goldman will save massive sums: At that rate, Goldman would have paid $2 billion less in taxes in 2014, $1.4 billion less in 2015, and $1.4 billion less in 2016. The Koch brothers’ network of political groups has already spent millions of dollars to promote the proposal. Even Blankfein, who the Trump campaign singled out in the commercial it ran in the final days of the campaign, acknowledged in a voicemail to employees that Trump’s commitment to tax cuts, deregulation, and infrastructure “will be good for our clients and our firm.”
The details of the president’s “$1 trillion” infrastructure plan are similarly favorable to Goldman. As laid out in the administration’s 2018 budget, the government would spend only $200 billion on infrastructure over the coming decade. By structuring “that funding to incentivize additional non-Federal funding” — tax breaks and deals that privatize roads, bridges, and airports — the government could take credit for “at least $1 trillion in total infrastructure spending,” the budget reads.
It was as if Cohn were still channeling his role as a leader of Goldman Sachs when, at the White House in May, he offered this advice to executives: “We say, ‘Hey, take a project you have right now, sell it off, privatize it, we know it will get maintained, and we’ll reward you for privatizing it.’” “The bigger the thing you privatize, the more money we’ll give you,” continued Cohn. By “we,” he clearly meant the federal government; by “you,” he appeared to be speaking, at least in part, about Goldman Sachs, whose Public Sector and Infrastructure group arranges the financing on large-scale public sector deals. “Goldman Sachs is one of the largest infrastructure fund managers globally,” according to infrastructure advisory firm InfraPPP Partners, “having raised more than $10 billion of capital since the inception of the business in 2006.” Lost in the infamous press conference the president gave in the lobby of Trump Tower a few days after Charlottesville, with Cohn and Mnuchin visibly uncomfortable at his right flank, were Trump’s remarks on infrastructure, the ostensible purpose of the event. The thrust was that the president would grease the wheels for project approvals by signing an executive order rolling back environmental impact requirements and other elements of an “overregulated permitting process.”
In countless other ways, Cohn is positioned to help the firm that has been so good to him over the years. The country’s National Economic Council adviser might caution a president against running too large a deficit, especially amid a healthy economy. But Goldman Sachs is in the business of finding investors to underwrite government debt. An economic adviser might caution a populist president that corporate inversions often cost jobs and tax revenue. Instead, Trump has ordered a review of policies Obama put in place to discourage them — good news for Cohn’s former colleagues. Transparency has been a watchword of initial public offerings dating back at least to the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, but easing those rules, a step Goldman has sought, could potentially generate hundreds of millions of dollars in fees for investment banks such as Goldman. The SEC announced in June that it would allow any company going public to withhold details of its finances and strategies, an exemption previously available only to firms with under $1 billion in revenue — more good tidings for Goldman. Just loosening the rules for IPOs, said Tyler Gellasch, the former Senate staffer, “could mean hundreds of millions of dollars more to Goldman.”
In June, the Treasury Department released a statement of principles about the administration’s approach to financial regulation focused on promoting “liquid and vibrant markets.” Not surprisingly, the report included a call to ease capital requirements and substantially amend the Volcker Rule.There’s a Pittsburgh-Themed Bar at the Sochi Olympics
Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. And they’re always glad you came.
BY PM STAFF
Photo via Twitter
Let’s all just forget about the bribery, corruption, human and animal rights violations, graft, vice, intimidation and delusional politicians surrounding the 2014 Sochi Olympics and focus on the positive. There’s a Pittsburgh-themed bar in Sochi! It even has a replica of Fifth Avenue Place.
These photos were taken by ’Burgh-native and current Getty photographer Jared Wickerham while on assignment in Sochi today.
No word if they serve Iron City.
Follow Wickerham on Twitter for more Russian adventures.
#Art: Used-wood pallets turned into beautiful bridge-themed paintings
Some Pittsburgh natives who relocate remind themselves of their |
Children in south-Sudan or Ethiopia would have better chances then you to survive.
If you are lucky enough to survive first 28 days of your life is a high chance you may not live to see your 5th birthday, as out of every thousand children under 5 years, 89 die mostly from conditions such as diarrhea, pneumonia and other vaccine preventable conditions. In case you survive this possibility for you to see your mother is very slim. Because it is a high probability your mother will die giving birth to you or a few days after that.Maternal mortality of Balochistan is 785/100,000 live births, as compared to 272/100,000 live births in Pakistan.
In fact if Balochistan was a country it would have been on the 8th country with highest maternal mortality ratio in the world (next to south-Sudan, Chad, Somalia, Central African Republic, Burundi and Guinea-Bissau) You think you are lucky you lived...Think again because there is a 50% chance that you will be chronically malnourished as every one in two child in Balochistan is stunted. Research suggests that stunting affects cognitive skills and mental development, school performances and economic productivity.
Only 40% of the population in the province is covered by community based health workers and facilities are even less.
Now you are 6 and survived the odds somehow,
pray and pray hard that you are in those 44% children who are enrolled in primary school. Though there are nearly 10,000 primary schools in Balochistan but probability of that school being without a teacher or not practically existing on ground is very high. (They call it a Ghost school)
So now you have had your primary education because you are not that unfortunate…you have to pray again and pray harder because 77% of children enrolled in primary school dropout and may not attend a middle/secondary school. But do remember only 30% of the schools are in a satisfactory condition probably you will be sitting on floor outside under a tree shed.
Moreover, remember you have to be a boy to achieve this because if you are a girl your chances to be in a middle/secondary school drop by 50% Now since you are the lucky one – you might fulfill your secondary education and you can actually get a chance to get some higher education –in one of the ONLY three universities in the province.
you are done studying, young energetic looking for employment
You know unemployment rate in Balochistan is 33.4 % which is not that bad you know why because that’s better than being in Afghanistan where this rate is 35%.
So 70% chances are you may get some work But wait there is also a 70% chance that you will earn less than 2 dollars a day. And there is an equal (70%)chance that your household will not have access to food, or there will be no food available to your family.
DAMN!! You thought that was tough
Now imagine you have to live in a ongoing conflict as-well
You can also be in one of those people in an estimated range of 4,000-14,000 people who just disappear. Don’t be shocked. You can actually be one of those who are subjected to enforced disappearances.
If you are luckier you can be killed in a target attack or a bomb blast well more than 500 people have lost their lives in such incidents only in 2013. (Figures go beyond thousands for past one decade)
This is not just any conflict this includes separatist movements, sectarian violence and state funded violence.
Now imagine how unlucky you would be if in the midst of all this there is a 7.8 magnitude earthquake
68.5% chances are that you live in a mud house with half or less percent of chances of having a radio, tv or any mode of transport.
And if you are in the worst affected Awaran district do remember that there are no metalled roads in the district and only 584 KMs of graveled road in an area of 21,630 square kilometers
SO WHEN THE 7.2 EARTHQUAKE STRIKES this is what you will see
Government does not have a head of provincial disaster management authority, there is no cabinet (no ministers as they were never formed even 3 months after elections), Chief Minister is in London for a dead poets birthday, there are only 3 doctors in the worst affected district and only one ambulance.
Pakistani media and the nation is marveled by Earthquakes precious gift..The NEW ISLAND!!
The relief work is targeted (supposedly) by the separatist groups …
The armed forces (allegedly) are holding aid, checking, harassing, and suspecting relief workers and aid being a masked effort to support the separatists
Aid workers (if there are a few or any) too fearful to get in the areas and at the same time striving for funds as international organizations have not been asked for help
International organizations (theoretically saviors of humanity) waiting for a letter or a piece of document to save lives of people
More than 300,000 people..People like you are affected and over 500 HUMAN BEINGS as human as you lose their lives.
And there you are the unfortunate one who lives;
you will either be looking for your loved ones under the debris or burying them in an unknown ditch like Miral a resident of Awaran
Or you are searching for food among the rubble of your once standing mud-house starving for days without any food and water supplies You are waiting for help..
When there are more important things than you and your dead..as a new island, a dead poets anniversary, a freedom fight and a rotten policy to counter conflict. So here you go..
The most unfortunate person in the world!!
(All the stats are referenced from Demographic Health Survey Pakistan 2007, UNICEF WHO and UNESCO studies on health and education)
AdvertisementsStory highlights The DEA says two pharmacies ordered more than 3 million oxycodone units in a year
A typical pharmacy orders 69,000 such units a year, the DEA says
The pharmaceutical distributor involved says it will fight the license suspension
"We believe the DEA is wrong," says the CEO of the company
Agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration raided two CVS pharmacies in central Florida over the weekend, removing controlled substances and suspending the stores' ability to handle or distribute drugs such as painkillers oxycodone and hydrocodone.
The DEA said that during one year, the two pharmacies -- both in Sanford, Florida -- ordered more than 3 million oxycodone units from a pharmaceutical wholesaler, while a typical pharmacy orders 69,000.
"Each registrant (pharmacy) was filling prescriptions far in excess of legitimate needs of its customers," said DEA Special Agent in Charge Mark Trouville during a press conference Monday in central Florida.
The DEA also has suspended the controlled-substance license of the wholesale distributor, Cardinal Health of Lakeland, Florida, according to Trouville.
"Cardinal Health did not fulfill its due diligence to insure controlled substances were not diverted into other than legitimate channels," Trouville said.
On Friday, Cardinal Health filed and received an emergency injunction from a federal judge in Washington allowing the drug supplier to continue filling orders for other pharmacies.
"We believe the DEA is wrong," said Cardinal Health Chairman and CEO George Barrett in a written statement.
"We strongly disagree with the allegations the DEA has made against our facility and intend to vigorously challenge this action," said Barrett.
Despite the DEA raid last weekend, the two Sanford, Florida, CVS pharmacies remain open.
The two Sanford pharmacies remain open filling regular prescriptions but they cannot fill prescriptions for controlled substances such as oxycodone, one form of which is the well-known narcotic OxyContin.
CVS said in a written statement that the company is disappointed by the DEA actions but is fully cooperating with the DEA suspension.
"CVS/pharmacy is unwavering in its compliance with and support of the measures taken by federal and state law enforcement officials to prevent drug abuse and keep controlled substances out of the wrong hands," said CVS spokesman Mike DeAngelis.
Hearings on the suspensions will be held but no date has been set.
Trouville said that since the state of Florida moved to crack down on "pill mills" by banning doctors from directly distributing controlled narcotics, pharmacy sales of controlled substances have skyrocketed.Link to previous issue: Oct 17 – 31
Translations of random snippets from Chinese Dota 2 scene social media… for fun and light reading, etc.
ChuaN
Praise for BTS: “BTS stream not bad, kudos.”
Is a NaVi fan: “NAVI NAVI NAVI”
ddc
Important question: “Asking for a friend, if he fell asleep and missed his girlfriend’s calls, several of them, is he dead meat?!”
IceFrog
Has a Sina Weibo account too, now: http://weibo.com/icefrogcn
KingJ
KingJ’s missed hook (with pic): “OMG”
xiao8 and MMY’s responses: “Your fault!”
(it was also KingJ’s birthday this week)
Mushi
Dad’s birthday wishes: “Lost today to VG. Today was my dad’s birthday, ever year I would take some time on family birthdays to go eat together, but today I wasn’t able to spend time with family to celebrate the occasion. My dad didn’t blame me, in fact his wish was for me to win these games today, but not only have I let down fans I’ve also let down my dad… I’m sorry~ I wish my dad health, happy birthday~~
Sansheng and xiao8
Getting friendly: After xiao8 posted about their undefeated winning run through NEST, Sansheng responded “Director 8 so good, I want to have your babies [flirty face]”
Sag
Exhausting event schedule (NEST): “Played so much that my spinal discs are protruding…”
Yao
Getting fit (with pic): “Life is about fitness, not late night snacks! Time for situps, xiao8, ddc, take your time eating, I’ll be at home.”
Stamina for event (NEST): “Really time to start training stamina for esports in this day and age.”Champs of NEST: “Champions, our first big offline event after our roster changes. Everyone worked very hard, especially Rabbit xiaotuji, with his first career title. The road ahead is still lengthy, brothers let us continue facing our challenges!”
Zhou
About his trashtalking at offline (NEST): “Been a while since my last offline event, I wanted to shout and get our team’s spirit flowing. Usually in these kinds of events if you lose in spirit then things become much more difficult, in the group stages our loss to VG came from just this reason. But anyway, today’s taunts might have been a bit much, so if I offended anyone I want to say sorry here :D”
AdvertisementsImage caption About 6,000 people turned up to the unauthorised party
Police investigating scenes of disorder at a massive unauthorised party in Glasgow have appealed for revellers to send them their videos and photos.
About 6,000 people turned up at Kelvingrove Park, on the day of the Royal Wedding, after the event was organised through Facebook.
After trouble flared, police made 22 arrests, with 11 officers being hurt.
Police want anyone with images or footage of unrest, to e-mail them to Contactus@strathclyde.pnn.police.uk
Two teenagers organised the party through the social networking site, Facebook, but Glasgow City Council warned people not to attend, expressing concern over safety.
Officers injured
Although the party began peacefully, scuffles broke out and police officers moved in to clear the area.
Mounted officers were called in after reports that some police had been pelted with bottles.
More than 100 officers attended the incident.
Image caption Police and paramedics attended after thousands turned up to the park
One of the officers who was hurt was taken to hospital with a head injury but released after treatment.
Det Insp Fil Capaldi, of Strathclyde Police, said: "A major enquiry team has been set up and officers are currently trawling through CCTV footage in an effort to gather more information on the incident and trace those responsible for the trouble.
"We will ensure that those who committed crimes are traced and brought to justice.
"I know that many people who attended the park took photos and video footage, and I would urge them to forward their photos and footage to us to assist with our enquiries."
Police said that many of the 22 arrests had been for alleged offences of breach of the peace and culpable and reckless conduct.
Meanwhile, Glasgow City Council is to explore legal options for recovering the cost - £25,000 - of cleaning up Kelvingrove Park after the gathering.
The council warned beforehand that the gathering was not authorised and outlined concerns over health and safety.
Officials will also discuss the involvement of any clubs or licence holders in the event with the council's licensing board.Report: Portland 5th fastest changing city in U.S.
The LendingTree report examines the amount of change in five factors common to all 1,176 American cities that were studied - rents, home values, the percentage of purchased homes that were previously foreclosed, the influx of new businesses, and the diversity of populations.
Many Portlanders believe their city is rapidly changing. Some changes are welcome, like the increasing food and craft beer scenes. Others are controversial, including the growing number of existing homes being demolished and replaced with more expensive housing.
Now a new report by LendingTree confirms the impression of unprecedented transformation, saying Portland ranks Number 5 among the fastest changing cities in the country.
"Portland's reputation as the Silicon Forest and its growing presence in the tech world may be contributing to the city's rapid change," says Stacia Mullaney, who headed up the research team.
The report is titled "Altered America: The Changing Landscapes if U.S. Cities" It examines the amount of change in five factors common to all 1,176 American cities that were studied — rents, home values, the percentage of purchased homes that were previously foreclosed, the influx of new businesses, and the diversity of populations.
Portland was only in the Top 10 in one of them. It was ranked Number 8 in the highest percent of homes that increased in value last year.
But, according to the report, Portland experienced more change in most of the other factors than the majority of other cities. The report says the city was:
• 50 points above average in the rent change score
• 57 points above average in the home value change score
• 21 points above average in the foreclosures score
• 6 points above average in the business change score
• 2 points below average for the diversity score
"Some cities may rank high in one category but then low in others, so they don't hold up when everything is combined to determine the overall 'fastest changing cities,'" says Mullaney.
Surprisingly, the Number 1 and 2 fastest changing cities in the report are also in Oregon, Bend and Salem. And Milwaukie and Beaverton ranked Number 3 and Number 4 among cities with the highest percent of homes that increased in value last year.
LendingTree drew the data for the report from a variety of sources. Home data was downloaded from Zillow, an online real estate research and service company. Openings of select businesses that reflect an influx of new people were tracked, including Panera Bread, Starbucks Coffee, Jamba Juice, Buffalo Wild Wings, The Cheesecake Factory, California Pizza Kitchen, Ruth's Chris Steak House, Bonefish Grill, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Five Guys Burgers and Fries, Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdale's, Saks Fifth Avenue, Whole Foods Market, Inc., Trader Joe's, and The Fresh Market. And race distribution data was pulled from the U.S. Census at the city level.
LendingTree is a leading online loan marketplace with one of the largest networks of lenders in the nation, providing consumers a way to connect with multiple lenders for a number of financial borrowing needs.
You can read the report at tinyurl.com/zxsyz2k.A Four-Step Plan to Figuring Out What to do With Your Life: How to Get Un-Stuck, Un-Bored, and on Your Way
Editor’s Note:
Due to the overwhelming popularity of this post, we’ve developed a free workbook version that includes the content below, as well as some extras to help you along the way. You can access your complimentary copy, and become a part of our community, by signing up for our newsletter
You will also find this and similar exercises and activities in our book The New Alpha: Join the Rising Movement of Influencers and Changemakers Who are Redefining Leadership. (If you like this blog post, chances are, you’ll love the book, which is similar, but much more comprehensive.)
Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?
~Mary Oliver
The Problem
While catching up with a friend of mine the other day (We’ll call her Kira), she lamented (as so many of us in our late 20s and 30s do) that she felt confused and torn about what to do with her life.
Despite the fact that she’s about to graduate with an advanced degree from a top school and has plenty of professional connections, Kira is neither excited about her prospective career options, nor has she been able to come up with any better alternatives. “I feel badly complaining about it, because I know there are worse things to deal with, but I feel kind of bored and stuck…or maybe I’m just lazy…” she finally confessed.
Yeah, yeah, yeah—Kira is privileged (which at least she’s self-aware enough to recognize…) and, in general, is dealing with one of the more preferable of life’s challenges: being flush with options, but lacking a sense of direction (or motivation).
Nevertheless, her story is a pretty common one: you start a career, and maybe do some post-baccalaureate or graduate training, and you’re a few years in—finally having some time to reflect and even coast a little—when you realize that you’re feeling “off-path,” “off-center,” and like you’re maybe/possibly/definitely headed in the wrong direction….
You begin to recognize that the current state of the world feels wrong, but have no flipping idea what to do to set it right, and the more you think about it, the more you stress and fret about making the wrong move—you’re no longer 22—decisions you make now matter! (Yada, yada…).
The reality is that tons of people go through this and it’s totally normal—and in my opinion, it may even signal some high level of self-reflection and thoughtfulness, and a desire to always question the status quo—all of which are good!
A Workable Solution
So, first things first, stop wallowing and beating yourself up, recognize the privileged position you’re in (i.e., Having options is more than most people in the world have, and if you’re still feeling bad for yourself, try this), and get ready to deal with your semi-existential crisis head on as I walk you through the 4 basic steps that I shared with Kira to figuring out what to do with your life…
Materials Needed
A few sheets of paper or a notebook
A pen or pencil (Yep, I recommended doing this process by hand versus on the computer; in my experience, something about the brainwaves-to-pen-to-paper process seems to make it work better for most people.)
Step 1: Do Some Self-Exploration.
Get your pen and paper out, and get cozy—you may be here for a while.
When you’re ready, I want you to write down your top 25 accomplishments in life—things that you succeeded at and that you enjoyed doing.
Identifying all 25 might take a few days, so feel free to carry a notepad around to use as necessary, or email yourself a note from your phone when you think of an item to add to your list—just be sure to get the email correct. (Poor Daniel Harlan gets so many of these from me…)
Once you have 25 items on your list, narrow it down to your top seven (and, no, you can’t just start with seven—you must have a list of 25 and narrow it down to seven). Now take a look at these seven: Underline, highlight, or circle anything that stands out or strikes you as interesting.
When you’ve got your final list, take 10 minutes to answer the following questions:
What values can you do you see as important to you, based on these stories? (e.g., I value moral courage!)
What character strengths do you see in yourself, based on these stories? (e.g., I’m persistent!)
What are your technical skills, or the things you’ve learned to do—like data analysis or computer coding—based on these stories?(e.g., I’m good at teaching!)
What interests or passions do you have, based on these stories? (e.g., I’m passionate about helping others!)
What work conditions (environment, people, etc.) are important to you, based on these stories? (e.g., I like a flexible work schedule!)
How have your accomplishments had a positive impact on others or on the world? Be generous and supportive of yourself here; list anything that even slightly benefits someone other than yourself—no matter how small (e.g., I helped a child understand how to convert fractions to decimals, I showed that girls can be competitive athletes, I bring humor to the work place, I rescued a cat…).
While you’re at it, don’t stress too much about getting the categories right here (e.g., maybe you list the same thing as a strength and a value—totally fine); the important thing is that you’re beginning to hone in on your ideal, authentic, and most purpose-driven identity.
Based on your answers to these questions, can you identify any common patterns in terms of the skills you used, your motivations, your work environment, your roles, your colleagues, the impact you had, the type of task?
WRITE THESE DOWN.
Step 2: Identify the Activities That are Best Suited to Your Unique Identity.
Take a look at the notes that you took in Step 1 about your values, strengths, skills, interests or passions, ideal working conditions, and contributions to others. Which are most important to you on a gut-level? Which ones give you a sense of purpose?
(Hint: Research suggests that identifying what gives you a sense of purpose, even if you have to experiment a little, is critical to long-term fulfillment, so don’t skimp on this part…)
What activities, roles, or jobs would allow you to do all, most, or some of the important items from your list?
WRITE THESE DOWN. Don’t worry too much about whether you want to make a career out of them—we’ll get to that later.
Here’s an example from a friend of mine:
Responses from Step 1:
I’m good at acting/entertaining/dancing.
I love English!
Helping others is important to me.
I value autonomy/flexibility, but also like collaboration.
I’m organized.
I like working with others.
I want flexibility in my life and don’t want to work in an office.
I enjoy contributing by supporting others.
Here’s a selection of activities that he listed for Step 2:
Be an actor. Join a community theater. Teach acting.
Be an actor/waiter.
Be a teacher. Teach English. Tutor in English.
Be a personal assistant and help people get organized.
Write a book.
Be an editor. Be a freelance editor (work from home).
If you’re struggling to identify your options here, try the following:
Do a few informational interviews. Think about people who do things that sound interesting to you. Drop them a line and ask if you can meet them for coffee (or eat a bunch of caramels) and ask them about what they do. ProTip: make a list of questions to ask beforehand or these conversations can be awkward and a waste of everyone’s time.
Do some volunteer work. A good friend of mine is a sales manager, but is interested in working with animals (a passion that she’s harbored for several decades now…). Since she’s not 100% sure this is the right career for her, she’s sticking with her day job for now, but testing the waters with a volunteer gig at a local animal shelter. If all goes well, she may very well make the leap—or maybe she’ll stick with her retail job and get her fill of working with animals on the side (a totally fine option, as long as she feels like she’s fulfilling her purpose and doing activities that honor her values, skills, preferences, needs, etc.).
Join a local group/club that sounds interesting or fun. Join Toastmasters to brush up on your public speaking skills, try intramural soccer, join the school board, or start a book club. If you don’t know where to start, check out your local options on MeetUp.
Take a career-related personal development course or assessment. You can take these from a career coach (I’m thinking of offering a 2-day workshop on this for Bay Area folks, so contact me if you’re interested), through a connection with your college alumni career center, or for free online. (This one is pretty good.)
Step 3: Determine How to Incorporate These Activities Into Your Everyday Life.
Okay, so you’ve figured out who you are (I mean—the basics….), and what kinds of activities honor this identity (at least a short list…). Now it’s time to think about how to incorporate these activities into your everyday life.
There’s no one best way to approach this—and so much depends on your context and situation (e.g., which of these activities you already do, how flexible you are re: changing jobs/careers, whether you want to explore an activity more or make the leap toward doing it regularly), but here are a few questions to help you as you explore your options:
Which of the activities on your list do you already do on a regular basis—either at your job, through your hobbies, as a volunteer, or in your personal life? Kudos to you—however lost you may feel, at least you’re incorporating some aspects of your true identity into whatever you’re currently doing.
Which other activities do you want to explore or do more of?
Which activity seems to “pull” you the most based on your research from Step 2? (Hint: if nothing pulls you, then go back to Step 1 and/or Step 2. When you hit on the right activity or activities, you’ll feel a physical reaction in your body—usually in the stomach or heart, but sometimes in your head; you’ll know when it happens.)
Does this activity involve a job or career change or can you incorporate it into your life as a hobby or a tweak to your current job/path (e.g., talking with your boss about taking on more management responsibility, working from home, leading a training)?
If you think it’s more of a tweak or an add-on, then DO IT NOW (e.g., sign up for the race, invite your friends over for dinner, call the local community center about being a volunteer, make an appointment to talk with your boss, etc.).
If you think that it may necessitate a job or career change, then consider your certainty around how fulfilling this activity will actually be. Is it likely to increase your happiness, give you a greater sense of meaning, something else that’s important to you?
Here’s the rule of thumb:
high certainty about fulfillment potential = consider a big change
low certainty about fulfillment potential = do more exploration
If you need to spend more time exploring (which is fine and even good!), go back to the exercises listed in Step 2. If you’re ready to implement, then take a deep breath, talk to anyone that you need to talk to (like your partner or spouse—especially if it impacts them), make the necessary preparations, and take the leap!
Now…for some obligatory advice on quitting your day job:
If after getting this far, you’re pretty sure that it’s time to move on from your current job or career path, consider whether you want to take the leap now (Are you financially and emotionally prepared? What’s your back up plan?), or whether it may be better to ease your way into this by remaining in your current position, but exploring other options (networking, informational interviewing, volunteering, etc.)? Consider the plusses and minuses of both options. (If you can’t identify plusses and minuses for both of these options, then you’re not ready to make the leap.)
Also, consider whether you really need or want to change your job or career. I have a friend who’s passionate about both social science and clowning (You can’t make this stuff up…), so she’s a college professor by day and does clowning after classes—unconventional, but it works for her!
Step 4: Reflect, Adapt, and Change Course as Necessary.
Perhaps the most important and hardest part of this whole process is recognizing that getting it right is going to take some time and energy—which is exactly why so few people actually get it right—nothing worth having comes easy, and many people give up when things get tough.
The point is not to figure this all out in a day or a week (however much I wish it worked this way…), but to be thoughtful and reflective and to LEARN from your experiences. Explore what works better or worse and adjust your behavior and actions as you go.
In the long run, if you are relentless about keepin’ on keepin’ on, you’ll eventually find your right path and end up where you’re meant to be. If you’re lucky, though, this too will change and shift over time as you grow and change and get to know yourself better, so you’ll likely need to revisit the steps listed in this guide more than once, which you shouldn’t feel at all badly about.
Good luck and leave your comments below to let us know how it’s going, or to share any tips that you pick up along the way, and as Liz Gilbert would say, “Attraversiamo!”
Keywords: leadership, personal development, career, fulfillment, happinessA Jesuit priest who used to say Mass at our convent was on the subway making his way to visit his mother on Ash Wednesday.
At one stop a young man entered the subway car and told the priest to hand over his wallet. When the priest explained that he did not have a wallet with him, the young man made him empty his pockets.
The priest pulled out his train pass, some change, and a little silver box. The young man demanded to know what was inside the box.
The priest said, “Well, I am a Catholic and it is Ash Wednesday so I am bringing some blessed ashes to someone who is sick.”
The young man responded, “Oh, I am Catholic, can I have some ashes?”
So the priest opened the little box, said the prayer and traced the cross on the man’s forehead.
The young man left at the next stop.
When I heard this story everyone around me laughed, imagining the priest tracing the cross on the young thief’s forehead and saying, “Repent, and believe in the Gospel.”
I said, “I hope he didn’t hold anyone else up that day with his forehead marked with a cross!”
After our laugh however, I kept thinking about that young thief.
I thought about how we are all actually quite a bit like him.
I hear a lot from people who are ashamed of the way they live their faith. Perhaps it is the Latino culture here in Miami but many people idealize religious life and say to me, “I am such a bad Catholic, but you would not know about that, you are a sister, so close to God.”
This kind of talk makes me want to gag. Of all people, I know who I am. I know that I am only in the convent (and not a prison, hospital or coffin) by the grace of God. I also know my sisters, even the ones who entered the convent as young teenagers before they had a chance to wreak havoc on their souls. We are all sinners. Every. single. one. of. us.
Inside and outside the convent, we all have our sins, our foibles, our hypocrisies. Perhaps some look more serious than others. Some people wear their sins on their sleeves (or their waistlines), while others hide their putrid, rotting sins in whitewashed tombs of pride. But the truth is that we are all imperfect Catholics. All of us. The sinners and the saints.
So as I continue in this Lent, I feel like I am that young thief exiting a subway train. My forehead was marked with a reminder that I am a sinner, and chances are, despite my best intentions, I will sin again, and again, and again. But every day I am given new chances to change. Perhaps no one will see the tiny hummingbird flutters of change from the outside. Or perhaps others will just think I am perfect because I am a nun (and they don’t live with me). But I know that I am a sinner.
I am a sinner.
But God is at work.
And that is really what Lenten penance is mostly about, not my work, but God’s work.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
North Korean officials responsible for the construction of a 23-storey apartment block which collapsed have reportedly been executed by firing squad.
Hundreds of people were feared dead when the structure fell to the ground, sparking a rare public apology and with Kim Jong Un being described as 'upset' and unable to sleep.
High-ranking party officials, police and intelligence analysts were among the 500 people killed in the incident in Pyongyang that was described as "serious" by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
Four design and construction engineers were shot by a firing squad, according to Japan's Tokyo Shimbun newspaper, while a military official is believed to have been sent to a prison camp.
Pyongyang's expression of "profound consolation and apology" was the first official news of the disaster, which happened in the Phyongchon district of the North Korean capital.
"The construction of an apartment house was not done properly and officials supervised and controlled it in an irresponsible manner," said the statement from KCNA, which is better known for its strident attacks against South Korea and the United States.
The KCNA statement also said the collapse of the apartment building "claimed casualties" but did not give any indication of how many may have been killed or injured. It said a rescue operation ended on Saturday.
An official from South Korea's unification ministry confirmed on Sunday that a 23-storey apartment building had collapsed in Pyongyang last Tuesday, although he would not say from where the information had been obtained.
The official, who asked not to be identified, said the building was presumed to have held 92 families and that it was common for North Koreans to move into new buildings before construction was completed.
"Hundreds are presumed to be dead, assuming that each family has an average of four members," he said.
A spokeswoman for the unification ministry said it was presumed there were four households on each storey but she also said it was not known exactly how many were in the building at the time.
The KCNA statement said North Korean authorities put emergency measures into place to rescue people from the collapsed building and to treat the injured.
It said that Choe Pu Il, North Korea's Minister of People's Security, had "repented", saying he had failed to supervise the project adequately, "thereby causing an unimaginable accident".
The rare apology from the North came while South Korean President Park Geun-hye's administration faces criticism for its handling of a ferry disaster that killed more than 300 people, many of them schoolchildren, last month.
The North launched vitriolic criticism of Park in the wake of that disaster.
On Saturday night, tens of thousands people attended a candlelight vigil in Seoul for victims of the ferry disaster.
Some marched to the presidential palace demanding Park resign, with police arresting 115 of the protesters.We have decided to search for a team coach for our CSGO squad to take some pressure off team captain MSL's shoulders. With a Danish lineup belongs a Danish coach and this brought us to none other than Casper "ruggah" Due, a veteran player who has been around since the CS: Source days. He will be taking on the role of Team Captain starting on June 1st.
Ruggah played with Copenhagen Wolves in his CS:Source days back in 2011, a team which was the home to every top Danish player at some point. After his switch to CS:GO he was part of Anexis eSports in 2012-2013 where he played alongside some of our current members such as Cajunb and MSL. Being not only a good friend of the players but also a very experienced player himself, we are confident that Ruggah will be able to help our team improve their strategy, teamplay and mindset while competing at the highest level.
Please give him a warm welcome and we look forward to seeing the fruits of his work during the upcoming ELeague and the ESL One Offline Qualifers.The assignments for Week 22 of the 2017 MLS season:
08/05/2017
D.C. United v Toronto FC
(7:00PM ET)
REF: ALLEN CHAPMAN
AR1: Eduardo Mariscal
AR2: Nick Uranga
4TH: Rubiel Vazquez
VAR: Ismail Elfath
Philadelphia Union v FC Dallas
(7:00PM ET)
REF: RICARDO SALAZAR
AR1: Jeffrey Greeson
AR2: Kyle Longville
4TH: Jorge Gonzalez
VAR: Hilario Grajeda
Montreal Impact v Orlando City
(7:30PM ET)
REF: KEVIN STOTT
AR1: Claudiu Badea
AR2: Craig Lowry
4TH: Geoff Gamble
VAR: Ted Unkel
Minnesota United v Seattle Sounders
(8:00PM ET)
REF: JOSE CARLOS RIVERO
AR1: Jose Da Silva
AR2: Adam Garner
4TH: Baboucarr Jallow
VAR: Victor Rivas
Chicago Fire v New England Revolution
(8:30PM ET)
REF: SILVIU PETRESCU
AR1: Oscar Mitchell-Carvalho
AR2: Andrew Bigelow
4TH: Juan Guzman Jr
VAR: Sorin Stoica
Colorado Rapids v Vancouver Whitecaps
(10:00PM ET)
REF: NIMA SAGHAFI
AR1: Matthew Nelson
AR2: Peter Balciunas
4TH: Armando Villarreal
VAR: Fotis Bazakos
Real Salt Lake v |
- has seen more and more vehicles being added to the roads every day. "Chennai roads and lanes are narrow. And pavements and footpaths have become a casualty in a bid to accommodate the ever-growing number of cars," says Ms Hariharan. This puts pedestrians, cyclists and users of public transport at grave risk. "Children, the elderly and the disabled face the maximum risk as they are forced to navigate roads without footpaths or pedestrian crossings," says Venkat, another co-ordinator at Walking Classes Unite. "Billions of rupees are spent on building new flyovers and road widening projects, but pavements remain ill-maintained and totally neglected. In many places they are unusable," he says. 'Frightening' The group says only 19% of Chennai's population uses private cars, but they take up nearly 75% of the road space,. The vast majority of people are dependent on public transport, but their share of road use has been steadily shrinking. Pedestrians say they feel unsafe in Chennai "We want wide and well-maintained footpaths, we want pedestrian crossings, we want dedicated cycle lanes, we want to reclaim spaces which were originally ours," says Ms Hariharan. That is music to the ears of Bharti, a computer professional in Chennai. "It is frightening to be a pedestrian on Chennai's roads," she says. "Pavements should be there for people to walk. But here, people are not able to cross the road easily, we have to wait for long to cross to the other side." Pavements in most areas simply don't exist, she said. "T-Nagar is a busy market area, it's generally very crowded, there is heavy traffic, but there are no pavements. So you have to walk on the road along side the traffic. It is scary."
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StumbleUpon What are these?Robert Hallock is a well known rep over at AMD and a recent tweet of his caught my attention. It is considered to be common knowledge among the initiated that two graphic cards running in SLI or Crossfire do not experience a memory stacking effect. A dual GPU 4(8) GB configuration does not amount to a total of 8GB vRAM, or at least it didn’t till some time ago. Mr. Hallock revealed that with the advent of Mantle API and other low level APIs such as DirectX 12, this is no longer the case and two GPUs finally acting as ‘one big’ GPU is definitely on the cards.
Not an official poster of AMD or Nvidia, naturally. @Wccftech @AMD @Nvidia
Graphic cards in SLI/Crossfire can experience video buffer stacking thanks to low level apis like Mantle
One of the more interesting features of multiple GPU configuration is how the system itself works. The reason why there is no memory stacking effect is because a complete copy of the game has to be run in each GPU, and frames are alternated between whatever number of cards you have. However, with low level APIs like Mantle having now entered the scene, the developer is granted the coveted ‘to-the-metal’ access to the GPU. That means, that with the proper optimization developers can now surpass the limitation of the old soft architecture and enable buffer stacking. Here is an extract of the explanation from his twtter page:
Mantle is the first graphics API to transcend this behavior and allow that much-needed explicit control. For example, you could do split-frame rendering with each GPU ad its respective framebuffer handling 1/2 of the screen. In this way, the GPUs have extremely minimal information, allowing both GPUs to effectively behave as a single large/faster GPU with a correspondingly large pool of memory. Ultimately the point is that gamers believe that two 4GB cards can’t possibly give you the 8GB of useful memory. That may have been true for the last 25 years of PC gaming, but thats not true with Mantle and its not true with the low overhead APIs that follow in Mantle’s footsteps. – @Thracks (Robert Hallock, AMD)
I think I should make it clear hear that just because you are running Windows 10 and DX12 and/or Mantle API does not mean that your multiple GPU configuration is now stacking memory. The capability is present in these low overhead APIs but they will not come into affect until devs specifically optimize the game as such. No optimization would still equal the usual no-stacking scenario. Optimization has always been pretty poor on PC titles due to the immense amount of raw horsepower that the platform offers, but this new development can usher in a sought-after era of optimization (of PC Games) and it will be about damn time.Wren Day, also known as Wren's Day, Day of the Wren, or Hunt the Wren Day ( Irish : Lá an Dreoilín ), is celebrated on 26 December, St. Stephen's Day in a number of countries across Europe. The tradition consists of "hunting" a fake wren and putting it on top of a decorated pole. Then the crowds of mummers, or strawboys, celebrate the wren (also pronounced wran ) [1] by dressing up in masks, straw suits, and colourful motley clothing. They form music bands and parade through towns and villages. These crowds are sometimes called wrenboys.
Wrenboys on St. Stephen's Day in Dingle, Ireland.
In past times and into the 20th century, an actual bird was hunted by wrenboys on St. Stephen's Day. The captured wren was tied to the wrenboy leader's staff or a net would be put on a pitchfork. It would be sometimes kept alive, as the popular mummers' parade song states, "A penny or tuppence would do it no harm". The song, of which there are many variations, asked for donations from the townspeople. One variation sung in Edmondstown, County Dublin ran as such; "The wren the wren the king of all birds/ St Stephen's Day was caught in the furze/ Her clothes were all torn- her shoes were all worn/ Up with the kettle and down with the pan/ Give us a penny to bury the "wran"/ If you haven't a penny a halfpenny will do/ If you haven't a halfpenny/ God bless you!".[2] Often the boys gave a feather from the bird to patrons for good luck. The money was used to host a dance or "Wren Ball" for the town on a night in January. Wrenboys would go from house to house in the countryside collecting money but in the towns the groups were more organised and there was often an element of faction-fighting. In both cases there would be a Wren Captain, usually wearing a cape and carrying a sword; musicians; strawboys and others dressed as old women or other things. It is a day of wild revelry and people usually conceal their identities so they can play tricks on their friends. This type of behaviour is typical of Celtic festivals as a sort of purge. The band of young boys has expanded to include girls, and adults often join in. The money collected from the townspeople is usually donated to a school or charity.
Similar traditions of hunting the wren have been performed in Pembrokeshire, Wales on Twelfth Day (6 January)[3] and, on the first Sunday of December in parts of Southern France, including Carcassonne.[4] The custom has been revived in Suffolk by Pete Jennings and the Old Glory Molly Dancers and has been performed in the village of Middleton every Boxing Day evening since 1994.[5]
A tradition of Hunting the Wren happens on the Isle of Man every St Stephen's Day (26 December) at various locations around the Island. This is a circle dance, music and song, taken around the streets. A stuffed wren or substitute is placed at the centre of a tall hooped pole decorated with ribbons and greenery. Then a lively circle dance takes place around it, to live musicians playing the tune, and from time to time the song is sung. The words of the song on the Island are similar to the Dublin variation and the North Wales version.[6][7][8]
Origin Edit
The Celtic Theory Edit
The wren celebration may have descended from Celtic mythology.[9] Ultimately, the origin may be a Samhain or midwinter sacrifice or celebration, as Celtic mythology considered the wren a symbol of the past year (the European wren is known for its habit of singing even in mid-winter, and its name in the Netherlands, "winter king," reflects this); Celtic names of the wren (draouennig, drean, dreathan, dryw etc.) also suggest an association with druidic rituals.
Lleu Llaw Gyffes, a Celtic hero, wins his name by hitting or killing a wren. He strikes a wren "between the tendon and the bone of its leg", causing Arianrhod, his mother, to say "it is with a skillful hand that the fair-haired one has hit it". At that Gwydion, his foster father, reveals himself, saying Lleu Llaw Gyffes; "the fair-haired one with the skillful hand" is his name now".
In the Isle of Man, the hunting of the wren is associated with an ancient enchantress or 'queen of the fairies' (or goddess) named 'Tehi Tegi' which translates to something like 'beautiful gatherer' in Brythonic (the Manx spoke Brythonic before they switched to Gaelic). Tehi Tegi was so beautiful that all the men of the Island followed her around in hope of marrying her, and neglected their homes and fields. Tehi Tegi led her suitors to the river and then drowned them. She was confronted, but turned into a wren and escaped. She was banished from the Island but returns once a year, when she is hunted.[10][11]
The Christian theory Edit
The myth most commonly told in Ireland[citation needed] to explain the festival is as follows; God wished to know who was the king of all birds so he set a challenge. The bird who flew highest and furthest would win. The birds all began together but they dropped out one by one until none were left but the great eagle. The eagle eventually grew tired and began to drop lower in the sky. At this point, the treacherous wren emerged from beneath the eagle's wing to soar higher and further than all the others. This belief is shown is the song that begins:
"The wren, the wren, the King of All Birds, St. Stephen's Night got caught in the furze."
This also illustrates the tradition of hunting the wren on Christmas Day (St. Stephen's Eve/Night)
The Norse theory Edit
The tradition may also have been influenced by Scandinavian settlers during the Viking invasions of the 8th to 10th centuries though it is usually attributed to the "Christianising" of old pagan festivals by saints to ease the transition and promote conversion.Various associated legends exist, such as a wren being responsible for betraying Irish soldiers who fought the Viking invaders by beating its wings on their shields, in the late 1st and early 2nd millennia, and for betraying the Christian martyr Saint Stephen, after whom the day is named. This mythological association with treachery is a possible reason the bird was hunted by wrenboys on St. Stephen's Day, or why a pagan sacrificial tradition was continued into Christian times. Despite the abandonment of killing the wren, devoted wrenboys continue to ensure that the Gaelic tradition of celebrating the wren continues, although it is no longer widespread.[12]Share. A look back at the moments in gaming news that made us groan, moan and pretend we had something in our eyes. A look back at the moments in gaming news that made us groan, moan and pretend we had something in our eyes.
It almost feels wrong to complain at the end of a year as rich as this one in sweet gamery goodness. Mass Effect 2 blew our minds, the Wii boasted a bunch of amazing exclusives, and Cam has been wandering around the office lately carrying a Bayonetta Real Doll with a disturbing glint in his eye. But still, as they say, s*** happens, and 2010 was no exception. Here's a look at the moments and events in gaming this year that made us cringe.
Sony's Anti-March Agenda Becomes Clear
March 1, 2010 was a dark day for owners of the old PS3 Chunky. A network error of insane magnitude struck Sony's console, rendering them unplayable until the next day. There was panic on the streets, and fear that the problem would be a permanent one. Console allegiances were decried. Copies of Heavy Rain were abused. Game journos all over the world eyed their deadlines with concern bordering on grief. On the plus side, it was a great day for Xbox fanboys, who scoffed and spent the day playing Mass Effect 2, their secret jealousy over Uncharted 2's various Game of the Year awards briefly thrown aside. Of course, by the next day the consoles had all started working again, and we all went back to complaining about the system's quiet first quarter.
You're on thin %$ing ice my pedigree chums, and I shall be under it when it breaks. Now, %$ off.
Dumb Quotes of 2010:
"I remain convinced that in principle, video games cannot be art." - Roger Ebert, a film critic who didn't even like Blue Velvet.
We're Still Over 18!
It wouldn't be an Australian article about games if we didn't throw something about the silly little R18+ debate that keeps on keeping on in here. On December 10, the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General were unable to reach a unanimous verdict on whether or not we should have an R18+ rating for games. At this point, we hardly need to reiterate the arguments for why we need it again.
Sure, that's fine. But he better not take any morphine afterwards!
But by far the worst thing about all this is that now we're going to have to keep writing articles about the issue well into 2011. Since Atkinson stepped down in March, we haven't even had an interesting villain to rally against, and the writing on the issue has stagnated somewhat. We need a new local controversy – could an Australian celebrity do us a favour and die in a LAN cafe after an epic StarCraft session? Ta.
Dumb Quotes of 2010:
"Studies have found that violent video games are a much bigger negative influence on kids (than porn)" – Ron Jeremy, porn star, known for many, many films we can't discuss here.
Proof that video games are harmful.
Infinity Ward Becomes Infinity Minus 48 Or So Ward
Activision has become an easy target. We briefly considered simply posting a bunch of pictures of CEO Bobby Kotick's face Photoshopped onto the bodies of history's greatest villains in place of text in this article, but we couldn't let this slide.
Okay... We couldn't resist.
In March, Infinity Ward president Jason West and CEO/co-founder Vince Zampella were fired from the developer, which had just recently released the stupendously profitable Modern Warfare 2. Why? Activision cites insubordination and breach of contract. The ensuing lawsuits from West, Zampella, and various other employees of Infinity Ward, both former and current, denote that the pair were unsatisfied over substantial unpaid royalties. 38 ex-IW staff now work at the newly formed Respawn Entertainment, under former supervillains EA.
Dumb Quotes of 2010:
(On selling cutscenes) "If we were to go to our audience and say we have this great hour-and-a-half of linear video that we would like to make available to you at a $30 price point or $20 price point, you'd have the biggest opening weekend of any film ever. Within the next five years, you are likely to see us do that." - Bobby Kotick, lovable scamp.
This probably isn't even Photoshopped...
Notable Cancelled Games
Hei$t was cancelled back in January, hopefully putting an end to putting symbols in game titles forever.
This is Vegas ran out of luck in August. As Thomas Pynchon once wrote, sometimes life is Vegas.
Highlander, in development for five years, was cancelled in December. Seems there can't even be only one.St. Louis Cardinals: April Report Card
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One month into the 162-game grind that is the MLB season is hardly a long enough amount of time to make judgements about a team or a player for the rest of the year. However, a month of play does give fans a good idea of certain trends. For the St. Louis Cardinals, it is tough to pick things out, while some developing trends are certainly easier to spot. For example, Aledmys Diaz is not going to hit above.400 all season, that is a certainty. Something tougher to predict would be when and if Mike Leake will become the groundball pitcher the Cardinals signed him to be or if he will continue getting hurt by the longball. Of course that question and more will be contemplated below, so let’s get to it and evaluate the Cardinals performance.
At a glance: The Cardinals are 12-13 overall entering play on Monday night, far below the even modest expectations many sites like Fangraphs had. Struggles with the rotation have hurt the team most, as have slow starts from many key lineup components. The Cardinals sit six games back of the division-leading Cubs, and there are still five months to right the ship, but the ship needs to be righted sooner rather than later as a double digit deficit when May ends would be quite the hole to be in.
Starting Rotation: D
The lone bright spot of the rotation has been Carlos Martinez, who has gone 4-1 with a 2.60 ERA and has 28 strikeouts in just under 35 innings pitched. Michael Wacha has been good as well with an ERA of 3.07, but he has gotten past the sixth inning just once so far this season. Outside of those two there isn’t much to be excited about. Jaime Garcia sports a 3.73 ERA but has taken three consecutive losses since twirling a one-hit gem back on April 14. Mike Leake has been bad, with an ERA above 5.00 and “ace” Adam Wainwright has been downright awful, showing a complete lack of control and feel for his pitches. Things stand to get better of course, especially since Wainwright’s only problem seems to be his control, as he is leaving balls up in the zone for hitters to drive. The veteran pitcher has said he is working on getting his pitches down, and though we are hopeful that will fix Wainwright’s game, for right now the Cardinals get a low grade for their rotation’s putrid performance through one month.
Offense: B+
The Cardinals’ main reason for even having 12 wins is largely because of the offense, which is scoring 5.72 runs per game, second only to who else but the Cubs. The offense is succeeding right now despite glacial starts from Kolten Wong (.232/.308/.232 and no XBH) and Randal Grichuk (.179/.261/.359) as well as slow starts from Matt Holliday (.256/.341/.500) and Matt Carpenter(.242/.375/.429). That’s not even to mention the black hole at first base where Brandon Moss (.227/.325/.545) and Matt Adams (.261/.320/.435) are both struggling to find a groove at the plate.
How has the offense produced then? Credit can go to rookies Aledmys Diaz (.405/.438/.703) and Jeremy Hazelbaker (.313/.352/.672) who have burst onto the scene and have been the motor driving this Cardinals team. Steady contributions from a now-healthy Yadier Molina (.329/.412/.435) and sophomore Stephen Piscotty (.284/.352/.495) have helped as well. Of course two rookies cannot be counted on to drive the offense all season, and Randal Grichuk plus the Matt duo will have to wake up at some point if this team wants to keep running a top-10 offense let alone a top-five offense.
Bullpen: A+
The bullpen has been the saving grace of this team. St. Louis’ bullpen ranks 4th in the Senior Circuit thanks to strong performances from closer Trevor Rosenthal and rookie setup man Seung-hwan Oh. The offense running smoothly and the bullpen being able to hold leads is the main reason the Cardinals are near.500 at all, and outside of Carlos Martinez the Cardinals best pitching have come out of the bullpen.
Overall Grade: C+
The Cardinals’ 12-13 record could be worse if not for the offense and bullpen, but things could also be a lot better and as a result the Cardinals are humming along as an average team. This series against the Phillies though is a perfect chance to bust out the bats and get hot, and the Cardinals are already on their way, as Adams, Diaz, Grichuk, and Wong all hit homers in Monday night’s game. Wainwright also hit a homer to go with his nice pitching line of six innings, five hits, three earned runs, one walk and four strikeouts. Wainwright’s line is encouraging and shows progress, especially with only one walk allowed, which may suggest that Wainwright has started to solve his control issues and be on the right track back to ace status.(Credit: UNMISS/AP Photo)
American relief workers trapped in Bor, South Sudan, were evacuated Sunday aboard United Nations helicopters that took them to the capital city of Juba.
Three U.S. military aircraft sent to evacuate the Americans from Bor on Saturday came under small arms fire from undetermined forces, forcing the mission to be aborted. Four U.S. military service members aboard were injured by the fire.
"This morning, the United States - in coordination with the United Nations and in consultation with the South Sudanese government - safely evacuated American citizens from Bor, South Sudan," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement released Sunday.
Psaki said that an unspecified number of Americans and citizens from other partner nations "were flown from Bor to Juba on U.N. and U.S. civilian helicopters." In light of Saturday's incident, Psaki said that both the United States and the United Nations "took steps to ensure fighting factions were aware these flights were a humanitarian mission."
Violence broke out earlier this week between rival factions of South Sudan's military, and there is concern that the violence could become a full-blown civil war. Hundreds have been killed in the fighting, which has mainly taken place in the capital city of Juba. Bor, in the eastern state of Jonglei, has also seen heavy violence and is reportedly controlled by the military faction not loyal to the government.
The Americans in Bor were transported out aboard flights organized by the United Nations to evacuate its civilian staff from the area, where as many as 15,000 have sought refuge from the fighting at the U.N. compound.
The United Nations Mission in South Sudan said Sunday that they were relocating their non-essential staff from Juba to Uganda and would beef up its military peacekeeper presence in Bor as part of their commitment to protect the civilian population.
"We are not abandoning South Sudan. We are here to stay, and will carry on in our collective resolve to work with and for the people of South Sudan," said Hilde F. Johnson, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for South Sudan. "To anyone who wants to threaten us, attack us or put obstacles in our way, our message remains loud and clear: we will not be intimidated."
Overall the State Department has evacuated 380 Americans and 300 other foreign nationals out of South Sudan, which has erupted in violence over the past weeks as two military factions struggle for power. The Americans have been transported out on four military flights and five military aircraft.
Psaki urged any Americans in South Sudan to "depart immediately" and encouraged them to remain in contact with the U.S. embassy in the capital city of Juba.
"The U.S. government is doing everything possible to ensure the safety and security of United States citizens in South Sudan," Psaki said. "We are working with our allies around the world to connect with and evacuate U.S. citizens as quickly and safely as possible. For their safety and security, we will not outline specific evacuation plans."
On Saturday, the State Department declined to answer how many Americans in Bor were to have been evacuated by the American Osprey aircraft, citing ongoing concerns for their safety.
The Ospreys took ground fire on Saturday as they approached a landing site where the Americans had gathered. U.N. Mission to South Sudan spokesman Jose Contreras confirmed to ABC News that a U.N. helicopter conducting an evacuation mission in the nearby town of Yuai on Friday also took small arms fire. All the crew and passengers aboard the helicopter were able to return safely to a U.N. base.
On Monday, two U.S. military C-130 aircraft evacuated 120 American and western diplomats from Juba after the State Department requested U.S. military assistance in evacuating non-emergency personnel.
The planes also carried in 45 members of the U.S. military's East Africa Response Force (EARF) to stay behind in Juba to protect the U.S. embassy and the American diplomats who remained behind.
The EARF is one of two U.S. military quick response forces for Africa established after the Benghazi consulate attack. The response force of 500 Marines based in Spain can respond to crises in North and West Africa, the smaller 100 man EARF is based in Djibouti and can respond to emergency situations in eastern Africa.
Just this week the U.S. military was wrapping up an airlift mission to the neighboring Central African Republic that is also in the middle of a violent crisis. For the last two weeks two U.S. Air Force C-17 aircraft had transported more than 800 Burundian troops and their equipment to assist with peacekeeping efforts there.
South Sudan is the world's newest country after breaking away from Sudan in 2011. The United States has provided almost $1 billion worth of foreign aid to help the new country establish infrastructure it sorely needs.Shearing
Continuous growth
Most breeds of sheep grow wool continuously, so it is important to shear them at least once per year. In 2013, the average sheep in the U.S. produced 7.3 lbs. of grease wool. Fleece weights vary by breed, genetics, and shearing interval. Shearing is usually done in the spring, so sheep don't get overheated in the summer.
Prior to lambing
Preferably, sheep are sheared prior to lambing. There are many advantages to shearing sheep prior to lambing. Sheared sheep take up less room in the barn and around feeders. It is easier for lambs to nurse sheared ewes. The fleeces will be clearners.
However, sheep that are shorn in the winter require good nutrition and shelter, as a freshly shorn sheep has a higher critical temperature than a sheep with a fleece. Some producers shear their sheep twice per year.
Shearing
Anyone can attempt to shear a sheep, but not everyone will do a good job. Shearing is a specialized skill. It is hard work. Shearing requires skill so that sheep are shorn efficiently without cuts or injuries to the sheep and shearer. If shearing is not carried out skillfully, it is stressful to the sheep. It is best to hire a professional shearer to shear sheep.
Small sheep farms often have a difficult time finding someone to shear their sheep. Small farms can save money by bringing sheep to a central location for shearing. Producers can learn to shear by attending shearing schools. Many states hold annual sheep shearing schools.
Large flocks of sheep are usually sheared by shearing crews who bring a trailer that accomodates shearing, as well as fleece handling and packing.
Before electric shears (up until about the 1880's), sheep were sheared with hand shears or blades. In some parts of the world where electricity is limited or not available, sheep are still blade sheared. Compared to machine-shorn sheep, blade shorn sheep will have more wool.
The New Zealand method is the most common method of electric shearing. Many shearers of Spanish or Mexican descent use a style of shearing that requires the legs of the sheep to be tied.
Electric shears
Electric shears have three basic parts: the handpiece, the comb and the cutters. Commercial sheep shears, having a powerful electric motor attached to the ceiling. Portable electric shears have the motor inside the handle of the handpiece.
Expect to pay $250-500 for a good set of electric shears. More teeth on a comb generally mean a cut closer to the skin. Cutters generally have 4 points, triangular protrusions, and attach to the handpiece by way of four "fingers" that press them firmly against the comb.
Cutters are the first thing to dull, and you will probably want about 3 cutters for every comb. Changing cutters is quick, and it ensures a sharp tool. Remember, dull tools are dangerous tools. Cutters cost $10-15. When purchasing shearing combs, it is important to buy a type of comb that is best suited to the sheep you will be shearing.
Preparing sheep for shearing
A sheep shearer should be contacted well in advance of shearing time. Sheep should be penned before shearing. They should be sorted into the following groups: lambs, yearlings, rams and ewes by breed and/or grade. Sheep should be fasted before shearing. This will result in a much cleaner shearing floor.
A full stomach also contributes to animal discomfort during shearing. Wet sheep should not be shorn. Sheep should be sheared on a clean, dry surface (e.g. wood, carpet, canvas, or concrete). The shearing area should be swept after each sheep to provide a clean surface for the next.
Skirting Fleeces
After shearing, belly wool and tags should be separated from the rest of the fleece. Every sheep producer should learn how to skirt and roll a fleece. To skirt, throw the fleece flesh side down, so the dirty end of the fleece faces up. Remove off-color wool, tags around the breach, very short and matted wool, and other contaminated areas.
Then roll the two sides of the fleece in toward the middle and roll the fleece from one end to the other. The flesh side will face out, created a clean, attractive package for the buyer. It is usually not necessary to tie fleeces. Some wool pools will discount fleeces that are tied. If fleeces are tied (for competition), only paper twine should be used.
Skirting is especially important for high value wool, wool that will be sold to hand spinners, or for fleeces that will be exhibited.
Packaging wool
Small producers can package their fleeces in cardboard boxes or plastic garbage bags. Wool should not be packaged in poly feed sacks or burlap bags. This will contaminate the wool. Large producers should pack their wool in large square bales. The preferred packaging material is clear plastic wool bags.
Different grades or classes of wool should be packaged separately. All belly wool, tags, off-color, burry, seedy, chaffy, cotted, stained or dead wool should be handled and bagged separately. Black wool should be kept separate from white wool. Bags of wool should be labeled. Properly sorted and labeled wool will bring more money to the grower. Wool should be stored in a clean, dry place until ready for market.
Improving Wool Quality
There many steps producers can take to improve the quality of their wool clip. Since black and colored fibers can seriously undermine the value of a white wool clip, black, colored, or spotted sheep should be sheared last and black wool should be kept separate from white wool. One of the major wool contaminants is polypropylene: hay baling twine, poly tarps, and poly feed sacks. Polypropylene should never be allowed to come into contact with wool.
Paint branding can be damaging to wool. If paint brands are used, only approved scourable solutions should be used. Sheep should not be paint branded prior to shearing time. Medium size paint irons should be used and the paint should be applied lightly.
Vegetable matter (e.g. seeds, straw, chaff, and burrs) is a primary source of wool contamination. To help prevent this type of contamination, sheep should not be bedded on hay or straw before shearing.
Overhead hay feeders should be avoided. Hays which allow sheep to poke their heads through will also result in wool contamination. Poor nutrition can weaken the strength of the wool fiber and result in breaks in the wool fiber.
Hair sheep
The widspread popularity of hair sheep breeds poses a significant threat to wool quality. Hair is damaging to a wool fleece. The fleeces from hair x wool crosses should be discarded. Hair x wool crosses should be sheared last.
If hair sheep and wool sheep are raised together, hair may get into the fleeces of the wool sheep. Wool sheep and hair sheep should not be housed or pastured together when the hair sheep are actively shedding. Ideally, they should never be kept together.
Crotching/Crutching
Crutching is a short, quick modification of shearing. Only the wool in the vulva area and around the udder is removed. If ewes are ot sheared before lambing, it is a good idea to crotch them. Crutching offers some of the same advantages as shearing prior to lambing. Crutching is the removal of wool from the crutch of a sheep to keep the area dry and less attractive to blowfly strike.
Not All Sheep Require Shearing
It is generally not necessary to shearing hair sheep and some hair x wool crosses. In addition, many of the primitive sheep breeds will also naturally shed their coats.
The Shear Facts
Professional sheep shearers can shear sheep in under a minute. World records are one sheep sheared in 38 seconds; one lamb sheared in 19.8 seconds; 720 sheep sheared in 9 hours; and 839 lambs sheared in 9 hours. The record for blade shearing was set in 1892 and still stands: 321 sheep in 7 hours and 40 minutes.
In 1994, Australian scientists invented a way of removing the wool from sheep without shearing. They inject the sheep with a special hormone, then wrap them in tight hairnets. Three weeks later, the fleece can be peeled off. The new wool harvest technology is called Bioclip. Australian scientists also developed a robot for shearing sheep.
Researchers are currently trying to breed sheep with bare britch and crutch areas to make shearing easier and to help prevent fly strike.
<= SHEEP 201 INDEXDonate
Original by bmpd; translation and analysis by J.Hawk
Flightradar24 indicates that on the evening of February 15, 2016, the Hmeimim airbase in Syria which is used by the Russian air group has seen the arrival of the Tu-214R remote reconnaissance aircraft belonging to the Russian Aerospace Forces (RF-64514). Judging by the flight path, it arrived from the Kazan Aviation Factory, which is associated with the Tupolev Aircraft Corporation.
This is the second series-produced Tu-214R to come out of the Kazan plant in 2014. It was delivered to the VKS in late 2015.
The two Tu-214R were manufactured under a 2002 contract with Tupolev. Their onboard equipment was designed by the Vega Radio Instruments Concern.
J.Hawk’s Comment: The flight route is interesting when one considers the qualities of the aircraft in question. The Tu-214R is equipped with a synthetic-aperture radar (whose flat antennae are visible on the sides of the fuselage) capable of tracking moving ground targets at ranges of several hundred kilometers and providing targeting data to aircraft and ground-based missile systems. It is, in effect, the airborne component of the “reconnaissance-strike complex” that enables enemy land movements to be detected and interdicted practically in real time. The Tu-214’s flight path would have enabled it to take a very close look at ground movements in ISIS-held territory, including the all-important Raqqa area, and to examine the goings-on in Jordan, where Saudi forces are demonstrating their presence and the British military is holding an exercise. Last but not least, it likely sneaked a peek into Turkish territory to as it was approaching Hmeimim. Its presence indicates the Russian military has become interested in establishing a clear picture of ground movements in Syria and also in adjacent countries in order to provide both early warning against a possible overland invasion of the country and targeting information against such forces for aircraft and long-range rocket artillery.
DonateUpdated 6:30 p.m. ET
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a proponent of U.S. military action in Syria - and a vocal opponent of President Obama's Syrian policy - sneaked across the Syrian border and met with rebels there, CBS News has learned.
The trip was in the works "for weeks, if not months," Mouaz Mustafa, the executive director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force who was with McCain all day, told CBS News' Clarissa Ward. "It's something the senator has wanted to do for quite some time because he's pro-active on the subject of the U.S. being more directly involved in Syria and helping to create the necessary changes on the ground to end the conflict."
While on a trip to Turkey, McCain met with the leader of the Syrian rebels, Gen. Salem Idris, who accompanied the senator across the border at Bab Salameh and facilitated a series of meetings with assembled leaders of the Free Syrian Army.
Mustafa told CBS News' Ward that McCain went to two meetings in Gazantiep, Turkey - near the Syrian border - first and met with a dozen different commanders from all over Syria.
E.U. agrees to lift arms embargo on Syrian rebels
McCain then crossed Bab Salameh and met with a smaller gathering of brigade commanders near the border, Mustafa said. Idris attended all three meetings. McCain, who was inside Syria for roughly an hour, had two personal security guards with him.
McCain and one commander discussed Hezbollah's increasing role in Syrian fighting and also the issue of extremism, when McCain asked commanders how to best combat extremism. The commanders agreed that the best way was for them to be armed under the command of Idris.
According to Mustafa, McCain said that the trip had been very important and that there was no substitute for meeting people and sitting down face to face. He said that more policymakers should make the trip inside and do the same.
McCain's visit was first |
, and DCX, all positive cells in the relevant brain areas were counted and recorded through the use of the cell tracking tool provided with the software. For GFAP and IBA-1, the image was overlaid with 120 × 120 μm grids, and every second grid for IBA-1 or 10 consistent representative grids for GFAP were counted with the total being corrected for the total area to determine the number of immunopositive cells. The size of the hippocampus or dentate gyrus was then measured within the NDP view software to allowing the final measurement to be expressed as cells/mm2. For oxidative stress, the dentate gyrus region from each mouse was ranked on a scale from 0 to 3, with 0 = no staining, 1 = light staining, 2 = moderate staining and 3 = strong staining. The researcher was blinded to the study group of the slides during the slide analysis process. The Coefficient of error was calculated by comparing the total number of immunopositive cells for each subject within each diet and stain to identify the mean and standard error of the mean. The Coefficient of error then was the result of the SEM divided by the Mean. For hippocampal TNFα, the CE for the for high Ω-3:Ω-6 mice was 0.06, for medium Ω-3:Ω-6 mice was 0.12 and for low Ω-3:Ω-6 was 0.10. For TNF-α in the dentate gyrus, the CE was 0.29, 0.21, and 0.31 for high, medium and low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, respectively. For DCX the CE values were 0.17, 0.18, and 0.05 for high, medium and low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, respectively. For Ki67 the CE values were 0.17, 0.17, and 0.19 for high, medium and low Ω-3-Ω-6 mice. For GFAP the CE values were 0.04, 0.12, and 0.04 for high medium and low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice. For IBA-1, CE values were 0.07, 0.06, and 0.08 for high, medium and low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice and for caspase-3 CE values were 0.20, 0.17, and 0.17 for high, medium and low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, respectively.
Free fatty acid analyses
Analyses of free fatty acids were carried out by the Waite Analytical Services. Briefly the standardized protocol extracted total lipids from thawed hippocampi tissue samples utilizing a modified Bligh and Dyer method with the addition of heptadecanoic acid as an internal standard (Tu et al., 2013). Free fatty acids were separated via thin layer chromatography and methylated and then analyzed via gas chromatography. The resultant fatty acid methyl esters were identified based on the retention time of standards obtained by Nucheck Prep Inc. (Elysian MN) using the Hewlett-Packard Chemstation data system. Free fatty acids were quantified as a percentage of hippocampal tissue sample.
Statistical Analyses
All data was analyzed using Graphpad PRISM software (version 6.02). Data was tested for Gaussian distribution using the D'Agostino-Pearson omnibus test. All data passed Normality testing. For Barnes maze learning analysis repeated measures Two-Way ANOVA with Tukey's multiple comparisons test was used, to show whether groups showed significant learning or not. For all other data, comparisons of the effect of different diets within mouse strains were tested using One-Way ANOVA with Tukey's post-hoc test comparisons. For all results, a p-value of < 0.05 was considered significant. All data is represented as mean values ± SEM.
Results
The Effect of Ω-3:Ω-6 Supplementation on Weight and General Open Field Measures
Mice were weighed immediately prior to euthanasia. Mice in the low Ω-3:Ω-6 group (28.5 ± 0.95 g) were found to be significantly lighter than medium Ω-3:Ω-6 (35.7 ± 1.78 g) and high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet (34.4 ± 1.73 g) mice (One-Way ANOVA F = 6.28, p = 0.006, Tukey's post-hoc test p = 0.007, p = 0.029, respectively). There was however no significant correlation between weight and anxiety or weight and immunohistochemistry stain count when analyzed using Pearson correlation.
Differences in locomotor activity were investigated by recording the distance traveled during the Open Field test. No locomotor differences were observed between low, medium or high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet groups (One-Way ANOVA F = 0.14, p = 0.87) (Figure 1A).
FIGURE 1
Figure 1. Locomotor activity and anxiety in the open field. (A) Locomotor activity of mice in the open field measured by distance traveled and (B) anxiety-like behavior in mice measured by time spent in the center of the open field. Data analyzed by One-Way ANOVA within strains with Tukey's post-hoc test, *p < 0.05, as indicated on figure. All data presented as mean ± SEM (n = 10/group).
Anxiety-like behavior was measured in the open field test whereby time spent in the center of the field represents reduced anxiety-like behavior (Flint, 2003; Hart et al., 2010). One-Way ANOVA (F = 3.97, p = 0.032) with Tukey's post-hoc test showed that mice in the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group spent significantly less time in the center of the open field compared to the low Ω-3:Ω-6 group (p = 0.047), with a trend to also spend less time than the medium Ω-3:Ω-6 group (p = 0.068). These results show that the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet leads to increased anxiety in the open field (Figure 1B).
Investigating Effects of Ω-3:Ω6 Dietary Supplementation on Spatial Learning
The Barnes Maze was used to investigate learning behavior as described. Learning ability was inferred from reduced latency to locate the escape hole on subsequent training days over 4 days. A repeated measures Two-Way ANOVA was used to analyses latency by Diet and by Day, showing a significant effect of day of training (F = 13.0, p < 0.0001) but not of diet (F = 0.55, p = 0.59) or interaction (F = 0.85, p = 0.54) (Figure 2). Tukey's post-hoc comparison of day effect suggests that both the medium and high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet groups showed significant learning over the 4 days, with latency on Day 1 significantly higher than on Day 4 in both the medium (p = 0.0047) and high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet groups (p = 0.0004). There were no significant differences between latency on any days for mice in the low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group. These observations suggest that the intake of a high or medium concentration of dietary Ω-3 PUFA's improve the ability of mice to learn across 4 days.
FIGURE 2
Figure 2. Learning behavior in the Barnes Maze. Learning ability of mice on the Barnes Maze measured by latency to the escape location over 4 days of training. All data represent mean ± SEM (n = 10/group).
Table 2 shows results of the Probe trial 1, where the escape box was rotated 90° from the old location. One-Way ANOVA showed no difference between diet groups in latency to find the old location (p = 0.67, F = 0.40) indicating similar spatial memory across all strains, or in time taken to enter the new location (p = 0.94, F = 0.06).
TABLE 2
Table 2. Probe Trial measures of Barnes Maze (retention memory).
Examining Effects of Ω-3:Ω-6 Supplementation on Serum Cytokine Expression
One-Way ANOVA showed a difference between diet groups in both IFN-γ (F = 10.3, p = 0.0047) and TNF-α (F = 6.81, p = 0.01). Tukey's post-hoc analysis indicated that both cytokines were increased in the low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group compared to the medium (IFN-γ p = 0.0068, TNF-α p = 0.029) and high (IFN-γ p = 0.0078, TNF-α p = 0.014) diet groups (Table 3). No differences between diet groups were observed for the remaining inflammatory markers (IL-6, IL-10, MCP-1, or IL-12; One-Way ANOVA, all p > 0.05).
TABLE 3
Table 3. Serum cytokine levels.
Effects of Ω-3:Ω-6 Supplementation on Expression of the Pro-Inflammatory Cytokine TNF-α in the Hippocampus
The hippocampus (including the cornu ammonis, dentate gyrus and hippocampal formation) was investigated due to its' role in spatial learning and memory (Jarrard, 1993; Rolls and Kesner, 2006; Neves et al., 2008). Within the hippocampus, the dentate gyrus was also investigated due to its role in memory and in neurogenesis (Neves et al., 2008). The cytokine TNF-α was investigated due to its' critical role in learning and memory. Recent evidence suggests that a basal level of TNF-α is required for normal memory and learning however excessive levels may be detrimental (Baune et al., 2008; McAfoose and Baune, 2009; Camara et al., 2013). Hippocampal TNF-α positive cells were reduced in a dose dependent manner as shown by less TNF- α positive cells with increasing Ω-3 dietary concentration (One-Way ANOVA F = 16.55, p < 0.001; Tukeys' post-hoc test low Ω-3:Ω-6 vs. medium Ω-3:Ω-6 p = 0.025, low Ω-3:Ω-6 vs. high Ω-3:Ω-6 p = 0.0003, medium Ω-3:Ω-6 vs. high Ω-3:Ω-6 p = 0.041) (Figure 3A). Furthermore, when the dentate gyrus was examined separately, the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet mice had significantly less TNF-α expression than low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet mice (One-Way ANOVA F = 4.45, p = 0.038; Tukeys' post-hoc test p = 0.036) (Figure 3B). A representative image of TNF-α expression in the dentate gyrus is depicted in Figure 4. These results suggest that higher Ω-3:Ω-6 dietary ratio's reduced the expression of the pro-inflammatory cytokine TNF-α in the hippocampus and the dentate gyrus.
FIGURE 3
Figure 3. Total number of TNF-α positive cells in the hippocampus. The total number of TNF-α positive cells in (A) the hippocampus (including the dentate gyrus) and (B) the dentate gyrus only. Data analyzed by One-Way ANOVA within strains with Tukey's post-hoc test, *p < 0.05, ***p < 0.001, as indicated on figure. All data presented as mean ± SEM (n = 5/group).
FIGURE 4
Figure 4. Representative images of TNF-α expression in the dentate gyrus. Representative images of the hippocampus centered on the dentate gyrus to demonstrate expression of TNF-α positive cells at 20× magnification in (A) High Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (B) medium Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (C) low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice and at 40× magnification in (D–F), respectively. Arrows signify relevant stained cells.
Effects of Ω-3:Ω-6 Supplementation on Neuronal Progenitor Proliferation and Gliogenesis Markers in the Dentate Gyrus
To investigate the effect of Ω-3 on neuronal progenitor proliferation, KI67 (proliferating cells) and DCX (immature neurons) expression in the dentate gyrus were examined by staining hippocampal slices with anti-Ki67 antibodies and anti-DCX antibodies. Gliogenesis in the hippocampus was investigated by staining of hippocampal slices with anti-GFAP (astrocyte marker) and anti-IBA-1 (microglia marker) antibodies. The subsequent slides were digitally imaged followed by manual examination.
Under physiological conditions, the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group showed a significant increase in Ki67 and DCX positive cells in the dentate gyrus compared to the low and medium Ω-3:Ω-6 diet groups (Ki67: One-Way ANOVA F = 5.21 p = 0.026; Tukeys' post-hoc test p = 0.030, p = 0.048, respectively; DCX One-Way ANOVA F = 6.70, p = 0.011; Tukeys' post-hoc test p = 0.0.035, p = 0.013, respectively) (Figures 5A,B). The representative images of these stains can be viewed in Figures 6, 7. In contrast, dietary Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio content was found not to modify microglia or astrocyte number in the hippocampus [One-Way ANOVA microglia (IBA-1) F = 2.40, p = 0.13, astrocytes (GFAP) F = 0.20, p = 0.82] (representative images can be seen in Supplementary Figures 1, 2). This indicates that the increase in cell proliferation in high Ω-3:Ω-6 mice was not associated with an increase in astrocyte or microglial number.
FIGURE 5
Figure 5. Effect of Ω-3:Ω-6 diet on neurogenesis in the dentate gyrus. Number of KI67 positive cells (A) and DCX positive cells (B) in the dentate gyrus. Data analyzed by One-Way ANOVA within strains with Tukey's post-hoc test, *p < 0.05 as indicated on figure. All data represented as mean ± SEM (n = 5/group).
FIGURE 6
Figure 6. Representative images of DCX expression in the dentate gyrus. Representative images of the hippocampus centered on the dentate gyrus to demonstrate expression of DCX positive cells at 20× magnification in (A) high Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (B) medium Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (C) low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice and at 40× magnification in (D–F), respectively. Arrows signify relevant stained cells.
FIGURE 7
Figure 7. Representative images of Ki67 expression in the dentate gyrus. Representative images of the hippocampus centered on the dentate gyrus to demonstrate expression of Ki67 positive cells at 20× magnification in (A) high Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (B) medium Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (C) low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice and at 40× magnification in (D–F), respectively. Arrows signify relevant stained cells.
Effects of Ω-3:Ω-6 Supplementation on Oxidative Stress and Cell Death in the Dentate Gyrus
Oxidative stress was investigated through staining hippocampal slices with an antibody to oxo8dG/oxo8G which measures DNA/RNA oxidative damage. Dietary Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio modified the level of oxidative stress, with a significant difference between the median of each group (Kruskal Wallis p < 0.05), with the low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet having a median of 2, representing moderate levels of staining compared to a median of 1, indicating a low level of staining in the medium and high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet groups (Figure 8).
FIGURE 8
Figure 8. Effect of Ω-3:Ω-6 diet on oxidative stress in the dentate gyrus. Representative images of oxo8dG/oxo8G expression in the dentate gyrus at 20× magnification in (A) high Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (B) medium Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, (C) low Ω-3:Ω-6 mice, with representation of the median intensity of staining in each group (D).
Similarly, cell death was investigated through staining hippocampal slices with anti-caspase 3 antibodies (a protein involved in cell apoptosis) and examination of digital images. The dentate gyrus was investigated to determine if the increase in cell proliferation and immature neurons was associated with an increase in cell death. Dietary Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio was not found to modify cell death in the dentate gyrus (One-Way ANOVA F = 0.54, p = 0.59) (representative images can be viewed in Supplementary Figure 3).
Free Fatty Acid Analysis of the Hippocampus
Analysis of Ω-3 and Ω-6 concentrations in the hippocampus of test mice confirmed that alterations in dietary levels of PUFAs do translate to the brain and that mice did consume enough of the pellets to see a change (Table 4). Concentration of Ω-3 increased from the low to high Ω-3:Ω-6 groups (One-Way ANOVA p = 0.0031) and Tukey's post-hoc test showed that the low Ω-3:Ω-6 group had significantly lower levels of Ω-3 in the hippocampus than both the medium (p = 0.037) and high Ω-3:Ω-6 groups (p = 0.0027). Concentration of Ω-6 also decreased from the low to high Ω-3:Ω-6 groups (One-Way ANOVA p = 0.0003) and Tukey's post-hoc test showed that the high Ω-3:Ω-6 group had significantly lower levels of Ω-6 in the hippocampus than both the medium (p = 0.0022) and low Ω-3:Ω-6 groups (p = 0.0004). Analysis of Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio in the hippocampus also confirmed the expected differences based on diet. One-Way ANOVA (p < 0.0001) showed that the low Ω-3:Ω-6 group had a significantly lower ratio than both the medium (p = 0.026) and high Ω-3:Ω-6 diets groups (p < 0.0001) while the medium Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group also showed a significantly lower ratio than the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group (p = 0.0022).
TABLE 4
Table 4. Hippocampus PUFA levels.
Discussion
This study demonstrated that long-term supplementation and increasing the dietary ratio of Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA in unchallenged mature adult (7 month old) WT mice leads to increased anxiety and improved hippocampal dependent spatial memory, with increases in neuronal progenitor proliferation and decreases in TNF-α expression, as well as oxidative stress, within the hippocampus. The effects on behavior, TNF-α expression and neuronal progenitor proliferation appeared to be dose dependent, with the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group demonstrating the highest levels of anxiety and significant learning in the Barnes Maze, the lowest number of TNF-α positive cells within the hippocampus, and the highest rate of neurogenesis whilst the low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet group had the worst performance on the Barnes Maze, the highest TNF-α expression and the highest levels of oxidative stress. This suggests that Ω-3 diet and Ω-3:Ω-6 ratios may play an important role in maintaining normal behavior throughout life.
The three different doses of Ω-3 supplementation used in this study were designed to represent relevant human equivalent quantities of Ω-3 and Ω-6 consumption. The low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet corresponds to a typical western diet, the medium Ω-3:Ω-6 diet represents a physiologically traditional diet, while the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet represents considerably higher supplementation again (Blasbalg et al., 2011; Simopoulos, 2011). As previously discussed, increasing dietary Ω-3 increases the Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio, allowing for higher concentrations of Ω-3 derived metabolites to form, which are considerably less pro-inflammatory than their Ω-6 derived counterparts (Wall et al., 2010). The use of specially designed lab diets based on the AIN-93 M standard was done to eliminate the inherent variability in standard lab chow diets. It should be noted that for the first 2 months after weaning, mice were fed with a standard diet (AIN- 93G) designed to support a healthy development. Any effect of dietary Ω-3:Ω-6 supplementation thereafter can be attributed to the effect of Ω-3 supplementation and Ω-6 reduction on adult central nervous system function, and not due to Ω-3 deficiency during neurodevelopment, which has been previously documented (Gibson et al., 2001; Salem et al., 2001; Ryan et al., 2010; Bhatia et al., 2011; Rombaldi Bernardi et al., 2012). Furthermore, our modified diets were given for 4 months (~60% of lifespan), where supplementation >10% of lifespan has previously been suggested to be beneficial (Hooijmans et al., 2012). Previous shorter-term studies have demonstrated that 8 weeks of high Ω-3 diet supplementation attenuated age related increases in TNF-α, IL-6 and IL-1β and improved spatial memory as compared to an Ω-3 deficient diet (Labrousse et al., 2012). No previous studies using a treatment as long as this one in unchallenged aged mice have been performed. The longer-term supplementation given in this study directs focus on the preventative actions of a high Ω-3-Ω-6 PUFA diet ratio in healthy, unchallenged mice up to middle age during early adulthood. Our results represent evidence for a preventative action of a high Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio against cognitive decline associated with early aging. It is important to note that higher dietary Ω-3:Ω-6 dietary concentrations resulted in increased hippocampal Ω-3:Ω-6 concentrations. This confirms that mice consumed as adequate amount of each diet, and that dietary PUFA modulated brain PUFA concentration thus providing an explanation for the central effects of ingested fatty acids. We did note that the mice consuming the medium and high Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA diet were significantly heavier than the mice consuming the low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet. Previous reviews have linked obesity to higher levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines (Lumeng and Saltiel, 2011), and thus, as the higher Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA diets resulted in reduced inflammation, the weight of mice is unlikely to have played a role.
No differences in locomotor activity were seen in the open field following different diets, however the high Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA diet led to lower time spent in the center of the open field, suggesting increased anxiety. Previous studies investigating similar parameters have shown varying results following Ω-3 deficiency or supplementation (Fedorova and Salem, 2006). For example, several studies showed no difference between Ω-3 deficient and control mice (Nakashima et al., 1993; Carrié et al., 2000a), or between high, low and normal Ω-3: Ω-6 diet groups, consistent with our study (Wainwright et al., 1997). However, other studies have shown Ω-3 deficient mice to have increased locomotor activity (Umezawa et al., 1995; Raygada et al., 1998; Fedorova and Salem, 2006) or mice given high Ω-3 diets had reduced activity (Rockett et al., 2012), while further studies have shown different effects of diet depending on age (Carrié et al., 2000b). All of these studies have used different methods to measure locomotor activity, as well as different dosing protocols, including the use of different foods to increase or decrease Ω-3 consumption and either giving it directly to the study mice at different ages or giving it to the mother before and during gestation, therefore direct comparison between studies is difficult. Similarly, various studies have shown different effects on anxiety behavior in animals after altering Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA levels in their diet (Fedorova and Salem, 2006). Ω-3 deficient mice have previously been shown to have everything from decreased anxiety (Nakashima et al., 1993; Francès et al., 1995), increased anxiety (Carrié et al., 2000a; Fedorova and Salem, 2006), or no change in anxiety measured by time spent in the open arm of an elevated plus maze (Belzung et al., 1998; Moriguchi et al., 2000).
Despite the high Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA diet leading to increased anxiety in the open field, as it has been suggested that anxiety may exacerbate poor memory (Spencer et al., 2010), the Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA ratio within the diet appears to be important for normal cognition, with only the normal and high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet groups showing normal learning across the 4 days on the Barnes Maze, as shown by a significant decrease in escape latency from day 1 to day 4. High Ω-3:Ω-6 supplementation may act through a variety of mechanisms to support normal cognition. Here, it was found that a low Ω-3:Ω-6 diet was associated with increased oxidative stress within the dentate gyrus, with previous studies demonstrating that oxidative stress contributes to age related impairment in learning and memory (Liu et al., 2003). Furthermore, it was found that a high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet ratio reduces the hippocampal TNF-α expression. Whilst at basal levels cytokines are intimately involved in cognitive processes (McAfoose and Baune, 2009), their overexpression is associated with increased risk of multiple neuropsychiatric disorders including cognitive decline (McAfoose and Baune, 2009). As cognition-like behavior improved in the high Ω-3:Ω-6 group while hippocampal TNF-α including dentate gyrus TNF-α decreased, this may represent a healthier concentration of TNF-α as compared to the low Ω-3:Ω-6 group. Interestingly, this decrease in dentate gyrus TNF-a coincided with increased neuronal progenitor proliferation. In this study, Ω-3 supplementation in conjunction with Ω-6 restriction also reduced systemic TNF-α and IFN-γ concentration. This is likely to predominantly occur through increased Ω-3 displacing Ω-6 from the common metabolic enzyme pathway leading to increased Ω-3 derived prostaglandins, leukotrienes, and thromboxanes which are less pro-inflammatory than their Ω-6 derived counterparts (Tassoni et al., 2008; Farooqui, 2009; Wall et al., 2010). Additionally, cell culture studies have demonstrated that Ω-3 down regulates the p38 MAPK signaling pathway resulting in decreased nitric oxide synthase, decreasing nitric oxide, TNF-α and prostaglandin E2 (Antonietta Ajmone-Cat et al., 2012). Furthermore, Ω-3 promotes the production of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR)-γ, which is known to regulate microglia and astrocyte cytokine production. Lastly, Ω-3 has been demonstrated to reduce pathological microglia and astrocyte activation which occurs with aging (Gupta et al., 2012; Labrousse et al., 2012). The modulation of systemic and central inflammation together appears to promote a neuroprotective environment in these unchallenged mature adult (7 month old) WT mice.
Evidence regarding the actions of Ω-6 suggests that while it is an essential fatty acid and necessary in small amounts for good health, large quantities such as in current western diets have been shown to have a detrimental and pro-inflammatory effect (Wall et al., 2010; Blasbalg et al., 2011; Simopoulos, 2011). Thus, the reduction of Ω-6 PUFA in the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet may also be contributing to the protective actions of this diet that were observed in our study.
Further potential mechanisms of improved cognition include the promotion of neuronal progenitor proliferation, which was only noted in mice given the high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet. Increased neurogenesis in the subgranular zone of the hippocampus in young mice (Valente et al., 2009), and in cell culture (Antonietta Ajmone-Cat et al., 2012), have previously been shown to occur with Ω-3 supplementation. This is likely to occur through increased BDNF levels (Jiang et al., 2009), while Ω-3 deprivation has previously been shown to decrease BDNF and phosphorylated CMP response element binding protein (pCREB) (Bhatia et al., 2011). This is the first study to demonstrate that a high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet supports adult neurogenesis (as measured by Ki67 and DCX expression in the dentate gyrus). A high Ω-3:Ω-6 dietary ratio has been demonstrated to have these effects in an approximately middle-age (7 months old) mouse model, supporting a preventative action of Ω-3 PUFA against cognitive decline, thus, investigation of long-term supplementation in young-middle aged human populations may be astute.
In contrast to the demonstrated effects on hippocampal TNF-α levels and on neurogenesis, no effect of diet was demonstrated on astrocyte number or microglia number in this hippocampus of this unchallenged mouse model. Current literature suggests that inappropriate microglia activation plays a key degenerative role in the progression of cognitive decline (Antonietta Ajmone-Cat et al., 2012; Czirr and Wyss-Coray, 2012). This study suggests that in an unchallenged mouse model, increased microglia number is not a major contributing factor and other mechanisms such as the promotion of neuronal progenitor proliferation and modulation of cytokine activity may be more significant.
In clinical studies of age related cognitive decline (ARCD) utilizing Ω-3 supplementation, the dose administered varies from 400 mg/day (Geleijnse et al., 2012) to 2800 mg/day (Van De Rest et al., 2008), while doses of up to 9600 mg/day have been trialed in depression. These doses, supplemented to a typical western diet, result in Ω-3:Ω-6 PUFA ratios of slightly less than the medium Ω-3 supplementation diet in this study (Blasbalg et al., 2011). The total fat intake of this study was standardized to 5% making quantification of human equivalent intakes speculative. Fat restriction allows for precise manipulation of the Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio without using large quantities of Ω-3 PUFA and the increased energy content that comes with fat ingestion. Specifically, in a fat restricted diet, relatively smaller increase in Ω-3 content corresponds to a greater change in Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio. Thus, achieving a similar Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio as the high Ω-3 mouse diet would require considerable fat restriction, or a targeted reduction of Ω-6 intake (Blasbalg et al., 2011). It will be necessary to monitor whether increasing the dose in future clinical trials proves more efficacious, although consideration must be made to investigating dietary fat restriction coupled with Ω-3 supplementation.
In conclusion, long-term Ω-3 supplementation coupled with Ω-6 restriction was demonstrated to increase anxiety, improve cognitive function, reduce TNF-α expression and enhance neuronal progenitor proliferation in unchallenged mature adult (7 month old) mice. These results support the view that in translational research, the preventive effects of a long-term high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet in older adults at risk of cognitive decline require further investigation, also addressing the dose required to result in clinically demonstrable preventive effects on cognitive function. It is unclear however whether supplementation such as used in the current study would overcome a long term significantly pro-inflammatory insult. Further trials investigating Ω-3 supplementation in long term, pro-inflammatory conditions may provide further insight into the efficacy of a high Ω-3:Ω-6 diet in such conditions. Future studies should also include a wider range of behavioral tests, to confirm the effects of Ω-3:Ω-6 ratio in diet on anxiety and cognition, at a range of ages up to old age in mice.
Author Contributions
Authors Trent Grundy, Catherine Toben and Bernhard T. Baune designed the study. Author Trent Grundy performed the behavioral experiments, immunohistochemistry and cell analysis, statistical analysis under the supervision of authors Emily J. Jaehne and Frances Corrigan Trent Grundy wrote the first draft of the manuscript. All authors contributed to manuscript revisions and have approved the final manuscript.
Conflict of Interest Statement
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Acknowledgments
This study was financially supported by the Neuroimmunology Research group of the University of Adelaide. The authors thank D. Apps from WAS for analyzing the free fatty acids, C. Jawahar for assistance with behavioral and feed protocols and thank Z. Sarnyai for helpful discussions on the topic of this manuscript.
Supplementary Material
The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: http://www.frontiersin.org/journal/10.3389/fncel.2014.00399/abstract
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face up to ten years in prison.
In the wake of Jasarevic's machine gun attack, Gornja Maoca became known across the country. Previously, no one in Bosnia-Herzegovina had been familiar with the assailant's native village. Jasarevic's physical appearance - a dense beard, a long robe - betrayed his affiliation: he was an adherent of the Wahhabi orientation of Sunni Islam, as practised in Saudi Arabia. Its supporters are sometimes called Salafists.
A European Islam
"This movement of Islam is at odds with the Sunni Hanafi orientation, which has been practised in Bosnia-Herzegovina for centuries," explains Enes Karic, professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Sarajevo.
Wahhabi Bilal B. faces accusations of recruiting jihad fighters in Bosnia
Ottoman rule began in Bosnia in 1456, which was followed by a process of Islamization in the population. According to Karic, Islam developed into an "urban" doctrine, its major interpretations emerging from "urbanized" madrasas (Islamic schools).
"In Bosnia-Herzegovina, Islam was always involved in an exchange of ideas with the country's other religions: Catholic and Serbian-Orthodox Christianity, as well as Judaism," Karic explained. By 1878, when Bosnia-Herzegovina was under Habsburg rule, Bosnian Muslims were living in a secular society in which religion played an important role, but did not dominate everyday life.
Despite that tradition, a group of radical Islamists, including the Wahhabis of Gornja Maoca, has now gained ground in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Primarily, this is a result of the Bosnian war, which broke out in 1992 and lasted until 1995. At the time, volunteers from various Islamic countries entered Bosnia-Herzegovina, supposedly joining the fight on behalf of the Muslim population.
Financial backing from Saudi Arabia
When the war was over, not all of those Islamist fighters left the country. Many among the 2,000 mercenaries were issued Bosnian passports and went on to recruit young people for their religious struggle.
'Nasa stranka' leader Dennis Gratz
In addition, Saudi charity foundations now regard Bosnia-Herzegovina as their sphere of influence. They have poured a lot of money into the construction of places of worship, including the King Fahd Mosque in Sarajevo, the biggest mosque in the Balkans with a capacity of 4,000, which was inaugurated in 2000 and is dominated by Wahhabis.
"In local mosques, as well as among the majority of the indigenous Muslim population, the extremists encounter rejection," said Dennis Gratz, chairman of the social liberal political party Nasa Stranka. "In spite of that, poverty and poor economic prospects foster radicalization."
At the same time, Gratz suggests, several Bosnian politicians are making efforts to appease Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Gratz thinks Erdogan advocates a neo-Ottoman version of Turkish foreign policy, pursuing a return to conservative Islam, which seemed to be a thing of the past in Turkey.
In a study compiled on behalf of the US Military Academy in West Point, analyst Steven Oluic provided a summary of the dilemma that affects Bosnia-Herzegovina as well as the community of Balkan nations and other European countries: "Bosnia's ability to resist extremism and radical Islam is largely dependent on continued western engagement in the region."
The study also has this to say about the ability of Bosnian Muslims to face the challenge of radical Islamists: their ideologies could in theory be resisted, given that a majority of the Bosnian Muslim population rejects a radical interpretation of Islam.Buy Photo The five flags are back. (Photo: Tony Giberson/tgiberson@pnj.com)Buy Photo
After hearing heated arguments against and for flying a Confederate flag at the Pensacola Bay Center, the Escambia Board of County Commissioners voted in favor of a resolution that gives the county the option of flying the same five flags there that the city of Pensacola flies at its public buildings.
The commissioners voted 3-2 in favor of the resolution, with District 3 Commissioner Lumon May and District 2 Commissioner Doug Underhill casting the dissenting votes. It changed the commissioners' decision in December to only fly the American and state of Florida flags at the Bay Center.
The resolution gives the county the option to display historical flags at county buildings that are consistent with the flags the city of Pensacola flies. The city buildings have the American, British, French, Spanish and the National Flag of the Confederacy.
The county previously displayed the American, French, Spanish, British, state and Confederate Battle flag, which is also known as the Battle Flag of the Army of Tennessee. Historians contend the Battle Flag never flew over Pensacola.
"We are not bringing back the Battle Flag," District 4 Commissioner Grover Robinson said.
He put the flag item on the agenda in December and again Thursday night.
But before the commissioners cast their votes, people weighed in. At one point, sheriff's deputies had to escort one opponent of the Confederate flag out of the commissioners' chambers.
"It's a symbol of an ideology," Rachel Sabree said. "It's a great insult to have that flag."
James Smith said the county should stick to the resolution it passed that allowed only flying the American and state of Florida flags at the Bay Center.
"It is an injustice," Katrina Ramos said about the Confederate flag. "I don't understand why this is an issue."
Pensacola City Councilwoman Sherri Myers said she doesn't like what the Confederate flag reminds her of and she isn't in favor of the city flying it either.
Phillip White said all of the flags that flew at the Bay Center previously and continue to fly there, the American, French, British, a Confederate, and the Spanish flags, represented some sort of transgressions by those countries throughout history.
Other speakers had similar arguments that White had, and one speaker argued flying all of the flags was a way to market the area for tourism.
"I'm appalled when people say taking the flag down will hurt tourism," May said. "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and I live in the state of Florida."
Underhill likened flying all of those flags next to each other to someone putting photos of his last four girlfriends on his mantle and then seeing how his wife would react.
District 1 Commissioner Wilson Robertson said the flag was an ode to Southern heritage and history.
"A lot of good people died over that flag," Robertson said in support of the Confederate flag.
"It seems what the city of Pensacola does has a reasonable outcome," BCC Chairman Steven Barry said.
Read or Share this story: http://on.pnj.com/1G2TJqsThe first N7 Challenge saw a tremendous level of success – the community goal of killing one million brutes was beaten handily by participants. Through your combined efforts, over THREE MILLION brutes were destroyed! Read on for the full report from Admiral Hackett.
From: Admiral Steven Hackett, Citadel Allied Command
Re: Operation Goliath
Confidentiality Classification: XB-PRIME
Distribution: N7 Forces Only
Soldiers of the Milky Way –
It is my honor to announce that Operation Goliath was an overwhelming success. By targeting the brutes of the Reaper forces, we dealt them a blow from which they will not soon recover. As I’m sure you’re aware, a brute is made out of the parts of turians and krogan, somehow melded into one. For them to replace those troops, they’re going to have to capture turians and krogan together and alive—and you can ask your turian and krogan friends just how rarely that’s going to happen from now on.
Over a three-day period, you downed a staggering number of brutes, and countless husks and other Reaper creatures in the process. As it is, the Reapers have been pushed back in key positions as they try to make up for the holes you left in their army.
I am confident that word of this operation will get out and that it will give people hope. The stories I am hearing continue to amaze me. They are stories of soldiers braving fire to pull a fallen comrade to safety; they are stories of biotics charging enemies ten times their weight to buy their friends a critical second; they are stories of engineers with their fingers shot off, hacking mainframes with the stumps because their teammates needed them. Thousands of strike teams ran successful sorties against particularly deadly Reaper occupations – those squads will be recognized with a special commendation.
This brotherhood knows no race or species. It is a bond you are forging together, knowing that when the time came, you heard the call, and you answered it with all the skill and passion you could muster. That much… you can say to anyone.
–Admiral Hackett
Congratulations everyone! The first N7 Challenge saw a tremendous level of success – the community goal of killing one million brutes was beaten handily by participants. Through your combined efforts, over THREE MILLION brutes were destroyed! Many thousands of players also managed to beat the Reaper faction on Silver difficulty and achieve extraction. As per the initial announcement, Victory and Commendation Packs will be awarded tomorrow (Tuesday, March 20) at 5 PM PST. We’ll be announcing additional challenges in the days to come – but be ready to step up your game…We hope to see you all on the front lines!
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TumblrPajhwok News Agency reports that on Tuesday, the Afghanistan senate deplored the foreign airstrikes that killed 21 innocent civilians in the province of Daikundi on Sunday, and demanded that NATO avoid any repetition of this sort of error.
But some senators went farther, demanding that NATO or US military men responsible for the deaths be executed. Senator Hamidullah Tokhi of Uuzgan complained to Pajhwok that the foreign forces had killed civilians in such incidents time and again, and kept apologizing but then repeating the fatal mistake: “Anyone killing an ordinary Afghan should be executed in public.”
Lawmaker Fatima Aziz of Qunduz concurred, observing, “We saw foreign troops time and again that they killed innocent people, something unbearable for the already war-weary Afghans.”
Maulvi Abdul Wali Raji, a senator from Baghlan Province, called for the Muslim law of an ‘eye for an eye’ to be applied to foreign troops for civilian deaths. Pajhwok concludes, “Mohammad Alam Izdiyar said civilian deaths were the major reason behind the widening gap between the people and Afghan government.”
Note that those speaking this way are not Taliban, but rather elected members of the Afghanistan National Parliament, whose government is supposedly a close US ally.
Sarah Chayes, a former National Public Radio correspondent who lived for years in Qandahar but has been on Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s staff for the past year, told CNN that she sees increasing frustration in the Afghan public over the killing of civilians by NATO and US strikes. She implies that how the government of President Hamid Karzai deals with this issue could determine its fate, given that it is acting like, and perceived as acting like a criminal syndicate.
In the meantime, Karzai is taking no chances. Radio Azadi reports in Dari Persian that Karzai took control of the supposedly independent Electoral Complaints Commission, and will appoint all 5 of its members. The system had been that 3 members were appointed by the United Nations, and the other two chosen by the supreme courty chief justice and the independent high electoral commission.
The ECC threw out about 1 million fraudulent ballots in last summer’s presidential election, a move that could have forced Karzai into a run-off election against rival Abdullah Abdullah. But the latter withdrew from the race on the grounds that Karzai controlled the in-country electoral commission and refused to relinquish control of it. Many observers believe that Karzai stole the election. In short, Karzai is increasingly acting like a Middle Eastern dictator, manipulating state institutions to ensure that he cannot be unseated in an election.
Whatever US troops are fighting for in Afghanistan, it is not democracy.
As for those nearly 100,000 trained Afghan troops that Washington keeps boasting about, it turns out that the Pentagon sub-sub-contracted the troop training and “a Blackwater subsidiary hired violent drug users to help train the Afghan army.” Many journalists doubt that there are actually so many troops in the Afghanistan National Army, citing high turnover and desertion rates, while others suggest that two weeks of ‘show and tell’ training for illiterate recruits is not exactly a rigorous ‘training’– even if it were done properly, which it seems not always to have been.
Canadian Brig. Gen. Daniel Ménard said that some estimates of the number of Taliban roadside bombs planted in Marjah were too low, putting them at 400 to 500. He said that despite what happened in Marjah, where Taliban took advantage of the ample warning NATO gave that it was coming, the same procedure will be followed this May when the Qandahar campaign begins. It is aimed at blunting the summer campaign of Taliban coming over the border from Pakistan.
Former Pakistan chief of staff, Mirza Aslam Beg, wrote in Nava-e Waqt for February 23, 2010, explaining Taliban strategy in Marjah. These passages were translated from Urdu by the USG Open Source Center:
‘ Marjah is located some 15 km from Lashkargah City, which is the provincial capital of Helmand Province. It is a flat desert area. It has a few scattered mud houses. There is a green belt to its north and west, which is irrigated by the Helmand River. This green belt has large agricultural farms and orchards, with a population of about 6,000 to 7,000 people. The entire terrain is flat and totally unsuitable for guerilla war, which is the preferred style of the Taliban. It will be very easy for the allied air forces and ground war machine to control the movement of the Taliban in this area. Now, the question arises is why are the allied forces preparing for a similar kind of heavy attack in an area where there is hardly any resistance? It appears there is a historical and psychological factor behind this decision. History says that every army that went to this area did not return safely. The allied forces believe that if they succeed in taking control of Marjah and the Taliban are compelled to back off, the allied forces will gain a psychological upper hand, making it easy for them to carry out operation against the Taliban in other provinces in Afghanistan as well. The Taliban have become experts in fighting a war in the difficult desert terrain of the northern regions for the past 30 years. They are brave mujahids [holy warriors] who have full confidence in themselves and in their quest for success against their enemies. Time and circumstance are totally on their side. Thus, it is easy to understand their strategy in the battle of Marjah. One of their strategies is to send 1,000 to 2,000 fighters under the command of Commander Mullah Abdul Razzaq. These fighters are committed to fight until their last breath and will bleed the allied forces to the end. They will defend the region with their scattered fighters spread all over the area. They will also defend the area against the attacking forces through the use of improvised engineering devices (IEDs), including the Omar bomb and booby traps. Their ground defense system, which was used by the Hezbollah against Israel in 2006, can also be used as a defense weapon. This strategy has been used by the Taliban during the last four days of this war. The number of Taliban present in the adjacent areas of Helmand is around 10,000 to 12,000. These troops have the ability to attack the allied forces from the nearby areas of the main battleground and keep them engaged by attacking them regularly. Moreover, they will cut off the supply line of the allied forces. Under this strategy, on one side, the Taliban will continue the battle in Marjah, and on the other side, they will create problems for the allied forces by increasing attacks on them in provinces under their control. ‘
End/ (Not Continued)written by Guest Author
Today’s post is a guest blog by Allison Hagood, co-author of the recent (highly recommended!) book “Your Baby’s Best Shot: Why Vaccines Are Safe and Save Lives.” The book is filled with factual, well-sourced information and is great read for parents wanting to understand more about vaccines – the facts about what’s in them, the actual risks associated with them and how misinformation has frightened parents unnecessarily. Here Allison addresses some of the math when it comes to serious adverse effects of vaccines – and she includes some great links if you want to read more.
Parents are bombarded with misleading information from anti-vaccine advocates. One piece of information that those advocates like to exploit is the existence of the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (NVICP). Anti-vaccine advocates use the fact that this program exists, and that it has paid out over 3,000 claims since its creation, to “prove” that vaccines are dangerous.
Let’s talk numbers.
The NVICP was created in 1988. The reasons for its creation are complex, and a topic for another post.
Since then, as of March 4, 2013, 14,548 petitions have been filed under the program, 12,566 have been adjudicated by the program, 3,256 have been compensated and 9,946 have been dismissed with no compensation. The last two numbers don’t equal the adjudication numbers because sometimes claims are settled with an agreement between parties and not by the court.
There are an estimated 4 million children born (pdf) in the U.S. every year. Therefore, if you start at 1989 (the year after the NVICP was created, since it was created in October of 1988), there have been approximately 92 million children born in America since the creation of the NVICP.
Average vaccination coverage in America hovers around 95%, with some areas being higher, some being lower, and coverage rates varying for various childhood vaccines. Therefore, since the NVICP was created, approximately 87.4 million children have been vaccinated at least partially, if not completely, according to the CDC recommendations.
The percentage of petitions to actual vaccines administered is therefore 0.016%. One one-hundredth of one percent of cases of vaccination have resulted in a petition being filed.
The percentage of compensations to actual vaccines administered is 0.003%. Three one-THOUSANDTHS of one percent of cases of vaccination have resulted in compensation for injury.
I don’t know about you, but a safety rating of 99.997% seems really great to me!
Additionally, the NVICP claims are not limited to children, and the above calculations are by person, not by injection, so the actual safety rate is significantly higher than 99.997%. If you included all adult vaccinations, and counted number of injections rather than number of vaccinated persons, you’d get something that probably looks like 99.9999999999999999% of child and adult vaccinations resulting in no serious adverse events.
Let’s put those safety statistics into perspective.
Your odds of dying in a car accident (pdf) are 1 in 98, or 1.02%, or 340 times greater than experiencing an adverse event from a vaccine.
The number of unintentional injuries in America in 2009 was 38,900,000 (pdf). The population in America in 2009 was approximately 307 million. If every one of the unintentional injuries in America was to a different person (and not multiple injuries to individuals), that means that 12.67% of the population was injured by accident in 2009.
Even if we control for multiple injuries, the chances of being injured in general (car accident, work accident, accident in the home, etc.) are thousands of times greater than developing a compensable adverse vaccine reaction (one that the NVICP will pay compensation for).
Bottom line – vaccines are safe, and save lives. Don’t let the misuse of the NVICP data scare you from making the easiest decision you can make as a parent – vaccinate your children, unless there is a legitimate medical reason not to do so.Boeing: AA, United modified Dreamliner orders to enhance fleet mix
American Airlines' first Boeing 787 Dreamliner prepares to depart Chicago's O'Hare International Airport on May 7. American joined United as the only U.S. airlines using the plane, which the airline hopes will appeal to passengers and open new, profitable international routes. (Photo: Nam Y. Huh, AP)
Boeing executives said Tuesday that delays in airline orders for 787 Dreamliners from American and United airlines stemmed from matching aircraft with their needs, not any disappointment with the innovative aircraft.
"Nothing about our fundamental view of the market has changed," Jim McNerney, Boeing's CEO, said during an investor day conference. "Airlines are increasingly profitable," and are investing in new aircraft, he said.
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TODAY IN THE SKY: Boeing 787 Dreamliner is now flying for American Airlines
TODAY IN THE SKY: United now flying its Dreamliners to six continents
Ray Conner, CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said American delayed delivery of five 787s in April so it could adjust its mix of planes after the merger with US Airways.
American just started flying the 787 between Dallas and Chicago last week and plans to shift the jets to international routes in June. As for the five Dreamliners American asked to delay, they will now arrive in 2017 and 2018 instead of next year.
Meanwhile, United swapped an order for 10 Dreamliners in favor of the same number of 777-300ER aircraft, which became more attractive with lower fuel costs. United was the first U.S. carrier to fly the 787 and airline executives still like the plane. But Conner said the 777s will replace the airline's aging 747s.
The result will allow Boeing to get 777s to United faster while also moving up other customers in line to get the popular 787.
"All in all, every one of those moves was a fantastic, win-win solution, which we always are trying to do with our customers on these things," Conner said.
Overall, Boeing has a backlog of 5,715 plane orders. Executives described a careful approach to boosting production, but said they could speed up deliveries of 737 MAX and 787 aircraft through the end of the decade.
"We think we're very careful with our rate increases," McNerney said.
Greg Smith, Boeing's chief financial officer, said 787 production will grow from 10 per month now to 12 per month next year and to 14 per month by the end of the decade.
The 737 will increase 12% to 47 per month next year and to 52 per month in 2018, Smith said.
"These production rate increases are supported by the strong demand for our commercial airplanes, where a number of our key programs are sold out in the 2020 time period and beyond," Smith said. "This backlog continues to provide a great foundation for us to deliver to our customers and our shareholders."
Conner said efficiencies in producing the planes increases the company's profitability. The 787-8 was only 70% similar to the longer 787-9, he said. But the transition is easier to the 787-10, which is 95% similar to the 787-9, he said.
For the 737, Boeing is moving to build 52 per month -- and could go higher -- in the same footprint that it used to build 21 per month, Conner said.
"That's a huge statement in terms of efficiency," he said. "You create a lot of flexibility to respond to the market."
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1Hf8drY1. Who are the two groups that are out looking for supplies?
Eugene and Abraham (Eugene looking for a place to make ammo)
Denise, Rosita and Daryl (Looking for medicine)
2. Does anyone in Team Family die this ep? If so, who and how?
Denise, crossbow through head
3. What is Rick’s reaction to Morgan’s jail cell? Do we find out what the cell is for?
Rick just asks what’s it for. Morgan says it will give some choices next time.
4. Why is Carol on Tobin’s porch?
It’s a 1 second shot. She kisses Tobin quickly as he leaves. She appears to be just waiting for him
5. What’s Carl up to this ep?
We don’t see Carl this episode.
6. Will Dwight make an appearance and if so, is his face ironed?
Yes he does and his left side is burned
7. Does Daryl get his crossbow back? If so, how?
Yes, after a fight with Dwight and his group
8. Does the group run into any other Saviors besides Dwight?
Yes there is a group with Dwight
9. Is Jesus in this episode?
We don’t see Jesus this episode.
10. Does anyone go missing by the end of the episode? If so, who?
NoAccording to the story published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and covered in Space.com, it appears that some of the landforms in dry valleys on Mars are the result of glaciation...advancing and retreating of glaciers, formed from the accumulation of snow into compacted ice over tens or hundreds of thousands of years.There is no return to the perchlorate discussion yet. However, this implies that the climate was far more earth-like than it is now, since it supported H-2-0 precipitation, which mean atmospheric pressure was much higher than it is now, and temperatures must have been in the narrow band (relatively speaking) when snow falls.The thicker atmosphere would have deflected ultraviolet radiation.If it's too hot, there will only be water vapor and maybe liquid water, if it's too cold - it won't snow. On earth, snow does not fall below temperatures of -40 C. Heaviest accumulations of snow occur when there is significant atmospheric mixing of low and high temperatures and surface temperatures may be anywhere from around 0 C (32 F) to -30 C or so. Glaciers form from yearly accumulation of snow that doesn't melt completely. On earth the glacier accumulation range at present is sea level in the arctic to 6000 meters high at the equator.This has varied in the past. So, possibly Mars would have been habitable by forms of organisms recognizable on the earth today. With all the ice and snow, water - and cloud cover - Mars would have been much brighter in the sky than it's present iron-rich desert appearance and would have looked more like earth, an azure marble, through a small telescope.
Labels: astrobio, dry, mars, perchlorate, valleysAdvertisement
The Open Source Robotics Foundation (OSRF) spun out of Willow Garage three years ago this month, after having been awarded a contract from DARPA to develop the Gazebo simulation environment for the DARPA Robotics Challenge. With the DRC about to conclude, OSRF will no longer have the support of DARPA to keep itself up and running, so earlier this month we stopped by the OSRF World Headquarters and Volcano Lair in Mountain View, Calif., to talk with CEO Brian Gerkey about the future of Gazebo, ROS, and the OSRF, and to get an early look at a few cool demos that the visitors to the DRC Finals will be back to check out.
In case you’re not familiar with the Open Source Robotics Foundation, or what it does, here’s a (very) brief overview just to get you up to speed. OSRF is a non-profit organization that oversees the management and development of the Robot Operating System, or ROS. They’re also in charge of the development of Gazebo, an advanced dynamic 3D robotics simulator.
You’ve probably heard of ROS because many (if not most) of the most interesting robots that we write about around here are running it. Gazebo, meanwhile, was used to decide which of the DARPA Robotics Challenge teams got a free ATLAS robot, and has been used since then as teams develop their software (and by lots of other people for simulating all sorts of other robots).
We should also emphasize that both ROS and Gazebo are free. You can download them and use them for whatever you want, and OSRF doesn’t get a dime. Instead, OSRF relies on community involvement to help them update, upgrade, and maintain ROS, as well as sponsors to help them keep the lights on. We discussed this and other issues with Brian Gerkey:
IEEE Spectrum: DARPA has been a significant sponsor from the inception of the OSRF until just a few weeks from now, so what’s next?
It’s a really interesting point of transition for us. We got started with the promise of a contract with the DRC in the summer of 2012, and that will officially come to an end for us in the finals in June. And so there’s been this question, at least in my mind, of, ‘Can we get everything in place so that we can continue operating after that,’ or do we just end up relying too much on that one thing and then we all have to go home? Right now, the future looks really bright. We’ve put together a portfolio of projects, including support from other government agencies like NASA, like the National Science Foundation, other DARPA projects like HAPTIX… But also, and I think this is more interesting for us in terms of feature support, we’re getting more close connections with industry. Qualcomm is one example, and I have several other examples that I can’t tell you about yet, where we’re talking with companies who are using our software and depending on it and they’re willing to support us to make improvements. I’m really interested in seeing the portion of our funding that comes from industry grow because I think that’s clear evidence that what we’re doing has real economic utility. We’re looking good, I think we’re on a really good footing after the DRC.
IEEE Spectrum: As the DRC Finals approach, what’s the status of the OSRF’s development of Gazebo?
Our role has shifted a little bit because at this point… we’re so close to the competition, and have been for a couple months now, that the teams are basically locked in to whatever they’ve got. Since [January], we’ve shifted our focus to some of the other stuff that we can do to ensure the long-term legacy of Gazebo, which is something that [DRC program manager Dr. Gill Pratt] had in mind from the beginning: he really wanted this simulator to be the legacy of the DRC. This includes things as mundane as making it work on Windows, which we’re actually really close on now, to things more profound, like can we speed up the physics computation by parallelizing it in various ways. It’s a mixture of engineering stuff and some science stuff that we never had a chance to do. In a way, it’s been kind of nice: we had this six month run at the end where we were still responsive to what the teams want, but we’re really looking more to, what are the things that we can do in the time we have left to make sure that Gazebo comes out of this program being as awesome as we can make it.
UPDATE: “Really close?” Try finished! Mostly! Check out Gazebo on Windows here.
IEEE Spectrum: Is the lack of support for Gazebo and ROS on Windows still a significant barrier to entry for users? Is there going to be a version of ROS that runs on Windows?
Absolutely, and it’s a question that we get all the time. Although, we don’t get it as often now, as people have taken for granted that it’s just not an option: they know that the answer’s going to be ‘no,’ so they’ve stopped asking. I think it’s a really significant barrier to entry for two groups of people: for people who are not software engineers; you get a lot of interest in using our tools from people who are mechanical engineers or robot designers who would like to use Gazebo as part of their workflow to design robots, test workspaces, and things like that. But, they’re used to running things like SolidWorks on Windows, and just that shift where you’ve got to install Ubuntu on a machine in order to use this tool, that's enough to keep them away. I think it’s also had a big impact in terms of keeping folks in Asia from using ROS or Gazebo nearly as much as they could. Windows has a much much higher penetration in Asia than it does anywhere else in the world, percentage wise, historically because [Windows] had better internationalization support way back in the day. That hasn’t stopped China and Japan from being our third and fourth in hits to our documentation site. But still, I think that could grow a lot more, and it think it would if we had support on Windows.
With ROS, all effort is on ROS 2.0, where we’re rewriting the middleware system from scratch, building on top of DDS, we’re making sure that all of that works on Windows from the start. So we actually have continuous integration machines that are building and testing the code, making sure that all the tests pass on Windows. We decided that we don’t have the spare cycles to address ROS 1, to go back and make it work on Windows. We’re just going to say, ‘We learned from this experience that from the beginning, we need to make sure that it works on all the platforms that we care about,’ which for us now are Linux, Mac, and Windows. But even after we get the first version of ROS 2.0 out this summer, we expect that people are still going to be using ROS 1 for years, and we’re committed to supporting that, and that will be reflected in how we roll out ROS 2.0: you won’t need to switch wholesale, because we know that’s not realistic. ROS 2.0 can be installed alongside your entire ROS 1 system, and you can use the two at the same time.
IEEE Spectrum: Can you give us some examples of why ROS 2.0 will be worth switching over to?
Maybe you have a multi-robot system, and you want to use the new peer-to-peer support for multi-robot systems that’ll be built in to ROS 2.0. You can use ROS 1 on each robot to have the control system there, but you can use ROS 2.0 to communicate between the robots. Or, if you’ve got a lossy WiFi link, you can use ROS 1 on either side, but you can use ROS 2.0 to communicate between them. Where it becomes important, people will start to use it, and then it will eventually spread through the rest of the system. If you’ve got realtime control requirements: if you’ve got a walking, balancing humanoid and you need to run a control loop reliably at a kilohertz or greater, historically with ROS 1, we said, “Well, that’s your problem.’ We’re building ROS 2.0 so that you can use our code directly in a realtime loop. Another use case we have in mind is taking a product all the way into production and deployment into the field using ROS. We’ve seen a lot of examples of people doing R&D with ROS, getting to a prototype, and switching to something else before they actually ship. The reasons for that are complicated: sometimes they’re technical and sometimes they’re not, but I believe that one of the big barriers is people look at the core messaging system and they say, ‘This is an ad-hoc thing that you guys built yourself, and it seems to work well enough, but how do we know we can trust it?’ We don’t have a great answer for that, but I believe that it’s something that we will get by virtue of depending on DDS, which is an open middleware specification that’s been widely used throughout the world in mission-critical applications.
Since they’ve been involved in the DRC from the very beginning, it’s no surprise that OSRF will be putting on an appearance at the expo part of the DRC Finals in Pomona next month. We got an early look at what they’ve been preparing, and if you can make it out to Fairplex for the DRC, here’s some of what you’ll find at their booth:
Virtual foosball via Oculus Rift and Razer Hydra:
This demo is a sort of showcase of how Gazebo works, with a world populated by interactive objects that you can control. Objects like the ball come with parameters that are easy to adjust, so that you can (say) change the amount of friction that the ball displays, or fine tune how bouncy it is.
Destroying a stack of virtual cups with a motion capture haptic feedback glove:
Gazebo integrates very well with all kinds of hardware, including sophisticated motion tracking systems like the Polhemus. For this demo, a head tracker is coupled with a motion tracking glove that also has vibrating haptic feedback to help the user tell when they've contacted an object in simulation.
Virtual quadcopter piloting in Gazebo:
This demo wasn’t quite ready for primetime yet (hence the picture of the real quadcopter, which you won’t get to pilot at the DRC), but when it’s up and running, you’ll be putting on an Oculus Rift and then flying around virtual terrain in Gazebo as a quadcopter, FPV-style. What’s cool, though, is that you’ll be using Gazebo’s physics engine to fly a model based on the actual flight characteristics 3D Robotic’s Iris quadcopter. The controller on the quadcopter is getting simulated flight data, and as far as it can tell, it’s actually up in the air. It’s lots of open source software integrated together, and is a total community effort, which is pretty awesome, if you ask me. Getting the physics of flying robots integrated into Gazebo is still a work in progress, but there’s a lot of demand for it, and this is what OSRF does: they continually make improvements to community driven tools for the betterment of the community, and with enough support, they’ll keep on doing this until robots are solved.
So, forever.
[ OSRF ]In 1956, Seiko created their first self winding wristwatch. In 1969 they produced their first automatic chronograph. To mark the 6oth anniversary of their first automatic wristwatch, Seiko have produced two limited edition Presage Automatic Chronographs.
The new Presage collection draws its inspiration from Seiko’s heritage in mechanical watchmaking, which stretches all the way back to 1913 and the celebrated Laurel which was Seiko’s, and Japan’s, first ever wrist watch. One of |
prevent the release of players.
Additionally, Atlético de Madrid and Real Madrid have been fined CHF 900,000 and CHF 360,000 respectively, while both clubs have been issued with a reprimand and given 90 days in which to regularise the situation of all minor players concerned.
The decisions, which were notified to the parties concerned today, were made based on the specific elements of each case. They follow investigations initially conducted by FIFA Transfer Matching System GmbH (FIFA TMS) and subsequently by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee as part of disciplinary proceedings. The investigations concerned minor players who were involved and participated in competitions with the clubs over various periods between 2007 and 2014 (Atlético de Madrid) and between 2005 and 2014 (Real Madrid).
FIFA works hard to protect the rights of players under the age of 18 – whether male or female, amateur or professional. This is done through the enforcement of regulations prohibiting the international transfer of minors, or the first registration of minors in a country other than their own, except in specific circumstances (cf. art. 19 of the Regulations) that must be approved by the sub-committee appointed by the Players’ Status Committee. As such, the provisions relating to the protection of minors need to be strictly applied. This has been confirmed on various occasions by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Opening up the door to exceptions beyond those carefully drafted and included in the Regulations would unavoidably lead to cases of circumvention of the rationale for these provisions.
The web-based Transfer Matching System (TMS) provides a crucial platform to monitor the international transfer market, to ensure compliance with the rules, and to promote transparency and best practice.Art movements are strange things: some are decreed by way of a manifesto, their antecedents declared and a purpose proposed. Others are made retrospectively, with entire historical periods yoked under a name that the artists involved never heard themselves, their work understood as part of a historical sweep regardless of individual inspirations or intentions. Either way, the naming and creation of art movements remains mysterious – who is in? Who is out? When did it start – and end?
Pop art was a movement that had no central manifesto but even in its infancy was acutely self-aware, born of a postwar media culture and the slow evolution of an underground queer aesthetic into a mainstream sense of irony. Its deep roots lay in the avant-garde of the early 20th century, pop inheriting the dada and surrealist tactics of shock and social critique, mixed with an unabashed love of selectively appropriated pop culture icons and an experimentation with new media of the day. Pop artists revamped those old strategies with new subjects and techniques, quickly eliminating the trace of the artist’s hand in the artwork in favour of the look of a mass-produced object.
Pop art grew outwards from a number of origin points in the late 1940s and early 50s. By the mid-60s pop had matured into a monster encompassing not just art but also music, film, fashion, design and politics, going well beyond Europe and the US into Australia, Japan and Brazil, among other outposts. Over the next decade, pop split in different directions including psychedelic and conceptual art, film and video, performance and theatre before mutating once more into what is loosely called postmodernism. Indeed, so vast and influential was pop that making sense of it now ends up sounding like a description of the last 60 years of mainstream western visual culture.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe (1967). Photograph: Frederick R Weisman Art Foundation
Pop to Popism – the Art Gallery of NSW’s 2014-15 summer blockbuster – is an exhibition with the almost impossible task of describing that trajectory. Curated by the AGNSW’s Wayne Tunnicliffe and assisted by Anneke Jaspers, the show was conceived as a way of putting Australian art from the gallery’s permanent collection into an international context, drawing examples from 49 Australian and international collections, a rare and welcome example of what an Australian museum can do with resources, space and time. And it works brilliantly.
Pop to Popism has its crowd-pleasing stars. Key works by early English pop pioneers hang alongside major early 60s pieces by their spiritual cousins in the US. English pop at the beginning of the 1960s was painterly with a graphic edge – David Hockney’s The Second Marriage (1963) and Peter Blake’s Self-Portrait with Badges (1961) are the link from a more orthodox figurative painting into the highly stylised work both would later produce. By contrast, Andy Warhol’s Triple Elvis (1963) and Roy Lichtenstein’s Kitchen Range (1961-62) are prototypes for the screened and mass-produced work of the next decade.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Bridgid McLean’s Untitled (1969). Photograph: Art Gallery of New South Wales
But where Pop to Popism is different to your average blockbuster is the Australian art that has been interwoven into that familiar story. In the early galleries alongside we find the works of Tony Tuckson, an abstract expressionist experimenting with found objects, and the collaborative paintings of Mike Brown, Ross Crothall and Colin Lanceley, with their funky, colourful assemblages that echoed early pop but also French New Realism. While early pop was forming, Australian artists were there at the heart of it.
By the mid- to late-60s, Australian pop art is seen in full flower in the paintings, sculptures, posters and collages of Richard Larter, Peter Kingston, Vivienne Binns, Peter Powditch, Martin Sharp, Gareth Sansom, Dick Watkins and Bridgid McLean, among many others. And the work compares very well – albeit on the more modest scale typical of most Australian art – but where radical isolation breeds exotic local variations, Australian pop was far looser, funnier and more satirical than its uptight international brethren.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Howard Arkley’s Triple fronted (1987). Photograph: estate of Howard Arkley
Where pop began as a shared aesthetic rather than as a formal movement, the end point of the AGNSW’s exhibition is centred on a manifesto written by the late Australian curator and publisher Paul Taylor for Popism, the exhibition that was held at the National Gallery of Victoria in 1982. Taylor’s claim was that Australian art was essentially derivative and unoriginal – or ab-original as he coined it – and was thus perfectly situated to describe and celebrate the postmodern era. Pop to Popism contains works by mid-80s Australian artists Peter Tyndall, Richard Dunn, Howard Arkley, Imants Tillers, Juan Davila and Maria Kozic – all included in Taylor’s nascent movement – alongside work by the US artists Jeff Koons, Richard Prince, Cindy Sherman, Barbara Kruger and the collaborations of Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Maria Kozic’s Masterpieces (Warhol) (1986). Photograph: Maria Kozic and Anna Schwartz Gallery
The last two galleries of Pop to Popism is an end point of pop art, the moment when the experimentation had solidified into a genre and then into an ism. But they’re also a lesson in another orthodox history – the beginnings of contemporary art. The last work in the show before you exit through the gift shop is Maria Kozic’s Masterpieces (Warhol) (1986), an exploded version of Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup 1 (1962), but jagged and in pieces, held in place by the gallery wall. The work is essentially without meaning, literally held in place by the institution that contains it. To understand the depth of Kozic’s pun one needs to know art history, or at least be aware of Warhol, because without them it’s hard to say what Kozic’s piece is beyond the ventriloquism of someone else’s joke.
That seems like a fitting end and a neat call back to Warhol’s original appropriation, but that wasn’t quite it. Pop was reborn in China in the 1990s and Australian artists such as Richard Bell use its style and ironies in a pointed satire of the art world today. In a much wider sense, street art is the true heir to the pop art kingdom with perhaps more than a dozen young painters working in Australia alone attempting to restore its legacy. There hasn’t been a major show of pop art in Australia since 1984 so this exhibition comes as a timely reminder, not only of pop’s continuing historical importance, but also for its effect on the art of now, and most likely, the future too. More importantly perhaps, is the realisation that Australian art has a part to play in that story.
• Pop to Popism is showing at the Art Gallery of NSW until 1 March, 2015German chancellor Angela Merkel visits Accumotive's plant in Kamenz, Germany.
Battery production is booming, and Tesla is far from the only game in town.
According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, global battery production is forecast to more than double between now and 2021. The expansion is in turn driving prices down, good news both for the budding electric-car industry and for energy companies looking to build out grid-scale storage to back up renewable forms of energy.
While Tesla gets tons of attention for its “gigafactories”—one in Nevada that will produce batteries, and another in New York that will produce solar panels—the fact is, the company has a lot of battery-building competition.
Exhibit A is a new battery plant in Kamenz, Germany, run by Accumotive. The half-billion-euro facility broke ground on Monday with a visit from German chancellor Angela Merkel and will supply batteries to its parent company, Daimler, which is betting heavily on the burgeoning electric-vehicle market.
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But the lion’s share of growth is expected to be in Asia. BYD, Samsung, LG, and Panasonic (which has partnered with Tesla) are all among the world’s top battery producers, and nine of the world’s largest new battery factories are under construction in China (paywall), according to Benchmark Minerals.
That competition means the steady downward trend in battery prices is going to continue. On a per-kilowatt-hour basis, costs have fallen from $542 in 2012 to around $139 today, according to analysis by Benchmark. That makes for a huge difference in the cost of an electric car, of which 40 percent is usually down to the battery itself.
Bloomberg’s analysts have already said that the 2020s could be the decade in which electric cars take off—and one even went so far as to say that by 2030, electric cars could be cheaper than those powered by internal combustion.
Those watching the industry might worry that a flood of cheap batteries could end up hurting profitability for producers, as happened in the solar-panel business. That could happen, but India and China, two huge rising automotive markets, are bullish about using electric cars to help solve problems like traffic congestion and air pollution. So even as supply ramps up, there is likely to be plenty of demand to go around.
(Read more: Bloomberg, Fast Company, “The World’s Largest Electric-Vehicle Maker Hits a Speed Bump,” “The 2020s Could Be the Decade When Electric Cars Take Over”)Getty Images
Hall of Fame receiver Michael Irvin said at the NFL Rookie Symposium that young players who think they need to be loyal to their old friends need to understand something: Those friends won’t always be loyal to them.
Referencing the 1996 drug charges that led to a no-contest plea and a five-game suspension, Irvin mentioned that people who had been his friends testified against him.
“All my keepin’ it real partners testified against me. They ran right to the D.A., ‘Oh, yeah, Michael did it.’ They kept it real, ‘I’m staying out of jail. Michael did it,'” Irvin said.
Irvin mentioned another Symposium speaker, Michael Vick, and how his three longtime friends turned dogfighting co-defendants all pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against him.
“Michael Vick stood up here and he told you,” Irvin told the rookies. “All his keep it real friends, they kept it real. They ran right to the police, ‘I’m keepin’ it real: He did it. He did it.’ All your keepin’ it real friends, I promise you, they’re going to keep it real on you.”
Irvin told the rookies at the symposium that they need to remember that they earned what they have in the NFL, and they don’t need to worry about, in Irvin’s words, “Somebody that didn’t put in the work that you put in, because he’s not determined enough, he doesn’t know how to get his butt up and doesn’t feel like getting his butt up and going to work.”
Irvin said he wanted to speak to the rookies because “When I came into the league I didn’t have anybody to tell me some things.” Irvin was ready for the on-field part of the NFL from Day One, but it took him many years and some painful lessons to be ready to conduct himself like a professional off the field. The lessons he learned the hard way are the ones he’s trying to impart on the rookies of today.A Canadian bike shop that claims to want to create a “a safe place for anyone to visit regardless of age, gender, race, sexual orientation, nationality, language, or ability” allegedly denied entry to a man because of his gender.
According to Metro News Canada, a man named “John” was denied entry to the Edmonton Bicycle Commuters’ Society’s BikeWorks South store because he happened to go to the shop on a particular Sunday that falls on a day as designated solely for “women, trans and gender non-binary” individuals.
The BikeWorks South shop describes its “Women, Trans and Gender Non-Binary Program” as part of "an effort to make our space more inviting and inclusive every day of the week" - by excluding men.
The website for the BikeWorks “Women, Trans and Gender Non-Binary" program states the program occurs three Sundays each month. On those days, “[O]nly those who identify as women, trans or gender non-binary individuals” are permitted to enter the shop.
Apparently, problems with the “Women, Trans and Gender Non-Binary Program” arise often enough to warrant a “Frequently Asked Questions” section on the program’s website. The FAQ reiterates men are not allowed in the shop - unless they are men who identify as women :
Q: What if someone is trans and male bodied, or male bodied but otherwise identifies as female, or identifies as female only some of the time, or is female-bodied but identifies as male, or doesn't identify as either male or female, etc etc etc? A: If you genuinely relate to the experience of being woman trans or non-binary on a daily basis, you are welcome to participate in our Women, Trans & Gender Non-Binary program. And no, you cannot participate if you are man wearing a wig/dress, and we are tired of that joke. We won't even fake a laugh.
Men are not even allowed to enter the store as invited guests of the women in the store:
Q: I am a woman shopping for a bike. Can I bring a male friend with me to the Women, Trans & Gender-Non-Binary program to help me choose a bike? A: No. […]
Men also cannot ask a woman to go in the store on their behalf, as it would be “disrespectful,” “disempowering,” and “belittling” to the point of “reinforcing toxic gender stereotypes”:
Q: I am a man. Can I send my girlfriend/wife to pick up parts for me? A: […] However, if you are a man who is sending a woman in on your behalf with a shopping list while you lurk just outside the door, you are being extremely disrespectful to both the woman who is helping you and to the goals and volunteers of our program. Our aim is to empower and educate women, trans and non-binary folk, and by standing outside yelling instructions you are disempowering and belittling the people working inside and reinforcing toxic gender stereotypes.
John told Metro News Canada he has filed a complaint with the Alberta Human Rights Commission. In a Reddit thread discussing the situation, John encouraged other men to take action if they too feel as if they have been targets of discrimination by the shop. BikeWorks predicted there would be concerns regarding whether the program violates human rights, to which the FAQ assures, “No.”
Despite the decision to deny entry to men on certain days of the month, BikeWorks insists, "We greatly value the importance of welcoming and supporting all people at BikeWorks. "The controversial Shahi Imam of Tipu Sultan mosque, Noor-ur Rahman Barkati, who once threatened to ostracise and beat up Muslims if they joined RSS and BJP, was on Wednesday sacked from his post for allegedly making anti-national statements and'misusing' his position.
Barkati, however, refused to step down, asserting, "Nobody has the right to remove me". "We have sent him the notice of termination and he has been asked to vacate the office room allotted to him. We have asked his deputy to conduct prayers and we will appoint a new imam very soon," Prince Ghulam Ahmed Wakf Estate trustee Arif Ahmed told reporters.
"We have removed him as the imam of the mosque for his anti-national statements. We never expect an imam, who is a religious person, to cross his line and misuse his post," he said. Ahmed said, "Barkati had shown disrespect to our national leaders and he was using the mosque for political purpose, and for his own financial gains. He was cautioned earlier for his activities.”
Barkati has made a habit of saying controversial things including the time in 2011 when he had held a special prayer for Osama Bin Laden and also for attacking Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen.
Who is Barkati?
Barkati has been constantly in the news for the last couple of months. Recently, he refused to remove his red beacon saying; “ I am a religious leader and I have been using the red beacon for decades. I do not follow the orders of the Centre. Who are they to order me? In Bengal, only the orders of the state government are effective. I will use the red beacon," he had asserted.
Earlier, he had attacked PM Modi over demonetization when he said: “Barkati had earlier attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi over demonetization, saying, "Every day people are harassed and face problem due to demonetization....Modi is bluffing the society and the innocent people of the country through demonetisation and nobody wants him to continue as PM."
He had also offered money to anyone who would cut Modi’s beard and once famously played his misogynistic credentials by blaming short dress for rape. He had said that "boys get excited on seeing girls in short dresses". "Girls these days wear too short dresses and very revealing shirts. We are not stopping them from wearing dresses but, they should avoid wearing short clothes to save themselves from the lust of men," Barkati told ANI.
Barkati has been the Shahi Imam of Kolkata’s famous Tipu Sultan Mosque for 30 years and inherited the post from his father. Known as the ‘Lal Batti Imam’, he was close to Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee and critics often attack Banerjee over their relationship.
Barkati has often been in the news and he was in fact, castigated for allowing Didi to tie a rakhi on his hand in 1999. It was a deemed an un-Islamic act. He was also criticised for supporting Mamata who was on good terms with the BJP and part of the NDA. He was also one of the most vocal voices against Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen, offering Rs 50,000 to anyone who would ‘blacken her face’.
He also launched a verbal attack on a TV channel in 2013 for trying to launch her show. He had told HT: “She is from Bangladesh and should restrict her activities to that country. She should not do such things that could lead to communal discord here.” His darkest moment came in 2011, when he held a Friday prayer for the ‘peace of the soul’ of terrorist Osama Bin Laden. The prayer meet was attended by over 5000 people.
All-India Minority Forum president Idris Ali and current TMC MP Idris Ali had justified the move by saying: “The special prayer was held as Laden was not given a proper burial and his bullet-riddled body was thrown into the sea in total disrespect of Islam. It was held for the peace of his soul.”
There were placards at the prayer meet reading ’Disrespect to Holy Quran is intolerable’, he said. He also said in 2014, that Muslims ruled India for a thousand years but they never made Hindus slaves. He said: "You must understand we ruled Hindustan for 1,000 years. But we never made Hindus slaves here, like the British did. We want to live in harmony now."
When Dilip Ghosh, the BJP Bengal’s vocal president suggested that Mamata be ‘pulled by her hair’ for speaking against demonetization, he said: Mera fatwa hai ki usko pathar marke Bangal se nikalna chahiye (My fatwa is that he should be pelted with stones and thrown out of Bengal.”
Barkati’s statements have often proven embarrassing for Muslims and other religious scholars who have slammed him. When he issued the fatwa against PM Modi, TMC MLA Siddiqullah Chowdhury said: “He is immature and has said these to be in the news. The statement has been made in bad taste and he has insulted the high chair of an imam.”
Different Muslim organisations too came down heavily against Barkati. Md Nooruddin, President of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, said that the comments were dangerous and would help those who had indulged in polarisation politics. “An imam should be balanced in his views. He may have his political suggestions but he should not be issuing any fatwa like this. This will damage the reputation of Muslims and BJP will reap political dividend from it,” he told DNA.
Md Kamruzaman, general secretary of All Bengal Minority Youth Federation said: “Imams from other districts have called me, expressing their concern and discomfort. They said they were feeling insulted. He is a religious leader and should not get into the political tug of war. The Prime Minister has been democratically elected and we must respect the chair,” he said.
It looks like Barkati’s days of making loaded statements, at least as the Shahi Imam of Tipu Sultan Mosque, are over.TRENTON — The New Jersey ACLU called on State Police today to explain why they took pictures of protesters at Gov. Chris Christie’s town hall meeting on Tuesday.
“It raises serious First Amendment concerns that the State Police may be photographing protesters at Gov. Christie’s town hall meetings,” Udi Ofer, executive director of the ACLU of New Jersey, said in a statement.
“The State Police must come clean and explain to New Jerseyans whether it has a practice or policy of photographing people engaged in First Amendment protected speech," he added. "New Jerseyans must be able to express their viewpoints without having to fear police officers photographing them and creating political dossiers on them."
The incident was reported by Politicker NJ, a political news website and by the Associated Press. The reports said a man taking photos of the protestors at a town hall meeting in South River identified himself a member of the State Police.
Christie’s spokesman referred questions to the State Police, who would not confirm or deny the reports.
The Republican governor has held more than 100 town hall meetings with minimal visible security measures, but security has become more apparent recently.
Last week, State Police began using hand-held metal detectors to "wand" attendees as they entered a town hall event in Mount Laurel. They followed the same procedure Tuesday in Middlesex County.
In both instances, protesters interrupted the proceedings to ask Christie questions about the controversial closing of access lanes to the George Washington Bridge in September and Sandy funding issues.
Christie, who hasn’t taken questions from the press since Jan. 9, will hold a town hall in Flemington on Thursday and another in Belmar next week.In his recent foreign-policy speech at West Point, President Obama insisted that the most direct threat to the US remains terrorism. However, noting that invading every country that harbours terrorist networks was "naive and unsustainable", he announced that the United States needed to "shift our counter-terrorism strategy - drawing on the successes and shortcomings of our experience in Iraq and Afghanistan - to more effectively partner with countries where terrorist networks seek a foothold."
An important component of this new strategic stance would be a Counter-Terrorism Partnerships Fund of up to $5bn, created on top of four already-existing "counter-terrorism assistance" programmes.
As revealed recently in The New York Times, since last year US Special Operations troops have been forming "elite counter-terrorism units" in Libya, Niger, Mauritania and Mali.
The programme has run into difficulties. In Libya, training ended abruptly last August after militia fighters attacked a training base and stole hundreds of US-supplied weapons and equipment.
Meanwhile, in Nigeria, Kenya, and Uganda, "counter-terrorism" campaigns have led to human rights violations by armed forces allied with the US and other Western states.
The possibility that US training may backfire, or lead to serious human rights violations, is nothing new. In fact, it is no exaggeration to suggest that many of the darkest pages in the history of US foreign policy can be traced back to such "counter-terrorism" programmes.
Following the overthrow of democratically-elected President Jacobo Arbenz by the CIA in 1954, US military advisors and police experts helped rebuild and reorganise Guatemala's intelligence apparatus, trained and equipped its security forces, and designed the "counter-terror" tactics they would use for three bloody decades.
In countless internal documents, now declassified, US analysts candidly describe the methods used by Guatemala's security forces, detail their ties with the dreaded "death squads", document the systematic resort to torture and the practice of "forced disappearances", methods that they repeatedly qualify as "terror", "counter-terror" or "terrorism".
To the American public, however, such programmes were presented as essentially benign, their objective being to help "professionalise" Guatemala's security forces so they could more efficiently fight against the "communist", "subversive" and "terrorist" threat.
Meanwhile, representatives of the executive branch assured critics in Congress that the country's security forces were not engaging in any systematic human rights violations, and dismissed reports from human rights organisations as untrustworthy and ideologically motivated.
Declassified evidence
In July 1971 for example, Senator William Proxmire referred to the fate of 600 people "brutally terrorised" during the recent state of siege in Guatemala, expressed his concern that US assistance was going to police forces "engaged in terror or in violation of human rights" and suggested for the first time that such training be stopped.
Assistant Secretary of State Charles Meyer rejected such accusations. There was, he insisted, "absolutely no evidence that our public safety program contributes to police terror or human rights violations." To the contrary, the Guatemalan government's main concern was "to achieve an open political atmosphere free from terrorism".
Countless declassified documents show the dishonesty of these assurances, as best exemplified in a March 1968 memorandum by Viron Vaky, the Deputy Chief of Mission in Guatemala City.
Entitled "Guatemala and Counter-Terror", it is a remarkably candid, stark and courageous internal critique of US policies. Vaky denounces the use of "counter-terror" to combat insurgency, explaining that the brutal methods used by the Guatemalan security forces were having "a terribly corrosive effect on Guatemalan society" and presented a serious problem for the "image" and "credibility" of the US.
Washington had, at times, expressed its displeasure with such excesses, but Vaky insisted that on the whole it had acquiesced, condoned and encouraged the use of "terror tactics" as an acceptable practice. He concluded:
[O]ne thing we can do is be honest with ourselves and admit to ourselves that there is a problem, and that counter-terror is wrong as a counter-insurgency tactic. […] The record must be made clearer that the United States Government opposes the concept and questions the wisdom of counter-terror. […] Otherwise, we will stand before history unable to answer the accusations that we encouraged the Guatemalan Army to do these things.
'Death squads'
In El Salvador, the declassified record once again highlights the gap between the public discourse surrounding "counter terrorism" programmes, the assurances given to Congress about the methods used by the forces trained by the US, and the reality on the ground as described in internal and secret documents.
In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan repeatedly described the Salvadoran security forces as engaged in a fight against "terrorism". In June 1985, he called on Congress to vote on the Central American Counterterrorism Act of 1985 and allocate $50m to assist armed and police forces as they confronted the threat of "terrorism".
Immediately, the bill was met with strong opposition.
Senator Christopher Dodd insisted that "a major source of terrorism in this part of the world is the very people that we may be providing additional assistance to."
Senator Claiborne Pell stated "so much of the terrorism the administration purports to oppose has, tragically, been institutional terrorism, perpetrated by the very police and military regimes we now propose to assist."
Having learned that the CIA had just completed a report on political violence in El Salvador, Senator John Kerry asked that it be promptly declassified, explaining: "If we are going to be here substantively trying to think about a legitimate response to the issue of terrorism in the region, if the CIA knows something about rightwing terrorism, that ought to be included in the programme."
As debates resumed two weeks later, Kerry announced that his request for declassification had been rejected, a decision motivated, he suggested, by a desire to protect the administration's policy. He maintained his opposition to the bill, which was ultimately defeated.
The report, titled "El Salvador: Controlling Rightwing Terrorism" has since been declassified, and its contents confirm Kerry's suspicion. The CIA was aware of the intimate ties that existed between the "death squads" and the Salvadoran security forces, and its analysts did consider many right-wing actors as "terrorists".
In 1999, President Bill Clinton officially apologised for US support of Guatemala's repressive regimes. Around the same time, the legal regime surrounding US assistance programmes was strengthened, thanks notably to the "Leahy laws".
Still, whether the US has truly turned the page on some of its worst Cold War practices remains an open question.
Indeed, it is Special Forces specialists involved in the Salvadoran training programmes that were called on to manage the "counter-insurgency" programme in Iraq in 2005. Referred to as the "Salvador Option," it resulted in the setting up of secret detention and torture centres, and the creation of "commandos" whose methods were often similar to Central American "death squads".
When President Obama suggests that the new "counter-terrorism fund" should draw on the "successes and shortcomings" of the past, does he agree with the US Army's Field Manual, which refers to the Salvadoran training programme of the 1980s as an unmitigated historical success to be emulated? Or with his Secretary of State who, in the 1980s, opposed such programmes as amounting to training the "real terrorists" in the region?
Remi Brulin is a research fellow at New York University's Journalism Institute, and a Shapiro fellow at George Washington University's School of Media and Public Affairs.Selenium 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 roadmap finally unveiled
At a 2013 conference session, Simon Stewart, the Selenium project lead and inventor of WebDriver, announced that Selenium 3.0, a widely used tool for user-focused automation of mobile and web apps, would be released by Christmas. Three years after that announcement, Selenium 3.0 still hasn't been released, but this month we got more information about Selenium 3.0 and a more likely release time frame.
"I did say Christmas, but I didn't specify what year," Stewart said jokingly in a webinar last week. That webinar only had room for 1,000 participants, but the registration list was well over 10,000.
After delays in the project, he's hoping that Christmas 2016 could be the release date for the long-awaited Selenium 3.0. I talked to Juho Perälä, a testing specialist at the Finnish development firm, BITFACTOR Oy, about the significance of some of these announcements and what they mean for automation testers and developers who are using Selenium and have a significant investment in Selenium tests.
Here are the highlights of the Selenium roadmap, which should give companies plenty of leadtime to figure out what changes to implement in their test suites between now and the Selenium 3.0 release, as well as the 4.0 and 5.0 releases.
TechBeacon: What are the changes going to be between Selenium 2.0 and Selenium 3.0?
Juho Perälä: The big change is that the old Selenium Core libraries will be dropped in 3.0. The focus will shift completely to the WebDriver API. But there was no detailed information about possible changes of WebDriver API from 2.0 to 3.0. It seems that the WebDriver API will remain more or less unchanged.
TB: Did the project leaders give a timeline for the beta or GA release of 3.0?
JP: Not exactly.
TB: What’s the history of this 3.0 release. Wasn’t it announced in 2013? What took so long?
JP: It was originally announced in 2013 that it would be delivered by Christmas (2013 we assumed), but it has been delayed. It is still planned to be delivered by Christmas, but Christmas 2016 still hasn't been confirmed.
There was no explanation for the delay, but it could have been due to lack of resources to complete the release by that time frame, or just a major change in the direction, which makes sense since the plan is to remove the Selenium Core completely in this release. Perhaps they wanted to give developers more time to migrate to using the WebDriver API in favor of the Selenium Core libraries.
TB: How significant is the removal of Selenium Core?
JP: I think most users are already writing tests with WebDriver, so this change won't really impact those users. But for the users of Selenium Core, there may be some significant work ahead if they want to migrate to the future, supported versions of Selenium. They'll need to migrate their tests to WebDriver, but there are ways to preserve your existing investment in tests even if they're older Selenium Remote Control (Selenium RC) tests.
TB: Was there any news around the Selenium Java APIs?
JP: Yes. The Selenium Java APIs will be broken into three packages: selenium-java (WebDriver classes), Selenium 3 server (command line remote server), and leg-rc, which will provide the current Selenium interface and client-side classes allowing execution of existing Selenium tests. Instead of Selenium Core, the leg-rc is backed by the WebDriver implementation.
TB: What is the background and status for the W3C WebDriver specification? What is the advantage of having a specification?
JP: The WebDriver API has grown to be relevant outside of Selenium. It is used in multiple tools for automation. For example, it's used heavily in mobile testing through tools such as Appium and iOS Driver. The W3C standard will encourage compatibility across different software implementations of the WebDriver API.
There is a working draft available currently, and the working group hopes to have it finished by the end of the year.
After that first specification is complete and in the browser vendors' hands, work will start on W3C WebDriver Level 2, which will focus on testing standard web user notifications such as allowing geolocation or other, deeper level access through the browser, and access to the shadow DOM.
TB: What does it mean when they say that browser vendors will own drivers in the future?
JP: The browser providers will accept responsibility for the implementation of the WebDriver API. The vendors have access to the internal implementation of their browsers, so putting this spec in their hands will allow for more advanced WebDriver implementations. It also will open up more sophisticated features for Selenium in particular by moving much of the workload off of the open-source contributors and into the hands of the browser vendors. They'll be able to do things and use their own technologies to improve Selenium in ways that the general open-source community could never have.
TB: What reasoning did the project lead give for some of these decisions?
JP: The reason they're retiring the Selenium Core is because it's becoming increasingly hard to test modern web applications using a pure JavaScript approach.
TB: What are your personal thoughts on this announcement?
JP: This was mostly about the Selenium roadmap in general. Here's the key slide from the announcement that really explains where the core is moving in the next two releases.
Simon Stewart expects that Selenium 5.0 will drop support for the WebDriver implementation that doesn't comply with the final W3C specification.
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The thing to remember is that WebDriver is so flexible that it is being used in numerous contexts outside of Selenium to do automated testing. So keep an eye out for WebDriver implementations that are already available to help you in your own stack, along with future implementations as it moves to a W3C spec.
If you want to hear some of the additional background around Selenium and the forthcoming changes, as well as some of the audience questions from the webinar, watch the entire presentation here:
Image credit: Flickr
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[ Conference: ADM Summit 2019: Optimize Your Deployment Pipeline ]Senate rejects tighter control over unions, giving Government double dissolution trigger
Updated
The Senate has again rejected a bill for greater oversight of unions, setting up a double dissolution trigger for the Federal Government.
In a late-night vote, the legislation was defeated 34 votes to 33.
The Coalition wanted to set up a Registered Organisations Commission to regulate unions, a move Labor has been fighting.
If passed, the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment Bill would have imposed the same disclosure and transparency obligations on union officials as company directors.
The bill also increased civil penalties and introduced criminal penalties for union leaders involved in fraud.
In making his final pitch to the Senate, Employment Minister Eric Abetz said unions and companies should be held to the same standard.
"Why should a corrupt union official who has ripped off hundreds of thousands of dollars from a union only be liable for a fine of $10,800, when for the same corrupt conduct a company director would be liable for five |
car is able to take over
Google has been testing its car for several years, with the company boasting of 300,000 computer-driven miles without an accident.
While at an earlier stage of development, Oxford University's car has significant key differences to Google's offering, Prof Newman said.
"Well if you look at it, we don't need a 3D laser spinning on the roof that's really expensive - so that's one thing straight away. I think our car has a lower profile."
He added: "Our approach is made possible because of advances in 3D laser mapping that enable an affordable car-based robotic system to rapidly build up a detailed picture of its surroundings.
"Because our cities don't change very quickly, robotic vehicles will know and look out for familiar structures as they pass by so that they can ask a human driver 'I know this route, do you want me to drive?'"
Prof Newman applauded Google's efforts in innovating in the space - but was buoyant about the role British expertise could have in the industry.
"This is all UK intellectual property, getting into the [driverless car] race.
"I would be astounded if we don't see this kind of technology in cars within 15 years. That is going to be huge.""Mafia-Methoden": Mieter raus, Flüchtlinge rein
Empörung über geplante Asylbewerberunterkunft in Reichelsdorf - 14.05.2016 05:59 Uhr
NÜRNBERG - Eine geplante Flüchtlingsunterkunft in Nürnberg-Reichelsdorf sorgt für große Empörung im Stadtteil und in SPD-Kreisen: Die Stadt wollte das Objekt, das teilweise noch bewohnt ist, demnächst mit Asylbewerbern belegen. Einige Mieter freilich werfen dem Hauseigentümer vor, sie mit rüden Methoden zum Auszug gedrängt zu haben.
In dieses Gebäude in der Geigerstraße in Reichelsdorf sollten demnächst Flüchtlinge einziehen. Daraus wird nun nichts. © Eduard Weigert
In dieses Gebäude in der Geigerstraße in Reichelsdorf sollten demnächst Flüchtlinge einziehen. Daraus wird nun nichts. Foto: Eduard Weigert
Neun Parteien lebten beziehungsweise arbeiteten bis vor kurzem in der Wohn- und Gewerbeimmobilie in der Geigerstraße 2, 2a und 2b, einige seit mehr als 30 Jahren. Das Haus, so berichten sie, habe im August 2015 den Besitzer gewechselt. Der neue Eigentümer Angelco Sein, habe zuerst die Miete um 20 Prozent erhöhen wollen, berichten mehrere Mieter übereinstimmend. Als dies nicht akzeptiert wurde, habe er die Kündigung wegen Eigenbedarf angedroht und den Druck deutlich erhöht.
"Das waren Mafia-Methoden", sagt ein Mieter, der keinesfalls namentlich genannt werden möchte. "Ich habe Angst, ich bin ja ganz alleine gegen die." Ein anderer Mieter bestätigt dies: "Das ist ein richtiger Clan, die waren manchmal mit bis zu zehn Männern da. Da fühlt man sich schon eingeschüchtert."
Das Prinzip Zuckerbrot und Peitsche funktionierte: Bis auf einen Mieter haben offenbar alle die von Sein angebotene Entschädigung angenommen und einen Aufhebungsvertrag unterzeichnet. Von fünf Monatsmieten spricht einer, von 1000 Euro ein anderer.
Angelco Sein will von Druck auf die Bewohner seines Hauses in der Geigerstraße nichts wissen: "Die Mieter sind rausgegangen, weil sie zufrieden waren mit dem Geld, das ich ihnen gegeben habe", beteuert er auf Nachfrage. Das Gebäude werde renoviert und vermietet, sagt er, "aber nicht an Flüchtlinge". Wer stattdessen einzieht, will er nicht beantworten und bricht das Gespräch ab.
Dieter Maly, Chef des Sozialamtes, bestätigt hingegen, dass die Stadt das Objekt demnächst mit Flüchtlingen belegen wollte. Mit Sein habe man einen Drei-Jahres-Vertrag abgeschlossen. Der habe das Quartier Geigerstraße Mitte April angeboten, woraufhin ein Mitarbeiter des Sozialamtes es in Augenschein genommen habe. "Herr Sein hat uns einige Wohnungen gezeigt und gesagt, das ganze Haus sei leer. Und er konnte eine Genehmigung für einen Pensionsbetrieb vorlegen", berichtet Maly. Dem habe man Glauben geschenkt.
Dass immer noch Mieter in dem Haus wohnen und nicht alle freiwillig ausziehen, ist Maly neu. "Dann hat uns der Eigentümer verarscht." Er kündigt an, dies möglichst schnell zu überprüfen und gegebenenfalls nach einem Weg zu suchen, vom Vertrag zurückzutreten. "Wir haben nicht vor, Wohnungen zu belegen, wo Mieter gekündigt wurden."
Das Kind scheint freilich schon in den Brunnen gefallen zu sein. Der Vorgang sorgt im Stadtteil und in örtlichen SPD-Kreisen für gehörigen Wirbel. Von einer "Riesen-Sauerei" spricht Wolfgang Heit, Mitglied der SPD Reichelsdorf-Mühlhof, früher Personalrat bei der Stadt Nürnberg: "Da verdient sich ein geldgieriger Geschäftemacher eine goldene Nase und die Stadt macht mit dem Geschäfte", schimpft Heit. Auch Hans Russo, Stadtrat und Vorsitzender des SPD-Ortsvereins, ist empört: "Das geht gar nicht, dass man Mieter rausschmeißt und dann Asylbewerber reinnimmt. Das sorgt für böses Blut." Russo ist überdies verärgert, weil er noch im Januar Oberbürgermeister Ulrich Maly über die Vorgänge in der Geigerstraße informiert hatte und vom OB im März die Auskunft bekam, dass die Stadt nicht plane, dort Flüchtlinge unterzubringen.
"Wir können uns unsere Geschäftspartner nicht immer aussuchen", entgegnet Dieter Maly leicht resigniert. Auch wenn der Flüchtlingsstrom etwas abgenommen habe, so müssten immer noch 1300 Menschen aus den Notunterkünften in Dauerquartieren untergebracht werden. "Wir schließen allerdings derzeit keine neuen Verträge ab", sagt Maly. Pro Monat zahlt die Stadt übrigens je nach Ausstattung des Hauses zwischen 600 und 900 Euro je Flüchtling an die Vermieter. "Das ist der Markt", sagt Maly, immerhin seien die Preise die letzten zwei Jahre über stabil geblieben.
Die Stadt informiert öffentlich über die geplanten Flüchtlingsunterkünfte in Reichelsdorf am Dienstag, 17. Mai, um 18 Uhr im Saal der Sportgaststätte SV Reichelsdorf, Schlößleinsgasse 9.
Christine AnneserAustralian director Bruce Beresford, known for films such as Driving Miss Daisy, Mao’s Last Dancer and the Academy Award nominated Breaker Morant, is a keen art collector. Here, he talks to Naomi Evans about how his love for art has shaped his life and films.
Film is of course a compelling medium where story, visuals and sound can be crafted to profound affect, but when did you discover an interest in the visual arts?
Well when I was in my early teens I suppose, because we grew up in a part of Sydney where my parents had really no interest in any painting or music or anything like that.
I mean, my father actually must be one of the few people I ever met who never read a book in his entire life. Nothing, except one called How to Win Friends and Influence People. The only one he read. Yes. It never worked, actually.
But I became interested largely from school. I remember teachers from school recommending books that I liked and that happened and then listening to music. Classical music I became interested in from hearing it on the ABC, and pictures I think from again school and visits to the Art Gallery of New South Wales. I thought “Oh this is interesting”, and it just sort of developed on from there.
How good that a school actually took you to see an art gallery, that seems quite rare.
They did – not often. I remember that we used to have an annual trip into the city and we’d go to the gallery … I was always fascinated by the big narrative pictures.
There was one where somebody was visiting the Queen of Sheba. It’s still there in the Sydney gallery and I remember they couldn’t get me away from it. I was standing in front of it and they were saying, “Come on Bruce. We’ve got to go to another room”, and I just thought that picture was fabulous. This was at primary school.
From what I understand it was actually at school that you came across Jeffrey Smart.
Yes now that was at high school. At Kings School Jeffrey Smart was the Arts Master, and I wasn’t in the art class because I couldn’t draw for nuts – I still can’t – but a friend of mine was in the art class and I used to go and meet him. I would wait outside the art class for my friend to come out because he was a film fan, and then I used to sometimes chat to Jeffrey who was always, unlike all the other masters in the school, extremely approachable and very friendly and would always explain what was happening and I went on from that.
Then when I left school I saw him again. I was at the ABC, and I was an assistant cameraman. I must have been about 17 and we went to a big art show to film it, in Sydney, and it was Jeffrey’s paintings. And he said, “Oh I remember you from school”, and from then on we always kept in touch.
Photo: Bruce Beresford
After studying in Sydney, you moved to London for a time. How did this affect your interest in film and art?
Well of course being in London was incredible because you could go to all these wonderful galleries. Clive [James, with whom he shared a flat] and I used to go off endlessly. I mean it was the amount of time we spent at the National Gallery, at the Tate, and then Clive would track down all the poetry readings and we’d go often to the US Embassy. It used to bring over American poets, famous ones, and they’d give readings.
We used to go to those, and a hell of a lot of galleries. And also concerts. We were always up in the cheap seats, or up in “the gods” at the opera.
Some of your films have taken you to some extraordinary places with the opportunity for chance encounters. How is it that you find the artworks that have come into your collection?
Well of course Frank Brangwyn was [once] the most famous painter in the world and it was easy to find him. I usually just stumble upon them. There’s a dealer in LA who used to go to old movie stars’ houses. He still has this place called the Los Angeles Fine Art Society which is on La Cienega Boulevard and I used to drive past and then I would see the pictures in the window. I mean this was years ago, the first time. So I stopped and I went in and said. “You’ve got some very interesting pictures”, and we got to know each other very well.
He had lots of figurative pictures, which I liked and nobody else did. I mean, the figurative was right out. So he used to call me and say, “I’ve just got some more, you might come and have a look”. That’s where I got maybe a quarter of all the pictures I own - from that one place.
Were there any exhibitions around the world that you found particularly influential or that stand out?
Oh, I’ve been to hundreds. Especially in London, you get on the train and go to Paris. I remember the last one that I ever went to that made a huge impression on me was Bouguereau [William-Adolphe Bouguereau, 1825-1905] and I’d always thought Bouguereau was a hack. I thought, “They’re having a big retrospective of Bourguereau, I can’t believe it. I mean it’s all rubbish”.
Then I thought I would go anyway, so I went to Paris. But when you see the Bouguereaus, as opposed to seeing the reproductions they are absolutely breathtaking. They are incredibly beautiful, and so moving. And I remember with one of them, I was standing in front of it and I got very embarrassed because I started crying. It was a little girl, just a painting of a little girl. And it was so beautiful that these tears are running down my face and I am mopping them away. I won’t hear a word against Bourgeureau since then.
via Wikimedia Commons, public domain
You were speaking last night about seeing Van Gogh’s works up close – that it was like magic.
Well it’s the difference in seeing the pictures as opposed to the reproduction. You sometimes get a tremendous surprise. And I’ve found another thing. In some films where I have wanted for some reason or other dramatically, we needed pictures on the wall allegedly by famous painters. So sometimes I’ve got painters in and I’ll say I need a Renoir there or a Van Gogh there – you can’t do it. Can’t be done.
It doesn’t matter how simple the original ones are, or how simple they look, they can’t be copied. And I’d look at these copies and I’d say, “We are not going to film it”, and they’d say to me, “But Bruce, this is quite a good copy” and I’d say, they are just not. I’d say, “Let’s get photographs of the original ones and we’ll rough them up so they look like they’ve been painted” …. but you can’t copy them.
Over the years, you have accumulated a wonderful and idiosyncratic art collection, that reflects your interest in people, relationships, stories and composition. Can you reflect on what it is that crooks its finger to you in artworks? How do you know that you’ve found a good picture?
Well, it’s just an emotional reaction. That’s all. You just look at something. Purely instinctive. Isn’t that what anyone does? I think it’s all you can do really. Just “bang” … and think: “That’s really good”.
This transcript has been edited for length.CLOSE MidAmerican Energy Thursday held an event to mark the near-completion of it’s 119.6 megawatt wind farm in Madison County. The farm is located just east of the town of Macksburg. So far 48 of the 51 Siemens wind turbines are up and running. Bryon Houlgrave/The Register
Buy Photo Bill Nosbisch manager of Wind Operations at MidAmerican Energy Company, enjoys the view from the top of a wind turbine during a tour of a wind turbine unit on Thursday at the Macksburg wind project turbine farm in rural Macksburg. (Photo: Bryon Houlgrave/The Register)Buy Photo
MidAmerican Energy took a giant, $3.6 billion step Thursday toward its goal of meeting all of its customers' power needs with green energy such as wind and solar.
With the investment, the Des Moines utility's largest, MidAmerican would get 85 percent of its energy from wind, CEO Bill Fehrman said Thursday at a press conference with Gov. Terry Branstad and Debi Durham, the state's economic development director.
"We have a dream to deliver 100 percent renewable energy to our customers," Fehrman said.
Officials with the Des Moines utility, already the nation's largest rate-regulated owner of wind energy, said the project would add up to 2,000 megawatts of wind generation.
The project, called Wind XI, won't increase consumers' energy bills, thanks largely to federal production tax credits that would cover the project's cost over 10 years, Fehrman said.
"For customers, the benefits are clear: clean energy produced right here in Iowa using an abundant natural resource," Fehrman said. "Unlike coal or natural gas, renewable energy has no fuel costs associated with it. Harnessing the wind is free."
MidAmerican serves 752,000 electrical customers and 733,000 natural gas customers in Iowa, Illinois and South Dakota.
RELATED: Iowa gets 31% of electricity from wind
MidAmerican's announcement received resounding approval across the board, including from U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, Rep. Dave Loebsack, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and state and national environmental groups.
Nathaniel Baer, energy program director at the Iowa Environmental Council, said the announcement sets the renewable energy bar higher for other Iowa and Midwest power suppliers.
"Making 100 percent renewable energy a goal starts a new discussion about how to get there. It’s an important new direction," Baer said. "It recognizes that the renewable energy sources we have in Iowa are tremendous."
The request must go to the Iowa Utilities Board for consideration. The company hopes to get board approval by mid-September.
The project, with about 1,000 turbines, wouldn't be completely constructed until 2019. The turbines' location is still under consideration.
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Fehrman said the utility's shift to wind has been dramatic since 2004, the first time it invested in wind energy generation.
"We didn't have any wind in our system, and coal made up 70 percent of our generation," Fehrman said. "By the end of this year, we will have built 4,048 megawatts of wind energy across 2,020 turbines."
The company has spent $6.6 billion on wind generation over the past 12 years. It will get close to 60 percent of its energy from wind by year's end.
Even with 100 percent of its energy from renewable sources, Fehrman said the investor-owned utility has no plans to retire its coal and natural gas plants.
"During times when the wind isn’t blowing — or isn't blowing enough — our coal plants, gas plants will be picking up the slack," Fehrman said
He said the company wants to to generate as much wind energy as its customers use annually.
"We will be able to certify to our customers that at least on an annual basis — not a minute-to-minute or hour-to-hour basis — we were able to deliver to you 85 percent of energy from renewable power.
"And hopefully we’ll get to 100 percent some time down the road," said Fehrman, adding that the utility will look to solar, energy efficiency, biomass and other sources to reach its goal.
RELATED: Solar advocates say new pricing plans will hurt progress
Robert Brown, professor of mechanical engineering and director of the Bioeconomy Institute at Iowa State University, said the utility will still need a considerable amount of fossil fuel generation to back up its wind generation.
For 100 percent renewable generation, the country needs utility-scale battery storage, smart grid improvements that can shoot renewable energy across the nation and power plants that burn biomass — plants such as perennials, Brown said.
Fehrman agreed that renewable energy storage is critical to growing green energy use.
"Battery storage is a game-changer in this renewable energy environment," he said. "The issue today is that it’s very, very expensive."
MidAmerican said no other utility has "staked out this 100 percent position."
"Our customers want more renewable energy, and we couldn’t agree more," Fehrman said.
Environmental groups applauded the investment.
"MidAmerican made clean energy history today," said Bruce Nilles, senior director for Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. "Iowa and MidAmerican's rapid transition from dirty coal to affordable wind offers a game-changing new model for how utilities will reach 100 percent renewable energy more quickly than anyone would have predicted."
Buy Photo The view from atop a MidAmerican Energy wind turbine during a tour on Thursday at the Macksburg wind project turbine farm in rural Macksburg. (Photo: Bryon Houlgrave/The Register)
“MidAmerican’s announcement reaffirms that wind energy is affordable, reliable and strengthens our energy independence,” said Josh Mandelbaum, an attorney at the Environmental Law & Policy Center.
MidAmerican said the proposal puts the state in "a strong position to comply with carbon emissions limits." Iowa is required to reduce carbon emissions from its power plants by 42 percent under the federal Clean Power Plan, which is now being challenged in courts.
Branstad said the MidAmerican project "puts Iowa on track to be the first state in the nation to generate more than 40 percent of its energy needs from wind power — far ahead of any other state.
"Today, Iowa is the only state to have crossed the 30 percent mark,” Branstad said.
RELATED:
Durham called MidAmerican's goal "audacious," adding that it could be a significant economic development recruitment tool.
Leaders have said wind energy in Iowa has been critical to attracting Facebook, Google and Microsoft data centers to the state. The operations are huge energy users, and the tech companies want renewable energy to be a large piece of the portfolio.
"What these publicly traded companies need to show shareholders and customers, particularly millennials, is that a large part of energy portfolio is from renewable," she said. "That's a calling card that separates Iowa from other states."
Fehrman said wind has helped make MidAmerican's energy costs seventh-lowest in the nation.
The company has wind farms in operation or under construction in 23 Iowa counties and has partnered with more than 2,400 Iowa landowners to place the turbines.
Leaders said wind power supports as many as 7,000 jobs in Iowa.
Fehrman said the new project would generate about $12.5 million per year in property tax payments, $18 million per year in landowner payments, and $48 million per year in state and local expenditures.
Photos: Macksburg wind project turbine farm
Read or Share this story: http://dmreg.co/1Scwv8PJANESVILLE--Donald Trump landed in Wisconsin Tuesday, turning out a huge crowd in Janesville, Paul Ryan's home town, just because he could.
According to Politico, Trump chose the location hours after Speaker Ryan chastised him for the tenor of his campaign. "Our political discourse did not used to be this bad and it does not have to be this way now. Politics can be a battle of ideas not a battle of insults," said Ryan.
Trump responded by issuing 5,000 tickets for a 1,000 seat venue at the Janesville Holiday Inn, generating a huge crowd. There were as many Trump supporters outside the hall as inside.
Hundreds of young people were also there to protest the candidate with a strong rejection of racist rhetoric. With dozens of vendors hawking goods, there was a carnival-like atmosphere to the event unlike any other.
Trump ditched the standard stump speech for a withering attack on Wisconsin's conservative establishment.
Trump vs. Scott Walker
On Monday, Trump was ambushed by the state's far-right radio talkers Charlie Sykes and Vicki McKenna, who in separate interviews demanded that Trump apologize for attacking Cruz's wife. The spectacle of the two trash-talking radio hosts demanding "civility" from Trump had many here rolling their eyes.
On cue, Walker endorsed Cruz Tuesday morning, citing among other factors the fact that he and Cruz, who has been accused by the tabloid National Enquirer of multiple affairs, were both "preacher's sons." Walker support among Republicans remains strong, but his approval rating has sunk to 40 percent, one of the worst in the nation.
On Tuesday afternoon, Trump got a chance to return the favor.
"He certainly can't endorse me after what I did to him in the race, right?" Trump said, referencing his attacks on Walker's record before he dropped out of the race last fall.
Trump then read a long list of economic data points to make the case that Walker has failed: total state debt $45 billion, 20,000 fewer people in labor force than 7 years ago, 800,000 food stamp recipients; middle class hit hard due to loss of manufacturing; 15,000 jobs lost to NAFTA and more.
"He's not doing such a good job, Scott Walker, but he's convinced you there's no problem."
"Both Walker and Cruz want TPP--that would hit Wisconsin so hard," said Trump, referencing the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade deal pending with 12 Pacific rim countries, and he mocked Walker for his fondness for biking clothes. "He doesn't look like a biker to me," said Trump.
Trump Attacks Club for Growth
Then Trump segued into a more personal story about Walker. "He came up to my office about a year ago…I supported him, I gave him money… I didn't know him well, but he was fighting, he was always fighting… and I gave him a lot of money. He gave me a plaque, a beautiful picture. I never read it. I just had my girl find it… she found it under a pile of other plaques. So I will bring it here, I will be here the whole week. Because if we win Wisconsin it will be pretty much over."
It is not clear whether Trump is referencing a $10,000 check he gave to Walker for his reelection in 2014, or the $15,000 check he gave secretly to Wisconsin Club for Growth to aid Walker during the 2012 recall election. The secret donation came to light in the course of the "John Doe" criminal investigation of Walker, currently being appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, and his top campaign aide RJ Johnson for potentially illegal coordination with allegedly independent groups. Wisconsin Club for Growth has spent millions over the years in support of the Wisconsin GOP and is as much of the Wisconsin political establishment as its pet project Scott Walker.
Trump had more to say about Club for Growth, calling it a "crooked outfit." Trump said that a representative of Club for Growth had met with him and written to him asking for $1 million and now the group is running ads against him in Wisconsin.
"He writes me a note asking for $1 million dollars. Now they are doing ads all over Wisconsin on eminent domain. By the way, without eminent domain you would not have schools, roads, or hospitals… but they are complaining about eminent domain, which is kind of funny because these people love the Keystone pipeline… which is all about eminent domain," he said.
Paul Ryan Not Spared
"Do you guys like Paul Ryan?" he asked the crowd. Ryan has represented Janesville since 1998. To boos and yells, Trump responded "Really? I was told not to criticize him here. He is the Speaker, he is very nice. Wow, are you sure you are all Republicans? Are you mostly conservatives?"
They weren't all Republicans. Many of the people CMD spoke to outside the venue called themselves independents, one was torn between Trump and Sanders, and some were at the first political event of their lives. Many had completely contradictory views on issues such as abortion.
Wisconsin is an open primary state, so by campaigning against the establishment Trump hopes to appeal to Independents, Democrats, and the disaffected.
Dianne from Janesville told CMD: "I like Trump because he is his own man, not owned by anyone. He brought me out. I am not a regular voter." On the whole she had little faith in typical politicians. "You know people get elected, they make promises, and still our country is falling apart." How is it falling apart? "Terrorism, it's a big issue and it's getting worse."
She wasn't the only person to talk about terrorism. Many Trump supporters placed it on their list of top issues and one spoke to me at length about the "22 ISIS camps already in America" being ignored by the mainstream media. He had heard it on an evangelical radio show.
"No Hate in Our State" Supporters and Protesters March Outside
Many Trump supporters outside the venue were not happy with the state of the nation. John Paulby wants a wall with Mexico to stop heroin, cocaine, and terrorists, but his real beef was with immigrants who he believed received food stamps, housing, and healthcare "for free." He carried a sign which read "entitlement suckers will keep sucking entitlements."
John Green was there to advocate for AARP and strengthening Social Security.
Victor Procopio is voting for Trump because of borders, babies (abortion), and business (jobs). "Obama gave our auto plants to China. Trump will bring jobs back from all over the world." Chuck from Janesville was also worried about a list of items including what he called "Ryan's trade deal." The TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, he said would allow foreign workers to come to the United States and get a fast track to citizenship. "Ryan was one of the architects of the deal, he is a globalist. At least Trump isn't bought."
Trump supporters were separated by a line of police from a vibrant and diverse crowd of young protesters holding signs such as "You can't combover racism," "I am not a criminal, I am a dreamer," "Trump empowers hate," "Trump leave our state, and take our Governor with you," and "Down with this kind of thing." It was notable that the protesters were not led by Wisconsin union leaders, but by young people in their twenties and teens, many concerned about racial justice and LGBT rights.
"Build communities, not walls" was a frequent chant.
Six protesters committed civil disobedience and were charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest after they locked themselves down in the hotel lobby the night before, demanding that Holiday Inn cancel the event. A number of the protesters returned to speak to the crowd through a bull horn and urge them to lead in their communities in the fight against discrimination of all stripes.
"Z!" Haukeness explained that the goal of the action was to shut down hate speech and racist rhetoric that can have consequences. He pointed out that two Hmong men and a Puerto Rican man were shot and killed in Milwaukee recently. Racist rhetoric can "embolden people" and lead to this type of anti-immigrant violence, he said. He called it a "Trump effect."
Democratic State Rep. Melissa Sargent was there to support the protesters: "I want young people to know that some Wisconsin policymakers care about them whether they are born in Mexico, worship at a mosque, or have black skin."
While there was a heavy police presence in Janesville, the crowd was boisterous, but largely peaceful. In an incident towards the end of the day, a teen-age girl was allegedly groped and when she punched the offender, she was pepper-sprayed in the face by someone who was not law enforcement.
On Wednesday March 30, Trump will be in DePere, Appleton, Green Bay, and Wausau, taking nothing for granted.
You can see the full Trump speech here.When Betty Friedan wrote “The Feminine Mystique,” forty-four years ago, she did more than launch a revolution by identifying “the problem that has no name”—the crushing ennui of the modern housewife. She also invited a bit of wordplay that has proved irresistible both to her detractors and to her would-be successors. If “The Feminine Mystique” has acquired the status of a classic, the various iterations of “The Feminine Mistake” have provided something of a barometer of a shifting cultural climate.
In 1967, “Alice in Womanland, or The Feminine Mistake,” by the pseudonymous Margaret Bennett, provided a satirical overview of the condition of the American woman, its chapters on marriage, family, and work framed within an extended allusion to Lewis Carroll—a tactic that, like the lyrics to Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit,” might once have made sense but these days indicates a culture that was on the verge of losing its collective mind. By 1971, the feminist movement was sufficiently well established to merit a parodic counterblast from the humorist Cal Samra, whose own “The Feminine Mistake” was, he claimed, “perhaps the first true masculinist tract since the Koran.” When Judith Posner’s “The Feminine Mistake” appeared, in 1992, it was time for feminist one-upmanship. Posner, a sociologist influenced by the burgeoning New Age movement, argued that those women who had followed Friedan’s counsel and sought to enter the workplace on a par with men had gained nothing but their own subjection to corporate culture, and would do well to cast aside career in favor of personal growth, forming a vanguard for the wholesale reformation of consumer capitalism. “We can even say that the glass ceiling was a blessing in disguise,” she maintained. “Today, women can not only see to the glass ceiling, they can also see through it.”
The latest “Feminine Mistake” (Voice; $24.95), by the journalist Leslie Bennetts, means to be a corrective to such correctives. Just as Posner’s book was conceived as a response to the media phenomenon of the overwhelmed Superwoman (Posner cited a Time cover from 1989 that featured a woman with a baby in one arm and a briefcase in the other, accompanied by the text “In the ’80s they tried to have it all. Now they’ve just plain had it. Is there a future for feminism?”), Bennetts’s book appears amid trend stories like one that was published, notoriously, in the Times in the fall of 2005, in which female Ivy League students disparaged the working-mother model of their mothers’ generation and declared an intention to be provided for by their future husbands as soon as they possibly could.
Bennetts, who is the same age as the mothers of those Ivy Leaguers, is appalled by that attitude. She argues that women must work, even after becoming mothers—not so much because, as Betty Friedan lyrically expounded, “if women do not put forth, finally, that effort to become all that they have it in them to become, they will forfeit their own humanity,” as because a woman without a job or a career will be in dire economic straits if she loses her provider to death, desertion, or debility. Nor should a woman who leaves the workplace when her children are babies count on being able to rejoin it later; her skills may have become unmarketable, Bennetts warns, and her years off will be counted against her. “It’s nice to be at home when your child loses her fourth tooth,” she writes, “but is it worth the price you might pay if your breadwinner dies or divorces you, and you end up losing that home entirely?” The feminists of Bennetts’s youth proclaimed that a woman needs a man the way a fish needs a bicycle; Bennetts’s point is that bicycles get broken or stolen all the time.
She is alarmed that women aren’t taking precautions. Census Bureau data show that 5.6 million mothers stayed home with their children in 2005, about 1.2 million more than did so a decade earlier; a survey of women who graduated from Harvard Business School in the years 1981, 1986, and 1991 revealed that only thirty-eight per cent of those with children remained in full-time employment by 2001. A poll cited in a recent issue of Psychology Today claims that forty per cent of today’s women would prefer a return to the gender roles of the nineteen-fifties. “Once seen as a quaint relic of bygone times, the stay-at-home mother who depends on a husband for economic support while taking care of their home and children has come back into vogue with a vengeance, as newly stylish as a vintage alligator purse,” Bennetts writes. She has a particularly low opinion of mothers who decide not to work in order to have more time to shop for vintage alligator purses and go to lunches carrying them. Bennetts, like Friedan, concerns herself almost exclusively with the life styles of the well-off, and focusses on professional women or the wives of professionals; but even among women without professional qualifications, she thinks, the decision not to work is a cop-out. “Under questioning, many stay-at-home wives admit they were bored or unhappy with their work before quitting their jobs,” she writes. Their insistence that they are fulfilled by taking care of their families is, she says, “the socially acceptable cover story” for their failure to find work that they like enough to leave the kids with a sitter for it.
To Bennetts, the new “stay-at-home momism,” as she termed it in the 2005 magazine article from which this book grew, is a kind of nationwide female delusion: “a plague of silence across the land,” she says, with Friedanesque rhetoric. (Elsewhere, she cites a soccer mom turned entrepreneur who likens the divorce and desertion among her peers to “the slaughter of the lambs”—a slightly less inflamed metaphor than Friedan’s description of domesticity as “the comfortable concentration camp,” but along the same lines.) Where Friedan’s interviews convinced her of a pervasive discontent, though, Bennetts finds, and deplores, a pervasive contentment. Interview after interview reveals a woman who seems, actually, pretty happy with her lot, at least until Bennetts sweeps in and points out how terrible things will become if her husband leaves her. (A typical response to a question about plans for the future—“To be honest, I haven’t thought long and hard about that”—is provided by the stay-at-home mother of a two-year-old and a two-month-old, a woman who deserves a medal simply for answering the door to Bennetts.) The response of one woman to the bald question of what she would do if the worst were to happen—“I would get married again”—strikes Bennetts as so absurd as to be barely deserving of commentary, although half of all divorced women remarry within five years of their |
opening them up to a Muslim demographic invasion. Mark Steyn’s bestselling America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It predicted the demise of “European races too self-absorbed to breed,” leading to the transformation of Europe into Eurabia. “In their bizarre prioritization of ‘a woman’s right to choose,’” he argued, “feminists have helped ensure that European women will end their days in a culture that doesn’t accord women the right to choose anything.”
This neat rhetorical trick—an attack on feminism coupled with purported concern about Muslim fundamentalist misogyny—is repeated again and again in Islamophobic literature. Now it’s reached its apogee in mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik’s 1,500-page manifesto, “2083: A European Declaration of Independence.” Rarely has the connection between sexual anxiety and right-wing nationalism been made quite so clear. Indeed, Breivik’s hatred of women rivals his hatred of Islam, and is intimately linked to it. Some reports have suggested that during his rampage on Utoya, he targeted the most beautiful girl first. This was about sex even more than religion.
Breivik describes himself as a disaffected product of the Norwegian liberal political elite, furious at the way sexual instability has affected his own life. His father was a diplomat, stationed first in London and then in Paris. His parents divorced when he was a year old, after which his feminist mother married a Norwegian army captain, and his father wed a fellow diplomat who Breivik calls a “moderate cultural Marxist and feminist.” Though he describes his stepfather as somewhat conservative, he nevertheless complains of a “super-liberal, matriarchal upbringing,” which he says has “contributed to feminise me to a certain degree.”
A terror of feminization haunts his bizarre document. “The female manipulation of males has been institutionalised during the last decades and is a partial cause of the feminisation of men in Europe,” he writes. He blames empowered women for his own isolation, saying that he recoils from the “destructive and suicidal Sex and the City lifestyle (modern feminism, sexual revolution) … In that setting, men are not men anymore, but metro sexual and emotional beings that are there to serve the purpose as a never-criticising soul mate to the new age feminist woman goddess.”
Furious and alone, Breivik plugged into the international anti-jihadist, anti-immigrant right. One of the most notable things about his manifesto is its scant attention to Norwegian politics or authors. Most of those he quotes are American, Canadian, or English, including Steyn, Robert Bork, Rich Lowry, and Melanie Phillips. Rather than railing against Norwegian feminists, he attacks Betty Friedan and even the relatively obscure Ellen Willis. He’s deeply versed in American culture-war issues—at one point, he even rants about the so-called war on Christmas.
Obviously, none of the writers he cites is responsible for his hideous crime. However, reading these authors pretty clearly helped him transmute his anger at women into a grandiose political ideology, and to recast himself as a latter-day crusader. He picked up the argument that selfish western women have allowed Muslims to outbreed them, and that only a restoration of patriarchy can save European culture. One of the books he references approvingly is Patrick Buchanan’s The Death of the West, which argues, “[T]he rise of feminism spells the death of the nation and the end of the West.”
The demographic theory behind such pronouncements is completely wrong. In fact, in modern, industrialized countries, feminism is correlated to higher birthrates. Catholic countries like Poland, Spain, and Italy have some of the lowest birthrates in Europe, because society does little to help women combine their aspirations for work and family, forcing them to choose. France and Scandinavia are much closer to replacement fertility, which is crucial to ensuring that pension systems don’t rest on the shoulders of a rapidly declining number of workers. As the Tory M.P. David Willetts wrote in a 2003 report, “The evidence from Italy, and indeed Spain, is that a traditional family structure now leads to very low birth rates.” Countries concerned about shrinking populations, he concluded, must find ways to help working mothers. “Feminism,” he wrote, “is the new natalism.”
Nevertheless, the right clings to the idea that feminism is destroying Western societies from the inside, creating space for Islamism to take cover. This politics of emasculation gave shape to Breivik’s rage. Thus, while he pretends to abhor Muslim subjugation of women, he writes that the “fate of European civilisation depends on European men steadfastly resisting Politically Correct feminism.” When cultural conservatives seize control of Europe, he promises, “we will re-establish the patriarchal structures.” Eventually, women “conditioned” to this new order “will know her place in society.” His mad act was in the service of male superiority as well as Christian nationalism. Those two things, of course, almost always go together.Suffolk County legislators were taken aback last week when they were asked to authorize bonds of nearly a half-million dollars for a federal brutality lawsuit involving the county jail — in which the plaintiff was awarded only $30,000.
The suit involved a 2007 incident in which prisoner Robert Houston said he was punched and kicked at the Riverhead jail, improperly put on suicide watch and deprived of his due process rights.
Lynne Bizzarro, deputy county attorney, said the borrowing figure was so high because the court also awarded the Manhattan law firm of Houston, Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen and Hamilton, which represented Houston, $426,000 in legal fees. Bizzarro said the firm originally sought fees totaling nearly $1 million, but Suffolk persuaded the judge to reduce the number by more than half.
“When the injured party is getting a pittance and the attorneys are reaping hundreds of thousands of dollars, something is wrong,” said Legis. Tom Cilmi (R-Bay Shore). “And its wrong because it’s the taxpayers who are taking it on the chin.”
Rick BrandZimbra, the Web-based e-mail and collaboration application, has given educational institutions access to its Zimbra Collaboration Suite software. Institutions will be able to choose whether they want on-site hosting, Zimbra's hosting, or hosting through Zimbra's local partners, depending on their needs.
Those who choose Zimbra's hosting solution will enjoy the benefits of Yahoo's (Zimbra's owner) infrastructure which should mean 99.9% uptime, 24/7 support, and disaster recovery. The fact that it's all hosted in the cloud means that schools and colleges who choose this option won't have to worry about upgrading the software, hardware, or even maintenance.
Satish Dharmaraj, Zimbra co-founder and Yahoo! vice president, puts it this way: “Zimbra is now the only open collaboration solution on the market that is built from the ground up to offer both on-site and hosted options. With the new Zimbra Hosted, we have removed the challenge of managing thousands of mailboxes and encouraged schools to rebrand Zimbra as their own, creating a communications portal that connects all key audiences.”
As far as features go, Zimbra offers a scheduling calendar with RSS and Atom support, offline access via Zimbra Desktop, data privacy and protection, and integration with third party data via Zimlets, which are essentially widgets for Zimbra's products. Furthermore, there's mobile access on a variety of handsets (iPhone included), branding the collaboration suite with your own logo and color scheme, and special packages which include enterprise-grade features such as synchronization with Outlook, Apple products or BlackBerries.
Prices for all this vary depending on the product version and the number of mailboxes, though educational institutions will get substantial discounts.In Australia, Tony Hannagan of BevelTech is the man to call if you need help with a classic Ducati. And this sleek black-and-red beauty is his latest build. ‘Vern R’ is a Ducati 900SS based racer designed for the BEARS series—meaning “British, European, American Racing and Supporters”, a club set up by the late, great John Britten.
Hannagan has taken the frame and motor from one of his heavily modified road bikes, and developed the machine for the track using the time-honoured principle of adding lightness. Dry weight, as seen here, is a trifling 290 lbs (132kg).
To keep running costs to a minimum, Hannagan limited his engine tuning mods. He’s fitted Imola cams, cleaned up the ports and installed higher compression Cosworth pistons. He trimmed the engine weight by using magnesium rocker covers (from Norway, of all places), removing the alternator and narrowing the engine cover, and fitting a roundcase motor clutch cover.
The heavily cut down gear selector case and fork brace were brought out from under a bench, where they had been hiding since Tony last built racing bevels back in the 1980s.
The 860 frame has been modified to the same geometry as a 916, with the motor rotated back 8mm. The twin shocks (required by racing regulations) are mounted with the same geometry as Barry Sheene’s RG500.
To reduce weight even more, Hannagan has fitted titanium fasteners wherever possible and removed every bit of unnecessary metal—even halving the number of mudguard mounts on the forks.
The Ducati 900SS is still being tested, so the exhausts are unmuffled for now. I bet this one sounds as good as it looks.
Thanks to Phil Aynsley for the images. Phil’s book Ducati: A Photographic Tribute, with a foreword by Troy Bayliss, is available from Amazon.Mr Wu, 67, is an retiree who often brought baby formula across the border to kill time and to earn from the difference, yesterday bought two cans of milk powder in Hong Kong, each HKD 270, took the cross-border bus to Futian Control Point, then traveled to Lo Wu Control Point to sell his goods to a buyer for RMB 540. Only when he was going to exchange the money back to HKD in Hong Kong did he discover that 4 pieces of $100 banknote were counterfeit.
Mr Wu said the counterfeit has high degree of resemblance. But with a careful checking one can spot that its surface is smoother and the watermark is slightly misplaced. They are all 2005 series, and two of them have identical serial number. Feeling unlucky, he does not bother to report to the police because he does not want any trouble (editor’s comment: does not want to get into trouble?), even though he recognizes the buyer. But he still wants the public to learn from his lesson. He said he has learnt a good lesson and will no longer do smuggling.
Source: Oriental Daily: 水貨伯賣奶粉收假「人仔」 蝕本生意 2014/07/14
Editor’s Comment: Lo Wu Control Point at Shenzhen side is now a smuggling goods trading centre. North District Parallel Imports Concern Group has taken some photos at Lo Wu Transport Plaza a few days ago to update the public:
AdvertisementsAnel uses this ritual knowledge of Diiwi to order and share knowledge with the seekers who come to her, thereby fulfilling the traditional role of the Nairarbi in multi-customary societies. With the aid of Diiwi, Anel lines up cultural objects in a precise order, one which lets young Kazakhs from outside her warehouse approach and learn more about any significant topic, from the impacts of modern technology to the history of related cultural groups.
Such an ordering and sharing is the goal of Nairarbi culture, a system that forms the basis for some of the most current systems of knowledge across the world today.
"How do you know what to call things?" I say, curiously touching an oblong, hard, fabric-covered object which she has tucked at the end of a curved shelf. The object seems made of wood, carved in thin slivers and inscribed with notes on culture, technology, and history. On the bottom corner, Anel has pasted a scrap of white paper. A label. A set of numbers, with dashes and dots.
"There's always something in here," Anel tells me, caressing the edge of her big Book. "Maybe there are many ways to order things, but I find the best one. The one that lets the students" –she points to a young Kazakh, studying the objects nearby–" discover our knowledge."
"Discovery" is a key word among the Nairarbi today, and at the heart of a paradox in their society. While Naira officiants are highly trained in using the Diiwi code to sort out the complexities of their society, allowing others to "discover" and easily assimilate this order into their own minds, this "simple" code can seems mystical and difficult to outside observers.
The Nairarbi sometimes refer to these observers as Putra, traditional clients which gather quietly in lines before the Naira, who respond at times with a smile and at times with indifference. Anel has put off the young seeker as she talks to me, but seems constantly aware as he walks back and forth near her shelves, studying her small labels and seeming thoroughly confused. He timidly glances in our direction, and she turns to answer him.
~~~~
Over a hundred and twenty years ago, the modern Nairarbi experienced a cultural revolution. Naira men (and sometimes women) were known for a shadowy existence, preserving the records of their society—and sometimes, allowing others to discover the same. Yet the most learned Naira tended to live in seclusion, sought out by scholars, students, and travellers only in times of need. Even when Putra approached their domain, they treated the Naira with caution and respect—secular in role, but perhaps similar to a shaman.
Yet as the industrial world accumulated its own memory of itself, and liberal values of discovery and exploration spread across the world in the 20th century, Nairarbi took on a more prominent scope in areas as diverse as the Soviet Union, Europe, and the Americas. They gained a new prominence with the rise of democratic institutions of learning–with the rise of the Book.
Estimates of the current Naira population range from 500,000 to 1,000,000 individuals, according to IFLA, an international organization. Yet among the Nairarbi, young members are always joining as old ones pass away—in fact, there has been a crisis of demographics of young Naira join faster than the elderly leave their hallowed roles, leading to limited resources among the population, and limited roles by which to grow and learn within their most traditional professions.
The Nairarbi also face a broader ecological crisis, as their flourishing role over several thousand years—and especially in the past hundred years—has shifted dramatically with the rise of digital technologies. Once focused on using the Diiwi code to stake out and order the world around us, the Naira increasingly find their organizing role interrupted by the unstructured, dynamic, linked nature of the internet—by the way that people, young and old, increasingly seek answers online rather than seeking out the expert Naira.
~~~~
I have worked with the Nairarbi for three years now, yet am always meeting people who challenge my claim to cultural fluency within this group. In 2014, I met a Nairarbi from America, who had moved from Virginia Beach through schools on the eastern seaboard, ending up in an elite Naira warehouse in New York.
Unlike Anel, Laura is loud and blond, wearing a burgundy dress and glossy high heels. Flicking her red nails across the screen of an iPhone, she looks up some information on the tribe for me, while boasting of her current position: "they [the Nairarbi elders] always want to claim me as a success, put me on the website, but I got here by myself."
I met Laura at a nationwide gathering of Naira practitioners, held twice a year across America. This year, some 16,000 attendees attend the sweltering meeting in Las Vegas. As I survey the halls, I find more women than men, more old than young, and a growing number of diverse Naira of many colors, and from around the world. Twitter is a popular venue for communication.
The future of the Nairarbi society is often discussed here, along with technological change and the challenge of retaining the attention of the Putra. Some Nairarbi react by becoming more engaged in the community, offering their services. Others offer assistance online, through free "Ask a Nairarbi" portals. Yet with more and more information and advisory offered by crowds online, for free, some young Naira are finding it hard to even find part-time work in their historic role.
~~~
When I bring up the Diiwi code, Laura laughs. "Haven't used it in a while."
While Laura was trained in Diiwi a few years ago, she and her friends find that modern Putra are put off by the linearity of the Diiwi code—for some, it preserves continuity and clarity. But for others, the system confuses rather than helps. Some Naira have moved to Elsii, but others invite in the Putra, allowing outside seekers to participate in "tagging" knowledge and culture in new ways.
But what does this mean for the future of the Naira? It's hard to tell, but social researchers would do well to pay attention. When we look at people "closer to home," we get a better understanding not only of our own society, but of many related processes occurring "out there."This project, had a quite shaken development on its history. From changing the name of the project due to legal reasons, to the frequent updates and changes on their core work environment, This project, had a quite shaken development on its history. From changing the name of the project due to legal reasons, to the frequent updates and changes on their core work environment, Budgie Desktop... - Its for sure a world apart!
This logo is under "Copyright © 2016-2017 Solus Project, Ikey Doherty" license.
Represent the GNU / Linux operating system, Solus.
Source: Solus
Brief biography of Solus
The image represent Solus with Budgie Desktop. It is under CC BY-SA 4.0 license. Source: Wikipedia
What is Solus?
The image represent Solus with Mate Desktop. All rights to the image belonging to the Solus Project. Source: Solus
Solus Package Manager
When Solus came out as Evolve OS, they adopted the PiSi package manager, originally developed by Pardus Linux. Unfortunately, this package manager is no longer supported.
Solus team, in anticipation forked PiSi, and integrated on the system designating it eopkg.
In late 2016, Ikey Doherty the project leader announced that, the project will drop eopkg and replaced by another package manager that will be completely written in C, and named sol.
At this very moment when I write the article, Solus still uses eopkg!!!
The image represents Solus with Budgie Desktop. All rights to the image belonging to the Solus Project. Source: Solus
Why a world apart?
Solus Links
Official website
Downoad's webpage
Solus wiki page
Solus Project Wiki
Publication Update: Solus Wiki page has been replaced by Solus Help Center
Solus, an operating system that has been gradually catching the attention of the Linux world.In 2011, Solus OS appears initially as a spin-off of Debian with the GNOME 2.x desktop. Later on, by Ikey Doherty ( project leader ) decision, the project stopped completely and the images (ISO) were no longer available.In 2014, Ikey returned by launching to the world, the newest Linux based operating system, "Evolve OS". Afterwards, due legal reasons, they were forced to change the name to Solus ( from what I could understand and contrary what you might think, the legal question falls on the acronym OS and not the Evolve name ).The new project has little or nothing to do with the previous one, has only the name and project leader.Initially Solus relied heavily on Gnome 3.x packages, but in time the distribution has been moving away from this dependency, and even announced that will switch to QT as base platform for its core environment, Budgie Desktop ( as we announced ).At first, Solus only had Budgie Desktop, but by the end of 2016, they also adopted Mate Desktop as a way to captivate potential users that weren't big fans of Budgie.Solus is an operating system designed to be user-friendly but minimalist, and offers a modern design and layout on both versions. It is an independent GNU / Linux distribution with its own repositories, or rather, isn't based on another distribution such as Debian Ubuntu or Fedora. The package management system is eopkg, and recently the team opted for a roling release update scheme, which means that the distribution is updated over time, and the images (ISO) are updated periodically to allow new users install or test, the latest software available.Unfortunately, it's been a trend in recent times, Solus is available for 64-bit processors only.Well, where to begin?Originally Solus adopted the PiSi package management system, which is no longer supported, then the team forked it and called it eopkg. Now they'll drop the eopkg, and replace it with sol... Confused?! - Me too, in the beginning!I will try to give a crystal clear image, as possible;It seems a bit confusing and with no resolution in sight, but it starts to be a very own characteristic of Solus team. They adopt a system or software package that best fits the project, and they evolve it, make it faster, practical and efficient. That's what seems to be the case of the new package manager. Once again everything is changing on Solus, and this will be surely another step towards consolidation.Why leads me to say, that Solus is a world apart? - Is exactly what I expected to see on a GNU/Linux project. Solus is taking strides with new features, new functionalities. I give you as an example, the software center that doesn't waste the precious time of the user, and makes trivial the simple action to install with one click, a package or application... - And that, it's for sure an achievement in the Linux world.However, it's not only the software center and its packages, I can also refer the latest driver manager or LDM, and also the continuous adaptation of Budgie Desktop to the real needs of the user ( I am not talking about themes and icons). In this particular issue, I mention the attention given to the usability, speed and interaction between what we seen on the screen, and whole processing necessary to run the software.With the transition from Gnome to Qt as Budgie's base, we will certainly have more modularity, speed, and why not to say, an appealing interface that QT integration itself allows in terms of design.The system isn't perfect, obviously. The project has flaws and errors like the rest of the distributions, but the approach given to the bugs and failures and the way the fixes are implemented, is unusual between Linux distros.The same thing happens with the integration of some applications, that often have lot of obstacles to run in the GNU/Linux systems, distinguish Solus from other OS, as it was in the case of Steam.It's in these small ( big ) differences that put Solus into a category of its own, in a world of its own.I have found few tricks that makes writing CoffeeScript more efficient and fun, especially when learning it and I’d like to share it with you.
These tricks are for Vim, but the ideas can be carried out to other editors as well. I know that at least the TextMate CoffeeScript Bundle can do some of these.
Basics
Let’s get the basics out of way. Get syntax hilighting from vim-coffee-script plugin and automatic syntax checking from Syntastic. These will take you a long way, but with CoffeeScript we can do more.
Reading compiled code
Especially when starting out with CoffeeScript you are not always sure what the snippet you are reading or even the code you just wrote does. Chances are that you already know Javascript so we can use that to our advantage. vim-coffee-script makes that incredibly easy.
Lets take following snippet that might be confusing to CoffeeScript newbies:
1 { @foo } = bar
With vim-coffee-script you can just select the snippet in Visual Mode and type :CoffeeCompile which will open up a new scratch buffer with a compiled version of the snippet which will clearly tell what this syntax in CoffeeScript means. You can use this to verify that you understood the CoffeeScript syntax by using your Javascript knowledge!
I recommend creating a shortcut for this. It’s so useful. Put this to your.vimrc :
1 2 vmap < leader > c < esc >: '<,' >: CoffeeCompile < CR > map < leader > c : CoffeeCompile < CR >
This allows you to invoke the compiler with Leader-key + c. The leader key is backslash by default, but usually it is redefined to comma.
Stack Traces
I don’t like manually compiling CoffeeScript files for my Node.js apps. Instead I use the coffee command directly or use plain js wrapper app that starts my CoffeeScript apps. This is clean and simple, but can be painful when you get an exception. There is a stack trace, but it refers to the compiled Javacript file which does not exist! You could look up the original CoffeeScript file and try to guess what line the stack trace means by looking variable names or manually compile the file when exception occurs. Not so fun.
vim-coffee-script to the rescue!
When you execute the CoffeeCompile Vim command in Command Mode you will get the whole file compiled into the scratch buffer. In that you can scroll the line referred by the stack trace and see what code exactly rose it. This is bit clumsy since normally you can jump to a certain line by typing :<number>. We can do better! Put this to.vimrc :
1 command - nargs = 1 C CoffeeCompile | :< args >Spread the love
Meridian, Idaho — Police accountability activist Matthew Townsend no longer faces a prison term over a Facebook post — but the Ada County Prosecutor’s Office may yet find a way to put him behind bars.
Roughly a year ago, as previously reported by The Free Thought Project, Townsend was charged with felony witness intimidation for a Facebook post in which he promised to wage a “non-violent and legal shame campaign” in the event a charge of resisting and obstructing was not dropped following a preliminary hearing on the following day. The March 18, 2015 Facebook post mentioned Corporal Richard Brockbank of the Meridian Police Department, the arresting officer, who had confronted Townsend while the latter was conducting a sidewalk protest in front of a tax preparation business.
Brockbank claimed that Townsend had been jaywalking, although his official incident report did not describe that offense. After a brief conversation in which the officer tried to browbeat Townsend into admitting to the offense, Townsend demanded that Brockbank either charge him or let him go. When Brockbank refused to respond, Townsend shrugged and walked away, as was his legal right. Without legal cause or justification, Brockbank arrested Townsend for “resisting and obstructing.”
“I’m hoping that the REAL reason I was harassed to begin with will be released by the State rather than I,” Townsend wrote, clearly anticipating — against all reasonable expectations, given that the witness was employed in a truth-aversive occupation — that Officer Brockbank would testify freely, fully, and truthfully. “If my case isn’t dismissed tomorrow upon my request, I will begin a non-violent and legal shame campaign that will be remembered….”
That statement was not a threat of criminal violence, but a candid statement of a citizen’s intent to protest abuses he had suffered and to seek redress of grievances. It was recognized as such by District Judge James Cawthon during the March 19, 2015 preliminary hearing.
“While it is concerning what the state is alleging, what I don’t hear is any threats related to any type of physical harm, violence, things of that nature, to the officer involved in this case, or his family,” Cawthon ruled in response to a motion by the prosecution that Townsend be taken into custody (emphasis added).
Rather than ordering that Townsend be taken into custody, Judge Cawthon issued an order setting up a hearing on March 30 and requiring the State “to file that motion and have it served no later than Monday the 23rd.”
If that adversarial hearing had been allowed to occur, the matter would almost certainly have ended there.
Under Idaho case law, Townsend could have explicitly made a personal threat against Brockbank without that act being defined as “witness intimidation” unless clear evidence existed that his intent was to prevent the officer from testifying “fully, freely, and truthfully.” On that understanding, in 2007 the Idaho Supreme Court overturned the witness intimidation conviction of a man who threatened an officer who had arrested him on a domestic violence charge. In 2011, the state Supreme Court overturned another conviction in a case involving an armed assault by the suspect against a witness in a narcotics trial; once again, the central issue was the lack of evidence that this action — which involved a very serious crime — was carried out for the purpose of “affecting future testimony.”
Townsend’s antagonists knew they were riding a weak case. This is why, instead of complying with Judge Cawthon’s order, the Ada County Prosecutor’s Office sought, and obtained, an arrest warrant from a different judge on the following day, pointedly refusing to disclose Cawthon’s ruling and order dealing with the matter. This led to Townsend’s after-dark arrest later that Friday evening — which would have led to a weekend in jail and the loss of his job had his mother not managed to obtain bail.
Townsend’s felony trial was scheduled to begin on January 19. It ended in a mistrial after Assistant Ada County Prosecutor James Vogt objected to defense attorney Aaron Tribble’s passing reference to the fact that Townsend faced a felony charge.
Since March of last year, Townsend informs The Free Thought Project, “I have spent more than $10,000 on my legal defense. There is no doubt I could have won this case on appeal, and it’s very likely that I would have won in a jury trial, too.” Townsend points out that he received a personal message from a juror in his abortive January 19 trial “urging me to keep fighting for my rights.”
As is so often the case, Townsend — a man of modest means employed in the productive sector — simply didn’t have the financial resources to deal with a predatory prosecutor with essentially unlimited funds at his disposal.
“I’ve been very blessed by people willing to help with the costs of this case, but I’ve also had to move out of my home, and I’m an hourly employee who can’t keep taking time off from work,” Townsend points out. “Because of the financial demands of my trial I’ve lost my house.”
Under the terms of the deal with the prosecutor, Townsend pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges. He will serve two years of unsupervised probation and was given an 180-day jail sentence, 179 days of which were suspended. He was also hit with a $1,000 fine, with half of that sum suspended.
The contrived felony charge — which carried a maximum sentence of five years in state prison and a $50,000 fine — was dismissed with prejudice. However, the Meridian PD and the Ada County Prosecutor’s Office might still be able to arrange for Townsend to spend half a year in jail — if he comes within eyeshot of his supposed victim, Meridian PD Corporal Richard Brockbank.
Shortly after Townsend was arrested on the “witness intimidation” charge, the Ada County DA obtained a three-year order of protection forbidding him to have any contact with Brockbank, or come within 100 yards of him. The urgent attention displayed by the DA in this matter contrasted sharply with the indifference she exhibited several months later when Meridian resident Makaela Zabael-Gravatt twice sought protective orders after receiving explicit, credible death threats from Christopher Wirfs, a man who had a violent criminal history. Last September, after twice being refused protection by the County Prosecutor’s office or the Meridian PD, Zabael-Gravatt was shot and nearly killed in her own home by Wirfs.
According to domestic violence counselor Jeannie Strohmeyer, the likeliest explanation for the denial of Zabael-Gravatt’s request for a protective order was that there was no “domestic relationship” between her and the aggressor, and she wasn’t able to cite an incident of physical harm – including “false imprisonment.”
Ironically, while it is certainly true that Townsend was not in a domestic relationship with Officer Brockbank, there was a history of violence between them, specifically false imprisonment. In this case, however, it was the perpetrator of the criminal violence who immediately received an order of protection, owing entirely to his privileged status under what we are supposed to pretend is the law.
In the service of the official fiction that Townsend’s rhetoric victimized a member of the state’s punitive priesthood, Ada County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney James Vogt composed two sophistry-laden motions. In one, an objection to a defense motion to dismiss, Vogt insisted that by criticizing Officer Brockbank on Facebook, Townsend had committed an act directly comparable to a cross-burning carried out by the Ku Klux Klan.
Vogt’s second exercise in Olympic-caliber dishonesty was an objection to a defense Motion in Limine. Since Townsend’s statement was a form of political dissent, that defense motion contended, it is protected by the First Amendment and cannot be construed as a criminal act, so it shouldn’t even be entered into evidence.
In his objection, Vogt wrote that Townsend’s statement that he was prepared to conduct non-violent, legal protests in Brockbank’s neighborhood constituted a “true threat” – owing to the alleged “war on police.”
“Given the current political/cultural climate, Mr. Townsend’s message … [serves] as a real and true threat,” oozed Vogt in his objection. “His words are more threatening in an era where [sic] the police are under attack from civilians, battered, and killed in the line of duty.”
To document that assertion, Vogt’s motion offered a footnote citing four news accounts of police being injured or killed. Two of them described minor injuries suffered by officers in the course of their not-exceptionally-dangerous jobs. Two others were high-profile stories of supposed martyrs in the so-called “war on police”: Lt. Joe Gliniewicz of Fox Lake, Illinois, and Deputy Darren Goforth of Harris County, Texas. Both died as a result of what the public was told were anti-police assassinations, and honored with the familiar Soviet-grade state funeral and saturation media coverage.
As previously reported by The Free Thought Project, Gliniewicz committed suicide as a desperate cover-up for a long criminal career in which he had embezzled from the local Police Explorers program, harassed and threatened female co-workers, and explored the possibility of a contract hit on a county official who was investigating the officer’s illegal activities. Deputy Goforth wasn’t assassinated by a “cop hater;” he was murdered — horribly — by a mentally ill man whose derangement is so severe that he may not have recognized the victim as a law enforcement officer. At the time of the shooting, Goforth — a married father — was not carrying out official duties, but rather en route to an assignation with his mistress, a woman who has been involved with several other deputies from the same department.
Despite the fact that he has done nothing to injure or threaten Corporal Brockbank, Townsend could be arrested and charged if their paths happen to cross at any point over the next three years.
“I’ve been a police accountability activist here for many years,” Townsend points out. “That order of protection places me in direct danger of imprisonment if I peacefully exercise my rights, or, for that matter, if I happen to run into Brockbank while simply going about my business. I can’t feel safe anywhere in Meridian or Ada County — and yet somehow I’m threatening him?”
In keeping with the preferred procedures of its disreputable profession, the Ada County Prosecutor’s Office was able to arrange punishment without proving the offense.A community under attack.
It’s not only the name of a report by housing activists that sheds light on the effects the city’s development plans and demolitions have on the Metrotown neighbourhood, but a growing sentiment from the people who rent and live there.
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This week, members of the Stop Demovictions Burnaby campaign gave the media a tour of an area undergoing redevelopment near Dunblane Avenue and Imperial Street.
The group chose the area because every building on the block is scheduled to be demolished and eventually developed into new highrise towers.
In all, 19 buildings will be demolished to make way for four development projects.
The study noted development companies Polygon and Amacon bought up all the apartments on the block.
The study also noted the 234 units on the block are only about a third of the 684 apartment units facing demolition in the Metrotown area. The study suggested nearly 1,400 people face eviction and displacement.
They are residents like Martin Lenin-Fernandez, who lives in an apartment on Imperial. He’s a single dad taking care of his two kids, who just moved in with him from Nicaragua. He’s being evicted from his apartment at the end of June.
Lenin-Fernandez, who moved to Canada in 1990 and has lived in Metrotown for eight years, said he has no idea where he’s going to go at this point.
“Every day my blood pressure is up and I don’t know what to do,” he told the media during the tour of the neighbourhood, adding he’ll also have to find a new school for his two young children.
The Burnaby resident said he currently pays $725 a month for his apartment, but now he expects his rent to double for any new place he lives.
He said he’s applied to B.C. Housing, but the organization can’t make any promises.
The group behind the study and campaign, which includes the Alliance Against Displacement, ACORN Burnaby and the Metrotown Residents’ Association, is putting the blame on the city’s development policies and the developers.
The report makes four recommendations to the city, suggesting that the city should:
· put a moratorium on demolishing apartment buildings;
· rehouse the residents displaced by the “demovictions”;
· create a new community plan that focuses on current residents most vulnerable to displacement; and
· dedicate city-owned land to social housing.
Ivan Drury, an organizer with the group, said half the people who took part in the study said they don’t know where they |
the clock with 3 seconds remaining. Gostkowski then kicked a 21-yard field goal.
"We have first-and-goal on the 1 1/2-yard line and settle for a field goal," Brady said. "You just can't do that."
Derek Carr completed 21 of 34 passes for 174 yards for Oakland. But with running back Maurice Jones-Drew sidelined for the second straight week with a right hand injury, the rookie remained winless as a pro. McFadden started in Jones-Drew's spot and rushed for 59 yards on 18 carries.
The Patriots relied on their running game early against the NFL's worst rushing defense and picked up 63 yards on the ground in the first half but just 16 the rest of the way.
"Sometimes you got to grind them out," Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman said. "An ugly win is better than a pretty loss."
The Raiders planned to leave after the game for London, where they face the Miami Dolphins in Wembley Stadium next Sunday.
"I was looking forward to it being after a win," Oakland safety Charles Woodson said. "It's a great opportunity to represent the NFL, but it's a business trip."
Game notes
Patriots defensive tackle Sealver Siliga didn't return after hurting his foot in the first quarter.... Oakland wide receiver Rod Streater and safety Tyvon Branch each left the game with a broken foot.... Edelman had 10 catches for 84 yards, extending his streak to nine regular-season games with at least six receptions.... Janikowski's field goals were from 49, 37 and 47 yards.BEIRUT, Lebanon — The head of Lebanese Shiite terror group Hezbollah on Thursday urged Lebanon to forge a plan to capture two disputed border areas held by Israel.
“We call on the state to devise a plan and take a sovereign decision to liberate the Shebaa Farms and the Kfarshouba Hills,” Hassan Nasrallah told thousands of his supporters in a televised speech, according to an English transcript of his speech provided by the Naharnet news website.
The Shebaa Farms — known in Hebrew as Mount Dov — is a small patch of land captured by Israel from Syria in 1967. Lebanon maintains that the strip of land is a part of Lebanon, despite it having been under Syrian control from the 1950s until it was captured and later annexed as part of the Golan Heights by Israel in 1981.
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Neither Israel, Syria or the United Nations recognize Mount Dov as Lebanese territory.
Nasrallah, who has lived in hiding since the 2006 war with Israel, said Thursday he traveled to Damascus to seek the Syrian president’s approval of a jihadist evacuation deal.
“I personally went to Damascus” to see President Bashar Assad,
Hezbollah terror group leader Nasrallah reveals from his underground bunker, that he met with Syrian dictator Assad in secret Damascus visit pic.twitter.com/8UgwMyvTky — Behind The News (@Behind__News) August 31, 2017
Nasrallah, 57, has only made rare public appearances since the 2006 war against his arch-foe Israel. As a figure on Israel’s most wanted list, he said in 2014 that he often changed his place of residence in the utmost secrecy.
On Monday, hundreds of Islamic State group fighters and civilians were evacuated from the border region between Lebanon and Syria under a ceasefire deal and headed toward eastern Syria near the Iraqi border.
The truce deal was negotiated between IS and Hezbollah, which has intervened in Syria’s six-year war to prop up Assad’s government.
The agreement has been criticized inside Lebanon, as well by the US-led coalition fighting IS in Syria and Iraq and especially by Baghdad.
Nasrallah tried to justify the deal by saying it was necessary to acquire information about the fate of Lebanese soldiers taken hostage by IS three years ago.
“We have a humanitarian cause. We wish you to help us,” Nasrallah said he told Assad. “We can only know what happened to the soldiers through this compromise.”
He said that, before approving the deal, Assad responded: “This will make things difficult for me.”
The deal came after Hezbollah fought a week-long offensive against IS on Syria’s side of the Lebanese border, at the same time as an assault by Lebanese troops on their side of the frontier.
A US-led coalition spokesman said Wednesday it had carried out air strikes to block the evacuated jihadists from reaching their destination in eastern Syria near the border with Iraq.Aquila on Pope Francis press coverage: [Pope Francis] has a deep love for those that are in need, for those who are poor, and reaches out to them, and so, the media never reports on his very real support for Catholic teaching and the understanding of Catholic teaching. They never report on - he's one of the few popes that, at least in my lifetime, who has referred to the devil in his homilies and his catechesis. And rarely do you hear the secular media reporting on that - that there is evil in the world, that there is - that Satan is real, the devil is real and he can really draw you away from the gospel message. And, of course, in a secular world that denies God, they're going to deny the evil one, too. And so it gives free rein to the evil one and that is really problematic because it is not good for humanity. Also, he is really one who embraces those who are sick or suffering. And I watched a video yesterday on Blessed John Paul II[...]. And so Francis, too, has that goodness about him, and people really do see that he loves them and cares for them. But he's also very challenging. When he - you know, the fact that he warned members of the mafia in Italy that they could go to hell if they continue to pursue their abuse of power and their murdering of people, and all of that.Even though both terms are used interchangeably, there is a difference between Hispanic and Latino. Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to ancient Hispania (Iberian Peninsula). Now it relates to the contemporary nation of Spain, its history, and culture; a native of Spain residing in the United States is a Hispanic. Latino refers more exclusively to persons or communities of Latin American origin. While there is a significant overlap between the groups, Brazilians are a good example of Latinos who are not Hispanic. Both terms were meant to refer to ethnicity, not race ; however, in the U.S., they are often used haphazardly to refer to race as well. As such, personal adoption of the terms is rather low.
Origin
The term Hispanic is derived from the Latin word for "Spain," while Latino is derived from Spanish word for Latin but which as an English word is probably a shortening of the Spanish word latinoamericano, which in English means "Latin American."
Use in the United States
Hispanic
This term is used to denote the culture and people of countries formerly ruled by the Spanish Empire, usually with a majority of the population speaking the Spanish language.
Collectively known as Hispanic America, this definition includes Mexico, the majority of the Central and South American countries, and most of the Greater Antilles.
The nations formerly pertaining to the Spanish East Indies are sometimes loosely included in this definition, as their cultures have some Spanish or Latin American elements.
It was first adopted by the United States government during the Nixon administration.
It has been used in the U.S. Census since 1980.
Hispanic is more broadly and frequently used in states like Florida and Texas.
Latino
Latino refers specifically to people living in the U.S. who are of Latin American nationality; the term also refers to their U.S.-born descendants. Latin America refers to countries in South America and North America (including Central America and the islands of the Caribbean) whose inhabitants mostly speak Romance languages, although Native American languages are also spoken there.
The term Latino is restricted to immigrants and their descendants from either Spanish, French, Italian, Romanian, or Portuguese speaking countries in North, Central, and South America, and it includes the French-speaking areas of Haiti, French Guiana, French-speaking Canada, and the French West Indies.
In the U.S., the term was brought into use because the Nixon administration could not fit the racially mixed North, Central, and South Americans into an established racial group since they are mostly mestizo and multiracial following, for example, white Europeans' raping of African slaves (see also history of the term mulatto ). Mestizos and mulattoes were considered inferior to whites, and the administration knew most people would not identify with the labels; as such, Hispanic and Latino labels were selected for use. Since the late 1990s, Hispanic/Latino labels were questioned and forced the Census to put a disclaimer that Hispanic or Latino were ethnic and not racial terms. However, in spite of this, government, law enforcement, and the media often utilize the terms when describing race (e.g., "One of the suspects was a white male, while the other was a Hispanic male.").
). Mestizos and mulattoes were considered inferior to whites, and the administration knew most people would not identify with the labels; as such, Hispanic and Latino labels were selected for use. Since the late 1990s, Hispanic/Latino labels were questioned and forced the Census to put a disclaimer that Hispanic or Latino were ethnic and not racial terms. However, in spite of this, government, law enforcement, and the media often utilize the terms when describing race (e.g., "One of the suspects was a white male, while the other was a Hispanic male."). Latino is used more often on the West Coast and especially California.
is used more often on the West Coast and especially California. Over 70% of Mexicans are mestizo, while Argentina has the lowest percentage of multiracial people.
Since ethnicities cannot be correctly identified by the Hispanic/Latino labels due to the wide variety of cultural groups within North, Central, and South America, and the Caribbean (including customs, foods, traditions and music styles) some have pointed out that these labels are racial and that the only label that accurately represents their ethnicity is their nationality, which immediately identifies their cultural traditions, foods, music, etc. (e.g., Colombian, Peruvian, Guatemalan, etc.). For example, "Hispanic food" often really means Mexican food in the U.S. and does not provide an accurate glimpse of the different types of food available in the Americas and the Caribbean.
Personal Adoption of Terms
According to a survey released by the Pew Hispanic Center, only 24% of "Hispanic" adults said they most often identified themselves as Hispanic or Latino. About half said they identified themselves most frequently by their family's national origin — e.g., Mexican, Cuban, Salvadoran, etc. An additional 21% said they called themselves American most often, a figure that climbed to 40% among those born in the U.S.[1]
Some find it offensive to be called Hispanic or Latino and prefer to be called by their true ethnic group, such as Mexican, Colombian, Bolivian, etc.
Race, Ethnicity and Nationality
We have a detailed comparison of race and ethnicity but to summarize:
Race is a social construct based on a person's ancestry and phenotype, i.e., their appearance. e.g. Black, White, Asian, Native American.
is a social construct based on a person's ancestry and phenotype, i.e., their appearance. e.g. Black, White, Asian, Native American. Ethnicity is also a social construct but is based on a person's cultural heritage. e.g. Hispanic, Greek, Latinx, African-American
is also a social construct but is based on a person's cultural heritage. e.g. Hispanic, Greek, Latinx, African-American Nationality refers to a person's citizenship in a country either by birth or by naturalization. e.g. American, German, Greek, Kenyan
There is, of course, overlap between many of these. For example, Czech can be both a nationality and ethnicity. But Latino and Hispanic are clearly ethnicities; both groups comprise people of many races and race mixtures, as well people of many nationalities. Hispanic or Latino is not a race. e.g. Afro-Latinx people may identify as Black, there are many White Latinos, as well as indigenous Latino populations who are neither white nor black.
ReferencesTobe Hooper’s “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” is a movie I had heard a lot about over the years, and I have watched numerous documentaries about its making to where it felt like I had seen it even though I had not. It wouldn’t be until the year 2000, just after I graduated from college, when I sat down to watch it on my new 27-inch JVC television set. I just started my subscription with Netflix, and this was one of the first movies I rented from it.
“The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” came out in 1974, so I went into it thinking there was no way it could be as horrifying now as it was when first released. I sat down in front of my TV prepared to eat my dinner, a Cedarline Mediterranean Stuffed Focaccia, while watching this horror classic. One of the first images, however, was of a pair of rotting corpses draped over a gravestone in a cemetery, and I decided it would be better to turn off the TV and finish my dinner before continuing. Once I was done and tossed my plate into the dishwasher, I turned the set back on and continued watching, believing it would be a piece of cake to sit through this lauded horror classic.
It has now been over 40 years since the original “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” was unleashed on the world, but when I watched it on DVD, I had no idea it would prove to be one of the most unnerving and brutal motion pictures I ever sat through. I figured no movie going experience would ever be more intense than “Requiem for a Dream” was when I saw it in Hollywood with a sold-out audience, but then I watched Hooper’s horrifying masterpiece. After it was over, I wondered to myself if I could have possibly endured this film had I first watched it on the silver screen.
“The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” opens with a crawl, narrated by John Larroquette, stating it is based on a true story, but it turns out this was not the case. However, certain plot elements were inspired by serial killer Ed Gein whose acts of violence came to inform many other movies including Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho.” We are introduced to a group of two siblings and three of their friends as they travel out to Texas to visit the grave of their grandparents. As you can imagine, what they discover far surpasses any imagined fears anyone could have endured when they were young.
I knew I was in trouble when this group of kids picked up a hitchhiker (played by Edwin Neal). This guy looked like he hadn’t showered in weeks as his face and hair seemed much slimier than anyone else’s on planet Earth. Seeing him cut himself and one of the kids had my hair standing on end, and this was just the beginning. The horror this movie had to offer was just starting, and the intensity would only increase exponentially from there.
By the time everyone got to the house, I was already sweating. I hadn’t seen the movie, but I already knew what was coming. People don’t just die a horrible death in “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” they die a realistic one. When Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) smashes one guy on the head with a hammer, the guy falls down and convulses horribly. Watching this sequence, I felt this is the way a person would react if bashed in the head with the hammer, and it showed me this would not be your average horror movie in the slightest.
What’s especially surprising about this film is it’s not as bloody or gory as you might expect. I figured there would be an ocean of blood on display, but instead it’s what I didn’t see which really messed with my head. We see Leatherface impale the beautiful Pam (Teri McMinn) on a meat hook, but we never see the hook go into her body. The expression you see on Pam’s face ends up feeling all the more unbearably real as a result because you can’t help but wonder how the hook went in and of how long she could hope to last before all her blood drained out.
In some ways, the powerful effect “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” gives off was something of an accident. When making this movie, Hooper was aiming for a PG-rating and even talked with members of the MPAA to find out how he could earn such a rating for a horror film like this one. A lot of the advice het got was to not show any body penetration or the chainsaw slicing into human flesh, and of course, he needed to limit the amount of blood shown. But instead of getting the PG-rating, Hooper saw his film get an X as these guides he was given proved to have the opposite effect. The fact it managed to get an R seems astonishing even by today’s standards. Still, this seems as welcome an accident as the shark not working on the set of “Jaws” was.
This could have been nothing more than a mere horror flick of the exploitation kind, but there really is a lot of artistry on display throughout. The acting all around is never weak, cinematographer Daniel Pearl gives everything a dirty look which will make you want to take a shower quickly after this movie’s conclusion, and the sound design makes you feel like you are in a real-life slaughterhouse. Hooper may have had a simple mission in mind while making this horror classic, but it turned into something far scarier than he ever intended.
Leatherface remains one of the scariest villains any horror movie could ever hope to have, and it’s a real shame this was the only time Gunnar Hansen played this iconic character as he brought a lot of thought and an instinctual energy to the role. Seeing him wander around in that human flesh-made mask of his, I started to fear what Leatherface looked like without the mask.
But while I want to give credit to all the other actors, I have to single out Marilyn Burns who plays Sally Hardesty. While she has an easy time during the movie’s first half, the last half has her screaming endlessly to where you want to see her get a Purple Heart instead of an Academy Award for her work. She screams and screams and screams to where I wondered just how tortured she felt throughout shooting. The closeup of her eyes while she is a guest at the most devilish of family dinners had me staring at the screen in utter horror. Even though I knew exactly how this movie would end, I was still gripped as I became desperate for Sally to escape any and every which way she could.
The movie’s last half is a frenzy to where I wondered how I could have survived this had I first watched it on the silver screen. Watching it on my television set with the volume turned down was hard enough as I wanted Sally’s hellish experience to end sooner rather than later, but her torture dragged on longer to where I refused to believe “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” is a mere 84 minutes long. When the screen finally went to black, it felt like such a welcome relief as I wondered just how much more I could have sat through had Hooper extended things out to two hours.
“The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” has long since earned its place alongside the greatest horror movies ever made, and the fact it hasn’t lost any of its power to unnerve and horrify the bravest of film buffs speaks to a power most filmmakers hope to have in their lifetime. The only other horror movies which equal this one’s power to terrify decades after their release are John Carpenter’s “Halloween” and William Friedkin’s “The Exorcist.” Some horror movies play better on the big screen than on television, but this one proves to be every bit as effective on both.
I still have yet to watch any of the sequels as I feel like I am still recovering from this cinematic experience over 10 years later. I did watch the Platinum Dunes remake, but the only thing about it which truly unnerved me was when Leatherface took off Eric Balfour’s face and made it into a mask for himself. As I write this review, the prequel “Leatherface” is about to released in theatres everywhere. Filmmakers can only hope to equal Hooper’s film, but it hasn’t stopped them from trying.
* * * * out of * * * *
Advertisements2 Brothers Beaten, 1 Killed, Allegedly By Their Parents And Fellow Churchgoers
Enlarge this image toggle caption New Hartford Police Department via AP New Hartford Police Department via AP
Six church members, including a married couple, are in custody, accused of a brutal assault on two of the couple's children that left one dead and another severely injured, according to law enforcement officials.
New Hartford, N.Y., police say Bruce and Deborah Leonard, along with four fellow churchgoers, fatally beat Lucas Leonard, 19, inside the Word of Life Church.
NPR's Joel Rose tells our Newscast Unit that police say the beatings appear to have taken place during a meeting where the brothers were to ask forgiveness for their sins.
"Police say the brutal beatings occurred inside the Word of Life Church in New Hartford, New York. Police Chief Michael Inserra says they were part of what church members describe as a "counseling session" that turned physical.... "Inserra says it's not clear what those supposed sins might have been. Nineteen-year-old Lucas Leonard died of his injuries. His seventeen-year-old brother Christopher is hospitalized in serious condition. Their parents are charged with manslaughter. Authorities say more charges and arrests are possible."
Inserra said the brothers were subjected to the punishment "over several hours." Lucas was pronounced dead a local hospital on Monday.
The Utica Observer-Dispatch reports, both victims suffered injuries to backs, thighs, stomachs and genitals.
"Police offered no motive for why the boys' parents, Bruce and Deborah Leonard of Clayville, would be involved in reportedly inflicting such injuries on their own children, however. The couple pleaded not guilty when they were arraigned on felony first-degree manslaughter charges Tuesday afternoon in New Hartford Town Court.... "The incident also resulted in several children found at the church being taken into custody by Oneida County Child Protective Services. Oneida County Assistant District Attorney Mike Nolan said Deborah and Bruce Leonard have been charged with'very serious felonies of multiple victims.'... "Bail for the Leonards was set at $100,000 each; bail for the other four defendants was set at $50,000."
The police investigation of the incident began on Monday. Law enforcement officials determined the Word of Life Church was the scene of the crime, according to the Associated Press. The wire service also reports Oneida County District Attorney Scott McNamara said a preliminary hearing for all of the defendants is set for Friday.Deep rocks have been cracked open and water isolated for billions of years released – the liquid may represent Darwin's “warm little pond” where life arose
(Image: Pearl Bucknall/Plainpicture)
IT IS the closest we have ever come to finding Earth’s primordial soup. Ancient rocks deep underground contain water that has been locked away for billions of years. It may never have been touched by life.
In 2007, geochemist Barbara Sherwood Lollar at the University of Toronto in Canada and her team found treasure in a copper mine. Water gushing out of cracks in the rock, caused by mining, turned out to be over a billion years old. Now the group has made a similar find in a second mine, suggesting ancient rocks could be riddled with such time capsules, right back to the early days of life on Earth.
Sherwood Lollar’s team is now scouring the water for ancient forms of life, perhaps unknown to science. So far it seems it holds no life, but that is just as exciting because it means the water they found may be identical to that in which life began.
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If that’s the case, it opens up an extraordinary opportunity to understand how life got started on Earth, and where (see “Beginner’s guide to the origin of life“). The find could also offer insights into how life may survive on other planets.
Sherwood Lollar first got a whiff of the hidden water over a decade ago, deep inside the Kidd Creek Mine in Timmins, Ontario, Canada. In a corridor more than 2 kilometres beneath the surface, she caught a whiff of gas from a fracture in the rock. Water dripped from the hole. Subsequent analyses revealed it to be between 1.1 and 2.7 billion years old (Nature, doi.org/tgw). The smell came from the sulphurous gases mixed in with the water, which also holds methane and hydrogen.
Crucially, as far as the team could tell, the water contained no trace of life. “It speaks to this question of whether we can find an exotic small part of this planet that has not been touched by life,” says Sherwood Lollar. “These fractures may have been isolated long enough that they retain chemistry that reflects the same kind of processes that were taking place before there was life on Earth. At that time, presumably the whole planet would have looked something like this.”
The discovery could have been a one-off, so the team has been looking for other places where ancient water exists in deep rocks. Last month at the Goldschmidt conference in Sacramento, California, team member Chelsea Sutcliffe presented their results from two mines in the Sudbury basin, also in Ontario.
Like Timmins, the mines are dug into rock that is billions of years old. Sutcliffe collected water from 1.3 and 1.7 kilometres down, and so far it looks very similar to the Timmins water. The chemicals in the water are similar, and isotope ratios suggest it is similarly old. The team are now running further analyses: the noble gases in the water samples will provide a fairly precise age.
“If they are seeing the same thing at Sudbury, that’s pretty powerful,” says Tullis Onstott of Princeton University. This water is “an abiotic fringe zone – a place where life could exist but doesn’t yet”, he says. “This is a zone that’s been trapped for billions of years, providing a geological experiment on the genesis of life.”
The water’s been trapped for billions of years, providing an experiment on the genesis of life
At most, the Timmins and Sudbury water is 2.7 billion years old – the age of the rock it is trapped inside. That’s about a billion years after life got started, so the researchers are not suggesting they have bottled the actual primordial soup in which life began. But the chemistry they are seeing corresponds to water that could have given rise to life.
“Geochemically, it’s the kind of site that has been invoked for the origins of life on our planet,” says Onstott. “Yet here we see it isolated from the present-day DNA world.”
There are two leading theories for where life got started on Earth. Perhaps the most famous is Darwin’s “warm little pond” – a soup of organic chemicals bathed in sunlight. The other, which has gained popularity in recent years, is that deep-sea vents at the bottom of the ocean acted as a cradle for life, offering both heat and nutrition via fluids pumped up through Earth’s crust.
That’s where the ancient water from the Ontario mines comes in. The rocks they are held in were formed by hydrothermal vent systems at the bottom of the ocean, billions of years ago.
“I would say this is as close as we have come to bottling the warm little pond, in a warm little fracture,” says Sherwood Lollar. Onstott agrees: “They are literally like Darwin’s warm little pond without the light.”
I would say this is as close as we have come to bottling Darwin’s ‘warm little pond’
Having bottled Earth’s primordial soup, the researchers are now probing it to see what they can learn. It may be that chemical reactions deep underground have given rise to some of the very earliest stages in the formation of life, like the generation of amino acids, or the building blocks of DNA.
If they find anything like this, it would suggest that life can begin without light – good news for the quest for life on other planets. Many distant worlds have never received as much light as Earth, but it is suspected that some of them have hydrothermal systems similar to Earth’s deep-sea vents. Can such systems generate life in an otherwise dead world? We don’t know for sure, but Sherwood Lollar’s water offers an unprecedented opportunity to find out.
“Given the chemistry that we have all speculated might have led to life,” says Onstott, “given that it’s there and it’s been there for billions of years, should we not anticipate seeing some prebiotic reactions trapped in there? Once we can find these types of sites, we can turn all our instruments on them to see if we find things like a primitive RNA world.”
Regardless of whether we find such pre-life chemistry in the water, Sherwood Lollar says one thing is fairly certain: the fluids are still full of energy-rich chemicals, the same energy that may have helped to kick-start life.
Sutcliffe’s latest results from Timmins show that the ancient waters are now slowly being colonised. Something seems to be eating the chemicals that have been trapped there for billions of years. It’s probably a modern organism that found its way into the ancient niche when it was cracked open by miners, and is now feasting. But the stuff it is eating has been around since life’s earliest days.
This article appeared in print under the headline “Bottling the primordial soup”For each week here at Goal Breakdown, I’ll do my best to write a breakdown of what I believe were the best three (or five) goals of the week. I’ll do my best to write one a day or so. Here’s number three in my countdown.
3) Edin Dzeko – Manchester City. 52nd Minute, 1-0
Edin Dzeko’s goal here is a fantastic example of link up play between strikers, in this case Kun Aguero and Dzeko. Like last week, we see these two playing nifty balls to find each other, and they seem to be on point. City does lose this match to Cardiff, but nonetheless take the lead with this beautiful goal. Let’s look at it.
Here’s the reminiscence of the attack just a few seconds before Dzeko’s goal. We see Fernandinho, a deep playmaker pushing up. We see Clichy, Dzeko, Silva and Aguero missing just to the right. City is getting high up the pitch, but this is what helps to make this goal great.
Now we see the ball was cleared back to Yaya Toure at the halfway line. It seems like the assumption would be that Toure would thump the ball forward back to that high attack of City’s to see if they can win the header. Instead, the opposite is coming. Fernandinho has already tracked all the way back and Cardiff’s defenders are following.
Aguero picks up the pass and has loads of options. Remember when I showed how high up City were? See where they are now, fifteen yards out of the box, coming back for the ball and all with the weight leaning on the attack. This is great awareness of the play. We can see here has already made up his mind but let’s go through the progressions.
If the ball comes correctly to his right foot, Aguero keeps the ball, runs to the open space (red arrow) and takes a shot. He’s a goal scorer, and he wants this for himself. If his first touch comes in front, feed Silva into open space for a shot (yellow arrow). However, David Silva’s shot probably wouldn’t be as lethal as his next progression. Feed Dzeko. A fancy touch, but also to his fellow striker. These two are clicking well and know where each other are. Aguero is aware of his best scoring option, and knows he can lay the ball onto the right foot of Dzeko. He makes that decision. The defender is nearly falling down and the ball is onto Dzeko’s better right foot. He tees it up for a near perfect shot. Finally, if Aguero’s touch lands out in front of him, he can feed Jesus Navas who is out to the other side (green arrow) and look for a cross. This may have been the second best option for me, since three scorers would be in the box, but the ball didn’t fall correctly.
After one touch, Dzeko opts for the shot. With great form here, he winds up. The defender who was off balance before hand had to give Dzeko space in order to recover. This results in a few yards for Dzeko to power the ball. The rest is history, or maybe not.
Typically, I might end a goal at the previous screen. But here is part of the reason why I love this goal. Both Aguero and Silva here stay with the play and are ready for a rebound if need be. They could have stopped and let Dzeko’s shot fall where it may. Instead, they are looking for the goal and both continue to attack. Even if there were a rebound on this shot, it would have been finished off by one of these two.
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You may remember a few of the more unfortunate extreme weather events of 2010: There was the terrible heat wave that hit Russia, and lead to deaths by heat exhaustion in Moscow. Shortly after, there was tragic, unprecedented flooding in Pakistan. Those were but two weather-related events in what is apparently a record-breaking year for them. But don't take your friendly neighborhood blogger's word for it -- and don't trust those nefarious climate scientists, either. So, who should we turn to in order to verify such a claim? Why, the insurance companies of course!From the AFP:
Catastrophic floods in Pakistan, wildfires in Russia, hurricanes in Mexico: 2010 has so far been an "exceptional" year for weather disasters, German reinsurance giant Munich Re said Thursday. "This year really has been a year of weather records," Peter Hoeppe, an expert from Munich Re's Geo Risks Research department, told journalists. "The first nine months of the year have seen the highest number of weather-related events since Munich Re started keeping records," he added. Hoeppe added that a clear pattern of continuing global warming was contributing to the natural disasters. 2010 has so far been the warmest since measurements began 130 years ago. New temperature records were set in Russia (37.8 degrees centigrade) and in Asia (53.5 degrees in Pakistan).
Hmmmmmm. Well, those insurance agents can't be trusted, either -- they probably just want to sell everyone extreme weather disaster insurance! It's another hoax! Alas, perhaps it's a better idea to trust the scientists after all : "Earlier Thursday, France's Academy of Science published a report written by 120 scientists from France and abroad stating that global warming was unquestionably due to human activity."
More on Global Climate Change
The Global Climate : Yes, It's Still Warming
View 300 Years of Global Climate Data on One Map
Is the IPCC Assessment on Global Climate Change Wrong?So how would you start your retirement from the NHL? Looks like I’ve started mine with a new leak on tech.
Today a source we have been working with at Motorola has provided a photo of the supposed Moto X+1
Some confirmed specs on the device are as follows from our source.
1080p amoled display
2gb ram
16, 32, 64gb of storage
Micro sd card expansion
And updated camera (source says 2 versions are being considered)
The model takes a lot of design cues from the Droid Ultra line but with more rounded corners and a return of the rounded back and dimple found on the Moto X. (Basically a bigger Moto X than what we have today)
Stay tuned as we are waiting to get some hands on time with this device and will be showing it in a upcoming hands on video.
I did ask about expected launch date, our source stated early September to very late August, this I’m told depends on the camera used in the final production device.
More photos and other images on our YouTube and Instagram feeds today
Do you think the launch time of this device may make it hard for Motorola to generate sales with the Galaxy F and iPhone 6 coming about the same time? Let us know in the comment section below
moto x+1
Advertisements-- No. 3 caught senior linebacker
C.J. Mosley's
eye at Alabama's first practice of the spring.
It wasn't
Trent Richardson
, but that's whom Mosley was reminded of when he spotted the Crimson Tide's newest running back,
Derrick Henry
.
"We were talking about it on the sideline, me and a couple of the players, how Henry looked like a bigger version of
Trent Richardson
," Mosley said Saturday. "But you have to do what you have to do. So we've got to make him better and he's got to make us better."
Henry looked every bit of 6-foot-3 and 243 pounds when Alabama opened practice Saturday. His size is unique enough to prompt speculation that his best fit would be at another position, but it's become clear that Henry, who holds the national high school record for most career rushing yards, will be a running back for the Crimson Tide in 2013.
Nick Saban
said last month that "a lot" of Alabama's running backs will have an opportunity to help in 2013, and Henry certainly falls into that category.
By arriving early, he'll get a jump on the competition much like
T.J. Yeldon
did in 2012.
Altee Tenpenny
,
Tyren Jones
and
Alvin Kamara
will join the fray in the fall.
, Henry's roommate, freshman tight end/H-back
O.J. Howard
said Henry was a "freak" who wakes up in the middle of the night to do push-ups.
that it was a "habit" and he'd been doing it ever since he was a child.
Whatever the case, Henry, as an early enrollee from Yulee, Fla., came to Alabama prepared. Mosley said Henry "killed" Alabama's Fourth Quarter offseason workout program.
"I'm excited to see what he's going to do when we start our first scrimmage," Mosley said.“Justice League” is a film years in the making, filled with some of the most recognizable superheroes in all of pop culture. And yet, this weekend, it has failed to even crack the top 50 highest box office openings of all-time.
The film was expected to gross $110- |
by a Bastila-turned-Sith. He implores her to come back with him – to come back to the light, but she refuses. She attacks him – three times – and each time, he refuses to strike her down or hurt her. After the third attack where she’s unsuccessful, Bastila begs him to kill her and end her suffering, but he doesn’t, because dude is head over heels in love. When Revan admits how much he loves her, its enough to draw Bastila back to the light. I see parallels for the set up of this scene in TFA, and if we do get a scene similar to this in Episode VIII or XI – regardless of who plays which role – I think it will be safe to say that “yeah, they’re clearing basing this off Bastila and Revan.” That will be The Determining Factor for me, honestly.
One last word (on all of this)
I’m not going to go into too much detail here, because this subject is not entirely related to KotOR/TFA and it could have a whole post on its own, but Kylo/Rey isn’t actually a trash ship. Like at all. There, I said it. As much as I love calling Reylo a trash ship, and as much as I love reveling in the proverbial garbage, this is really inaccurate when we’re describing them, and we should probably stop (although doing so might be difficult).
I won’t go into more speculation as to what will happen in Episode VIII in this post because it will take too long, but I swill say this: this connection between Kylo and Rey? This heavy, heavy emphasis on them and their dynamic, and all the clues that JJ drops along the way? The fans aren’t imagining the romantic undertones – those are real, they’re there – and this isn’t a case of shippers seeing two attractive people and deciding “yeah, I want you to fuck like rabbits.” This is literal, in-your-face-canon-subtext that the creators have doused all over the film like kerosene, and they want you to notice. They’re sitting there with the goddamn matches and they want you to watch the blaze.
You don’t accidentally reference KotOR a million times over, and say it’s not intentional. You don’t specifically reference Revan and Bastila – a Sith and a Jedi who were notorious for their Force Bond and being lovers – time and time again, and say you don’t know what you’re doing. You don’t accidentally show what was essentially the same interrogation scene twice in one movie, where the villain rips into one character but treats the other like glass (in context). You don’t accidentally dress a woman all in white (or the equivalent of white), dress a man all in black, then have him carry her out of the woods and onto the threshold of a ship, bridal style, a la wedding night/Hades-and-Persephone, and say “whoops. I didn’t know how that would be interpreted.”
As a writer – as someone who’s written scripts before – if I was going to sit down and say “okay, these two characters are going to fall in love/have a very complex, sexually-tinged dynamic, and I want the general public to notice it right away,” this is what I would do. This is exactly what I would do, and you would never, ever make all these references by accident. There’s just too many of them.
So this Kylo/Rey thing is not a trash ship. It’s not even unrealistic. The age difference between them is not that big of a deal – Rey’s nineteen, and the age difference between Anakin and Padme/Bastila and Revan was greater. To be honest, the only thing off about all of this that could make it trash is the potential of Rey and Kylo being cousins. But again, this is not that much of a big deal, canon wise – incest has been done in Star Wars before, and on a much more interconnected level. I’m also not sure how plausible the theory of them being cousins is. But that’s another post for another time.
There you go, @kylo-rey-all-day-erry-day - I’m done my homework. Give me an A+ and a cookie.Sweden is becoming more adamant about restricting illegal migrants due to rising crime rates, Reuters reported Thursday.
According to the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention crimes against an individual in 2016 rose 7 percent, with approximately 275,000 reported incidents. There was also a 20 percent increase in the amount of sexual molestation reported in 2016, with 10,500 incidents compared to 8,840 incidents in 2014.
Sweden’s popular Bråvalla music festival was also canceled for 2018, after four rapes and 23 sexual assaults at the outdoor gathering were reported to the police in 2017. The victims allege that many of the men who carried out the attacks were of foreign origin. Due to the increase in crime, police have been increasingly watchful of the migrant population.
Swedish police are more rigorously checking immigration papers, netting illegal workers and sending warnings to employers to search for illegal migrants.
“Before there was a lot of tolerance for migrants. Now the laws are harder,” said Nicaraguan migrant Hugo Eduardo Somarriba Quintero to Reuters. He claimed to be wrongly detained during a raid in May and was later released from the detention center.
Expanded police powers include workplace checks without concrete suspicion of a crime and sharply higher fines for employing illegal immigrants. Sweden was ranked the best country to be an immigrant, according to a survey for US News on July 10.
The EU’s overall population grew to 512 million in 2017, growing by 1.5 million due to the growth of migrant population.
Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.In his recently-released book ‘Aussie Grit’, Webber confirms that he was not only speaking to Ferrari about joining Fernando Alonso there in 2013, but that talks advanced to the point where contracts had been drawn up after a meeting following the 2012 Monaco Grand Prix.
In the end, Webber says the major reason he didn’t sign was because Ferrari would only offer a one-year deal.
“The meeting was with Stefano Domenicali, the Ferrari team principal, on Flavio’s boat in the famous Monaco harbour,” wrote Webber in his book.
“There was now a very real chance I would be joining the Prancing Horse team. Flavio, Stefano, and Fernando all wanted it to happen; contracts were sent but they were for one year plus an option, instead of the two years we were pushing for.
“I just wasn’t interested in switching to another F1 team for 2013 when in July of that season they might tell me my services wouldn’t be required the following year.
“I remember driving to [Silverstone] on the Friday morning and chatting with Fernando on the phone. We swapped a few more calls and although he asked me to wait for a bit longer, my gut was telling me Ferrari wasn’t right for me.”
Hamilton and Red Bull
Webber added that when Red Bull Racing heard he was talking to Ferrari, the team began contract talks with Lewis Hamilton.
“Red Bull Racing were having a bit of fun talking to other drivers too, Lewis in particular, as they had clearly got wind of the Ferrari approach, so there had been no dialogue about extending my contract,” wrote Webber.
“At Silverstone, however, Christian [Horner] suddenly wanted me to sign a new deal for 2013, which we did a few days later.
“It would have been a change of scenery to go to Ferrari: it was also nice to feel a little bit wanted.
“Interestingly Bernie Ecclestone did a U-turn on that prospective Ferrari move: he was against it at the time, but in mid-2013 he asked me if I was comfy with my decision [to leave F1] and said he believed we could still make the Ferrari deal happen for 2014.”“Harambe” blazoned jerseys, inspired by the gorilla put to death at the Cincinnati zoo, are back on sale after a brief ban.
Wednesday an employee of Fanatics, a retail company for the four major North America professional sports leagues, added the name of America’s favorite dead gorilla to the list of words forbidden to be carved into the fabric of MLB, NFL, NBA, and NHL sports jerseys.
ESPN reported on Thursday that after protests appeared on social media platforms, Fanatics officials deemed that “Harambe” shouldn’t be lumped in with thousands of mostly profane words and removed the name from the banned list.
The @NFL won't let me buy a Harambe jersey, but it'll let me get an Aaron Hernandez jersey? Hmmm @PardonMyTake pic.twitter.com/2rWQRaNVBK — Tank The Hank (@TheHankofTanks) September 15, 2016
https://twitter.com/KButter5/status/776191373611597825
The NCAA is now blocking custom "HARAMBE" jersey creation as well. What is going on people? — Luke Rodgers (@thelukerodgers) September 14, 2016
In an unfortunate incident at the Cincinnati Zoo in May, when a three-year-old child got through a protective barrier and fell into Harambe’s habitat, zoo officials killed the adult male gorilla. Video showed Harambe dragging the child like a rag doll through a shallow waterway. Animal activists expressed outrage at Harambe’s killing, while online messages on social media exploded.
In August social media outrage over Harambe’s death was so strong that the zoo terminated its Twitter account.
A spokesperson for Fanatics insists, “There is no ban on ‘Harambe’ and the NFL never asked for this name to be banned.”
The company said once they realized the employee made a mistake they fixed it. CNBC reported that customers who tried to input “Harambe” in the customized name section of the online order received an error pop-up, indicating ”We are unable to customize this item with the text you have entered, please try a different entry again.”BRUSSELS, Belgium — Almost one-third of French voters agree with the ideas of the far-right National Front, according to a poll published Thursday in the latest sign of growing support for the party ahead of April’s presidential election.
The figures reflect the impact of the National Front’s charismatic leader Marine Le Pen, who took over from her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, as the head of the party a year ago.
She has campaigned hard against free trade and the European Union, and has pushed the party’s traditional tough line on crime and immigration.
Read more on GlobalPost: Front National courts Jewish voters
The younger Le Pen has sought to distance the party from the taint of racism which has hung over it in the past, in order to reach out to a wider electorate. She seeks to emulate her father, who polled well enough to compete in the final round of France’s presidential vote in 2002.
Support for the party’s ideas, at 31 percent, is the highest since 1991, according to the TNS Sofres poling agency.
“The term ‘National Front’ has become acceptable; It used to put people off but that’s changing,” Edouard Lecerf, director of agency told the newspaper Le Monde. “This confirms the Marine Le Pen effect, some of the rough edges of the NF’s ideas have been smoothed out.”
Her poll ratings are significantly higher than in the run up to the 2002 presidential election when Jean-Marie Le Pen shocked the political establishment by coming second in the first round of voting, earning himself a run off against the center-right incumbent, Jacques Chirac. Back then, left and center voters rallied behind Chirac to block Le Pen’s path to the Elysee Palace.
Read more on GlobalPost: Not so happy anniversary for the French and the euro
Most polls currently predict that the April 22 election will be a close race, between President Nicolas Sarkozy and his Socialist rival Francois Holland.
An OpinionWay survey published Thursday gave Hollande 27 percent and Sarkozy 25 percent with Le Pen trailing on 17 percent.
However, many political observers believe support for Le Pen is underestimated and believe that her polished political performance is winning new converts among young and middle class voters, beyond the party’s traditional blue collar base.
“Never has the threat of the National Front seemed so great,” investigative journalist Eric Decouty wrote this week in the left-leaning daily Liberation.During his Senate confirmation hearing in January, Energy Secretary Rick Perry said that he was supportive of an “all of the above” approach to energy development, asserting that the country’s best interests lie in encouraging production of both traditional and renewable power sources.
As Secretary Perry knows well, we’re at an important juncture in terms of establishing the framework for America’s energy future. Just a few years ago, many of us engaged in the development of solar and other renewables couldn’t have predicted the growth we’ve all experienced. I think it’s also fair to say that the traditional fossil fuel industry, like a prototypical big brother, viewed solar as squarely secondary. Both sides tended to adopt an us-versus-them mentality.
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This can no longer be the case given that the paradigm has fundamentally changed. Over the past five years, solar has become America’s fastest-growing, nonpartisan energy source.
Without question, both the marketplace and technology behind it have come of age. The Energy Information Administration projected that the U.S. added 9.5 gigawatts of utility-scale solar power last year alone. That’s more than the previous three years combined.
From 2009 to 2015, the average price of solar dropped by 70 percent and advances in technology have made it much easier for homeowners and businesses to adopt solar. In some parts of the U.S. (and the world for that matter), the cost of solar is now equal to or less than buying power from the electrical grid. Many people didn’t think we would ever see this level of pricing parity, or at least not this soon.
With 195 nations having made a commitment to renewable energy at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, solar power has left upstart status far behind and is an integral part of the world’s energy outlook.
This is why we must put the us-versus-them, conventional-versus-renewable debate in the rear-view mirror. Everyone in the industry knows that clean energy is our future, but the most successful companies in the next 5-10 years will be those that build an integrated power business model.
The energy infrastructure of tomorrow won’t rely on one exclusive source — it’s simply not possible. All of our considerable resources, whether from the ground, ocean or sky, must be available to consumers as a matter of choice and free-market competition. A testament to how the landscape is changing is that more than 60 percent of U.S. installed solar as of the end of 2016 is purchased by electric utilities.
The policy direction that Secretary Perry will implement, in partnership with a bipartisan Congress, becomes ever-so important. In the solar industry, we’ve now reached a level of growth at which we’re no longer dependent upon federal support for our survival. However, we still need thoughtful, forward-thinking energy policy that encourages this source diversity.
We need policy approaches that reflect the progress embodied in regional and global agreements, with a focus on legislation and regulations that encourage continued growth and innovation. Above all, it’s important that we have a policy mindset that lets the free market do what it does best — drive down prices, create jobs and give people plenty of options from which to choose.
According to a census report by The Solar Foundation, more than 260,000 Americans are currently employed in our industry. Since the first report in 2010, the overall number has tripled.
Every CEO in the renewable and conventional energy sectors must be candid that the future path is promising, but far from predetermined. The energy marketplace as a whole is more uncertain than it is stable. However, the maturation of renewables provides an opportunity for us to rethink the world’s energy future.
That process must begin now. Everyone from the solar homeowner to the power plant owner to the policymaker in Washington D.C. should be part of the conversation. It’s not an ideological one, but rather a practical approach at a time when the majority of Americans are expecting it.
Tom Werner is President and CEO of SunPower.
The views of contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.Who has done a better job of keeping the country safer - George Bush or Barack Obama? Well, as soon as it we make it past the morning of 9/11, then Obama will have officially kept us safer longer than George Bush did. It's empirical. You can't argue with it.
One of the contributors to our show, Malcolm Fleschner, made this point to me. I found it rhetorically enjoyable. Of course, in reality the circumstances are different and you can't necessarily compare one time period to another. And Bush supporters could even make an argument that we have not been hit on Obama's watch because of what a great job Bush did to keep us safe earlier.
But that leads us to the second point about 9/11. Republicans would love to take credit for the safety we are enjoying under Obama, but do you think that they would say the same thing if the shoe was on the other foot? If we were attacked right now, do you think a single one of them would say it's because Bush didn't do enough to keep us safe on his watch? Not one, right? Do you think a single one of them would say that it wasn't Obama's fault because it's too early in his administration? Not one, right?
In fact, so far they have done nothing but the exact opposite. They have blamed every single thing on Obama. The economy, the deficit, unemployment and even the Afghanistan War. It's all Obama's fault in less than nine months.
Do you remember what they said when we got hit by the worst terrorist strike in US history on this same date in Bush's first term? Bush could not be blamed at all! It was far too early in his administration! It was considered nearly unpatriotic to suggest such a thing. No one could blame him for anything that happened before 9/11 in his first term.
Now, do you think they've used that same standard for Obama? No one in their right mind could think that. Perhaps the media should keep that in mind as they evaluate what Obama has done so far and what Bush failed to do at this point in his administration. We could call that the 9/11 standard.
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_______Goldman Sachs maintained its Sell rating on MannKind Corporation (NASDAQ: MNKD) as it believes the recent rally in shares is not related to fundamentals as news flow is negative since Sanofi SA (ADR) (NYSE: SNY) dropped out of the Afrezza partnership in January.
"Specifically, Afrezza is averaging 400 TRx's per week in Feb/Mar down from 500 in 4Q15. At this rate, Afrezza scripts are only ~20% of the level Exubera reached at the same point post launch," analyst Jay Olson wrote in a note.
"Recognizing that Sanofi invested in physician and consumer targeted promotional campaigns to educate and create awareness for Afrezza, we are concerned that Afrezza scripts may continue to decline in the absence of Sanofi's marketing muscle and substantial diabetes expertise. It is unclear to us how MNKD intends to finance the promotion of Afrezza which has so far been costly and unprofitable."
As of December 31, MannKind had about $60 million in cash and $30 million available to borrow from the Mann Group.
Olson said Sanofi reported total Afrezza end market sales of only $8 million in 2015 resulting in about $170 million net loss of which MannKind owes Sanofi about $60 million for their 35 percent share.
Shares of MannKind were down 0.29 percent at $1.73, while Olson has a price target of $0.25.Thursday, September 22nd 2011, 6:09 PM EDT
Foreword by Václav Klaus,President of the Czech RepublicRELEASED DATE: November 2011ISBN: 978-1-921421-80-8Paperback, (250 pages approx)About the authorPROFESSOR IAN PLIMER (The University of Adelaide) is Australia’s best-known geologist. He is also Emeritus Professor of Earth Sciences at The University of Melbourne where he was Professor and Head of Earth Sciences (1991-2005) after serving at The University of Newcastle (1985-1991) as Professor and Head of Geology. He was on the staff of the University of New England, The University of New South Wales and Macquarie University. He has published more than 120 scientific papers on geology. This is his eighth book written for the general public, the best known of which are Telling lies for God (Random House), Milos-Geologic History (Koan), A Short History of Planet Earth (ABC Books) and his best-selling Heaven+Earth (Connor Court).He won the Leopold von Buch Plakette (German Geological Society), Clarke Medal (Royal Society of NSW), Sir Willis Connolly Medal (Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy), was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering and was elected Honorary Fellow of the Geological Society of London. In 1995, he was Australian Humanist of the Year and later was awarded the Centenary Medal. He was Managing Editor of Mineralium Deposita, president of the SGA, president of IAGOD, president of the Australian Geoscience Council and sat on the Earth Sciences Committee of the Australian Research Council for many years. He won the Eureka Prize for the promotion of science, the Eureka Prize for A Short History of Planet Earth and the Michael Daley Prize (now a Eureka Prize) for science broadcasting. He is an advisor to governments and corporations and a regular broadcaster.Table of ContentsFOREWORDPREAMBLE FOR PUPILS, PARENTS AND PUNTERSINTRODUCTION1. HUMAN-INDUCED CLIMATE CHANGE: WHY I AM SCEPTICALA short history of planet EarthWhat warming?Follow the moneyCorruption, fraud and porky piesSnow, ice, floods and cyclonesFellow travellers2. SCIENCEThe process of scienceEvolution of scientific ideasModels, predictions and adaptationAnti science3. CARBON DIOXIDE, WATER AND ICEPlanetary degassing and carbon dioxideAn innocent trace gasAnother innocent trace gasWater and iceSea level4. TEMPERATUREHow do we measure global temperature?Urban effectAdjusting of measurementsHottest year on record5. HOW TO GET EXPELLED FROM SCHOOLBackgroundIs climate change normal?One hundred and one questions.A guide for teachers, parents and puntersClick source for moreSome of the contemporary achievements in the Polish medical field today can be traced back to a historical list of Nobel Prize-winning researchers who also achieved careers as ministers or practiced as authors, pianists, art collectors or therapists. We have selected five stories which illustrate the enormous Polish contribution to the world of medicine.
Recently, figures of medical genius have regained public exposure with Łukasz Palkowski’s internationally praised film, Gods / Bogowie (2014) -- a biopic about Polish cardiologist Zbigniew Religa, who led the team of surgeons that performed the first successful heart transplant in the Polish People’s Republic. Bogowie has had over a million viewers worldwide. As the fundamental professional duty of saving lives touches upon the limits of morality in light of constant scientific advancement, the Polish medical field has produced figures with wide-ranging interests, not only in medicine, but also in politics, the humanities and the arts.
Koprowski: The Case of Polio
The first effective vaccine against the post-war epidemic of polio was invented by the Warsaw-born virologist and immunologist Dr. Hilary Koprowski. Recognized for his curiously distinct personality throughout his career in the U.S., Koprowski was a graduate of Warsaw University’s medical department as well as the Warsaw Conservatory and the Santa Cecilia Conservatory in Rome. Throughout his medical career Koprowski remained an avid pianist, a collector of paintings of the old masters, and a polyglot who spoke seven languages. After his recent death in 2013, Koprowski’s name was remembered as one of the world’s foremost biomedical researchers, however, his groundbreaking discovery did not always receive the recognition it deserved.
Dr. Koprowski developed an effective polio vaccine and registered it under his name in 1948, before doctors Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin (who, as luck would have it, was also of Polish origin) received accreditation for their concurrent research. Nevertheless, Koprowski remained a forgotten figure of the trilogy of great virologists of the 50s. Koprowski’s vaccine was used with good results at research sites in various countries; excluding the United States, as Americans feared the potential side-effects of a vaccine based on a live virus - instead of a “killed” version - which was later developed by Salk and released in 1955 in injection form, while an “attenuated” version (reduced in virulence) was developed in oral form by Sabin around the same year. While Salk is regarded as the world's deliverer from polio in the American popular consciousness, thanks to its cheaper production and distribution, Sabin’s oral vaccine allowed for the hope that the epidemic may one day be eradicated worldwide. Among the three of them, Koprowski’s name remained forgotten for a long while, but it also illuminated the delicate balance between risk and recognition, as well as the convergence of medicine and politics in the development of a drug that can save thousands of children from infection.
Numerous other politically-involved cases in the history of Polish vaccine research are worth recognition: Polish biologist Dr. Rudolf Stefan Weigl is regarded as the inventor of the first effective vaccine against typhus. Weigl, who is known to have employed and protected Polish intellectuals during WWII, made his vaccines available inside ghettos in Lviv and Warsaw, saving countless lives. On a similar venture, Dr. Eugeniusz Lazowski along with Dr. Stanisław Matulewicz caused a “fake” epidemic by injecting a typhus vaccine into the non-Jewish population in neighborhoods surrounding the Jewish ghettos, causing Germans to abandon the area, thus sparing thousands of local Jews’ lives. Today, human testing of a prostate cancer vaccine is being carried out in eight different European countries by a German-Polish medical team under Dr. Mariola Fotin-Mleczek’s supervision.
Szczeklik and The Kraków-effect
As the historical city of master painter Jan Matejko, Kraków’s artistic and architectural flavours seem to have inspired those from the medical field and turned them into novelists and theatre actors. To name it the “Kraków-effect” wouldn’t be an overstatement, especially in the case of two figures. Polish immunologist Prof. Andrzej Szczeklik was not only involved in the discovery of prostacyclin (a hormone produced in the lining of the arteries, and helped understand the uses of aspirin) alongside another Kraków-based pharmacologist Ryszard Jerzy Gryglewski at John Vane’s London laboratory in 1976, but he was also praised as a novelist. Szczeklik’s recent book, Kore: On Sickness and the Sick and the Search for the Soul of Medicine (Znak, 2007), was published a little before his death in 2012. A previous work, Catharsis: On the Art of Medicine (2005), translated into several languages from the Polish original with a foreword by prominent Polish poet Czesław Miłosz, reflects Prof. Sczczeklik’s main source of inspiration after the Greek term, catharsis; cleansing of the body by medicine and the soul by art.
...Science is just one way of learning about reality... Plato knew this, and as he came near the limits of scientific learning, he turned to poetry... Through poetic metaphors, through art, he captured truths that were inaccessible to science. But what, we might ask, is the “truth”? “Truth is a mobile army of metaphors,” replies Nietzsche. If this truth about the truth is true, then the circle closes, art meets up with science, and the doctor finds his place at the point where they connect (Catharsis, 53-54)
Another associate of the internationally renowned School of Medicine at the Jagiellonian University, Julian Aleksandrowicz, also known as the father of Polish psychosomatics, has focused on developing ecological methods of preventing leukaemia and most importantly, psychotherapeutic and theatrically engaging methods of healing somatic diseases - in which mental factors play a significant role in the development or resolution of a physical illness. Serving as a physician of the Polish resistance during the war under the pseudonym “Doktor Twardy”, Aleksandrowicz focused on practicing theatrical therapy with his patients. His numerous publications cover topics ranging from ecological consciousness to the experimental convergence of the kitchen and medicine.NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg pays a visit during an International exercise "Iron Wolf 2017 /Saber Strike 2017" of NATO advance force battalion group (EFP) in Stasenai, Lithuania | Petras Malukas/AFP via Getty NATO to increase non-US spending by 4.3 percent in 2017 Romania expected to be next country to meet 2 percent of GDP spending target.
NATO allies other than the United States are expected to increase defense spending by 4.3 percent in 2017, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Wednesday.
After years of decline, military expenditures started to increase in 2015, but NATO members have come under intense pressure in recent months from U.S. President Donald Trump, who has criticized European allies for not spending enough on their own defense.
In response to Trump's pressure, allies who are not yet meeting a previously-agreed-upon target of 2 percent of annual GDP being spent on defense have agreed to step up efforts to move toward that goal. At a meeting in Wales in 2014 they agreed "to move towards the 2 percent guideline within a decade”
At a news conference on Wednesday ahead of a meeting of NATO defense ministers, Stoltenberg noted that spending moved onto an upward trajectory in 2016, and "in 2017 we foresee an even greater annual real increase of 4.3 percent.”
“This means, over the last three years, European allies and Canada spent almost $46 billion more on defense,” Stoltenberg, a former prime minister of Norway, said.
This week's defense ministerial meeting is the first gathering of senior NATO officials since a leaders' meeting last month where Trump publicly berated his colleagues during a ceremony to open the alliance's new headquarters.
Trump disappointed European partners who hoped he would use the occasion to explicitly reaffirm America’s commitment to NATO's collective defense principle, which is enshrined in Article 5 of the NATO treaty.
Currently, 25 out of 29 NATO allies plan to raise defense spending this year, Stoltenberg said, a move that would add Romania to the list of five allies (U.S, U.K, Greece, Estonia and Poland) currently meeting the 2 percent target. Next year, Lithuania and Latvia are also expected to cross the threshold.The cost of Greece avoiding a Grexit is submitting to becoming an economic serf of the Eurozone, subject to even more draconian austerity than was ever on the table before. I’ve embedded the statement that sets forth the deal that was tentatively agreed today. The Greek government still has to pass four bills by the 15th and another two by the 22nd to comply. It’s not clear that that will take place.
Due to the hour, there are yet to be detailed analyses up, so I’ll provide quick media reactions and some additional observations. This deal is simply vicious. This is far and away the most one-sided agreement I’ve ever seen, by an insanely large margin. Even the language is shamelessly punitive. For instance, the document repeatedly mentions that all the previous terms under consideration will need to be made vastly more stringent in light of the deterioration of the economy and how the Greek government needs to prostrate itself to gain the trust of the creditors.
As Politics.co.uk puts it (hat tip Swedish Lex):
As the dust settles this morning on the Greek bailout crisis, it is increasingly clear we are witnessing one of the most daring raids on national democracy in post-war political history. If this new plan passes the Greek parliament, Greece can no longer be said to be a genuinely sovereign state. Brussels and Berlin are taking over Athens. Even one of Alexis Tsipras’ minor victories – that a £50 billion privatisation fund would be based in Athens, not Luxembourg – was entirely superficial. As Angela Merkel insisted this morning, it would not be under Greek control.
The fact that Greece is even considering it means that they recognize what we have argued: that a Grexit would be such a cataclysm that even this dreadful deal would be considerably less costly to Greece and its citizens. But this is like asking someone to choose between cutting off an arm versus cutting off both legs.
This gives an idea of the crumbs that Tsipras was fighting to salvage. According to the Financial Times:
Mr Tsipras succeeded in removing from the final statement a German-proposed sentence saying that, in the event of rescue plans failing, “Greece should be offered swift negotiations on a timeout from the euro area”. Ms Merkel later said there was no Plan B and there would be no discussion of a Grexit without agreement with Greece.
And here is the overview:
Under the planned deal, the stricken Greek economy would receive its third rescue in five years, a three-year programme, funded mainly by the ESM (European stability mechanism), the eurozone rescue fund, and by the International Monetary Fund. Mr Tsipras has promised to pass tough new reform laws, including on tax and pensions, by Wednesday and prepare further rapid reforms, such as labour market liberalisation, opening up closed professions, deregulating Sunday trading and reinforcing the financial sector. In a particularly humbling move, the government has to reverse some of the extra spending measures it introduced earlier this year, when it trumpeted its ambitions to end five years of EU-imposed austerity.
The major terms include:
Increasing and simplify VAT Cutting pensions. More on that shortly. The terms here look to be vastly worse than the cuts Greece fought a few weeks ago “Requesting” continued IMF “support” (monitoring as well as financing) “Introducing quasi-automatic spending cuts in case of deviations from ambitious primary surplus targets after seeking advice from the Fiscal Council and subject to prior approval of the Institutions” Sequestering €50 billion of assets, nominally supervised by Greece but under strict oversight of the creditors. Half will go to recapitalizing the banking system Implementing labor market “reforms” along the lines sought by the creditors
Not only is there no debt relief, there is no prospect of any debt relief unless Greece meets targets. And forget about principal reduction. From the letter:
…the Eurogroup stands ready to consider, if necessary, possible additional measures (possible longer grace and payment periods) aiming at ensuring that gross financing needs remain at a sustainable level. These measures will be conditional upon full implementation of the measures to be agreed in a possible new programme and will be considered after the first positive completion of a review. The Euro Summit stresses that nominal haircuts on the debt cannot be undertaken.
And it’s Greece’s fault that it is having trouble with its debt loads. From earlier in the document:
There are serious concerns regarding the sustainability of Greek debt. This is due to the easing of policies during the last twelve months, which resulted in the recent deterioration in the domestic macroeconomic and financial environment. The Euro Summit recalls that the euro area Member States have, throughout the last few years, adopted a remarkable set of measures supporting Greece’s debt sustainability, which have smoothed Greece’s debt servicing path and reduced costs significantly.
I’ve seen nothing in the media reports or the Twittersphere (I have not had the time to check it extensively) that suggests that the ECB is going to let up on the Greek banks today. It’s not clear how they limp through till Thursday if they are utterly drained of cash. Do they simply freeze all operations? In the meantime, suppliers will remain unable to bring anything in, which means intensifying shortages of drugs, particularly insulin, and the start of food shortages. The document takes the airy posture that dealing with the banking system is a tiresome detail that can wait:
The Euro Summit is aware that a rapid decision on a new programme is a condition to allow banks to reopen, thus avoiding an increase in the total financing envelope. The ECB/SSM will conduct a comprehensive assessment after the summer. The overall buffer will cater for possible capital shortfalls following the comprehensive assessment after the legal framework is applied.
Rapid decision on a new program? Does that mean getting the “first set of measures” as in the initial six sets of bills due to be passed by the 22nd, or the more detailed resolving of the updated “proposals” which will take more time? I’m leaving reader comments open (but please play nicely!) so that readers can post links and tweets as more analysis comes in.
Now to pensions. I must confess to not being certain what the critical highlighted section means, but if it means anything within hailing distance of Nathan Tankus’ and my best guess, the pension system is about to be gutted. This is the reference to what Greece needs to agree with the Institutions regarding pensions (emphasis ours):
….carry out ambitious pension reforms and specify policies to fully compensate for the fiscal impact of the Constitutional Court ruling on the 2012 pension reform and to implement the zero deficit clause or mutually agreeable alternative measures by October 2015.
That would seem to mean that Greece needs to fund its pensions from dedicated sources with no deficits. I have no idea whether any Greek tax sources are segregated to pay for pensions, analogous to America’s payroll tax which funds Social Security. The only other source would presumably be pension assets. A post by LOL Greece examined the Greek pension system in some detail.* This gives you an idea how much it falls short of being able to pay pensions:
To cut a long story short, the total assets of the greek social security funds would not pay for ten months’ worth of pensions and benefits, even if we could somehow liquidate them all without causing a fire sale. I have nothing but respect for the actuarial profession, but an actuary’s work right now would not be to discuss what pensions are affordable or what the pensionable age ought to be; it would be to discuss how much of the Greek public sector |
that in fact, she said over, and over, that whoever sent it to her sent it after we published. Which was true, but the whole reason she spent so many minutes on this timeline was to imply that whoever got it obtained it pre-publication. And then once she saw the proof that that was false, instead of acknowledging that, instead of apologizing for not having contacted us before doing her story, which would have led her to find this out, she just got very defensive and started insisting that the meaning that so many people took from her report was not actually anything that she said. And so, it was not particularly constructive.
JS: It appears, Glenn, as though we have now a copy of this fabricated Top Secret NSA document that was sent to Rachel Maddow. And in a minute, I’m gonna read portions of it. But first, I want you to talk about how we got it and what the source told you.
GG: So, someone contacted me anonymously on the day that I wrote the article, and said, “I’m the person who sent this document to Maddow.” He said, “I’m attaching a copy of what I sent to her.” He said, “I also sent it to other news organizations, and that my motive in doing it was that I wanted to test whether media outlets would just run with an obvious forgery if they liked the message.” And he said he literally — that Maddow made it seem like it was some sophisticated forgery, but that in fact, it took him about ten minutes to whip it up; that he did nothing but take the document from our site, stick it into a graphics program or a basic —
JS: He used the Photoshop ‘photocopy’ filter on it.
GG: Right, right. He Photoshopped it and then made ‘photocopy’ to make it seem like it was a photocopy. He said he whipped it up in ten minutes, and that he purposely made it ridiculous to see if he could trick media outlets into running it. And the reason why I believe that he is in fact the person and that this is the document is because BuzzFeed said that they got the same document that Maddow got and instantly realized what a fucking joke it was. Like, BuzzFeed looked at it, and they’re like, this is an obvious fraud, and they just moved on. And there was one small difference in the document that BuzzFeed got and that Maddow got. And this person knew what the difference was in the two documents, which he could have only have known if he were the one who sent it, because BuzzFeed hadn’t publicly disclosed it.
JS: I read this fabricated document and, like, guffawed, because it is so transparently fake just on the way — on the content of it. But the title of the document is “Russia/Trump Campaign Communications: Trump Campaign Director David Bossie, Communications With Russian State Agents, Coordinating Release Of The WikiLeaks John Podesta Email Dump. September 2016 to October 2016.” And then the summary, it says, “Russian agents made contact with Trump campaign manager David Bossie on,” and then there’s a redacted, “by telephone at” redacted. “Security footage confirms the unregistered phone was purchased on,” and it says the word “redacted.” It’s not actually redacted, “by a member of David Bossie’s staff at redacted contact in September 2016. Mr. Bossie discussed the release of the ‘Podesta Files’ through the Russian front Wiki Leaks.” And WikiLeaks has a space between Wiki and Leaks, “with Russian State Agents.” And this is my favorite part of it. “In October 2016, it is believed Russian State Agents reestablished contact with Mr. Bossie, informing him of a potentially damaging video of Candidate Trump being released in the coming weeks.” It’s kind of astonishing that the number one cable news show in prime time actually promoted the idea that they believed at first that this document was, A) real, and B) that they would spend 20 minutes on their program talking about something that some dude made and sent in to them.
GG: Oh, my God. She — they spent weeks gathering experts and former NSA officials and lawyers to investigate this. She said that this was a very sophisticated forgery. Because again, she was trying to imply, because her story only matters that this came from the highest levels of the government. And so, to do that, she had to pretend that this was like some mastermind forgery that the likes of which could never have been perpetrated absent some very high-level skills, as opposed to the reality, which is that you read this document and you laugh your ass off the second you look at it because it’s the biggest, most obvious joke ever, as BuzzFeed and every other media outlet that got this document immediately concluded and said nothing about because it was such a crank and such a joke. I think that the reason why this is significant, aside from the fact that she is the most watched cable news host in the country, and one of the leading voices — media voices of the self-identified resistance, is because it’s just generally indicative of this broader trend of the media completely losing its mind when it comes to Russia.
And the best report that I’d recommend is a long article in The New Yorker by its Russia correspondent, who interviewed real Russian journalists, people who have reported intrepidly and courageously on Putin. Investigative journalists who have said that the American media has lost its mind when it comes to Russia, and it’s just like madness and hysteria, the way they think about Putin and their country. And it’s really worth reading.
JS: You know, as I watch the massive protests against the G20 summit, and the protests against Trump and against Putin and against all these world leaders, and knowing that at the heart of that, they’re protests against neoliberal economic policies around the world, and you have countries throughout Europe that have been decimated by these economic neoliberal policies. Austerity measures have been imposed. At the same time, we have — the war in Syria is not abating. It’s getting worse. In Iraq, you have the third or fourth iteration of the post-9/11 wars in Iraq. The U.S. is surging in Afghanistan. And it’s sort of like, you know, if you can spend 20 minutes on the number one rated cable news show in the country right now talking about a document that some dude made in a few minutes, but not talk at all about what’s at the heart of the protests against the G20 summit, about the slaughter that’s happening around the world, not to mention what the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and Britain are doing in Yemen, it says a lot about our priorities.
And it’s — it really is kind of an epic global wag the dog, where everyone is following the minutiae of, you know, the palace intrigue, and, you know, Trump is actually president. And the G20 leaders came together and agreed on most of everything. And it’s sort of like, you know, we’re gonna talk about Donald Trump Jr. because this is stuff that could eventually lead to, you know, serious problems for the Trump presidency. But I mean, do you get my point? Like, we’re not talking about the real issues that are important to people around the world and the issues that are actually causing people to lose their lives and lose their livelihoods.
GG: And this has been the problem for the Democrats for over a year now. And a lot of Democrats — you know, Democratic officials are starting to explicitly recognize it, which is, they ran an entire campaign based on issues that many, many people, arguably most people, didn’t really care about. People don’t care when they wake up in the morning — they’re not worried about what Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin are doing. They really didn’t care about these character issues that the Clinton campaign based its entire campaign on. They care about what can the Democratic Party do to improve my life? So, you have this entire Democratic Party and their media allies obsessed with Russia, which isn’t to say it isn’t a story — it isn’t to say that it doesn’t merit investigation. We’ve all said from the start that it does, and it is being investigated formally now, by a well-trusted, longtime prosecutor, Robert Mueller, and his team of prosecutors. So, the truth is all gonna come out eventually, as it should.
But in the meantime, everything else is getting crowded out — questions about the implications of Donald Trump’s foreign policy, his domestic policy, the effect that it’s having on people. Very little of it gets discussed, in part because the Democrats have gambled that this Russia collusion issue is gonna be the silver bullet that brings down Trump. And at least thus far, it doesn’t look like that that’s gonna happen. And in the meantime, there are millions and millions of people out in the United States who are suffering, waking up with anxiety about job prospects, and healthcare, and their kids, hearing virtually nothing from the Democratic Party, again, still, about what they intend to do to improve their lives. And I think that’s a serious danger.
JS: I want to say, before we get into the meat of what The New York Times reported, that it’s remarkable how the story just keeps changing with this White House. I mean, how many times has Mike Pence either knowingly lied on national television or in speeches, or has he been lied to, and then he’s going out and is sort of sent to the dogs to pass the lies on. But the list of lies that just the Vice President has told over the past six months, including before he was vice president, is in and of itself astonishing. The way that the Trump White House has handled these allegations by just kind of tweeting rage or tweeting blatantly idiotic things, in and of itself, is something I guess worth talking about. But the reason I wanted to talk about this Donald Trump Jr. thing is because they really have lied a lot about this stuff, Glenn. And that is disturbing when you’re talking about the First Family, and you’re talking about the highest rungs of official established power in the United States — your read on this story?
GG: So, a few things. First of all, obviously, it’s a serious problem when high government officials — which by the way, does not include Donald Trump Jr., though he was a campaign official — but others like Jared Kushner, and Trump himself, and Pence, have repeatedly lied to the public. Yes, it is a bad thing when government officials lie. Unfortunately, we’ve created a moral standard where we don’t actually punish them even politically, let alone legally, for doing so. I think the way that you can look at this Donald Trump Jr. story is very similar to a lot of the other Russia stories, which is — the ultimate question is: Is there underlying evidence of actual criminal collusion? So, if what happened is what Donald Trump Jr. says is what happened — and that’s a big if, but that’s so far the only version that we have, which is, someone told him, “Hey, there’s this woman. She’s a Russian lawyer, and she says she has incriminating evidence on your father’s campaign opponent, Hillary Clinton.” And he said, “Okay, I’m willing to listen to what she had — has to say.” He went, realized she didn’t have much, and then left. That doesn’t seem criminal to me. It doesn’t even seem uncommon to me. I mean, I keep reading all these things online about how it’s treasonous to be willing to get dirt on your opponents from Russians. And yet, the entire Steele memo, which Democrats love and have continually cited, is nothing but that. All that is — is an operative paid by the Democratic Party, by the Clinton campaign, going to Russia and getting dirt about Donald Trump from Russians. That’s what campaigns do. Anyone who tells a campaign operative, “I have dirt on your opponent” is gonna be listened to.
So, as far as the inconsistent statements are concerned, like Donald Trump Jr. first denying it and then kind of poo-pooing it, and now coming out with more details once The New York Times catches him — I think you can look at that in one of two ways. Either the reason why Trump officials keep lying about and getting caught in inconsistencies concerning their meetings with Russians is because there really is underlying criminality, and at some point, we’ll see the evidence of that, and they’re lying about it because they want to cover that criminality up. Or, the alternative explanation is that in Washington, the climate now is that if you meet with anyone who’s Russian, even if they’re not a Russian official, as this lawyer isn’t — she’s “Kremlin-connected,” whatever that means. To me, that means she’s Russian. We’ve created this climate where any meeting with Russians of any kind is deemed nefarious and even treasonous. And so, in that climate, it makes sense to me that people like Jeff Sessions, or Michael Flynn, or Donald Trump Jr., or Jared Kushner, would want to downplay how many times they met with Russians and how deep these meetings were because they know that any meetings that they have are gonna be depicted in this nefarious light.
Whether — it’s one or the other. Whether it’s actually covering up underlying criminal behavior or it’s just a political fear of trying to downplay these meetings because of how it gets depicted is something we’re gonna find out. We’re gonna have a comprehensive report by a well-regarded prosecutor armed with subpoena powers who will finally tell us whether there’s real criminality here. And that’s why it’s just so irritating that we’re obsessed with everyday leaks as though — you know, these are like stories that dominate the news cycle for 12 hours. People get excited that it’s gonna be the final nail in the coffin of the Trump presidency. And then it disappears because there’s no underlying evidence of criminality. And I just think that until we have that, this story will be lacking.
JS: What if kind of the darkest narrative is true here, that this woman was Kremlin-connected, this lawyer, that she came, and that she — let’s say she did have information, and she presented to them, that did show something questionable about Secretary Clinton when she was running for president. Would you have any problem then, given the whole history of how opposition research is used in American politics? Is there anything inherently wrong with Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort, and Jared Kushner receiving information that they can effectively use as opposition research from someone who is actually connected to the Kremlin, if that’s true?
GG: No. No, I do not. And for people who are shocked or outraged by that answer, I guess the way — the question I would pose is, look at the Steele memo. That’s what the Steele memo is. It’s the Democratic Party and the Clinton campaign hiring* a former member of British intelligence to go to Russia and get dirt about Donald Trump from the Russians. I guarantee you a lot of the Russians he spoke with were “Kremlin-connected.” That’s how they have the dirt in the first place. Nobody said it was immoral for the DNC or for the Clinton campaign to try and get dirt on Donald Trump that comes from the inner circles of the Kremlin or from Russian intelligence because that’s what campaigns do. Why is it okay for the investigators of the Steele memo to get dirt about Donald Trump from Russians, but it’s not okay for Donald Trump Jr. to get dirt about Hillary Clinton from Russians? I really would love somebody to explain that — the discrepancy in that standard for me.
*Clarification:
It has not been established that Hillary Clinton’s campaign or the official Democratic Party directly paid for the production of the so-called Steele dossier. It has been reported that “allies” of Clinton contributed to its funding.
JS: Glenn Greenwald, great to have you back on the show. Thanks for being with us on Intercepted.
GG: Always happy to be back, Jeremy. Thank you.
JS: Glenn Greenwald is my fellow co-founder of The Intercept.
[Music interlude]
JG: Before we go to break, I have two brief updates that I want to give our listeners. The first is, as you know, we’ve done a lot of reporting and discussion on this show about Erik Prince of Blackwater infamy and his ties to the Trump White House, and particularly, his close relationship with Steve Bannon, the former head of Breitbart News. And even before Trump officially became president, I was reporting at The Intercept and on this show after Trump became president on the connections of Erik Prince to Vice President Mike Pence, as well as Bannon. And a few weeks ago on the show, we talked about Prince pitching his idea for a mercenary force to take over the U.S. war in Afghanistan. Well, on Monday of this week, The New York Times ran an article. They reported that Bannon and Jared Kushner actually brought in Erik Prince and a guy named Stephen Feinberg, who is the billionaire owner of the mercenary company DynCorp. And according to The Times, these two mercenary kingpins were brought in to “devise alternatives to the Pentagon’s plan to send thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan.” The paper says that insiders have referred to this proposal as the “Laos option,” which apparently is a reference to the CIA’s dirty war, dirty campaign, in Laos in the 1970s. Erik Prince himself, as we’ve reported on this show, has called for a new version of the Phoenix program, which was the CIA’s assassination program in Vietnam.
And in an appearance on Steve Bannon’s radio show before Trump was elected, Prince said that such a Phoenix style program should be used to defeat terror networks around the world. According to the New York Times, Defense Secretary James Mattis listened politely to Steve Bannon when Bannon tried to convince him to adopt this mercenary position, but he declined to implement it. We’re gonna keep you updated on all of those developments.
And then the second update I have relates to this story that we did in early June that I was mentioning in the earlier segment about Rachel Maddow, having to do with the Russian cyber-espionage efforts targeting U.S. software companies that service elections in the United States in some states. And of course, someone was arrested — an NSA contractor named Reality Winner was arrested, and the FBI put out this heavily politicized affidavit really kind of trying to convict her before she even goes to trial.
Well, this week, First Look Media, which is The Intercept’s parent company, announced that it’s going to be contributing financially to the defense of this alleged whistleblower Reality Winner. She’s facing prosecution under the Espionage Act on charges that she was the one who anonymously leaked this Top Secret NSA document to The Intercept. And of course, The Intercept does not know who sent that document to us, who the person was. But we are against any attempts to prosecute whistleblowers under the Espionage Act, in part because it’s an attack on the very existence of a free press. And this is really outrageous, that Reality Winner is being held without bail while she’s awaiting trial. And in addition to helping directly fund her defense, First Look is also providing $50,000.00 in matching funds through its Press Freedom Defense Fund to a group called Stand With Reality. That’s a grassroots crowd-funding effort that is seeking to support public awareness and legal work around winner’s case.
I actually want to briefly draw your attention to a statement this week by our editor-in-chief, Betsy Reed, about the internal review that we said we were gonna be conducting about this story, the NSA Russia hacking story. And in her statement, Betsy writes:
Betsy Reed: An internal review of the reporting of this story has now been completed. The ongoing criminal case prevents us from going into detail, but I can state that at several points in the editorial process, our practices fell short of the standards to which we hold ourselves for minimizing the risks of source exposure when handling anonymously provided materials. Like other journalistic outlets, we routinely verify such materials with any individuals or institutions implicated by them, and we seek their comment. This process carries some risks of source exposure that are impossible to mitigate when dealing with sensitive materials. Nonetheless, it is clear that we should have taken greater precautions to protect the identity of a source who was anonymous even to us. As the editor-in-chief, I take responsibility for this failure, and for making sure that the internal newsroom issues that contributed to it are resolved. We are conducting a comprehensive analysis of our source protection protocols, and will make revisions to ensure that any materials provide to us, anonymously, are handled in the most secure manner possible. It remains core to our mission to ensure that all our journalism is carried out in a manner that honors the risks that whistleblowers take.
JS: That statement in its entirety is available at theintercept.com.
[Music interlude]
JS: And you are listening to Intercepted. When we come back, we’re gonna talk about the shadowy mercenary company TigerSwan. They were the ones hired to target activists protesting the Dakota Access pipeline. And we’re also going to speak to Victoria Ruiz of Downtown Boys. Stay with us.
[Music interlude]
JS: Okay, we are back here at Intercepted. And in late May, the Intercept published part one of an ongoing investigative series about a U.S. mercenary firm hired to infiltrate and gather intelligence on water protectors and their allies protesting the Dakota Access pipeline. The series that The Intercept published is based on more than a hundred leaked internal documents from this firm TigerSwan. And these documents show how TigerSwan surveilled pipeline opponents from the air, on social media, through radio eavesdropping, and also through the actual infiltration of the camps and activist circles. And then they shared that intel with local law enforcement. These documents were leaked to The Intercept by a contractor working for TigerSwan. Energy Transfer Partners, the company behind the Dakota Access pipeline, they were the ones that hired TigerSwan. And the fact that this mercenary company is now operating inside the U.S. — and they were not just in the Dakotas. They have their sights set on several other U.S. states as well — that’s an ominous development in an already heavily paramilitarized law enforcement landscape in this country. You can read all five of the articles in this series at theintercept.com. A sixth installment is gonna be published in the coming days. The reporters who have been doing this story are Alleen Brown, Will Parrish, and Alice Speri. Two of them join me now. Alleen Brown, welcome to Intercepted.
Alleen Brown: Thanks so much, Jeremy.
JS: Alice Speri, welcome to Intercepted.
Alice Speri: Thanks for having me.
JS: You know, when I see TigerSwan, I think of former special operations soldiers. I think of the work that TigerSwan did. And I’ve spent a little bit of time over my work as a journalist looking at TigerSwan. They’ve been involved with covert contracts with the U.S. military and with U.S. intelligence agencies in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. To see that they’re then deployed on indigenous soil inside the United States, or inside of the borders of the United States, I think for a lot of people is and, it should be, shocking and kind of an affront to people’s understanding of the Constitution of the United States. It’s sort of a work around of posse comitatus, which prohibits the U.S. military from operating on U.S. soil in a law enforcement capacity. But if you have former U.S. military doing it, it’s kind of a backdoor way of having soldiers face down against water protectors, which is the term that the movement uses. The media often calls them protestors. They call themselves water protectors. There’s a lot to cover here. But I wanted to just begin with you giving an overview of the documents that we’ve published at The Intercept that you’ve reported out, what they say, and who the main players are.
AB: TigerSwan is a private security contractor that worked on the Dakota Access pipeline. A contractor for TigerSwan leaked more than 100 internal documents describing their daily activities monitoring the pipeline and surveilling water protectors protesting its construction. So, there’s a few things that the documents tell us. I mean, for one, they show us the invasive tactics that this private security firm was using: use of aerial surveillance, as well as a propaganda campaign. The documents, in their descriptions of the activities of the water protectors, use really militaristic language, comparing water protectors to Jihadist fighters at times. At one point, they describe the movement as an “ideologically driven insurgency with a strong religious component.” And another thing about the leaked documents is that they reveal this private security firm’s collaboration with law enforcement.
JS: Who hired TigerSwan, Alice?
AS: So, in this case, TigerSwan was hired by Energy Transfer partners, which is the company behind the Dakota Access pipeline. But I think what you’re pointing out, too, is really interesting. This is a company that’s, for the most part, done foreign contracts for the Department of Defense. They have worked in Iraq and Afghanistan. And they’ve taken those same tactics back to the U.S. I think that’s very clear in the language they use when describing water protectors. They talk about them as Jihadists. They talk about their direct actions as attacks. They talk about the camps as a battlefield. It’s really quite fascinating to see the language of war sort of brought back home. You know, if they have been able to operate in such an unchecked manner here in the United States, where we have reported, for instance, that they worked in North Dakota without a license for months. They just recently got sued because of that, but they were still able to be on the ground there basically since September with pretty much free reign. Who knows what they’re doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, where there’s even less scrutiny of their actions.
JS: Right. And Alleen, the main guy at TigerSwan is this former colonel, James Reese. Describe who James Reese is, as much as you’ve been able to gather about his history.
AB: Sure. James Reese is a former commander for Delta Force. And many of the contractors he’s employed to work for TigerSwan are also former Special Ops members, so many from Delta Force. Beyond his background in the military, TigerSwan is being sued, as Alice mentioned, by the North Dakota Private Investigations and Security Board, which provides licenses to private security firms in North Dakota. And they’re being sued because they were denied a license to operate as a security firm after doing so for several months.
JS: I remember back in 2005, in New Orleans, in the aftermath of the flooding of the city, I encountered Blackwater mercenaries on the streets of New Orleans saying that they were there to, you know, stop looters and confront criminals. And they too had operated for a period without a license to be a private security firm inside of the state of Louisiana. Eventually, they claimed that they were deputized by the governor of the state of Louisiana. And ultimately, we learned that they had actually been hired on a contract with the Department of Homeland Security. In this case, though, we’re talking about a private company hiring its own private mercenary force, and they’re using the same language that they use when they’re hired by the U.S. government to work on so-called counterterrorism operations. Find, fix, and finish is a term that we reported on in the Drone Papers, which is used for finding a target, fixing their location, and then finishing them off, either in a night raid or in a drone strike. TigerSwan used this phrase in the documents to talk about the targeting of water protectors — “find, fix and eliminate.” What kinds of tactics were TigerSwan’s operatives using against the water protectors?
AS: Basically, some of the things that we learned about in their situation reports are aerial surveillance; very, very intense social media monitoring; and then direct infiltration, which I think is one of the most fascinating and disturbing aspects of it. We know that they had undercover agents in the camps for long periods of time, building relationships with water protectors, and then using those relationships to feed information back to their clients. They were also creating lists of people of interest. They were collecting photos and personal information. They were collecting license plates numbers and all kinds of like, really detailed — really detailed information on people that they still have. And the other thing that I think is really important to stress, that we’ve been reporting on, is that, yes, Energy Transfer partners was the client, and so this was really a private contract that TigerSwan had. But at the same time, without that relationship being sanctioned in any contract, they were also feeding all of this information to law enforcement.
So, for instance, we were able to find some of their reports that were leaked to us, eventually made it into the public record as well, because they were sent by TigerSwan to local police. The local police was using this to inform their actions on the grounds. Their reports also talk about TigerSwan, you know, regularly meeting with local sheriffs, with state and sometimes federal agents to discuss some of their findings. So, I think it’s important that we remember that, yes, they were not directly deputized by law enforcement, but they worked with them very closely.
JS: In the first story that you did in the series, you cite an October 3rd report where TigerSwan — this is a direct quote from one of the documents — “exploitation of ongoing native versus non-native rifts and tribal rifts between peaceful and violent elements is critical in our efforts to delegitimize the anti-DAPL movement. Talk about that, Alleen.
AB: The documents frequently note rifts within the movement, and at times, as you mentioned, talk about the imperative of exploiting them. So, this is kind of where we see the work of TigerSwan shifting outside of just surveilling the movement into also influencing it. So, another example that kind of speaks to that is this counterinformation campaign that TigerSwan was pushing forward. You know, they frequently analyze the news coverage that the pipeline is getting in reference to the need to combat it. We learned that one of those efforts transformed into the production of videos published on Facebook featuring an individual posing as an anchor, a news anchor, critiquing the water protector movement.
Robert Rice of TigerSwan: Now, let us be clear. We are not against peaceful protesting. However, many of the members of this cell have been part of the destruction in Standing Rock last year. And they’ve all been posting regularly on social media about how they refuse to be part of society. That means constantly asking for money and support for locals. We are not here to convince you they shouldn’t be welcomed into your community. We just want to make you aware of the full situation to keep you informed.
AB: So, this individual did not disclose that he was working for TigerSwan. Essentially, this is a form of fake news that people were sharing and liking on Facebook that they had no idea was being produced by this private security firm.
JS: The fact is that TigerSwan then was not only focused on the Dakota Access pipeline. They also set their sights on another project that clearly, they though that what they had done in Dakota was this great success. And then they started looking at Mariner East 2. Talk about what that is and what the private security industry was hoping to gain by working on that.
AS: Yeah. So, first of all, something that’s important to notice is that TigerSwan is obviously a for profit company. And it’s very clear in all of the reports that they’re constantly trying to justify their presence. So, they’re constantly describing the situation on the ground as being more dangerous and more volatile than it actually was in an effort to continue their contracts, to gain more contracts in other states.
JS: As you guys point out in the pieces, you wrote something like, it borders on parody, the way that they’re using military terms to describe the caliber of munitions for — you know, for paint guns and the stockpiling of protest signs. I mean, it really —
AS: Absolutely.
JS: You know, it does read as though a desperate attempt to justify their presence. You know, another one, “operational weakness allows TS, TigerSwan, elements to further develop and dictate the battle space.”
AS: I mean, if they weren’t so disturbing, these reports would actually be pretty hilarious. Like they’re an interesting read, definitely. The language and the images they convey are certainly characteristic of a certain type of company and framework, really. But yes, that’s definitely what they’re doing. They’re trying to make it look as if things are about to blow up any second. They’re like obsessing over the potential for crimes, the potential for weapons. They’re always very vague in their speculations, but they’re very alarmist. And that’s part of their effort to convince their client, and other clients, possibly, that there is this massive need for security, and this massive need for surveillance and infiltration. So, as you mentioned, they are already beginning to look past the Dakota Access pipeline to other pipeline projects. And, you know, the protests are actually dying down in North Dakota. A lot of the camps were evacuated and people started leaving. And so, TigerSwan finds itself in the position of needing to justify its paycheck, essentially. And so, they start talking about other pipelines. They also talk about Mariner East 2 Pipeline in Pennsylvania, where they do have a presence, as we reported in one of our stories. But they also began talking about the Bayou Bridge Pipeline in Louisiana, the Rover Pipeline in Ohio. They’re starting to sort of build the ground for possible future work. I would also like to point out that after our reporting and after the lawsuit in North Dakota, ETP actually dropped TigerSwan in North Dakota. They’re still working with them in other states, but they’re no longer working in North Dakota. And I imagine that they will consider new contracts with some more scrutiny going forward.
JS: What does the future hold for TigerSwan as you can best assess from reporting on this story?
AS: Well, we know right now they are in some legal trouble, at least in North Dakota, right? They are getting sued for operating without a license. And I think that was partially a result of our investigation, really. We saw this lawsuit that used some of our documents as exhibits. I think, you know, these are very creative companies. We’ve seen — you’ve mentioned Blackwater before. These are companies that have a history of sort of resurrecting themselves and finding new ways to stay in business. I think one thing that TigerSwan is positioning itself or it’s really monitoring that goes much beyond pipeline protests and environmental activism — some of the infiltration they did in Chicago, for instance, into a very wide-ranging set of activist groups. They look at the anti-Trump resistance, which of course is a very broad movement, so to speak. They look at some Black Lives Matter activists. There’s all kinds of potential there for TigerSwan and others like it to stay in business. And that’s actually something else we want to remember, is TigerSwan is one of several private security companies that were involved in the policing of the DAPL protest. So, if their legal troubles eventually kill them off, there will be many others to pick up the work.
AB: I mean, I would say just the level of freedom that a private company like this has to surveil a social movement should be really shocking. You know, we’ve done a lot of reporting at The Intercept about the deep limitations to the guidelines that entities like the FBI have to follow in order to carry out covert operations. You know, we’ve reported that their guidelines are essentially insufficient. But a private security firm like TigerSwan doesn’t have to follow anything like that. There are so few rules about what they have to do and the constitutional protections that they have to keep in mind that it raises a lot of important questions about the tactics that private companies, profit-seeking companies, can use to enhance their bottom line.
JS: Well, and it’s — you know, I think people would do well to read the history of the Pinkertons in this country, and also look at the utter lack of accountability for all of the crimes committed by contractors abroad in Iraq, Afghanistan, and, you know, whatever new battlefields are going to emerge in the Trump era. Well, I want to highly recommend that people read this incredible series that Alleen and Alice have reported. It’s of vital importance that we focus on real issues and not just be following the tit for tat of the Democrats and the Trump administration, because for many people, these are life and death issues, and it certainly is a life and death issue for the planet. So, I want to thank both of you, Alice Speri and Alleen Brown, thank you very much for joining us on Intercepted.
AS: Thank you, Jeremy.
AB: Thanks, Jeremy.
JS: Alleen Brown and Alice Speri are both journalists at The Intercept.
[Music interlude]
JS: And finally, we’re gonna end today’s show with some music. When it comes to the intersection of politics, activism, and music, very few bands actually walk the walk. The band Downtown Boys, they’re one of them, and they do it gracefully, with a hell of a lot of energy.
[“Wave of History,” Downtown Boys]
Coming in on a wave
A wave of history
Coming in on a wave
A wave of history
JS: Once called America’s most exciting punk band by Rolling Stone, and recently quoted as Tom Morello’s favorite punk band, the Providence, Rhode Island, quartet is upfront about who they are: Latinx, queer, bilingual. And their actions, such as successfully leading the charge in forcing the festival South by Southwest to change its artist contracts, which you’ll recall threatened musicians with deportation, show where Downtown Boys stand: for the marginalized and oppressed, and against white hegemony, American imperialism, and the police state. Well, our producer Jack D’Isidoro spoke to lead singer Victoria Ruiz about what it means to be a musician living in the Trump era.
[Downtown Boys]
Victoria Ruiz: My name is Victoria Ruiz, and I’m the vocalist in Downtown Boys. Our music is filled with messages of our own personal experiences of having to deal with colonialism by white supremacy, by toxic masculinity, and by systems and institutions that weren’t made for our survival. And I think that, like, our music is very much about figuring out how to live so that we can survive, so that we can exist, and think about how to dismantle a lot of why we’re here. And we had a lot of messages around workers. We had a lot of messages around policing. And I think that it was like this very broad sort of swoop about capital. And I think we’re coming out with a new album called “Cost of Living.” And I think it’s getting at sort of the mundanities and the nuances of actually having to think about the distribution of resources and |
mentioned, in Hebrew, having been there to record the event.
The Israeli "art student" story, which first surfaced in 2001 in news reports, has yet to be explained by U.S. authorities. A memorandum sent to the 9/11 Commission, and Senate and House intelligence committees in September 2004, suggests that young Israelis who canvassed dozens of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) offices in 2000 and 2001 trying to sell paintings to federal workers, may have been spying not only on the DEA, but also on Arab extremists in the United States - including the Sept. 11 hijackers who were living in Florida and New Jersey.
Many reports describe incidents of government employees spotting individuals in office hallways or elevators carrying large art portfolio cases. The art sellers would typically make a pitch to sell paintings, but if they were told that soliciting in government offices was prohibited, some replied that the art wasn't actually for sale but was promoting a future art show, the DEA report said.
During the first five months of 2001, according to Shea's memorandum, the "Israeli DEA Groups" visited a total of 57 DEA locations - 28 offices and 29 private residences
Other individuals that Shea calls the "Israeli New Jersey Group" were based in Bergen and Hudson counties, in New Jersey, according to the well-annotated memorandum that also cites the 9/11 Commission report, the 2002 congressional intelligence committees' joint inquiry into the terrorist attacks, newspaper and magazine reports, Fox News telecasts, 9/11 hijacker timelines, FBI suspect lists, and an East Rutherford (New Jersey) Police Department report.
Dozens of the more than 100 Israelis were stopped and questioned by DEA agents, and other federal government authorities. The individuals were vague about why they were in the U.S. or what their purpose was for being here. Dozens were arrested for visa violations and deported, according to the memorandum. Many in the groups had served in the military, which is compulsory for Israeli citizens, and group leaders had been in intelligence and electronic communications units. With such expertise, it strikes many as odd that the Israelis would be hawking inexpensive artwork. In the report, the DEA concluded that the agency was being spied on by the Israelis.
In 2001, a Fox News report by Carl Cameron laid out the Israeli spy scenario, however, the story was short-lived, and Shea was told by a representative at the news organization that there was outside pressure to kill the story.
Wayne Madsen Online Journal Friday, July 17, 2009
The way the corporate media would have it believed is that Israeli "art students" who aggressively sell cheap art door-to-door, usually at federal office buildings and the houses of government employees, are merely traveling abroad after their military service in Israel to "see the world." In fact, these "art students" are classic intelligence operatives who have appeared before and after major terrorist events and covert operations conducted by the Mossad.
WMR has learned that an Israeli art student cased the offices of an investigator of the suspicious February 26, 2004, death of Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski. Trajkovski's Beechcraft King Air 200 crashed near Stolac, Croatia, in southern Bosnia while en route to an investors' conference in Mostar.
After the crash, U.S. Ambassador to Macedonia Lawrence Butler quickly met with Nikolai Gruevski, the minister of finance in the VMRO-DPMNE government. Gruevski was an ardent supporter of denationalization, a globalist, and supporter of NATO membership for Macedonia. Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski, although a Social Democrat, was also seen as close to the globalists.
Although Trajkovski, a Methodist minister, was also a member of the VMRO-DPMNE party he was viewed as less accommodating to international demands for privatization of state enterprises in Macedonia.
After Trajkovski and his party were killed in the plane crash, Macedonian and Bosnian authorities complained that NATO's investigation of the plane crash was secretive and the two countries' aviation authorities were kept in the dark. Many Macedonian officials were opposed to allowing the United States to investigate the crash and there was confusion about who had access to the two "black boxes" on Trajkovski's plane. NATO troops stationed in Bosnia were the first to arrive at the crash scene.
HUNDREDS OF MOSSAD AGENTS CAUGHT RUNNING WILD IN AMERICA
by Warren Royal
We spoke earlier about the five celebrating Israeli "movers", (Mossad agents), who were arrested and placed in solitary confinement for weeks after they were spotted in a white van suspected of attempting to blow up the George Washington Bridge. We also reviewed how the Israeli owner of Urban Moving Systems - Dominick Suter - then suddenly abandoned his "moving company" and fled for Israel on 9-14. But there were still more Israeli "movers" and other Israelis whose actions raise serious suspicions. Even more suspicious is how they are always quietly released and deported.
In October of 2001, three more Israeli "movers" were stopped in Plymouth, PA because of their suspicious behavior. These "movers" were seen dumping furniture near a restaurant dumpster! When the restaurant manager approached the driver, a "Middle Eastern" man later identified as Moshe Elmakias fled the scene. The manager made note of the truck's sign which read "Moving Systems Incorporated" and called the police. When the police spotted the truck, two other Israelis - Ayelet Reisler and Ron Katar began acting suspiciously. The Plymouth police searched the truck and found a video. The Israelis were taken into custody and the video tape was played at the police station. The video revealed footage of Chicago with zoomed in shots of the Sears Tower. The police quickly alerted the FBI and it was also discovered that the Israelis had falsified travel logs and phony paperwork on them. (1) They were also unable to provide a name and telephone number for the customer that they claimed to have been working for. These Israelis were up to some sort of dirty business, and you can be sure it had nothing to do with moving furniture. These Israeli spies may have had a dark sense of humor. The name of their "moving company" actually contained the word MOSSAD embedded inside. Moving Systems Incorporated. MOving SyStems IncorporAteD...MOSSAD
On October 10, 2001, CNN made a brief mention of a foiled terrorist bomb plot in the Mexican Parliament building. They promised to bring any further developments of this story to their viewers, but the incident was never heard of again in America. But the story appeared in bold headlines on the front page of the major Mexican newspapers (2) and was also posted on the official website of the Mexican Justice Department. (3) Two terror suspects were apprehended in the Mexican Chamber of Deputies. Caught red-handed, they had in their possession a high powered gun, nine hand grenades, and C-4 plastic explosives (great stuff for demolishing buildings!) Within days, this blockbuster story not only disappeared from the Mexican press, but the Israelis were quietly released and deported! The two terrorists were Salvador Gerson Sunke and Sar ben Zui. Can you guess what their ethnicity was? Sunke was a Mexican jew and Zui was a colonel with the Israeli special forces (MOSSAD). (4)
The story in El Diario de Mexico went on to reveal that the Zionist terrorists had fake Pakistani passports on them. Can you say "false flag operation?" The probable motive of this particular botched terrorist operation was to involve oil rich Mexico in the "War on Terrorism". (The War on Israel's enemies would be a more accurate description). Mexico is no military power, but the psychological trauma of an "Arab" attack on Mexico would surely have induced Mexico to provide unlimited cheap oil to her American "protector". With cheap oil flowing to America at low prices from Mexico, the US could better afford to break off relations with the oil rich Arab states in general and Saudi Arabia in particular. That's why the planners chose 15 Saudi identities to steal for the 9-11 operation.
Many Mexicans expressed shock at the release of the two Israelis. But when you learn that Mexico's Secretary of Foreign Relations is a Zionist named Jorge Gutman, it's not surprising! The Zionist tentacles reach even into Mexico! La Voz de Aztlan (Mexican-American news service), in it's excellent investigative report revealed: "La Voz de Aztlan has learned that the Israeli Embassy used heavy handed measures to have the two Israelis released. Very high level emergency meetings took place between Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations Jorge Gutman, General Macedo de la Concha and a top Ariel Sharon envoy who flew to Mexico City specially for that purpose. Elías Luf of the Israeli Embassy worked night and day and their official spokeswoman Hila Engelhart went into high gear after many hours of complete silence. What went on during those high level meetings no one knows, but many in Mexico are in disbelief at their release." (5) In November of 2001, 6 more suspicious Israelis were detained in an unspecified mid-eastern state. They had in their possession box cutters, oil pipeline plans, and nuclear power plant plans. (6) The local police called in the Feds and Immigration officials took over the scene and released the men without calling the FBI. The Jerusalem Post, the Miami Herald, (7) and the Times of London (8) all carried this amazing story and all revealed how furious FBI officials were that these terror suspects with nuclear power plant plans were allowed to go free. Of course, the corruption riddled FBI would only have caved into Zionist pressure from the Justice Department's Criminal Division boss, Michael Chertoff, and also from the ADL's "partner", FBI boss Robert Mueller - who would no doubt have found a way to eventually release those Israeli terror suspects too.
In December, 2001, the Los Angeles Times published the story of how two jewish terrorists were arrested by the FBI for plotting to blow up the office of US Congressman of Arab descent - Darrell Issa (R- CA), and a California mosque. (9) Irv Rubin and Earl Kruger of the Jewish Defense League (JDL) were charged with conspiracy to destroy a building by means of explosives. This story got brief national coverage but quickly disappeared too. These Zionists sure love blowing up buildings and killing innocent people don't they?
In May of 2002, yet another moving van was pulled over in Oak Harbor, Washington near the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station. Fox News reported that the van was pulled over for speeding shortly after midnight. The passengers told the police they were delivering furniture, but because it was so late at night, the police weren't buying the story. A bomb sniffing dog was brought in and the dog detected the presence of TNT and RDX plastic explosives in the truck (great stuff for demolishing buildings!) Both Fox News (10) and the Ha'aretz newspaper of Israel (11) reported that the two "movers" were Israelis.
In December, 2002, Ariel Sharon made the amazing claim that Al-Qaeda agents were operating inside of Israel. But when Palestinian authorities apprehended the suspects, they turned out to be Palestinian traitors impersonating Al-qaeda agents for the MOSSAD! From the Sydney Morning Herald of Australia: "Palestinian security forces have arrested a group of Palestinians for collaborating with Israel and posing as operatives of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist network, a senior official said yesterday...The arrests come two days after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon charged al-Qaeda militants were operating in Gaza and in Lebanon.
It was considered a surprise because the Gaza Strip is virtually sealed off by Israeli troops. The hard-line Israeli leader also charged other members of the terror group were cooperating with Lebanon's Shi'ite militia Hizbollah" (12) You know, if Sharon wasn't so dangerous, I'd almost be amused by his bullshit!
According to FOX news, throughout late 2000 and 2001, a total of 200 Israeli spies were arrested. (13) It was the largest spy ring to ever be uncovered in the history of the United States. The Washington Post also reported that some of these Israelis were arrested in connection with the 9-11 investigation. (14) US. Carl Cameron of FOX News Channel did a excellent four part, nationally televised, series of investigations into this blockbuster scandal. But FOX pulled the investigative series after Zionist groups complained to FOX executives. FOX even went so far as to remove the written transcripts of the series from its website! In it's place was posted a chilling, Orwellian message which reads: "This story no longer exists." (15) Fortunately for the sake of history, the FOX transcripts were copied onto to many other websites and all four parts are available for your review. (see footnotes.)
The FOX series and other mainstream news media sources revealed that many of these Israelis were army veterans with electronics and explosives expertise. Many of them failed lie detector tests. FBI agents told FOX that some of their past investigations were compromised because suspects had been tipped off by Israeli wiretapping specialists. It was discovered that Israeli companies such as Comverse and Amdocs have the capability to tap American telephones (great for blackmailing all those wife-cheating politicians!) FBI agents also told FOX they believed the Israelis had advance knowledge of the 9-11 attacks. (which certainly would explain why no Israelis died in the WTC) Still another US official informed FOX that some of the detained Israelis actually had links to 9-11, but he refused to describe the nature of those links. The FBI official told FOX's Carl Cameron: "Evidence linking these Israelis to 9-11 is classified. I cannot tell you about the evidence that has been gathered. It is classified information." (16) Then there was that small army of Israeli "art students" who were arrested for trying to sneak into secured US Federal buildings and staking out 36 Department of Defense sites. Some of these suspicious "art students" even showed up at the homes of Federal employees. (17) Ron Hatchett, a Department of Defense analyst, told Channel 11, KHOU news in Houston that he believed that the "art students" were gathering intelligence for future attacks. Here's an excerpt from the October 1, 2001 KHOU investigative report by Anna Werner: "Could federal buildings in Houston and other cities be under surveillance by foreign groups? That's what some experts are asking after federal law enforcement and security officials - nationally and in Houston - described for the 11 News Defenders a curious pattern of behavior by a group of people claiming to be Israeli art students."
"Hatchett says they could be doing what he would be doing if he were a terrorist, sizing up the situation: "We need to know what are the entrances to this particular building. We need to know what are the surveillance cameras that are operating. We need to know how many guards are at this operation, when do they take breaks?" Says Hatchett: This is not a bunch of kids selling artwork."
"A former Defense Department analyst, Hatchett believes groups may be gathering intelligence for possible future attacks. "Some organization, thinking in terms of a potential retaliation against the U.S. government could be scouting out potential targets and. looking for targets that would be vulnerable." And a source tells the Defenders of another federal memo, stating that besides Houston and Dallas, the same thing has happened at sites in New York, Florida, and six other states, and even more worrisome, at 36 sensitive Department of Defense sites. "One defense site you can explain," says Hatchett, "well that was just a serendipitous,...Thirty-six? That's a pattern." (18) A Federal memo stated that these "art students" may have had ties to an "Islamic terror group". More likely, they were the "Islamic terror group"! Remember the bombing of the King David Hotel in 1946, and how the "Arab terrorists" were actually Irgun terrorists? Remember the Zionist terrorists caught in Mexico with Arab passports? Remember the official motto of the Mossad - By Way of Deception Thou Shalt Do War. Are you getting the picture? Can you say "false flag operations"?
In a follow up report a few days later, KHOU Channel 11 revealed that Dallas was also targetted: "11 News reported how people claiming to be "Israeli art students" might be trying to sneak into federal buildings and defense sites, and even doing surveillance. And at least one expert said he thought it could all be preparation for an attack. Well, now federal sources say they are not ruling out that all of this could be connected with the hijackings on September 11, because of events in another Texas city.
In Dallas, the so-called students hit early this year at the city's FBI building, the Drug Enforcement Administration and at the Earle Cabell Federal building, where guards found one student wandering the halls with a floor plan of the building.
So the Dallas INS went on the alert, finding and arresting 15 people in March. Thirteen claimed to be Israelis and two are professed Colombians. But according to sources, once again their passports were phony. And another federal source says some of those arrested also appeared to have lists of federal employees and their home addresses.
All 15 "students" have now been deported. Now, since our first story ran Sunday night, some viewers called who said that they've been visited by people who claim to be Israeli students selling art." (19) Absolutely mind boggling! Why were Israeli explosives experts, posing as "art students" roaming the halls of US Federal buildings?
Why were Israeli army vets, armed with explosives and detonators, roaming the halls of the Mexican Congress?
Why were Israeli "movers" caught invans with explosives residue?
Might some of these shady characters have once also "roamed the halls" of the World Trade Center prior to 9-11?
Why aren't "60 minutes", "Nightline", "20/20", and the rest of the Zionist media aggressively pursuing the story behind the Israeli "art students" and "movers" with 1/1,000th the zeal that they pursued Martha Stewart over allegations of insider trading (who cares?), or 1/10,000th the zeal that they pursued the Catholic Church over an occasional pedophile priest? Funny how we never hear about the documented cases of pedophile rabbis!, or 1/100,000th the zeal that they pursue the Muslim bogeyman on a daily basis? Something smells rotten here!
One would think that these intriguing mysteries would have great TV audience appeal, especially in light of the fact that the Oklahoma Federal building was blown up in 1995 by the since executed Timothy McVeigh (dead men tell no tales), and a "John Doe # 2" of "Middle- Eastern appearance", who was never tracked down or pursued despite numerous eye-witness accounts and despite an FBI All Points Bulletin which clearly described him as such.
Of America's major networks, only FOX News made a meager attempt to investigate these mysteries, but FOX was quickly silenced by Zionist pressure. This alone is evidence of criminal activity! Before his excellent work was silenced, FOX's Carl Cameron reported this amazing bit of information: "Investigators within the DEA, INS, and FBI have all told FOX News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying is considered career suicide."(20) Did you catch that? If a Federal investigator dares to "even suggest" Israeli spying, he has committed "career suicide"! And if a journalist like FOX's Cameron dares to bring this scandal to light, he is told to shut his mouth. If they persist, they may even be called "anti-Semitic" - a label which has served as the kiss of death for many a career. This means that Zionist Mafia can do whatever it wants, whenever it wants, and however it wants - including orchestrating, financing, executing, and covering up the true story of events in the Middle East, the 9-11 massacre, and the ensuing "War on Terrorism" (war on Israel's enemies).
Now do you remember the Mossad's "warning" about the 200 "Al-Qaeda terrorists" said to have been preparing major attacks in the US? (21) At the time of this writing, we are one year into the largest investigation in American history, and not one of these 200 "terrorists" has yet to be uncovered. (22) But 200 Israeli spies were uncovered, among them many military members, electronics experts, wiretapping and phone tapping specialists, and explosives experts with the skill to bring down tall buildings. (23) Logic and common sense leads to the conclusion that the "200 Al Qaeda terrorists" were in reality, 200 Zionist terrorists sent to frame the Arabs for terrorist attacks and drag America into a war.
On December 11, 2002, Senator Bob Graham (D-FL), a leading member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, appeared as a guest on the PBS Newshour with Gwen Ifill. Graham surprised Ifill by expressing his belief that a foreign government or governments had to have funded and supported the hijackers. Here's part of the exchange: IFILL : "Are you suggesting that you are convinced that there was a state sponsor behind 9/11?"
GRAHAM : "I think there is very compelling evidence that at least some of the terrorists were assisted not just in financing - although that was part of it - by a sovereign foreign government and that we have been derelict in our duty to track that down, make the further case, or find the evidence that would indicate that that is not true and we can look for other reasons why the terrorists were able to function so effectively in the United States."
IFILL : "Do you think that will ever become public, which countries you're talking about?" Now listen to Graham's bombshell.........: GRAHAM : "It will become public at some point when it's turned over to the archives, but that's 20 or 30 years from now. And, we need to have this information now because it's relevant to the threat that the people of the United States are facing today." (24) Senator Graham is suggesting that US intelligence knows which foreign government helped the terrorists, but the government isn't going to tell us for another 30 years! Given the current state of anti-Muslim war hysteria being promoted by the media and government, common sense dictates that if an Arab government was ever discovered to have sponsored 9-11, we'd be seeing the evidence night and day on the controlled media, and hearing about it non-stop from all the President's warmongers as well as the Israeli-occupied US Congress and Senate. This alone is evidence that no Arab government was involved in 9-11.
It can't be an Arab government. Why would any Arab government sponsor "Al-qaeda", an organization dedicated to overthrowing what it sees as corrupt, US-backed Arab governments?
What Arab government would have incentive to attack America- its best oil purchasing customer?
What Arab government would have the ability to shield itself from US media exposure?
What Arab government would be so suicidal, so hell-bent on its own destruction, as to attack a mighty nuclear superpower like the United States?
So who, if not an Arab government could be the chief sponsor of 9-11? Again, let's go back to FOX News quoting an FBI official. Pay close attention to the specific language used: "Evidence linking these Israelis to 9-11 is classified. I cannot tell you about the evidence that has been gathered. It is classified information." (25) In order for evidence "linking these Israelis to 9-11" to become classified, the evidence has to have existed in the first place! Furthermore, but it must have been very, very serious stuff indeed. Only the really ugly stuff merits the distinction of being "classified!"
It may be possible that the good Senator doesn't know himself which country or countries are involved. Graham may still be under the delusion that it's an Arab government. Or, perhaps he's a disgusted patriot just trying to throw a subtle shot at Israel in his own little way, without actually having to commit "career suicide" as so many other anti-Zionist politicians have in the past. History will reveal the truth one day, just as it did for Pearl Harbor. The trouble is, by that time, no one will care about 9-11 and this phony war "War on Terrorism" anymore. The American attention span does not reach "20-30 years". It's closer to 20-30 minutes, about the length of an average Dan Rather, Peter Jennings, or Tom Brokaw infomercial. If even that!
History always repeats itself. But who will teach this history to the American people when the Zionists control the information industry? The Zionist Mafia and their ass-kissing careerist henchmen in media, government, academia, and business have all of the bases covered.
The Five Dancing Israelis Arrested On 9-11 On the day of the 9-11 attacks, former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was asked what the attacks would mean for US- Israeli relations. His quick reply was: "It's very good. Well, it's not good, but it will generate immediate sympathy (for Israel)"
A Mossad surveillance team made quite a public spectacle of themselves on 9-11.
The New York Times reported Thursday that a group of five men had set up video cameras aimed at the Twin Towers prior to the attack on Tuesday, and were seen congratulating one another afterwards. (1) Police received several calls from angry New Jersey residents claiming "middle-eastern" men with a white van were videotaping the disaster with shouts of joy and mockery. (2) "They were like happy, you know They didn't look shocked to me" said a witness. (3) [T]hey were seen by New Jersey residents on Sept. 11 making fun of the World Trade Center ruins and going to extreme lengths to photograph themselves in front of the wreckage. (4) Witnesses saw them jumping for joy in Liberty State Park after the initial impact (5). Later on, other witnesses saw them celebrating on a roof in Weehawken, and still more witnesses later saw them celebrating with high fives in a Jersey City parking lot. (6) "It looked like they're hooked in with this. It looked like they knew what was going to happen when they were at Liberty State Park." (7) One anonymous phone call to the authorities actually led them to close down all of New York's bridges and tunnels. The mystery caller told the 9-1-1 dispatcher that a group of Palestinians were mixing a bomb inside of a white van headed for the Holland Tunnel. Here's the transcript from NBC News: Dispatcher: Jersey City police. Caller: Yes, we have a white van, 2 or 3 guys in there, they look like Palestinians and going around a building. Caller: There's a minivan heading toward the Holland tunnel, I see the guy by Newark Airport mixing some junk and he has those sheikh uniform. Dispatcher: He has what? Caller: He's dressed like an Arab. (8) * Writer's note : Why would this mystery caller specifically say that these "Arabs" were Palestinians? How would he know that? Palestinians usually dress in western style clothes, not "sheikh uniforms"
Based on that phone call, police then issued a "Be-on-the-Lookout" alert for a white mini-van heading for the city's bridges and tunnels from New Jersey.
White, 2000 Chevrolet van with 'Urban Moving Systems' sign on back seen at Liberty State Park, Jersey City, NJ, at the time of first impact of jetliner into World Trade Center Three individuals with van were seen celebrating after initial impact and subsequent explosion. FBI Newark Field Office requests that, if the van is located, hold for prints and detain individuals. (9) When a van fitting that exact description was stopped just before crossing into New York, the suspicious "middle-easterners" were apprehended. Imagine the surprise of the police officers when these terror suspects turned out to be Israelis! According to ABCs 20/20, when the van belonging to the cheering Israelis was stopped by the police, the driver of the van, Sivan Kurzberg, told the officers: "We are Israelis. We are not your problem. Your problems are our problems. The Palestinians are your problem." (10) Why did he feel Palestinians were a problem for the NYPD?
The police and FBI field agents became very suspicious when they found maps of the city with certain places highlighted, box cutters (the same items that the hijackers supposedly used), $4700 cash stuffed in a sock, and foreign passports. Police also told the Bergen Record that bomb sniffing dogs were brought to the van and that they reacted as if they had smelled explosives. (11)
The FBI seized and developed their photos, one of which shows Sivan Kurzberg flicking a cigarette lighter in front of the smoldering ruins in an apparently celebratory gesture. (12) The Jerusalem Post later reported that a white van with a bomb was stopped as it approached the George Washington Bridge, but the ethnicity of the suspects was not revealed. Here's what the Jerusalem Post reported on September 12, 2001: American security services overnight stopped a car bomb on the George Washington Bridge. The van, packed with explosives, was stopped on an approach ramp to the bridge. Authorities suspect the terrorists intended to blow up the main crossing between New Jersey and New York, Army Radio reported. (13)
"...two suspects are in FBI custody after a truckload of explosives was discovered around the George Washington Bridge... The FBI... says enough explosives were in the truck to do great damage to the George Washington Bridge." WMV video download (545kB)
It was reported the van contained tonnes of explosives.(14) What's really intriguing is that ABC's 20/20 (15), the New York Post (16), and the New Jersey Bergen Record (17) all clearly and unambiguously reported that a white van with Israelis was intercepted on a ramp near Route 3, which leads directly to the Lincoln Tunnel.
But the Jerusalem Post, Israeli National News (Arutz Sheva) (18), and Yediot America, (19) all reported, just as clearly and unambiguously, that a white van with Israelis was stopped on a ramp leading to the George Washington Bridge, which is several miles north of the Lincoln Tunnel.
It appears as if there may actually have been two white vans involved, one stopped on each crossing. This would not only explain the conflicting reports as to the actual location of the arrests, but would also explain how so many credible eye-witnesses all saw celebrating "middle-easterners" in a white van in so many different locations. It also explains why the New York Post and Steve Gordon (lawyer for the 5 Israelis) originally described how three Israelis were arrested but later increased the total to five.
Perhaps one van was meant to drop off a bomb while the other was meant to pick up the first set of drivers while re-crossing back into New Jersey? If a van was to be used as a parked time-bomb on the GW Bridge, then certainly the drivers would need to have a "get- away van" to pick them up and escape. And notice how the van (or vans) stayed away from the third major crossing -the Holland Tunnel- which was where the police had originally been directed to by that anti-Palestinian 9-1-1 "mystery caller". A classic misdirection play.
From there, the story gets becomes even more suspicious. The Israelis worked for a Weehawken moving company known as Urban Moving Systems. An American employee of Urban Moving Systems told the The Record of New Jersey that a majority of his co-workers were Israelis and they were joking about the attacks.
The employee, who declined to give his name said: "I was in tears. These guys were joking and that bothered me." These guys were like, "Now America knows what we go through." (20) A few days after the attacks, Urban Moving System's Israeli owner, Dominick Suter, dropped his business and fled the country for Israel. He was in such a hurry to flee America that some of Urban Moving System's customers were left with their furniture stranded in storage facilities (21).
Suter's departure was abrupt, leaving behind coffee cups, sandwiches, cell phones and computers strewn on office tables and thousands of dollars of goods in storage. Suter was later placed on the same FBI suspect list as 9/11 lead hijacker Mohammed Atta and other hijackers and suspected al-Qaeda sympathizers, suggesting that U.S. authorities felt Suter may have known something about the attacks. (22) The Jewish weekly The Forward reported that the FBI finally concluded that at least two of the detained Israelis were agents working for the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, and that Urban Moving Systems, the ostensible employer of the five Israelis, was a front operation. This was confirmed by two former CIA officers, and they noted that movers' vans are a common intelligence cover. (23) The Israelis were held in custody for 71 days before being quietly released. (24) "There was no question but that [the order to close down the investigation] came from the White House. It was immediately assumed at CIA headquarters that this basically was going to be a cover-up so that the Israelis would not be implicated in any way in 9/11." (25) Several of the detainees discussed their experience in America on an Israeli talk show after their return home. Said one of the men, denying that they were laughing or happy on the morning of Sept. 11, "The fact of the matter is we are coming from a country that experiences terror daily. Our purpose was to document the event." (26) How did they know there would be an event to document on 9/11? It doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to connect the dots of the dancing Israeli Mossad agents - here's the most logical scenario: The Israeli "movers" cheered the 9-11 attacks to celebrate the successful accomplishment of the greatest spy operation ever pulled off in history. One of them, or an accomplice, then calls a 9-1-1 police dispatcher to report Palestinian bomb-makers in a white van headed for the Holland Tunnel. Having thus pre-framed the Palestinians with this phone call, the Israeli bombers then head for the George Washington Bridge instead, where they will drop off their time-bomb van and escape with Urban Moving accomplices. But the police react very wisely and proactively by closing off ALL bridges and tunnels instead of just the Holland Tunnel. This move inadvertently foils the Israelis' misdirection play and leads to their own capture and 40 day torture. To cover up this story, the U.S. Justice Department rounds up over 1000 Arabs for minor immigration violations and places them in New York area jails. The Israelis therefore become less conspicuous as the government and media can now claim that the Israelis were just immigration violators caught in the same dragnet as many other Arabs. After several months, FBI and Justice Department "higher-ups" are able to gradually push aside the local FBI agents and free the Israelis quietly. Osama bin Laden was immediately blamed for the 9/11 attacks even though he had no previous record of doing anything on this scale. Immediately after the Flight 11 hit World Trade Center 1 CIA Director George Tenet said, "You know, this has bin Laden's fingerprints all over it." (27) The compliant mainstream media completely ignored the Israeli connection. Immediately following the 9-11 attacks the media was filled with stories linking the attacks to bin Laden. TV talking- heads, "experts", and scribblers of every stripe spoon-fed a gullible American public a steady diet of the most outrageous propaganda imaginable.
We were told that the reason bin Laden attacked the USA was because he hates our "freedom" and "democracy". The Muslims were "medieval" and they wanted to destroy us because they envied our wealth, were still bitter about the Crusades, and were offended by Britney Spears shaking her tits and ass all over the place!
But bin Laden strongly denied any role in the attacks and suggested that Zionists orchestrated the 9-11 attacks. The BBC published bin Laden's statement of denial in which he said: "I was not involved in the September 11 attacks in the United States nor did I have knowledge of the attacks. There exists a government within a government within the United States. The United States should try to trace the perpetrators of these attacks within itself; to the people who want to make the present century a century of conflict between Islam and Christianity. That secret government must be asked as to who carried out the attacks.... The American system is totally in control of the Jews, whose first priority is Israel, not the United States." (28) You never heard that quote on your nightly newscast did you?
[A] number of intelligence officials have raised questions about Osama bin Laden's capabilities. "This guy sits in a cave in Afghanistan and he's running this operation?" one C.I.A. official asked. "It's so huge. He couldn't have done it alone." A senior military officer told me that because of the visas and other documentation needed to infiltrate team members into the United States a major foreign intelligence service might also have been involved. (29) Bin Laden is not named as the perpetrator of 9/11 by the FBI:
When asked why there is no mention of 9/11 on Bin Ladens Most Wanted web page (30), [Rex Tomb, Chief of Investigative Publicity for the FBI] said, The reason why 9/11 is not mentioned on Usama Bin Ladens Most Wanted page is because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11. (31) "So we've never made the case, or argued the case that somehow Osama bin Laden [sic] was directly involved in 9/11. That evidence has never been forthcoming" - Dick Cheney. (32) To date, the only shred of evidence to be uncovered against bin Laden is a barely audible fuzzy amateur video that the Pentagon just happened to find "lying around" in Afghanistan. How very convenient, and how very fake. (33)
There is no evidence, be it hard or circumstantial, to link the Al Qaeda "terrorist network" to these acts of terror, but there is a mountain of evidence, both hard and circumstantial, which suggests that Zionists have been very busy framing Arabs for terror plots against America. "I think there is very compelling evidence that at least some of the terrorists were assisted not just in financing - although that was part of it - by a sovereign foreign government... It will become public at some point when it's turned over to the archives, but that's 20 or 30 years from now" - Senator Bob Graham. (34) If the sovereign foreign government mentioned by Senator Graham was an enemy of the United States the "compelling evidence" would not be kept secret for 20+ years.
One final point; at 09:40 on 9-11 it was reported that the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine claimed responsibility for the attacks (35). This claim was immediately denied by the DFLP leader Qais abu Leila who said it had always opposed, "terror attacks on civilian |
bond, according to the Gothamist.
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Once the town clerk’s office received Barboza’s payment for the ticket and saw the words, “F**K YOUR SH*TTY TOWN, B*TCHES,” he was reportedly a marked man.
Barboza, a Connecticut resident who lives two hours away from Liberty, was ordered to make the trek back in order to face a judge. When he arrived at the town’s courthouse to attend his hearing, a judge reportedly let him have it by berating him before the courtroom for his obscene choice of words on the summons.
After Barboza was cuffed, he posted the bail on the same day. The charges against the young man were dismissed six months down the line by another judge who deemed that even though Barboza’s words were “crude, vulgar, inappropriate, and clearly intended to annoy,” they were fully protected by the First Amendment.
Now the New York Civil Liberties Union has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit on Barboza’s behalf, and according to Mariko Hirose, a staff attorney for the civil rights organization, who spoke with the Gothamist, “New York’s aggravated harassment statute must be struck from the books, once and for all. No one else should have to suffer the way Mr. Barboza did.
“Indeed in 2003, the New York Court of Appeals said the statute cannot be applied to speech just because it is “crude and offensive.” And in 1997, a federal court judge found the law to be “utterly repugnant to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and also unconstitutional for vagueness.”
Meanwhile, Barboza is baffled as to why his written expression of disgruntlement with “the system” was taken to such extreme levels of punishment, “All I did was express my frustration with a ticket, and I almost ended up in jail. I want to make sure nobody else ends up in a similar situation because of this law,” contends Barboza.
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Also On News One:by John Zangas
A group of activists concerned with the continuing economic struggle of Americans held a sidewalk “conference” in front of Federal Reserve Board headquarters in Washington, DC on March 21 and 22. Their conference, called “Fed Up: The Peoples First Conference on Monetary Reform,” coincided with a European Central Bankers’ meeting to discuss international monetary policy. Occupying the sidewalk in front of the Federal Reserve, they spoke to passersby about the need to change U.S. economic policy and redistribute wealth.
Fed Up delegates claim the Federal Reserve is a “black box of decision-making,” responsible for policies that enrich banks with free money at the expense of millions who are economically strapped. Their message: “We need to take back the Federal Reserve, stop bailing out Wall Street and start rebuilding America.”
“The idea of economic independence is as important as political freedom and social justice,” said Jim Costanzo of the Aaron Burr Society. “You are not independent if you do not have economic independence,” he said. Costanzo believes the present economic problems stem from an accelerating wealth imbalance, facilitated by money that has been given to banks since the 2008 recession.
The group advocated the National Emergency Employment Defense Act or NEED Act (HR2990), which was introduced by Congressman Dennis Kucinich in 2011. The bill, they say, is designed to put money where it is needed: back into people’s pockets for jobs, education, healthcare and building infrastructure. Though the bill died in committee in 2013, it contains policy changes which the activists say should be adopted and will directly help those who continue to slide economically. The bill would re-locate the Federal Reserve within the U.S. Treasury Department to create a new public monetary authority, empower the U.S. Treasury to print money and cap interest rates at 8%.
The Federal Reserve has funded bond and mortgage-backed securities purchases, and since 2007 has increased its holdings by three trillion dollars while issuing money. The policy, known as quantitative easing (QE), was adopted to drive interest rates lower, increase bank lending rates to get more money into the economy, and create jobs. But there has been little economic relief for workers and only a marginal decrease in the unemployment rate. “Capitalism will never look at labor except as a liability,” said Costanzo.
Most of the four trillion dollars the federal reserve has bought in bond purchases will languish as debt in its coffers, exposing future generations to financial obligations for which they were not responsible. The Federal Reserve has accumulated three trillion in government debt since 2008 and converted it to money. While it has helped Wall Street stocks rise to record heights, it has done little to help the person on the street. “We need to allow communities to have access to capital to form worker co-ops and food co-ops, just as corporations [have] access to capital,” said Costanzo.
Harrison Schultz, 31, who helped organized the Fed Up conference with his partner Lorna Shannon, believes the time to make change in the nation’s economic policy is needed now more than ever. Schultz, a sociology Ph.D. candidate at the New School for Social Research in Manhattan, contacted leaders from groups around the country to educate others and share their message. “We are here to talk about money issues, the relationship between the Federal Reserve and the banks,” he said. “The Needs Act is a possible solution to our money problems,” he said. “It will allow us to take control over Congress instead of Wall Street controlling Congress.”
“Many people believe the Federal Reserve is part of the government, but it is not,” Schultz said. “The Federal Reserve is a group of private bankers setting fiscal policy for all of us. They keep too big to fail from failing.”
Schultz, who has over $300,000 in education loans, is no stranger to economic struggle. Unable to find adequate employment, he works as a Dating Coach, helping singles with compatibility tips. He shares a one-bedroom studio with his partner, Lorna Shannon, in Williamsbridge, Brooklyn. She was a pre-school teacher but is now unemployed. She has several thousand dollars in medical debt and no money saved. At 29, she feels the pressure of an economy that has no stake in them. “This system is inhumane,” she said. “This is a system that exploits everyone. It doesn’t work for me or my friends. It’s making things worse.” They have no health insurance or benefits or retirement either, and barely make enough to pay rent, utilities and food bills.
Schultz and Shannon are among a growing population of disenfranchised youth who feel the effects of growing pressures to get ahead yet are left behind. Shultz is among many educated youth who have debt they may never be able to pay off because employment opportunities are scarce. There is over one trillion dollars in outstanding student debt in the U.S.
Their plight is reflective of the fact that U.S. wealth inequality is greatly skewed towards the top one percent, which owns 40 percent of the wealth, while the bottom 80% owns only 7% of the country’s wealth. And it is getting worse. Meanwhile the U.S. ranks fourth to last of all 34 developed countries in income inequality according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Income inequality is rising in every country according to OECD.
Wealth inequality may have even more dire consequences than previously thought. A recent NASA study theorizes that wealth inequality actually poses a threat to civilization. In one potential scenario, excessive resource consumption by elites will exacerbated economic woes of the majority to such an extent that the study warns it will precipitate civilizational collapse.
Costanzo offered several solutions to wealth inequality in addition to the NEED Act. He believes that the tax breaks corporations get are unfair to the communities which welcome them. “Every corporation is getting subsidized, so it is hard to get small businesses started,” he said. “Corporations like Walmart get to build stores in communities and get tax free incentives.”
Costanzo has also been involved with “Strike Debt,” a grassroots organization which bought back medical debt from creditors by raising money in a telethon. “We raised $700,000 which we used to buy back $14 million in debt for pennies on the dollar,” he said. “We abolished the medical and education debt of people who would never have been able to pay it off.”
Shannon offered several other solutions to help the working class, including funding for food and child care co-ops, something which could be provided through the NEED Act. As people lose faith in the viability of the dollar, some communities have established local currencies. A cooperative in Ithaca, New York set up an alternative currency called “Ithaca Hours.” Over 900 local businesses in Ithaca use the currency in place of the dollar to exchange goods and services. “It only circulates in the local community, keeping business profits local,” she said.
Shultz and Shannon feel their first conference at the Federal Reserve was a success as they reached out to hundreds of people and shared information and ideas between themselves. “This is the beginning of something new,” said Shultz. They plan to hold another conference during Wave of Action events in New York on April 4.Well this is a bit odd. Attorney Lisa Schifferle writing for the Federal Trade Commission’s Consumer & Business education division issued a warning on April 18 titled “There’s no Nintendo Switch emulator.” That has been, and as far as I can tell continues to be, a true statement, though the FTC isn’t generally in the business of issuing warnings about video games.
There’s apparently a noteworthy scam making the rounds, wherein people are either going looking for counterfeit software on dubious websites, or being approached by scammers peddling nonsense in the guise of a Nintendo-fied simulacrum.
In a blog post that seems at time to knowingly wink at readers amidst its stern language, Schifferle acknowledges the Switch’s supply scarcity at the moment. It’s a problem. Buyers have either been paying ridiculously inflated scalper prices off auction sites for Nintendo’s mobile-TV hybrid game system, or paying retailers like GameStop exorbitant sums for “bundles” with take it or leave it bric-a-brac.
Thus the impatient (or just plain mischievous) may be lured by promises of software that runs Switch games on a computer. “But there is no legit Nintendo Switch emulator. It’s a scam,” writes Schifferle, noting all the other nefarious things that can install themselves surreptitiously if you download fake software and give it carte blanche. (Not to be confused with fake fake software, which, like fake fake news, would in fact be real.)
Don’t be deceived by stories you may have seen about people running The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild at ultra-high-definition resolutions. There are two versions of Breath of the Wild, one for Wii U and one for the Switch. That’s because a Wii U emulator exists; a Switch emulator doesn’t. (To say nothing of the grayish legality of emulators in general, which is another matter.)
Here’s the FTC’s list of guidelines to avoid the scam, all arguably obvious enough not to bother repeating, but presented here because that last one made me smile.“With disturbing frequency, backpackers die in the mountains during the first snows of the season. Avalanche danger, hypothermia and obliterated trails are a threat to your life. Snow has closed the PCT in Washington as early as mid-September. In a normal year, you should plan to be off the trail by October at the latest. Please be experts at winter travel and study the forecast and our snow information if you are traveling the Washington PCT section in the fall.”
~ Pacific Crest Trail Association, ‘Thru Hiking – Northbound Vs Southbound’
Despite clear warnings from the PCTA (and there isn’t much grey in the above quoted passage), each and every year increasingly more northbound thru hikers are continuing their journeys deep into October in hopes of reaching Canada. This rise in the number of late season aspirants, has been paralleled by a worrying growth in the amount of hikers that get themselves into trouble, and subsequently need to be rescued.
Whenever I hear these stories, like most folks, my initial reaction is always that I’m glad that the hikers are Ok. My second thought is that the majority of these instances could have been avoided through a combination of common sense, objectivity, and paying heed to the warnings of those in the know.
Let’s take a look at the whys and wherefores behind this disturbing trend, and outline what can possibly be done in order to address the issue:
Why do PCT thru-hikers continue deep into October despite all of the warnings?
A combination of border fever, overestimating their own abilities and underestimating how dangerous October conditions can be in WA. Throw in the “safety net” factor of personal locator beacons/satellite messengers (i.e. “I can always press the button if I get into difficulty”), and you have a recipe for trouble.
Ok, border fever I understand, but overconfidence? These guys have walked over 2000 miles on the PCT, and many of them have prior long distance hiking experience on the Appalachian Trail; surely they are highly experienced hikers?
In many cases they are not. Thru-hiking in regular season conditions on the Triple Crown trails does not necessarily equip you for what Mother Nature can throw at you in the Cascade mountains in the fall. Paul “Mags” Magnanti, one of the most experienced hikers and outdoors people in the US, wrote an article about this very subject titled, Thru Hikers: Specialized Outdoors Knowledge. Here is an excerpt:.
“Many people who have done thru-hiking as their only outdoor activity often-times have a narrow base of outdoor knowledge……….Reading a guidebook, following a well-defined path and having a large trail infrastructure does not make for an outdoor “expert”. It makes a person an outdoor specialist. Even the Continental Divide Trail, with its increasingly better maintained tread, defined route, specific maps, guidebooks, and smart phone apps, is becoming a very defined experience.”
With the occasional exception, PCT hikers that possess the experience to be out in winter-like conditions in the Cascades, will have already finished before October. “Why?” Because they are aware of how difficult it can be at that time of year, and they know that the best chance they have of reaching Canada, is to get their skates on and finish sooner rather than later.
Hold on, many of these ‘October’ hikers have come through hundreds of miles of snow covered terrain in the High Sierra. Is that so different to what they will face in WA?
Yes it is. There is a big discrepancy between walking over “Sierra Cement” (hard-packed snow) in the spring, and getting hit by an early season winter-like storm and a few feet of fresh powder in the Cascades. That’s not to say that the former is a walk in the park, as anyone who has spent hours postholing on a sunny June afternoon will attest. However, in the WA section of the PCT, where much of the hiking is done in wooded areas, it is easy to become disorientated if the trail is completely snow covered, the weather is coming in, and you haven’t been paying attention to where you are on the map. This particularly holds true if something goes wrong and a phone app is your only navigation tool, which increasingly appears to be the case on America’s popular long distance trails.
In regards to phone apps, it seems that most of the “rescued hiker” stories you hear, tell of phones that either died or were damaged, lost or malfunctioned. What’s the skinny?
The skinny is that paper maps are going the way of the dodo, and a rapidly increasing amount of thru hikers are tackling long trails with little in the way of navigation skills, and nothing in the way of a navigational backup.
As the PCTA, myself and countless other experienced backcountry people have said (over and over and over), Hiking Apps are not a panacea and shouldn’t be thought of as a substitute to map and compass. Batteries can die (particularly in the sub freezing temps), electronics can fail, signals don’t always come through. GPS apps have their limitations, and if you have nothing in the way of a navigational backup to call on if a worse case scenario occurs, you may well find yourself up poo creek without a technological paddle.
I’m not saying that folks should give up their GPS/Smart phones and go 100% old school map and compass. That’s not going to happen. What I am saying is that you should always carry a backup, and get in the habit of regular correlating what you see around you, with where you are on the map. That way if you do get into trouble and your phone dies, you will know where you are, where you have come from, and where you need to go.
If all that doesn’t convince hikers to carry a compass and paper maps, perhaps the words of Guthook, the guy behind the most popular app for the Triple Crown Trails, may make a difference :
“We (the Guthook’s Guides development team) are alarmed at the increasing number of people stating their intention to hike without paper maps. ELECTRONIC DEVICES AND APPS CAN FAIL. IT IS A HORRIBLE IDEA TO RELY SOLELY ON A DEVICE OR AN APP AS YOUR SOLE NAVIGATION SOURCE.
There’s really not much more to it than that.
We love technology, and we love our customers who use our apps. But please carry paper maps with you — even if it’s just as a back up — when you hit the trail.”
To Guthook’s words I would add the following; if you are going to carry a map and compass on trail, know how to use them before you begin your journey. There are plenty of helpful websites where can learn navigation basics. Once you have the theory down, head out into the boonies and practice what you have learnt. If you don’t live near the woods, go to your local park:
Let’s cut to the chase; what’s the principal reason hikers find themselves racing the meteorological clock in October?
In a nutshell – too much time off trail, not enough time walking. Obviously there are many reasons why individuals take breaks from their thru hikes (i.e. personal issues, injuries, finances, etc). However, if we are being completely honest, a lot of these October hikers find themselves behind the eight ball because they have spent too much time faffing about and partying in towns along the way. Double and triple zeros eventually add up. Before they know it, late September has arrived and they have only just reached the Bridge of the Gods on the OR/WA border.
What about all the fire closures in recent years?
In such scenarios, hikers usually have the choice of taking alternates or flip flopping up to areas that aren’t affected. Neither option is ideal, but if an area is closed, it is closed for a reason. In such scenarios the onus is on the hiker to adapt. Mother Nature never has a copy of your hiking itinerary.
Come on, mate, get off your soap box. Haven’t you heard the expression, “hike your own hike”? If these guys know the risks and still choose to continue, it’s their business.
Last year I wrote an article addressing this argument. It was titled, “When Hike Your Own Hike Ceases to Apply.” Here’s an excerpt:
“Once you make the decision to venture into conditions that you have neither the experience, skill and in many cases the equipment to handle, all bets are off. You have forfeited the right to “Hike your own Hike.”
“Why?”
Because not only have you put yourself at risk, you’ve potentially also placed the Search & Rescue (SAR) workers that have to come and find you in danger.
“Isn’t that their job?”
No, it’s not. At least it shouldn’t be. These individuals have more than enough to do as it is; the last thing they need is to be spending time and resources looking for ill prepared hikers, that more often than not have no one but themselves to blame for their predicament.”
Solutions
How can PCT hikers maximise their chances of getting to Canada before October?:
Prioritise Hiking over Socialising: If your goal is to hike from Mexico to Canada, focus on doing just that. That doesn’t mean you have to be a monk or nun every time you hit town. What it does mean is that you should have a basic trip itinerary and stick to it as best you can. There will always be temptations; it comes down to how much you want to finish the hike.
If on the other hand, the social side of things is more important to you than reaching Canada, that’s fine as well, but be honest with yourself, and accept the fact that you may not be able to complete a single season thru hike.
Be Prepared: Unlike what some so-called experts will tell you, ‘Thru Hiking is not 90% Mental‘. Apart from being utter rubbish, this oft-heard mantra can give newbie hikers the wrong impression in regards to how much preparation they need to be doing for a PCT thru hike. Don’t get me wrong, mental strength and resilience obviously plays a part in any long distance hike, however, a balance needs to be struck. Basic skills such as navigation, how to ford swollen rivers, self-arrest with an ice axe, reading snow conditions, the importance of campsite selection, hydration strategies for the desert, etc, are all important if you hope to maximise your chances of reaching Canada in an average or greater snow year.
Accept and Adapt: Wilderness travel is by nature unpredictable. During your PCT journey, one of the only things of which you can be guaranteed is that unexpected shit will happen. Fires, storms, detours, logistical mishaps, pains, sprains and niggles. The list goes on. Try not to get too down or too up; learn to shrug your shoulders and have a chuckle. The universe isn’t conspiring against your thru hiking dreams. As best you can, accept and adapt to whatever Mother Nature and the trail throws your way. By doing so, the stumbling blocks become stepping stones, and the chances of not only reaching Canada before October, but more importantly having a great time in doing so, increase exponentially.
Be Consistent: Do you know why so many old buggers in their 50’s (I’m almost there), 60’s and 70’s finish thru hikes, while a lot of younger, faster and stronger hikers, die in the ass before journey’s end? There are a few different reasons, but the big one is pacing and consistency. Channel your inner tortoise, stay in the “85% effort zone”, and finish each hiking day with a little left in the tank. That way you will invariably wake up feeling ready to go the next morning, and there will be less need to take as many zero days in towns for rest and recuperation.
Objective Observer: When faced with tough decisions in the backcountry, try to take pride and ego out of the equation, and look at situations as an objective observer rather than a subjective participant. In the case of finishing the PCT in October, I get it; Canada is so close that you can almost see the moose and Mounties. However, ignoring forecasts and venturing into dangerous conditions for which you aren’t prepared, is simply not worth the potential price. I’ve seen it way too many times over the years. Hikers unnecessarily putting both themselves, and the people that have to come and search for them into harm’s way. Remember that Canada’s not going anywhere, and while “the heart and spirit may be the catalysts for many of us heading out into the wilderness, when worst-case scenarios occur, usually it is what goes on between our ears that dictates whether or not we return home safely.”A losing season changes the tone of how a team conducts its business and weighs its values when it heads into the next campaign.
That is not to say that the Chicago Fire lost sight of the ultimate goal of attempting to put together a winning club during their sub-par 2010 season. But the Fire's demeanor and the way that they have conducted business in the offseason are noticeably different.
The "attractive" and "possession" lingo of last year from head coach Carlos de los Cobos and their players is less at the forefront, and the "calculated risk" approach of bringing in expensive disappointments such as Nery Castillo and Collins John appears to be gone.
This year, the Fire have centered on words such as "cohesiveness" and "winning," and the idea that everybody has bought into one philosophy.
Now that sounds all hunky-dory, but only those in the Fire locker room and front office truly know how smoothly everything is functioning behind the scenes. On the surface, the team's demeanor has to be an improvement compared to last year's disjointed team that included personality differences, style differences, injuries and fitness issues, players on the final legs of their playing careers, numerous signings that did not pan out and a new coach who was brought in so late that he missed the 2010 MLS Combine.
For a second straight offseason, Fire owner Andrew Hauptman and company undertook a major overhaul. Now, the question is whether the Fire feel they are ahead of last year's campaign, and if they have a functioning system in place to rebound from only their second playoff-less season in team history.
Four points and a 1-0-1 start to the 2011 season have brought some early optimism for the Fire.
"I've got my fingers crossed that we've tried to do as much as we could do in a relatively short preseason," Hauptman said last Thursday.
Last year was a self-evaluation lesson for everyone involved with the Fire, which posted a 9-12-9 record. Hauptman knows mistakes were made, but he and the Fire staff hold no remorse for taking some chances. It was just the manner in how their risk-taking was drawn out.
"You can't win without taking risks, and part of the challenge here is when you're working within the parameters of a salary cap, you have to sometimes take this on in ways that seem good on paper," Hauptman said. "I think one of the lessons we learned is it might be good on paper, but what kind of process needs to be in place in order to make sure the elements that are not what's on paper get covered? How do we evaluate those intangibles?"
Case in point last year was the midseason addition of designated player Castillo. On paper, Castillo appeared to be a bargain simply based on the coin he was earning from Shakhtar Donetsk and how high his stock was only a few years earlier in his mid-20s. But on the pitch, Castillo's lack of fitness was so glaring that De los Cobos should have pulled the plug earlier than he did.
"It was a risk," Hauptman said. "[The technical staff] came to me and said it would be expensive, but not nearly as expensive as the cost to Shakhtar, who bought him for 20 million Euros and had to pay him significant dollars beyond that. Now look, it was a mistake. We shouldn't have done it. But we're always looking for that special player. Our first priority is how do we build the team that we think is built to win. That is our first priority, no matter where they come from or what their nationality is."
This year's Fire are trying to establish a new system and it is apparent that they have taken a few pages from teams that piece together winning franchises without the need of a designated player, instead using steadfast recruiting systems. Last year's MLS Cup featured the champion Colorado Rapids and runner-up FC Dallas, two franchises that did not have a DP on their roster. FCD is exemplary at recruiting south of the border, as evidenced by 2010 MLS MVP and Colombian David Ferreira.
"So far there is the negative correlation between those teams that have those iconic players and those teams that win," Hauptman said. "So far the data speaks for itself. It's not a big data set. We don't have that many years experience with it. But I don't think we look at it one way or the other. There are some clubs that look at it and say, 'We will not have a DP under any circumstances.' And there are other clubs that say 'We're all about getting the biggest DP possible, the biggest name. We don't care what the technical team says, but we're going to bring that iconic player.' I think we're kind of in the middle in the sense that if we can find the right opportunity, we'll do it."
Hauptman said that at no point in the offseason did he consider changes with his head coach De los Cobos or technical director Frank Klopas. Instead, a more rigorous approach was taken as Hauptman funded a scouting trip more expansive than in any other Fire offseason.
Now, Hauptman hopes the "stars align" in this new approach translating onto the field.
"I'm one of these guys that's very process-oriented," Hauptman said. "There's the process and there's the results. Sometimes you can have the results and the process can be pretty dysfunctional, and you're going to run into trouble at some point. Or vice versa. For me, I'm definitely the guy that would rather have the process right and feel comfortable with that process ultimately yielding results."The 1970 postal strike brought the nation to its knees.
In early 1970, National Guardsmen were spotted walking from door to door in neighborhoods throughout the United States. They weren’t conducting a military operation or helping clean up after a natural disaster—they were delivering the mail in the midst of a postal strike that almost brought the United States to a halt.
The eight-day strike of some 150,000 letter carriers in 30 cities took the nation by surprise, but for many in the U.S. Postal Department (forerunner of today’s USPS) it was a long time coming.
At the time, pay raises for postal workers were almost unheard of: After 21 years on the job, notedThe New York Times, a letter carrier would only earn $2,266 more than their starting salary. Though unionized, postal workers were forbidden from negotiating for pay raises due to cost of living. There was no chance to earn overtime, and many workers had to find a second job to make ends meet.
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To top it off, life as a letter carrier was unforgiving. The work was physically demanding, and even experienced employees had no idea how many hours they would work. They waited in break rooms for long periods, hoping to be called for a few hours of delivering the mail. By 1970, their turnover rate was 23 percent.
Post Office workers on strike at Tenafly, 1970. (Credit: Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images)
Tensions boiled over when Congress proposed raising their own salaries by 41 percent in early 1970—but only offered postal employees a 5.4 percent raise. Furious letter carriers in New York called a meeting of the local branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers union on March 17, 1970 to demand a strike.
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But the union refused to strike. Union leaders agreed there were legitimate problems, but pointed out that it was illegal for federal workers to strike. (It still is.) Members took a vote. It was close—1,555 for a strike, 1,055 against. However, a group of pro-strike workers led by Vincent Sombrotto defied their union and decided to stop work the next morning.
This “wildcat” strike—one that goes against the wishes of the union—meant that Sombrotto and his colleagues lacked official support for their actions. But they had many supporters elsewhere: other discontented letter carriers from coast to coast.
As letter carriers took to the streets of Manhattan and stopped delivering mail, others joined in. Thirty other cities’ workers walked out, too, and soon at least 150,000 letter carriers—over 200,000, by other counts, often members of other unions—walked off the job.
It was the largest ever walkout of federal employees, and its effects immediately rippled through the nation. At the time, notes the National Postal Museum, letter carriers handled 270 million pieces of mail a day. With no one to deliver them, documents critical to government, finance and other industries sat unprocessed in Postal Department handling facilities.
Martha Leslie, Secretary to Operations Director, points to 60 bags of parcel post stalled in Denver due to the postal strike. (Credit: Dave Buresh/The Denver Post via Getty Images)
Letter carriers were just the tip of the iceberg. According to historian Philip F. Rubio, sympathetic bosses allowed some picketing postal workers to clock in and out before heading out to the picket lines and the strike “became a rank and file…revolt.”
“No one had any idea of the chaos that would soon stifle the post offices, the post boxes, the airports, the railroad stations, the stores,” wrote The Guardian’s Alastair Cooke. Weeping women waiting for mail from Vietnam and poor people who needed their welfare checks descended on local post offices, he reported, and businesses announced they might go out of business if the strike continued.
The strike affected another area of life, too: the draft. At the time, the Vietnam War was still raging and draft notices were sent through the mail. Young men now had no idea if they would be called up to war or exempted from it.
“I’m not a rabble rouser or anything like that,” Martin Conroy, a postal clerk from New Jersey who struck in solidarity with the New York workers, told the Philadelphia Inquirer. “Frankly, I’m not the picketing type. But they keep putting us off, and this is the only way we can get any reaction.”
With at least 30 percent of the nation’s letter carriers on strike, the entire postal system began to sink to its knees. Finally, the reaction came—from President Nixon himself. He declared a national emergency and called in the National Guard despite worries that federal action might prompt an even larger strike.
A mailbox decorated with “Rest In Peace” as the postal strike continued. (Credit: Denver Post via Getty Images)
Soon, the National Guard was delivering the mail. Ironically, many of the National Guardsmen were postal carriers who had signed up as a second job. Others struggled to adjust to the difficult sorting tasks and hard delivery work and developed sympathy for the striking workers.
After eight days, convinced by assurances that a deal had been struck with the federal government for a more significant raise, the strike ended. In reality, there was no deal. But when postal employees went back to the job, Nixon’s government gave the workers an immediate pay hike that was also retroactive. A year later, when the U.S. Postal Service was formed, postal unions were given the right to negotiate their salaries and working conditions.
One thing Nixon never did was cancel the national emergency. And his use of an executive order to prompt a military response was not exactly popular. It sparked a special investigation by Congress, and presidential use of both executive orders and national emergency declarations is still hotly debated as a possible overreach of executive power today.
Though Nixon drove a hard bargain while the strike was in progress, his government did not retaliate against those who walked out. Not a single striking worker was fired. Nobody was fined or jailed for acting against federal law. But when labor laws were amended in 1978, allowing collective bargaining for federal workers, provisions that made it illegal to strike stayed in the law.
It’s still against the law for federal workers to walk out on the job. But the strike reminded the government—and the nation—of the power of rank-and-file workers. “Finally,” declared the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of unions in the United States, “the Post Office Department figured out it needed postal workers.”Get ready for a very special episode of the Cult Film Club. On our last episode Pax, Jaime and I broke out our BMX bikes and took a look at the 1986 sportsploitation classic Rad. To cap off that discussion we had the opportunity to chat with the star of the movie, Cru Jones himself, Mr. Bill Allen.
We talk about the film, Bill’s penchant for extreme hobbies, his music career, what it’s like to be associated with a cult classic film and to have inspired countless athletes and filmmakers. We also dig into his new memoir, My Rad Career, which highlights his 30 years spent in front of and behind the cameras. It was an honor and an amazing pleasure to chat with one of our film heroes and we hope you enjoy the conversation. So without further to do, queue up Send Me An Angel, put on your sequined shirts, and jump on your bike as we talk to a supremely Rad dude!
Listen now!
(Or right-click and save this file to download -> Cult Film Club, Episode #17: Bill Allen Interview)
If you like what you hear you can subscribe to the Cult Film Club on iTunes.
You can also join our not-so-exclusive but totally rad club so you can know which movie(s) we’ll be discussing next and watch along with us.Indeed, a large proportion of what is nowadays published, especially in chemistry and nonspecialized journals, relates to nanosized carriers (nanoparticles, nanocapsules, drug–polymer conjugates, etc.) aimed at directing anticancer drugs to neo- plastic tissues. In such systems, the tumor-targeting principle generally relies on the enhanced permeation and retention (EPR) effect. However, this constitutes the main limitation of the “nanomedicine” dogma, since the EPR effect is increasingly recognized to be much less prominent in humans than in the classical rodent models employed to demonstrate antitumoral activity.
One might ask whether some of these things are “funding bait”, going after high-profile subjects like cancer with high-profile approaches like nanotechnology. It would be unfair to characterize the whole field like this, but it would be unrealistic to pretend that this isn’t a factor, either. And by “funding”, I have in mind both academic grants and industrial biopharma money as well.
They’re certainly “publication bait” in many cases, and that’s one of LeRoux’s big points: the specialist journals in this area are publishing a bit less of the gaudy stuff, which is instead showing up in the broader-interest journals. And that stuff is perhaps not getting the detailed reviewing it should when it moves up in this fashion, which is a general problem in the literature. You end up with a situation where the highest-profile publications end up as some of the less potentially reproducible ones, a situation that the chemists and biologists in the crowd will be familiar with. Toxicity is just one of the issues that can get swept under the scientific rug under these conditions.
Reproducibility is another thing that LeRoux |
-Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein and were ultimately scuttled, although they were approved by the Ministerial Committee for Legislation.
Also in the previous Knesset, Habayit Hayehudi pushed an initiative to apply labor laws in the West Bank to help pregnant women in the settlements. But it backtracked when it became clear that the legislation would improve Palestinian rights and add an economic burden to employers in the settlements.
Israel has not been inadvertently avoiding the process Shaked advocates. To date, Israeli law applies to the settlers on a personal basis under the law that extends emergency regulations, while whatever applies on a regional basis is by order of the regional military commander. There are already Israeli laws “imported” to the territories that favor the settlers, and Shaked’s proposal will make the situation worse because the laws will be applied more systematically.
The proposal is expected to deepen the apartheid in Israel’s code of law that effectively exists between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. It will also cause Israel damage in the international arena. The proposal is akin to de facto annexation, making discrimination in the territories official. This will bring the world down on Israel’s head, which is why even firm opponents of withdrawal like former premiers Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir avoided such a step.
Mendelblit must refuse to support the legal bypass Shaked is trying to pave, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – who repeatedly says that he’s ready “for negotiations with the Palestinians without preconditions” – must protect the State of Israel’s interests, which are being trampled by the interests of the messianic Greater Israel.
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You are in your mid-twenties and your vision is 20/20 or better. You are not color blind and all the devices you own have a ‘retina’ screen. You are standing in a major city and your internet is fast.
Imagine
Your vision isn’t 20/20 anymore, just like 65% of the population, it’s worse than that. Like 4.25% of people on the planet you are color blind. You are now 1 in 10. You are dyslexic. Your phone is 3 years old. You can’t afford a new one. Your data plan caps out at 3g and 1 gigabyte a month. The internet connection where you spend most of your time is not what you’d like it to be.
Imagine
You can’t see at all. You use a computer with a screen reader. A mouse is mostly useless to you. You use your keyboard to navigate around interfaces and sites.
If you woke up tomorrow without knowing what your life would be like – and you needed to build a new internet for everyone. What would you think about? What would your priorities be? What problems would you try to solve?
American philosopher John Rawls (1921–2002) had a lot of mind-crushing ideas, but perhaps the most significant was his concept of “the veil of ignorance.” It best applies to the creation of social contracts. At risk of oversimplification, Rawls’s scenario was basically this: Let’s pretend you were instantly able to re-create American society in totality, and you could do it in whatever way you wanted. You could make (or eliminate) whatever laws you desired, and you could implement whatever financial and judicial structures you believed would work best. However, you must do this under a magical “veil of ignorance.” The moment after you create this system, you’ll no longer be yourself (and you don’t have any idea what your new role in this society shall be). You might be a rough facsimile of your current self, or you might be someone entirely new. Your gender might be different, or your race. It’s possible you will be extremely destitute and appallingly ugly. You’ll have a different level of intelligence and a different work ethic. You might suddenly be disabled, or super athletic, or homosexual, or criminally insane. As such, you will (probably) want to create a society that is as fair and complete as possible, since you have no idea what station you’ll inherit within your own new, self-constructed boundaries. You need to think outside of your current self, because tomorrow you’ll be someone else entirely.
– Chuck Klosterman – ‘I Wear the Black Hat’
John Rawls mostly philosophized about theories of justice but I think he would have been a pretty great designer.
Imagine
You drive to a job interview. Before you get out you look in the mirror and straighten your tie. Both of your legs work so you open the door and climb out. Earlier that day you ran 6 miles and did 20 minutes of stretching afterwards. Your legs feel great! You walk across the parking lot and bound up a set of stairs. You don’t think twice about it.
Imagine
You don’t have two working legs. You arrive at a building for a job interview. You exit your automobile and roll across the parking lot. There is no ramp. Your wheelchair can’t climb stairs. You don’t know what to do.
Thanks to the Americans with Disabilities Act this doesn’t happen as much as it used to. Most people don’t view a set of stairs as a barrier to a building. We don’t observe whether or not there is a ramp. We don’t notice if a doorway is wide enough for a wheelchair. Or if a hallway is wide enough to make a 180 degree turn. We most likely don’t think about this because our life doesn’t necessitate it.
When we build things – we must think of the things our life doesn’t necessitate. Because someones life does.
“When we build things – we must think of the things our life doesn’t necessitate. Because someones life does.”
Imagine the frustration of people who use things designed by people who don’t take their basic needs into consideration. I think it is dehumanizing.
“The ADA is one of America’s most comprehensive pieces of civil rights legislation that prohibits discrimination and guarantees that people with disabilities have the same opportunities as everyone else to participate in the mainstream of American life — to enjoy employment opportunities, to purchase goods and services, and to participate in State and local government programs and services.”
Think about the current state of the website/application/digital product you were working on. Can everyone use it with the same opportunity to participate in ‘mainstream American life?’ Statistically speaking, probably not. But you are providing a service.
Facts
• At 20 years old, your retina receives 100% of the light that hits the eye.
• At 40 years old, only 50% of the available light enters the retina.
• For an 80 year old, 25% of the available light passes through the retina.
When people say “My old tired eyes can’t read this” It is because they can’t.
I’ve often hear two complaints when designing for accessibility.
• Accessible color combinations limit my choices as a designer.
• Big type looks clumsy.
First lets talk about color contrast.
There are 140,737,479,966,720 combinations of hexcodes. Obviously not all of them are accessible. If only 1% of all color combinations are accessible than there are still almost 141 million combinations to choose from. This seems more than adequate to paint any bikeshed you will come across for the rest of your career.
Typography
“If it is too small people can hit command + and make the type bigger”
This is a fact that can’t be disregarded. But I offer a counter: If the type is so big that it offends your user they can hit command – and make the type smaller. I have never observed anyone do this. Quite often, I watch people bump up the font-size of the page they are viewing. This seems backwards.
Typography, like color, and music is all about how values relate to each other. If large type looks clumsy it is most likely due to an ineffective type scale that doesn’t relate to the proportions within your design system. Type scales are all about relativity.
The thing about large type, is that everyone can read it. Not everyone can read small type. This is a fact. No one complains that typefaces set at 20px are too big to read. In all of the user testing I have ever done that has never been said. But people have complained about the readability of type set to the equivalent of 10 and 12px.
“No one complains that typefaces set at 20px are too big to read.”
Consider the consequences of building a ramp instead of a staircase. Anyone can get up a ramp. But not everyone can get up a set of stairs. As a design community I think we should be building more ramps.
The Morality of Designing
I’m a designer. I am not here to focus on making things pretty. I’m here to make things work.
“I’m a designer. I am not here to focus on making things pretty. I’m here to make things work.”
I am a designer because I want to solve problems. I want people to be less frustrated when they use technology. I want to make their lives easier. I don’t want to make anyones life more difficult. These two sentiments sound the same, but they are not. I find both are important to consider.
When I sit down to design things I try to put on the veil of ignorance. I imagine a world where I am not who I am right now. And I think about all the things that could possibly frustrate me. Then I think some more.
I try to design for that reality. I don’t design for myself and my perfect eyesight, my retina screens, and my fast internet connection.
“I don’t design for myself and my perfect eyesight, my retina screens, and my fast internet connection.”
I design for everyone I can think of. Which is a growing list of people with a growing list of concerns that possess a growing number of devices made up of a wide variety of screen sizes.
If everyone can use your product I think it’s good for your business. But even if it wasn’t, I think it would be the right thing to do. Which makes it worth doing.
So I’d do it anyway.
Further Reading
Mathematical web typography
Relative Readability
Section 508
tota11y
This post was originally published on Adam’s blog.Record 60 pc jump in khadi sale after PM's appeal Top Stories » Apr-Jan fiscal deficit at 121% of target » Industry welcomes GST Council decision on real estate » Govt invites entries for intellectual property competition » FIEO hails draft e-commerce policy » Need to diversify exports, explore new markets: Minister Saurabh Gupta | 08 May, 2015
After Prime Minister Narendra Modi appeals to the Nation to at least buy one khadi garment, the total sales of Khadi products from Khadi Gramodyog Bhawan, for the period from April 13 to 28 has increased over 60 percent as compared to corresponding period of previous year, informed ministry of Micro, Small & Medium Enterprise ( MSME).
The sale of readymade garments increased by record 86 percent. The purchases made by women and youth during the exhibition is remarkable and over one lakh customers purchased KVI products, it said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his "Mann ki Baat" Radio address made an appeal to the Nation to at least buy one khadi garment and under the guidance of Kalraj Mishra, Union Minster for Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises, Khadi Gramodhyog Bhawan, New Delhi organized a special "Kurta Payjama Exhibition" on the occasion of 60th foundation day of Khadi Gramodhyog Bhawan held on 13th April, 2015.
K.S. Rao Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Khadi Bhawan informed that to reach out and popularize khadi amongst the youth, Khadi Bhawan has arranged the display of readymade garments exclusively designed by students of National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT).
Chief Executive Officer, KVIC, Arun Kumar Jha stated that Khadi is cool comfortable and environment friendly fabric ideal for Delhi summer.
Keeping in view of overwhelming response of customers and considering quantum jump in the sale, Khadi Gramodhyog Bhawan is organizing another exhibition during this summer commencing from May 16 at its premier outlet in New Delhi in which exclusive range of "Khadi summer collection" will be displayed and available to esteemed customers, added Jha. Print the Page Add to Favorite Share this on :
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(Maximum 1500 characters) Characters left 1500 Your name:The availability of credit in the U.S. was a major catalyst in the economic boom of the twentieth century. However, too much of a good thing can also be a problem. Is the U.S. too reliant on debt? Is the federal government mortgaging the future earnings of an entire generation? In this article, we’ll explore these and other issues as we take a look at the debt cycle in America.
The Impact of Debt on Economic Growth
In the early part of the twentieth century, if people didn’t have the money to purchase an item, they would save for it. With the introduction of credit terms, high-dollar items became much more affordable. It also changed the way we view debt. For example, rather than think of a new car in terms of its total price, we began to focus on the amount of the monthly payment. And, as the use of debt increased, the American standard of living rose with it. Excessive debt was also one of the primary catalysts for the economic boom of the 1980s, 1990s, and part of the 2000s. However, when debt is used in excess, it steals from the future since it must be repaid. This is because a dollar borrowed today necessitates that a dollar plus interest be repaid in the future. This reduces the amount of money available for future spending. If the amount of debt accumulated is significant and the period of accumulation is long, the required debt payments will negatively impact economic growth. What about government debt? How does it impact the future and the economy?
Government Debt and the Future
As I write this article, the federal government has accumulated $18.2 trillion of debt. In the following chart we can see how much the “public” debt has risen since 2004.
In 2004, the federal debt was $7.3 trillion. This rose to $10 trillion when the housing bubble burst four years later. Today it exceeds $18 trillion and is projected to approach $21 trillion by 2019. When you break this down to an amount per taxpayer, the numbers are substantial. The chart below contains this data which shows how it has more than doubled over the past 11 years, rising from $72,051 per taxpayer in 2004 to $154,161 today. As the debt continues higher, the liability of every taxpayer is also rising. The change in the amount of the federal debt per taxpayer from 2004 to 2015 represents an average annual increase of 7.16%. This is much more than the average annual wage increase during the same period.
The Great Private Sector Extortion?
What problems might result from our fiscal failure? With the debt per taxpayer as high as it is, if the government continues to raise taxes on middle income earners and above, it will become increasingly difficult for many of these individuals to preserve their standard of living. This will result in a reduction of wealth that spans the entire income spectrum, excluding perhaps the super-rich. The difficulty will begin in the middle class and eventually creep toward the higher income earners if the debt problem persists. Why will this create difficulty? Because these individuals will be asked to pay higher taxes so the federal debt can be retired. It may be framed under a pretense of patriotism but will really be just another excuse to extract money from the private sector. As the private sector shrinks, economic activity will slow which will result in smaller wage increases. Therefore, these individuals will be squeezed from both ends (taxes and wages). This is one of the key reasons why the middle class is shrinking. It’s as if we’re all on the Titanic and people are continuing to sing and dance while the ship slowly sinks. Does the federal government have the ability to repay its debt? And, if it does today, what about in five or ten years? How difficult will it be then? Let’s address this question now.
The U.S. Debt-to-GDP Ratio
The debt-to GDP ratio compares the amount of the public debt to the size of the economy. For example, if GDP – which is the total of all goods and services produced in the U.S. – is $17.0 trillion and the debt is the same amount, the ratio would be 100%. As the debt rises beyond GDP, the ratio will exceed 100%. This indicates that the debt is greater than the total of what we produce. You might equate it to an individual’s debt-to-income ratio which helps lenders assess an individual’s ability to repay a loan. America’s debt-to-GDP ratio in 1980 was only 35.4%. Ten years later it was 57.7%. As you can see from the chart below, America’s debt-to-GDP ratio has continued to rise and today stands at 102.6%. Although this is not a staggering percentage, as an absolute number, $18.2 trillion in debt is very formidable.
Is the federal government getting in over its head? Will the mounting debt cause a financial hardship on Americans? As the debt continues to expand, the economy will continue to be sluggish, the tax burden will continue to grow, and the middle class will continue to shrink. If Washington doesn’t act soon, will the debt become an unmanageable burden? I believe the answer to this questions lies somewhere between “absolutely” and “very likely.” How bad could it get? It’s difficult to say. To change direction, however, we will need elected officials who are willing to put the needs of the country ahead of their own agenda. In other words, politics will have to take a back seat. You can be sure of this: You cannot circumvent the laws of economics. If we continue to accumulate debt, if we ignore the warning signs, if our officials maintain the status quo, there will be consequences. I only hope America realizes it before it’s too late.Donald Trump Jr. said Sunday that he’d “love to” make New York City great again by running for mayor — after he’s helped his old man win the White House.
Trump Jr. — who scored high marks for his stand-out appearance at the Republican National Convention last week — said he “had a good time up there” and found it “exciting to be able to have a platform like that to speak my voice.
And when asked point-blank whether he’d seek to take over City Hall, a notion first floated by pundits in The Post last week, the younger Trump said, “I never like to rule anything out.”
“As my father has always said, I want to— we always like to keep our options open,” he told CNN’s “State of the Union.”
“So if I can do that as a service to our country I’d love to do it.”
Trump Jr., 38, also didn’t rule out challenging embattled Mayor de Blasio next year, but said “right now I’m more concerned about getting my father in [the Oval Office] because I know that he will do a wonderful job with that.”
His remarks revealed considerably more interest in a political career than he expressed on Wednesday, when the father of five told a breakfast meeting sponsored by the Wall Street Journal:
“Maybe when the kids get out of school, I would consider it.”
During Trump Jr.’s Tuesday night stem-winder, veteran GOP pollster Frank Luntz polled 18 focus-group members and found that 15 wanted to see him holding elected office — with Luntz adding that “they felt his father should take lessons from him.”
Councilman Joe Borelli (R-Staten Island) on Sunday told The Post that Trump Jr. “would instantly be the leading Republican candidate” for mayor if he chose to run.
Manhattan GOP Chairwoman Adele Malpass also said that after his speech, “We were on the convention floor and people looked at each other and said, “mayor or governor?’”
Former US Sen. Al D’Amato noted that “it’s tough for a Republican to run for New York City mayor. “
“But Donald Jr.’s got the stuff to do it,” the GOP elder said.
Veteran Republican operative Roger Stone, a former advisor to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, said the son “could be a phenomenal candidate,” but suggested he set his sights on Congress instead of becoming mayor.
“The problem is, it’s just the bluest of blue cities. Republican registration is down to 19 percent,” Stone said.
“I’d like to see him run for an office that he has a reasonable chance of winning.”
Former Republican gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino, who’s co-chairman of Donald Trump’s New York campaign committee, called Trump Jr.’s convention speech “captivating,” and said “the young man can do anything he wants to. “
“Donald Jr.’s got all the leadership qualities to run for office. He’s a well -rounded human being,” Paladino said.
But Paladino also said he thought Trump Jr. — who is executive vice president of development and acquisitions for the Trump Organization — should spend some more time working in the private sector and wait for his kids to grow up before taking the plunge into politics.
Asked for comment on the possibility of de Blasio facing off against Trump Jr., Hizzoner’s campaign spokesman said: “It’s a free country, and assuming his dad loses it will still be in 2017.”
Additional reporting by Daniel Halper and Michael GartlandFederal Medicaid funding could drop by as much as 39 percent over the next two decades under Senate Republicans' healthcare plan, according to a report presented at the National Governors Association meeting.
The report, authored by the consulting firm Avalere Health and first reported by Politico, estimates that the GOP's plan to overhaul large parts of the country's healthcare system would offer deep cuts to Medicaid, ranging from 27 to 39 percent.
Among the states that would be hit the hardest by the cuts are California, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Minnesota and Kentucky, among others that would see funding reductions of 35 percent or more.
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States like Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio would see cuts between 30 and 35 percent, according to the report. Only 19 states would be hit by spending reductions under 30 percent.
The estimates were presented to a gathering of the country's governors in Providence, R.I., that also included some Trump administration officials, like Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price Thomas (Tom) Edmunds PriceIs a presidential appointment worth the risk? Former Ryan aide moves to K street Grassley to test GOP on lowering drug prices MORE, Politico reported.
Senate GOP leaders are hoping to hold a final vote on their healthcare bill next week But the measure's success is uncertain, with two GOP senators saying they will not vote to approve the bill. Just one more Republican defection would ensure its failure.In April, the European law forcing Internet Service Providers to collect sensitive data about our web browsing, emails and telephone calls was struck down by the European Court of Justice.
The judges said that the law violated our basic right to privacy. But ISPs in the UK like BT, Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media are still storing our data! On Government advice they're carrying on regardless.
Tell your ISP to stop retaining your data! If the ISPs don't back down, we'll look into taking legal action, using these complaints to support our case.
ORG's Legal Director Elizabeth Knight and solicitors from Deighton Pierce Glynn have prepared a letter in legal language so you can complain to your ISP really quickly.
If you use an ISP other than BT, Sky, TalkTalk or Virgin, you can use this letter to send to them.Modernity and ancient culture meet gracefully in the shining “Lion City” (as “Singapura” can be literally translated from Malaysian language), which turned 49 in 2014 and has received a fantastic time-lapse tribute by Marklin Ang.
Singapore is a rather small Country. In fact, it is just a insignificant tiny red dot on the map. Despite this, Singapore has four major races living harmoniously in this tiny city-state, and is a well developed country. Having just celebrated its 49th birthday, Singapore has come a long way and developed drastically. Tall skyscrapers, high-rise buildings, and everything modern can be found in this “Lion City”. Despite its modernity, Singapore has preserved its cultures and heartlands accordingly, resulting in a healthy blend of nostalgia and anticipation.
Video
Marklin Ang has worked on this video for over one year during his spare time, bringing us this amazing 5-minute long trip to Singapore!
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BfF_cZamtc
Equipment Used
Cameras: Canon 5D Mark III
Lenses: Canon 17-40mm f/4 L USM, Canon 70-200mm f/4
Slider/Dolly:
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Marklin Ang on YouTubeAMMAN — Colloquial Arabic dominates the content of TV channels, newspapers and other media outlets, according to the Jordan Academy of Arabic.
The use of colloquial Arabic is even common in advertisements published in newspapers and in TV commercials, some of which are government ads, the academy said in a recent letter to Minister of State for Media Affairs and Communications Mohammad Momani.
The academy, which monitored and observed media outlet content, said it also noticed that the editing of Arabic content in television news is weak.
The language used during talk shows is also close to colloquial Arabic, which is “inappropriate”, the academy added.
It pointed out that all public and private entities as well as professional associations, NGOs, political parties and companies, are required to use Arabic in their formal activities as stipulated by the law on the protection of Arabic.
A bill on the follow-up of the enforcement of this law is being studied at the Cabinet and it will help address any violations to the Arabic language, the academy indicated.
“It is unfortunate that almost no one is using classical Arabic except at academic institutions such as universities, and that does not even happen all the time,” Areej Hammoudeh, a teacher of Arabic at a private school in Amman, told The Jordan Times on Tuesday.
“This is our language and we have to preserve it by using it. Even when it comes to writing, young people are either writing very poor Arabic or using Arabizi [colloquial Arabic written using English letters] to express their thoughts, especially on social media networks,” Hammoudeh said over the phone.
“I always tell my students how important it is to know classical Arabic and be capable of using it… Even on the Internet, Arabic content is lacking and it is rarely in classical Arabic,” she added.
But Alaa Mousa, an accounting student, does not believe classical Arabic should be used everywhere.
“I don't think I would like to watch any show in classical Arabic. It would be so boring. I prefer colloquial Arabic. It makes things more fun,” the Balqa Applied University student said over the phone.
“If a show is in classical Arabic, I guess it will be rigid and bore viewer. Maybe it should be only used in writings and formal letters”.
The idea of establishing the Jordan Academy of Arabic began to take shape in the first years after the founding of Transjordan in the third decade of the 20th century.
The Journal of the Arab Scientific Academy in Damascus published the news of the Jordan Academy of Arabic's establishment in January 1924.
It was the second academy of Arabic set up in the Arab world after the Arab Scientific Academy in Damascus, which was founded in 1919.
But the Jordanian academy was short-lived due to the scarcity of financial, scientific and human resources.
A Royal Decree was issued in 1976 to establish the Jordan Academy of Arabic, which officially assumed its responsibilities on October 1 that year, and joined the Cairo-based Union of Arab Scientific and Language Academies in 1977, according to its website.In general, potential for harm is roughly proportional to dose received, and it's important to distinguish the trivial from the worrisome. When sloppy reporting causes us to fret about the trivial, we waste energy that could better be spent on the serious.
My friend Walter Van Veen, an environmental engineer with Conestoga-Rovers, the Canadian company that cleaned up Love Canal, used to give tours of the Sydney Tar Ponds and Coke Ovens, which we were trying to clean up. Standing on the old coke-oven grounds, which had yet to be cleaned up, he would describe the blood curdling process by which coal was turned into coke, one of the most common industrial processes of the 19th and 20th centuries, and the basis for many Superfund cleanups.
Wide-eyed eco-tourists would inevitably ask, "Is it safe for us to be standing here?"
"Well," Walter replied, "Most of the volatiles have long since evaporated, but if we had a VOC [volatile organic compound] meter with us, we could probably detect trace amounts of benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylene. But if you were filling up at a self-serve gas station, you'd be getting 1,000 to 10,000 times more of those chemicals than we are now."
The visitors would nod at this standard-issue reality check. Then Walter would add the kicker.
"In fact, I don't let my daughters out of the car at a gas station, because I don't think that level of exposure is good for them."
Walter is an affable fellow whom people naturally tend to like and trust. His declaration always made jaws drop. This guy was sensitive enough to environmental issues that he would avoid an everyday risk none of them had ever even considered. But he would have no problem showing his daughters around a project widely -- and falsely -- described in news reports and environmental websites as "Canada's worst toxic waste site."
On the Columbia Journalism Review website, David Ropeik makes a similar point in much greater detail. Journalists and citizen environmentalists, please read. And just so the rest of you don't forget, I offer this mnemonic, courtesy of a Spaniard known to me only as Gabrielziya:
Parker Donham, a writer and consultant who lives on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, blogs at Contrarian.ca.Jason Lee / REUTERS The US is pushing China deeper into a corner over the crisis with North Korea. It wants the Chinese to persuade the North Koreans to give up their nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.
The popular perception is that Beijing has substantial leverage over Pyongyang, partly because China is North Korea's largest trading partner. This impression also stems from China's proposals to mediate trade concessions between North Korea and the United States.
The US has recently urged China to continue to use its leverage over North Korea and said there will be consequences if China does not. However, on June 20, Trump tweeted that China's efforts to influence North Korea appeared to have failed.
Later that night, US satellites reportedly detected modifications to an underground North Korean test site that may be preparing for the country's sixth nuclear test.
This raises some questions: Does China have the power to deter the North Koreans? and how much influence does Beijing actually have over Pyongyang?
Steps Taken
China has already taken action to apply pressure on North Korea. In February, Beijing said it halted imports of North Korean coal, according to UN sanctions. These sanctions limit North Korean coal exports—which were worth $1 billion in 2014—to $400 million for the year.
Earlier this month, after North Korea did another round of missile tests, the UN expanded sanctions by freezing the assets of four North Korean companies and 14 members of the regime and imposing a travel ban on the same individuals.
China supported this motion. China has also taken action with regard to migrant laborers from North Korea. In March 2016, the Chinese government informally told Chinese companies to stop hiring North Korean workers.
Remittances from North Koreans living abroad are a vital source of hard currency for the regime, up to $2.3 billion annually according to some estimates.
What Can China Do That It Hasn't Yet Done?
The answer is… not a whole lot.
It could impose greater financial sanctions. But it seems unlikely that financial sanctions could deter North Korea from pursuing a program that it considers central to its security interests. Especially given that current pressure has not done so already.
That leaves Chinese crude oil exports as Beijing's strongest remaining point of leverage. North Korea generates most of its electricity from coal, but its military would depend on crude oil if a conflict were to break out.
Without it, Pyongyang's ability to wage war would be significantly reduced.
China no longer discloses how much crude oil it exports to North Korea. However, some estimate that it could account for 500,000 tons per year, or about 3.7 million barrels.
North Korea is believed to have only minimal capacity to produce crude oil. Its imports from Russia are not substantial either. That means it's a real threat to North Korea and gives China some strong leverage.
But China may decide that it's not in its interest to cut oil supplies to North Korea. If this move doesn't stop the North Koreans and war does break out, China doesn't want to be on Pyongyang's list of enemies.
The US Will Push China More Going Forward
Given these limited options, there are two reasons the US would continue to demand further action from China.
First, the US will explore all options within a certain window of time before resorting to force. In the lead-up to the Iraq War in 2003, the international community tried to mediate a solution, and the US declined the offer.
This time, it will seek mediation from anyone willing to offer—even Dennis Rodman, who visited North Korea just last week.
If it decides that a strike is necessary, the US wants to be able to point out that it tried every diplomatic solution, including using China as a mediator, before resorting to force.
And by pushing China to act as an intermediary, it can argue that it was China, in fact, that failed to prevent the war.
The second reason the US will demand further action from China is that China has long used its supposed influence over North Korea as a way to gain concessions from the US.
The US is now calling China's bluff. If China can't sway the North Koreans, then it will no longer be able to use them as a bargaining chip in future negotiations with the US.
Statements by officials are often just smoke and mirrors.
In this case, the US's demands for China show that it's time to act. Public posturing gives the US real leverage in its private discussions with Beijing. But China's window of opportunity is closing, and if Trump's tweet is any indication, it may have already closed.
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The World Explained in Maps is an essential guide for every investor as 2017 takes shape. Get your copy now—free!Carly Aquilino at Laugh Boston Dec.1st - 3rd
Carly Aquilino is a stand-up comedian described by audience members as "funny" and by her father as "a huge mistake." As a New York native, Carly first stepped onstage at Gotham Comedy Club and has since been quickly rising in the comedy scene, performing at the most popular clubs in New York.
Carly's hobbies are telling jokes and checking Facebook to make sure the people that made fun of her in high school got fat. Carly feels proud of having her stand up featured on Sirius XM radio and is especially proud that she once made her grandma Marilyn laugh so hard that her teeth fell out.
also featuring: Will Noonan
& Emma Willmann
Laugh Boston (http://laughboston.com/) is located at 425 Summer Street
Boston, MA 02210
Thur: 8pm, $25 - $35
Fri: 7:30pm & 10pm, $25 - $35
Sat: 7:30pm & 10pm, $25 - $35
Click here to purchase tickets: http://www.laughboston.com/event/1375846-carly-aquilino-boston/
Click here for more info: http://www.laughboston.com/event/1375846-carly-aquilino-boston/ or call 617-72LAUGH (617-725-2844)Anandiben at Bahucharaji on Thursday. (Source: Express photo by Javed Raja)
The Patidars stayed away from a public event of Chief Minister Anandiben Patel on Thursday at Bahucharaji in Mehsana, one of the worst affected districts in the recent violence following a rally by the community in Ahmedabad.
This was Anandiben’s first visit to her home district following the widespread violence after the August 25 rally.
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Even as Patidar MLAs from north Gujarat, many of whom were targeted by the mobs, flanked Anandiben on stage, the audience largely comprised members from Rabari, Chaudhari and other communities. It appeared that the Patidar or Patel community was sending a “strong message” ahead of the local body polls in Gujarat.
According to sources, the venue for the event was shifted from a open ground to Bahucharaji temple premises due to heightened security concerns in view of the Patidar agitation for OBC status and reservation benefits.
[related-post]
Anandiben, who is already a Z plus protectee, remained under heavy security cover throughout the event for inauguration of infrastructure projects worth Rs 21 crore in the area.
Naren Patel, BJP MLA from Unjha, told The Indian Express, “When police are present here in such a big number, why should they (Patidars) come here? To get beaten up again?’’
Harshad Patel, a prominent Patidar community leader from Bahucharaji, however, said: “During the condolence meeting for those who died in the violence at Umiya Wadi in Bahucharaji, the community took a decision against attending this function. After what happened by the end of Ahmedabad rally, for our security concerns, we decided not to attend it.”
“There cannot be more than five Patidars in the crowd. They have held meetings in all 42 villages of Bahucharaji taluka. In unison, they decided |
VA and his Justice Department are trying to jail this American patriot.”
###[Updated at 12:11 p.m. ET] State Attorney Angela Corey, appointed as a special prosecutor in the February shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, has decided against sending the case to a grand jury, her office said Monday.
"The decision should not be considered a factor in the final determination of the case," Corey's office said in a statement.
The grand jury, set to convene on Tuesday, was previously scheduled by the former prosecutor.
Corey previously said she has not used grand jury's in cases like this and added that from the time she was appointed she said she may not need a grand jury.
The decision about whether or not to charge George Zimmerman in the case now rests with prosecutors.
"At this time, the investigation continues and there will be no further comment from this office," in the statement.
The decision means that the timetable for any possible charges remains up in the air.
"We had hoped she had enough evidence without the need to convene a grand jury,” Ben Crump, the attorney for the Martin family said about Corey. “The family is trying to have patience and faith through all of this."
Crump said they are hoping for charges and an arrest as soon as possible.
"We know we want that day to come,” Crump said. “We want a very public trial so the evidence can come out and show people that the justice system works for everybody."
Crump added that he believed the evidence that has come out has “made it clear” that charges should be filed, without the need of a grand jury.
George Zimmerman's new attorney, Hal Uhrig, told CNN that he was "not surprised" by the announcement.
Uhrig said he doesn't know what her ultimate decision will be but that the move to go without a grand jury is a "courageous move on her part."
Martin ventured out from his father's fiancee's home in Sanford to get a snack at a nearby convenience store. As he walked home with a bag of Skittles and an Arizona iced tea, he was shot and killed by Zimmerman.
Sanford police questioned Zimmerman and released him without charges.
From there, the case has evolved into opposing allegations from Zimmerman's supporters, Martin's family and authorities.
Zimmerman says he killed Martin in self-defense after the teen punched him and slammed his head on the sidewalk, according to an Orlando Sentinel report that was later confirmed by Sanford police.
The case has triggered a nationwide debate about Florida's "stand your ground" law - which allows people to use deadly force anywhere they feel a reasonable threat of death or serious injury - and race in America.“We stand at the birth of a new millennium, ready to unlock the mysteries of space, to free the Earth from the miseries of disease, and to harness the energies, industries and technologies of tomorrow.”
So said the freshly inaugurated President Donald Trump during his speech on Friday, sending a perhaps surprisingly pro-science, if somewhat vague, message to those listening. And while the categorisation of a new millennium is somewhat off, it’s interesting that Trump seems determined to push for advancements in space. Given the big goals NASA is in the midst of trying to accomplish, it is promising that there is at least an overtone of presidential support.
That support will be necessary given the ambition of programmes such as the Mars mission. NASA are currently building the necessary rocket in-house, but it is possible Trump’s administration, given their business-friendly nature, may instead choose to have NASA make use of SpaceX’s in-development heavy-lift rocket.
“The next president is inheriting a space program that has this nascent ambition to go to Mars but doesn’t have hardware actually flying yet,” Casey Dreier, director of space policy at The Planetary Society, told Space.com in November. “
So there’s a lot of opportunity for the next administration to say, ‘Should we continue these [programs]? What will the direction be? Do we want to commit to supporting these programs as is? Do we change them? Do we cancel them?’ … So it’s a big question mark.”
An Expansionist Outlook
There is a certain space race vibe to Trump’s approach to the future of the US in space; a combination of nationalism and a belief in industry that could see the administration funnel cash and support into NASA programmes. It is possible this may come about through private-public partnerships, such as with SpaceX, but either way should result in a more robust space programme.
The fear, however, is that the efforts of NASA to explore space may be boosted at the expense of their programmes on our own planet. Given the incoming administration’s at times flat-out denial of climate change, there is a strong chance that NASA’s Earth Sciences Mission Directorate could have its $2bn funding stripped to be directed towards expanding space programmes.
“NASA should be focused primarily on deep-space activities rather than Earth-centric work that is better handled by other agencies,” Robert S Walker and Peter Navarro, both senior advisers to the Trump campaign, wrote in an opinion piece published in SpaceNews before the election.
“Human exploration of our entire solar system by the end of this century should be NASA’s focus and goal.”
As for the President himself, outside of his inaugural speech, his view is slightly less clear. He has previously expressed excitement for the idea of privatisation in the space industry and critiqued President Obama’s approach to NASA.
“It is very sad to see what @BarackObama has done with NASA. He has gutted the program and made us dependent on the Russians,” he tweeted in August 2012. but at the same time seems reluctant to commit to a huge investment in the space agency. When questioned on NASA’s budget, Trump said “our first priority is to restore a strong economic base to this country. Then, we can have a discussion about spending.”
Capitalising the Cosmos
A primary Trump policy is putting America first. That means American business and American workers fueling the American economy over any outsourcing or importation of foreign talent. Given that the foremost private space efforts are primarily American (Space X, Blue Origin), and Trump is notoriously business-first, it makes sense that the idea of private industry leading the way into the next generation of space exploration would be exciting to the new President.
During a town hall in New Hampshire, Trump said that he “likes that maybe even better” when discussing the prospect of a private space programme as opposed to a public one and though he couched it in wanting to first prioritise infrastructure, he did also call the idea of a manned mission to Mars “wonderful”. Given that privatising such efforts allows him to push off the responsibility, and certain costs, from the government, it also allows him to boast of a combined cost cut and American industry boost.
Perhaps most notably, Elon Musk, founder of SpaceX, made two trips to Trump Tower during the transition period. According to the Washington Post, it seems that Musk discussed how private-public partnerships could help prime NASA for manned missions to Mars. Having probably the most prominent private space entrepreneur meeting with Trump one-on-one certainly suggests that the announcement of a NASA/SpaceX partnership may be on the cards for the administration.
Into the Unknown
There are still a lot of decisions to be made in the coming months as the new administration settles into its role, and there’s a strong chance that NASA won’t be at the top of the list of priorities.
It’s not exactly a new problem, given the problems on our own soil; it’s often hard to convince people that billions should be spent firing probes into space. However, it’s hard to argue that the world isn’t better off for having a robust and well-funded NASA, whether it be for its exploration programmes or any of its other diverse efforts.
It certainly seems that there is an enthusiasm for the idea of buoying American interests in space but it may be that this is done so more via the promotion of private companies than public agencies.
Those behind NASA’s programmes should certainly feel concerned as to where they will be headed under Trump, it seems likely that even if they gain support in some areas it will be at great cost in others.President Donald Trump has sparked enthusiasm in markets and boardrooms around the United States with a set of policies aimed at supporting American businesses: reforming our tax code, easing burdensome regulations, and finally investing in the improvement of American infrastructure. But the assault on trade, fueled by campaign rhetoric on both sides that has not abated under the new administration, is inconsistent with the President’s business-friendly agenda. Stoking anti-globalization passions may have been politically expedient during an election year, but it is counterproductive when it comes to implementing policies that will drive our economic growth in the century ahead.
The administration’s actions on trade—including withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), threats to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), considering tariffs on Mexican and Chinese imports, as well as a border adjustment tax—reflect the mistaken assumption that trade is a zero-sum game. The truth is that there is no path to robust, sustainable, inclusive economic growth that does not embrace global trade and investment. And with 95% of global consumers outside our borders, trade is fundamental to maintaining American competitiveness in a global marketplace.
While globalization has meant economic displacement of some American manufacturing, the fact is that the vast majority of the more than 6 million American manufacturing jobs lost since 1970 can be attributed to technological advances. Between 1970 and 1994, when NAFTA, our first major free trade agreement, went into effect, manufacturing as a percentage of overall U.S. employment had already decreased by 42%. The trend toward automation can be neither stopped nor reversed by closing our markets through protectionist policies.
We must also recognize trade’s contribution to U.S. job growth. Trade supports more than 11 million American jobs, including the more than 3.5 million jobs supported by our exports to Mexico, Canada and China alone. With global supply chains as the nucleus of modern manufacturing, the majority of U.S. imports are inputs that our factories rely on to create internationally competitive finished goods. In fact, our country experienced trade surpluses in manufactured goods with our 20 free trade partners in every single year between 2008 and 2015. And between 2009 and 2015, U.S. export growth to our free trade partners was 52%, compared to 34% for the rest of the world.
Trade also supports inclusive economic growth while combating income inequality. The U.S. International Trade Commission reported that in export-intensive industries, earnings in manufacturing jobs are higher than the national average by 16%. Trade also boosts wealth for working Americans by dramatically strengthening their purchasing power. A 2016 study authored by economists from UCLA and Columbia Business School found that closing off trade would result in a 37% loss of purchasing for the 50th percentile of U.S. consumers, and a stunning 69% loss for those consumers in the lowest 10th percentile. Trade also makes international business simpler for small-and-medium sized enterprises (SMEs), which generate more than half of all net new jobs. Trade agreements lock in transparent rulemaking and regulations, reduce unnecessary red tape, and secure fair treatment for goods, which is essential for SMEs that may not have the capital to succeed on their own in global markets.
As much as politicians don’t like to admit it, not all American jobs have to be provided by American companies. With the most advanced workforce of any mature economy, the most dynamic innovation ecosystem, the best network of higher education institutions, a tradition of sound rule of law, low energy costs, and the strongest capital markets in the world, the United States is inarguably the best place in the world to do business. Trade agreements enhance our ability to leverage our unparalleled competitive advantages to attract foreign direct investment (FDI), creating a powerful incentive for global businesses to set up U.S. subsidiaries. Trade’s ability to incentivize greater FDI is a significant reason why 6 million Americans today are employed by foreign-owned subsidiaries and why the U.S. is home to the largest amount of FDI in the world.
Trade is also essential to succeeding in the digital economy. Besides prohibiting tariffs on digital products, trade agreements ensure that data flows -- the very lifeblood of the digital economy -- are able to seamlessly move across borders. Such agreements prevent and roll-back localization policies that would otherwise require companies to set up costly and often unnecessary servers to gain market access; enable U.S. companies to digitally deliver services to cross-border customers; and offer small businesses the opportunity to reach global consumers through e-commerce platforms. Trade agreements are also essential to provide intellectual property protection for those assets.
Beyond the purely economic benefits, trade is at the heart of every core international interest that requires American leadership: preventing violent extremism, combating climate change, reinforcing energy security, deepening our bilateral and multilateral relationships, and maintaining the relative global peace and prosperity that has prevailed since World War II. Global trade and investment during this period helped lift hundreds of millions of people from extreme poverty, supported the rise of institutions to advance commerce and governance, and deepened relations that sustained the longest period in world history without a war between major world powers.
The world is not standing still. If the U.S. stays on the sidelines, it will fall behind other countries that continue to negotiate agreements to provide market access for their businesses. The European Union approved a free trade deal with Canada and is exploring deepening its trade relationship with China, and China is moving forward with a multilateral trade agreement in the Asia-Pacific after our withdrawal from TPP. These trade agreements are likely to include regulations and other non-tariff barriers that are misaligned with U.S. goods and services, ultimately making it even more difficult and more expensive for American businesses to reach those markets.
Trade was an indispensable factor in making the 20th century the American century. The only way to ensure the same for the 21st century is for us to assume our preeminent role in the global marketplace and the international community by embracing trade’s importance as a core element of our pro-growth economic policy.
Stefan M. Selig served as United States Undersecretary of Commerce for International Trade from 2014-2016 after nearly 30 years on Wall Street. He is the founder and CEO of BridgePark Advisors, a financial and strategic advisory firm.If automated testing is not already part of your development workflow, then it’s time to get started. Testing helps reduce uncertainty by ensuring that new features you add to your application do not break older features. Having confidence that your not breaking existing functionality reduces time spent hunting bugs or getting reports from clients by catching them earlier.
Unfortunately, testing still does not get the time and attention it needs when you’re under pressure to make a deadline or release a feature your clients have been asking for. But—like using a version control system and having proper development, staging, and production environments—it should be a routine part of how you do your work. We are professionals, after all. After reading all the theory, I only recently took the plunge myself. In this post, I’ll show you how to use Behat to test that your Drupal site is working properly.
Before we dive in, the Behat documentation describes the project as:
[…] an open source Behavior Driven Development framework for PHP 5.3+. What’s behavior driven development, you ask? It’s a way to develop software through a constant communication with stakeholders in form of examples; examples of how this software should help them, and you, to achieve your goals.
Basically, it helps developers, clients, and others communicate and document how an application should behave. We’ll see shortly how Behat tests are very easy to read and how you can extend them for your own needs.
Mink is an extension that allows testing a web site by simulating interacting with it through a browser to fill out form fields, click on links, and so forth. Mink lets you test via Goutte, which makes requests and parses the contents but can’t execute JavaScript. It can also use Selenium, which controls a real browser and can thus test JS and Ajax interactions, but Selenium requires more configuration.
Requirements
To get started, you’ll need to have Composer on your machine. If you don’t already, head over to the Composer Website. Once installed, you can add Behat, Mink, and Mink drivers to your project by running the following in your project root:
composer require behat/behat composer require behat/mink composer require behat/mink-selenium2-driver composer require behat/mink-extension
Once eveything runs, you’ll have a composer.json file with:
"require": { "behat/behat": "^3.1", "behat/mink": "^1.7", "behat/mink-selenium2-driver": "^1.3", "behat/mink-extension": "^2.2" },
This will download Behat and it’s dependencies into your vendor/ folder. To check that it works do:
vendor/bin/behat -V
There are other ways to install Behat, outlined in the quick introduction.
The Drupal community has a contrib project, Behat Drupal Extension, that is an integration for Behat, Mink, and Drupal. You can install it with the requre command below. I had to specify the ~3.0 version, otherwise composer couldn’t satisfy dependencies.
composer require drupal/drupal-extension:~3.0
And you’ll have the following in your composer.json :
"drupal/drupal-extension": "~3.0",
Configuring Behat
When you run Behat, it’ll look for a file named behat.yml. Like Drupal 8, Behat uses YAML for configuration. The file tells Behat what contexts to use. Contexts provide the tests that you can run to validate behavior. The file configures the web drivers for Mink. You can also configure a region_map which the Drupal extension uses to map identifiers (left of the : ) to CSS selectors to identify theme regions. These come in very handy when testing Drupal theme output.
The one I use looks like:
default: suites: default: contexts: - Drupal\DrupalExtension\Context\DrupalContext - Drupal\DrupalExtension\Context\MarkupContext - Drupal\DrupalExtension\Context\MessageContext - FeatureContext extensions: Behat\MinkExtension: goutte: ~ javascript_session: selenium2 selenium2: wd_host: http://local.dev:4444/wd/hub capabilities: {"browser": "firefox", "version": "44"} base_url: http://local.dev Drupal\DrupalExtension: blackbox: ~ region_map: breadcrumb: '#breadcrumb' branding: '#region-branding' branding_second: '#region-branding-second' content: '#region-content' content_zone: '#zone-content' footer_first: '#region-footer-first' footer_second: '#region-footer-second' footer_fourth: '#region-footer-fourth' menu: '#region-menu' page_bottom: '#region-page-bottom' page_top: '#region-page-top' sidebar_first: '#region-sidebar-first' sidebar_second: '#region-sidebar-second'
Writing a Simple Feature
Now comes the fun part. Let’s look at writing a feature and how to test that what we expect is on the page. The first time we run it, we need to initialize Behat to generate a FeatureContext class. Do so with:
vendor/bin/behat --init
That should also create a features/ directory, where we will save the features that we write. To behat, a feature is test suite. Each test in a feature evaluates specific functionality on your site. A feature is a text file that ends in.feature. You can have more than one: for example, you might have a blog.feature, members.feature, and resources.feature if your site has those areas available.
Of course, don’t confuse what Behat calls a feature—a set of tests—with the Features module that bundles and exports related functionality into a Drupal module.
For my current project, I created a global.feature file that checks if the blocks I expect to have in my header and footer are present. The contents of that file are:
Feature: Global Elements Scenario: Homepage Contact Us Link Given I am on the homepage Then I should see the link "Contact Us" in the "branding_second" region Then I should see the "Search" button in the "branding_second" region Then I should see the "div#block-system-main-menu" element in the "menu" region
As you can see, the tests is very readable even though it isn’t purely parsing natural language. Indents help organize Scenarios (a group of tests) and the conditions needed for each scenario to pass.
You can set up some conditions for the test, starting with “Given”. In this case, given that we’re on the homepage. The Drupal Extension adds ways to specify that you are a specific user, or have a specific role, and more.
Next, we list what we expect to see on the webpage. You can also tell Behat to interact with the page by specifying a link to click, form field to fill out, or a button to press. Again here, the Drupal extension (by extending the MinkExtension), provides ways to test if a link or button are in one of our configured regions. The third test above uses a CSS selector, like in jQuery, to check that the main menu block is in the menu region.
Testing user authentication
If you’re testing a site that is not local, you can use the drush api driver to test user authentication, node creation, and more. First, setup a drush alias for your site (in this example, I’m using local.dev. Then add the following are in your behat.yml :
api_driver: 'drush' drush: alias: "local.dev"
You can then create a scenario to test the user login’s work without having to specify a test username or password by tagging them with @api
@api Scenario: Admin login Given I am on the homepage Given I am logged in as a user with the "admin" role Then I should see the heading "Welcome" in the "content" region
If you’ve customized the username text for login, your test will fail. Don’t worry! Just add the following to your behat.yml file so that the test knows what text to look for. In this case, the username field label is just E-mail.
text: username_field: "E-mail"
Custom Testing by Extending Contexts
When you initialized Behat, it created a features/bootstraps/FeatureContext.php file. This can be a handy class for writing custom tests for unique features on your site. You can add custom tests by using the Drupal Extension’s own sub-contexts. I changed my Feature Context to extend the Mink Context like this:
class FeatureContext extends MinkContext implements SnippetAcceptingContext {
Note that if you do that, you’ll need to remove MinkContext from the explicit list of default context in behat.yml.
No matter how you organize them, you can then write custom tests as methods. For example, the following will test that a link appears in the breadcrumb trail of a page. You can use CSS selectors to find items on the page, such as the ‘#breadcrumb’ div in a theme. You can also re-use other tests defined by the MinkContext like findLink.
/** * @Then I should see the breadcrumb link :arg1 */ public function iShouldSeeTheBreadcrumbLink($arg1) { // get the breadcrumb /** * @var Behat\Mink\Element\NodeElement $breadcrumb */ $breadcrumb = $this->getSession()->getPage()->find('css', 'div#breadcrumb'); // this does not work for URLs $link = $breadcrumb->findLink($arg1); if ($link) { return; } // filter by url $link = $breadcrumb->findAll('css', "a[href=\"{$arg1}\"]"); if ($link) { return; } throw new \Exception( sprintf("Expected link %s not found in breadcrumb on page %s", $arg1, $this->getSession()->getCurrentUrl()) ); }
If your context implements the SnippetAwareContext, behat will generate the Docblock and method signature when it encounters an unknown test. If you’re feature has the following:
Then I should see "foo-logo.png" as the header logo.
When you run your tests, behat will output the error message below that you can copy and paste to your context. Anything in quotes becomes a parameter. The DocBlock contains the annotation Behat uses to find your test when it’s used in a scenario.
/** * @Then I should see :arg1 as the header logo. */ public function iShouldSeeAsTheHeaderLogo($arg1) { throw new PendingException(); }
Selenium
Follow the Behat docs to install selenium: http://mink.behat.org/en/latest/drivers/selenium2.html. When you’re testing you’ll need to have it running via:
java -jar /path/to/selenium-server-standalone-2.53.0.jar
To tell Behat how to use selenium your behat.yml file should have:
selenium2: wd_host: http://local.dev:4444/wd/hub capabilities: {"browser": "firefox"}
You’ll also need to have Firefox installed. OF course, at the time of this writing, Firefox is asking people to transition from use Webdriver to Marionette for automating browser usage. I have Firefox 47 and it’s still working with Webdriver as far as I can tell. I have not found clear, concise instructions for using Marionette with Selenium. Another option is to use Phantom.JS instead of Selenium for any features that need a real browser.
Once everything is working—you’ll know it locally because a Firefox instance will pop up—you can create a scenario like the following one. Use the @javascript tag to tell Behat to use Selenium to test it.
@javascript Scenario: Modal Popup on click Given I am at "/some/page" When I click "View More Details" Then I wait for AJAX to finish Then I should see an "#modal-content" element Then I should see text matching "This is a Modal"
Conclusion
If you don’t have tests for your site, I urge you to push for adding them as part of your ongoing work. I’ve slowly added them to my main Drupal client project over the last few months and it’s really started to pay off. For one, I’ve captured many requirements and expectations about how pages on the site work that were only in my or the project manager’s heads, if not lost in a closed ticket somewhere. Second, whenever I merge new work in and before any deploy I can run tests. If they are all green, I can be confident that new code and bug fixes haven’t caused a regression. At the same time, I now have a way to test the site that makes it less risky to re-factor or reorganize code. I didn’t spend a lot of time building tests, but as I work on a new feature or fix a bug, writing a test is now just part of confirming that everything works as expected. For complicated features, it’s also become a time saver to have a test that automates a complicated interactions—like testing a 3-page web form, since Behat can run that scenario much faster than I can manually.
The benefits from investing in automated testing outweigh any initial cost in time and effort to set them up. What are you waiting for?The 6th Critics' Choice Television Awards, presented by the Broadcast Television Journalists Association (BTJA), honoring the best in primetime television programming from June 1, 2015 until December 31, 2015, were held on January 17, 2016 at the Barker Hangar at the Santa Monica Airport in Santa Monica, California. In addition, this year marked the first time the awards were presented with the Critics' Choice Movie Awards.[1] The ceremony was simulcast live on A&E and Lifetime.[1]
The nominations were announced on December 14, 2015. Channelwise, ABC, FX, and HBO each received 15 nominations. Fox received 12 nominations.[1] Comedian and actor T.J. Miller hosted the ceremony.[2]
Winners and nominees [ edit ]
Winners are listed first and highlighted in boldface:
Shows with multiple wins [ edit ]
The following shows received multiple awards:
Awards Series 4 Fargo 3 Mr. Robot
Shows with multiple nominations [ edit ]
The following shows received multiple nominations:
See also [ edit ]Speedruns have officially started being accepted for Super Mario Odyssey, and fans are now in a mad dash to figure out the best strategies, pathways, and jumps to beat the game quickly. In the last two days alone, the world record for clearing the game at any percentage of completion has been toppled multiple times by different people.
The most current record, as of this writing, was earned by IMtendo—he beat the game in 1:28:45 with 124 Moons, and you can watch that run below. Start the Twitch embed around the 1:47:22 mark to see it:
By the time you read this, it’s entirely possible another speedrunner has come along and attained a new record. This run, while obviously accomplished by a very good Mario player, features multiple deaths, some missed jumps, and out-of-the-way Moons. Still, it’s an early look at what is sure to be a lively speedrunning scene.
Unsurprisingly, IMtendo proceeds with the bare number of Moons necessary to power the Odyssey into the next section, often opting for some of the simplest ones available, all in the name of speed. He does collect some coins—at least one Moon in this run is purchased—and skips all the cutscenes he can to accomplish this current world record time. While many of us mere mortals could never beat the game this quickly, IMtendo notes there’s plenty of room for improvement.
“This is bad,” IMtendo says, in reference to his run. Later on, he speculates that it’s possible players will be able to shave down the time to under an hour once a better route is figured out.
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He also notes that 100% Mario speedruns are bound to be wild, and it makes sense: there are so many moons, some of which can only be purchased, never mind the different outfits and regional coins. How the community decides what that category will look like is bound to be interesting. Otherwise, the other big speedrunning categories are 253 moons (finishing Dark Side) and 503 Moons (beating the real final level).Sunday marks the first time this season the Phillies need to use their fifth starter and they finally announced who will toe the rubber.
Right-hander Sean O’Sullivan will get the start opposite the Washington Nationals’ Max Scherzer.
What made the Phillies go with O’Sullivan?
“His ability to throw strikes,” said Sandberg. “We’ve seen him before. He did a good job for us last year in some spot starts and being a guy that has some experience in doing that.”
The 27-year-old appeared in three games – two starts - for the Phillies last year. He was 0-1 with a 6.94 ERA in the starts and also threw a scoreless inning in relief in September.
The Phillies will make a roster move after Saturday’s game to make room for O’Sullivan.
Brown rehabbing: Domonic Brown, who has been out of the major league lineup since a March 19 game against the New York Yankees with tendinitis in his left Achilles, will begin a rehab assignment with Single-A Clearwater Thursday night.
The right-fielder is on the 15-day disabled list and is eligible to return Saturday, however, he’s not that close to returning. Sandberg stressed that the biggest issue with Brown is the need to get in at-bats at this point since he only had 29 this spring.
“We’re going to gradually build up his innings,” said Sandberg. “Start with a couple games at five innings, build to seven innings a couple games and then nine innings. And then to go from there, possibly go and get some upper level at-bats. Just to get his Achilles behind him and make sure he’s 100 percent and there’s no setbacks once he comes with us.”
Sandberg didn’t know exactly how many at-bats Brown would need before returning to the big league club.Remarks of President Barack Obama--As Prepared For Delivery
Consumer Financial Protection Event
Friday, October 9, 2009
Washington, DC
Good afternoon. For the last several months, this administration has been working with Congress to reform an outdated system of financial regulations and lax oversight that helped lead to last year's crisis. And I want to thank Chairman Chris Dodd, Chairman Barney Frank, and Senator Richard Shelby for the leadership and enthusiasm they've shown throughout this process.
Part of our reform effort involves putting in place new safeguards that would help prevent the irresponsibility and recklessness of a few from wreaking havoc on our entire financial system. We want to close gaps in regulation, eliminate overlap, and set rules of the road for Wall Street that make fair dealing and honest competition the only way for financial firms to win and prosper.
But a central part of our reform effort is also aimed at protecting Americans who buy financial products and services every day - from mortgages to credit cards. It's true that the crisis we faced was caused in part by people who took on too much debt and took out loans they couldn't afford. But my concern are the millions of Americans who behaved responsibly and yet still found themselves in jeopardy because of the predatory practices of some in the financial industry. These are folks who signed contracts they didn't always understand offered by lenders who didn't always tell the truth. They were lured in by promises of low payments, and never made aware of the fine print and hidden fees.
Secretary Geithner and I just finished meeting with some of these Americans who've joined us here today. You already heard from Patricia, who was forced to pay thousands of dollars in interest on a $550 payday loan. We also heard from Susan Chapman, who had excellent payment history until she was contacted by a broker who told her that she could lower the monthly payments on her mortgage. Instead, the loan they sold her ended up increasing her debt, and her principal has now gone up $20,000.
We talked with Karen Cappuccio, who is still fending off foreclosure because her mortgage company duped her into taking out two expensive loans when they had originally promised her one low, fixed rate mortgage. We talked with Maxine Given, whose bank hit her with four separate overdraft charges because of one mortgage check that they ended up rejecting the very next day. And we talked with Andrew Giordano, whose bank made a mistake that cost him over $800 in overdraft fees. And when he caught their mistake, the bank only refunded part of the fees.
As we've seen over the last year, abuses like these don't just jeopardize the financial well-being of individual Americans - they can threaten the stability of the entire economy. And yet, the patchwork system of regulations we have now has failed to prevent these abuses. With seven different federal agencies each having a role, there is too little accountability, too many loopholes, and no single agency whose sole job it is to stand up for people like Patricia, Susan, Maxine, Andrew and Karen - no one whose chief responsibility it is stand up for the American consumer and for responsible banks and financial institutions.
Under the reforms we've proposed, that will change. The new Consumer Financial Protection Agency that I have asked Congress to create will have just one mission: to look out for the financial interests of ordinary Americans. It will be charged with setting clear rules of the road for consumers and banks, and it will be able to enforce these rules across the board.
This agency will have the power to make certain that consumers get information that is clear and concise - in plain language - so they can compare products and know exactly what they're getting into. It will ensure that banks and other firms cannot hide behind those ridiculously confusing contracts - pages of fine print that no one can figure out. It will have the ability to enforce and build on the credit card reforms we passed earlier this year, so that consumers aren't hit with unfair rate hikes, penalties, or hidden charges. It will require brokers to look out for the interests of families if they give advice about mortgages. And it will ensure transparency and fair-dealing for other financial products, like bank overdraft services and payday loans.
In a financial system that has never been more complicated, it has never been more important to have a watchdog function like the one we've proposed. And yet, predictably, a lot of the banks and big financial firms don't like the idea of a consumer agency very much. In fact, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is spending millions on an ad campaign to kill it. You might have seen some of these ads - the ones that claim local butchers and other small businesses will somehow be harmed by this agency. This, of course, is completely false - and we've made clear that only businesses that offer financial services would be affected by this agency.
Contrary to what some have argued, this agency would not restrict consumer choice and innovation. Nothing could be further from the truth. In the past, a lack of clear rules led to innovation of the wrong kind: the firms that did best were the ones that did the best job of hiding the real costs to consumers. By contrast, the consumer agency we're proposing would set ground rules so that firms don't have to compete to confuse families, but to give them better choices. This will also help small business entrepreneurs who often rely on credit cards and home equity loans to finance their start-ups.
But all this hasn't stopped the big financial firms and their lobbyists from mobilizing against change. They're doing what they always do - descending on Congress and using every bit of influence they have to maintain a status quo that has maximized their profits at the expense of American consumers. And since they're worried they may not be able to kill this agency, they're trying their hardest to weaken it - by asking for exemptions from this agency's rules and enforcement; by fighting to keep open every gap and loophole they can find. And they're very good at this, because that's how business has been done in Washington for a very long time. In fact, over the last ten years, the Chamber of Commerce alone spent nearly half a billion dollars on lobbying - half a billion dollars.
Well the stories we heard today remind us that the American people cannot afford business-as-usual any longer. These Americans cannot afford high-priced lobbyists to argue their case. They are counting on us to be their advocate; to be their voice; to restore a sense of responsibility from Wall Street to Washington. That's why we need a Consumer Financial Protection Agency that will stand up not for big banks and financial firms, but for hardworking Americans. That's why we need regulatory reform that will reward innovation and competition instead of short-cuts and abuse. And that's why we cannot let the special interests win this fight.
We have already seen and lived the consequences of what happens when there is too little accountability on Wall Street and too little protection for Main Street, and I will not allow this country to go back there. It is time to move forward. It is time for real change. And I am confident we will get it done. Thank you.President Donald Trump doubled down on his assertions that investigators should be scrutinizing Hillary Clinton’s emails and alleged connections to Russia during a Thursday evening rally in Huntington |
, which are controlled by user volunteers.
[Donald Trump’s online army is looking for a few good Bernie Sanders converts]
By mapping these affinity groups according to the people who run them, it’s possible to nail down which groups share moderators in common. It also suggests the degree to which certain affinities or interests overlap: For instance, the group r/thedangerousfa**ot, a fan club for gay Breitbart tech reporter Milo Yiannopoulos, shares two mods in common with r/rightwingLGBT. So there is a clear overlap there, at least to a certain degree.
When it comes to the Trump universe — which we began mapping from the largest groups, and spiraled out from there — many of those overlaps are precisely what you’d expect. Several moderators of r/the_donald are also involved in groups aligned with the “alt-right,” an insurgent and uniquely Internet-y strain of conservatism. And several mods who are big on Trump Reddit also oversee pages like r/the_farage, r/danish and r/european, which are devoted to Europe’s nationalist movement.
But there are more unsettling affinities, as well. One of the moderators of r/DonaldTrump2016 also oversee r/Quranimals, which self-identifies as an anti-Muslim “hate sub,” and r/Rapefugees, which is virulently anti-migration. Other mods of the group are involved with r/eugenics and r/betauprising (which advocates a society in which women cannot “choose with whom they want to have sex.”) Another mod, r/RamblinRambo3 — who also works with r/PURE_TRUMP — also moderates groups devoted to decrying Islam as a “violent and oppressive ideology,” as well as a group devoted to “far right, possibly illegal memes.”
A map of the groups moderated by u/bojangles_unchained, who also mods Reddit’s largest pro-Trump group. (Screenshot via Kumu)
As Trump subreddits go, r/PURE_TRUMP, with its 600 subscribers, isn’t particularly large. But all of its mods have unsavory affiliations. For starters, there is enormous overlap between the moderators of r/PURE_TRUMP and those who oversee a cluster of “public watch” clubs, which basically exist to slur liberals, Black Lives Matter activists and members of the LGBT community in extravagantly offensive terms.
On top of that, three of r/PURE_TRUMP moderators are also involved with r/ArbeitMachtFrei, whose politics should be fairly obvious from its name. (“Arbeit Macht Frei” is the German phrase that appeared on Auschwitz’s gates.) Three oversee r/ShoahThoughts, a forum for “Antisemitic/Anti-Zionist jokes.” Two are involved in r/f*gworldproblems, which has been quarantined by Reddit for its “highly offensive” attacks on gay people. One r/PURE_TRUMP moderator, u/Haizenberg, is involved in five separate groups that mock Jews or invoke Hitler or the Holocaust.
The groups moderated by u/haizenberg, who also mods r/PURE_TRUMP. (Screenshot via Kumu)
To be clear, the Trump campaign has no official presence on Reddit, and it’s impossible for any candidate to control the online behavior of its fans. Trump isn’t even the only candidate to face these sorts of problems: Earlier this year, the Bernie Sanders campaign scrambled to deal with overt sexism and gender-based harassment by some of its online followers. But while staffers from that campaign locked down the Sanders subreddit, apologized to victims and denounced the behavior, the Trump campaign has taken a different approach.
“They have not done a good job distancing themselves from this,” said Patrick Ruffini, a digital strategist for Republican campaigns. “Whenever one of these issues bubbles up, [the Trump campaign] sends the signal that they’re okay with this activity happening on their behalf, as long as it happens on their behalf. They haven’t come out strongly and denounced it.”
“There’s kind of this wink-wink, nod-nod to white supremacists,” Ruffini added. “And so they keep doing it.”
Ruffini is hopeful the campaign will change tack as more attention is drawn to it. Already, he said, the national outrage over Trump’s posting of a “Star of David” meme from 4chan suggests that the public has become more sensitive to the far-right proclivities of some in Trump’s audience. Tuesday night, Twitter also permanently banned the account of the aforementioned Yiannaopolous, an outspoken Trump supporter, reportedly in connection with harassment of Jones. And r/the_donald continues to crackdown on bad behavior.
“This is about doing what is best for Donald Trump,” teh_donald wrote in his June 21 post disavowing white nationalist activity in the sub. “… They are people that Trump would want nothing to do with. Just as Trump would, we disavow them.”
Liked that? Try these!Taking a "poo bus" to work in Bristol, UK, is about to get a lot easier. A commuter bus that runs on biomethane gas produced by food waste and fecal matter will enter regular service on March 25th, The Guardian reports. This means that people in Bristol will be able to ride the waste-powered bus four days a week, on Service Route 2, of all places.
the bus runs on biomethane gas released from food waste and fecal matter
Bristol's "poo bus" uses fecal matter and food waste generated by 32,000 local households. Microorganisms break down the waste that's gathered at Bristol Sewage Treatment Works, and produce 600 million cubic feet of biomethane a year, reports Gizmag. The bus itself can travel 186 miles on a full tank of gas. The end result is a vehicle that produces less emissions than traditional diesel-powered buses, according to Geneco, the renewable energy company that makes the buses.
"Gas-powered vehicles have an important role to play in improving air quality in UK cities, but the Bio-Bus goes further than that and is actually powered by people living in the local area, including quite possibly those on the bus itself," Geneco general manager Mohammed Saddiq told Gizmag.
Geneco
The Bio-Bus started running in Bristol in November, but it has only been used in the center of the city once before. Its previous route was irregular and easy to miss: it traveled between Bath and Bristol airport — a 17-minute trip, according to Google maps. Now, locals and tourists will be able ride it more often, and for longer periods. If the experiment is successful, Bristol may soon find itself gaining additional "poo buses," according to First West England, the company that operates the bio-bus.
If successful, Bristol may soon find itself gaining additional "poo buses"
"Since its original unveiling last year, the Bio-Bus has generated worldwide attention and so it’s our great privilege to bring it to the city," James Freeman, managing director at First West of England, told The Guardian. "The very fact that it’s running in the city should help to open up a serious debate about how buses are best fuelled, and what is good for the environment."
Verge Video: The Geneva Motor Show's craziest cars in 1 minuteDuring the last couple of weeks, I’ve been working more and more on content for the next release, as opposed to features. The next release is going to add four new star systems - Arcadia, Eos, Magec, and Valhalla. David has done a lion’s share of work in mapping these out and creating the backstory – and now, it’s time for these to be populated with fleets.
When adding content, a key question that comes up is how much to procedurally generate vs hand-craft. Both approaches have their pros and cons; on a very basic level, hand-crafted content is going to have higher initial quality, while procedurally generated content is going to have more replay value. It’s not a question of which approach to choose, though. Every approach lies somewhere on a continuum between the two, so the question is exactly how to mix hand-crafted and procedural components, and in what proportion – in this case, specifically as it applies to fleet creation.
Before deciding how to do something, it’s not a bad idea to figure out what it is you want to actually do. With that in mind, let’s take a look at what we actually want out of fleet creation. There are two parts to it: what ships make up a fleet, and what kinds of fleets to spawn (and where, and how often).
Fleet Composition
First, the obvious: what ships go into a fleet depends on what type of fleet it is. A trade fleet is going to need freighters, a patrol is going to need fast attack ships, and so on.
Completely unrelated screenshot of the habitation glows on Sindria, along with some backstory
Ships aren’t directly tied to factions; ultimately the idea is that ship production is based on the availability of blueprints. So, for example, the Hegemony-controlled autofactory at Jangala may have a blueprint that allows it to produce Enforcer-class destroyers, while a different Hegemony world might not. On the other hand, given a choice between the high-tech (and high-cost!) Medusa and the low-tech, reliable Enforcer, a Hegemony commander would prefer the latter; factions should be able to express ship preferences in some way.
“Proper” autofactory-based ship production isn’t part of the next release, but ideally, the new system for creating fleets would be built to easily factor in ship availability.
Finally, with local conditions of the market that’s creating the fleet should factor in as well. A highly stable market is going to produce higher quality, better-equipped fleets.
Up until now, Starsector has been using a system where fleet compositions are explicitly defined for each faction. A Hegemony patrol might have one to three specific Enforcer variants (a “variant” being a particular weapon loadout), zero to two Broadsword fighter wings, etc. Good enough for what it needed to do, but this kind of approach isn’t flexible enough to meet the new requirements – what would it do if Enforcers aren’t available at all, but a different type of destroyer was? What we need is an extra layer of abstraction.
"escortMedium":{ "enforcer_Assault":20, "medusa_PD":10, "fallback":{"combatMedium":1}, },
This is what the definition of a ship role looks like. It says that 1) a Medusa variant and an Enforcer variant are both suited for the “medium escort” role, 2) all things being equal, the Enforcer variant is more desirable (20 to 10, so by a factor of two, and 3) if neither is available, fall back to picking one “medium combat” ship instead.
There’s a default set of ship roles, but each faction can define its own, thus expressing its preferences. For example, the Tri-Tachyon Corporation would prefer the high-tech Medusa instead, and might have a different loadout for it as well – but would still fall back to using an Enforcer if that’s what was available.
The stability of the market creating the fleet further adjust the weights to prefer more expensive ships with higher stability.
When putting together a fleet, then, we just say that it needs two medium escorts, a medium freighter, and a small personnel transport. What we might end up with, depending on ship availability, fallbacks, and how the faction defines its ship roles, could be two small combat ships, a medium escort ship, two small freighters, and a medium personnel transport. There’s enough flexibility to put together a fleet that roughly matches the specifications, but takes into account what’s actually available.
Trade Fleets and Patrols
The economy is a big part of the next release, and having trade fleets ply routes dictated by supply and demand is a big part of making it visible to the player and making the world feel more alive.
The algorithm for generating trade fleets is simple:
Do we have the maximum allowed number of trade fleets in play? If we do, abort and check again later. Pick a market to spawn a trade fleet from. Bigger markets have a higher chance to be picked, but the same market can’t be picked twice within a week or so. Pick another market to send the fleet to. Markets that have a higher trade volume with the initial market have a higher chance to be picked.
At this point, we’ve got the trade route. Now we need to create the trade fleet, and the new approach to fleet composition makes it much easier. We don’t need to worry at all about what faction either of the markets is owned by, what ships are available, etc. We just add enough transport ships to match the types and quantity of cargo being carried, add an appropriate number of escorts, and the fleet composition algorithm takes care of the rest.
Generating patrols is similar. The number of patrols is governed by the size and stability of the market, and the actual ships that the patrol is made up of is determined by the faction and by ship availability.
All in all, this is a heavily procedural approach, and you might be thinking to yourself – “But what if there’s a case where we want something special that the above can’t handle? Procedural content is good as a baseline, but it’s not going to take you all the way there.” Indeed it’s not; a more customized approach is still possible, as is disabling automated trade fleet and patrol generation for specific markets. The procedural approach is meant to fill in the blanks, so to speak; to provide a basic level of meaningful-looking activity that you get for free. Detail can be hand-crafted in as needed.
Other Stuff
Speaking of meaningful-looking activity, but on a somewhat unrelated note: something I found interesting came up while playtesting the behavior of trade fleets. Initially, the fleets would spawn and immediately proceed to their destination. This just felt… strange. Part of it is that fleets fade in after they spawn, and that was very apparent when the fleet immediately headed away from the planet is started from. It also made the fleets seem very mechanical in their behavior – take off, immediately head off, tag the destination, immediately head back and despawn after tagging the original market. The proceedings lacked gravitas, if you will.
Adding an extra step where fleets orbit each world, loading and offloading cargo for several days, made a huge difference in terms of feel. Just seeing non-frantic activity in orbit around a world, large fleets orbiting slowly on a predictable trajectory. I was surprised how much such a minor change helped make things feel more alive.
This also reminds me of when I tried reducing fleet speeds by a factor of 10 or so, just to see what would happen. Sounds drastic, right? It is, and it wouldn’t work out well without some changes to gameplay. Purely on a feel level, though, it was really, really good. Instant majestic feel to everything!
Switching topics once again, but still about trade fleets: you might be wondering what impact those have in-game. If you’ve been keeping track, you know that the economy goes on behind the scenes, and doesn’t depend on trade fleets to actually work. This is good, because relying on trade fleet behavior would make for an incredibly brittle and volatile system. You can’t even count on a trade fleet from market A to market B spawning with any regularity, let alone arriving safely.
On the other hand, what happens to trade fleets can feed back into the economy without running into the same issues. When trade fleets take losses along a route, it affects the economy, and can drive goods to different markets in the long term. There are also smuggling fleets. These are analogous to trade fleets, though smaller, and feed back into the economy in a similar way, with the addition of a “smuggling” market condition that applies a penalty to the market’s stability.
Alright, then… back to the content-ing!
Comment thread here.
Tags: economy, fleets, pretty sure these tags aren't good for anything, procedural, tradeEven in his greatness, there is something perpetually understated about Nicklas Backstrom.
Cool? Oh, yes. Definitely. But not in that kind of "hip-cool-look-at-me" kind of way. More of a quiet, "I-don't-really-care-if-you-notice-me" kind of cool.
Subtle distinction? Maybe.
Is it the kind of distinction that separates playoff disappointment from Stanley Cup glory? Washington Capitals fans too used to the former and thirsting for the latter are hoping that is the case.
One thing we can say with certainty is that Backstrom has cool in his blood.
Chatting with both Backstrom and his father, Anders, during the Washington Capitals' fathers' trip, there is something coolly elegant about Anders Backstrom. It's that same quiet, reserved way that has marked his son's personality since Nicklas came into the league in 2007.
Anders is a former Swedish elite league player who was drafted by the New York Rangers and whose family has a property development business in Sweden. He explains that everyone in the Backstrom family takes a long time to make a decision. The Backstroms analyze things from different angles, poke, prod, consider. Then they act.
"Then when we do it, we do it quick," Anders added with a laugh.
If you've ever watched Nicklas Backstrom handle the puck, you are likely nodding your head and saying "exactly."
"I think he's the quietest superstar in the league. I've said that exact line for years," teammate Brooks Laich told ESPN.com recently. "The guy he plays with, No. 8 [Alex Ovechkin], he gets the headlines, he's the rock star, right? Nicky's the guy that keeps the band together.
"Nicky's the beat of the band. He's so good all over the ice he's our quarterback. The best thing about Nick is that every player that he plays with he makes them better, and I think that's the true testament to a great player is they make everybody else on the ice better, and he does that and it's with intelligence, it's with positioning," Laich explained.
Nicklas Backstrom's vision on the ice is one of his best assets. Patrick McDermott/Getty Images
"Obviously everybody knows about his elite skill level, the hands, the vision, but the way he sees the game and understands the game, and his other talent is understanding his teammates, what they want, where they want the puck, when they want the puck, do I have to give it to them now or should I hold it longer with this guy and give it to him when he's open? Just an elite level of intelligence. Great teammate. Hard worker. The quietest superstar in the National Hockey League."
But make no mistake, this is not the old Nicklas Backstrom, just as these are not (at least right now) the old Washington Capitals. For all his consistency -- as of Thursday morning, he ranks third in the league (behind Henrik Sedin and Joe Thornton) with 416 assists since he entered the league -- there is something vital and different about Backstrom's play this season.
As of Thursday morning, Backstrom is tied with Ovechkin for the NHL scoring lead with 67 points, putting Backstrom in the running for his first scoring title. As for his Capitals, this might be the most playoff-ready of any of the Caps teams that have promised so much but delivered so little come playoff time over the years.
"For me, I was scared of him before and I'm probably more scared of his game now," former Pittsburgh head coach Dan Bylsma told ESPN.com this week. "He has such a great ability to hold on to the puck, manufacture time, read the play and execute with the puck, that it allows the other players on his line to freelance, to not be in the same spot all the time.
"They can go to different areas, they can work to get open away from the puck."
He likens Backstrom's gifts with the puck to those possessed by Hall of Famer (and former Caps coach) Adam Oates, who's considered one of the greatest playmakers of all time.
"It's an unbelievable asset that he has. I don't want to say it's sleight of hand," added Bylsma, who has been doing some national broadcast analysis while he bides his time waiting for another head-coaching gig. "To me, he's the best player on the half wall, he's the best half-wall distributor."
As for the breadth of Backstrom's game, he is perhaps more of a force now than ever at both ends of the ice.
"He covers up for a lot of mistakes. He's sound. Good, intelligent defensively, he covers up for a lot," Bylsma said.
"He's good," the former coach of the year added. "He's real good."
Capitals head coach Barry Trotz saw Backstrom and the Caps from afar during his long tenure as head coach of the Nashville Predators. Since coming to Washington in a great offseason of change -- one that also saw longtime GM George McPhee dismissed in favor of longtime Caps executive Brian MacLellan -- Trotz has learned there is much more than meets the eye when it comes to the team's top center.
Trotz admits he thought Backstrom was a player who could be taken off his game, disrupted. And maybe that was so in the past. Not now, though.
"I didn't realize there was a bite to Nick Backstrom," Trotz told ESPN.com. "He actually excels when you try and sort of get under his skin. It sort of lights his fire a little bit. That's probably the biggest thing that surprised me. And then realizing how good he is and how important he is to this team.
"I just think he is, to me, one of the best all-around forwards I've ever dealt with."
Former Capitals player Alan May, who provides broadcast analysis for the Capitals, agrees that the current version of Backstrom is much more textured.
"You just said it. This year is the very first time I've seen him have snarl or bite to the game. He doesn't take anything from anyone anymore," May said. "You see how tough he is finishing hits. He's just so much more physical on the puck."
That things are different in Washington is a given. You watch the Capitals, and you listen to opposing coaches, scouts and GMs who describe how much more difficult they are to play against. The "why" of that evolution is more complex, again, perhaps more subtle. We go back to our conversation with both Backstroms and the common theme of "Where did the time go?"
"It's amazing to me that this is Nick's eighth year. It feels like it should maybe be his second or something like that. So the time has passed very fast," Anders said while watching his son at a recent morning skate.
#19 C
Washington Capitals
2015 STATS
GM 65
G18
A49
PTS67
+/-5
PIM 40
Nicklas feels that sense of time having slipped through his fingers, too, that urgency to seize the moment.
"If you look at it, time flies by pretty quick. I'm in my eighth season now. Felt like I got here yesterday, so time flies. You've got to make sure you do the best with it and be ready every night. Right now we're playing better overall I think, so if we can keep improving I think that's great," Backstrom said.
On a personal level, Backstrom is a father now and he is remembering the lessons his father taught him when he first put him on skates at 3 or 4 years old: Try your best and work hard.
If there is an element of time having passed too quickly -- with less to show for it than anyone connected to the team had hoped for -- it is balanced perhaps by a communal growing up from a core of players that includes Backstrom, Laich, Ovechkin, Mike Green, John Carlson and Karl Alzner.
"I think when we all were younger we didn't know too much. I think we learned a little bit about our mistakes when we were done. I think you usually feel like everyone has developed, especially core guys that have been here a long time," Nicklas Backstrom explained.
"We want the same things," he said. "We're going for the same goals here and we want to win. That's something that's always back of our heads and I think that's really important to have. We have to set high goals."
Among the offseason changes were the additions of veteran defensemen Brooks Orpik and Matt Niskanen, who came over from Pittsburgh. Their leadership has been and will continue to be pivotal. But make no mistake, this is a team whose axis runs through two numbers: 8 and 19.
That No. 8 (Ovechkin) will garner most of the attention as he roars toward what could be another Rocket Richard Trophy for most goals, and possibly another run at the Hart Trophy as MVP, is of little concern to No. 19 (Backstrom), who will presumably continue to feed Ovechkin soft saucer passes from across the rink, which he will then blast to the back of opposing nets.
Nicklas Backstrom is happy to help the team and defer attention to others. AP Photo/Nick Wass
"Not really, actually," Backstrom said with a laugh. "I don't really care to be honest with you. People want to talk about Ovi or Orpie, Greener, that's the way it is. I don't really care because I get tons of recognition here in the locker room. That's all that matters. I think that's good enough for all of us."
Those are not empty words. Mention Backstrom around the Caps' locker room and his teammates rush to explain his importance, perhaps understanding that from the outside that import is perhaps overlooked or overshadowed. Countryman Marcus Johansson has benefited from Backstrom's tutelage on the ice and his friendship off the ice.
"He was very helpful. He knows his way around and he's I think the biggest thing he's such a leader on and off the ice. It's amazing. He means so much to this team. And to learn from him, I think, is one of the best ways," Johansson said. "I think it's a pretty good role model to have."
Likewise, the captain feels pretty good about Backstrom's role with the squad.
"He is definitely very important for us. For me and for this organization, basically. He's probably, like, top five centers in the league if not top three," Ovechkin told ESPN.com.
He should know. Of Ovechkin's league-leading 43 goals this season, Backstrom has assisted on 28. Since both started wearing Caps jerseys, Backstrom has assisted on 46 percent of Ovechkin's 367 goals.
"He's an all-around guy and that's a great chance for me to play with him," Ovechkin said.
As for being kind of the opposite of the Caps' captain in terms of personality, well, there is that.
"Yeah, he's a kind of shy guy to be honest with you. He's not, like, screaming around you know, do some crazy stuff. But definitely he's one of our leaders," Ovechkin said.
What all of this means in the grand hockey scheme will not be told for many weeks. The Eastern Conference is as wide-open as it has been in many years. For a Capitals team that has never won a championship and went to its only Cup final back in 1998, there is cautious optimism that maybe, just maybe, the subtle changes are enough.
Within the locker room there is the understanding that, changes or not, time keeps growing ever shorter for this group.
"I think we're first of all a great group of guys and I think we're all really tight with each other. It starts off there, I think," Backstrom said.
"I think to have a nice bond, and that you can see that on the ice, too, you play for each other more," Backstrom explained. "And obviously the coaching staff brought in a good system for us. We've been following that. Our work ethic is good and that's something we've got to try and keep doing. We can't take nights off. You've got to come ready to work every night."Humans are interesting creatures. Linux PC users can add themes which make Linux look like Windows. Android smartphone owners can get utilities and themes to make their phones look like an iPhone.
For Mac users who love the new iOS 7 control center options, well, there’s an app for that, and it’s cleverly named Control Center for Mac. Guess what it does?
When activated Control Center for Mac pops out from the edge of the Mac’s screen (much the same way Control Center pops up from the bottom of the iPhone and iPad screen).
What you get are a bunch of options that look and feel much like those on iOS 7 (though they don’t work exactly the same, of course).
Control Center can control iTunes, login or disconnect from Wi-Fi and Bluetooth devices. Tap to view the World Clock or Alarm Clock. There’s also a Timer, a Stopwatch, and a simple Notes app which is good for managing todo lists or task items.
Sleep can be disabled from Control Center and you can view in realtime CPU usage, RAM usage, and Network throughput. You also get an option to adjust audio volume and screen brightness, as well as set the Mac’s startup disk.
Unlike Control Center on the iPhone and iPad you’ll need to click the buttons and sliders rather than use your fingers, but because of the visual similarities you might be tempted to use your finger.
Control Center reminds me of Apple’s Launch Pad for OS X. It looks and works much like the launcher for iOS; just another step in the sissifying and emasculation of OS X so the Mac becomes more comfortable to the great masses of iPhone and iPad users.Atari and Chuck E. Cheese Founder Nolan Bushnell has launched a virtual reality company called Modal VR, and is already showing off a prototype of his new system.
Modal VR's system includes a VR headset, plus a full-body tracking "suit," both of which are tracked using sensors mounted around a room. According to Modal VR, these can accommodate a space of up to 900,000 square feet, and each server unit or "VR Fabricator" can track up to nine users.
Modal VR won't be directly competing with existing VR headsets, though. While no price point has been set yet, the system will be targeted at businesses and probably be well over budget for the vast majority of consumers. The idea is for businesses to use the technology to set up virtual reality "arcades," according to TechCrunch.
Check out the video of a Modal VR demo in action below. While it says it's showing "actual footage" of a Modal VR application, the footage has clearly been mocked up a bit to include the two actors in the scene.
[Source: TechCrunch]
Our Take
Without getting a chance to try out the tech myself, there's not much to go on here other than the enthusiasm shown by the TechCrunch reporter. Assuming this all works as described, Modal VR's approach could mean a lot more VR headsets out in the world, which means there will be that many more reasons to develop VR software. Seems like a good deal.(Belchertown, MA) – Shelton Brothers just issued this note regarding its festival coming up next weekend. The good news is that attendees of The Festival will be able to get some Westvleteren XII early. The bad news, tucked quietly in the release, is that wide distribution throughout the U.S. will be delayed. What was initially thought to be an April, 2012, release in U.S. shops won’t be until September.
Full news release below…
—
Shelton Brothers Importers is pleased to announce that, next weekend, for the first time ever, Westvleteren 12° beer will be legally available for beer lovers in the United States to taste and enjoy.
Westvleteren 12° has consistently topped the best-in-the-world rankings at beeradvocate.com and ratebeer.com for many years. Due to its quality and the fact that it is brewed in small quantities and very hard to come by, it is as well the most sought-after beer in the world.
Westvleteren 12° – painstakingly brewed by the Sint-Sixtus Abbey in Westvleteren, Belgium – was initially scheduled to debut across the U.S.A. this month. For reasons known only to higher powers, the Abbey has requested that the official public release be delayed until September. However, the Abbey has now given its blessing for a small quantity of the beer to be previewed at The Festival, which takes place on June 23rd and 24th at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts. The Abbey hopes in this modest way to slake the thirst and reward the patience of true beer aficionados as they continue to wait for the Big Release later in the year.
At each Festival session, eight cases of Westvleteren 12° will be poured, with samples limited to one per person.
Better yet, all attendees of The Festival will be offered the opportunity to purchase their own Westvleteren XII gift boxes (6 bottles of beer and two commemorative glasses) from Julio’s Liquors, Westborough MA, which has generously agreed to join Shelton Brothers in donating profits from these sales to fund much-needed renovations of the Sint-Sixtus Abbey.
This is an exceedingly small window of opportunity to buy the Abbey’s special gift boxes in a relatively calm setting. The boxes will not be available again until general release in September – and never again after. (Wait until September, and risk getting caught up in a beer-fueled frenzy.)
The Festival will feature many of the Abbey’s Belgian neighbor breweries and dozens of other small brewers from around the world. For more information, visit www.the-festival.us
ABOUT WESTVLETEREN AND SHELTON BROTHERS
The Abbey of St Sixtus, located in the far west of Belgium, is home to 24 monks, and the Trappist Westvleteren brewery that they have operated since 1838. The brewery is one of only six Trappist breweries in Belgium, and is the second-smallest of them. (Only the Achel Trappist brewery is a bit smaller.) It produces about 50,000 cases of beer per year, which is sold only at the gates of the Abbey, one case per customer only. It makes only three beers – Westvleteren Blonde, Westvleteren 8°, and Westvleteren 12°. About half of the brewery’s production is of Westvleteren 12°, the most popular of the beers and, as every beer aficionado knows, the highest-rated beer in the world. The Abbey has created the Westvleteren XII gift boxes, and allowed the sale of its beers outside of the Abbey’s gates for this one time only, in order to raise money for much-needed building renovations.
Shelton Brothers is a beer importing company based in Belchertown MA. Since 1996, it has been the premier importer of hard-to-find, small production, artisanal beers from all over the world.LONDON — Stephen Hawking wasn't at the Oscars in Los Angeles on Sunday night, but he let the world know how proud he was of Eddie Redmayne. Redmayne picked up the Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of theoretical physicist Hawking in The Theory of Everything at Sunday night's ceremony.
"Well done Eddie, I'm very proud of you," Hawking wrote on Facebook on Monday.
The Theory of Everything focuses on Hawking's relationship with his future wife, Jane Wilde Hawking, as he deals with the onset of the motor neurone disease ALS.
Redmayne was the favourite to take the award after the film was a success with both movie-goers and critics. In his acceptance speech on Sunday at the Oscars, Redmayne paid tribute to the Hawking family:
Thank you. Thank you. I don’t think I’m capable of articulating quite how I feel right now. I’m fully aware that I am a lucky, lucky man. This Oscar belongs to all of those people around the world battling ALS. It belongs to one exceptional family – Stephen, Jane and the Hawking children. I will be his custodian. I will be at his beck and call. I wait on him hand and foot.
Hawking previously attended the BAFTA awards in London earlier this month, describing the evening as a "blast."Official Synopsis For Prometheus Revealed, Ben Foster Joins The Cast By Eric Eisenberg Random Article Blend
Picked up by
Visionary filmmaker Ridley Scott returns to the genre he helped define, creating an original science fiction epic set in the most dangerous corners of the universe. The film takes a team of scientists and explorers on a thrilling journey that will test their physical and mental limits and strand them on a distant world, where they will discover the answers to our most profound questions and to life’s ultimate mystery. Outside of explaining that the movie is a science fiction tale about people on a distant world - things we already know - this is about as bland a synopsis that you will find. Even stranger, it doesn't do anything to undermine the leaked description from earlier today, which was the whole point of it's release. The paragraph doesn't even list the movie's stellar cast, which has apparently gotten bigger.
In addition to posting the synopsis, JoBlo has also learned that Ben Foster has joined the film's ranks. Whether it's a late-in-production addition or something we just didn't know about, the casting of Foster makes the established list of actors, which includes Noomi Rapace, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Guy Pearce, Logan Marshall-Green and Michael Fassbender, even better. The project will only be the actor's second venture into the sci-fi genre, having starred in 2009's Pandorum. Still in production, the film is set to be released on June 8, 2012. There's been an awful lot of secrecy and security surrounding Ridley Scott's Prometheus, a film that may or may not be a prequel to his 1979 classic Alien. Earlier today, however, a tipster revealed quite a bit about the plot, but there has been a lot of questioning in regard to its validity. Now 20th Century Fox has finally released its first plot synopsis for the film to combat the validity of the leaked story, but unfortunately it doesn't exactly deliver any answers one way or the other.Picked up by JoBlo, the synopsis itself is only 70 words (26 of which are dedicated to stroking Ridley Scott's ego) and it largely consists of filler adjectives. While you might feel excited reading it, closer examination will have you questioning why. Here it is:Outside of explaining that the movie is a science fiction tale about people on |
front lever is applied, pressure is built up at 4 of the 6 pots in the 2 calipers at the front. A secondary master cylinder at the front wheel distributes remaining pressure to the rear wheel through a proportional control valve and acts on 2 of the 3 calipers. If strong brake force is applied at the rear wheel force is also distributed to 2 of the 6 pots of the front wheel. More modern dual CBS use front and rear calipers (and all pots) according to a preset load ratio of front to rear. The proportioning was originally controlled by complex all-hydraulic systems interlinking the front and rear, with a fixed delay or by sensing weight distribution changes. As early as 2001 an electrohydraulic system was introduced by BMW.[44]
CBS and ABS [ edit ]
CBS helps to reduce the danger of wheel locks and fall downs but in certain situations it is possible that CBS causes a fall down. If brake pressure is distributed from the rear wheel to the front wheel and the friction of the surfaces changes suddenly (puddle, ice on the street) the front wheel might lock even if only the rear brake has been applied. This would lead to a loss of stability and a fall down. CBS is therefore combined with ABS to avoid this on a motorcycle. Different approaches are possible to realize this combination: Without active pressure Build up Single Version: A third additional channel links the rear wheel circuit through a delay valve to the front brake. Strong brake pressure at the rear wheel (or both wheels) pressurises both brake circuits however this pressure is adjusted according to wheel speed and brake slip.
The dual version combines Hondas Dual CBS with a secondary master cylinder and a proportional control valve [with Piston ABS] A modulator regulates the pressure for each[45] With Active Pressure Build up In 2009, Honda introduced the electronic controlled combined ABS for its high performance sports bikes which utilizes brake by wire technology. The brake input of the rider is measured by pressure sensors and the information is provided to an ECU. Together with the information of the wheel speed sensors the ECU calculates the optimal distribution of pressure to prevent lockups and to provide best possible deceleration. Based on this output a motor for each wheel operates a pump which builds up and regulates the brake pressure on the wheel. This system offers a fast reaction time because of the brake by wire functionality.
The MIB (Motorcycle integral Braking system) from Continental Teves and the eCBS (electronic CBS) in the enhanced Motorcycle ABS from Bosch are results of another approach. These systems are based on the pump and valve approach. Through additional valves, stronger pumps and a more powerful motor the system can actively build up pressure. The input pressure of the rider is measured with pressure sensors at the lever and pedal. The pump then builds up additional pressure adjusted to riding conditions. A partial integral System is designed for working in one direction only: front→rear or rear→front. A fully integral system works in both directions.
Because these systems are electronically controlled and are able to build up pressure actively, they offer the opportunity to adjust the motorcycle braking behavior to the rider. CBS and ABS can be switched off by experienced riders and also different regulation modes with higher and lower thresholds can be chosen. Like the rain or slick mode in the BMW S1000RR.
Perception and legislation [ edit ]
A report of the European Transport Safety council showed that riding a motorcycle is 20 times more dangerous than driving a car the same distance. And the accidents situation in Germany from 1990 to 2011 showed that total traffic fatalities decreased drastically (11 000 to 4 009) but motorcycle fatalities remained constant.[46]
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) conducted a study on the effectiveness of ABS for motorcycles and came to the conclusion that motorcycles above 250 cm3 without ABS are 37 percent more likely to be involved in fatal crashes and a study of the Swedish Road Administration came to the conclusion that 48 percent of all severe and fatal motorcycle accidents above 125 cm3 could be avoided due to motorcycle ABS.[47]
These studies caused the EU commission to initiate a legislative process in 2010 that was passed in 2012 and led to ABS for motorcycles above 125 cm3 becoming mandatory from 2016 onwards. Organizations like the Federation International de l’Automobile and the Institute of advanced Motorists (IAM) demanded the implementation of this legislation already for 2015.[48] On the other hand, some motorcycle riders are protesting against a compulsory ABS for all bikes because they call for a possibility to switch the system off, for off road usage or for other reasons.[49][50][51] In 2011 the United Nations (UN) started the Decade of Action for Road Safety. The main goal is to save 5 million lives until 2020 through global cooperation.[52] One part of their global plan is to: Encourage universal deployment of crash avoidance technologies with proven effectiveness such as Electronic Stability Control and Anti-Lock Braking Systems in motorcycles.
ABS is required on all new passenger cars sold in the EU since 2004. In the United States, the NHTSA has mandated ABS in conjunction with Electronic Stability Control under the provisions of FMVSS 126 as of September 1, 2013.[53]
See also [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]
References [ edit ]One of my previous gigs (before I discovered the red pill) was in a multinational media firm predominated by women. In hindsight, I see that office as a soul-crushing nightmare for a red piller to work in because the boss was himself a mangina who was under the influence of his mistresses in the office.
She was a mature, progressive feminist spinster (previously a professional call-girl) from the FSU, whom he had given an insignificant job in the HR after having tasted her ‘goods’. I had subconsciously nicknamed her as Madame du HR, out of her self-confessed outspoken fascination for medieval French courtesans. She was an average looking, thin, long-legged pale woman with a conspicuous plump ass, but notable for her sexual allure and pull over men.
In spite of her ‘job’, a respectable family background and a higher education, she used to prostitute herself for money on weekends—to business clients, male coworkers, or any other rich influential man whom she met and caught a fancy to at work—and sleep her way to money and professional influence. The office had effectively become her brothel to ply her wiles on men.
After being on the same team with her, she expectedly made her move on me (like she did on everybody else), which I rejected out of both personal and professional ethics. But during the time I worked with her, I learnt some valuable lessons about workplace prostitution.
1. Work place and part-time voluntary prostitutes are as common as professional prostitutes.
Sleeping with the boss, business clients or coworkers for career gain or influence is prostitution—just as sleeping with a man to influence him to pay for domestic or personal expenses. These girls are no different from the working girls on the street whoring themselves for money. That’s what Madame du HR used to do—and often glamorized her own lifestyle to female interns. They were ‘trained’ by her and graduated as full-blown whores themselves to dominate men by the time they left their jobs.
2. A woman’s sexuality often gives her more power and influence than her professional skill.
Madame du HR spent most of her office hours chatting on the phone or idly surfing the web at her desk. In spite of being inefficient and incompetent, and the numerous times she was often reprimanded for her “non-professionalism” by the boss himself (sometimes in front of all the staff), she surprisingly retained her job. The reason? Because of her ass (her sexual exploits).
She often mockingly boasted how sexually ‘addicted’ the boss was to her ass, which afforded her the professional immunity.
3. Voluntary prostitution is a self-rationalized delusion of utopia that women harbor to subconsciously destroy their own character.
Madame du HR’s deadpan justification when I rejected her advances was, “You know what, I am a whore. But I know why I am doing it. It’s just another job, like any another profession.” She had firmly rationalized her choice to whore herself.
It’s common to see a lot of modern women having the Pretty Woman complex (a role model for some)—especially from the FSU, to choose voluntary prostitution (a notorious stereotype with some truth), even though prostitution is a social evil. A lot of women keep sponsors for social benefits and end up marrying them, even while having boyfriends, without any qualms about it.
The ability to compartmentalize between love, sex and friendship is a trait unique to whores and sluts. With her dissociation of sex from emotion, a whore often destroys her own nurturing (emotional) ability to bond through sex – a trait unique to the emotional nature of women.
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Whores can thus neither nurture nor bond to a man because their minds are self programmed to detach themselves from their emotional natures. Sexual loyalty is a joke for them while sex or love becomes merely an act or a profession, without emotion.
4. Whores can’t deal with rejection and lack of attention even more as compared to ordinary women.
After I rejected her, I faced intrigue and double-standards within the office (due to her sexual influence on the male management).
She made sure to make my office life miserable. Whores need attention because of their fragile egos, while real women need respect. And I had unknowingly implied to her that I rejected her because she was a whore (thus bruising her ego), even though I didn’t call her one.
Things became tense if she saw me even casually complimenting a female client or coworker—I was often given inexplicable disciplinary talks in the boss’s cabin about professional ‘etiquette’ (while she continued to whore herself to men with impunity right under his eyes ). I then realized the depth of a mistress’s power in an office.
5. Never get involved with women who pursue you (especially at work).
I’ve seen many men falling for this bait which usually entails a hidden trap—female control over men—not only in that office, but also in other real life situations.
Madame du HR embodied that– she aggressively pursued men whom she wanted to control (using sex). The men who fell for her sexual bait predictably ended up as her slaves.
6. Never fuck with the boss’s mistress.
A no-brainer which most of my male colleagues there failed to follow. The result was forced subservience to her, who dominated them by often threatening to reveal their shenanigans with her to the boss. She used fear as well as sex to control them.
It’s often said never to mix business with pleasure, but what’s more idiotic is the stupid dog which shits in its own bed. The man who fucks the boss’s mistress becomes a toy boy pup of sorts, whose professional life then becomes a minefield with the detonation trigger in the hands of the eaten forbidden fruit (the mistress).
7. Never work where whores rule.
A lot of businessmen offer their mistresses a job in their firms. The ensuing problem for the male staff is that they then have to actually report to two bosses: the actual male boss and his mistress. Looking at her behavior, I sometimes wondered whether the boss had deliberately hired her as a spy, to seduce the male staff on purpose so as to create both a professional fear (for fucking her) as well as to pry out their personal secrets (which he could then exploit to dominate them).
For the man refusing to sleep with such women, working in such places is where you often have to be reluctantly subservient to a glorified prostitute, not to mention the countless double standards and intrigues you’d have to endure for scorning a whore who wants to call the shots in the office. Yet you simply can’t afford to piss her off. Offices where whores rule are actually mangina producing factories.
Conclusion
Needless to say, after two years, I quit that soul-crushing job to regain my freedom again. A lot of my ex-colleagues still say to me that in retrospect how I could’ve possibly risen to higher ranks within that office had I not rejected her. I reply that not all pussy is worth the risk. Sometimes there’s a choice in life between a piece of ass, and peace of mind. It’s better to choose the latter to maintain your freedom and dignity.
Read More: Don’t Work For A Female BossHealth care isn’t the only issue on which lies are coming back to bite the liars. The same story is playing out on other issues — in fact, on almost every substantive policy issue the U.S. faces.
On Saturday pretty much the entire medical sector — groups representing doctors, hospitals and insurers — released an extraordinary open letter condemning the Graham-Cassidy health bill. The letter was written in the style of Emile Zola’s “J’accuse”: a series of paragraphs, each beginning with the bolded words “We agree,” pointing out the bill’s many awful features, from the harm it would do to people with pre-existing conditions to the chaos it would cause in insurance markets.
It takes a truly terrible proposal to elicit such eloquent unanimity from organizations that are usually cautious to the point of stodginess. So how did Republicans come up with something that bad, and how did that bad thing get so close to becoming law? Indeed, it still has a chance of being enacted despite John McCain’s “no.”
The answer is that Republicans have spent years routinely lying for the sake of political advantage. And now — not just on health care, but across the board — they are trapped by their own lies, forced into trying to enact policies they know won’t work.
Reporting on why the GOP plowed ahead with Graham-Cassidy makes it clear that many Republicans supporting it are well aware that it’s a bad bill, although they may not appreciate just how bad. “You know, I could maybe give you 10 reasons why this bill shouldn’t be considered,” said Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa. “But,” he continued, “Republicans have campaigned on this,” meaning repeal-and-replace, and had to fulfill their promise.
Carl Hulse of The New York Times adds more detail: One big factor behind the push for Graham-Cassidy was anger among big donors, who wanted to know why Republicans had broken their vows to kill Obamacare.
But repealing the Affordable Care Act wasn’t the only thing Republicans promised; they also promised to replace it with something better and cheaper, doing away with all the things people don’t like about Obamacare without creating any new problems. Remember, it was Bill Cassidy, not Jimmy Kimmel, who came up with the “Jimmy Kimmel test,” the pledge that nobody would be denied health care because of expense.
Yet Republicans never had any idea how to fulfill that promise and meet that test, or indeed how to repeal the ACA without taking insurance away from tens of millions. That is, they were lying about health care all along.
And the base, both the grass roots and the big money, believed the lies. Hence the trap in which Republicans find themselves.
The thing is, health care isn’t the only issue on which lies are coming back to bite the liars. The same story is playing out on other issues — in fact, on almost every substantive policy issue the U.S. faces.
The next big item on the GOP agenda is taxes. Now, cutting taxes on corporations and the wealthy may be an easier political lift than taking health insurance away from 30 million Americans. But Republicans still have a problem, because they’ve spent years posing as the party of fiscal responsibility, and they have no idea how to cut taxes without blowing up the deficit.
As with health care, the party has masked its lack of good ideas with lies, claiming that it would offset lower tax rates and even reduce the deficit by eliminating unnamed loopholes and slashing unnamed wasteful spending. But as with health care, these lies will be revealed once actual legislation is unveiled. It’s telling that Republicans are already invoking voodoo economics to justify their as-yet-unspecified tax plans, insisting that tax cuts will pay for themselves by leading to higher economic growth.
At this point, however, few people believe them. The Bush tax cuts didn’t create a boom; neither did the Kansas tax-cut “experiment.” Conversely, the U.S. economy did fine after the 2013 Obama tax hike, as has the California economy since Jerry Brown raised state taxes. Party apparatchiks will no doubt engage in an orgy of Reaganolatry, but the broader public probably won’t be moved by (false) claims about the wondrous results of tax cuts 36 years ago.
So tax policy, like health care, will be hobbled by a legacy of lies.
Wait, there’s more.
Foreign policy isn’t usually a central concern for voters. Still, past lies have put the Trump administration in a box over things like the Iran nuclear deal: Canceling the deal would create huge problems, yet not canceling it would amount to an admission that the criticisms were dishonest.
And soon the GOP may even start to pay a price for lying about climate change. As hurricanes get ever more severe — just as climate scientists predicted — climate denial is looking increasingly out of touch. Yet donors and the base would react with fury to any admission that the threat is real, after all.
The bottom line is that the bill for cynicism seems to be coming due. For years, flat-out lies about policy served Republicans well, helping them win back control of Congress and, eventually, the White House. But those same lies now leave them unable to govern.Leading conservation groups, including the RSPB, scientists and residents of Pitcairn Island today congratulate the UK Government on its decision to create the world’s largest marine reserve around the Pitcairn Islands, a UK Overseas Territory in the South Pacific.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, announced in the Budget that the government intends to proceed with designation of a marine protected area around Pitcairn. This decision begins the process of creating a fully protected marine reserve, extending from 12 miles offshore of Pitcairn Island to the full 200 nautical mile limit of the Territory’s waters, encompassing over 830,000 square kilometres of ocean, an area about 3.5 times the size of the UK.
Jonathan Hall, Head of UK Overseas Territories for the RSPB, said: “We’re delighted that the Government has today granted the Pitcairners wish to see a marine reserve declared in their waters. Today’s announcement builds the network of marine reserves around the UK’s Territories, and we hope that this achievement will heighten ambition to see further protection around other Territories, such as Ascension.”
When taking all 14 of its Overseas Territories into account, the UK is responsible for the fifth largest area of ocean in the world, measuring 6.8 million square kilometres, over twice the size of India, and nearly 30 times the size of the UK itself. Some 94 per cent of the UK’s biodiversity exists in these Territories.
Common White Tern Pitcairn Islands © Dave Williamson, from the surfbirds galleries.
The announcement of the designation of a Pitcairn marine reserve means that the UK now has the two largest marine reserves in the world, the second largest being the Chagos marine reserve created around the British Indian Ocean Territory in 2010. This puts Britain virtually level-pegging with the USA, who top the table for the most marine area fully protected following the expansion of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument by President Obama last year.
Pitcairn’s waters host some of the best-preserved marine ecosystems on the planet and are of globally significant biological value. Over 1,200 marine species have been recorded around Pitcairn, including whales and dolphins, 365 species of fish, turtles, seabirds and corals. Forty-eight of these species are globally threatened – such as the critically endangered hawksbill turtle, and some are found nowhere else on Earth – such as the Pitcairn angelfish.
With the designation of the marine reserve, Pitcairn’s waters will become off-limits to all extractive and damaging activities, offering protection from overfishing and illegal pirate fishing, as well as deep-sea mining exploration, pollution and climate change.
Common White Tern Pitcairn Islands © Dave Williamson, from the surfbirds galleries.
Conservationists and the Island’s residents have been campaigning for the creation of a reserve around Pitcairn since 2013. In February 2015 a coalition of over 100 conservation and environmental organisations and scientists launched the www.GreatBritishOceans.org campaign, to encourage the Government to create fully protected marine reserves in the UK Overseas Territories, principally around the Pitcairn Islands, Ascension Island in the Atlantic and the South Sandwich Islands in the Southern Ocean.
The coalition, led by the RSPB, The Pew Charitable Trusts, the Zoological Society of London, the Blue Marine Foundation, the Marine Conservation Society, Greenpeace UK and the National Geographic Society today praises the creation of the Pitcairn marine reserve as a monumental step for ocean conservation.
Excepting today’s announcement, only around three per cent of the world’s ocean has any protection at all, and less than one per cent is classified as ‘fully protected’. This is despite commitments from 194 countries to protect 10 per cent of the entire global ocean by 2020. The designation of the Pitcairn marine reserve means that the UK Government is now fully protecting nearly a quarter (22 per cent) of waters under British jurisdiction, and has increased the global fully protected area by a quarter.
Members of the Great British Oceans coalition now look forward to working with the Government on expanding the UK’s marine reserve network throughout other Overseas Territories, and the possibility of designating reserves in the waters of Ascension Island and the South Sandwich Islands in the near future.
In conjunction with the designation, the Bertarelli Foundation announced a five-year commitment to support the monitoring of the Pitcairn reserve as part of Pew’s Project Eyes on the Seas. With this satellite system, developed by Pew and the UK-based Satellite Applications Catapult, government officials will be able to monitor and protect the reserve’s boundaries.
A statement from the Pitcairn Island Council read: “The people of Pitcairn are extremely excited about designation of the world’s largest marine reserve in our vast and unspoiled waters of the Pitcairn Islands, including Ducie, Oeno and Henderson Islands. We are proud to have developed and led this effort in partnership with Pew and National Geographic to protect these spectacular waters we call home for generations to come.”
Matt Rand, Director of Pew’s Global Ocean Legacy project, which advocates for establishment of the world’s great marine parks, said: “The United Kingdom is the caretaker of more than 6 million square kilometres of ocean—the fifth-largest marine area of any country. British citizens are playing a vital role in ensuring the health of our seas. The Pitcairn Islands Marine Reserve will build a refuge of untouched ocean to protect and conserve a wealth of marine life.”
Charles Clover, Chairman of the Blue Marine Foundation, said: “Declaring a marine reserve around Pitcairn is a visionary thing to do and the right thing to do. With Pitcairn, Britain is now perilously close to having the largest amount of protected ocean of any country in the world. This is a fantastic achievement and while most would agree this probably isn’t the greenest Government ever, it is certainly now the bluest Government ever.”
Paul Rose, Expedition Leader, National Geographic Pristine Seas, said: “Ocean leadership like this from our Government is exactly right: It protects the pristine waters of our Overseas Territories, sets an example to the rest of the world, giving hope and encouragement to future generations. Thank you UK Government!”
Sam Fanshawe, Chief Executive, Marine Conservation Society said: “Designation of the Pitcairn Islands as one of the world’s largest Marine Reserves is a significant step toward addressing the deficit in global ocean conservation. It’s good to see the UK Government showing some leadership in marine conservation issues at the international level!”
John Sauven, Executive Director of Greenpeace UK, said: “This is good news for the marine environment and a positive sign from the Government about wanting to improve the health of the world’s oceans. This decision will be an opportunity to create a sanctuary for marine life to thrive, and unlocks the possibility for the UK to play a global leadership role in ocean conservation.”
Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall, whose Fish Fight television programmes advocated greater marine protection in both UK waters and British Overseas Territories, said: “Today’s announcement shows this Government really does mean business when it comes to marine conservation. It is an excellent step forwards towards better protection of our seas and one that will make a genuine difference in a globally important marine habitat. It’s clear that the British public care hugely about protecting our marine life, and so it’s great to know that our Government is ready to protect some of the most unspoiled parts of the global oceans for the benefit of future generations. And it surely paves the way for even more protection of our seas, both overseas and here at home.”
The Ocean Elders, a collective of global leaders including H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco, Sir Richard Branson, Jackson Browne, James Cameron, Dr. Rita Colwell, Jean-Michel Cousteau, Dr. Sylvia Earle, Jose Maria Figueres, Graeme Kelleher, Sven Lindblad, Her Majesty Queen Noor, Nainoa Thompson, Ted Turner, and Captain Don Walsh, said: “We are delighted that the UK Government is showing global leadership through its designation of a marine reserve in the Pitcairn Group of Islands. This will offer protection to some of the most pristine waters and coral reefs on Earth. We urge other countries to follow suit and create additional large and protected ocean areas in the face of escalating climate change and constant threats to ocean health.”It seems like so much of our online activities are tied to our identity. All manner of online shopping and social media require you to hand over pieces of your identity so that you can enjoy their product or service. At the crux of this particular quest is this thought:
What kinds of conversations are possible with social media that is completely anonymous?
I recently started doing some data science projects at Confesh, an anonymous social media platform that makes a promise never to track you… no username, email, or ip address. One of the interesting things we’re exploring is classifying user sentiment, ie. what do people think/feel about a confession? Is most of it spam, trolling, and bigotry, or – maybe counter intuitively – can there be honest, substantive, or at least some kind of civil conversation?
The thing about sentiment analysis is that a sentiment classifier (i.e. “this post has a positive/negative sentiment”) only performs well if have access to a lot of labeled data. Luckily, Confesh also has a mechanism for reporting spam. These reports are a potential source of labels because users can provide free text to state the reason for reporting the confession or comment.
One other limitation of sentiment analysis is that it can typically only detect patterns in simple binary outcomes, like “this review is positive or negative”. I can talk about this more in a future post, but generally going for the simplest model is the most expedient thing to do when building these kinds of data pipelines. Luckily, the subset of the Confesh dataset that we’re going to take a look at might be able to provide us with everything that we need to create a rudimentary ‘offensiveness’ detector.
In data science speak, I’d say we’re dealing with semi-structured data (which we often are). In this post, we’re going to reshape and recast our dataset into a structure that can help answer some interesting questions.
I always like to have a working hypothesis to guide my explorations, so here it goes:
There are statistical patterns in the word composition of confessions such that we can predict whether a confession is offensive or not offensive with some degree of accuracy using a simple classifier algorithm.
I won’t really be able to test this hypothesis in this post, but I think it’s a good enough motivation to get us started!
The Toolbox
As with any craft, we need some tools… in our case, those would be Python and a bunch of nice open source libraries!
import numpy as np import matplotlib import matplotlib.pyplot as plt import pandas as pd import re from os import path from scipy.ndimage import imread from nltk.util import ngrams from collections import Counter from wordcloud import WordCloud, STOPWORDS, ImageColorGenerator from IPython.display import display, HTML # importing plotly-related modules import cufflinks as cf import plotly.plotly as py import plotly.graph_objs as go from plotly import tools from plotly.tools import FigureFactory as FF plt. style. use ( 'ggplot' ) % matplotlib inline
The Data
What do you get if you give a bunch of liberal arts college students an anonymous platform?
This dataset is a small subset of the confessions, comments, and reports from the Mount Holyoke Confesh.
We can read in the dataset into memory to take a closer look. Think of this as our chopping block. We’re going to take four seperate csv (comma-separated value) files and splice them together.
# Reading in data holyr_df = pd. read_csv ( '../tmp/clean/holyokecon_confessional_reports.csv' ) holys_df = pd. read_csv ( '../tmp/clean/holyokecon_confessional_secrets.csv' ) holyraw_df = pd. read_csv ( '../tmp/raw/holyokecon_confessional_secrets.csv' ) holyrawr_df = pd. read_csv ( '../tmp/raw/holyokecon_confessional_reports.csv' ) # defining some global variables SECRET_COL = 'clean_tokens_secret' REPORT_COL = 'clean_tokens_report' # merge the clean secrets, clean reports, raw reports, and raw secrets data holysr_df = holys_df. merge ( holyr_df, left_on = 'id', right_on = "secret_id", how = 'left', suffixes = ( '_secret', '_report' )) holysr_df = holysr_df. merge ( holyraw_df [[ 'id', 'create_date', 'confession' ]], left_on = 'id_secret', right_on = 'id', how = 'left' ) holysr_df = holysr_df. merge ( holyrawr_df [[ 'id','reason' ]], left_on = 'id_report', right_on = 'id', how = 'left' ) holysr_df. rename ( columns = {'reason' :'report_reason' }, inplace = True ) #preprocess: remove rows with null clean_tokens_secret value holysr_df = holysr_df [ holysr_df [ SECRET_COL ]. notnull ()] holysr_df [[ 'id_secret', 'confession', 'clean_tokens_secret', ]]. head ()
id_secret confession clean_tokens_secret 0 14040 goddamn insomnia. goddamn insomnia 1 13994 GO TO SLEEP. KEEP YOUR SECRETS TO YOURSELF. sleep keep secret 2 10971 we are accidents waiting to happen accident waiting happen 3 12515 Is this site ruining your life? site ruining life 4 9854 I just do it for kicks, and I don't believe an... kick dont believe
The confession column is the original raw text, and the clean_tokens_secret is the result of some preprocessing that I did. For this initial preprocessing step, I did the following:
removed punctuation
removed special characters like / or ~,
or, removed numbers
lowercased all letters
removed stopwords (i.e. common words like ‘the’, ‘and’, ‘a’ that are typically structural and convey little to the ‘aboutness’ of a piece of text).
Censoring Problematic Words
Not surprisingly, we need to do more preprocessing…
Ultimately, we want to process our data so that we can create some interesting things with them, like visualizations and machine learning models.
After seeing the unfiltered version of the results that you are about to see, I decided that processing select words (namely the n-word) was appropriate. While it’s important to let the data speak for itself, I didn’t feel comfortable presenting these results without exercising some editorial judgement.
Warning: there is some offensive language in this text analysis.
# Removing the offensive word by matching it to a pattern. def preprocess_pattern ( text, replace = "n_word", p = r'nigger|niger|niggar|nigar' ): return " ". join ([ replace if re. search ( p, t ) else t for t in text. lower (). split ()]) # these are the columns we want to process text_columns = [ "confession", "clean_tokens_secret", "clean_tokens_report", "report_reason" ] # apply the preprocess_pattern function to # each column that contains text for c in text_columns : holysr_df [ c ] = holysr_df [ c ]. apply ( lambda x : x if isinstance ( x, float ) and np. isnan ( x ) else preprocess_pattern ( x ) ) holysr_df [[ SECRET_COL ]][ holysr_df [ SECRET_COL ]. str. contains ( "n_word" )]. head ()
clean_tokens_secret 1955 define making fool many people think dont want... 4235 n_word n_word n_word discus 4236 n_word n_word n_word discus 4237 n_word n_word n_word discus 4238 n_word n_word n_word discus
Let’s find a pattern… not!
This next little code block is meant to sift through all the secrets for a specific pattern and return only those posts that contain a match. In this initial analysis, I want to be able to analyze all the confessions, so we’ll leave pattern at '', which means all secrets will be matched.
# detecting secrets containing a specific word pattern = r'' selector = holysr_df [ SECRET_COL ]. str. contains ( pattern ) match_df = holysr_df [ selector ] # Drop duplicate secrets match_secrets = match_df. drop_duplicates ( 'clean_tokens_secret' ) # Match secrets that were not reported match_not_reported = match_secrets [ match_secrets [ 'id_report' ]. isnull ()] # Match secrets that were reported match_reported = match_secrets [ match_secrets [ 'id_report' ]. notnull ()] # Select report text report_text = match_df [ match_df [ REPORT_COL ]. notnull ()]
Makin’ a Word Cloud, ‘cause we can…
With all its limitations, Word Clouds are still fun :) It’s great for giving you a broad impression of the word composition of text, which is exactly what we want to do right now.
Below we create a word cloud in the shape of the Confesh logo, all purple n’ stuff, ‘cause purple is pretty.
word_cloud_options = { 'width' : 1000, 'height' : 1000, 'background_color' : "white",'max_words' : 300,'stopwords' : STOPWORDS, 'random_state' : 42 } def create_word_cloud ( text_iterable, image_color_fp = None, title = '', ** kwargs ): confesh_coloring = imread ( image_color_fp ) # generating the word cloud plot kwargs. update ({'mask' : confesh_coloring }) wc = WordCloud ( ** kwargs ) text = " ". join ( text_iterable ) wc. generate ( text ) # prettifying the plot image_colors = ImageColorGenerator ( confesh_coloring ) plt. figure ( figsize = ( 12, 12 )) plt. title ( title ) plt. imshow ( wc. recolor ( color_func = image_colors )) plt. axis ( "off" ) plt. show (); logo_fp = '../assets/logo-purple.png' create_word_cloud ( match_secrets [ SECRET_COL ]. astype ( str ), logo_fp, ** word_cloud_options );
As you can see, the n-word is one of the most frequently used words in the dataset, along with a smattering of expletives and some other pretty mundane verbiage. I don’t know about you, but when I first saw this word cloud I thought to myself: “wow, this platform enables racism and bigotry because anonymity”.
Pardon the grammitically incorrect thought, but actually I think I may have been jumping to a conclusion there. Isn’t the entire internet a platform for trolling, bigotry, and racism? It occured to me that the quality of content on a social media platform is heavily influenced by the moderation system of that platform.
Like Facebook and Twitter, Confesh has a moderation system that communities can use to report confessions and comments. We will end this post by answering a final question:
If we group confessions by those that were reported by the community and those that were not, how would the above word frequency distribution change?
Counting Ngrams: An Introduction to Text-mining
It’s great to count individual words and all, but what we lose by doing that is context.
What words appeared together in sequence?
A simple way to address this problem is by computing ngrams. An ngram is the n sequence of words that appear in succession for any given piece of text. So a unigram would be a single word, a bigram would be a sequence of two words, like so:
Unigram (1-gram): ‘the’
Bigram (2-gram): ‘the cat’
Trigram (3-gram): ‘the cat sits
…
Doing this allows us to at least capture the most frequent sequences of words.
# Defining functions to compute ngram frequency def word_counter ( text, n = 1, length_thres = 50 ): t = text. split () t = [ tk for tk in t if len ( tk ) < length_thres ] for i in range ( n ): t_ngrams = [ " ". join ( b ) for b in list ( ngrams ( t, i + 1 ))] t. extend ( t_ngrams ) return Counter ( t ) def word_aggregater ( corpus_list, n = 1 ): c = Counter () for doc in corpus_list : c. update ( word_counter ( doc, n = n )) return c def count_token_frequency ( token_series, filter_thres, ** kwargs ): freq_df = pd. DataFrame ( word_aggregater ( token_series, ** kwargs ). items ()) freq_df. rename ( columns = { 0 : 'word', 1 : 'frequency' }, inplace = True ) freq_df = freq_df [ freq_df [ 'frequency' ] > filter_thres ] \. sort_values ( 'frequency', ascending = False ) freq_df [ 'ngrams' ] = freq_df [ 'word' ]. apply ( lambda x : len ( x. split ())) return freq_df. reset_index ( drop = True ) # create frequency count dataframes secrets_corpus = count_token_frequency ( match_secrets [ 'clean |
board game".[30]
The game was played on a 9×9 mat of embroidered reindeer hide.[31] In his diary, Lachesis Lapponica, Linnaeus explained that the players referred to the defending pieces as "Swedes" and the attacking pieces as "Muscovites".[32] The name of the latter pieces reflect the Grand Duchy of Moscow, a regional rival of Sweden, which changed its name to the Tsardom of Russia in 1547. Linneaus does not describe the pieces as being differently colored, but his drawing shows that one side's pieces are distinguished by being notched (the Muscovites).[33] This way of distinguishing board game pieces is known from other traditional Sámi board games (cf. Sáhkku and Dablo).
Lachesis Lapponica was translated into English in 1811 by James Edward Smith.[34] The translation of the tablut rules (which were done by a Swedish merchant in London, Carl Troilius) had many errors which would become an issue not only for playing tablut, but also for the subsequent attempts to reconstruct other historic tafl games on the basis of the tablut rules. The central mistake in Troilius' translation is that four attackers are always needed to capture the king, whereas the original rules only demand two, except in special cases. The following rules are based on the modern translations of John C. Ashton (2007), Nicolas Cartier (2011) and Olli Salmi (2013)[33]
Tablut starting position: lighter "Swedes" start in centre; darker "Muscovites" start at the board's edges. Based on Linnaeus' sketches reproduced in Smith (1811).
Setup [ edit ]
The game is played on a 9×9 board. Initial setup is as shown.
The king ( konakis, modern Lule Sámi gånågis ) starts on the central square or castle (Latin: Arx ).
, modern Lule Sámi ) starts on the central square or castle (Latin: ). The eight defenders, called Swedes, start on the eight squares adjoining the gånågis, in the form of a cross.
, start on the eight squares adjoining the gånågis, in the form of a cross. The sixteen attackers, called Muscovites, start in groups of four at the centre of each edge of the board, in direct contact with the Swedish "cross".
Goal of the Game [ edit ]
The Swedes win if the king escapes to any of the fields at the edge of the board.
The Muscovites win if they capture the king.
Movement and Capture [ edit ]
Any piece may move any number of vacant spaces in any straight line [←↑→↓], but not diagonally. (Cf. the rook in chess.)
No piece may ever pass over another piece in its path.
An enemy piece is captured and removed from the board if you move one of your pieces so that the enemy piece becomes surrounded on two opposite sides (horizontally or vertically - not diagonally) by two of your pieces. The king is also captured in this way, except in a few select cases where he is protected by the castle. A piece may be moved in between two enemy pieces without being captured.
Capturing around the Castle [ edit ]
When the castle is not occupied by the king, it is "hostile" to all soldiers - attackers and defenders. This means that an enemy soldier may be captured by pinning it (horizontally or vertically) between one of one's own pieces and the castle.
If the king is on a square adjoining the castle (horizontally or vertically) he must be surrounded on the three remaining sides by his enemies.
If the king is inside the castle, he is not captured until he is surrounded on all four sides.
If the king is in the castle and surrounded on three sides by attackers, but protected by a defender on the last side, it is possible to capture the last defender by pinning it between an attacker piece and the occupied castle.
The latter is the only situation in which the attackers may capture a defender against the occupied castle. The defenders may capture an attacker between one of their own and the occupied castle, since the king then participates in capturing.
Moving through the Castle [ edit ]
The only unclarity in the modern translation of the tablut rules concerns the castle. Resultantly, tablut is currently played in two variants: In one variant, the castle cannot be entered by anyone, not even the king, once the king has left it. In another variant, the king may re-enter the castle, and both attackers and defenders may pass through it but not stop in it.[35]
Warning Rules [ edit ]
If the king should ever have an unimpeded path to the edge of the board, he must call out "raichi" (modern spelling: rájgge), meaning "opening" or "hole", and If he has two paths of escape, then he must call out "tuichu" (modern spelling. dujgu) (Cf. "check" and "checkmate" in chess.)
Tawlbwrdd [ edit ]
This variant was played in Wales. It is described as being played with 8 pieces on the king's side and 16 on the attacker's side. Robert ap Ifan documented it with a drawing in a manuscript dated 1587. His version was played on an 11×11 board with 12 pieces on the king's side and 24 pieces on the opponent's side. His passage states:[36]
The above tawlbwrdd should be played with a king in the centre and twelve men in the places next to him, and twenty-four men seek to capture him. These are placed, six in the centre of each side of the board and in the six central positions. And two move the men in the game, and if one [piece] belonging to the king comes between the attackers, he is dead and is thrown out of the game, and the same if one of the attackers comes between two of the king’s men in the same manner. And if the king himself comes between two of the attackers, and if you say ‘Watch your king’ before he moves to that space, and he is unable to escape, you capture him. If the other says ‘I am your liegeman’ and goes between two, there is no harm. If the king can go along the [illegible] line, that side wins the game.
Other modern games in the tafl family [ edit ]
Certain modern board games not generally referred to as "tafl", "tablut" or "hnefatafl" have nevertheless been based on tablut rules, or the rules of other tafl games reconstructed on the basis of tablut. They bear significant resemblance to the other tafl games, but with some important differences.
Around 1960, Milton Bradley published Swords and Shields, which was essentially Tablut as recorded by Linnaeus and erroneously translated by Troilius, but with the Swedes transformed into shields (with a king shield) and the Muscovites transformed into swords.
Breakthru was developed in the 1960s as part of the 3M bookshelf game series. It features tafl-like symmetry,[37] but with twelve defenders plus one "flagship" (cf. king) pitted against twenty attackers upon a tiered board, so that the objective of the defenders is to escort the flagship from the centre to the outer zone of the board.[38] Apart from the distinction of the inner zone and outer zone, there are no distinctive spaces on the Breakthru board. Breakthru also features a distinctive double move, whereas no evidence points to such a move in any of the historical games.
Thud, a modern game inspired by a series of fantasy novels by Terry Pratchett (which in turn were inspired by the historical tafl games), also features the general symmetry of tafl games, although it is played on an octagonal board with only eight defenders pitted against thirty-two attackers. Thud also features a "Thudstone" (cf. konakis), but no kingpiece. There are also important differences in the moves and attacks in Thud.
Balance of play [ edit ]
There have long been controversies concerning imbalance of the game, as rules for certain modern tafl games strongly favor the defenders.[39] This imbalance results from a mistranslation of Linnaeus' rules for tablut, a Sámi tafl game from the 1700s, which were subsequently used as the basis for reconstructions of rules for medieval tafl. Newer translations of Linnaeus' tablut rules reveal a balanced game.[40] After this change, tablut can be said to be slightly in favor of the attackers rather than the defenders: according to statistics, the attackers overall win marginally more often (on average 9% more).[41]
There are several rule modifications that have been made to produce more balanced play than in the mistranslation of the tablut rules. These include a weaponless king (the king cannot participate in captures), escape to the corners (rather than to the edges), or hostile attacker camps (the king and defenders may be captured against a vacant attacker camp square).[42] Schmittberger (1992) even reveals some workarounds to produce more balanced play without modifying the rules of gameplay.
One such solution is by bidding: Players take turns bidding on how many moves it will take them to win the game. The lowest bidder gets the king. Thus, one player may open with a bid of 15 turns, the other player may counter with a bid of 14 turns, and the first player, more confident in his ability to escape in 13 rounds than in his ability to contain for 14, may bid 13 and take the king's side. If that player does not escape within 13 turns, the other player wins.[43] Another workaround is to play a two-round match, in which players switch sides after the first round. If the king escapes both rounds, the winner is the player whose king escaped in the fewest turns.[44]
Tafl in saga literature [ edit ]
Sweden An illustration of people playing a Tafl game, from the Ockelbo Runestone
Hnefatafl was mentioned in several of the medieval sagas, including Orkneyinga saga, Friðþjófs saga, Hervarar saga, and others. These three period treatments of Hnefatafl offer some important clues about the game, while numerous other incidental references to Hnefatafl or Tafl exist in saga literature.[45] Sagas help indicate the widespread use of board games just by mentioning them—although rituals varied in the Viking period from region to region, there were some underlying basics to culture. The fact that the sagas mention board games indicates this use because the sagas are read and understood by a very large audience.
In Orkeyinga saga, the notability of Hnefatafl is evident in the nine boasts of Jarl Rögnvald Kali Kolsson, who tops his list with skill at Tafl.[46] In Friðþjófs saga, a conversation over a game of Hnefatafl reveals that the king's men are red and the attackers white, and that the word hnefi does indeed refer to the kingpiece.[47] The most revealing – and yet most ambiguous – clues to Hnefatafl lie in a series of riddles posed by a character identified as Odin in disguise (see Gestumblindi) in Hervarar saga.[48]
One riddle, as stated in Hauksbók, refers to "the weaponless maids who fight around their lord, the [brown/red] ever sheltering and the [fair/white] ever attacking him", although there is controversy over whether the word weaponless refers to the maids or, as in other versions, to the king himself, which may support the argument that a "weaponless king" cannot take part in captures (see Balance of play below).[48] One may also note that the assignment of the colours of brown or red to the defenders and fair or white to the attackers is consistent with Friðþjófs saga.
Another of Gestumblindi's riddles asks, "What is that beast all girded with iron, which kills the flocks? He has eight horns but no head, and runs as he pleases."[49] Here, it is the answer that is controversial, as the response has been variously translated as: "It is the húnn in hnefatafl. He has the name of a bear and runs when he is thrown;" or, "It is the húnn in hnefatafl. He has the name of a bear and escapes when he is attacked."[50] The first problem is in translating the word húnn, which may refer to a die (as suggested by the former translation), the "eight horns" referring to the eight corners of a six-sided die and "the flocks" that he kills referring to the stakes the players lose.[51] Alternatively, húnn may refer to the king, his "eight horns" referring to the eight defenders, which is more consistent with the latter translation, "He has the name of a bear and escapes when he is attacked."[52] Ultimately, the literary references prove inconclusive on the use of dice in Hnefatafl.
Tafl in archeological finds [ edit ]
There have been many archeological discoveries of tafl games and gaming pieces found in various Warrior Burials. One example was a wooden board and a single gaming piece made of horn found in a ship burial at Gokstad in southeastern Norway. Another example was twenty-two gaming pieces made of whalebone found in the Orkneys.[53]
It is believed that there is a connection between warrior status and the playing of board games. There is also a connection between the value of military strategy and skill to playing a board game.
The material used to make both the board game and the gaming pieces has varied: from walrus ivory to bone to amber to wood.[54]
In some boat burials there have been wooden board games found. There have been very few actual boards found in these burials, implying that having these board games included was extremely rare. However, this is believed to be due to wood readily being destroyed by cremation fires or decaying over time.
Legacy [ edit ]
The first major attempt to revitalize tafl was the publication of "The Viking Game" in 1981. This was essentially the Sámi game tablut of the 1700s, as mistranslated by Troilius in 1811, and with the modern innovation that the king's escape possibilities were limited to the corners. The latter was done in order to compensate for the imbalanced gameplay resulting from the notion that the king must be surrounded on all four sides. In "The Viking Game" the pieces drawn by Linneaeus, which reflected traditional Sámi game piece design (see: Tablut), had been replaced by pieces influenced by Norse medieval aesthetics. The game booklet did not inform players that the rules were drawn from the Sámi game tablut, and claimed that "hnefatafl" was last played "in Lapland in 1732" without mentioning the Sámi at all. The Sámi game terminology such as "raichi", "tuichu" and "konokis" was also not included in the booklet.
This game did much to spark the interest in tafl games, and also began the modern evolution of the game as players attempted to remedy the game which was still unbalanced in the king's favor.[55]
In 2008, Hnefatafl was revived by Peter Kelly in the island of Fetlar in Shetland, where the annual World Quickplay Hnefatafl Championships are now held each summer under the auspices of the Fetlar Hnefatafl Panel. The term "quickplay" refers to the time limit of ten seconds per move, marked by the sounding of a gong.[56] The Fetlar rules were for some time the standard in international hnefatafl play, but have since largely been superseded by Copenhagen Hnefatafl, which builds on Fetlar Hnefatafl.[57]
After the rules for tablut were retranslated and published online (2007-2013), this historical game has also gained in popularity. A tournament was held in England in 2017.[58]
Tafl games can be played online on sites similar to Chess.com. Aage Nielsen created his site in 1998, and currently hosts the World Tafl Federation Hnefatafl Championship Tournament.[59] Another Hnefatafl game site was launched in 2014, by Jacob Teal and John Carlyle. Variants of tafl playable online today include Copenhagen Hnefatafl, Tablut, and many others.
See also [ edit ]
Alea evangelii—an Anglo-Saxon variant documented in a medieval manuscript
Breakthru—a modern game inspired by Tafl games
Fidchell—an ancient Irish board game
Fox games—e.g. Fox and geese
Game of the Gods—a Norse literary motif
Tables—an unrelated board game with a similar name
Thud—a modern game inspired by Tafl games
Notes [ edit ]prech Profile Joined March 2014 United States 2947 Posts #2 Poll: Heart?
Jaehoon (4)
50%
Sea (4)
50%
8 total votes (4)50%(4)50%8 total votes Your vote: Heart? (Vote): Sea
(Vote): Jaehoon
Poll: Head?
Sea (5)
63%
Jaehoon (3)
38%
8 total votes (5)63%(3)38%8 total votes Your vote: Head? (Vote): Sea
(Vote): Jaehoon
Liquipedia
TheGreatOne Profile Joined November 2005 United States 502 Posts #3 Jaehoon! Live life and enjoy every day and always be thankful for God and his blessings!!!! :)
TerranOwnsAll Profile Joined January 2014 353 Posts #4 Sea! Man, I miss how dominant seige tanks were in SC1. Wish they would bring that back in SC2
Probemicro Profile Joined February 2014 3708 Posts #5 a chance for jaehoon to redeem himself with a legitimate amateur title
nG.Templar Profile Joined May 2015 France 32 Posts #6 Go Go Jaehoon! [ Iccup ID : nG.TemplAr ] Fan boy of : Baby ~ FireBatHero ~ PianO ~ JangBi ~ Free ~ sAviOr ~ Jaedong
FlaShFTW Profile Blog Joined February 2010 United States 8205 Posts #7 god this is tough... both players have played nothing but PvT or TvP... but if I had to give it to someone, I'm giving it to Jaehoon. He played against 2 of the best terrans right now in Last and Mong. Sea only had to play Shuttle in Ro8 and did beat Free. 3-2 either way, but I'm thinking Jaehoon wins this. Unless he does another Bermuda recall, in which case Sea wins. We'll see this is super tough. Writer #1 KT and FlaSh Fanboy || Woo Jung Ho Never Forget || Author of the SC:R Power Rank
Jenia6109 Profile Blog Joined December 2008 Russian Federation 1578 Posts #8 Enigma Toss! INnoVation TY Maru | Classic Stats Dear sOs Zest herO | Rogue Dark soO
Foxxan Profile Joined October 2004 Sweden 3408 Posts #9 pretty dissapointing semi-finals imo.
Was not impressed by jaehoon. More impressed by sea.
I think sea has the better lategame and also a better "setup" towards getting everything needed; factories, 3base, starport SV.
This is based on very small sample size.
Sea will take it.
Probemicro Profile Joined February 2014 3708 Posts #10 finals will start after ssl11 final match end
Foxxan Profile Joined October 2004 Sweden 3408 Posts Last Edited: 2015-06-07 12:40:08 #11 offline? :S
Stream is lagging when it goes online. T_T;
Anyone know a better stream or something?
tanngard Profile Joined April 2011 Norway 1193 Posts #12 Why so early gg!? This makes me dislike Jaehoon again...
Probemicro Profile Joined February 2014 3708 Posts #13 On June 07 2015 21:51 tanngard wrote:
Why so early gg!? This makes me dislike Jaehoon again...
yeah he basically ragequit when his 2 arbiters got emp-ed and still has 3k minerals in the bank..
yeah he basically ragequit when his 2 arbiters got emp-ed and still has 3k minerals in the bank..
tanngard Profile Joined April 2011 Norway 1193 Posts #14 On June 07 2015 21:38 Foxxan wrote:
offline? :S
Stream is lagging when it goes online. T_T;
Anyone know a better stream or something?
Hiya is restreaming on snipealot, it has quality options if you have slow internet Hiya is restreaming on snipealot, it has quality options if you have slow internet
tanngard Profile Joined April 2011 Norway 1193 Posts #15 On June 07 2015 21:53 Probemicro wrote:
Show nested quote +
On June 07 2015 21:51 tanngard wrote:
Why so early gg!? This makes me dislike Jaehoon again...
yeah he basically ragequit when his 2 arbiters got emp-ed and still has 3k minerals in the bank..
yeah he basically ragequit when his 2 arbiters got emp-ed and still has 3k minerals in the bank..
Weird to ragequit when 500 dollars is on the line. Sure things looked bad when his arbiters got emp-ed, but in starcraft you need to keep your head cool and fight to the end - unless you want fans to hate you Weird to ragequit when 500 dollars is on the line. Sure things looked bad when his arbiters got emp-ed, but in starcraft you need to keep your head cool and fight to the end - unless you want fans to hate you
Probemicro Profile Joined February 2014 3708 Posts #16 zzz looks like failhoon showed up to the finals -_-
whaski Profile Joined December 2012 Finland 136 Posts #17 2-0 already... But Aztec can save Jaehoon. it's not just a music it's something else
tanngard Profile Joined April 2011 Norway 1193 Posts #18 I came in late - how did sea's tanks and vultures get up behind jaehoons natural?
whaski Profile Joined December 2012 Finland 136 Posts #19 12 nex failhoon... And down it goes! it's not just a music it's something else
whaski Profile Joined December 2012 Finland 136 Posts #20 And Dt-fail :D it's not just a music it's something else
1 2 Next AllCAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.- Forty-five years after the first Apollo lunar landing, the United States remains divided about the moon’s role in future human space exploration.
Ten more U.S. astronauts followed Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin’s July 20, 1969, visit to the moon before the Apollo program was canceled in 1972. No one has been back since.
The most recent effort to return astronauts to the moon ended in 2010 when the Obama White House axed an underfunded program of the previous administration called Constellation. Instead, NASA was directed to begin planning for a human expedition to an asteroid.
That initiative, slated for 2025, also includes a robotic precursor mission to redirect a small asteroid or piece of a larger asteroid into a high lunar orbit.
Astronauts would then rendezvous with the relocated asteroid and pick up samples for return to Earth. The missions are intended as steppingstones for eventual human expeditions to Mars.
This path, however, is fraught with technological cul-de-sacs that do not directly contribute to radiation protection, landing systems, habitats and other projects needed to build the road to Mars, a National Research Council panel concluded in June.
After a three-year study of different options for human space exploration, the panel said a more viable and sustainable path would be to return to the moon.
"The moon, and in particular its surface, (has) significant advantages over other targets as an intermediate step on the road to the horizon goal of Mars," the council’s Committee on Human Spaceflight wrote in a report.
"Although some have dismissed the moon as no longer interesting because humans have visited it before, this is similar to considering the New World to have been adequately explored after the first four voyages of Columbus."
NASA considers the moon "the purview of other nations’ space programs," and "not of interest to the U.S. human space exploration program," the report said.
"This argument is made despite the barely touched scientific record of the earliest solar system that lies hidden in the lunar crust, despite its importance as a place to develop the capabilities required to go to Mars, and despite the fact that the technical capabilities and operational expertise of Apollo belong to our grandparent’s generation," the report added.
Under current plans, it will be another 11 years before U.S. astronauts travel beyond the International Space Station, a permanently staffed research laboratory that flies about 260 miles (420 km) above Earth. A mission to Mars is at least a decade or more beyond that – if it happens at all.
"It is clear to me that we will not be able to build a long-term research base on Mars if we don’t first do it on the moon," planetary scientist Chris McKay wrote in a paper entitled "The Case for a NASA Research Base on the Moon" that was published last year in the journal New Space.
"New technologies and approaches and increased international interest in the moon make the time right to consider pushing for a base that is 10 times less expensive than previous base designs," McKay added in an email.
Development of the Orion space capsule, Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket and launch pad renovations at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida currently cost NASA more than $3 billion a year.
Ultimately, the hurdles on the path to Mars are political, not technical, in nature, the National Research Council report concludes.
"Probably the most significant single factor in allowing progress beyond low Earth orbit is the development of a strong national (and international) consensus about the pathway to be undertaken and sustained discipline in not tampering with that plan over many administrations and Congresses," the panel said.This week @AIESema, @MaxTheGrey and Astromech EPC-2-3 discuss the latest Rakghoul event and talk about some of the hidden and special elements that you may have missed. We’ll also talk about our opinions on it and predictions for when and how it might return. We also cover our quick tips for the week for Galactic Starfighter and, of course, talk about what we have been up to.
Dangerously inaccurate and unsubstantiated rumor of the week: Jeelvic the Jawa is actually the source of the Rakghoul plague outbreaks and is using them as a business opportunity.
Direct podcast download link.
Are you a mature, team player interested in a supportive community? Come join AIE!
On Jedi Covenant, find Max playing as: Imperial (Max’z, Mhax, Mhaxs, Mhaxz) Republic (Maxz, Maxxz, M’axz) and Sema playing as: Imperial (Maurienne, Enne) Republic (Semaperdu)
Podcast theme music by Dan-O at DanoSongs.com"JAMES" wants people to know men suffer from domestic violence too.
The 61-year-old - who has to go by a pseudonym for legal reasons - feels the services available unfairly cater for women.
James (pictured) claims he has been the victim of domestic violence after he split from his former partner last December. He claims she had hit him with a wine bottle months earlier, but he forgave her as "I loved her".
Since then, he says he has "copped a beating and endured financial and mental torture". But his cries for help to authorities didn't receive the same amount of attention they would have - if he was a woman, he said.
Domestic Violence Connect CEO Diane Mangan acknowledged there were fewer services for men, but this was because the numbers of men needing help were so much lower.
DV Connect's Women's line is open 24/7 while the men's line was only open from 9am to midnight.
RELATED: '24/7 domestic violence helpline for men too costly'
Ms Mangan said the women's line received about 60,000 calls a year while "the men's line is 10% of that".
James said the system in place for men was "very limited", while the system for women was "astronomical".
Male support group One in Three argues one in every third case of domestic violence involves men, yet the government funding is unfairly skewed to women.
Researcher Greg Andresen said a bare minimum of "basic services" needed to be available to everyone, regardless of gender.
James said while the attacks on women were far greater, "I am still human and I have similar human rights. It's not a nice place to be (when you're being abused by your partner)".
He said he was kicked out of his former partner's home and had been unable to find shelter elsewhere. James has been seeing a psychologist - paid for by Centrelink - but felt like he was little more than a "CRN number".
"There is no housing for me. If I was a woman, something would be available."
VIOLENCE IN SPOTLIGHT
At least one in three victims of family violence is male
One male is a victim of domestic homicide every 10 days
Almost one in four young people are aware of their mum/stepmum hitting their dad/stepdad
Male and female victims of reported domestic assault receive very similar numbers and types of injuries
Males are almost three times less likely to report being a victim of domestic violence to the police
Post-separation, similar proportions of men and women report experiencing physical violence, including threats by their former spouse
Source: One in Three campaign
Men looking for help can contact the DV Connect Mensline on 1800 600 636 between 9am and midnight seven days a week.Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
April 24, 2016, 3:09 PM GMT / Updated April 24, 2016, 3:09 PM GMT By Mike Brunker
A Georgia mom is helping to lead the charge to expand the state’s limited medical marijuana law, which she says unfairly excludes many patients with severe medical conditions — including her 5-year-old autistic daughter — who could benefit from the plant’s medicinal properties.
“There are some pretty tenacious parents who are fighting,” said Jennifer Conforti, whose daughter, Abby, isn’t covered by the current law. “... Why wouldn’t you do that as a legislator? What is in it for you to make you not want to help families in the state?”
Second of two parts
Georgia is one of 17 conservative states in the Midwest and South that have passed so-called "CBD-only" medical marijuana laws since 2014. The laws allow patients with certain medical conditions to legally use products derived from the marijuana plant that are high in cannabidiol (CBD) but low in tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which produces the “high” associated with consumption of the plant.
The messiness of medical marijuana lawmaking -- amid conflicting medical opinions and increasing public demand for access -- is amply illustrated by the situation in Georgia, where a civil disobedience campaign is underway to try to force legislators to expand the state’s CBD-only law.
Georgia’s law, approved with overwhelming support last year in the state Legislature and enthusiastically embraced by the state’s conservative Republican Gov. Nathan Deal at the time, illustrates how quickly the political winds have shifted since the adoption of a rash of CBD-only laws began two years ago.
State Rep. Allen Peake, a Republican from Macon, earned the honorific of “godfather” of Georgia’s medical marijuana movement by proposing a bill in early 2014 to legalize so-called “CBD-only” products derived from pot.
The bill would have allowed residents with glaucoma, cancer and seizure disorders to legally use products containing CBD, as long as they contained no more than 0.3 percent of THC.
That bill failed, but Peake returned last year with HB 1, which expanded the list of treatable conditions to eight — seizure disorders; Crohn’s disease; mitochondrial disease; severe or end-stage ALS; multiple sclerosis; Parkinson’s disease; sickle cell disease; and cancer – and raised the allowable THC level in the CBD products to 5 percent.
'We're going to make a difference'
This time the bill won overwhelming approval in both houses of the Georgia Legislature. It was signed into law a year ago by Gov. Deal, who choked up at the signing ceremony, as dozens of children with debilitating conditions and their families looked on.
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal, center, signs a medical marijuana bill into law as the bill's sponsor, Rep. Allen Peake, R-Macon, left, and Sen. Butch Miller, R-Gainesville, right, look on during a ceremony on April 16, 2015, in Atlanta. David Goldman / AP file
“This certainly has touched my heart,” Deal said, his voice cracking. “And I’m pleased today we’re going to make a difference.”
But as in many other states with CBD-only laws, Georgia’s law didn’t establish a system for cultivation, processing or distribution, leaving patients with the choice of not using CBD products or violating state or federal law by traveling across state lines or using the mail to get them.
And like laws in other states, it quickly ran into opposition from residents who said it either unfairly excluded their medical condition or didn’t provide any relief because of the low THC levels allowed.
“I was still worried that the Department of Family Services would take my daughter away. I was still worried the sheriff … would show up at my door and arrest me."
Conforti recalled that after an incident at school in which Abby had to be restrained by three teachers who carried her out to her car “like a battering ram,” she decided to try a cannabis oil to treat her autism. After doing some research and making some phone calls, she was able to obtain some oil.
“I was still worried that the Department of Family Services would take my daughter away. I was still worried the sheriff... would show up at my door and arrest me... but after I saw her teachers walking her out like that, that was it. I didn’t care anymore,” she said.
Jennifer Conforti feeds Abby. Before Conforti started using cannabis oil to treat her daughter's self-harming rages, she tried various diets: "Gluten-free, dairy-free, dye-free, soy-free, every different kind of free there is," she said. "And none of it made any difference." John Brecher / NBC News
Conforti said the oil immediately controlled the violent “rages” and severe biting triggered by her daughter’s autism.
“I ended up giving her her first dose and weaning her off her seizure meds, and I’m telling you the raging stopped, completely stopped,” she said.
Conforti said that by experimenting with different products she eventually was able to zero in on the best dose for Abby’s condition, which is far higher in THC than allowed by Georgia’s law.
“For Abby, the best ratio or component mixture is at least 70 to 75 percent combination of THCa (tetrahydrocannabinolic acid) and THC,” she said. “She has a neurological issue in her brain and the THCa and THC help to calm those nerve synapses so her brain can calm down and perform better.”
An oral syringe that Conforti uses to measure the twice-daily dose of cannabis oil she gives her daughter. John Brecher / NBC News
Rep. Peake led an effort this year to relax the THC limit, authorize in-state cultivation and distribution of CBD products and expand the list of treatable conditions to include HIV/AIDS, PTSD, autism, Tourette’s syndrome and several others.
But this time the legislation received a much cooler reception.
First in-state cultivation was removed by a House committee. Then the state Senate’s Health and Human Services Committee failed to vote on the measure and send it to the full Senate before the Legislature adjourned on March 24.
Gov. Deal also did not support the bill this time around, reportedly because of the in-state cultivation clause.
“There is no appetite to move any legislation, sign any legislation, or even gather additional information to write legislation on this issue,” his chief of staff, Chris Riley, told Peake in a November 2015 email obtained by NBC affiliate WXIA.
What changed in Georgia in the year since Deal put his signature on HB 1?
Opponents of the legislation – including law enforcement and anti-drug abuse groups – regrouped after last year’s defeat and mounted a campaign to undercut support for the law and “educate” legislators about the lack of hard science behind THC products.
Part 1: 'No-Buzz' Medical Pot Laws Prove Problematic for Patients, Lawmakers
That effort, conducted under the umbrella of the “Let’s Be Clear Georgia” coalition and documented in a recent presentation titled “How Georgia Avoided Commercial Marijuana,” included distribution of a list of “12 Myths of Medical Marijuana” to legislators.
Foes also noted that Peake’s update would remove the law’s THC limit and argued that would open the door for “legalized cultivation, processing and distribution of marijuana so that CBD could be extracted.”
“(These laws) are poorly written by people who don’t understand the process of approving a drug.”
Sue Rusche, president and CEO of the Atlanta-based drug prevention organization National Families in Action, whose group was active in the coalition, said the overall message was that CBD-only medical marijuana laws like Georgia’s “don’t work for a whole lot of reasons” — including uncertain science and the possibility of contaminated products.
“They are poorly written by people who don’t understand the process of approving a drug,” she told NBC News.
Calls by NBC News seeking comment from Deal and state Sen. Renee Unterman, who declined to send the bill to the full Senate, were not returned.
Chuck Spahos, executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, who testified against Peake's bill, called it “the most inartfully written piece of legislation I have read in my |
movie, written by The Empire Strikes Back and The Force Awakens co-writer Lawrence Kasdan and directed by The LEGO Movie's Phil Lord and Chris Miller, and a third as-yet-untitled project scheduled for 2020. That's besides episodes eight and nine, which will be directed by Looper's Rian Johnson and Jurassic World's Colin Trevorrow respectively.
"You can recognise when a film-maker really, really cares about what they're doing," says Kennedy. "I felt that about Colin. Rian's an unbelievably smart, fascinating film-maker, and he's done a beautiful job on Episode VIII. He's introduced some new things and new ideas. That's what I want. That's what is exciting about bringing in this new variety of talent - you always want to be surprised."
That, Kennedy says, is the whole reasoning behind the Story Group, behind the Digital Backlot. It's the same instinct that she developed as a producer: to liberate storytellers - whatever the platform - to be creative. To let their imaginations run wild, then let her make it real.
Kennedy (second left) with cast and crew members on the Rogue One set Allstar
Read next When neural networks name planets, they call them Tina When neural networks name planets, they call them Tina
"What has been so wonderful about Kathy is there was a real creative freedom from the start," says Johnson. "She gave me a script for The Force Awakens and then sat down and said, 'So what happens next?' That was the last thing I was expecting."
Edwards remembers a pivotal meeting early in the development of Rogue One. "We made a big assumption at the very beginning," says Edwards. "And Kathy, I remember in one meeting, turned around and went, 'Well, why are you assuming that? We can do what we want.' It changed the direction of the film. Our film is not your average blockbuster. It takes a few more risks. Kathy was very supportive of that and defended it to everybody."
"I think what this movie is going to do is say to the audience: Star Wars is going to go many, many different places. These movies are not all going to look alike. They're all going to be very different," says Kennedy.
Not every film-maker is the right fit - such was the case with one aborted anthology project that was being helmed by director Josh Trank, before he reportedly ran into problems on the set of Fantastic Four. "At a certain point you just develop this sixth sense of where you know it's either starting to click into gear or it's not," says Kennedy.
"You've got to convince Kathy," says Edwards. "But once you've got her, you're invincible."
”It's one thing to come in and say you want to do Star Wars. It's another to say, specifically, this is something that I love about Star Wars and I feel like I could really own it" Kiri Hart, Lucasfilm’s vice president
Lucasfilm is not just Star Wars. When Kathleen Kennedy inherited the company from George Lucas, she also took over Industrial Light & Magic. ILM has long been a creative force in the industry - moving on from Jurassic Park to create dozens of visually groundbreaking films, from the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy to the Marvel films. That airport fight in Captain America: Civil War? ILM created it almost entirely digitally. (Try watching it again knowing that Spider-Man in that sequence isn't real.)
But Star Wars is ILM's raison d'etre. And, with Lucasfilm and ILM sharing a physical space, it can use the franchise to explore its most innovative work. "Usually for a visual effects company, you're very hand to mouth," says Brennan. "You're trying to figure out how to get a technology ready that's going to appear in a year or 18 months. Being able to know we can really invest in technology that it's going to take a little bit longer to come to fruition."
One example is ILMxLAB, the company's new advanced technology division established under Kennedy to explore the potential for alternative technologies in storytelling, such as virtual reality. "The idea with ILMxLAB is to explore what storytelling looks like in these new, immersive worlds," says Bredow.
Early in the lab's creation, the team had Kennedy test a VR experience they were working on. "We took the Millennium Falcon we had just done for Episode VII and we landed it on her head," laughs Bredow. "Skywalker Sound came in and set up 12 speakers - suitable for a large-scale movie theatre. It shook the whole building." They rigged up a wind machine, a suggestion from one of Disney's Imagineers. "She took the headset off and said: now that's what I'm talking about!"
That test became Trials on Tatooine, Lucasfilm's first VR experience in which visitors (as xLAB calls them) are put in the shoes of a Jedi in training. It's only a few minutes long, but it gives a revealing glimpse of what ILM is doing. The assets are film-quality; it really feels like you're standing beneath Han Solo's spaceship. When the xLAB team took the experience to Star Wars Celebration and watched thousands of fans flick on their lightsabers in VR for the first time, every single face was grinning like a child.
ILMxLAB's work includes augmented-reality experiences Allstar
ILMxLAB is now working with Batman Begins writer David S Goyer on a Darth Vader VR experience, and is working closely with the secretive AR startup Magic Leap on mixed-reality experiences. But the group's experiments aren't just impacting how the Star Wars franchise will live on in virtual reality, or in Disney's imminent Star Wars attractions. They're also changing how Star Wars films are made.
Rogue One follows Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones), the leader of a band of misfit rebels tasked with working out the Death Star's weakness. There's a family connection too: Erso's father is one of the battle station's designers. As Edwards had pitched it: if The Force Awakens is grand melodrama, Rogue One is a second-world-war movie, gritty and chaotic. On Monsters and Godzilla, Edwards was known for using handheld shots and unexpected angles - something shared by Greig Fraser, the film's director of photography. "They'll be searching for camera angles the whole time. It's very natural - it gives it a sort of earthy realness," says animation supervisor Hal Hickel.
So, early in Rogue One's production, ILM built virtual sets for several of the film's locations that Edwards and his production designer could explore inside an HTC Vive. "The first time we did it, he was visualising the inside of the U-wing [starfighter]," says Bredow. The art team had been working for weeks, translating concept art into a digital model. "We took the rough model that we had and put it in VR, and we put Gareth in the goggles. After two minutes, he said, 'This looks way better in real life.'"
These new tools translated over to filming. "We'll pre-animate a section of, say, X-wings diving on an Imperial facility, and then we'll bring that on to our motion capture stage, and he can view it through a camera viewfinder," says Hickle. "The action just keeps looping, so he can walk around it just like he can with actors on set and find cool angles. It's great to give them real-time tools they can use the same way they're used to with a live-action process."
Those tools will go on to have a life for ILM's other clients - both within Disney and the wider industry. But just as the Story Group is about building a foundation for a narrative universe, Star Wars is providing a testing ground for the company to innovate from. It's changing not just how Star Wars is made, but how movies are made, period.
Much of that comes from Kennedy's drive to push boundaries. "One of my favourite quotes from Kathy: she is always saying that good is the enemy of great. If it's not great, why are we doing it?" says Brennan. "She wants to make sure every time Star Wars touches any platform - whether it's a book, a game, a consumer product, or immersive entertainment - it has a reason for being on that platform, and that it ties in with the story."
ILMxLAB is exploring mixed reality and theme-park rides Photoshot
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If making The Force Awakens exerted a toll on Kennedy, it doesn't show. She's confident, funny, a natural leader. (At school, she played American football. On the boy's team. As quarterback.) "It's a similar feeling I remember having had making E.T. many years ago, where there's so much a sense of overload happening that you get kind of numb," she says. Well, not quite the same: as a novice producer making E.T., Kennedy would be physically sick from nerves.
"[The Force Awakens] was a tremendous weight on her shoulders," says Marshall. "I think she felt a huge responsibility of maintaining the legacy and taking care of Star Wars on George's behalf. But she always approaches these things with a great enthusiasm and a sense of humour. She was the same on E.T. as she was on Star Wars: always trying to make the movie better."
"I think George knew that Kathy could handle the pressure of running Lucasfilm," says Abrams. "She has an animal instinct to produce. She intuits and identifies problems and within milliseconds takes action to address them."
Kennedy knows that the film industry is undergoing a foundational shift again, not for the first time in her career. That's one of the reasons she took over from Lucas: to help shape its future. "When we made E.T., nobody was talking about the foreign market to the extent they do today. Now, from a standpoint of business, you have to do that," says Kennedy. "But I don't feel drastically different about how I approach things."
Of course, the difference is that back then, when she talked to directors about their childhood inspirations, they'd mention the same directors she loved growing up: David Lean, Antonioni, Truffaut. Now, they'll talk about Kathleen Kennedy movies.
"Kathy and Frank were two of the first producers' names I recognised as a kid," says Johnson.
"I had a shelf of VHS tapes, and on it were Star Wars and Kathy Kennedy movies," says Edwards.
"That's really weird," says Kennedy, laughing. "It makes me feel old."
" Star Wars is going to go many, many different places. These movies are not all going to look alike. They're all going to be very different" Kathleen Kennedy, Lucasfilm president
At Lucasfilm, Kennedy is trying to create for a new generation of storytellers the environment that she and Spielberg had in those early days at Amblin and Kennedy/Marshall, when they weren't fretting about China's box office or licensing deals. Sitting around with Spielberg and Marshall, figuring out how to make Raiders of the Lost Ark. ("I remember reading the script and saying, 'That's amazing, but I've no idea how we're going to do it.'") That's always been her gift. Whether the story is a movie, a comic or a VR experience is beside the point. The point is the story. The point is: if the next Spielberg comes to Lucasfilm and wants to see a dinosaur run, she'll find a way.
"The story of Kathy relayed to me when I joined was the story of her making Jurassic Park," says Bredow. "Her mandate was: look for our next dinosaur."
"I've been around long enough that I've had moments where I step back and say: 'Oh my god, that's a game changer. That allows us to tell stories in a way that we never could have imagined,'" says Kennedy, in a rare moment of reflection. Then she smiles. "I want to be a part of that, over and over again, until I can't do this any more."Now that certain PSN services have been restored and you’re once again enjoying online gaming, it seems a good time to confirm what is being offered as part of the Welcome Back programme.
Once we restore PlayStation Store, which will be just a little while longer, you will have the opportunity to claim your Welcome Back gifts. Please note that the Welcome Back programme is only available for those countries with access to PlayStation Store*.
All existing PlayStation Network members will be able to access the following from PlayStation Store*:
Two PS3 games from the following list:
LittleBigPlanet
Infamous*
Wipeout HD/Fury
Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty
Dead Nation*
For those with PSP accounts, you will also be eligible to download two PSP games from the following list:
LittleBigPlanet PSP
ModNation PSP
Pursuit Force
Killzone Liberation*
– 30 days free PlayStation Plus membership for non PS Plus subscribers*
– Existing PlayStation Plus subscribers will be given 60 days free subscription.
– For existing Music Unlimited subscribers, you will be given 30 days free subscription.
– We are working on a Welcome Back offer in PlayStation Home and will share that when it is confirmed.
I would like to thank all of the developers and publishers involved in this programme for their support in making this happen. We certainly couldn’t have done it without you.
You will be able to access this content once PlayStation Store comes back online and we are doing everything we can to make that happen as soon as possible.
Thank you for your support and keep checking back on the blog for more information.Demetrious Johnson's style is no secret. Inside the cage, the UFC flyweight champion blends his many tools into a cyclone of technical brilliance -- mystifying footwork and unrivaled speed joining together in one unassailable package. Johnson's approach may not always translate into fan enthusiasm, but hey, with four successive title defense and counting, there's no doubting its effectiveness.
Once the gloves come off though, Johnson's frenetic motor tends to shift into a milder sort. Rarely is the 28-year-old champion seen navigating the minefield of public callouts. Boisterous acts of bravado just are not his thing, nor any of the general feats of ruckusness upon which so many legends of the mic game built their reputation.
For Johnson, it's a tried and true formula: stay respectful, win, and eventually esteem will become a compulsory partner in your success.
So it's a curious thing, then, to hear Johnson explain that his non-competitive leanings -- his interests as a fan first -- fall right in line with the very bluster he avoids in his own professional life; that, aside from himself, the storyline he's eating up the most ahead of UFC 178 is not one of redemption or technical mastery, but rather, whether Irish braggart Conor McGregor can cash the checks his bulldog mouth has written for Dustin Poirier.
"I really, truly appreciate Conor McGregor's style -- his fighting style and the way he talks," Johnson said on Monday's edition of The MMA Hour. "The reason why is because he reminds me of a young Mike Tyson, a young Muhammad Ali, the way he talks.
"Like, I look at him and I don't see him talking trash. I look at him and I see him talking (about) what he sees, where he's like: ‘dude, I'm way faster, I move way better than you do, you're slow, I'm going to hit you hard' -- which, I believe all these things that he says are true. Like, I believe that his fighting style is good, he understands fighting, and not taking anything away from Dustin Poirier -- Dustin Poirier is a huge test -- I can appreciate somebody who can talk that stuff and he'll go in there and he'll back it up."
Indeed, with the smoldering theatrics between Jon Jones and Daniel Cormier now replaced by the quiet deference of Johnson and challenger Chris Cariaso, UFC 178 fight week in Las Vegas has a good chance of becoming the Conor McGregor show. The feud between the loquacious Irishman and his foil, Poirier, is just one of many narratives driving Saturday's pay-per-view, but McGregor has never been one to shy away from a microphone, and even Johnson is fascinated to see how far the young featherweight can take his act before it falters.
"The curious thing will be like, what if he loses?" Johnson mused. "They have so much hype behind Conor McGregor. If he loses then, you know, they'll look around like, ‘Well, we had a good run, Conor. Let's see what you got to say again.'
"So I'm more intrigued by that fight because I think that fight has more stakes going into it, because it's like, one, I'm pretty sure if Conor wins it, then he can be fighting ‘old man Swanson,' as he called him, Cub Swanson next. And then, who knows, he could be fighting Chad Mendes or Jose Aldo for the title after those two fight. We'll see."Structure of the ZRANB3 HNH domain
To gain structural insight into the ZRANB3 HNH domain, we solved the crystal structure of the C-terminal region of the ZRANB3 (residues 948-1067) by experimental phasing. The HNH structure contains two HNH molecules in the asymmetric unit that are structurally similar, with an RMSD of 0.76 Å over 117 equivalent Cα atoms. Each HNH molecule contains one two-stranded anti-parallel β-sheet (β1–β2) surrounded by eight helices (α1–α8). The structure adopts a ββα fold16, typically found in the HNH protein family. It also contains a non-catalytic zinc-finger coordinated with four cysteine residues (Fig. 1a and Supplementary Fig. 1), conserved in a subset of HNH proteins containing the C-x-x-C dyad14. A structural homology search using the DALI server17 identified the closest structural homologues of the ZRANB3 HNH domain as phage T4 endonuclease VII, a Holliday junction-specific resolvase (PDB code 1EN7; ref. 18), and the HNH nicking endonuclease from Geobacter metallireducens (PDB code 4H9D; ref. 19) (Fig. 1b). Interestingly, sequence comparisons with other zinc-finger containing HNH proteins revealed the presence of the HNH insert (Fig. 1c), specific to ZRANB3 and the self-standing HNH proteins found in Acidobacterium bacterium and Solibacter usitatus, but absent from other HNH proteins. Overlays of the ZRANB3 HNH structure with its closest structural homologues showed that this ZRANB3-specific HNH insert adopts a well-structured α-helical domain (Fig. 1a,d). Deletion of this domain led to the loss of ZRANB3 endonuclease activity (and a reduction, but not a complete loss of the ATPase activity, Fig. 1e and Supplementary Fig. 2a; Table 2), raising a possibility that it might be important for the structure-specific recognition of the DNA substrate.
Table 1: Summary of crystallographic statistics. Full size table
Table 2: Average rates of ATP hydrolysis determined by an NADH-coupled assay according to ref. 59. Full size table
DNA binding surface
Analysis of the electrostatic surface potential of the HNH domain revealed a predominantly electropositive face (Fig. 2a), with a continuous positively charged region encompassing helices α1 and α8, as well as helices α2 and α3 in the ZRANB3-specific helical domain (Fig. 2b). Overlay of the HNH and T4 endonuclease VII structures showed that helix H2 in T4 endonuclease VII, which penetrates into the Holliday junction and stabilizes the separation between exchanging DNA strands, overlaps with the helix α8 in the HNH structure (Fig. 2c), suggesting a potential involvement of helix α8 in DNA binding. To address the role of the positively charged regions of the HNH domain, we introduced a number of mutations targeting the ZRANB3-specific helical region and helix α8 (Fig. 1c). Some of these mutations resulted in reduced DNA binding by the HNH domain (Supplementary Fig. 3b), and had a pronounced effect on the ZRANB3 endonuclease activity- as observed with the K1046A, R1048A double mutant in helix α8, and with the R1009A mutant in the ZRANB3-specific helical domain (Fig. 2d,e). Interestingly, the K1046A, R1048A double mutant retained efficient ATPase activity (Fig. 2e, Table 2), suggesting that the impact of the mutations on the endonuclease function was not linked to the ability to hydrolyse ATP. The DNA binding surface therefore likely involves helix α8 and certain positively charged regions within the ZRANB3-specific helical domain.
Characterization of the active site
Analysis of the electrostatic surface potential also revealed the presence of a negatively charged patch on a predominantly electropositive face of the HNH molecule (Figs 2a and 3a). Interestingly, overlay of the HNH and T4 endonuclease VII structures showed that the observed electronegative patch in HNH overlaps with the Mg2+ ion binding pocket in the T4 endonuclease VII active site (Fig. 3a). To gain insight into the architecture of the HNH catalytic site, we further analysed the structure of the ZRANB3 HNH domain superimposed to that of the inactive T4 endonuclease VII (N62D) in complex with the Holliday junction DNA substrate. The active site of T4 endonuclease VII adopts a characteristic ββα-metal fold, and contains a Mg2+ ion and catalytically essential residues Asp40, His41 and Asn62 (refs 20, 21, 22) (Fig. 3b). The Mg2+ ion is coordinated by the side chains of Asp40 and Asn62Asp, two oxygen atoms of the scissile phosphate and a water molecule22. A catalytic mechanism involves His41, which likely acts as a general base and activates water for nucleophilic attack. On the other hand, the Mg2+ ion is thought to stabilize the phosphoanion transition state and facilitate product formation. Although the structure of the ZRANB3 HNH domain does not reveal the presence of a divalent cation in the putative active site, residues Asp1020, His1021 and His1045 assume equivalent positions to the catalytically important residues within the ββα-metal fold of T4 endonuclease VII (Fig. 3b). Sequence comparisons show strict conservation of Asp1020 and His1021 and His1045 among ZRANB3 proteins, highlighting their importance (Fig. 1c). By analogy with the T4 endonuclease VII structure, we hypothesized the involvement of Asp1020 and His1045 in metal coordination, and the role of His1021 as a general base in nucleophilic attack.
To address the relevance of specific residues in the ββα-fold of HNH domain, we introduced a number of mutations and tested the activities of the mutant ZRANB3 proteins. Although the mutations did not have a dramatic effect on DNA-dependent ATP hydrolysis (Supplementary Fig. 2c, Table 2), some of them either substantially reduced (N1036A), or completely abrogated (D1020A, H1021A and H1045A) ZRANB3 endonuclease activity (Fig. 3c). This is consistent with the proposed catalytic roles of Asp1020, His1021 and His1045 in the nucleolytic cleavage of DNA substrate.
ZRANB3 differs from other characterized HNH nucleases in being an ATP-dependent nuclease. Our previous work showed that mutation of the conserved Lys65 in the ATP-binding motif of ZRANB3 (known as the Walker A motif) yielded an ATPase-deficient enzyme9. Although the ATPase dead ZRANB3 mutant K65R showed no detectable endonuclease activity, it was unclear whether this was due to its inability to hydrolyse ATP, or due to the possible effect of the K65R mutation on the binding of ATP. To test whether ATP hydrolysis is essential for endonuclease activity, we tested ZRANB3 endonuclease activity in the presence of non-hydrolysable ATP analogues (ATPγS, AMP-PNP, AMP-PCP). Our data show that substitution of ATP by non-hydrolysable ATP analogues in ZRANB3 endonuclease reactions resulted in a complete loss of activity (Fig. 3d). ZRANB3 endonuclease activity is therefore strictly dependent on ATP hydrolysis catalysed by the helicase core domain.
Stimulation of nuclease activity by PCNA
Given that ZRANB3 acts as a structure-specific endonuclease, we compared its activity to an archetypal structure-specific endonuclease: FEN1. FEN1 is known to interact with PCNA through the PIP box located at its C-terminus5,6, and this association was shown to stimulate endonuclease activity of FEN1 (refs 23, 24). We therefore sought to test whether PCNA also has an effect on the endonuclease activity of ZRANB3. Our results show that, similarly to FEN1 activation, increasing concentrations of PCNA stimulated endonuclease activity of ZRANB3 (Fig. 4a). To gain molecular insight into this activation, we decided to explore the way ZRANB3 interacts with PCNA. Previous studies identified two conserved PCNA binding motifs in ZRANB3: a PIP box located between residues 519 and 526, and an APIM motif located at the very C-terminal end of the ZRANB3 protein (Fig. 4b, ref. 10). We inactivated the PIP box and the APIM motif by mutating critical residues (Fig. 4b,c), and assessed the impact of PCNA interactions on ZRANB3 endonuclease activity. Whereas the wild-type ZRANB3 showed notable stimulation of endonuclease activity in the presence of PCNA, such stimulation could not be observed upon inactivation of either the PIP box or the APIM motif (mutants PIP* and ΔAPIM, respectively) (Fig. 4d,e). An additive effect could not be observed with the PIP*-ΔAPIM double mutant, which highlights the relevance of both PCNA binding motifs for optimal ZRANB3 endonucleolytic activity. Interestingly, PCNA did not stimulate the ATPase activity of ZRANB3 (Supplementary Fig. 2d). Moreover, mutations of the PCNA binding motifs did not affect ATPase function (Supplementary Fig. 2e, Table 2), suggesting that ZRANB3 employs distinct mechanisms for activation (by ATP hydrolysis) and stimulation (by PCNA binding) of its endonuclease activity.
PCNA-dependent recruitment of ZRANB3
We next wanted to address the importance of PCNA in targeting structure-specific nucleases to sites of DNA damage. We expressed YFP-tagged proteins in U2OS cells and examined their ability to localize at sites of DNA damage caused by Ultraviolet laser microirradiation. As shown in Fig. 5a, YFP-FEN1 was efficiently recruited to the sites of laser-induced DNA damage. However, mutation of the PIP box motif resulted in a dramatic loss of FEN1 recruitment to the microirradiated stripes (YFP-FEN1 PIP* mutant), highlighting the importance of PCNA in mobilizing FEN1 to the appropriate nuclear locations. We further examined the recruitment of ZRANB3 to DNA damage, which was previously suggested to employ a similar PCNA-dependent mechanism9,10. To address the relevance of the individual PCNA binding motifs in ZRANB3 more directly, we expressed them as YFP-tagged proteins with nuclear localization signals. As shown in Fig. 5b, both the PIP box and the APIM motif were efficiently mobilized to the sites of DNA damage. However, this was completely abrogated when mutations, shown to abolish interactions with PCNA (Fig. 4c), were introduced into the PIP box and the APIM motif (Fig. 5b, mutants PIP*and APIM*). To address the relevance of these motifs in the context of the full length ZRANB3 protein, we further tested the recruitment of YFP-ZRANB3 wild-type and mutant proteins to locally induced DNA damage. In agreement with the published data10, ZRANB3 was readily recruited to the microirradiated stripes, and the individual inactivation of either the PIP box or the APIM motif (mutants PIP* and ΔAPIM, respectively) was not sufficient to abrogate recruitment to DNA damage (Fig. 5c). The recruitment of ZRANB3 was abolished only upon inactivation of both PCNA binding motifs (PIP*-ΔAPIM double mutant, Fig. 5c), indicating that the PIP box and the APIM motif might act independently in a biological context to support PCNA-dependent recruitment to DNA damage.
Figure 5: PCNA-dependent recruitment of ZRANB3. (a) Recruitment of FEN1 to the sites of laser induced DNA damage is abrogated by the mutations in the PIP box (Q337A, F343A and F344A). U2OS cells were transiently transfected with the indicated YFP constructs and analysed by live-cell imaging. Shown are representative images at the indicated time points post damage. (b) Recruitment of the YFP-tagged PIP box and APIM motif to the sites of laser induced DNA damage. Recruitment is abrogated by the mutations of the conserved residues in the PIP box and the APIM motif. (c) Recruitment of the YFP-tagged wild-type ZRANB3 and ZRANB3 PCNA binding mutants ZRANB3-PIP*, ZRANB3-ΔAPIM and ZRANB3-PIP*ΔAPIM) to the sites of laser induced DNA damage. (d) Recruitment of the wild-type and mutant ZRANB3 proteins to the sites of ongoing DNA replication. U2OS cells were transiently transfected with the indicated YFP constructs and stained against endogenous PCNA. Scale bar (a–d) 5 μm. (e) ZRANB3 accumulates at stalled replication forks. U2OS cells were transfected with YFP-ZRANB3 constructs and either left untreated, or exposed to UV irradiation. After 6 h, cells were fixed and stained with PCNA antibody. The percentage of cells containing ZRANB3 foci that colocalize with PCNA was determined. Shown is the average of three experiments. s.d.’s are shown as error bars. Full size image
We also examined the relevance of PCNA binding motifs in targeting ZRANB3 to the sites of DNA replication. To do this, we expressed YFP-ZRANB3 wild-type and mutant proteins and analysed their ability to colocalize with endogenous PCNA. In undamaged conditions, the majority of YFP-ZRANB3 expressing cells show uniform nuclear expression (such as in Fig. 5c). However, about 20% of the cells expressing YFP-ZRANB3 form foci, which colocalize with PCNA (Fig. 5d,e and Supplementary Fig. 4) (ref. 9). Individual mutation of either of the PCNA binding motifs in ZRANB3 reduced the efficiency of foci formation (PIP* and ΔAPIM mutants, Fig. 5e), but a complete loss of colocalization with PCNA was observed only upon inactivation of both motifs (PIP*-ΔAPIM double mutant, Fig. 5d,e). This indicates that the PIP box and the APIM motif mediated interactions with PCNA play critical roles in the recruitment of ZRANB3 to the sites of ongoing DNA replication.
ZRANB3 is also known to play a role in the replication stress response and to accumulate at sites of stalled DNA replication9,10,11. To address the significance of PCNA-binding motifs in recruiting ZRANB3 to stalled replication forks, we expressed YFP-ZRANB3 wild-type and mutant proteins in U2OS cells, and induced replication stress by exposing the cells to ultraviolet light (UV) irradiation. Following a 6-h recovery, we evaluated recruitment of ZRANB3 to stressed replication forks by measuring colocalization of YFP-ZRANB3 proteins with endogenous PCNA. UV induced an increase in the number of cells that formed ZRANB3 foci, and for wild-type ZRANB3 the proportion changed from ∼20% of cells in undamaged conditions to >95% following Ultraviolet irradiation (Fig. 5e and Supplementary Fig. 5). The number of cells containing focally concentrated ZRANB3 also increased with the PIP* and ΔAPIM mutants following Ultraviolet irradiation, but not with the PIP*-ΔAPIM double mutant, whose ability to form foci was completely lost (Fig. 5e). Interestingly, the increase in the number of cells containing ZRANB3 foci was more pronounced with the PIP* mutant than with the ΔAPIM mutant, possibly suggesting a specific role of the APIM motif in the replication stress response.
Comparative analysis of PCNA binding affinities
We further examined the association of PCNA and the peptides derived from ZRANB3 by performing isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC) (Supplementary Fig. 6). Analyses of the synthetic peptides containing the PIP box or APIM motif sequences revealed comparable affinities of the two peptides for PCNA (K D values of 4.8 and 9.24 μM for the PIP box and the APIM motif, respectively) (Supplementary Table 1). In agreement with previous studies, the association of the peptides with PCNA fitted a 1:1 stoichiometry, suggesting that the trimeric complex can accommodate one peptide per monomer5,25,26,27. Furthermore, the associations of ZRANB3 peptides were compared to the interactions of peptides derived from other PCNA interacting proteins (FEN1, p21 and Polι). The peptides were of equal length and covered the homologous sequence within the PIP box region. Our data showed that the affinities of ZRANB3 peptides were within the range of values detected for other PIP box peptides (Supplementary Table 1).
Structures of the PCNA-PIP and PCNA-APIM complexes
To gain molecular insight into the way the PIP box and the APIM motif of ZRANB3 interact with PCNA, we crystallized and determined the co-structures of PCNA with the ZRANB3 PIP and APIM peptides (Table 1). Both the PCNA:ZRANB3(PIP) and PCNA:ZRANB3(APIM) complexes show the typical homo-trimeric PCNA structure, consisting of three PCNA molecules in the asymmetric unit forming a trimeric ring28. Three peptide molecules are visible in the structures, each of which interacts with a different monomer in the PCNA trimer.
The PIP boxes found in PCNA interaction partners can generally be categorized as either canonical (defined by the Q-x-x-[ILM]-x-x-F-[FY] consensus sequence) or non-canonical (deviate from the canonical consensus). ZRANB3 has a canonical PIP box (Fig. 4b) that binds to the PCNA ring in a manner similar to other canonical PIP boxes (such as those found in p66 of Polδ and FEN1; Figs 6a–f and 7i)5. Specifically, the conserved glutamine (Gln519) in the PIP box peptide interacts with PCNA by forming a hydrogen bond with the main-chain carbonyl of Ala252, and by an additional contact with Ala208 via a well-structured water molecule (Fig. 6e,f). Furthermore, Lys518 and His520 form main chain hydrogen bonds with Ile255 and Pro253 of PCNA, respectively (Fig. 6e,f and Supplementary Fig. 8a). On the other hand, residues Ile522-Phe526 form a 3 10 helix that orients the conserved hydrophobic residues (also known as the ‘hydrophobic plug’1; Ile522, Phe525 and Phe526 in the ZRANB3 PIP box) for docking into the hydrophobic patch on the PCNA surface (Fig. 6d). While this topology is conserved in other PIP box peptides, differences are usually observed in the regions at the C-terminus of the PIP box sequence. This region forms an antiparallel β-sheet with the IDCL of PCNA in p21 (ref. 25) and FEN1 (ref. 6), but not in some other proteins with canonical PIP boxes, such as the PIP box in the p66 subunit of Polδ5 or the PIP box in the intrinsically disordered protein p15(PAF)29 (Fig. 7i). In the structure presented here, the PIP box peptide is not long enough to form extensive contacts with the IDCL.
Figure 6: Structure of the PCNA:ZRANB3(PIP) complex. (a) Front view of the PCNA ring (grey surface and ribbons) with the ZRANB3 PIP box peptide (yellow sticks). (b) Magnified view of the boxed region in a. Shown is a surface representation of one of the three PIP box binding sites on the PCNA ring with the bound PIP box peptide (yellow sticks coloured by atom type). (c) Overview of the hydrogen-bond interaction network between the ZRANB3 PIP box peptide (yellow) and PCNA (grey). Bound water molecule ( |
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1958–61: Seals Stadium and Candlestick Park [ edit ]
When the Giants moved to San Francisco, they played in Seals Stadium for their first two seasons. The stadium, located at 16th & Bryant Streets across from Stempel's Bakery, had been the home of the Pacific Coast League San Francisco Seals in their last years the AAA minor league affiliate of the Boston Red Sox, 1931–1957. In 1958, first-baseman Orlando Cepeda won Rookie of the Year honors. In 1959, Willie McCovey won the same award.
In 1960, the Giants moved to Candlestick Park, nicknamed "The 'Stick", a stadium built on Candlestick Point in San Francisco's southeast corner overlooking San Francisco Bay. The new stadium quickly became known for its strong, swirling winds, cold temperatures and thick evening fog that made for a formidable experience for brave fans and players, as well as its built-in radiant heating system which did not work. Candlestick's reputation was sealed in the ninth inning of the first 1961 All-Star Game (two All-Star Games per season were played from 1959 to 1962) when after a day of calm conditions the winds picked up and a strong gust caused Giants relief pitcher Stu Miller to slip off the pitching rubber during his delivery, resulting in a balk, and a baseball legend that Miller was "blown off the mound". Despite the event, the National League won the game.
1962 World Series [ edit ]
In 1962 after another memorable pennant chase with the Dodgers which resulted in a second three-game playoff series with the Dodgers, which the Giants again won by coming from behind with four runs in the ninth inning of Game 3, the Giants brought a World Series to San Francisco only to lose it four games to three to the New York Yankees. The seventh game went to the bottom of the ninth inning, with the Yankees ahead 1–0. With Matty Alou on first base and two out, Willie Mays sliced a double down the right field line. Right fielder Roger Maris quickly got to the ball and rifled a throw to the infield preventing Alou from scoring the tying run and keeping him at third base.
With Mays on second, well known for his speed, any base hit by the next batter Willie McCovey would likely have won the series for the Giants. McCovey hit a line drive right at second baseman Bobby Richardson who caught it after taking one step, bringing the game and series to a sudden end. Earlier in the inning, a failed sacrifice bunt by Felipe Alou with nobody out had ultimately kept his brother Matty—who couldn't advance to second—from scoring on Mays' two-out double. Finally, Richardson was not originally well-positioned to catch the drive until he moved three steps to his left in reaction to a McCovey's foul smash on the preceding pitch.
Giants fan (and resident of nearby Santa Rosa) Charles Schulz made a reference to the real world in one of his Peanuts comic strips soon afterward. In the first three panels of his 12/22/62 strip, Charlie Brown and Linus are sitting on a porch step, looking glum. In the last panel, Charlie Brown cried to the heavens, "Why couldn't McCovey have hit the ball just three feet higher?" Some weeks later, the same scene reappeared in the strip with Charlie Brown exclaiming, "Or why couldn't McCovey have hit the ball just TWO feet higher?"
Giants pitcher Ron Herbel in a 1963 issue of Baseball Digest.
Although the Giants did not play in another World Series until 1989, the teams of the 1960s continued to be pennant contenders thanks to several future Hall-of-Famers. These included Gaylord Perry, who pitched a no-hitter with the Giants in 1968; Juan Marichal, a pitcher with a memorable high-kicking delivery; McCovey, who won the National League MVP award in 1969, and Mays, who hit his 600th career home run in 1969. A Giants highlight came in 1963 when Jesús Alou joined the team, and along with Felipe and Matty, for one late inning of one game, formed the first all-brother outfield in major league history. In 1967, pitcher Mike McCormick became the first Giants Cy Young Award winner.
In 1970, the field at Candlestick Park was converted from natural grass to AstroTurf; at the same time, the stadium became enclosed to accommodate the 49ers, who moved in the following year.
The Giants' next appearance in the postseason came in 1971. After winning their division, they were defeated in the League Championship Series by the Pittsburgh Pirates and Roberto Clemente, who then went on to beat the Baltimore Orioles in the World Series four games to three.
During this decade, the Giants gave up many players who became successful elsewhere, including Garry Maddox, George Foster, Dave Kingman and Gaylord Perry. Two Giants became Rookies of the Year – outfielder Gary Matthews Sr. in 1973 and no-hit pitcher John Montefusco in 1975.
In 1976, in an eleventh-hour deal,[14] Bob Lurie bought the team, saving it from being moved to Toronto.[15] Toronto was awarded an expansion team called the Blue Jays which began play the next year, but San Francisco baseball fans' worries about losing their beloved Giants had not completely gone away just yet.
The rest of the 1970s was a generally disappointing time for the Giants, as they finished no higher than third place in any season. This was in 1978, thanks to young star slugger Jack Clark, veteran slugging first baseman Willie McCovey, star hitter second baseman Bill Madlock who was acquired from the Chicago Cubs, shortstops Johnnie LeMaster and Roger Metzger, and slugging third baseman Darrell Evans. Veteran pitchers Vida Blue, John Montefusco, Ed Halicki and Bob Knepper rounded out the starting rotation with Vida Blue leading the way with eighteen victories. The most memorable moment of that 1978 season occurred on May 28, 1978. With the Giants trailing 3-1 in the sixth inning, pinch hitter Mike Ivie, acquired from the San Diego Padres during the offseason for Derrel Thomas, hit a towering grand slam off of Dodgers pitching ace Don Sutton before Candlestick Park's highest paid attendance of 58,545. They led the National League West for most of the season until slugger Dusty Baker, rookie pitcher Bob Welch and the rest of the Dodgers got hot late, winning the West and then beating the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League Championship Series for their second straight NL pennant.
The field at Candlestick was converted back to natural grass for the 1979 season.
In 1981, the Giants became the first National League team to hire a black manager, Frank Robinson, although he lasted less than four years and was generally unsuccessful. The Giants finished a game over.500 in the strike-shortened 1981 season. The next season, the Giants acquired veterans Joe Morgan and Reggie Smith, got hot late and ended up in a three-team pennant race with the Dodgers and Braves. The day after the Dodgers eliminated them, Morgan hit a homer against the Dodgers on the last day of the season, giving the NL West to Atlanta.
In 1984, the Giants hosted the All-Star Game for the second and last time at Candlestick Park, which the NL won as it did at Candlestick in 1961 when Stu Miller was blown off the mound by a gust of wind.[16]
The 1987 Giants, pictured above at Candlestick, led the club to its first postseason appearance since 1971.
In 1985, owner Bob Lurie threatened to move the team out of the city of San Francisco to another location in the San Francisco Bay Area. Locations under consideration were Redwood City, San Jose, and Milpitas.[17]
The 1985 Giants lost 100 games, the most in franchise history, under unsuccessful rookie manager Jim Davenport, and Lurie responded by hiring Al Rosen as general manager and Roger Craig as field manager. Rosen began in 1986 by bringing up promising rookies such as Will Clark and Robby Thompson, which inspired the promotional radio jingle "Ya gotta watch these Giants! You gotta like these kids!!" and followed up in 1987 with canny trades for stars like Kevin Mitchell, Dave Dravecky, Candy Maldonado, and Rick Reuschel.
Craig, renowned as the "Humm Baby" because he often said it, managed the Giants from late 1985 to 1992. In his first five full seasons with the Giants, the team had winning records. The Giants won 83 games in 1986 and won the National League Western Division title in 1987, losing the 1987 National League Championship Series to the St. Louis Cardinals in seven games. The one bright spot in that defeat was their slugging outfielder Jeffrey Leonard, who was named the Most Valuable Player for the series in a losing effort. In Leonard's own faltering words, the prize money ($50,000) meant nothing to him, but only the win that eluded him and his team. He would have given anything to be going up north to play the Minnesota Twins, and his former teammate outfielder Dan Gladden, traded to the Twins at the start of the season, in the 1987 World Series.
1989: Will the "Thrill", World Series and the earthquake [ edit ]
Although the team used fifteen different starting pitchers in the regular season, the 1989 Giants won the National League pennant. They were led by 1989 National League All-Star Game starting pitcher Rick Reuschel, closer and 1989 National League ERA leader Scott Garrelts, 1989 National League Most Valuable Player Kevin Mitchell, and Will Clark.
The Giants beat the Chicago Cubs in the National League Championship Series, four games to one. In Game 1, first baseman Will Clark hit a grand slam off Greg Maddux in the fourth inning after reading Maddux's lips telling his catcher which pitch he was going to throw. In Game 5, Clark, who was the Most Valuable Player in the series for batting.650 with eight RBIs, came through in the clutch with a bases-loaded, two-out single off hard-throwing lefty closer Mitch Williams to break a 1–1 tie in the bottom of the eighth inning. With two outs in the top of the 9th inning, Giants closer Steve Bedrosian gave up three straight singles and a run before getting the dangerous Ryne Sandberg on a harmless first-pitch groundout straight to Robby Thompson at second, who threw easily to Clark for the final out, stranding the tying run at second, as longtime Giants radio voice Hank Greenwald proclaimed, "27 years of waiting have come to an end. The Giants have won the pennant!"
After dispatching the Cubs four games to one, the Giants faced the Oakland Athletics in the unforgettable "Bay Bridge Series", best remembered by the October 17, 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake which struck at 5:04 p.m. just before the scheduled Game 3 at Candlestick Park. After a ten-day delay, Oakland finished its sweep of the Giants, winning Games 3 & 4 at San Francisco. The Giants never led in any of the games, and never even managed to send the tying run to the plate against A's closer Dennis Eckersley in their last at-bat of Game 4.
The Giants and A's had played three World Series before when John McGraw's Giants were in New York and Connie Mack's A's were in Philadelphia, the Giants winning in 1905 on Christy Mathewson's record three complete-game shutouts and the A's in 1911 & 1913 behind Home Run Baker and Eddie Collins.
1992: Farewell San Francisco? [ edit ]
A "Save Our Giants" banner hanging from San Francisco City Hall
In the wake of that disappointing 1989 World Series sweep, a local ballot initiative to fund a new stadium in San Francisco failed, threatening the franchise's future in the city. After the 1992 season, owner Bob Lurie, who had previously saved the franchise from moving to Toronto in 1976, put the team up for sale. A group of investors from St. Petersburg led by Vince Naimoli reached an agreement to purchase the team and move them to the Tampa Bay area, but the National League owners voted against the acquisition.[18] San Francisco mayor Frank Jordan made it a top priority to retain the team, and recruited local real estate billionaire Walter Shorenstein to help organize a local team of investors.[19] Wally Haas, the owner of the Oakland Athletics at the time, agreed to grant the Giants exclusive rights to the South Bay so the Giants could explore all potential local sites for a new stadium and at least help to keep the team in the Bay Area. The team was instead sold in another last-minute deal[20] to an ownership group including managing general partner Peter Magowan, former CEO of supermarket chain Safeway, and Harmon and Sue Burns.
In addition to the anticipated move to downtown San Francisco, the Giants' ownership also made a major personnel move to solidify fan support. Before even hiring a new general manager or officially being approved as the new managing general partner, Magowan signed superstar slugger free agent Barry Bonds away from the Pittsburgh Pirates, a move which was initially blocked by Major League Baseball until terms were negotiated to protect Lurie and Bonds in case the sale failed.[21]
1993: "The last pure pennant race" [ edit ]
The Barry Bonds era began auspiciously as Bonds put up the numbers for the third MVP of his career: 46 home runs, 129 runs, 123 runs batted in,.336 batting average,.458 on-base percentage,.677 slugging percentage, 1.135 on base plus slugging. All exceeded his numbers from previous years.[22] Matt Williams excelled as well (38 home runs, 110 runs batted in,.294 batting average), with veterans Robby Thompson and Will Clark, the latter in his last season with the Giants, providing additional offensive support. John Burkett and Bill Swift won more than twenty games apiece, and closer Rod Beck was dominant with 48 saves and a 2.16 ERA.[23] All this led the Giants to a 103–59 record in Dusty Baker's first year as manager, which earned him the Manager of the Year award. But despite the Giants' great record, the Atlanta Braves—fueled by solid seasons from David Justice, Ron Gant, Deion Sanders and their key midseason acquisition of Fred McGriff from the San Diego Padres—came back from a ten-game deficit to pass the Giants win the NL West by a single game.[24] The Braves also had two 20+-game winners, Tom Glavine and Cy Young Award-winning Greg Maddux.
Desperately needing a win against the Dodgers in the final game of the year to force a one-game playoff with the Braves in San Francisco, the controversial choice of rookie pitcher Salomón Torres proved disastrous for the Giants as he gave up three runs in the first four innings of a 12–1 rout. The only other rested Giants starter, Scott Sanderson, was not chosen because he was considered a fly-ball pitcher and the Dodgers were a fly-ball-hitting team. After the major leagues' establishment of the three-division playoff format with a fourth wild card entry after the 1993 season, New York Times sports columnist Dave Anderson captured the feeling of many baseball purists regarding the thrilling – and for Giants fans, heartbreaking – winner-take-all outcome of the last two-division National League West when he characterized the 1993 National League regular season as "the last pure pennant race."
1994–96 seasons [ edit ]
The 1994 to 1996 seasons were not good for the Giants, punctuated by the strike that canceled the rest of the 1994 baseball season and the World Series. The strike denied Matt Williams a chance to beat Roger Maris's single season home run record: He had 43 home runs in the Giants' first 115 games, and was thus on pace for 60 when the strike hit with 47 games left to play. But the rest of the team wasn't as good as their two sluggers, with no other player having even 10 home runs or even 40 RBI that late into the season although they were still in contention, not far from the division lead, when the strike ended play in mid-August.[25] When Commissioner Bud Selig refused to budge in negotiations with the owners, a radio sports talk-show host quipped, "Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo couldn't cancel the World Series [in World War II], but Selig did!"[citation needed]
The Giants finished a dismal last in both 1995 and 1996, crippled by key injuries and slumps. 1995 had a strange feeling about it, with many fans not coming back after the strike-shortened 1994 season, something that kept attendances notably lower until the McGwire-Sosa record-breaking home run chase of 1998. Bonds continued as the Giants' driving force, posting fantastic numbers, with the highest WAR among position players in the National League (33 HR, 104 RBI, 109 R and 120 BB in 144 games). Matt Williams and Glenallen Hill were the only other Giants with at least 20 home runs, and the rest of the team had mediocre offensive numbers. The pitching staff was poor, with Mark Leiter leading the way with ten wins, going 10–12 with a 3.82 earned run average. Closer Rod Beck had 33 saves but nine blown saves and a 4.45 earned run average.[26]
1996 was highlighted by Bonds' joining the 40–40 club as only the second member, after the A's José Canseco in 1988, with 42 home runs and 40 stolen bases, along with 129 runs batted in, 151 walks, and a.308 batting average. Rookie Bill Mueller also provided hope for the future of the club with a.330 average, with 66 hits in 200 at bats over 55 games. The pitching was scarcely better than in 1995. Only Mark Gardner had more than 10 wins, going 12–7 with a 4.42 earned run average, and Rod Beck had 35 saves and a 3.34 ERA but nine losses and the rest of the bullpen was woeful.[27] The low point came in late June when the Giants, after surging to three games over.500 and second place in the National League West, lost 10 straight games en route to a 68–94 record. Their long-time radio voice, Hank Greenwald, retired after the season.
1997–99: Rebuilding [ edit ]
1997 [ edit ]
After three consecutive losing seasons, the Giants named Brian Sabean as their new general manager for 1997, replacing Bob Quinn. Sabean may have been acting as GM even before the announcement, and was rumored to have engineered the deal to get southpaw starter Kirk Rueter from the Montreal Expos. His tenure began with controversy. In his first official trade, he shocked Giants fans by trading Matt Williams to Cleveland for what newspapers referred to as a 'bunch of spare parts', with a negative reaction great enough for him to explain publicly, "I didn't get to this point by being an idiot... I'm sitting here telling you there is a plan."
Sabean was proven right: The Giants acquired for Williams—slugging second baseman Jeff Kent, shortstop José Vizcaíno and bullpen setup man Julián Tavárez, along with Joe Roa and the $1 million in cash that enabled them to sign center fielder and leadoff hitter Darryl Hamilton—and a subsequent trade with Anaheim for clutch-hitting, slick-fielding first baseman J.T. Snow – turned out to be major contributors, leading the Giants to their first National League West title of the decade in 1997. Snow, Kent, and Bonds each had over 100 runs batted in, and pitcher Shawn Estes' 19 wins against only 5 losses led the team. Rod Beck had his usual fine season with 37 saves.[28]
1997 also saw the introduction of interleague play to major league baseball, with the division-winning Giants going 10-6 against the four American League West teams: Seattle Mariners, Texas Rangers, Anaheim Angels and Oakland A's.[29] On June 12 the Giants beat the Rangers 4-3 in the first regular season interleague game in major league history. But the wild-card Florida Marlins ended the Giants' season with a 3–0 sweep in the first round of the playoffs.
1998 [ edit ]
In 1998, the Giants were fueled by good seasons from sluggers Jeff Kent and Barry Bonds, both with 30+ HR and 100+ RBI, and from starters Kirk Rueter (16–9 W-L record, 4.36 ERA), Mark Gardner (13–6, 4.33) and newly acquired Orel Hershiser (11–10, 4.41).[30] New closer Robb Nen had 40 saves. A hot September stretch tied them for the NL wild card, but they lost a one-game playoff at Chicago's Wrigley Field.
1999: Final season at Candlestick Park [ edit ]
1999 saw the Giants finish second in the NL West with an 86–76 record. Barry Bonds's production dropped as he hit.262, his lowest average in a decade. He did, however, hit 34 home runs even though he missed more than a third of the season due to injury, and other team regulars put up very good supporting numbers including Snow, Kent, shortstop Rich Aurilia and outfielder Ellis Burks, all with 20+ HR and 80+ RBI. Marvin Benard also had a career year in center field with 16 home runs, 64 RBIs and a career- and team-high 27 stolen bases. The pitching staff was paced by Russ Ortiz (18–9, 3.81) and Kirk Rueter (15–10, 5.41).[31]
With the knowledge that their days in Candlestick Park were numbered, the 1999 season ended with a series of promotions and tributes. After the final game of the season, a loss to the Dodgers, home plate was ceremoniously removed and taken by CHP helicopter to the new grounds where the downtown stadium was being built. (Candlestick Park remained the home of the San Francisco 49ers football team through the 2013 season.)
2000–present: Oracle Park [ edit ]
In 2000, after 40 years, the Giants left Candlestick Park and, as long advocated, moved into a privately financed downtown stadium (Oracle Park, originally Pacific or "Pac" Bell Park, and later known as SBC Park and AT&T Park) on that part of the shoreline of China Basin known as McCovey Cove, at the corner of 3rd and King Streets (with an official address of 24 Willie Mays Plaza in honor of the longtime Giants superstar), ushering in a new era for the Giants and their fans.[citation needed]
The Giants routinely sell out the newer 43,000-seat 21st century stadium, whereas smaller attendances of less than 10,000 were not uncommon in Candlestick despite its nearly 60,000 seating capacity, although by the 1999 season the Giants did manage to draw about 25,000 fans per game.[citation needed] The new location annually vies for highest MLB season attendance, in contrast to often having had the lowest attendance in the NL (or close to it) previously.[citation needed] Still quite breezy in summer compared to other MLB parks,[citation needed] Oracle Park has been a consensus success despite its reputation as a "pitcher's park" stingy for power hitters.[citation needed] Its design minimizes wind-chill, and it is served by mass transit and has views of the bay and the city skyline; traits all lacking at Candlestick especially after it was redesigned in the early 1970s to accommodate the NFL 49ers. Oracle Park is the centerpiece of a "renaissance" in San Francisco's South Beach and Mission Bay neighborhoods, known for what has been called sustainable design.[32]
Despite inaugural game festivities at the new ballpark, the Dodgers spoiled the 2000 season opener with an unexpected three-HR outburst by little-known, light-hitting shortstop Kevin Elster. But the Giants rebounded after losing their first six games in their new home with a solid effort all season long, culminating with not only the NL West Division title but the best record in the major leagues. Kent paced the attack with clutch hits (33 HR, 125 RBI) en route to being elected MVP over runner-up Bonds with 49 HR & 106 RBI. The pitching staff was not great but certainly decent, five starters earning at least ten wins: Liván Hernández (17–11, 3.75), Russ Ortíz (14–12, 5.01), Kirk Rueter (11–9, 3.96), Shawn Estes (15–6, 4.26) and Mark Gardner (11–7, 4.05). Closer Robb Nen was nearly perfect, with 41 saves and a minute 1.50 ERA.[33]
The Giants lost the 2000 division series to the New York Mets three games to one after a solid win in Game 1 on the postseason clutch pitching of Liván Hernández. But the Mets won the next three games despite decent starts by Estes, Ortíz and Mark Gardner. Game 2 in particular ended tumultuously but disappointingly. Down 4–1 in the ninth, Snow smacked a three-run home run to tie the game; but the Mets won in the tenth with a run off Félix Rodríguez, Bonds making the last out, stranding two runners, on a controversial called third strike.[34]
In 2001, the Giants were eliminated from playoff contention on the next-to-last day of the season. Slugging shortstop Rich Aurilia put up stellar numbers (37 HR, 97 RBI,.324 BA) in support of Bonds, who once again gave fans something to cheer about with his single-season record 73 home runs, surpassing Mark McGwire's 70 in 1998. The pitching staff was good but not great, with Russ Ortíz (17–9, 3.29) leading a staff that also had Liván Hernández (13–15, 5.24) and Kirk Rueter (14–12, 4.42). Shawn Estes and Mark Gardner had subpar years, but a notable late-season acquisition from the Pirates was superstar starter Jason Schmidt (7–1, 3.39). Robb Nen continued as a dominant closer (45 saves, 3.01 ERA).[35]
2002: National League Championship season and World Series [ edit ]
In 2002, the Giants finished second in the NL West behind the Arizona Diamondbacks, bolstered by another MVP season for Bonds (46 HR, 110 RBI,.370 BA, a then-record 198 walks and a.582 OBP) and Kent (37 HR, 108 RBI and.313 BA).[36] Additional roster support was provided by decent seasons from veteran catcher Benito Santiago and Aurilia, aided by new acquisitions third baseman David Bell, slugging outfielder Reggie Sanders and fleet-footed outfielder Tsuyoshi Shinjo, (generally known by last name only), who spent only one season with the Giants before returning to Japan. The pitching staff again proved solid, with five starters winning 12 or more including Jason Schmidt in his first full season in San Francisco. Closer Robb Nen had 43 saves and a 2.20 ERA, and setup men Felix Rodríguez and Tim Worrell were solid out of the bullpen.
The Giants made the playoffs as the NL wild card in the last weekend of the season. They began by defeating the Atlanta Braves in the NLDS three games to two, with Ortíz winning Games 1 and 5 in Atlanta. With the tying runs on base in the bottom of the 9th inning, Snow ending the deciding game with a spectacular double play ending in a rundown between first and second.[37]
In the NLCS, they defeated the St. Louis Cardinals four games to one with wins by Rueter, Schmidt and two by Worrell in relief.[38] Santiago, particularly for his late clutch game-turning and -winning home run in Game 4, was elected MVP of the NLCS.
The Giants then faced the American League champion Anaheim Angels (now known as the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim) in the World Series, marking the first World Series between two wild-card teams. The Giants split the first two (one-run) games in Anaheim, were beaten 10-4 by the visiting Angels in Game 3, then won Games 4 & 5 in Pac Bell Park, 4-3 and 16-4. The Series shifted back to Anaheim for Game 6. With the Giants leading the Series three-games-to-two and leading 5-0 with one out in the bottom of the 7th inning, manager Dusty Baker removed starter Russ Ortíz after he gave up two straight singles and handed him what Baker hoped would be the "game ball" as he walked off the mound. Moments later, after fouling off numerous fastballs, the Angels' Scott Spiezio hit a three-run home run off reliever Félix Rodríguez. The Giants' closer Robb Nen, pitching "on fumes and guts" with an injured right shoulder, gave up an eighth-inning two-run double to Troy Glaus, who was the Most Valuable Player for the series, and the Angels won the game 6–5 and capture the momentum in the Series. The following night, Anaheim cruised to a 4–1 victory behind an early three-run double by Garret Anderson off Hernández to claim the Series.
After 2002, the Giants went through many personnel changes. Baker's managerial contract was not renewed after ten seasons. Closer Nen's damaged shoulder ended his career, forcing him into early retirement; and Kent, moving on to the Houston Astros in his native Texas, was not re-signed. He had aroused front-office ire earlier in the season with an off-field injury when he fell off the roof of his vehicle while shining it, and by getting into a public scrap with Bonds in the dugout in the middle of a game. Position players David Bell, Reggie Sanders, Tsuyoshi Shinjo and Kenny Lofton, as well as pitchers Liván Hernández, Russ Ortiz and southpaw reliever Aaron Fultz (winner of 2002 World Series Game 4), all went to other teams in 2003 as well.
2003: Wire to wire [ edit ]
In the 2003 season the Giants, under new manager Felipe Alou, won 100 games for the seventh time in franchise history and the third time in San Francisco, winning their division for the third time in seven seasons and spending every day of the season in first place, the ninth team to accomplish that feat in baseball history. Their offense was paced by yet another MVP season from Bonds (45 HR, 90 RBI,.341 BA, 148 BB and an OBP of.529). Decent offensive support was provided by Rich Aurilia, Marquis Grissom, José Cruz Jr., Edgardo Alfonzo, Benito Santiago, Pedro Felíz and Andrés Galarrága. The pitching staff was led by Jason Schmidt (17–5, 2.34 ERA) and Kirk Rueter (10–5, 4.53), but dropped off after that, no other starter earning ten wins.[39]
Once again in the playoffs, and just like in 1997, the Giants faced the eventual-world-champion Florida Marlins in the NLDS. Schmidt won Game 1 in San Francisco with a low-scoring complete game outdueling Josh Beckett; but the Marlins won the next three games, and the series three games to one, as the Giants bullpen faltered after Game 2 starter Sidney Ponson imploded, blowing a big early Giants lead. As usually reliable outfielder Fred Snodgrass blew the deciding game of the 1912 World Series on the road with the Giants one run ahead going into the last of the tenth with a notorious "muff" of a fly ball by the leadoff hitter ending with the home team Boston Red Sox scoring two runs for a come-from-behind walk-off win, exactly the same scenario happened in the last of the tenth in Florida in Game 3 of the 2003 NLDS with a muff of another easy leadoff fly ball by otherwise slick-fielding José Cruz, Jr, ending with Iván Rodríguez's two-out, two-run, come-from-behind bases-loaded walk-off win for the Marlins off closer Tim Worrell.[40]
2004–06: Playoff drought [ edit ]
In 2004, Bonds broke his own records with 232 walks and a.609 OBP en route to his 7th and last NL MVP award (45 HR, 101 RBI,.362 BA). The team also had a solid but not stellar supporting cast including Marquís Grissom (22, 90,.279) and Pedro Felíz (22, 84,.276), along with decent hitting by Ray Durham, Edgárdo Alfónzo, Michael Tucker and AJ Pierzynski. Jason Schmidt was the star of the staff (18–7, 3.20 ERA, 251 SO), but the team was constantly looking for a new closer (Matt Herges and Dustin Hermanson sharing the role during the season).[41] After sitting out most of the first half of the season with an injury, Snow led the league in hitting after the All-Star Break.
The Giants' 2005 season was the least successful of the decade in their new stadium. Bonds missed almost the entire season with a knee injury, erratic closer Armando Benítez was injured for four months, and ace Jason Schmidt struggled after numerous injuries. But management took advantage of the off-year to give playing time to numerous young players, including pitchers Noah Lowry, Brad Hennessey, Kevin Correia, Scott Munter, Matt Cain and Jeremy Accardo, as well as first baseman Lance Niekro and outfielders Jason Ellison and Todd Linden. The acquisition of veteran outfield contact hitter Randy Winn from the Seattle Mariners was invaluable in the stretch run.
On May 25, the Giants held a celebration for Baseball Hall of Famer Juan Marichal. A statue of Marichál was dedicated on the plaza outside the stadium. Leonel Fernández, the President of the Dominican Republic, attended. In the two games following the ceremonies, the Giants wore uniforms with the word GIGANTES (Spanish for "Giants") on the front of their jerseys. On July 14, 2005, the franchise won its 10,000th game, defeating their longtime rival Dodgers, 4–3 and thereby becoming the first professional sports franchise to have a five-figure win total.
On September 28, the Giants were officially eliminated from the NL West race after losing to the division champion San Diego Padres, finishing a distant third at 75–87, their worst, and first losing, season since 1996. Despite the disappointing finish, the Giants extended manager Felipe Alou's contract for another year.
The Giants were expected to contend in 2006 with a strong starting staff. Despite a losing streak in May, and the worst batting performance by Barry Bonds in about 15 years[22] the Giants did contend in the less-than-stellar Western Division and by July 23 were in first place. A 3–16 stretch ensued, with nine one-run losses, and combined with a season-ending eight losses in nine games, the team finished in third place with a 76–85 record.[42]
On October 2, 2006, the day after the end of the regular season, the Giants announced that they would not renew manager Felipe Alou's contract but still offer him the opportunity to stay with them in an advisory role to the general manager and to baseball operations.
2007–09: Losing ways and milestones [ edit ]
2007: End of the Bonds era [ edit ]
With eleven free agents (excluding Jason Schmidt) who signed with the Dodgers for roughly $15 million a year, a new manager on board (Bruce Bochy, division rival San Diego manager since the mid-1990s who left the Padres to manage the Giants), and the loss of veteran catcher Mike Matheny due to complications (cumulative trauma) resulting from concussions sustained during his career,[43] the Giants' prospects for the 2007 season were less than favorable as 2006 came to an end. They then made several deals, re-signing infielders Pedro Feliz, Ray Durham and longtime fan favorite Rich Aurilia, and picking up catcher Bengie Molina, slugger Ryan Klesko and outfielder Dave Roberts. They also signed free-agent pitcher Barry Zito to a lucrative seven-year contract worth $126 million with an $18 million option for an eighth year, the richest pitcher's contract in baseball history at the time. On January 9, 2007, they re-signed pitcher Russ Ortiz to compete for the fifth starting position in spring training, which he won by late March due to his outstanding spring.
They got off to a slow start in the regular season, with spurts of promise but more often stretches of mediocre play at best. Pitching was often inconsistent or the offense nonexistent (such as in a pair of 1–0 losses for young star starter Matt Cain, for whom lack of run support was a frequent problem).
The season was memorable in some regards, such as the Giants – Red Sox series in Fenway Park, their first appearance there since they lost the deciding game of the 1912 World Series with two errors in the last of the tenth after scoring a go-ahead run in the top of the tenth, and their hosting of the 2007 MLB All-Star Game. Much more notable, however, was Bonds' march toward Hank Aaron's 755 career home run record that brought heavy media attention to the San Francisco Giants.
Leading off in the top of the second before a sellout crowd at Petco Park in San Diego in Game 2 of that series, Bonds hit a high fastball off the facing of the upper deck in left field for an off-field jack, tying the score at 1-1 and |
osis.
Chaplin on the set wearing part of the chicken costume
The lone prospector’s dream of hosting a New Year dinner for the beautiful dance-hall girl provides the opportunity for another famous Chaplin set-piece the dance of the rolls. The gag had been done before, by Chaplin’s one-time co-star Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle in The Rough House (1917) ; but Chaplin gives unique personality to the dancing legs created out of forks and rolls. When the film was first shown audiences were so thrilled by the scene that some theatres were obliged to stop the film, roll it back and perform an encore.
The Gold Rush was the first of his silent films which Chaplin revived, with the addition of sound, for new audiences. For the 1942 reissue he composed an orchestral score, and replaced the inter-titles with a commentary which he spoke himself. Among the scenes he trimmed from the film was the lingering final embrace with Georgia, with whom he had maintained a long and often romantic friendship. Perhaps some private and personal feelings caused him to replace the kiss with a more chaste shot of the couple walking off, simply holding hands.
The final kiss was cut from the 1942 reissue of the film
Today, The Gold Rush appears as one of Chaplin’s most perfectly accomplished films. Though he himself was inclined to be changeable in his affections for his own work, to the end of his life he would frequently declare that of all his films, this was the one by which he would most wish to be remembered.
A Memorable Hollywood Premiere
The premiere of The Gold Rush on 26 June 1925 was held in Hollywood’s newest wonder theatre, Grauman’s Egyptian, built three years earlier and - inspired by the recent discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamen - decorated in extravagant Ancient Egyptian style. Its proprietor, Sid Grauman, was a friend of Chaplin and had even accompanied The Gold Rush unit on location in the High Sierras. Grauman was famous for the stage shows he mounted as supporting attractions to the films, and determined to create one of his most spectacular for The Gold Rush.
“A Chaplin première,” reported the Los Angeles Evening Herald, “is always an outstanding event…. There was not a vacant seat at the opening. If any ticket-holder preferred to stay away, he could have disposed of his coupons at a fancy figure... “
Sid Grauman and Charles Chaplin at the premiere of The Gold Rush
The courtyard in front of Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre was, he continued, “a veritable fairyland of color and light. The most skilled decorators in the realm of make-believe had been at work for a week dressing the enclosure for the occasion.” All Hollywood was there, it seemed; and as each celebrity entered the theatre he or she was announced by a stentorian voice, and each was applauded according to his or her degree of popularity. In the intervals, pretty usherettes served the audience with chilled punch. Each guest was presented with a souvenir programme bound in embossed simulated leather, in which the great names of Hollywood – Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, Gloria Swanson, Marion Davies, Buster Keaton, Constance and Norma Talmadge, William Fox, Cecil B. DeMille – had taken pages to congratulate their friend. The stage prologue, said the reporter, was “of matchless beauty... Grauman has actually outdone himself in this achievement and The Gold Rush première probably never will be surpassed. If it is, only a genius like Grauman can do it.” The curtain rose on a panorama of the frozen north, revealing a school of seals mounting a jagged crag of ice. The seals were quickly joined by a group of Eskimo dancing girls. This was followed by a recitation of Robert W.Service’s celebrated poem, “The Spell of the Yukon” –
It’s the cussedest land that I know,
From the big, dizzy mountains that screen it
To the deep, deathlike valleys below.
Sid Grauman and Charles Chaplin during shooting of The Gold Rush
Next came a series of “impressively artistic dances by fascinatingly pretty young women wearing astoundingly rich and beautiful gowns all blending with the Arctic atmosphere and bespeaking the moods of the barren white country.” The numbers which followed included ice skating, a balloon act presented by Miss Lillian Powell and a Monte Carlo dance hall scene.
Only after this long prelude did the audience finally see the film; but the impression it made on them undoubtedly obliterated the memory of Grauman’s stage show. At the end of the film the applause lasted several minutes; and the director-star was led down to the stage. He announced that he was too emotional to make much of a speech – but then characteristically proceeded to deliver a rather good one. Georgia Hale was struck that this was one of the rare occasions when Chaplin had no self-doubts about his work: “He was confident about that. He really felt it was the greatest picture he had made. He was quite satisfied.”
Chaplin and Mack Swain in a publicity still for The Gold Rush
Text by David Robinson / Copyright 2004 MK2 SAWe've got ladders, but where are the chutes?
These vaults are thievery gauntlets, complete with traps and guards all over the place.
The night is dark and full of terrors.
The major changes come to how the perks work, eliminating the woefully overpowered ones.
Hide yer kids, hide yer wife, hide yer kids, hide yer wife...
You can sneak into every building in Solitude, Whiterun, and Windhelm using windows rather than the front door.
Come hither, shady, suspicious-looking fellow! I can tell you've got a bit of the thief about you. It's the pencil moustache, the stench of someone who's spent a great deal of time lurking in a sewer, and the frankly ridiculous amount of knives adorning your person. You like to steal, don't you? Well let's spruce up the world for you! In my oversized trenchcoat I have three modifications -- grand, sweeping changes to wreak across Skyrim that'll make your thieving more satisfying, and your sneaking more thrilling.First up we've got Shenk's Thievery Overhaul. While its effects are perhaps not as obvious as you might expect, it actually makes some pretty fundamental changes to the world of Skyrim. The first, and most immediate, is that the five major cities are suddenly riddled with ladders and alternate pathways that make them more sneak-and-steal friendly. The ladders operate as teleporters onto the rooftops, and there are all sorts of ratways and new sewers running under the streets to aid in getting around.Then there are the vaults. So far they're secure underneath Markarth, Solitude, and Whiterun, but the aim is to give every city one of their very own. These are thievery gauntlets, complete with traps and guards all over the place. But the rewards are worth it, with both fiscal and tangible prizes for the taking, with even a few unique items thrown into the mix. The interesting thing about them is that they are almost harder to find then break into, requiring either proper "casing" of the "joint" or "canvasing" for "clues." I've done my research.Shenks Thievery Overhaul also improves the guard presence in almost all the cities, giving residence and commercial properties night watchmen, even if it is only a guard dog for the poorer districts. Nevertheless, it makes wanton thieving a slightly more daunting prospect -- which makes the three new arrow types all the more useful.By far the most subtle is the Noisemaker Arrow, which creates a distracting sound to attract the attention of the guards to somewhere you're not. This feature may be outright stolen from Thief, but, well... thieves, remember? The Immolation Arrow that sets things on fire isn't exactly the first choice when you're trying to keep a low profile, but it is fun. Similarly, the Blinding Arrow is a last resort when things have gone pear shaped and you need to make a hasty escape.Where's Shenk's Thievery Overhaul changes the world around you, Path of Shadows changes, overhauling the entire way that stealth works within Skyrim, from the perks to interaction with NPCs.The major changes come to how the perks work, eliminating the woefully overpowered ones such as Light Foot, which meant you never triggered traps. The aim is to bring more balance to stealth in Skyrim, which explains the heavy adjustment to how line-of-sight and light work to enhance or diminish your visibility. When you're out of view you're now much less likely to be seen (as counterintuitive as that sounds) and in addition sounds are far more emphasised, meaning you need to shift to walking if you want to get a proper backstab in.Armor and weapon weight, too, makes a bigger difference, which means grabbing a great big two-handed sword and trying to sneak attack with it might not be theidea. In essence, this is going to make sneaking considerably harder and more akin to something like Deus Ex: Human Revolution's heavy leaning on Line of Sight rather than the occasionally abstract feeling of Skyrim's current system. And it works, for the most part, making sneaking a far more tense and thoughtful affair.Hey, did it suddenly get drafty in here? Oh, it's our final mod: Enterable Windows, the fenestration enthusiast's wet dream. It's still a work in progress (really, aren't all mods?) but the current version allows you to sneak into every building in Solitude, Whiterun, and Windhelm using windows rather than the front door -- which, while certainly very gentlemanly, isn't exactly the most subtle way to go about breaking and entering. The long-term goal is to retrofit every building in Skyrim, making it much easier to gain entry without alerting everyone in the area that you're gaining entry.With these three under your belt, or in your pouch, or... wherever you thieves keep your stuff, skulking around Skyrim should be considerably more interesting and varied. Your stealth will be stealthier, your thieving more thievery, and your backstabbing far more satisfyingly brutal.: These are my kind of mods! I always tend to play as a stealthy character in RPGs -- go figure -- so new sneaking challenges and abilities are just what the spy-doctor ordered. What's your best in-game thieving accomplishment?The US government has admitted to the existence of a top-secret site in the Nevada desert, but the declassification will probably do little to calm ‘conspiracy theories’ over UFOs and other rumors involving the place.
George Washington University's National Security Archive obtained a CIA history of the U-2 spy plane, a high-altitude surveillance aircraft, through a freedom of information request, and released it Thursday.
National Security Archive senior fellow Jeffrey Richelson says he requested the information back in 2005 and received a version a few weeks ago.
According to the Archive’s website, the new information “is notable for the significant amount of newly declassified material with respect to the U-2 (spy plane project),” which provides the names of pilots, codenames and cryptonyms, as well as a map of the secret site where the jet was tested in the 1950s.
The story of Area 51 begins with the CIA searching for a reliable place to test the U-2 reconnaissance aircraft at a time when the military showdown between the United States and the Soviet Union was in high gear.
US pilots found what they were looking for at Groom Lake, a desert salt flat, on April 12, 1955, according to “The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance,” an internal CIA history of the U-2, written by Gregory W. Pedlow and Donald E. Welzenbach.
“President Eisenhower also approved the addition of this strip of wasteland, known by its map designation as Area 51, to the Nevada Test Site,” the authors wrote.
The U-2 spy plane flew at an altitude of 70,000 feet, which made some believe UFOs were buzzing Earth.
"High-altitude testing of the U-2 soon led to an unexpected side effect – a tremendous increase in reports of unidentified flying objects (UFOs)," the report states.
Richelson says the new document shows the CIA is becoming less secretive about Area 51's existence, and the activities that took place there.
"It marks an end of official secrecy about the facts of Area 51," he told The Las Vegas Sun. "It opens up the possibility that future accounts of this and other aerial projects will be less redacted, more fully explained in terms of their presence in Area 51."
However, judging by the number of conspiracy theories involving Area 51, the release of the information may only serve to intensify rumors as to what else may have taken place on this lonely stretch of wasteland in the Nevada desert, which remains off-limits to this day.
Area 51 has come to be associated with a number of so-called urban legends, perhaps most famously the Roswell UFO incident that occurred on July 7, 1947 when an airborne object crashed on a ranch near Roswell, New Mexico.
The US government said the crash involved a military surveillance balloon, but other reports said the object was a spacecraft containing extraterrestrial life.
Ever since the 1970s, speculation has been rife as to what really crashed in Roswell.The piece, written by Ronan Farrow, comes days after a New York Times investigation.
Not even 48 hours after Harvey Weinstein's termination from his own company, The New Yorker has published its full report detailing rape allegations against the mogul by three women.
NBC anchor/reporter Ronan Farrow, in what he says was a 10-month investigation, spoke with three women who claim the movie mogul forcibly performed or received oral sex and forced vaginal sex.
In the story, Asia Argento, an Italian film actress and director who starred in crime drama B. Monkey, distributed by Miramax, spoke out. Argento outlines a 1997 incident, when she was 21, where she was told by one of Weinstein’s producers that there would be an industry party at the Hotel du Cap on the French Riviera, only to be escorted to a hotel room that was empty save for Weinstein. He then asked her for a massage, after which he spread her legs apart and performed oral sex on her, despite her repeated pleas for him to stop.
“I know he has crushed a lot of people before,” said Argento in the piece. “That’s why this story — in my case, it’s 20 years old, some of them are older — has never come out.”
A former aspiring actress named Lucia Evans told Farrow that, in 2004, before she began her senior year of college, Weinstein forced her to perform oral sex on him. She recalled saying no repeatedly, and then, “I just sort of gave up." Evans continued: "That’s the most horrible part of it, and that’s why he’s been able to do this for so long to so many women: people give up, and then they feel like it’s their fault.”
A third woman, who asked not be named in the story, worked with Weinstein and went to his hotel room under the guise of a work meeting. Weinstein changed into a bathrobe and forced himself on her sexually. She says after the rape, she continued to have professional contact with Weinstein through her work. "I was in a vulnerable position and I needed my job,” she told Farrow. “It just increases the shame and the guilt.”
Farrow says he also spoke to 16 current and former TWC employees, who witnessed or had direct knowledge of Weinstein’s sexual harassment, including unwanted touching, in the workplace or at events for the company’s projects.
Actress Mira Sorvino, who starred in the Miramax movies Mimic and Beautiful Girls, recalled how, in 1995, Weinstein chased her around a room and, on one occasion, showed up after midnight at her apartment: “I opened the door terrified.”
Weinstein responded to The New Yorker via his spokeswoman Sallie Hofmeister. The mogul's new statement read: “Any allegations of non-consensual sex are unequivocally denied by Mr. Weinstein. Mr. Weinstein has further confirmed that there were never any acts of retaliation against any women for refusing his advances. Mr. Weinstein obviously can’t speak to anonymous allegations, but with respect to any women who have made allegations on the record, Mr. Weinstein believes that all of these relationships were consensual."
The statement added: "Mr. Weinstein has begun counseling, has listened to the community and is pursuing a better path. Mr. Weinstein is hoping that, if he makes enough progress, he will be given a second chance.”
The New Yorker story comes on the heels of Thursday's New York Times exposé by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey that outlined decades of sexual harassment claims leveled against the Hollywood movie mogul. On Sunday, The Weinstein Co. board terminated Weinstein. The attorney for the mogul, Charles Harder, said the same day he was preparing a lawsuit against the Times over "false and defamatory statements." The paper has defended its reporting.
Weinstein has not given any interviews beyond a conversation with Page Six, in which he said of the claims that “I also have the worst temper known to mankind, my system is all wrong, and sometimes I create too much tension. I lose it, and I am emotional, that’s why I’ve got to spend more time with a therapist and go away."
Weinstein is now being represented personally by David Boies and Harder. On Thursday, Harder emailed The Hollywood Reporter saying they are prepping a lawsuit against the Times. There has been no word yet from the Weinstein camp on what legal action, if any, will be taken against The New Yorker.
The women in Farrow's New Yorker piece are the latest in a days-long whirlwind of victims coming forward with their own stories of harassment at the hands of Weinstein. This includes TV news reporter Lauren Sivan, who told HuffPost how the mogul had cornered her in a New York City restaurant a decade ago, masturbated and then ejaculated into a potted plant. On Tuesday, Gloria Allred announced a press conference with another Weinstein sexual harassment accuser, a former film actress and screenwriter.
On Monday, actresses Meryl Streep, Jennifer Lawrence and Judi Dench, all of whom have starred in Weinstein movies, publicly denounced his alleged behavior.
Amid the emerging claims, Bob Weinstein and TWC president/COO David Glasser have taken control of the company. TWC is going to lengths to distance itself from Harvey Weinstein and begin to rebrand, removing his name from the credits of upcoming film and television projects and mulling a company name change that may be announced as soon as the next few days.Spring is usually a season for new stuff in the San Francisco food scene, and this year is no exception. As our local economy continues to boom, 2014 is shaping up to be a very busy year for Bay Area food-and-drink scribes not to mention the Yelp Elite who clamor to be first to review everything. Below, a collection of new bars and restaurants quickly coming your way.
As Eater noted yesterday, including the revamp of Schroeder's that we talked about earlier this week, there are at least a dozen new things on the radar and getting set to open, though not all of them have official opening dates yet.
These are the big ones you should be aware of:
Magnolia's Dogpatch Brewery and Smokestack
Everyone's been waiting impatiently for this one for a couple of years now, since it was first announced. But brewmaster Dave McLean is finally ready to debut his expansion to Dogpatch, which will have a full-scale brewery operation, tap room, and a BBQ restaurant called Smokestack led by Namu Gaji's Dennis Lee. 7x7 has some photos here, and they're aiming to open the first week of May.
2505 3rd Street at 22nd
Urban Putt
We told you about this super exciting thing last week, but just a reminder, this mini golf course with attached restaurant and cocktail bar is coming your way May 5. And there will be deep-dish pizza.
1096 South Van Ness Avenue at 22nd
4505 Burgers & BBQ
4505 Meats, which has long had a presence at farmers' markets and now has a small butcher shop at Mission and 15th, will now have a little restaurant to call their own serving the famous 4505 burger, as well as some probably awesome barbecue. They've moved into the former Da'Pitt/Brothers BBQ space on Divis, and they're set to start serving food for takeout on May 3. Patio seating and dining will launch later.
705 Divisadero at Grove
Aveline
We talked about this one last year, and it's the first Bay Area restaurant project from Top Chef alum Casey Thompson, who's actually been living here, and up in Napa, for the past six years. Named in honor of both of her grandmothers, one of whom was French, the menu promises "refined casual fare," with some inventive combinations of ingredients, like crispy chicken skins with charred onion, eggplant, and trout roe; and Wagyu beef with fatback and cheese toast. Also, there will be an attached cocktail bar dubbed The European. Both are set to open in early May.
490 Geary Street in the Warwick Hotel
Dirty Habit
The replacement concept in the former Fifth Floor space will be cocktail- and small-plate-driven, as we discussed last month, and it's due on May 1. The name is meant to convey something edgy about the new restaurant, and as such they're going to be offering some large format cocktails of the bad-decision sort like “Daiquiri Time Out” for four, and the “Get Me a Juice Box” lunch box for two - with two cans of PBR, two Fernet minis, and housemade chicharrones.
12 4th Street at the Hotel Palomar
Palm House
This exciting new project in the former Nettie's Crab Shack space from Foreign Cinema chef Gayle Pirie and Bergerac partners Anderson Pugash and Bruce McDonald will be Caribbean-focused, with tropical cocktails and a kitchen led by former Foreign Cinema chef de cuisine Lea Walker. They're hoping to be open in May.
2032 Union Street
Harper & Rye
The replacement bar for the defunct Red Devil Lounge is a new project from Tipsy Pig vet Jamal Blake-Williams. He's aiming for a late May opening and will be offering large-format stuff like punchbowls, as well as a tight list of cocktails. And there will be a pool table. [Tablehopper]
1695 Polk Street
The Commissary
Top Chef Masters alum and beloved local chef Traci Des Jardins (Jardiniere, Public House, Mijita) is getting set to open this big project in the Presidio, in the Montgomery Street Barracks building. The restaurant will offer casual stuff for lunch, and get more upscale for evening dinner service, and will have a market component as well, with housemade bread, jam, and charcuterie to go. Look for it to open by late May.
101 Montgomery Street in the Presidio
Chino
You may have noticed the construction at the former Andalu at 16th and Guerrero, and that's this project: A Chinese dumpling house from the team behind Tacolicious. The chef is Tacolicious's own Telmo Faria, and for the cocktail portion they've recruited The Alembic's Danny Louie. The opening is set for late May as of now.
3198 16th Street at Guerrero
Also big on the horizon for a little later this year:
Monsieur Benjamin, the new Hayes Valley bistro promising late-night service from Benu chef-owner Corey Lee and former RN74 chef Jason Berthold; Pabu, the new Japanese concept from Michael Mina coming to 101 California in June; Top Chef Masters alum Suvir Saran's unnamed project in the base of the NeMa building; and former Prospect chef Ravi Kapur's unnamed project at 871 Sutter Street, on which he's collaborating with Nopa partners Allyson Jossel and Jeff Hanak.
Deep breaths, everyone.
[Eater]it’s all downhill from here – 18
No color today: i’ve got an inflamed nerve in my back which made drawing this hell. I’m going to take a break and color it in a few days if I feel up for it.
In other news my birthday is soon! Also on that day my friend Katie Silver is releasing her new book Paper Triangle! Congrats Katie! Even with the color setback I’m well on target to print off my books by November to be sold at INDYpendent Show where Katie will be too. I’m also going to try to ramp up my production(back pain willing) to two pages a week making 96 pages making 4 books a year.
What’re you guys doing this year for 24 Hour Comic Day? I’ll probably be moving but I’ll be with you guys in spirit. October 3rd is when 24hrcd is- check out your local comic shop if you’d like to attend. Frankly I probably wouldn’t be in the comic space if it weren’t for going to Downtown Comics when they hosted the 2014 24hrcd. I met Katie mentioned above there, actually. As well as a few others that have impacted my development. It was a great experience and it was fun to see the group dynamic grow stronger over time. Around hour 20 you’re so loopy from lack of sleep that your focus is just to get done. I suggest tons of coffee and laughs to get you through. Bring a good buddy.
Keep on with your art! I’ll update you with the process of ordering books, setting the pages, and how the Novermber 15th INDYpendent show goes in a future blog, for now I’m just going to compress my back.
-MattAttaq
Pull list:
BPRD HELL ON EARTH #135
CONSTANTINE THE HELLBLAZER #4
LADY MECHANIKA TABLET OF DESTINIES #5 (OF 6
NUTMEG #4
ODYC #7
SEX CRIMINALS #12
STAR WARS #9With the newly christened Selby-Lake line up and running, the streetcars made runs between Minneapolis and St. Paul at all times of the day. Most of the ride was steady and uneventful; people often remarked how lovely it was to ride with the gentle rocking of the car and the various things to see along the line. But once the streetcar reached the 16 percent grade of the St. Anthony Hill, the ride became slower, rougher, and there were often long backups. The counterweight system could not handle all of the streetcars that needed to ascend and descend the hill quickly enough to avoid delays--especially in the winter.
A plan was devised in 1906 to cut a tunnel that would lower the grade to seven percent, which was manageable for the electric streetcars to handle without counterweights. After a year of digging, the two track tunnel opened in 1907. Streetcars bound for downtown St. Paul would simply dip below the surface of Selby near Nina Street and descend quickly through the 920-foot long passage to emerge at the base of the hill. Riders heading out of St. Paul rode through the same close, dark passage, but at a slower pace. A two man crew operated each car--a motorman who controlled the car and a conductor who collected the fare from those entering through the rear door. The streetcars ran every three minutes during peak travel times and every seven minutes during off-peak hours.Among the many terrifying facts that have emerged in the last several days, perhaps the scariest relate to the nuclear button over which now hovers the finger of Donald Trump. It turns out that, of all the powers held by this or any other US president, the least checked or balanced is his authority over the world’s mightiest arsenal. He exercises this awesome, civilisation-ending power alone.
Donald Trump warns North Korea that US is ‘locked and loaded’ Read more
As Trump has learned in recent months, the man in the Oval Office cannot simply issue a decree changing, say, the US healthcare system. He has to build majorities in the House and Senate, which is harder than it looks. If he wants to change immigration policy, a mere order is not enough. He can be stopped by the courts, as Trump saw with his travel ban. But if he wants to rain fire and fury on a distant enemy, bringing more fire and fury down on his own citizens and many hundreds of millions of others, there is no one standing in his way. Not for nothing does the geopolitical literature refer to the US president as the “nuclear monarch.”
The more you hear of the simplicity of the system, the more frightening it becomes. If Trump decides he has had enough of Kim Jong-un’s verbal threats, he merely has to turn to the low-level military aide at his side and ask them to open up the black briefcase that officer keeps permanently in their grasp. The bag is known as the nuclear “football”. (It gets its name from the code word for the very first set of nuclear war plans: dropkick.) Inside the bag is a menu of options, explained in detail in a “black book,” but also set out in a single, cartoon-like page for speedy comprehension. Trump has only to make his choice, pick up the phone to the Pentagon war room, utter the code words that identify him as the president and give the order. That’s it.
The officer who receives the call at the Pentagon has no authority to question or challenge the order
There is no need for consultation with anyone else. Not the secretary of state or the secretary of defence, nor the head of the military. The officer who receives the call at the Pentagon has no authority to question or challenge the order. His or her duty is only to implement it. Thirty minutes after the president gave the instruction, the nuclear missiles would be hitting their targets. There is no way of turning them back. Such power in the hands of a single individual would be a horrifying prospect even if it were Solomon himself whose finger was on the trigger. But as Bruce Blair, a former nuclear missile launch officer, and seasoned military analyst wrote during the 2016 campaign, Trump’s “quick temper, defensiveness bordering on paranoia and disdain for anyone who criticises him do not inspire deep confidence in his prudence.”
What’s more, Trump is the man who said in 2015, “For me, nuclear is just the power, the devastation is very important to me,” and who bellowed from the campaign podium, “I love war”. In last year’s election campaign, the former Republican congressman Joe Scarborough reported on a briefing a foreign policy expert had given Trump. “Three times, he asked, at one point, ‘If we have them, we can’t we use them?’ … Three times, in an hour briefing, ‘Why can’t we use nuclear weapons?’”
It turns out Hillary Clinton was right to warn Americans 14 months ago that, “It’s not hard to imagine Donald Trump leading us into a war just because somebody got under his very thin skin.” And here we are, Trump tweet-goading the North Koreans by declaring military solutions “locked and loaded”. We need imagine no longer.
Those who find themselves trembling at all this have spent the last few days grasping for a comfort blanket. A favourite has been the notion that those around Trump, especially the generals current and former, will not let him unleash nuclear Armageddon. This view holds that, yes, Trump may well be dangerously unhinged but fear not, the wiser heads of Washington will stay his hand. Indeed, this strain of thinking has been visible since Trump took the oath of office. Call it the deep state fantasy. It looks to the national security apparatus, the intelligence agencies and the permanent bureaucracy, the shadow government, to step in and do the right thing.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest A White House military aide the “football” containing emergency nuclear weapon codes. Photograph: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images
It hangs its hopes on a range of prospective saviours. It might be the trio of former generals made up of Jim Mattis, who heads the Pentagon, John Kelly, recently drafted in as chief of staff, and HR McMaster who serves as national security adviser. Alternatively, it looks to the loose alliance hailed this week by the influential Axios website as “The Committee to Save America”, consisting not only of the generals but also the cluster of New Yorkers that includes some of Trump’s less hot-headed economic advisers, with added reinforcements from the Republican ranks in Congress. The committee’s unofficial mission: to protect “the nation from disaster”. The ultimate deep state fantasy longs for the men in the shadows not merely to restrain Trump, but remove him from office. The designated hero of this story is Robert Mueller, the former FBI director now heading what is reported to be a swift and penetrating probe into allegations of collusion with Russia as well as Trump’s wider business dealings.
Mueller’s role may indeed prove to be critical. But the deep state fantasy itself, while comforting, is surely a dead end for Trump’s opponents. For one thing, events have reached an odd pass when liberals are dreaming of unelected generals thwarting an elected head of government: that used to be the fantasy of the militaristic right.
But it also relies more on hope than evidence. All these supposedly wise heads around Trump: what restraint have they achieved so far? Kelly was meant to impose order and discipline, and yet we still have Trump tweeting threats that could easily be misinterpreted as the cue for war. On North Korea, the US administration continues to send conflicting signals by the hour, with Trump outriders like Sebastian Gorka slapping down secretary of state Rex Tillerson on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Friday, creating confusion when a nuclear standoff requires calm clarity.
Trump's apocalyptic threats demand a moral case for disarmament | Daniel José Camacho Read more
And we cannot escape the basic fact. All these advisers can try to hold him back, but when it comes to it, nuclear authority is Trump’s and Trump’s alone. He is the nuclear monarch.
The glum truth is that the only people who can effectively check a democratically elected menace like Trump are other democratically elected leaders. Ultimately it will be up to the men and women of Congress to do their constitutional duty by impeaching Trump and removing him from office. If Republicans won’t do it, then voters need to replace them with Democrats who will, by voting for a new House in the midterm elections of November 2018. The trouble is, it’s not clear that the US – or the world – have that much time.
• Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnistEnjoy “Thanatos Beach,” by James Morrow, a story inspired by an illustration from John Jude Palencar.
“Thanatos Beach” is part of a five-story series curated by senior Tor Books editor David G. Hartwell. All five are based on a singular piece of art by John Jude Palencar and will be released for free on Tor.com every Wednesday in March.
Read the story behind these stories or purchase all five right now in a $2.99 ebook.
This story was acquired and edited for Tor.com by Tor Books editor David Hartwell.
When Inez Montaugh first saw the magnetic-resonance image of her brain tumor, she marveled at its resemblance to Idaho, the state where she was born and raised. The contours of her birthplace and her neoplasm were practically identical: a surmounting obelisk, a ragged eastern edge, a vast southern mass. Inez immediately remarked on the coincidence, whereupon her twin sister, Alexis, likewise contemplating the ominous blob, said, “Jesus, sweetie, how can you be thinking of Idaho at a time like this?”
“How can I not be thinking of Idaho?” Inez replied. “Back home in Boise, I was never sick.”
“It’s where we expected to find it, the motor cortex,” said the neurologist, Dr. Goncourt. The three of them were standing in his consulting room, huddled around the backlit MRI like art students appreciating a Vermeer. “Hence your difficulties with gait and coordination.”
The smart and photogenic Montaugh sisters had come a long way since Idaho—to different but comparable East Coast liberal arts colleges, followed by failed marriages in Boston, successful psychoanalyses on the Upper East Side, and brilliant careers as, arguably, America’s premier women of letters. No less a figure than Noam Chomsky had once dubbed Inez and Alexis “the Pauline Phillips and Eppie Lederer of public intellectuals,” but whereas the sisterhood of Pauline and Eppie comprised two liberal Jews who answered poignant questions addressed to “Dear Abby” and “Ask Ann Landers,” Inez and Alexis were radical Brooklyn-based WASPs who staged plays, wrote novels, and routinely published essays dense with Continental philosophy and recondite cultural criticism (though at times it seemed to Inez that she was indeed managing a kind of advice column: “Dear Inez, My father-in-law consistently misreads Kierkegaard”). Earlier in the year, the committee in charge of MacArthur Fellowships had decided that both Montaugh sisters were equally deserving, Inez in the category of scholar (though she was no less a journalist) and Alexis in the category of journalist (though she was no less a scholar), and so arrangements were made for the sum of $500,000 to be transferred in installments to each of their respective bank accounts.
“Do you think it’s malignant?” asked Inez, her normally contralto voice entering a soprano register.
“When we speak of brain tumors, ‘malignant’ can mean two different things,” Dr. Goncourt replied in a tone both Inez and Alexis thought impossibly pedantic under the circumstances. “The term may indicate a cancerous mass that destroys healthy tissue through metastasis, but it can also mean a benign growth that threatens vital neurological functions.”
“So in either case, Inez would be well advised to have the thing removed,” said Alexis.
“May I speak candidly?” said Dr. Goncourt.
“Yes,” said Inez with fake bravery.
“I’m not a surgeon, but it appears that this neoplasm is poorly situated for excision.”
“Location, location, location,” said Inez, shivering as if standing naked in Nome, through the temperature in the room was surely no less than sixty-five degrees Fahrenheit.
Correctly sensing that Dr. Goncourt was not amused by Inez’s sardonic remark, Alexis made the appropriate snickering noises.
“The next step is to get a biopsy,” the neurologist said.
“I need to visit the ladies’ room,” said Inez, uncertain whether she was about to endure an episode of vomiting or an attack of incontinence.
As it |
the 2009 Trustees Report, the OASDI closed group unfunded obligation is reported as $16.3 trillion, or 3.7 percent of taxable payroll, and 1.2 percent of the GDP over the infinite future.
Uncertainty of the Future
Projections of cost and income for the OASDI program are inherently uncertain. This uncertainty is thought to increase for more extended periods into the future. The trustees attempt to illustrate the nature and extent of uncertainty in the annual reports in several ways. Mentioned earlier are the high-cost and low-cost alternatives to the intermediate sets of assumptions. These alternatives provide scenarios in which the principal assumptions used for projecting the financial status of the program are assumed to collectively differ from the best estimate in either a positive or negative direction. Each parameter is assumed to differ by a plausible amount from the intermediate expectation, so it is unlikely that all parameters will differ in the same direction. As a result, the three alternative projections produce a broad range for the prospects of the program.
The range of cost rates projected for the OASI and DI programs under the three alternatives in the 2009 Trustees Report are shown in Chart 6. Trust fund levels expressed as a percent of annual program cost were presented earlier for the three alternative projections. Projected income rates are shown based on the intermediate alternative II assumptions only, as these rates vary little across the three alternatives.
Chart 6.
OASI and DI program cost and noninterest income as percentages of taxable payroll, 1990–2008, projected under alternative assumptions, 2009–2085 SOURCE: 2009 Social Security Trustees Report, Figure IV.B1 and Table IV.B1. NOTES: Alternative I = low-cost assumptions; alternative II = intermediate assumptions; alternative III = high-cost assumptions.
The trustees report also presents sensitivity analyses showing the effect of variation in individual parameters. These estimates provide a sense of the sensitivity of the long-range financial status of the program to any difference that may evolve in a given parameter from the trustees' intermediate projection.
Finally, the trustees report presents stochastic projections of the potential financial operations of the OASDI program in the future. For these projections, many economic, demographic, and disability-related parameters are allowed to vary randomly through time, creating 5,000 separate possible projection scenarios. The random variation reflects the degree of historical fluctuation in each parameter and is intended to simulate a large number of scenarios that could occur in the future. Results are presented in the report for the future cost and trust fund levels of the program, showing year-by-year the distribution of results from the 5,000 separate projections. The distribution derived from these stochastic projections for the 2009 Trustees Report is shown in Chart 7. Stochastic results have the advantage of showing an estimated likelihood that actual results will fall within or outside any probability interval. (For example, the 95 percent probability interval falls between the lines in the chart representing the 97.5 percentile and 2.5 percentile outcomes.) It should be noted that lines on this chart do not represent specific individual simulations. Rather, for each line, the value in a year is for the simulation that is at the given percentile in that specific year. For any percentile line, the specific simulation from among the 5,000 scenarios will vary from one year to the next.
Chart 7.
Stochastic projection of OASDI trust fund assets as a percentage of program cost, 2009–2084 SOURCE: 2009 Social Security Trustees Report, Figures II.D7 and VI.E1. NOTE: The values assigned to charted lines are probability percentiles; thus, the 95 percent probability interval, for example, falls between the lines labeled 2.5 percent and 97.5 percent.
The stochastic projections suggest a high degree of certainty that the combined OASDI trust fund will become exhausted well before 2083, the end of the 75-year, long-range period. It should be noted, however, that the stochastic projection methodology is still being developed and refined. We believe that further enhancements are likely to broaden the range of uncertainty shown for the trust fund exhaustion date across any probability interval.
Actuarial Status and Budget Scoring
The requirements in the law for the annual report of the Social Security Board of Trustees are specific on the nature of the analysis that is desired. Although the OASDI program is highly dependent on the trust fund assets for solvency, and these assets are held in Treasury securities, the assessment of the actuarial status of the program is separate from direct consideration of implications for the federal government budget.
The assets of the trust funds are required to be invested in interest-bearing securities guaranteed as to interest and principal by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. As a result, all assets are currently invested in nonmarketable special-issue obligations of the Treasury. In scoring assets and liabilities for the federal government as a whole, the trust fund assets are generally assumed to be a wash: an asset for the trust funds, but an equal liability for the General Fund of the Treasury. This is a valid perspective, but it does not lessen the claim that the trust fund assets have for future cash when needed. Trust fund securities have always been redeemed on maturity or when needed, and there is no risk of default on these securities. Moreover, it is reasonable to assume that the financial markets understand that securities held by the trust funds may be redeemed in the future, requiring the Treasury to collect additional taxes, lower other federal spending, or borrow additionally from the public. In fact, the trust fund assets are combined with publicly held debt to compute the total debt subject to limit, which is subject to approval by the Congress. If the redemption of trust fund securities in the future results in issuance of additional publicly held debt, this would not alter the total federal debt (see Chart 8).
Chart 8.
OASDI net cash flows as a percentage of GDP, 1957–2009, projected under the intermediate assumptions, 2010–2085 SOURCE: Social Security Administration, Office of the Chief Actuary.
An additional important distinction in trust fund versus budget scoring is the assumption about current law. In the trustees report, careful distinction is made between the cost of the program—reflecting scheduled benefits, and the actual expenditures—reflecting the benefits that would be payable subject to the limits imposed by the inability of the trust funds to borrow. If the trust funds ever become exhausted, expenditures thereafter would be limited to the amount of continuing tax income. It is projected in the 2009 Trustees Report that only 76 percent of scheduled benefits would be payable and could be paid at the time the trust fund is exhausted in 2037. This limitation not only places an absolute braking force on the spending that is possible by the OASDI program, but also forces Congressional action before exhaustion of the funds.
Budget scoring convention, on the other hand, assumes that full scheduled benefits would continue to be paid on a timely basis even after the fund is exhausted and the continuing tax income is insufficient to finance full scheduled benefits under the law. When considering the potential effects of the OASI, DI, and HI programs on projected unified budget balances, it should be noted that these projections presume changes in the law that would, in effect, allow the trust funds to either borrow from the General Fund of the Treasury or to receive transfers from that fund sufficient to continue full payment of scheduled benefits.
What is Causing the Financial Status to Show Shortfall?
With the current 12.4 percent payroll tax rate, along with additional revenue from federal income taxation of benefits, the OASDI program has been taking in more tax revenue than it has spent providing benefits for more than two decades. However, this favorable cash flow will be changing in the future as the large baby boom generation, born from 1946 through 1965, moves into retirement. The oldest people in this generation have already reached early retirement age (62), and the transfer of this generation from working age to retirement age will continue for the next 20 years. The substantial increase in the cost of the OASDI program from 2010 to 2030, both as a percent of taxable payroll and GDP, is founded in an even more basic shift in our economy: the change in the ratio of beneficiaries to the number of workers.
Chart 9, showing the number of beneficiaries for each 100 OASDI -covered workers, is almost identical in shape and timing to Chart 6, which shows the projected annual cost rates of the program. This should not be surprising because benefits over time rise at roughly the same rate as the average wage in the workforce. What is notable is that the strong upward shift in both this ratio and in the cost rate is permanent; it does not come back down to a lower level after the large baby boom generation dies off. The permanence of this shift was not caused by the existence of the baby boom generation; instead, the permanent shift was caused by the substantial and apparently permanent drop in birth rates that followed the baby boom births.
Chart 9.
Number of OASDI beneficiaries per 100 covered workers, 1980–2008, projected under alternative assumptions, 2009–2085 SOURCE: 2009 Social Security Trustees Report, Figure IV.B2 and Table IV.B2. NOTES: Alternative I = low-cost assumptions; alternative II = intermediate assumptions; alternative III = high-cost assumptions.
Birth rates that averaged over three children per woman during the baby boom period (1946–1965) dropped to just two children per woman by 1970 and have remained at about that level since that time (see Chart 10). Considering even longer historical periods helps in understanding the significance of the drop in birth rates in the United States (Table 1). It may be surprising to see how high birth rates were back in 1875 (over four children per woman) and how much they dropped by 1925 (to three children per woman). Reductions in death rates during infancy and early childhood help explain much of the longer-term decline in birth rates. Before 1900, the probability that a newborn would survive to age 5 or 10 was far below 100 percent. Thus, in order to have a family with a desired number of children surviving to adulthood, more births were required in the past. Adjusting birth rates to include only those children who survive to age 108 results in fairly flat total fertility rates near three children per woman from 1875 through 1925. From 1926 through 1965, this adjusted total fertility rate was still about 2.7 births per woman, on average, including both the temporary low-birth period of the Great Depression and World War II, and the temporary high-birth period after World War II. After 1965, however, the total fertility rate shifted to a new level around two children per woman. It is this apparently permanent shift to lower birth rates in the United States that is the principal cause of our changing age distribution between 2010 and 2030 and the resulting shift in the ratio of beneficiaries to workers.
Chart 10.
Total U.S. fertility rates with and without adjustment for survival to age 10, 1875–2005 SOURCE: Social Security Administration, Office of the Chief Actuary. NOTE: TFR = total fertility rate.
Table 1. Annual average total U.S. fertility rates with and without adjustment for survival to age 10, various periods, 1875–2003 Period Average TFR Adjusted TFR 1875–1925 3.67 2.85 1926–1965 2.84 2.69 1966–1990 1.99 1.95 1991–2003 2.01 1.99 SOURCE: Social Security Administration, Office of the Chief Actuary. NOTE: TFR = total fertility rate.
Chart 11 demonstrates even more vividly the impact of the changes in birth rates on the age distribution of the population. The aged dependency ratio (ratio of population aged 65 or older to the population at working ages, 20–64) has been almost flat since 1975 and was held down between 1994 and 2010 as the relatively low-birth-rate generations born during the Great Depression and World War II (1929–1945) reached age 65. However, this ratio will rise substantially between 2010 and 2030, reflecting both the attainment of age 65 by the baby boom generation (born 1946 to 1965) and entry into the working ages of low-birth-rate generations (born after 1965) that followed the baby boom. The dashed line in the chart illustrates what the projected dependency ratios would be if we assumed no further improvement in life expectancy after 2008.9 The chart demonstrates that through 2030, the upward shift in the ratio is almost entirely because of the changing birth rate. The illustration for the total dependency ratio (ratio of the population aged 65 or older or younger than age 20 to the population at working ages, 20–64) tells essentially the same story.
Chart 11.
Total and aged dependency ratios, 1975–2008, projected under alternative life expectancy assumptions, 2009–2085 SOURCE: 2009 Social Security Trustees Report, Table V.A2 and the Social Security Administration, Office of the Chief Actuary. NOTE: Projections reflect the intermediate assumptions. a. Ratio of the population aged 65 or older and under age 20 to the population aged 20–64. b. Ratio of the population aged 65 or older to the population aged 20–64.
Chart 11 also shows that improving life expectancy after 2008 does begin to produce significant effects on the age distribution of the population after 2030. But the permanent shift in the age distribution between 2010 and 2030 because of lower birth rates remains the dominant factor for the increased Social Security program cost over the next 75 years.
The effect of changes in real wage growth, productivity, labor force participation, price inflation, unemployment rates, and other economic factors all have significant impact on the future cost of Social Security. However, most of these variables, and in particular real average wage growth, affect both the tax income and the benefits of the program—as a result having offsetting effects on the program as a whole. In addition, shifts in these parameters have not been as dramatic as the change in birth rates.
Future Changes for the Social Security Program
One useful way to describe the effect of the change in the aged dependency ratio and the resulting effect on the ratio of beneficiaries to workers is to consider the implied number of workers per beneficiary. For the past 35 years, there have been about 3.3 workers per beneficiary (consistent with the ratio of 30 beneficiaries per 100 workers). After 2030, the ratio will be two workers per beneficiary (consistent with 50 beneficiaries per 100 workers).
With the average worker benefit currently at about $1,000 per month, 3.3 workers would need to contribute about $300 each per month to provide a $1,000 benefit. But after the population age distribution has shifted to have just two workers per beneficiary, each worker would need to contribute $500 to provide the same $1,000 benefit.
Thus, in order to meet increased Social Security costs, substantial change will be needed. The intermediate projections of the 2009 Trustees Report indicate that if we wait to take action until the combined OASDI trust fund becomes exhausted in 2037, benefit reductions of around 25 percent or payroll tax increases of around one-third (a 4 percent increase in addition to the current 12.4 percent rate) will be required. Past legislative changes for Social Security suggest that the next reform is likely to include a combination of benefit reductions and payroll tax increases.
Because the large shift in the cost of the OASDI program over the next 20 years is not due to increasing life expectancy, it is not clear that increasing the NRA should be the principal approach for restoring long-term solvency. Increasing the unreduced retirement age beyond 67 is one option that may be considered, given that the population may be healthier in the future and able to work to an older average age. However, this raises the question of the adequacy of monthly benefit levels. After the NRA reaches 67, those persons claiming benefits at age 62 will receive only 70 percent of the unreduced benefit level. Further increase in the NRA would decrease the adequacy of monthly benefits at age 62, and at all other ages, even further.
There is no one clear solution to the problem of increased cost for retirees because of fewer workers available to support the retirees, which in turn is caused by lower birth rates. This issue is not specific to Social Security, but also affects Medicare as well as many other private and public retirement income systems. The decline in birth rates has been far more dramatic in Japan and many European countries that are struggling with the effects of aging populations because of declines in birth rates even more severe than in the United States.10
A variety of possible changes to the provisions of the Social Security Act have been considered by policymakers and have been scored by the Office of the Chief Actuary. The reader is invited to look through these options, both as individual provisions and comprehensive proposals for improving solvency of the OASDI program.11A TRIP to Denver for two award-winning detectives was turned into a booze fuelled freebie for the two men who headed up Cleveland Police.
What should have been a proud night for the force turned into an embarrassing evening as the then chairman of Cleveland Police, Dave McLuckie, said in front of the host of the event that he would have "chinned" the Denver Police Chief.
The larger-than-life former chairman was also heard on several occasions shouting across the packed conference room to former Chief Constable Sean Price demanding that he get him a drink – shouting "Price – bar" while waving an empty glass in the air.
Detective Sergeant Rebecca Driscoll and Detective Constable Gill Matthews were invited to attend the International Association of Woman Police (IAWP) after they helped expose a transatlantic drugs network.
Their expertise and dedication played a pivotal part in breaking up the supply chain between the UK and the States, which closed 100 drugs factories in the US.
However, the behaviour of Mr McLuckie and their boss Mr Price overshadowed the celebrations.
A misconduct hearing report released as part of the Operation Sacristy investigation showed that the former chairman had behaved in a boorish way after he believed he had been snubbed by the Denver Police chief during a formal dinner in September 2007.
The report which includes evidence from one witness, states: “During a lunch ceremony involving senior officers and other dignitaries from all over the world, McLuckie behaved in a rude, unprofessional and embarrassing way.
“The host explained how she had risen through the ranks despite being a mother-of-four and stated that she had only been able to achieve that due to the flexible working practices instigated by the Denver Police Chief.
“In front of the host of the event, McLuckie stated that he would have ‘chinned’ the Denver Police Chief. It is believed that there was a grievance between McLuckie and the Denver Chief who had ignored McLuckie. The comments were felt to be embarrassing.”
Mr McLuckie is also said to have complained about the quality of the food and demanded that the former chief constable "should take him out for something decent to eat after the meal".
The trip cost the taxpayer £7,312.72 despite the two recipients having their expenses covered as invited guests, while their partners paid for their own costs to attend the conference.
Undeterred by their experience the pair returned to Denver two years later to attend the International Association of Chief Police Officers Conference.
This time they invited along the two women who would later become their wives.
Mr Price was accompanied by his partner and staff officer Inspector Heather Eastwood, who later resigned from the force after failing to inform her superiors she had been arrested for being drunk and disorderly.
And Mr McLuckie was accompanied by the former secretarial manager of Cleveland Police Authority Julie Leng, who he later married after being imprisoned last year for perverting the course of justice.
The trip, which included business class flights and stays at the Marriott hotel in Denver and Radisson Heathrow Hotel, cost the taxpayer £18,015.49.
During an interview as part of the investigation into his gross misconduct, Mr Price produced a prepared statement where he denied hearing Mr McLuckie threaten to chin the Denver Police chief but said that the former CPA chairman felt he had been snubbed by the American officer when he barely spoke to him during the event.
He also described Mr McLuckie’s attempts to get him to buy him a drink by shouting across the room was just his sense of humour but was not responsible for the manner in which his friend may "spontaneously" choose to behave.
The report into the trip concluded: “The cost of the trip and the cost to the public purse (particularly with Price and McLuckie travelling business class) was excessive, contrary to Cleveland Police policies and unacceptable.
“Price knew or ought to have known that to be the case and that his actions constituted an abuse of public funds.”Share:
Super Smash Club - additional tickets available in Montreal at door!
En Français? –cliquez ici
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MONTREAL – November 8th
Additional tickets will be available at the door for the Super Smash Club event this weekend. Come early as the ticket quantity is limited!
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Calling all Canadian Super Smash Bros. fans! Nintendo of Canada is launching Super Smash Club to connect Super Smash Bros. fans in Canada. Now you can participate in the launch of Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U! Haven’t seen the announcement video featuring Reggie Fils-Aime? Check it out!
There are lots of ways to get involved! Keep reading to learn more about how to get involved and for chances to win prizes.
Super Smash Club events UPDATED – click here
Super Smash Club Defining the Rules social contest is now closed. Click here for the fan-voted rules
Super Smash Club Sharing your Smash Bros. fandom social contest is now closed. For links to view the winning submissions - click here
Future Shop Sponsor & Pre-order link – click here
Timing: September 18 to September 26
Contest is closed and the fan-voted official rules of Super Smash Club have been decided upon. Check them out below.
Timing: October 1 to October 10
The contest is now closed. Thank you to all who participated! To see the final 10 winner's submissions visit the Nintendo of Canada Facebook page or click here.
Timing: October 18 to November 8
Official registration through Eventbrite.ca is now full. However, there will be additional tickets available at the doors for the Super Smash Club events. Come early as space is limited. The schedule for the main events is listed below.
Everyone who attends will receive a Super Smash Club item plus a chance to win additional prizing onsite. Events will run on Saturdays from October 18th to November 8th in select locations. Bring your Nintendo 3DS onsite to battle and StreetPass with other fans!
Event times shown in local time.
Super Smash Club Gatherings
Attend one of the Super Smash Club Gatherings listed below for your chance to play against fellow fans and win prizing (while supplies last). There will be systems on-hand, but it’s suggested to bring your own Nintendo 3DS/2DS and copy of the game to battle against other guests and build up your own characters. If you have not picked up your copy of Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS, be sure to download the demo from Nintendo eShop prior to the event.
The events below do not require an RSVP to participate.
Future Shop is the title sponsor of the Super Smash Club in Canada. To visit the sponsor’s website, please go to Futureshop.ca.
Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS is available now! Get your copy NOW!
Welcome to the club!
-Nintendo of Canada
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Contest Rules and Regulations:
Super Smash Club: Defining the Rules Contest
OFFICIAL RULES.
NO PURCHASE OR PAYMENT OF ANY KIND IS NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN
This Super Smash Club: Defining the Rules contest (the “Contest”) is sponsored by Nintendo of Canada Ltd. located at 2925 Virtual Way, Vancouver, BC V5M 4X5 (“Sponsor”) and is open to legal residents of Canada who are age 13 or older. All employees, representatives or agents of the Sponsor, and the persons with whom the foregoing are domiciled (whether related or not) are ineligible to participate in this Contest. Eligibility will be determined by Sponsor in its sole discretion. Void in Puerto Rico and where prohibited or restricted by law. The Contest starts at 12:00am EDT on September 18, 2014 and ends at 11:59pm EDT on September 26, 2014 (the “Contest Period”). Odds of winning depend on number eligible entries received for the draw. To enter, (1) visit the Nintendo of Canada Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/nintendoofcanada or Nintendo Twitter Page at https://twitter.com/NintendoCanada during the Contest Period, and (2) Post or Tweet your proposed rule for Super Smash Club and include the hashtag #SuperSmashClub (your “Submission”). Entries will be judged by creativity, how true they are to the game and how relevant they are to Super Smash Bros. battles. The final rules list will be determined by the Sponsor. If the submission is chosen as a final rule or is akin to a final rule, it will be entered into the final draw. Twenty (20) winners will be drawn at random to each receive one (1) Super Smash Bros. branded towel ($ 5.00 ARV). Each prize winner will be notified by email on or about October 1,2014. Selected entrants must correctly answer math skill question to win. Prizes returned as undeliverable or otherwise not claimed within ten (10) days after delivery of notification will be forfeited and awarded to an alternate winner.
All Submissions must adhere to the following guidelines: (1) Be safe. Do not engage in any dangerous activities to make your Submission. Do not harm (or pretend to harm) yourself or anyone else in your Submission; (2) If you name or depict any person in your Submission, you may only name or depict yourself. Group entries depicting more than one person will not be accepted; (3) Your Submission must be suitable for general audiences and not be offensive, obscene, or illegal, or violate the rights of others. In addition, your Submission must not violate any policies or terms of Facebook or Twitter; (4) Your Submission must be an original, non-commercial work of your own creation. Do not submit professional videos or images. You must own the copyright to your Submission (including all components of it) or have sufficient rights to submit the Submission in this Contest and to grant permission to Sponsor to use the Submission, as described below. (5) Your Submission must not include any TV programming, movies, artwork, or any website or other content that you do not have documented rights to use and license for this Contest. (6) If you wish, you may include Nintendo logos, brand names and products in your Submission. Otherwise, do not wear clothing or show products with prominent logos or brand names. There should not be any recognizable third-party products, logos, signs, or brand names visible. Note that you do not have to include any Nintendo products in your Submission, and doing so will not improve your chances of winning.
No substitutions or exchanges (including for cash) of any prizes will be permitted, except that Sponsor reserves the right to substitute a prize of equal or greater value for any prize. All prizes are awarded "AS IS" and WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, express or implied (including, without limitation, any implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose). ALL FEDERAL, STATE, PROVINCIAL AND LOCAL TAXES ASSOCIATED WITH THE RECEIPT OR USE OF ANY PRIZE ARE THE SOLE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE WINNER. This Contest is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with Twitter and/or Facebook, Inc. You understand that by participating, you are providing your information to Sponsor, not to Twitter or Facebook. You understand that by using and interacting with www.facebook.com, you are subject to the terms, conditions, and policies that govern the use of www.facebook.com so please review them, including privacy policies.
Except where prohibited by law, and for Canadian residents, subject to the Nintendo of Canada Online Privacy Policy at http://www.nintendo.com/corp/privacy_ca.jsp, entry into the Contest constitutes permission to use your name, city and state/province of residence, likeness and prize information, without limitation, to administer the Contest, and for Sponsor's promotional purposes without further permission or compensation. Without limiting the foregoing, you understand and agree that Sponsor may use (and may allow third parties to use) your Submission on websites, Facebook pages, advertisements, and other promotional materials. Your grant of the foregoing permission is perpetual and may not be revoked.
The Contest and these Official Rules will be governed, construed and interpreted under the laws of the British Columbia. For Quebec residents only: Any litigation respecting the conduct or organization of a publicity contest may be submitted to the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux for a ruling. Any litigation respecting the awarding of a prize may be submitted to the Régie only for the purpose of helping the parties reach a settlement. For a copy of the winners list or these Official Rules, send a written request with a self-addressed, business-size return envelope to: Attn: Contest Administrator – Super Smash Club: Defining the Rules, Nintendo of Canada Ltd. located at 2925 Virtual Way, Vancouver, BC V5M 4X5.
Super Smash Club: Share your Super Smash Bros. Fandom
OFFICIAL RULES.
NO PURCHASE OR PAYMENT OF ANY KIND IS NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN
This Super Smash Club: Share your Super Smash Bros. Fandom contest (the “Contest”) is sponsored by Nintendo of Canada Ltd. located at 2925 Virtual Way, Vancouver, BC V5M 4X5 (“Sponsor”) and is open to legal residents of Canada who are age 13 or older. All employees, representatives or agents of the Sponsor, and the persons with whom the foregoing are domiciled (whether related or not) are ineligible to participate in this Contest. Eligibility will be determined by Sponsor in its sole discretion. Void in Puerto Rico and where prohibited or restricted by law. The Contest starts at 12:00am EDT on October 1, 2014 and ends at 11:59pm EDT on October 10, 2014 (the “Contest Period”). Odds of winning depend on number eligible entries received for the draw. To enter, (1) visit the Nintendo of Canada Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/nintendoofcanada or Nintendo Twitter Page at https://twitter.com/NintendoCanada during the Contest Period, and (2) Post or Tweet your artwork, cosplay, photo or favourite memory regarding the Super Smash Bros. franchise (your “Submission”). Sponsor will select one eligible entrant per day at random to receive one (1) Super Smash Bros. branded towel ($5.00 ARV). Each prize winner will be notified by email on or about October 15, 2014. Selected entrants must correctly answer math skill question to win. Prizes returned as undeliverable or otherwise not claimed within ten (10) days after delivery of notification will be forfeited and awarded to an alternate winner.
All Submissions must adhere to the following guidelines: (1) Be safe. Do not engage in any dangerous activities to make your Submission. Do not harm (or pretend to harm) yourself or anyone else in your Submission; (2) If you name or depict any person in your Submission, you may only name or depict yourself. Group entries depicting more than one person will not be accepted; (3) Your Submission must be suitable for general audiences and not be offensive, obscene, or illegal, or violate the rights of others. In addition, your Submission must not violate any policies or terms of Facebook or Twitter; (4) Your Submission must be an original, non-commercial work of your own creation. Do not submit professional videos or images. You must own the copyright to your Submission (including all components of it) or have sufficient rights to submit the Submission in this Contest and to grant permission to Sponsor to use the Submission, as described below. (5) Your Submission must not include any TV programming, movies, artwork, or any website or other content that you do not have documented rights to use and license for this Contest. (6) If you wish, you may include Nintendo logos, brand names and products in your Submission. Otherwise, do not wear clothing or show products with prominent logos or brand names. There should not be any recognizable third-party products, logos, signs, or brand names visible. Note that you do not have to include any Nintendo products in your Submission, and doing so will not improve your chances of winning.
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In their rush to readily promote neoliberal dogma and corporate-inspired PR, many government officials, scientists and journalists take as given that profit-driven transnational corporations have a legitimate claim to be custodians of natural assets. There is the premise that water, food, soil and agriculture should be handed over to powerful and wholly corrupt transnational corporations to milk for profit, under the pretence these entities are somehow serving the needs of humanity.
These natural assets (‘the commons’) belong to everyone and any stewardship should be carried out in the common interest by local people assisted by public institutions and governments acting on their behalf, not by private transnational corporations driven by self interest and the maximization of profit by any means possible.
Concerns about what is in the public interest or what is best for the environment lies beyond the scope of hard-headed commercial interests and should ideally be the remit of elected governments and civil organisations. However, the best-case scenario for private corporations is to have supine, co-opted agencies or governments. And if the current litigation cases in the US and the ‘Monsanto Papers’ court documents tell us anything, this is exactly what they set out to create.
Of course, we have known how corporations like Monsanto (andBayer) have operated for many years, whether it is by bribery, smear campaigns, faking data, co-opting agencies and key figures, subverting science or any of the other actions or human rights abuses that the Monsanto Tribunal has shed light on.
Behind the public relations spin of helping to feed the world is the roll-out of an unsustainable model of agriculture based on highly profitable (GM) corporate seeds and massive money-spinning health- and environment-damaging proprietary chemical inputs that we now know lacked proper regulatory scrutiny and should never have been commercialised in the first place (VAN STRUM). In effect, transnational agribusiness companies have sought to marginalise alternative approaches to farming and create dependency on their products.
Localisation and traditional methods of food production have given way to globalised supply chains dominated by transnational companies policies and actions which have resulted in the destruction of habitat and livelihoods and the imposition of corporate-controlled, chemical-intensive (monocrop) agriculture that weds farmers and regions to a wholly exploitative system of neoliberal globalization. Whether it involves the undermining or destruction of what were once largely self-sufficient agrarian economies in Africa or the devastating impacts of soy cultivation in Argentina or palm oil production in Indonesia, transnational agribusiness and capitalism cannot be greenwashed.
Soil on a doughnut diet
One of the greatest natural assets that humankind has is soil. It can take 500 years to generate an inch of soil yet just a few generations to destroy. When you drench soil with proprietary synthetic chemicals, introduce company-patented genetically tampered crops or continuously monocrop as part of a corporate-controlled industrial farming system, you kill essential microbes, upset soil balance and end up feeding soil a limited “doughnut diet” of unhealthy inputs (and you also undermine soil’s unique capacity for carbon storage and its potential role in combatting climate change).
Armed with their synthetic biocides, this is what the transnational agritech companies do. In their arrogance (and ignorance), these companies claim to know what they are doing and attempt to get the public and various agencies to bow before the altar of corporate ‘science’ and its scientific priesthood.
But in reality, they have no real idea about the long-term impacts their actions have had on soil and its complex networks of microbes and microbiological processes. Soil microbiologists are themselves still trying to comprehend it all.
That much is clear in this article, where Brian Barth discusses a report by the American Society of Microbiologists (ASM). Acknowledging that farmers will need to produce 70 to 100 per cent more food to feed a projected nine billion humans by 2050, the introduction to the report states:
“Producing more food with |
's website says. But to Dave, it was more like a cult than a professional military organization. The way he sees it, if you superimpose the Foreign Legion's characteristics on top of a cult, there's a lot more similarities than if you superimpose it onto a military outfit like the British Parachute Regiment. The physical punishment, hardcore work, disrupted sleep, and lack of food combined with the fact that they were constantly telling you to forget your past, created what Dave sees as a kind of brainwashing.
On the border of Bosnia-Herzegovina/Croatia, November 1992, with 3 PPCLI.
One of the training staff's favourite things to do was to line everyone up in the morning on the parade grounds, sometimes in their underwear, and let them freeze for 40 minutes—the only time they were allowed jackets, gloves or toques on their shaved heads was during their regular night marches. Most people were constantly in some form of sickness and while the corrective beatings continued, corporals sometimes punished transgressions by forcing people to jump into a pond called "Le Petit Lac."A week before their time there ended, the whole section was ordered to strip naked and dive into the ice-rimmed pond. One Moldovan guy named Mozes—"known for being a bit of an individualist”—refused to get in and the rest of the group watched from freezing water as the Romanian corporal "motivated" him through combat-boot clad kicks to the guy's thighs. "It was right out of a World War II, concentration camp film," Dave says.
Once Mozes's rampant string of individualism had been curbed, the group was ordered to stand by the pond and chant Legion songs—but Dave committed the heinous crime of clattering his teeth too much to sing as frostbite settled in on his nose, ears, and hands. A lieutenant slapped him in the face and stated: “You can't sing.”
They eventually completed the 50-kilometre march over the course of a night and day and were officially graduated in their shiny white kepi hat and traditional dress uniform. In a kind of twisted Legionnaire sense of vacation, they were then all made to march up the slopes of a mountain in the Pyrenees with a heavy pack, skis, and an automatic weapon; then spent the next few days learning out to ski "black diamond routes with an assault rifle on your chest James Bond style."
Three more months of basic training followed, and the only marked improvement was that the troops received longer meals. They were slowly guided towards the combat regiments they wanted—some would go to Corsica, a mountain unit and cavalry unit would stay in France and some to Djibouti. After six months without contact with friends, family, or anyone in the outside world, the new legionnaires were given a three-day vacation in Marseille. Afterwards, they began to be packed off to their regiments. Dave, was off to French Guiana, where he would gain a specialty as a sniper and a secondary in demolitions.
As for Mozes, a sergeant who took offense to the Moldovan's individualism took him into a room and "used his body as a punching bag" in the last month of basic training. Dave heard he deserted shortly after.
French Guiana
They called it a Deep Mission. Around 100 legionnaires were based in the small town of Kourou in the middle of French Guiana's coastline. They were divided into sections that rotated month-long shifts patrolling the border to watch out for cocaine smugglers and people conducting illegal gold mining operations in the jungles. Shortly before Dave arrived, a man was nearly killed from a poisonous tarantula bite on a mission. The man's fellow legionnaires immediately submerged him in a nearby creek to cool the skyrocketing body temperature the venom caused and blasted open a landing pad with explosives after radioing for help. A chopper guided by a red smoke saved him just in time—if you aren't treated within six-eight hours of the bite you can die.
The jungle patrol missions could involve any number of run-ins with snakes, spiders, armed drug traffickers, or in one case a column of marauding ants that was around 4.5 meters wide and nearly a kilometre long that made a chattering noise as they swamped the camp "like a blanket." In the face of such an army, even the mighty legionnaires couldn't do anything except get out of their way and wait until they passed. Dave went into his first Deep Mission weighing 80 kilograms and came out at 64, covered in a shaggy beard, due to the fact accidental razor cuts could quickly lead to infection in the jungle.
Nonetheless, Dave said that the Deep Missions were a relief because you got to escape the strict regimentation of the base. Back in Kourou there would be almost daily room inspections and you had to deal more with the "bullshit politics" in a base Dave says was full of racism.
French Guiana, 2005.
Otherwise they spent their time in Kourou going through a strict jungle routine to limit the chances of catching malaria. They were always on anti-malarials and the routine involved covering up as dusk settled in and getting off the ground into hammocks. “Everything in the jungle hunts at night,” he said, and to lower the chances of scorpion stings or malaria, the legionnaires were made to be extremely strict about getting in sync with the way the jungle operates. They were even given an acne medicine because bugs hated the smell of the stuff. "You have great complexion in French Guiana—you have no pimples on your face," Dave says. But nonetheless a mosquito somehow always made its way through. “Tons and tons of legionnaires get malaria for life from going to French Guiana," Dave says.
Escape
One of the reasons for the constant training is to be ready if something happened, and France's involvement in the aftermath of the coup d'etat that removed Jean-Bertrand Aristide's from power in 2004 provided just such a happening. Dave spent four months in Haiti securing the French embassy and Port-au-Prince airport, evacuating diplomats and monitoring a new presidential election. It was during this time that one of his friends in the outfit got shot. Although there was always a sense of danger, this intensified the reality of the scene for Dave.
"It was a reminder that I could lose my life in this organization and it wouldn’t be for anything romantic—it would be for something stupid," Dave said. Others had also died in French Guiana—mostly from drowning during river crossings. The high points of life for Dave was a trip to Central America to train with the Salvadoran army and the odd day guarding a perimeter around the European space agency site during a launch and the daily regimentation began to weigh on his spirit.
"The regimentation is there because it’s a tradition that’s worked for over 150 years," Dave said. And while he admits that if they took the regimentation away, it could lead to fighting or worse problems, he had personally had enough of a place where the whole group continued to lose their days off, among other collective punishments, for the transgressions of an individual. While he understood the Legion was an escape for a lot of people, for him it started to be the opposite. With two years left on his contract, he started to look at escaping into Paramaribo in Suriname, but there was no Canadian embassy there and the Legion had taken his passport when he first joined.
On the 600 metre range, French Guiana, 2005.
His opportunity came when he received a seven-week vacation in France. He spent his first day getting blotto, then the next morning he began to look for ways to cross into Spain on Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree Forum. A few days later he was on a train to the border. He knew if he was caught trying to leave the country he would face possible jail time and be sent straight back to Kourou to finish his contract. But he was determined to get to the Canadian Consulate in Barcelona. He crossed the border overland through the Pyrenees and caught a bus in the Spanish side. A tense moment passed when some border police got on and checked for a passport he didn't have. He made an elaborate and drawn-out show of shuffling through his bag in the hopes that the man would eventually get bored, and for some reason, it actually worked. The guard continued on and exited the back of the bus.
At first, the Canadian Consulate in Barcelona refused to help due to the fact that he voluntarily gave up his passport to another country, but the woman at the desk was German and a few words in her native tongue softened her up to Dave’s case. After two months of hanging around in Barcelona, he was once more David Clouds, the Canadian—passport in hand.
Freedom
Dave can never return to France, and is still wary of traveling to countries such as Mali where he may come into contact with the Gendarmerie, who would see his name come up on the Interpol as a Legion deserter and potentially arrest him. “I regret not being able to go back to France but it’s just something I had to give up," he said. "France is a beautiful country and it has a beautiful history, and beautiful people that live there."
In search of the kind of adventure that had initially pushed him into the structured life of a legionnaire, Dave set off on a life-changing one-year trip that took him from Morocco to Jordan overland then from Kenya to the Democratic Republic of Congo—he'd always wanted to travel through Africa. His career in the Legion had left him equipped for most danger—so much that to this day he still has random companies phone him up to ask him to do contract security work for jobs with varying degrees of sketchiness. It had also left him with loads of salary built up over the last three years and tax-free due to the fact that he was "a fictional person that didn't exist." He'd received a €15,000-bonus the Legion gave for French Guiana volunteers due to the risk of malaria and other diseases.
On parade in French Guiana, 2004.
“I had the attitude that I could do anything,” he said, and besides all the bullshit, his experience with the Legion is not a legacy that has left him badly. “I joined the legion ultimately for adventure and I definitely got that," he said.
Now he skydives, plays guitar in a band in Ottawa and bartends at a tiny, boisterous pub that attracts a random assortment of characters from the surrounding neighbourhood. He pours drinks with military precision and falls back on a kind of bartending tradition sometimes lost in today's world of generic Irish pubs and cellphone societies. He engages with the regulars in a humble friendliness that imbues the place with a charm that goes beyond its scattered decor of hanging lobster traps and old armchairs. Every surface is kept sparkling clean and every glass sits in its place.
As I sit on a stool on a relatively empty night he first tells me a story about Africa shortly after he left the Legion. In Uganda, a guy jumped out of the bushes while he was walking down the road and tried to snatch his bag. Dave turned and open-palm struck him in the throat. "I fucking dropped him in two seconds," he said.
The guy picked himself up and escaped into the bush, but it was unclear whether he'd realized a valuable lesson about fucking with an ex-legionnaire. In fact, he probably had no idea what he was up against.
@joshualearn1(Newser) – South Dakota is considering a Republican-backed law that would bulk up the definition of "justifiable homicide" to include another kind of killing—one intended to prevent harm to a fetus. Mother Jones points out that if it passes, it could make it legal to kill doctors who perform abortions. The bill, sponsored by state Rep. Phil Jensen along with 22 other reps and four state senators, didn't initially include the "unborn child" wording; it was added in a little-noticed hearing last week. It will soon be up for a vote in the state's GOP-majority House.
Jensen says the move is just about "consistency": South Dakota currently allows prosecutors to charge people who commit crimes that result in the death of a fetus with manslaughter or murder. But, writes Kate Sheppard, "there's a difference between counting the murder of a pregnant woman as two crimes—which is permissible under law in many states—and making the protection of a fetus an affirmative defense against a murder charge." South Dakota, which has twice tried and failed to ban abortion, has some of the most limiting abortion laws in the country: There have been no providers in the state since 1994; Planned Parenthood flies in an out-of-state doctor weekly to see women at a lone clinic in Sioux Falls. (Click to read about a controversial abortion law Ohio is considering.)Joshua Zeitz, a Politico Magazine contributing editor, has taught American history and politics at Cambridge University and Princeton University and is the author of Lincoln’s Boys: John Hay, John Nicolay, and the War for Lincoln's Image. He is currently writing a book on the making of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. Follow him @joshuamzeitz.
Mar-a-Lago. It’s a magical place. Bedecked in marble colonnades and crystal chandeliers, the so-called Winter White House affords members of the 1 percent an opportunity to brush shoulders with the president’s senior advisers and Cabinet members and even, on occasion, to capture a glimpse of national security deliberations that ordinarily occur in the White House Situation Room. On Friday, when President Donald Trump hosts Chinese President Xi Jinping at his resort for a “very difficult” summit, this unusual marriage of private and public space will find its ultimate consummation.
The particular spectacle of Mar-a-Lago drives the president’s liberal opponents mad, but Trump is by no means the first American president to decamp often for “winter” or “southern” White Houses. Ulysses S. Grant frequented Long Branch, New Jersey, where his family kept a summer cottage. Woodrow Wilson also preferred the Jersey Shore; his staff worked out of an office building in Asbury Park during many of the summer months. Harry Truman traveled often to Key West, where a modest naval officer’s home served as his “Little White House.” Teddy Roosevelt had Sagamore Hill; John Kennedy, his family’s compounds in Palm Beach and Hyannis Port; and Ronald Reagan, his California ranch.
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Only one other president’s executive outpost, however, was also his own private resort. That distinction falls to Franklin Roosevelt, who built a sprawling facility in Warm Springs, Georgia, where he regularly escaped the pressures of Washington, D.C.
In some ways Warm Springs wasn’t so different from Mar-a-Lago. Both compounds had swimming pools, a golf course, a dining hall and private quarters for the president. Both became the weekend nerve center of the federal government. Both relied on contributions from wealthy individuals.
There, however, the similarities end.
FDR built his club to care for people stricken by polio—many of them poor, and most of them children; he reveled in their companionship. Warm Springs was where FDR developed a deep and abiding empathy with those who had been left behind by life, and in some ways, it was the birthplace of his liberal outlook.
Trump, on the other hand, charges wealthy guests $200,000 for the opportunity to commingle with his very wealthy inner circle. His club seems to celebrate the privilege of those born or arrived to lots of money—an ethos that has come to characterize his short tenure in office as well. Morally and ideologically, the two resorts couldn’t be more different, and they represent two very different presidencies. It’s the New Deal vs. Make America Great Again.
***
Franklin Roosevelt first happened upon Warm Springs in October 1924. Three years earlier, the former assistant secretary of the Navy and Democratic vice presidential nominee contracted polio, which left him paralyzed from the waist down. The impoverished Southern town was “not much beyond the horse-and-buggy stage” remembered the manager of the town’s one decrepit hotel. But like other polio victims, FDR hoped that its warm spring waters would help him regain use of his legs. It was a dream to which he clung for the remainder of his life.
Though he did not overcome his paralysis, Warm Springs helped a deeply depressed Roosevelt regain his confidence. His frequent presence at the hotel gained national attention, and soon the crumbling resort attracted other polio patients who similarly hoped that its warm waters would aid their recovery. Biographers generally agree that by his personal struggle, and through his intimate contact with other disease victims, FDR—formerly a callow man of no outward liberal conviction—came to develop a deep sense of empathy with people less fortunate than himself.
In 1926, Roosevelt purchased the aging Meriwether Inn—including the main hotel, 3,000 acres of undeveloped land, several crumbling cottages, a large pond, and several warm spring pools—for just over $200,000, a sum representing roughly two-thirds of his personal trust (his mother, Sara, still retained most of the family’s real estate and investments). It was a decision that deeply distressed both his wife, Eleanor, and Sara, who for perhaps the only time in their fraught association agreed: Franklin was squandering his children’s legacy. It didn’t help that the Roosevelts’ personal cabin was so threadbare that Eleanor could “look through the cracks and see daylight.”
But FDR had grand designs. He poured money into the endeavor, upgrading the facilities and hiring a medical staff to work with polio patients. It was both a real resort and a recovery center. “Our rate is $42 a week,” roughly $600 in today’s money, Roosevelt informed a fellow disease victim. “This includes board, lodging, medical and therapeutic treatment, pool charges, etc.—in fact, everything except your traveling expenses and cigarette money.” Of course, those who could pay did. Those who couldn’t did not. The future president established a fund to cover costs for indigent patients, and when the fund ran dry, he instructed the resort’s staff to send the bills directly to his home in Hyde Park, New York.
As governor of New York and as president, Roosevelt retired frequently to Warm Springs, where in 1933 he built a modest home—“astonishingly small and simple,” the New York Times later observed—for a cost of under $9,000 (just under $175,000 in 2017 dollars). A ranch house that “could easily have been built by a struggling insurance salesman or an accountant,” it had just three small bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room and a study. Yet it was there that the president, often in the company of his chief advisers, “made decisions that affected the world,” both during the Great Depression and World War II.
FDR rejoiced in his role as the host-in-chief at Warm Springs. He rode around the grounds and into the small town in his specially outfitted Model T, with hand controls substituting for gas and brake pedals. On Easter Sunday and Thanksgiving evenings, he presided gleefully over dinners in the main dining hall, surrounded by smiling polio victims—many of them children. He swam with the other guests, broke bread with them and invited them back for reunions. Cocktail hour on the veranda of his cottage was normally reserved for White House staff, though when foreign diplomats or American politicians visited, they, too, were included.
Harry Hopkins, Roosevelt’s closest White House aide, described a typical retreat in the late 1930s. The president slept late and took breakfast in bed at 8:30. An hour later, Hopkins arrived to discuss overnight developments. The two men would consult by telephone with the State Department. Other assistants would amble in and out with briefings. At noon, FDR, Hopkins and Missy LeHand, the president’s secretary and confidante, would take luncheon alone at the cottage (“the service incidentally is as bad as the food”). Roosevelt would then survey the property, chat with guests, and return to his “Little White House” by 4:30 to dictate letters and telegrams. Cocktails began around 6, and dinner followed at 7, after which FDR retired to his study with his beloved stamp collection while LeHand and Hopkins played Chinese checkers in the living room. By 10, Roosevelt was asleep. It was a comforting routine that afforded him rest from the pressures of office.
Roosevelt’s original intention was to operate two endeavors: the hotel and recovery center for polio patients, and a proper, for-profit resort for wealthy vacationers who would (like members of Mar-a-Lago) pay steep membership fees, build their own “cottages” on reserved land, and enjoy access to luxury dining facilities, a 3,000-acre shooting reserve, riding trails and stables, and a golf course. The for-profit business would subsidize the polio treatment center. That plan never came fully to fruition—Roosevelt would have greater projects on which to focus in the coming decade and a half—though FDR did commission the construction of a nine-hole golf course.
Instead, in 1927 Roosevelt chartered the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, which over the coming decade gradually purchased the property and facilities—thus replenishing FDR’s personal fortune—and invested in new capital improvements, health care and rehabilitative services, and subsidies for poor patients. As governor of New York and even as president, Roosevelt personally solicited donations for the foundation from wealthy Americans. Edsel Ford, the auto company scion, wrote a $25,000 check, a transaction that today might raise concerns about potential conflicts of interest.
***
Much like FDR, Trump appears to enjoy the pageantry associated with operating the vacation resort that he bought well before his election to the presidency. He plays golf with Mar-a-Lago members and the club pro. Greets guests in the main dining room. Presides over Thanksgiving dinner. Poses for photographs with a smiling bride and groom whose wedding fortunately overlaps with a presidential weekend visit.
But therein ends any similarity between presidents Roosevelt and Trump.
Warm Springs was where Roosevelt learned, figuratively, how to walk a mile in the shoes of someone less fortunate, even as he struggled—and failed—to walk by the power of his own legs. It was the place where he could be himself; he could use his wheelchair in the presence of other polio victims, who did not expect him to keep up the arduous and painful artifice of “walking” with locked, steel leg braces, his arms supported by guard rails or body men. He sunk his fortune into the endeavor and welcomed children whose parents could not afford to pay $42 each week for care and lodging. When he solicited funds from wealthy donors, he did so to keep the doors open.
By contrast, Mar-a-Lago is a playground for the wealthy—where Trump, the son of an outer-borough developer of middle-class housing tracts, revels in the adulation of the country’s privileged and elite. Its opulence screams money, power and entitlement. Membership costs $200,000 each year, and the proceeds benefit the Trump family directly.
In effect, one might say that the difference between Warm Springs and Mar-a-Lago embodies the difference between two administrations, one of which endeavored to provide a safety net to the country’s most vulnerable citizens, the other of which celebrates the avarice and enrichment of a small, privileged few. Mar-a-Lago may be grander in physical scale than FDR’s Little White House at Warm Springs. But it’s smaller in both heart and spirit.In 1992, a chap in Philadelphia by the name of Bill O’Neill starting noticing strange tiles randomly embedded in local roads. They were generally about the size of a license plate, and each had some variation of the same strange message: “TOYNBEE IDEA IN KUbricK’s 2001 RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPiTER.” They varied a bit in color and arrangement, but they were all made of an unidentifiable hard substance, and many had footnotes as strange as the message itself, such as “Murder every journalist, I beg you,” and “Submit. Obey.” Some were accompanied by lengthy, paranoid diatribes about the newsmedia, jews, and the mafia.
So Bill started asking around about these tiles, but nobody knew anything about their origin or meaning. So, he created a website devoted to the mysterious tiles, and in doing so learned that it is not just a local phenomenon. Similar tiles have appeared in many US cities, including Washington DC, Pittsburgh, New York City, Baltimore, Boston, and many more. Some have even shown up in South America; in Brazil, Argentina, and Chile. To date, about 130 tiles have been discovered. Somehow, someone is managing to embed these tiles into public roads— some of which are busy 24/7— without being spotted.
The tiles all mention “Toynbee,” most likely Arnold J. Toynbee, a religious historian born in England in 1889. Some of the tiles mention Kubrick, the filmmaker responsible for 2001: A Space Odyssey, which was a movie that made implications that a man was reborn on a mission to Jupiter, not exactly resurrected. There is only one known intersection between the works of Toynbee and Kubrick, and it’s pretty circumstantial: Toynbee’s writings spoke of a man named Zoroaster who conceived the idea of monotheism, and this name also occurs in the title of the famous 2001: A Space Odyssey theme song; it’s entitled “Thus Spoke Zoroaster.”
Due to strong similarity in craftsmanship and writing style, these tiles are most likely the work of a single individual (in the interest of conserving slashes and pronouns, we’ll assume this individual is a male). Either this man is disturbed, or he has a bizarre sense of humor. He is certainly creative, as the messages’ delivery system indicates, and he must be a patient and methodical man to have invested the time in making these 130 or so tiles by hand. And given the diverse locales where the tiles can be found, he has the means and money to travel. Some people also suppose that he is European, given that Kubrick and Toynbee are both English, and because one of the paranoid-ranting plaques indicates that he is/was hiding in Dover, England.
One Toynbee Tile enthusiast has claimed that a freshly laid tile was once found and examined:
The highlight of my search for answers to this mystery occurred one Sunday night of this previous winter. I had gone to my local convenience store for a snack around 4:00 A.M., noticing nothing unusual. On my way home I noticed something unusual in the street. Upon closer inspection, I discovered it to be a “Toynbee Idea” tile – freshly placed and only minutes old. Of course I was beside myself with excitement and I could now see exactly how, and of what materials these tiles are made. (This tile, by the way, is located on 13th. & Arch St. in Philadelphia.) The tiles are just that – tiles….although not the standard vinyl floor tile, as I had suspected. The letters are cut out of a material with, I assume, a higher rubber content than a standard floor tile. The inlay letters seemed to made from a less maleable substance, and in this case were red and yellow. The tile is secured to the street by intricately folded and layered tar paper, glued together. A layer of raw tar seemed to lie beneath the whole tile, anchoring it. The weight of cars, as they run over the tile, forces the layers of tar paper to impregnate the spaces in the cracks of the letters.
The most tantalizing clue as to the source of these tiles was a 1983 newspaper interview with a social worker from Philadelphia, a man named James Morasco, who claimed that Jupiter could be colonized by bringing Earth’s dead people there to have them resurrected. When writing an article on the tiles in 2001, one reporter stumbled upon the original 1983 article, found the link intriguing, and tried to call the only James Morasco listed in Philly. A woman who answered said Mr. Morasco couldn’t come to the phone because a mysterious ailment had required that he have his voicebox removed. Another reporter writing another story in 2003 tried to call the same man, only to be told that he had died the previous March at age 88, but that he had known nothing about the tiles:
“My husband doesn’t know anything about that,” she said. “Besides he died in March. But he didn’t know anything about it.”
Thou dost protest too much? Given the strong ties and strange circumstances, some believe that Mr. Morasco was the responsible party… but there are some problems with the Morasco theory: A) He would have been in his 70s when most of the tiles were placed, and B) some new ones have been installed since his death in 2003.
Another ambiguous Toynbee-2001 link appears in a 1985 play by Pulitzer-prize winning playwright David Mamet. In his “Goldberg Street” collection, he wrote an exchange between a radio talk show host and a caller obsessing over Arnold Toynbee, the movie 2001 and dead people. This play was written seven years before the first Toynbee tile was discovered, but two years after the Morasco article.
Despite finding a few links and some background information, the purpose and message of these tiles remains inexplicable. Did 70-year-old James Morasco install the tiles, then pass the legacy on to another to continue after his death? Was it some disturbed individual who latched onto the theory described in the 1983 article, and acted on his/her own? Or could it be someone who made the bizarre Kubrick-Toynbee link independently? Particularly fitting is the last line of the original 1983 article on James Morasco:
“You may be hearing more from Morasco. And then again, you may not.”
Update: Since this article was published one Jon Foy has created a documentary which identifies a possible/probable Toynbee tiles perpetrator.Speaker John Boehner John Andrew BoehnerEx-GOP lawmaker joins marijuana trade group Crowley, Shuster moving to K Street On unilateral executive action, Mitch McConnell was right — in 2014 MORE (R-Ohio) said Sunday that he is “certainly” willing to let federal funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) expire this month if a congressional standoff that is threatening the agency’s appropriation continues.
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The department’s funding has become embroiled in a fight over federal immigration policy as staunch conservatives in the Republican-led House have pushed to tie the agency’s appropriations bill to at attempt to undo President Obama’s executive actions on immigration.
Asking by “Fox News Sunday” host Chris Wallace on Sunday if he is willing to let DHS shut down over the immigration fight, Boehner John Andrew BoehnerEx-GOP lawmaker joins marijuana trade group Crowley, Shuster moving to K Street On unilateral executive action, Mitch McConnell was right — in 2014 MORE replied, “Certainly.
“The House has done its job under the Constitution,” he said. “It's time for the Senate to do their job.”
DHS funding was left out of a broader appropriations measure that was approved in December because conservatives were hoping to use the DHS deadline to extract concessions from Obama on immigration. DHS, which includes the Transportation Security Administration, will partially shut down and stop paying thousands of employees on Feb. 28 unless Congress agrees on a way to fund it.
Senate Republicans have argued that they are being put in a bind by their counterparts in the House because they do not have a filibuster-proof majority in the upper chamber.
Boehner moved Sunday to shift blame for a potential DHS shutdown to Democrats in the Senate, who are standing firm against GOP efforts to undo Obama’s immigration executive action.
“Senate Democrats are the ones putting us in this precarious position,” he said. “It's up to Senate Democrats to get their act together.”
Senate Democrats rejected Boehner’s claim after the Sunday interview.
“When Speaker Boehner tied immigration to DHS funding he knew exactly what he was doing; saying unless I get my way, I’m going to shut down a large part of the government,” Sen. Chuck Schumer Charles (Chuck) Ellis SchumerBrady gun control group gets rebranding 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-N.Y.) said in a statement. “To now blame Democrats when members of his own party, conservative leaders and others have all asked him to back off this game of chicken is disingenuous at best.”
“There is only one thing that’s certain – if Speaker Boehner persists in following Ted Cruz Rafael (Ted) Edward CruzCornyn less popular than Cruz in Texas: poll Trump unleashing digital juggernaut ahead of 2020 Inviting Kim Jong Un to Washington MORE on this path just has he did in 2013, he will be responsible for shutting down a large part of the government, the American people will perceive it that way, and his party and the country will suffer for it.”A known ally of the fossil fuel industry, Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt has been officially selected to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Pruitt previously sued the very body he is to lead.
“For too long, the Environmental Protection Agency has spent taxpayer dollars on an out-of-control anti-energy agenda that has destroyed millions of jobs, while also undermining our incredible farmers and many other businesses and industries at every turn. As my EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, the highly respected Attorney General from the state of Oklahoma, will reverse this trend and restore the EPA’s essential mission of keeping our air and our water clean and safe,” President-elect Donald Trump said in a statement on Thursday.
Pruitt, 48, has served as Attorney General for Oklahoma since 2011. Senate democrats promise to block the EPA nomination.
The appointment is “like putting an arsonist in charge of fighting fires,” Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in a statement.
A good time to read this Pulitzer-prize winning @ericliptonnyt story on Scott Pruitt's ties to energy industry https://t.co/TwEaJACpQHpic.twitter.com/UeGSbYzksf — Michael Tackett (@tackettdc) December 7, 2016
"This is a four-alarm fire. We are going to do everything we can to stop his nomination," said Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii.
The nomination of a Secretary-designate is reviewed during hearings held by the members of the Environment and Public Works Committee, then referred to the full Senate for a vote.
Here are five things to know about Pruitt
Sued the EPA several times
Pruitt sued the EPA on behalf of Oklahoma utilities unwilling to take on the burden of additional regulation of their coal-fire plants emissions. Regulation costs were estimated to stand at $2 billion with threats to pass the costs onto to customers. Oklahoma utilities require coal to power plants.
Pruitt later criticized the agency in congressional hearings for dictating an “anti-fossil fuel agenda” to states.
“This is all about cap and trade. It’s all about curbing emissions,” Pruitt says. “It’s all about greenhouse gasses. And I think that’s going to trump and kind of swallow up all these other areas that we’re dealing with now. These other areas have been battles – that’s going to be a war,” Pruitt testified before the House Oversight subcommittee in 2012
All of his suits against the EPA have failed.
Sharing state stationery with lobbyists
A New York Times investigative report in December 2014 found Pruitt copied the text of an energy lobbyist's letter to the Environmental Protection Agency and pasted it on official Oklahoma state letterhead and sent it to the EPA arguing that the EPA wasn't properly measuring pollution from natural gas drilling in Oklahoma
Earthquake state
Within the past few years, Oklahoma has been hit by innumerable earths, going from roughly one moderate earthquake per decade from 1882 through 2009 (on average) to 24 earthquakes in the year 2014 alone.
Two studies, published in Science Advances and Science, pin the blame for the rise in earthquakes clearly on saltwater disposal related to oil drilling.
Oklahoma shaken by 40 earthquakes in one week, fracking waste blamed http://t.co/gHY8LkOGX8pic.twitter.com/0faDHEFlX1 — RT America (@RT_America) August 7, 2015
Pruitt supports fracking, calling it “a technological innovation that has done more to reduce carbon emissions in this country than any other technological advancement of our time.”
Egg fight
In March 2014, in a multistate lawsuit, Pruitt sued California over a farming law that required egg producers to house egg-laying hens. Under the law farm animals would have enough room to lie down, stand up, extend their limbs and turn freely.
For egg-laying hens, the measure outlawed the cramped quarters known as battery cages, which animal-rights groups said were both inhumane and potential sources of disease.
According to the USDA, Oklahoma produced 741 million eggs in 2012 with a value of $90.5 million.
Pruitt argued the farming law violated the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution; a federal court dismissed the lawsuit.
10 Commandments Monument
The Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled that the monument violated the state’s own constitution and ordered it moved off Capitol grounds.
Oklahoma’s top court orders removal of 10 Commandments monument http://t.co/ehWoIQKEJYpic.twitter.com/i70RcABuud — RT America (@RT_America) July 1, 2015
Pruitt sued arguing the ruling was hostile to religion and violated the First Amendment of the US Constitution.Damascus, SANA –Syria demanded UN Security Council to condemn the Israeli repeated aggressions on the country and take an immediate and decisive measure to halt them in accordance with its resolutions related to combating terrorism, warning of the catastrophic consequences of such attacks which complement the ISIS crimes and practices to escalate the situation and fuel the region and the world.
” At 02:42 a.m. on Thursday September, 7th, 2017, the Israeli warplanes targeted one of the Syrian military positions near Misyaf in Hama province with several missiles, killing two army personnel and causing material damage to the site,” Foreign and Expatriates Ministry said in two letters addressed to UN Secretary General the Chairman of the UN Security Council.
The Ministry added that the new Israeli attack aims at raising the morale of its agents represented by the terrorist groups which are carrying out its aggressive agenda and in response to the great achievements made by the Syrian Arab army and its allies in their war against terrorism, the last of which is breaking the 3-year ISIS siege of Deir Ezzor city.
The repeated Israeli attacks have become systematic behavior with the aim of protecting Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS terrorists, said the ministry, noting that it is unacceptable that the UNSC has not taken decisive measures to put an end to such flagrant |
real chilling effect by threatening to turn over personal information to the same entity the protesters were protesting. Fortunately, the government has walked back most of its demands in both cases.
Filed Under: disruptj20, doj, inauguration, privacy, social media, warrant
Companies: aclu, facebookUpgrades are not just for software anymore. Humans are steadily gaining access to technologies that enhance our brains and bodies. But most Americans, says the Pew Research Center, see this as yet another way for the haves to get a leg up over the have-nots.
Scientists are already working on synthetic blood substitutes to boost strength and endurance, brain implants to improve concentration and information processing, and gene splicing techniques that hack the human genome with surgical precision. Most of these techniques are designed to prevent debilitating diseases. Eventually, they will allow us to redesign our genetic inheritance.
That doesn’t sit well with most Americans. The majority of U.S. adults would not want brain or blood enhancements (66% and 63%, respectively) for themselves or their children, while about one-third favored such procedures. Of the 4,726 people surveyed by Pew, most were “very” or “somewhat” worried about technology-enhanced humans, believing the negatives outweighed the benefits for society.
Enhancements were seen as likely to exacerbate the divide between the wealthy and the poor. More than 70% said inequality would increase as benefits from enhancement would go to the wealthy first, and humans with “enhancements” would feel superior to those without them. Silicon Valley technorati are already curious about where such improvements might lead, with PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel expressing interest in parabiosis, transfusing blood from someone younger to improve health and potentially reverse aging.
Resistance to human enhancement appears to follow religious lines. People high in religious commitment were the least likely to endorse enhancements (agreeing with the idea that it was “meddling with nature),” compared to the less religious who were “more inclined to see the potential use of these techniques as just the continuation of a centuries-old quest by humans to try to better themselves.”
The sentiment reflects Americans widespread distrust of GMOs, which half of Americans think are unsafe (13% are unsure) — despite scientific evidence showing they are safe. Opinions did not differ by race, ethnicity, educational level, income or age, although women were less supportive of enhancements.The John Batchelor Show, February 7.
Nation Contributing Editor Stephen F. Cohen and John Batchelor continue their weekly discussions of the new US-Russian Cold War. (Now in their fourth year, previous installments are at TheNation.com). With fighting having escalated between the US-backed Kiev government and Russian-backed rebels in Donbass, this week’s discussion focuses again on Ukraine’s role in the new Cold War since 2013–2014. Ad Policy
Cohen begins with a generalization: As the possibility of a Trump-Putin détente grows, so do false narratives, even “fake news,” that the US political-media establishment has deployed, knowingly or not, to characterize the new Cold War and to shape Washington policy. Since Trump became president, for example, allegations that his would-be partner Putin has “killed” personal opponents and journalists (for which there are no actual facts) have redoubled, as have allegations that he hacked the DNC in order to put Trump in the White House (for which the “facts” are extremely tenuous and hotly disputed even by American experts), all the while, according to a New York Times editorial on February 7, “snuffing out Russia’s once-incipient democracy” (a process that actually began under Putin’s predecessor, Boris Yeltsin). In this toxically mendacious context, Cohen makes the following “alternative” points regarding the more than three-year long Ukrainian civil and proxy war:
§ The orthodox US narrative that Putin alone is responsible for the new Cold War hangs largely on his alleged unprovoked “aggression” against Ukraine in 2014 and ever since. (The narrative is sustained in part by the near-total absence of any American mainstream reporting of what is actually happening in Kiev-controlled or rebel-controlled territories.) In fact, Putin’s actions both in Donbass, where an indigenous rebellion broke out against the overthrow of the legally elected president in Kiev three years ago, and in Crimea, which had been part of Russia for more than 200 years (about as long as the United States has existed), was a direct reaction to the longstanding campaign by Washington and Brussels to bring Ukraine into NATO’s “sphere of influence,” itself a form of political aggression. Cohen discusses the centuries of intimate relations between large segments of Ukrainian society and Russia, including family ties, concluding that it was reckless and immoral for Washington and Brussels to impose upon Kiev a choice between Russia and the West, thereby fostering, if not precipitating, civil war. And to flatly reject Putin’s counter-proposal for a three-way Ukrainian-Russian-Western relationship. In this regard, Washington and Brussels bear considerable responsibility for the 10,000 who have died in the ensuing civil and proxy war, but they have yet to assume any responsibility at all. Ready to Fight Back? Sign Up For Take Action Now
§ A similar false narrative quickly emerged to explain the recent escalation of fighting along the cease-fire zone in Ukraine. There are no facts to support the US political-media establishment’s contention that Putin initiated the escalation—all reported facts point to Kiev—or any logic whatsoever: Why would Putin, who has openly welcomed Trump’s détente initiative, seek to provoke or challenge the new American president at this critical moment? Whether or not Kiev was actively encouraged by anti-détente forces in Washington is unclear, but a real possibility. (Inflammatory remarks made by Senators McCain and Graham in Ukraine, in January, now circulating on a video, may be telling evidence. If so, the blood of the 40 or more who died in the January–February fighting is on their hands as well.)
§ What, Cohen asks, are the chances of Trump-Putin cooperation to end the Ukrainian crisis? If Ukraine is not to fragment into two, three, or more parts, a united Ukraine will have to be militarily non-aligned (that is, never a member of NATO) and free to have prosperous economic relations with both Russia and the West. The Minsk Accords, drafted by Germany and France and endorsed by Moscow and Kiev, would have moved Ukraine in this direction, but have been repeatedly thwarted, primarily by Kiev. Whether or not full backing for Minsk by both Trump and Putin, particularly the provision giving rebel territories some degree of home rule, would end the Ukrainian civil war is far from certain, especially as it might result in the overthrow of the current Kiev government by well-armed ultra-nationalist forces, but for now there is no peaceful alternative.
Cohen concludes that even if Trump and Putin adopt a wise joint policy toward Ukraine, neither leader has much political capital to spare at home. Trump is opposed by virtually across-the-political-spectrum opposition to any kind of détente with Russia, especially regarding Ukraine. And Putin can never be seen at home as “selling out” Russia’s “brethren” anywhere in southeast Ukraine. Whether both leaders have the understanding and determination to end Ukraine’s tragic and utterly pointless war, which has left the country in ruins, remains to be seen.Mar 27, 2016; Sacramento, CA, USA; Sacramento Kings guard Rajon Rondo (9) looks to pass against the Dallas Mavericks in the our quarter at Sleep Train Arena. The Kings won 133-111. Mandatory Credit: John Hefti-USA TODAY.
The Chicago Bulls GM Gar Forman may have disappointed fans by grabbing Rajon Rondo in the free agent market, but the former nemesis of the team may actually turn out to be a good fit for Hoiball.
After Gar Forman traded Justin Holiday and Derrick Rose to the New York Knicks for Robin Lopez, Jerian Grant and Jose Calderon, the general manager of the Chicago Bulls said the team needed to get ‘younger and more athletic’ as they were retooling for next season.
Then, the Bulls picked up 30-year-old Rajon Rondo through a two-year deal, which baffled almost everyone in the NBA sports media and especially long-time Bulls fans who have long memories of Rondo clocking beloved former Bull Brad Miller and tussling with Kirk Hinrich during a playoff game.
What can Rajon Rondo do for Fred Hoiberg that the current guard roster cannot deliver?
The Chicago Tribune mentioned that Fred Hoiberg met up with Rondo on Friday night prior to the announcement of the signing and both watched film.
The former Sacramento Kings playmaker told Marc Spears of ESPN’s The Undefeated website, “I’m excited. Great organization with pieces around me that I’m excited about.”
Denzel Valentine and Jerian Grant — two of the Bulls’ newest guards — excelled for their college teams by having knockdown shooters on their teams. In New York, instead of pick-and-pop, Grantwas forced to play in a system where he was assigned as a catch-and-shoot triangle offense guard for two-thirds of the Knicks’ season instead of facilitating a fast-paced shooting offense. Valentine won’t have to endure such an ill-fitting situation with his game also suited with shooters around him.
But, both guards will have to play against All-Star guards on almost every NBA team if they start for the Bulls; a rude awakening from the start of the season. Only Spencer Dinwiddie may have enough NBA experience to play as starter for leading the Pistons during a stretch of last season and winning, but that still may not be enough.
As much as Bulls fans don’t like Rondo (which includes me), the more time you take to look at what’s going happen on the court with Rondo playmaking, the more interesting the fit looks than it seems on paper.
Rondo is a four-time All-Star with playoff championship level experience to show these kids how it’s done. He has a high basketball IQ. You don’t see playing smart in the stat sheet. It’s the proverbial “eye test” that shows you these players will sync.
Sacramento would have lost more if Rondo was not their point guard and he played really well alongside a player that’s had his own issues in his career: DeMarcus Cousins. The Bulls’ younger backcourt depth get to learn the ropes alongside Rondo and still play in a system tuned for each of their strengths.
The Bulls will play attacking basketball. That’s Rondo’s forte, rather than more of a slower-paced, big man-oriented offense like Dallas and Sacramento’s games. Rondo sees teammates who can backstop the defense and protect the rim if he gambles on defense. He can funnel drives into guys like Cristiano Felicio and Robin Lopez if opposing guards get past him.
The current Bulls team amplifies his advantage as a pass-first, driving point guard with their tall shooters who can gun it on a dime on the fast break and during half-court sets. Even Jimmy Butler can get his offense easier with rim runs and off-ball cuts, while getting his highlight film lob dunk passes from Rondo.
Last season, Rondo scored 11.9 points, dished out 11.7 assists per game (led the NBA) and hauled down six rebounds for the Kings while posting 37 double-doubles and six triple-doubles, plus a career-high 36.5 percent from three-point range.
The best thing about Rondo on the court is that Hoiberg won’t get headaches calling plays like he did with Aaron Brooks or repeating play instructions to Derrick Rose every time before games and still not seeing it done on the court; something that came out when Hoiberg was talking about prepping Rose every game by the middle of the season. Butler won’t waste shot clock seconds preening with his walk-up dribble if Rondo is the lead guard.
The Bulls’ underrated scorers get to develop in time getting feeds from Rondo and surprise everybody who thinks getting rid of the Tom Thibodeau corps will tank the team into the lottery next year.
With Rajon Rondo as starting guard and a pass-first playmaker, it’s nice that everybody else will hate the Bulls for winning more than expected, in spite of all the bad press Rondo and the roster is getting from know-it-all analysts who stereotype season outcomes based on past performances.Yiiiiiiikes. This dumb motherfucker... Reply
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"Reluctant to contribute his own funds to UNICEF"
A Donald Trump tea. Reply
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he would kill one if his kids if it meant getting a knighthood Reply
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forreal Reply
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Was this a known fact or is his obsession with knighthood out of the blue? Reply
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Is knighthood anything more than a great honor? Why does he obsess? Reply
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That's all it is but I mean some people just really like titles. It's like that dumb kid that always wants to be first in line even though you're all getting to the same place at the same time. /shrug Reply
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omg, i was just lookin thru VB's instagram admiring her and her family
Eeeeeeek Reply
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lol please, she's an awful person too.
He cheats on her all the time and she's miserable but she stays with him because of the fame and money Reply
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....why did you ever think anything about their relationship, family, or personas are genuine tho. Reply
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seriously....how gullible are they, lol Reply
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dang he ain't shit. Reply
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Never liked him Reply
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LOLLLL is that Punky? Reply
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no lol it was the next door neighbor Harriet Reply
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80's show called Small Wonder Reply
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LMAO this gif Reply
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i made a friend of a friend's daughter vicki's dress for a halloween costume and mother fucker only paid me half. smh, that's all this gif reminds me of. Reply
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Small Wonder!! Reply
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Rich people are trash what else is new tbh? Reply
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I'm not surprised. and his kids seem like they will be total douches. Reply
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yikes @ that UNICEF tea! Looks like he's as stupid as his voice sounds smh Reply
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ikr lol Reply
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hnnnnnnnnlol Reply
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damn he is thirsty for a knighthood lmaoooo
also who bitches about this kind of stuff over emails???? i can barely remember the last time i sent an email that wasn't work related Reply
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Right I always wished (not really, but you know) that celebrities texts would leak, not their emails! Emails are supposed to be dry, it's mostly olds who use it to discuss their corruption and juicy shit a la Queen Amy Pascal. Reply
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Edited at 2017-02-05 06:45 am (UTC) iconic tbh Reply
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Lol right? My emails read like that of a 87yo woman of God, so polite and understanding, very business like and my texts are blunt and messy af! So I don't understand these problematic emails, maybe it's a white people thing? Idk. Reply
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Petition to rename the ICONIC and TIMELESS lesbian movie Bend it like Beckham Reply
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she's not lebanese she's punjabi Reply
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Lmao yes Reply
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"Our designs will make even these little mosquito bites look like juicy, juicy mangoes!"
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ugh I love that movie sfm Reply
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i wish that movie was on netflix or HBO damn Reply
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GET YOUR LESBIAN FEET OUT OF MY SHOES Reply
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yikes. it's pathetic how desperate ppl can get over recognition. Reply
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I mean, these make him look like an ass, but I was expecting a sex scandal so this seems very tame in relation. Reply
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I was expecting a sex scandal
well he already had one of those in the past but another would've been more interesting Reply
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same Reply
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I was expecting his dick pics leaked but this will do now. He ruined ha self Reply
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Did you really think he's sending dick pics as an email attachment Reply
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ikr where's the tea again? Reply
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mte, not what I was expecting lol Reply
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already happened lol Reply
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This is all related to football, his pr team Reply
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lol i was a child when his sex scandal happened. how time flies Reply
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He looked fucked up and went home with Cara Delevingne's sister the other night.. in paparazzi photos. She allegedly has an open marriage and pretty much never sees her husband. The DM was shading him badly with "family man David.." Reply
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I was expecting some racist ass shit so this is nothing to me. Reply
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he fucked Esther Cañadas Reply
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yeah this is like a non-event Reply
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same. thought itd be emails of him cheating Reply
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damn. he wants a knighthood so bad, huh. he gonna have to wait until william is king for that
Edited at 2017-02-04 11:33 pm (UTC) Reply
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I'm so disappointed tbh :(
DIVORCE HA VICTORIA!!! Reply
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Agreed on both points. Reply
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victoria aint shit either lol and she would be nowhere without his $$$ Reply
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correct on all accounts. Reply
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where is the negative here? Reply
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she was more famous/rich than him when they got together, and i think a lot of his popularity comes from them as a brand/family
no doubt his money helped her though Reply
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LinkPHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Want to lose weight and be healthier? Then drink more tequila! Actually, hold that thought.
A new study suggests that the sugars in the plant used to make tequila may offer health benefits to people who are overweight or have diabetes.
According to an article in Time, researchers say the sugars may lower blood glucose levels for people with type 2 diabetes.
According to Mexican researchers, the type of natural sugar, agavins, are non-digestible and do not raise blood sugar.
In their research, scientists fed mice a normal diet and added agavins to some of their drinking water. It was revealed that the mice who consumed the agavins ate less and had lower blood glucose levels.
Those mice also produced a hormone called GLP-1 that keeps the stomach full for a longer period and produces insulin.
The authors of the study say, “This puts agavins in a tremendous position for their consumption by obese and diabetic people.”
The research was presented at the National Meeting of the American Chemical Society in Dallas."When I was a kid, I didn't dream of becoming a video game executive" Diablo designer David Brevik on his choice to end two decades as the boss, leave Gazillion, and go it alone
Matthew Handrahan Editor-in-Chief Thursday 16th June 2016 Share this article Share
The last time David Brevik looked closely at Diablo he was president of Blizzard North, and his team had just finished its development. That was 1996, and the scale and reach of the game's influence was still impossible to predict. Now, though, exactly 20 years later, Brevik is finally revisiting what remains his most famous contribution to the medium, the game that cemented his place in the pantheon of great designers. He talked about it at GDC in San Francisco earlier this year, and he's visiting Digital Dragons in Krakow for the very same reason.
"I keep getting promoted until I'm the boss... I don't want to do that any more. I don't want to run a studio with 200 people"
The main hall is packed, with every seat taken and a standing crowd steadily growing in the space at the rear. When Brevik finishes, a snaking line of aspiring Polish developers forms in front of the stage. The sheer volume of selfies that follow delays our meeting by almost an hour, and Brevik honours them all with unfailing good humour. But if he is entirely at ease with the enthusiasm of his fans, the forensic examination of Diablo on this momentous anniversary is more difficult to bear. Like an actor who can see only themselves in even their greatest performances, Brevik looks at Diablo and recognises only its flaws.
"It's similar to that," he says. "When I see it, I'm a perfectionist and I just see all of the things I wish I had fixed or done differently. It's tough for me."
Nevertheless, the opportunity to reflect on the past has arrived at an appropriate moment in Brevik's career. At the start of this year he resigned as CEO of Gazillion Entertainment, the company he joined as studio director seven years before. Marvel Heroes, the free-to-play MMO on which Brevik has worked for most of his time at Gazillion, is, "definitely much better than what it started out being," but in spite of the many ways he can see to improve it further - he is, after all, a perfectionist - he knew the time had arrived to move on.
This time, though, there will be no grand appointment in Brevik's future, no new C-level role to add to those he has held in the 13 years since he left Blizzard North. "When I was a kid, I didn't dream of becoming a video game executive," he says. "I wanted to make video games, and I just miss that so much. I keep getting promoted until I'm the boss, and that's not just at Gazillion; that's all the time. I don't want to do that any more. I don't want to run a studio with 200 people."
"I felt that my work was more of an obligation than it was something I was passionate about. I really want to make games"
Though Brevik enjoyed his time at Gazillion and the other companies at which he worked, time and again he ran up against a version of the Peter Principle; one in which his ability to perform management roles was never found wanting, but his passion ebbed away as he spent more and more time away from the hands-on process of making games. "I can do that job, and I can do it well," he says, "but I felt that my work was more of an obligation than it was something I was passionate about. I really want to make games. I really want to programme. I really want to do what I enjoy doing, and I'm fortunate enough that I can afford to do that."
After more than two decades working on some of the biggest games produced by this industry, Brevik departed Gazillion in desperate need of a palate cleanser. He found it in Ludum Dare, a regular event in which participants are tasked with making a functioning game, to a theme, within two days. Brevik admits that, in all his years as a game designer, he has "never" been involved with a game jam, and though the idea of creation under those restrictions was certainly appealing, the dual realities of "being old" and "having kids" made it a practical impossibility. Instead, Brevik found a compromise: the "Old-man Game Jam." Instead of 48 hours Brevik would make a game in 30, with the time broken up into manageable, family-friendly chunks. The development of the resulting game, Nonomancer, is documented in a series of YouTube videos.
"It was great, really fun," Brevik says of the first act of creation for his one-man studio, Graybeard Games. "And my secret behind the whole thing was it gave me the opportunity to test the game engine that I've been creating, distribute it and get a couple hundred people to test it for me. It was a great experience and I enjoyed doing it, but it wasn't the real thing I'm making."
Brevik isn't yet ready to discuss the details of the "real thing" either, beyond the fact that he will be departing from the free-to-play model employed on projects like Marvel Heroes. "I'm going back to the boxed model," he says, and the possibility of commercial failure couldn't be further from his mind. Brevik's embrace of YouTube, even on a hobbyist project like Nonomancer, indicates that he's perfectly aware of the value of self-promotion in indie development. "You've got to be active on Reddit, on forums, on social media, and get people to notice your product," he says. "If you don't do that you're in for a long haul. But why spend all that time and effort creating something and then not do the whole thing?"
"People expect so much from myself and my products that doing something small is a bit of a twist - a bit weird"
Of course, simply being David Brevik has its advantages in that respect. He did, after all, just finish speaking in front of hundreds of fans, and honouring several dozen selfies with the most smitten. While that inherent interest can be leveraged in the long-term, he says, it also carries with it a great many expectations, and a great deal of pressure.
"On god yeah," Brevik says. "That's scary as hell, honestly. That's the thing I'm struggling with the most: trying to manage people's expectations. When I say it's a small game, I'm doing it by myself, people go, 'Are you making Diablo 4?' That's what everybody expects, and it's nothing like that. That's my biggest struggle. People expect so much from myself and my products that doing something small is a bit of a twist - a bit weird.
"Graybeard is just me. I'm doing it all. And people keep calling me: 'Hey, when are you going to start a studio? When are you going to raise funding? I want to fund something for you?' I imagine that one day I might grow the company, but right now I'm just not interested. I'm doing this because I love it."
And he's doing it because he has more to express than the remainder of his old career would have allowed. Working on large-scale, multiplayer, AAA projects would leave very few games Brevik could expect to complete before he plans to retire. "As an indie studio, I'm able to do more, and that's what I want to do," he says. "I have a lot of ideas. I want to see those happen, and not just one or two of 'em."
GamesIndustry.biz is a media partner for the Digital Dragons conference. Our travel and accommodation costs were provided by the organiser.Held as part of a charity beer festival at the Bottle Inn in the village of Marshwood near Crewkerne, the event attracts entrants from around the world.
As the competition's fame has spread, nettle eaters from as far as New York, Australia, Northern Ireland and Belgium make the trip to West Dorset.
As the huge bunches of stinging nettles arrive, the competitors face one hour of munching their way through the leaves, and the winner is whoever finishes with the most two foot stalks, stripped of their leaves.
Showing the effects of nettle eating! The rules Not surprisingly, the rules are tight for this level of competitive nettle eating.
Only nettles provided by the organisers can be eaten, competitors are not allowed to bring their own, no mouth numbing substances are permitted - although a swig of beer in between mouthfuls is always encouraged.
And for spectators, it makes for a bemusing sight. Competitors have described their unusual bar meal as tasting like anything from "rancid salad with no dressing" to "a mixture of spinach and cow-pat".
Contestants ready to eat their greens Crucially, nettles can't be expelled from the body. In previous years, a competitor seemed to have victory in sight, only to see his efforts end up on the ground of the pub car park just minutes from the end of the competition.
A previous winner of the contest is Ed Brooks, a regular at the Bottle Inn. He won the contest by scoffing 48 feet of nettles and was thrilled with winning the title: "Oh it's tremendous, amazing... I'm a bit peckish though!".
Meanwhile Jo Carter from Weymouth and Liz Gray from Bath once both shared the women's title - they both ate exactly 26 feet of nettles.
Nettle eating winners How it began What has turned into one of England's most eccentric weekends stems back to an argument in the pub in 1986 when two farmers were discussing who had the longest stinging nettles in their field.
The longest-nettle competition eventually turned into the World Nettle Eating Championships when one of the farmers, Alex Williams, promised to eat any nettle which was longer than his.
Although competitive nettle eating is something some may not seem as very palatable, nettles have been used by many top chefs, nettle tea is widely available, and they have long been used as a medicinal herb.
The 2009 contest is on Saturday 13 June - more details on The Bottle's website (link on the right hand column)(Please scroll down to acknowledge)
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Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc., 466 U.S. 485 (1984), was a product disparagement case ultimately decided by the Supreme Court of the United States. The Court held, on a 6-3 vote, in favor of Consumers Union, the publisher of Consumer Reports magazine, ruling that proof of "actual malice" was necessary in product disparagement cases raising First Amendment issues, as set out by the case of New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1963). The Court ruled that the First Circuit Court of Appeals had correctly concluded that Bose had not presented proof of actual malice.
The magazine Consumer Reports had published in 1970 a review of an unusual loudspeaker system manufactured by Bose Corporation, called the Bose 901. The review expressed skepticism of the system's quality and recommended that consumers delay purchase until they had investigated for themselves whether the loudspeaker system's unusual attributes would suit them. Bose objected to numerous statements in the article, including the sentences, "Worse, individual instruments heard through the Bose system seemed to grow to gigantic proportions and tended to wander about the room. For instance, a violin appeared to be 10 feet (3.0 m) wide and a piano stretched from wall to wall." Bose demanded a retraction when they learned that Consumer Reports changed what the original reviewer wrote about the speakers in his pre-publication draft, which the magazine refused to do.
Lower court history [ edit ]
The Massachusetts district court had heard testimony from an author of the article that the instruments heard through the 901's speakers tended to wander "along the wall," rather than "about the room," as had been stated in the article; and found that this constituted a publication of a false statement with the knowledge that it was false. It had found Consumers Union liable for damages.
On appeal, Bose had argued that the district court's findings of fact could not be set aside by the appeals court under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure Rule 52(a) unless the findings were "clearly erroneous." The appeals court, however, had agreed with Consumers Union that under the precedent set by New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1978), the appeals court had to review the entire matter de novo in order to determine whether the false fact was published with "actual malice." As Bose had not presented sufficient evidence of actual malice, the appeals court ruled, the judgment was required to be overturned.
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]The masthead of the latest edition of Charlie Hebdo
Leading Norwegian Muslims have criticized the new cover of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, which features the Muslim Prophet Muhammad crying and holding a ‘Je Suis Charlie' sign. The decision by some Norwegian media to reproduce it has also come under fire.
Mehtab Afsar, head of the Islamic Council of Norway, said “They should take into account that a lot of people feel bullied, harassed and mocked. But it is an editorial decision whether or not to publish this kind of drawing,” Afsar told Dagbladet newspaper.
The front page was topped with the words ‘Tout est pardonné’ or ‘All is forgiven’.
Afsar added that he didn’t think Muslims in general want to limit freedom of expression, but said that freedom came with responsibility.
“Muslims can also, in the name of freedom of expression, express their view that they don’t approve of the publication of caricatures of the Prophet. Because isn’t that what freedom of speech is all about?”
Norwegian Christian leaders also expressed reservations about the Charlie Hebdo cover, and particularly the decision by Norwegian media to reproduce it.
“I don’t think it’s a very good idea that a large number of newspapers do this,” said Berit Hagen Agøy, secretary general of the Norwegian Ecumenical Council to NTB, while adding that she understood and respected Charlie Hebdo’s choice to print new Muhammad cartoons after the terror attack against the magazine’s offices. But she said she questioned the choice of Norwegian papers to reproduce it.
One million copies of the new edition of Charlie Hebdo went on sale on Wednesday in France, selling out almost immediately.Last year, Insane Clown Posse vowed they would march on Washington D.C. to protest the FBI, with whom they’ve sparred for the last few years. (In 2011, the FBI named the Juggalos a “loosely organized hybrid gang”; ICP sued the FBI over the slander in 2014, lost the initial lawsuit, and won on appeal in 2015.) Shaggy 2 Dope and Violent J are not ones to break their promises, and ICP have officially announced the Juggalo March, which will take place September 16 at Washington D.C.’s National Mall.
“This is the day that we are asking every single Juggalo to join us in our nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., to make a collective statement from the Juggalo Family to the world about what we are and what we are not,” the group said on a website launched for the march. “We must collectively show them that we truly are a family that is united by a shared love of music and fellowship.”
The march will be followed by a free concert with performances by ICP, Vanilla Ice, 2 Live Crew, and several other artists affiliated with ICP’s Psychopathic Records.
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an entire year of eligibility after a first positive test. A second offense means permanent ineligibility from sports.
In practice, though, the NCAA's roughly 11,000 annual tests amount to just a fraction of all athletes in Division I and II schools. Exactly how many tests are conducted each year on football players is unclear because the NCAA hasn't published its data for two years. And when it did, it periodically changed the formats, making it impossible to compare one year of football to the next.
Even when players are tested by the NCAA, people involved in the process say it's easy enough to anticipate the test and develop a doping routine that results in a clean test by the time it occurs. NCAA rules say players can be notified up to two days in advance of a test, which Catlin says is plenty of time to beat a test if players have designed the right doping regimen. By comparison, Olympic athletes are given no notice.
"Everybody knows when testing is coming. They all know. And they know how to beat the test," Catlin said, adding, "Only the really dumb ones are getting caught."
Players are far more likely to be tested for drugs by their schools than by the NCAA. But while many schools have policies that give them the right to test for steroids, they often opt not to. Schools are much more focused on street drugs like cocaine and marijuana. Depending on how many tests a school orders, each steroid test can cost $100 to $200, while a simple test for street drugs might cost as little as $25.
When schools call and ask about drug testing, the first question is usually, "How much will it cost?" Turpin said.
Most schools that use Drug Free Sport do not test for anabolic steroids, Turpin said. Some are worried about the cost. Others don't think they have a problem. And others believe that since the NCAA tests for steroids their money is best spent testing for street drugs, she said.
Wilfert, the NCAA official, said the possibility of steroid testing is still a deterrent, even at schools where it isn't conducted.
"Even though perhaps those institutional programs are not including steroids in all their tests, they could, and they do from time to time," she said. "So, it is a kind of deterrence."
For Catlin, one of the most frustrating things about running the UCLA testing lab was getting urine samples from schools around the country and only being asked to test for cocaine, marijuana and the like.
"Schools are very good at saying, 'Man, we're really strong on drug testing,' " he said. "And that's all they really want to be able to say and to do and to promote."
That helps explain how two school drug tests could miss Maneafaiga's steroid use. It's also possible that the random test came at an ideal time in Maneafaiga's steroid cycle.
Enforcement varies
The top steroid investigator at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Joe Rannazzisi, said he doesn't understand why schools don't invest in the same kind of testing, with the same penalties, as the NFL. The NFL has a thorough testing program for most drugs, though the league has yet to resolve a long-simmering feud with its players union about how to test for human growth hormone.
"Is it expensive? Of course, but college football makes a lot of money," he said. "Invest in the integrity of your program."
For a school to test all 85 scholarship football players for steroids twice a season would cost up to $34,000, Catlin said, plus the cost of collecting and handling the urine samples. That's about 0.2 percent of the average big-time school football budget of about $14 million. Testing all athletes in all sports would make the school's costs higher.
When schools ask Drug Free Sport for advice on their drug policies, Turpin said she recommends an immediate suspension after the first positive drug test. Otherwise, she said, "student athletes will roll the dice."
But drug use is a bigger deal at some schools than others.
At Notre Dame and Alabama, the teams that will soon compete for the national championship, players don't automatically miss games for testing positive for steroids. At Alabama, coaches have wide discretion. Notre Dame's student-athlete handbook says a player who fails a test can return to the field once the steroids are out of his system.
"If you're a strength-and-conditioning coach, if you see your kids making gains that seem a little out of line, are you going to say, 'I'm going to investigate further? I want to catch someone?' " said Anthony Roberts, an author of a book on steroids who says he has helped college football players design steroid regimens to beat drug tests.
There are schools with tough policies. The University of North Carolina kicks players off the team after a single positive test for steroids. Auburn's student-athlete handbook calls for a half-season suspension for any athlete caught using performance-enhancing drugs.
Wilfert said it's not up to the NCAA to determine whether that's fair.
"Obviously if it was our testing program, we believe that everybody should be under the same protocol and the same sanction," she said.
Fans typically have no idea that such discrepancies exist and players are left to suspect who might be cheating.
"You see a lot of guys and you know they're possibly on something because they just don't gain weight but get stronger real fast," said Orrin Thompson, a former defensive lineman at Duke. "You know they could be doing something but you really don't know for sure."
Thompson gained 85 pounds between 2001 and 2004, according to Duke rosters and Thompson himself. He said he did not use steroids and was subjected to several tests while at Duke, a school where a single positive steroid test results in a yearlong suspension.
Meanwhile at UCLA, home of the laboratory that for years set the standard for cutting-edge steroid testing, athletes can fail three drug tests before being suspended. At Bowling Green, testing is voluntary.
At the University of Maryland, students must get counseling after testing positive, but school officials are prohibited from disciplining first-time steroid users. Athletic department spokesman Matt Taylor denied that was the case and sent the AP a copy of the policy. But the policy Taylor sent included this provision: "The athletic department/coaching staff may not discipline a student-athlete for a first drug offense."
By comparison, in Kentucky and Maryland, racehorses face tougher testing and sanctions than football players at Louisville or the University of Maryland.
"If you're trying to keep a level playing field, that seems nonsensical," said Rannazzisi at the DEA. He said he was surprised to learn that what gets a free pass at one school gets players immediately suspended at another. "What message does that send? It's OK to cheat once or twice?"
Only about half the student athletes in a 2009 NCAA survey said they believed school testing deterred drug use.
As an association of colleges and universities, the NCAA could not unilaterally force schools to institute uniform testing policies and sanctions, Wilfert said.
"We can't tell them what to do, but if it went through a membership process where they determined that this is what should be done, then it could happen," she said.
'Everybody around me was doing it'
Steroids are a controlled substance under federal law, but players who use them need not worry too much about prosecution. The DEA focuses on criminal operations, not individual users. When players are caught with steroids, it's often as part of a traffic stop or a local police investigation.
Jared Foster, 24, a quarterback recruited to play at the University of Mississippi, was kicked off the team in 2008 after local authorities arrested him for giving a man nandrolone, an anabolic steroid, according to court documents. Foster pleaded guilty and served jail time.
He told the AP that he doped in high school to impress college recruiters. He said he put on enough lean muscle to go from 185 pounds to 210 in about two months.
"Everybody around me was doing it," he said.
Steroids are not hard to find. A simple Internet search turns up countless online sources for performance-enhancing drugs, mostly from overseas companies.
College athletes freely post messages on steroid websites, seeking advice to beat tests and design the right schedule of administering steroids.
And steroids are still a mainstay in private, local gyms. Before the DEA shut down Alabama-based Applied Pharmacy Services as a major nationwide steroid supplier, sales records obtained by the AP show steroid shipments to bodybuilders, trainers and gym owners around the country.
Because users are rarely prosecuted, the demand is left in place after the distributor is gone.
When Joshua Hodnik was making and wholesaling illegal steroids, he had found a good retail salesman in a college quarterback named Vinnie Miroth. Miroth was playing at Saginaw Valley State, a Division II school in central Michigan, and was buying enough steroids for 25 people each month, Hodnik said.
"That's why I hired him," Hodnik said. "He bought large amounts and knew how to move it."
Miroth, who pleaded no contest in 2007 and admitted selling steroids, helped authorities build their case against Hodnik, according to court records. Now playing football in France, Miroth declined repeated AP requests for an interview.
Hodnik was released from prison this year and says he is out of the steroid business for good. He said there's no doubt that steroid use is widespread in college football.
"These guys don't start using performance-enhancing drugs when they hit the professional level," the Oklahoma City man said. "Obviously it starts well before that. And you can go back to some of the professional players who tested positive and compare their numbers to college and there is virtually no change."
Maneafaiga, the former Hawaii running back, said his steroids came from Mexico. A friend in California, who was a coach at a junior college, sent them through the mail. But Maneafaiga believes the consequences were nagging injuries. He found religion, quit the drugs and became the team's chaplain.
"God gave you everything you need," he said. "It gets in your mind. It will make you grow unnaturally. Eventually, you'll break down. It happened to me every time."
At the DEA, Rannazzisi said he has met with and conducted training for investigators and top officials in every professional sport. He's talked to Major League Baseball about the patterns his agents are seeing. He's discussed warning signs with the NFL.
He said he's offered similar training to the NCAA but never heard back. Wilfert said the NCAA staff has discussed it and hasn't decided what to do.
"We have very little communication with the NCAA or individual schools," Rannazzisi said. "They've got my card. What they've done with it? I don't know."Kordale and Kaleb Lewis are starring in a new Nikon campaign with their children.
The pair shot to fame when a photo of the two dads doing their daughters’ hair in the mornings went viral. It also drew homophobic backlash on Twitter with people taking issue with two gay black men raising a family.
Nikon’s “I Am Generation Campaign” shows the family telling their story in an inspiring video.
Kordale and Kaleb told the Huffington Post that the photo and now the video had changed their lives and how people viewed them.
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“There will be those people who do not agree and will post negative comments or snarl their faces, but there are much more people who do agree and commend us as fathers and community activists,” the pair said in a statement.
[Huffington Post]
Write to Helen Regan at helen.regan@timeasia.com.There are days when I think it would be cool to step outside myself, to take a few minutes or hours and just become someone else. New York musician Jonathon Linaberry feels the same way. In fact, he has gone so far as to create a fictitious persona, J.R. Jones, through which he channels the spirits of early Americana roots players to create beautifully dark, moody and bluesy folk music.
Linaberry, under the moniker The Bones of J.R. Jones, has just released, Dark Was The Yearling, his first full length record. It is outstanding. Drawing from a wellspring that includes blues luminaries like R.L. Burnside, Lightnin’ Hopkins, and Blind Lemon Jefferson, and old time favorites like The Carter Family, Dark Was The Yearling represents a sonic collision between the age old worlds of roots music. Banjo driven tunes like “St. James Bed” rest side by side with acoustic gems like “The Plan” and the electrified grit of “Fury of the Light.” This collection, like the spirit of J.R. Jones, feels old, like it was pulled, after being long forgotten or ignored, from a dusty shelf instead of cut in the digital age. For those less interested in digital slickness, it’s a sound that definitely works.
Dark Was The Yearling marks The Bones of J.R. Jones as a new voice resonating with the heaviest timbre of old time Americana.
I recently caught up with Jonathon Linaberry to chat about old heroes, playing in a one man band, and whether J.R. Jones prefers beer or whiskey.
BRO – Tell me more about J.R. Jones. Would I like to sit down and have a beer with him? Maybe a whiskey?
JL – Depends on if you are buying or not. Honestly, he’s not picky. If it’s wet, he will probably drink it. He could chat mostly about anything, but I think if you really want to get to know him, I don’t think talking about his music is a good approach. At least at first. He tends to be a little tight lipped about all of that.
BRO – The best part about being in a one man band?
JL – I suppose it is the fact that I know exactly what to expect. I can rely solely on myself, which makes things less complicated. Generally, less complicated means less stress, which makes this whole thing a little more enjoyable. It can be easy to travel, too, which works well for me. All I need is a sleeping bag, guitar, and my kit.
BRO – The worst part about being in a one man band?
JL – I could say the worst part about all of this is the same as the best part. It depends on my mood. Flying solo, for all its freedom, can be overwhelming. Mostly because when things go bad, there is only one person to blame.
BRO – We are running “Good Friend of Mine” on Trail Mix this month. What is the story behind the song?
JL – That song went through a lot of transitions. It took me a while to figure out what it was about. I think I decided it’s about being so hopefully gone for a girl that, in a way, she is killing you. It’s so bad that even the voice of the devil in you is the voice of reason. I hope that makes sense.
BRO – You draw inspiration from some of the early Americana and blues greats. If you could jam or hang out with one of your long gone musical heroes, who would it be? What might you talk about?
JL – Oh, man. There are so many. If I had to choose, maybe Skip James of Son House. To be honest, I don’t think I would have much to say to them. I’d just want to hear them. What I love about them is the pain and passion they put into their songs. And to be able to hear that live.... I think it would be soul quaking.
You can catch Jonathon Linaberry, as The Bones of J.R. Jones, on Friday, June 27th, at Pete’s Candy Store in Brooklyn, New York. His calendar shows more upcoming dates in New York and Maryland. Stay tuned to www.the-wildness.com for more show dates and information on how you can grab a copy of Dark Was The Yearling, the brand new record.
Speaking of that new record, Trail Mix would like to give you a shot at getting a signed copy for free. Here’s what you need to do. Shoot an email to dave@blueridgeoutdoors and answer the last question from up above – If you could jam or hang out with one of your long gone musical heroes, who would it be?
We’ll pick a cool entry from all of the responses we receive by noon tomorrow (Thursday, June 26th) and get that lucky winner a copy of the record.
Good luck!Brazil has confiscated the passports of two US swimmers and have removed them from their airplane bound for home over discrepancies in their story of an armed robbery several days ago.
Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz were questioned y police until 12:50 AM Wednesday night after a judge ordered them to remain in the country until further notice: (NBC Sports)
Insane media scrum. Gunnar Bentz, Jack Conger have been released. Atty says they did not give a statement. #Rio2016 pic.twitter.com/KJWvaj8EDp — Gadi Schwartz (@GadiNBC) August 18, 2016
Attorney Sergio Viegas, who is representing the pair, said they will not be allowed to leave Brazil until they testify about the robbery. Their passports were “temporarily confiscated by a court order,” a detective with the Rio tourist police department said. The move comes after a Brazilian judge issued an order to seize the passports belonging to American swimmers Ryan Lochte and James Feigen, prohibiting the Olympians from leaving the country.
According to the Brazilian authorities, the two Americans are being detained because there are inconsistencies in their account of the armed robbery from the wee hours of the morning after celebrating the US Olympic Swim Team’s historic victories.
For a moment, let’s stipulate that the armed robbery story is made up. For the record, I don’t know one way or another whether the robbery took place, but I don’t understand why the four Olympians would make it up. But, as I said, let’s just stipulate that the robbery didn’t happen. So? Does this really rise to the level of passport confiscation, detention and an international incident?
It appears that Brazil is rather embarrassed by the string of violent crimes at these games that have occurred despite the Mayor of Rio’s public proclamation that these games would be “the safest place in the world.” In fact, according to a Latin American legal expert speaking to the LA Times, it’s common for the Brazilian government to white-wash the dangers of their country:
Lowell Gustafson, a Villanova University professor who has studied Latin American politics, said Brazilian authorities have a history of downplaying bad news. “What seems fairly traditional is for the Brazilian police and bureaucracy to call into question anyone making accusations,” Gustafson said. “They want to say that this doesn’t happen in Brazil.”
Indeed, the Games in Rio have been plagued by high-profile, violent crimes and this very public spectacle involving these American swimmers appears to be overkill on behalf of the Rio tourist bureau and has nothing to do with law and order or justice. (LA Times)
Two Australian rowing coaches were robbed in Ipanema, and an Olympic security officer was shot to death after taking a wrong turn into a favela. The Games’ chief of security was attacked by knife-wielding men as he left Maracana Stadium after the opening ceremony. Stray bullets have landed in the equestrian venue in Deodoro on two occasions, and a bus carrying journalists in the area had its windows shattered. Rio officials said thrown rocks were to blame.
The State Department has acknowledged that they are aware of the situation: (WaPo)
“We have seen media reports that two U.S. citizen athletes were detained,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said. “We stand ready to provide all appropriate consular assistance. Due to privacy considerations, we do not have any further information to offer. We refer you to Brazilian authorities for more information about this case.”
That’s not good enough. There is absolutely no good reason to detain these young men. Even if you believe they made up their story, there is no actual crime here that rises to the level of passport confiscation and detention. At worst the swimmers are accused of making Brazil look bad and filing a false report.
Outrageous. Let them come home.
UPDATE: Ed has the latest developments on this story as Brazil claims the swimmers were involved in an altercation resulting in damage to a gas station rest room. Read the account. If it is true, it sheds more light on what may have happened that night in Rio. However, it doesn’t change my over all point in this column. – LOCReady to fight back? Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week. You will receive occasional promotional offers for programs that support The Nation’s journalism. You can read our Privacy Policy here. Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week.
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There are several pieces of conventional wisdom about Vivian Maier: She was a nanny; she was also a photographer; she was mysterious and secretive; she and her work were discovered and promoted primarily by John Maloof, the former Chicago real-estate agent who owns a large portion of her belongings and made an Oscar-nominated documentary about her, Finding Vivian Maier. All of these things are true, but placing emphasis on one or another can change the narrative—and even taken together, they don’t tell the whole story. Ad Policy
Maier was a nanny, but that didn’t overwhelm her identity as a photographer; she spent copious amounts of money on equipment and was known to travel with at least three cameras at a time. Maier was a doggedly private person, to the extent that she gave out false names and showed her photographs to very few people—but arguably this is only a strange quality in hindsight, in the age of the Internet, when privacy barely exists anymore. (It’s also worth noting that she had a family history of paranoia.) Maloof was responsible for recognizing and publicizing Maier’s talent, and for building her posthumous public persona, but he wasn’t the only person involved in that process, and he did so in a way that raises ethical questions.
The key is context, and the problem is that for many years, we didn’t have enough. Maier left behind so much and, at the same time, so little. Her possessions were scattered at auction after she failed to make payments on five storage lockers, and then were further scattered by resale. So Maier’s legacy exists in pieces—a “fractured archive,” as Pamela Bannos calls it in her new biography, Vivian Maier: A Photographer’s Life and Afterlife. The highest value of Bannos’s book is that it contains an incredible amount of contextual information, more than has ever been uncovered or synthesized about Maier before. At last, we have a way of separating the individual from the myths that have been constructed around her.
The revelation of greater context is the beating heart of Bannos’s book, and she’s clear from the start that she sees it as an act of feminist reclamation. “Maier’s work and her life are defined over and over again by presumptions about and representations of her as a woman,” Bannos writes in the introduction. She points out that despite Maier’s fierce independence—she never married and clearly set the terms of her own life—and the fact that she “found men to be ‘uncouth’…her legacy has been almost entirely in the hands of men.” Related Article Pushing the Limits of Photography Barry Schwabsky
Indeed, Maloof and other men remain an inseparable part of Maier’s public face: Her artist biography on the website of the Howard Greenberg Gallery includes a paragraph about Maloof, and her Wikipedia page names collectors Ron Slattery, Randy Prow, and Jeffrey Goldstein as well. The portrayal of a woman artist as a long-sequestered object, awaiting discovery by men—almost a conquest—has a well-worn history (and is in no way limited to women who are dead). As Ashton Cooper wrote in an essay titled “The Problem of the Overlooked Female Artist,” “Instead of the tired story where a masculinist force deigns to discover, find, or recognize female artists, what if we tried to also understand the material realities of these women’s lives?”
That’s precisely what Bannos attempts to do, using the lifetime of items that Maier left behind—bank ledgers, photo books, letters, clothing, albums—as her guide. The most important resource in this process is Maier’s trove of photographs, which sometimes document her life in less aesthetically interesting but, to a researcher, crucial ways. She “kept uniquely meticulous records by using her camera as a copy machine,” Bannos notes, allowing us to know, for instance, when Maier applied for a new passport and what falsehoods she listed on the application (death dates for her parents, both of whom were still alive but neither of whom she was in contact with).
More often, though, Bannos uses Maier’s photographs to track her movements alongside the development of her art. After two chapters of outlining her family history—beginning with her maternal great-grandparents, who lived in France’s Champsaur Valley during the 19th century, and on to Maier’s 1926 birth in New York City, followed by her tumultuous childhood (her parents split soon after she was born, and her mother was mentally ill)—we meet Maier the photographer. She began taking pictures on a trip to France in 1950, when she was 24 years old, and shot an incredible amount of film from the get-go—more than 3,000 photographs in one year abroad. What’s more, “from the temporal gaps in the prints and negatives, it is possible that more than a thousand images have not yet surfaced,” Bannos adds. Current Issue View our current issue
Such a line demonstrates Bannos’s method: She treats Maier’s photographs as material evidence, using them as clues to help solve a mystery. Just as important, she looks at them holistically, not as the one-off snapshots that Maloof cut from Maier’s negatives and sold individually on eBay. This way of reading Maier’s photographs gives us a more accurate and complete picture of her practice and, by extension, who she was. For example, discussing Maier’s yearlong trip to France, Bannos notes, “As Vivian Maier traveled through the region, she gathered small groups for her camera.… Always facing her subjects toward the bright sun, she consistently achieved the groups’ ease and cooperation.”
In this way, the myth of Maier’s aloofness is countered early on by an awareness of her ability to connect with people—a quality that helps explain her success as a nanny. In other places, Bannos reads sequences of images to illustrate how Maier lingered on or followed a scene to achieve a certain shot, or as Bannos calls it, her “stalking technique.” We can follow the photographs on long walks through Manhattan, in which Maier took pictures of homeless men on the Bowery and of her own reflection in mirrored doorways; a trip to Southeast Asia, where she shot indigenous villagers in the Philippines and a Malaysian family visiting a grave. Still more of her pictures plunge into the burned-out Chicago cityscape five days after the 1968 riots. “Vivian Maier’s photographs reveal her footsteps,” Bannos writes. The book allows us to walk in them.
The problem is that Maier’s footsteps are all we have of her—we don’t hear her voice or encounter substantive evidence of her ideas, thoughts, or artistic judgments. Aside from the brief descriptive and evaluative notations she made about her photos (“first time with cue light,” “comme si comme sa”), the quotes in the book that come from Maier herself are few and far between. (In a favorite of mine, from an audio recording she made in 1974, she says, “Women are supposed to be opinionated, I hope.”) The quotes from people who knew her offer impressions of her personality, but little insight into her psyche.
There is, in other words, a limit to what we can know about Vivian Maier. Bannos bravely attempts to circumvent this considerable obstacle by analyzing Maier’s photographs at length, but the overcompensation becomes tedious. Cleverly, Bannos places Maier’s biographical sketches alongside the contemporaneous history of photography—another critical addition of context and an intervention in the nanny-savant narrative—though it sometimes strays too far to be useful. Maier doesn’t appear to have had much formal training, but Bannos firmly portrays her as a product of a specific time and milieu. “At the end of the summer of 1950, a Kodak marketing research study found that about twenty-six million families—half of America’s households—used cameras,” Bannos writes. “Of those, about 90 percent owned box cameras or the type of folding camera that Maier likely used in Europe.”
Maier was clearly a product of the midcentury photography boom; however, she invested far more time and money in her hobby than one would expect of an amateur. This raises the book’s latent central question: Did Maier consider herself an artist? Without a sense of her subjectivity, there’s no way to answer it—though she seems to have fancied herself a photojournalist. “Maier shot public events as if she was on assignment, but there’s no evidence that she was working for anyone other than herself,” Bannos writes. (Later in life she also stopped people on the street to interview them in audio recordings like the one mentioned above.) Perhaps her lack of assignments and peers contributed to her eventual artistic stagnation, or maybe it was something else entirely. Either way, Bannos notes how, beginning in the mid-1960s, Maier’s trajectory diverged from the paths of other canonized photographers:
Corresponding to the chaotic and changing times, Diane Arbus, Lee Friedlander, and Garry Winogrand represented editorial photography’s counterculture. Yet while Vivian Maier’s photographs have been compared to theirs, Maier’s strategies stayed aligned with her earliest work, even as her repertoire broadened.
It was also around this time that she stopped developing some of her film, a habit that would grow in the following decades.
Bannos’s primary addition to Maier’s life story is an incredibly detailed retelling of the way her work has been dispersed, published, popularized, and fought over since her death in 2009 (hence the subtitle: “A Photographer’s Life and Afterlife”). She attempts to interweave these two narratives throughout the book. There are times, particularly in the second half, when the strategy works, as Maier’s movements sync up and resonate with moments in her public discovery; however, there are many more when the back-and-forth feels forced. The two tales often fail to inform each other in meaningful ways.
Yet there’s no question of the value of this endeavor, which clues us in to the often absurd drama that Maier’s photographs have inspired. (When Maloof and Goldstein teamed up to buy a cache of Maier’s work from Prow for $140,000, they sealed the deal in a mobster-inspired transaction that included “musclemen” and guns.) More important, Bannos lays bare the process by which we’ve come to know her subject, reminding us time and again that “Vivian Maier” is an image crafted by the people who bought, sold, and posthumously printed her work—not one that’s necessarily true to who Maier really was. “Vivian Maier’s biggest champions were people who had little knowledge or previous interest in the history of photography,” Bannos writes—people who did little to seek out scholarship and failed to consider the value of her body of work as a whole.
Several pages later, Bannos explains how, as Maier became more famous, she was removed as a subject from her own story:
Crafted by expert darkroom technicians and enhanced by vibrant paper stock, the new prints elevated Maier’s work. Full-frame reproductions of Maier’s posthumously edited negatives conjure comparisons to other photographers from their era; but none of the images that Maier had selected matched those that were now being chosen for her.
It’s harrowing then to read, dozens more pages later, about an episode concerning the book publisher Curt Matthews, who once employed Maier as a nanny. After viewing some of her pictures, he inquired about why she hadn’t pursued a career in photography. “She told me that if she had not kept her images secret, people would have stolen or misused them,” Matthews wrote. That line reverberates back through the book like a haunting judgment.
Maier was a private person who moved through the world by taking photographs. She left behind hundreds of thousands of them, in the form of prints, negatives, slides, and undeveloped rolls of film (not to mention motion-picture reels). The collection is so large that its public dissemination can feel justified, almost inevitable. But in many cases, Maier didn’t even see her own pictures beyond framing them in her viewfinder. Who’s to say she would have wanted the whole world looking at them?
One of Bannos’s most effective passages, near the end of the book, sums up the quandary that anyone searching for Vivian Maier must face: The people who knew her had vastly divergent impressions of her, sometimes to the point of outright contradiction. Maier was unknowable in life; it’s unclear why we think we can know her now.Check Out Nintendo’s New 3DS Marketing Push in These 3 Commercials
Today is a big day for Nintendo. It has just debuted its New 3DS in North America, a product that it hopes will bring much-needed hardware sales momentum.
As seen during Better Call Saul and The Walking Dead last Sunday, Nintendo is taking a new approach to marketing with its 3DS. Instead of aiming for a younger audience, it has taken a more adult-oriented tone. It seems that Nintendo is hoping that it can turn the heads of young adults who may have forgotten how much fun they had with Nintendo growing up.
Also See: Nintendo to Market New 3DS XL During Better Call Saul Premiere and The Walking Dead
There are three commercials, each running at a full 40 seconds, that Nintendo will be pushing on cable networks and online ad space. Each focuses on an improvement the New 3DS makes over its older brethren. You can see all three below:
Super Stable 3D
The C-Stick
Enhanced Processing PowerThe Border Patrol says an agent shot at someone near the Texas-Mexico border who later identified himself as a militia member.
Border Patrol spokesman Omar Zamora said that agents pursuing a group of immigrants east of Brownsville on Friday came upon a man holding a long arm near the river. An agent fired multiple shots, but did not hit the armed man. The man then identified himself as a member of a militia.
An unknown number of militia members have come to the Texas border following a surge in illegal immigration.
Zamora said no other details were immediately available.
This month, the Border Patrol warned its agents about militia members after seven of them were initially mistaken for a Texas Department of Public Safety tactical team near Mission.Meryl Streep isn't holding back when it comes to addressing Karl Lagerfeld head on.
Two days after WWD published an interview with the Chanel creative director in which he accused the Florence Foster Jenkins star of enlisting another designer to create her 2017 Oscars look because she wished to receive financial compensation for wearing it, the actress has responded in a statement to E! News.
"In reference to Mr. Lagerfeld's'statement,' there is no 'controversy': Karl Lagerfeld, a prominent designer, defamed me, my stylist, and the illustrious designer whose dress I chose to wear, in an important industry publication," Meryl's statement reads.
"That publication printed this defamation, unchecked. Subsequently, the story was picked up globally, and continues, globally, to overwhelm my appearance at the Oscars, on the occasion of my record breaking 20th nomination, and to eclipse this honor in the eyes of the media, my colleagues and the audience. I do not take this lightly, and Mr. Lagerfeld's generic'statement' of regret for this 'controversy' was not an apology. He lied, they printed the lie, and I am still waiting," it ended.It has been nearly seven months since a young student was gang-raped in the New Delhi, India, and died from her horrific injuries 13 days later on December 29, 2012. The fast-track trial of the accused men has just re-started and the sentence is due any day now.
When thousands of Indians took to the streets to protest the inability of the establishment to protect women, they demanded not just a change in the law but in people's attitudes. But the watershed moment that many Indians hoped for doesn't seem to have arrived. And that may be because most Indians don't even recognise the extent of the problem in their own country.
Let's start with a figure: 60 million. That is nearly the entire population of the United Kingdom. That is also the approximate number of women "missing" in India. They have either been aborted before birth, killed once born, died of neglect because they were girls, or perhaps murdered by their husband's family for not paying enough dowry at marriage.
So why isn't there more recognition of this mass tragedy?... many Indians don't want to recognise the problem because it has become deeply ingrained in the culture.
That number isn't a wild exaggeration or a figure thoughtlessly plucked out of the air, but a matter of demographics. As far back as 1991, the economist Amartya Sen pointed out that Asia was missing |
25,000 for the former NASA administrator, $29,500 for the outgoing head of the EPA, and the list goes on and on.
'No bias, no bull' Get the latest on the presidential race on "Campbell Brown: No Bias, No Bull"
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I hear what defenders of this practice say: This is for history. A portrait will outlast any photograph.
But come on, in this economy? With the financial crisis we are all facing?
Guys -- take a picture.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Campbell Brown.
All About George W. Bush • Donald H. Rumsfeld • Bill Clinton • Hillary ClintonEd Werder says Vikings offensive coordinator Norv Turner and coach Mike Zimmer did not see eye to eye on how to improve the Vikings' offense. Herm Edwards says Turner made the best decision for the team. (1:56)
EDEN PRAIRIE, Minnesota -- Mike Zimmer prepared for decades to be an NFL coach. So when that time came, in January 2014, Zimmer knew exactly what he wanted to do.
He would use his considerable expertise to rebuild the Minnesota Vikings' defense, then hire experienced coaches to handle the rest of the team. Norv Turner, a head coach for 15 years and an NFL coordinator for eight others, was his choice for the offense.
For most of his 2½ years with the coordinator, Zimmer gave Turner almost complete autonomy. The arrangement sounded ideal and respectful, but ultimately it was a mistake -- one that was born of good intentions, but in the end was responsible for Turner's stunning resignation midway through a 5-2 season.
Zimmer has always said he's had a hand in the team's offensive approach, but the truth came out Wednesday in the raw emotion of Turner's decision.
"I would say that since Norv has been here, I've given him almost 100 percent, total free will in everything that they've done offensively," Zimmer said. "Obviously I'd come in and make suggestions, but there really has never been a time when I have demanded anything from there."
I'm sure Zimmer takes some professional pride in that approach, especially as a longtime assistant himself. Who wouldn't want a boss who stays out of the way? But it rendered him powerless to execute one of the basic jobs of a head coach: to "coach" the assistants. Mike Zimmer hired Norv Turner as his offensive coordinator in 2014. Kamil Krzaczynski/USA TODAY Sports
Turner is one of the most accomplished coordinators of this generation, and in this case, he was hired to be the head coach of the Vikings' offense. This is never an ideal approach, regardless of the mutual admiration and achievements of the respective parties.
When something goes wrong and a schematic adjustment needs to be made, it's the job of the head coach to step in and make sure it gets done. It's not always pleasant. It could encounter resistance and might be inferred as disrespect, but it's an important part of the checks and balance of leadership, and it was something Zimmer has largely avoided addressing in a direct way through the ups and downs of the Vikings' offense during his tenure.
His lone attempt was shaking up Turner's staff after the 2015 season. When the music stopped, the Vikings suddenly had two former head coaches -- tight ends coach Pat Shurmur and offensive line coach Tony Sparano -- nipping at Turner's heels. Even those changes were passive aggressive. Zimmer hoped to effect change through the ideas and influence of others.
All it did was lead Turner to believe that he was being disempowered. Close observers of the offense noticed that it increasingly included concepts that Shurmur and quarterback Sam Bradford had used when they were with the Philadelphia Eagles and St. Louis Rams. On Wednesday, Turner told ESPN's Ed Werder that he and Zimmer "have different views of where the offense was going."
Anyone watching this season knows that the biggest reason for the Vikings' offensive struggles is injuries. There isn't a team in the NFL that could skip seamlessly through the loss of its starting quarterback, running back and both tackles. But there are always schematic adjustments that can be made to minimize personnel deficiencies, and it doesn't take a genius to understand that Turner didn't agree with the suggestions he was hearing from inside the coaches' room.
I don't blame him. Norv Turner has been coaching his way for a long time. And for the most part, it has worked. Zimmer hired him to do his thing in Minnesota, and Zimmer essentially recused himself from having a substantive role in the direction of the offense.
With Zimmer unable or unwilling to insert himself directly in times of crisis, to guide Turner effectively through adjustments that could be made, this arrangement was doomed from the start.
I don't think Zimmer will make the same mistake again. I asked him Wednesday if he would preside differently over the offense after promoting Shurmur into the coordinator's role. He paused, took some time to consider the answer, and said, "I always had really good dialogue with Norv. So I think I'll continue to have good dialogue with those guys. We'll just have to see where things go."
Shurmur has a tough job ahead of him. He must find a way to score points without an NFL-caliber feature back and with an offensive line that has been getting smoked on a weekly basis.
Zimmer's job will be tougher, however. Amid a two-game losing streak, he'll need to assert himself once and for all as the coach of the Vikings' offense, defense and special teams. You can pick whatever cliché you want, but I'll go with this: The ship can't go down with someone other than the captain at the helm.It’s hard to forget when the Dreamcast hit stores: Sept. 9, 1999. But Sega’s failure to light the industry on fire with its ambitious console is the narrative that most remember best. Less than two years after it came to market, poor sales led to the Dreamcast’s discontinuation.
Except that 17 years after its release, the Dreamcast’s most dedicated, talented fans are grown up and making games themselves. Instead of moving on to modern iterations of the Dreamcast’s one-time competitors, a community of programmers continues to develop games for Sega’s final home console. Between the Dreamcast itself and the Virtual Memory Unit (VMU), a funky peripheral released alongside it, there’s a steady stream of new releases to play on there.
Uh, what?
This may seem bizarre, especially as we enter a period where new consoles are emerging mid-cycle. But there’s a pretty simple reason why the Dreamcast remains a viable, if limited, primary console option: homebrew.
Unlike other bygone consoles, playing unofficial games on the Dreamcast doesn’t require any hardware alterations. Download a game onto a regular old CD-ROM and you should be good to go, as hackers discovered not long after the console’s discontinuation. The ease of producing and distributing homebrew content to Dreamcast owners has kept the development community alive and kicking over the years, leading to a variety of original games and homages to classic, non-Dreamcast titles.
Although fans have released their own games for the console since just after its discontinuation — and the first official title arrived in 2007 — the Dreamcast’s homebrew community kicked it into high gear around a decade after the console was first released. Since 2003, more than 40 games have launched or been announced for the Dreamcast. Ten of those arrived in 2015 alone. Chalk it up to nostalgia or download speeds getting faster; either way, the Dreamcast lives on.
From brand new games to Pokémon Go
What’s most fascinating is that the new games released on the Dreamcast are more than just emulations of popular games. There’s plenty of those too, particularly on VMU, for which hackers have learned to recreate bite-sized versions of Metal Gear and Metroid. With the advent of Kickstarter and other crowdfunding sites, original games have been produced for the system as well.
Gunlord is one of the better known Dreamcast games to see release after the console’s seeming death. The 16-bit sidescroller is all about, well, being the lord of guns, and it came first to the similarly old-school Neo Geo system in 2011, ahead of its Dreamcast debut in 2012. The game even received a physical print, although that’s been sold out for years. It was well-received, a success for believers in the Dreamcast’s longevity.
Must Read Remember those weird Dreamcast commercials?
Redux: Dark Matters is another shoot-’em-up from the guys behind Gunlord, and it also saw a commercial release. Although it’s a revamp of Dux and came to modern consoles as well, the Kickstarter project received more than twice its funding goal. It’s a solid example of how Dreamcast owners haven’t been left in the dust even as more powerful systems take the forefront.
That’s true of other recent, popular titles, like Cave Story. The cult favorite platformer has made its way to a bunch of platforms, and the Dreamcast is definitely among them. The port is unofficial, of course, but it’s available for free and looks mostly the same as it did in its original release.
Less graphically involved games like Cave Story and Super Mario titles are easy to replicate on the Dreamcast as well; there are several compilations of old games for the Dreamcast and other systems. More enterprising developers are trying trickier ports, though, like a version of Pokémon Go for the VMU peripheral, which is also easy to hack. That sounds like a perfect fit for the mobile title, perhaps along the lines of its upcoming Apple Watch version. It’s eyeing a 2017 release, according to its developer, who’s also brought Flappy Bird to the device.
As the saying goes, "The Dreamcast is dead; long live the Dreamcast."Swiss authorities are arresting several top FIFA officials and plan to extradite them to the United States, where they will face federal corruption charges.
The New York Times reported that more than a dozen plainclothes Swiss law enforcement officials arrived unannounced at Zurich's Baur au Lac hotel in the early hours of Wednesday morning as leaders of FIFA gathered for their annual meeting.
The charges allege there has been widespread corruption throughout football's governing body over the past 20 years, involving bids for World Cups as well as marketing and broadcast deals.
Officials arrested included vice presidents Jeffrey Webb and Eugenio Figueredo, former executive committee member Jack Warner and Costa Rica federation president Eduardo Li. Fourteen people -- nine football officials and five sports-marketing executives -- are named in the indictment and face charges of wire fraud, racketeering and money laundering.
"The indictment alleges corruption that is rampant, systemic and deep-rooted both abroad and here in the United States," U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said. "It spans at least two generations of soccer officials who, as alleged, have abused their positions of trust to acquire millions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks.
"And it has profoundly harmed a multitude of victims, from the youth leagues and developing countries that should benefit from the revenue generated by the commercial rights these organizations hold, to the fans at home and throughout the world whose support for the game makes those rights valuable.
"Today's action makes clear that this Department of Justice intends to end any such corrupt practices, to root out misconduct, and to bring wrongdoers to justice -- and we look forward to continuing to work with other countries in this effort."
Acting U.S. attorney Kelly T. Currie added, "Today's announcement should send a message that enough is enough. After decades of what the indictment alleges to be brazen corruption, organized international soccer needs a new start -- a new chance for its governing institutions to provide honest oversight and support of a sport that is beloved across the world, increasingly so here in the United States.
"Let me be clear: This indictment is not the final chapter in our investigation."
FBI director James B. Comey said, "As charged in the indictment, the defendants fostered a culture of corruption and greed that created an uneven playing field for the biggest sport in the world. Undisclosed and illegal payments, kickbacks and bribes became a way of doing business at FIFA.
"When leaders in an organisation resort to cheating the very members that they were supposed to represent, they must be held accountable.
"Whether you call it soccer or football, the fans, players and sponsors around the world who love this game should not have to worry about officials corrupting their sport.
"This case isn't about soccer, it is about fairness and following the law."
According to the indictment, competitions being investigated include World Cup qualifiers in the CONCACAF region, the CONCACAF Gold Cup, the CONCACAF Champions League, the CONMEBOL/CONCACAF Copa America Centenario, the CONMEBOL Copa America, the CONMEBOL Copa Libertadores and the Copa do Brasil, which is organized by the Brazilian national soccer federation (CBF).
Other alleged schemes "relate to the payment and receipt of bribes and kickbacks in connection with the sponsorship of CBF by a major U.S. sportswear company, the selection of the host country for the 2010 World Cup and the 2011 FIFA presidential election."
There is no allegation of wrongdoing in relation to the 1994 World Cup hosted by the United States.
The arrests come just days before Friday's vote for the FIFA presidency, in which Sepp Blatter is widely expected to win re-election to a fifth term.
Blatter was not among the men arrested, FIFA spokesman Walter De Gregorio told The Associated Press.
"He is not involved at all," De Gregorio said.
Blatter's only opponent in Friday's presidential election, Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan, said it was "a sad day for football" but declined to comment further.
Swiss law enforcement getting room numbers for FIFA execs they are heading upstairs to arrest pic.twitter.com/F69djqpcu5 - Michael S. Schmidt (@MichaelSSchmidt) May 27, 2015
In a statement, the Swiss Federal Office of Justice said U.S. authorities suspect the officials of having received or paid bribes totalling millions of dollars. It says the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York is investigating these individuals on suspicion of the acceptance of bribes and kickbacks between the early 1990s and now.
An FOJ statement said: "The bribery suspects -- representatives of sports media and sports promotion firms -- are alleged to have been involved in schemes to make payments to the soccer functionaries -- delegates of FIFA and other functionaries of FIFA sub-organisations -- totaling more than $100 million.
"In return, it is believed that they received media, marketing, and sponsorship rights in connection with soccer tournaments in Latin America. According to the U.S. request, these crimes were agreed and prepared in the U.S., and payments were carried out via U.S. banks."
The Wall Street Journal reported that prosecutors plan to unseal indictments in New York as early as Wednesday, when Lynch and Corney are expected to host a news conference scheduled for 10:30 a.m. ET, reports ABC News.
FIFA's top officials headed to Zurich this week ahead of the presidential election on Friday.
Warner led CONCACAF, the FIFA confederation that oversees North and Central America and the Caribbean, from 1990 until 2011, when he resigned amid evidence of corruption. A CONCACAF report later revealed that he received millions in misappropriated funds, though FIFA stopped its investigation when he resigned.
Webb was among the six detained at the hotel in Zurich. He succeeded Warner and is the current president of CONCACAF, which oversees the United States Soccer Federation and 40 other national associations.
Figueredo is the president of CONMEBOL, the South American confederation that includes powerhouses Brazil and Argentina.
The Times identified Li as one of those detained at the hotel. Police escorted him from the hotel without handcuffs and with his luggage, according to the newspaper.
Allegations of corruption among FIFA have hit a new high since 2010, when the body awarded the 2018 World Cup to Russia and the 2022 World Cup to Qatar -- two countries embroiled in human rights investigations.
A whistleblower told the The Times of London that she witnessed multiple African FIFA officials receiving bribes of $1.5 million for their votes on the World Cup.
FIFA then began an investigation into the bids in 2012, but its full report has not been made public, and its author, former U.S. attorney Michael Garcia, has slammed the integrity of the summary released by FIFA's ethics committee.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.President Donald Trump on Wednesday tempered his threat to pull the United States out of NAFTA after an eleventh-hour phone call with leaders from Canada and Mexico who informed him of the consequences of abandoning a trade deal worth more than $1 trillion.
The White House issued a statement late Wednesday night saying Trump “agreed not to terminate NAFTA at this time” after a brief phone conversation with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Trump instead said he would renegotiate the trade deal.
So just how close did Trump come to pulling the U.S. out of the North America Free Trade Agreement? Here’s a brief timeline of events.
2016
In an interview with CNN’s Chris Cuomo on May 9, 2016, Trump derided NAFTA and blamed former President Bill Clinton for signing the agreement. The agreement was actually signed by his predecessor, George H.W. Bush in 1992 and went into effect in 1994 after Clinton signed the NAFTA bill Congress passed into law.
“These trade deals have sucked everything out of our country,” Trump told Cuomo. “NAFTA is the worst deal, one of the worst deals our country's ever made from an economic standpoint. One of the worst deals ever.”
On numerous occasions during the presidential race in 2016, Trump described NAFTA as a “total disaster,” “one of the worst deals ever” and a “terrible” one for the U.S. and American workers. A number of times he said he would either “get rid of it” or “terminate it” or “renegotiate” it.
The New York Daily News has a comprehensive list of Trump’s remarks on NAFTA, but here are just two out of several tweets Trump sent during the campaign.
January
In a series of tweets that ended in the cancellation of a meeting between Trump and the Mexican president in January, Trump called NAFTA a “one-sided deal” that benefits Mexico and not the U.S.
Monday and Tuesday
Because Trump has traditionally complained about NAFTA in terms of trade with Mexico, this week he surprised many when he shifted his attention to Canada.
On Monday, Politico reported that the Commerce Department announced it would issue tariffs on more than $5 billion worth of lumber imports from Canada. The next day, Trump complained about Canadian policies that have reportedly blocked American dairy exports at the northern border.
Wednesday
Trump’s head of his National Trade Council, Peter Navarro, and chief strategist Steve Bannon reportedly drafted an executive order on Wednesday that would have led to the U.S. pulling out of NAFTA, Politico reported.
News of the order spooked high-ranking Republicans who then urged the White House to hold off on such an order. Among those who discouraged Trump from signing the order was Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, who on Wednesday tweeted, “Withdrawing from #NAFTA would be a disaster for #Arizona jobs & economy — @POTUS shouldn’t abandon this vital trade agreement.”
Several other Republicans also echoed McCain’s concerns, including Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Nebraska, who in a statement said “Scrapping NAFTA would be a disastrously bad idea.”
Wednesday night
It all came to a screeching halt late Wednesday evening after Trudeau and Peña Nieto called Trump to talk him out of singing such an order. Canadian reporter Cormac Mac Sweeney on Thursday tweeted that Trudeau said the U.S. president was ready to pull out.
At 10:30 p.m. local time in Washington D.C., the White House issued a statement saying the U.S. agreed not to terminate NAFTA, as several journalists reported late in the day.
Thursday
On Thursday, Trump admitted that he would “terminate NAFTA as of two or three days from now” but was swayed by the calls from Trudeau and Peña Nieto who urged him to “please renegotiate.”
“I decided rather than terminating NAFTA, which would be a pretty big, you know, shock to the system, we will renegotiate,” Trump told reporters. “Now, if I’m unable to make a fair deal, if I’m unable to make a fair deal for the United States, meaning a fair deal for our workers and our companies, I will terminate NAFTA. But we’re going to give renegotiation a good, strong shot.”
NAFTA lives to see another day, but for how long remains to be seen. Will Trump manage to renegotiate NAFTA to benefit the U.S. as he has promised or is this the beginning of the end for the trade deal? Should the U.S. exit NAFTA anyway?
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Email: luis.gomez@sduniontribune.comTo mark the launch of the re-jacketed Old Kingdom series, ahead of next month’s new book in the series with prologue Clariel, here’s cover artist Sebastian Ciaffaglione explaining his process in taking our initial design brief through various iterations to final sketches.
Here’s publisher Eva with the new books when they landed in our office recently, hot off the press. You can find these incredible new editions in shops now!
The new look for the Old Kingdom series
Sabriel
These were the very first roughs Sebastian presented, to show us the sorts of illustrations he might do for all four books. The brief was to provide character portraits that could stand alone, for use in marketing material as well as on the covers. Sabriel has been illustrated many times, so one of the challenges for Seb was to come up with a new vision for the characters, based on his own reading of the books.
What I sometimes like to do is try to describe a character without mentioning what they look like or what their job is. I find it’s a good way to get to the core of a character. For instance, with Sabriel – I would describe her as brave, stoic, dutiful, altruistic, loyal, responsible and mostly lacking in self pity. She jumps right on board in assuming her responsibilities without even blinking. Even though she doesn’t feel fully up to the task, she proceeds anyway because it is her duty. Her duty means she has to be brave and she has to face nightmares. She has to look horrors right in the eye and fight. I didn’t at any point think this qualified her as a warrior though. She seems to fight because she has to. Which is why I originally focused on her bells instead of her sword.
There was much discussion about how active the pose should be – whether to focus more on Sabriel’s inner character, or the adventure elements of the story.
In the next rough I tried to instil more of her willingness to fight and her inner strength without having her seem like Xena.
In the final rough Sabriel’s inner strength shines through, yet her warrior stance and sword make it clear this is a story of action and adventure. There was some discussion about whether to include Mogget on the front cover or not; in the end we decided to focus on only the main characters on the front covers, and include the companions elsewhere.
Lirael
Lirael is my favourite character. I completely adore her. I would describe her as isolated, melancholy, curious, talented, good-hearted and most of all lonely. In the first rough, where she is facing in profile, I wanted the reader or audience to want to hug her like I do. I want them to look at her and not so much feel sorry for her, but appreciate that she may be a little deeper than a straightforward fantasy heroine. It is her and her dog versus the world. Together, they will satisfy her curiosity and find hidden treasures. When she is afraid, her Disreputable Dog will help her find courage.
The second Lirael rough is meant to emphasis more her curious nature and latent magical talents.
The final rough shows Lirael’s warrior side, and as with Sabriel, the sword and charter marks send a strong message of fantasy and adventure.
Abhorsen
Sameth is extremely talented, and does his best to fulfil his obligations. Really though he is a master builder and not an Abhorsen – he’s a world-class artisan, the embodiment of builders. Rather than just have the man be standing there tough as nails with a sword (though he can be pretty tough) I wanted to emphasise this other, more interesting (to me, anyway) aspect of his character. I wanted to show Lirael developing into a character more powerful and heroic. In this rough I like to think they are by a campfire and Sam is tinkering with some mechanical miracle, while Lirael has the sword and is alert, tapping him on the shoulder as if to warn him of a nefarious presence.
In the end, the decision was to go with a more active pose, showing Sameth and Lirael back to back, facing off against an unknown danger.
After doing the rough drawing I like to get an idea of the temperature of the painting by splashing colour around until I like it. Then I put that away and drop all the colour out and work on the value structure. If you can get your painting to work in black and white then it will work no matter what colours you lay on top. After that it is a slow back and forth process of adding rough chaos, then refining, and then back to adding more mess and so on until it’s time for final details.
Clariel
I think Clariel is 100% fighter. She is literally a Berserk. She is the student who brings a weapon to school. She has violent thoughts against her own family in some scenes. She is independent. She is focused, strong, true neutral and nature loving. I see her a bit like the Hulk. She just wants to be left alone to do her own thing and people keep coming along and heaping obligations on her. I wanted to imply her future in the series. That maybe she doesn’t quite end up as altruistic as some of the other Abhorsens-in-Waiting. She will cut you if she needs to, but mostly I think she wants to just walk away from you.
About the Illustrator: Sebastian Ciaffaglione
The stunning new covers for the Old Kingdom series were illustrated by Sebastian Ciaffaglione – you can find more of his amazing work at sebastiancreative.com
After studying illustration at NMIT Sebastian Ciaffaglione began a freelance art career based out of Melbourne. A strong desire to push his own artistic boundaries, striving always to improve and learn, has formed his reputation as a versatile artist who emphasises professionalism and flexibility.
Sebastian has kindly permitted us to use some of the illustrations that were ‘left on the cutting room floor’ to help us show some aspects of the cover design process.
This isn’t the first fabulous set of covers Sebastian has done for us, Lian Tanner’s series has also benefited from his incredible artistic touch:
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Like this: Like Loading...Lena Dunham, best known as creater, writer and star in the acclaimed HBO series “Girls,” recently took aim at New York Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. for allegedly rejecting her.
Dunham claims that Beckham Jr. sat next to her at the Met Gala — New York’s premier fashion event — and was so uninterested in her that he chose to scroll through Instagram rather than chit-chat.
Although Beckham Jr. didn’t actually speak a word to her, Dunham didn’t stop herself from attempting to interpret what she views as a sexist take on her physique and appearance.
“I was sitting next to Odell Beckham Jr., and it was so amazing because it was like he looked at me and he determined I was not the shape of a woman by his standards,” Dunham told comedian Amy Shumer during a ‘friend chat’ for Lenny Letter. “He was like, ‘That’s a marshmallow. That’s a child. That’s a dog.’ It wasn’t mean — he just seemed confused.
“The vibe was very much like, ‘Do I want to [expletive] it? Is it wearing a... yep, it’s wearing a tuxedo. I’m going to go back to my cell phone.’ It was like we were forced to be together, and he literally was scrolling Instagram rather than have to look at a woman in a bow tie. I was like, ‘This should be called the Metropolitan Museum of Getting Rejected by Athletes.’ ”
Keep in mind that Dunham and Shumer are comedians. Unfortunately for Beckham Jr., it’s these type of comments that get him in trouble with the media and the public. Heaven forbid he wasn’t interested in this woman, so therefore he must be a horrible and confused sexist who mistook her for a “dog.”
Beckham Jr., like many people, probably had no idea who Dunham was and assumed she was there as a spectator. If she’s that desperate for attention, she should find her way to MetLife Stadium at some point this year. Beckham Jr. would undoubtedly give her a selfie and an autograph to help ease the pain of the alleged rejection.
Update: Dunham has since taken to Twitter to help clarify her rejection comments.
.@OBJ_3 is talented, stylish, seems super awesome and wasn't into chatting with me at a fancy party. — Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) September 2, 2016
My story about him was clearly (to me) about my own insecurities as an average-bodied woman at a table of supermodels & athletes. — Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) September 2, 2016
It's not an assumption about who he is or an expectation of sexual attention. It's my sense of humor, which has kept me alive for 30 years. — Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) September 2, 2016
Update: Dunham has offered Beckham Jr. a public apology.Clan Lake, Northwest Territories, June 22, 1960
Clan Lake, and the small community on its shoreline, is located in a remote part of the Northwest Territories, accessible only by boat or airplane. The people of the area have lived off the land -- hunting, fishing and trapping -- for generations. In 1960, when an object hit the water of Clan Lake, a month passed before the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), located 30 miles away in Yellowknife, were called to investigate the sighting.
On June 22, 1960, an airplane dropped two campers off at Clan Lake. About 20 minutes after the plane left, the two reported hearing a loud noise similar to an airplane. As the noise grew louder, the campers looked to the sky, but saw nothing. Seconds later, however, an object fell from the sky and crashed into the water. When it hit the surface, the object began to rotate, causing a spray of water around it. There was no steam to indicate that the object was hot. According to the campers, the object was approximately 4 to 6 feet wide, with spokes coming out of it like arms. As it began to slow down, a rush of water met the campers on the shore. Finally, the object sank.
The campers rushed to the spot in the water with their canoe and saw that the reeds in the water appeared burnt, and an area approximately 20 feet by 60 feet appeared to be 'cut-up'. Poking around with their paddles, they found a channel in the bottom of the lake that corresponded with the cut path of grass. The campers, however, could not locate the object with their canoe paddles.
A statement of one camper's sighting was filed with the RCMP on July 18th, almost one month after the event. The report states that the observer was "well known in this county and is considered very reliable."
Records of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police ( RG 18, volume 3779, file HQ 400-Q-5, parts 1 to 7)
RCMP report of July 19, 1960
The RCMP investigated Clan Lake on July 19, 1960 through an aerial patrol. It appeared that an object did land on the east side of the lake. An area of water about 12 feet wide by 40 feet long was completely clear of reeds and grass. The water in this corridor also appeared to be deeper.
RCMP report of July 25, 1960
Another RCMP officer returned to the lake on August 15, 1960. The officer reported that the lake's water level had dropped considerably since the previous RCMP visit, with only 1 foot of water at the site in the lake where the object had supposedly landed. Officers could easily wade through the area and used metal rods to probe beneath the water's surface. A Geiger counter, used to detect the presence of radiation, returned negative results. No object was located. A local geologist volunteered to do a magnetometer check after the water froze in the fall to help locate any metal objects in the area.
RCMP report of August 25, 1960
It was around this time that the RCMP contacted the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) for help with the investigation. As a follow-up to a phone conversation, the RCMP sent a memo to the Director of Air Intelligence of the RCAF. The memo, dated August 16, 1960, stated that the issue was likely more in keeping with the interests of the Air Force than with those of the RCMP: the "description of the object is very interesting and the whole matter seems worthy of the attention of someone such as the RCAF, who are no doubt better able to handle this matter."
Memo of August 16, 1960
The Department of National Defence responded on September 23, 1960, with a letter confirming that the object could not have been associated with space research, as no reports were made by tracking agencies within Canada or the United States. The department stated that it was inclined to believe that the object seen by the campers was a meteorite, and that the heat of the meteor when it struck the Earth would have undoubtedly caused steam and could account for the burning reeds and grass. The original observers, however, reported that they saw no steam when the object hit the water.
The department recommended that the local geologist complete the magnetometer check; he would be familiar with the reactions of the instruments, and would be able to ascertain whether fabricated metals were buried in the area. Finally, although the department doubted the object was significant as far as national security was concerned, the Department of National Defence stated that they would "be most interested in being advised of the outcome" of the investigation.
Letter of September 23, 1960
However, a document dated almost one year after the incident explains that the plan to have the local geologist complete a magnetometer check never happened. Mr. Brown, the geologist, had to be out of the area and could not complete the check. The use of the magnetometer would have been the most effective method for finding the object. The case of the flying object landing in Clan Lake was closed. No object or meteor was ever found.
Letter of May 16, 1961Let’s stop with the carbon con already
The side that defines the vocabulary of a debate wins the debate. So we could ask: as we fight the global warming scam, why are we using the language of the scammers? It’s harder to combat “carbon” taxes, “carbon” credits, and callow “carbon” appeals if we accept that at issue is “carbon.” Calling CO2 “carbon” is like calling H2O “hydrogen.” Carbon is about as useful to a plant aspiring to photosynthesize as a tank of hydrogen is to a dehydrated man in a desert. Carbon dioxide and carbon are not the same thing any more than a fox and foxglove are the same thing.
If chemical formulas are meaningless and one element or atom between friends can be ignored, try inhaling copious amounts of CO. It’s also “carbon,” being in fact more “carboney” ratio-wise than CO2. But carbon monoxide is poisonous to fauna and flora, while carbon dioxide is plant food, which is why botanists pump it into greenhouses. Likewise, would you like some chlorine with your food, sir? Sodium is poisonous; chloride is poisonous. Combine the two – NaCl – and you have table salt. Chemistry is our friend. It would be nice to think that the carbon crew is just being friendly and familiar. But not only would calling CO2 Mr. Dioxide be just as inaccurate, but there’s clearly an agenda here. Carbon, the primary element in coal, conjures up images of spewing sky-blackening soot into the air. It’s a dark brand of marketing. In fact, I challenge those crafting “carbon tax” bills to call CO2 “carbon” in their legislation’s text. They won’t, because I suspect it wouldn’t stand up in court, as factories don’t actually emit carbon. The alarmists will either specify carbon dioxide or define, tendentiously, what “carbon” means for the “purposes of the bill.” Of course, carbon isn’t really a villain, either. It’s the fourth most abundant element in the universe, and man is known as a “carbon-based life form.” Given the latter, if extra atoms and elements and how they react with each other can be ignored when formulating labels and definitions, we could say that Al Gore’s birth was a carbon emission. Honest people should reclaim the language and reboot the debate by rejecting “carbon” talk. As for those knowingly using the term for propaganda purposes, they should have a huge carbon footprint placed firmly on their carbon-based posteriors. Contact Selwyn Duke, follow him on Twitter or log on to SelwynDuke.com.CLEVELAND (AP) — A woman who spent five days in jail for what police internal affairs investigators concluded was a false charge of assaulting a police officer said the officer choked her and slammed her to the ground.
Cleveland.com reports 18-year-old Angelina Martinez, of Lakewood, said in a telephone interview that she thought she was going to die when Sgt. Christopher Graham picked her up by the throat and threw her to the pavement on Sept. 12.
“I couldn’t breathe with his hands around my throat,” Martinez said. “When he put me in handcuffs, I was actually relieved because I felt like at least he couldn’t kill me now.”
Graham was charged Thursday with misdemeanor |
effectively the spread of this infection. We cannot bring it under control," he told the Global Alliance for Research on Avian Diseases conference at King's College, London.
Even in places like Europe and Japan, where huge efforts had been made to contain AI, it still had a habit of coming back.
A major difficulty in containing the disease was that it was often hard to detect.
Trade barriers are themselves damaging
Governments that place countrywide bans on trade from countries where HPAI has been reported, could be doing themselves a disservice, UK chief vet Nigel Gibbens told the conference. "We must not kill off trading routes. This is an over-reaction to the disease breaking out. It depressingly, predictably happens that it causes trade barriers that are themselves damaging and possibly perverse in their outcomes. You might shut off the trading route from a safe trading partner because of avian influenza, and open up a different trading route with a new partner who will bring you a whole host of different endemic diseases that you'd rather not have."
Changing epidemiology of H5 virus
Since the so-called Guandong strain of HPAI had emerged in China in 2004, there had been waves of infection, exacerbated by the extensive trade in live poultry and the fact it can replicate in free-range ducks, without any symptoms showing, said Prof Brown.
"The evolution and changing epidemiology of the H5 virus over time has also made it really difficult for us to select and use the right vaccines. In the mid- to late-1990s we had relatively little variation, but over time we see more genetic diversity. That's because we've had truly global spread, we have a virus that becomes established in the ecosystem and evolves independently. The epidemiology has become more complicated because of this virus's ability to pick up genes readily from other strains."
Live bird movement
Wild birds certainly played a role as a primary source of the disease. "But sometimes this gets out of perspective and they are blamed for spreading an outbreak when there is no epidemiological evidence to support that." The actual spread was often down to things like live bird movement, trade in contaminated product and vehicle movements.
Source: Farmers WeeklyReorganizing the Closet
Laying a firm foundation of misinformation with one’s family and friends in order to make it easier to perform maintenance lies about one’s sexuality later.
Checking for Monsters in the Closet
A practice only performed by young, naïve gays, in which – despite a certain amount of fear – they carefully scout out the availability of discreet sexual partners.
Installing a Shoe Rack in the Closet
Fabricating a large-scale cover for your extensive collection of flamboyant shoes, like a fictitious aspiration to be a cobbler.
Calling Someone From the Closet to Ask If They’ve Seen Your Jeans
Hinting at the fact that you are gay to a friend or family member, a measure taken to prepare them for your coming out of the closet later.
Calling Someone From the Closet to Ask If They’ve Seen Your Tight, Pink V-Neck Shirt
Like calling someone from the closet to ask if they’ve seen your jeans, but laying it on a whole lot thicker.
Cleaning Out the Closet for Goodwill
Debunking the lies and deceptions that obviously no longer fit after you’ve come out of the closet, and donating the more gently-used lies to your gay friends who are still in the closet.
Repurposing the Closet
After one has come out of the closet, it may be necessary to lie to family members about aspects of your love life for other reasons – for example, if you are currently dating your sister’s closeted fiancé.
AdvertisementsDisney is making a 'Young Han Solo' movie, and we're already seeing some of the leaked casting choices for the young smuggler online.
As Dave Thier writes, "It’s just so hard to imagine how an entire movie about Young Han Solo won’t be terrible."
To be fair, a Young Indiana Jones wasn't all bad. But Indiana was the star of those movies. Han is part of a bigger universe, and one in which his story has already been told pretty much perfectly.
Unlike the Jones movies, there was never a young Han Solo flashback either.
And so far, the actors Disney has on their short list, while all fine people I suppose and reasonably talented actors, neither look, act, sound, or can possibly be anything at all like Harrison Ford. Just give up it isn't going to happen. Some fans apparently want Shia LeBeouf to be young Han, which is just super weird and inexplicable to me.
In any case, Disney should just, to coin a phrase, let it go. Let this horrible, no good, very bad idea go and we'll all forgive you. The Force Awakens was good enough that you're allowed to make a mistake, but please let that mistake be a small one, like having a bad idea rather than executing it.
Jar Jar Binks was a bad idea, but nobody would even know about him if George Lucas had searched his feelings properly. A Young Han Solo movie is just as bad an idea as Jar Jar.
Search your feelings, Disney. You know it to be true.
Unless you cast Chris Pratt. If you cast Chris Pratt I'm sure everything will be just fine.
Update: The Chris Pratt comment was a joke, in case you missed that. I'd also like to add, in all seriousness, that if this movie is made, they should pick this guy to play young Han Solo. He's the only sensible choice at this point.Kurt Russell will talk about John Carpenter’s kung fu epic Big Trouble in Little China at this year’s Beyond Fest in Los Angeles, the event announced Thursday. The discussion will be moderated by Russell’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 director James Gunn and will be accompanied by a screening of Big Trouble to mark its 30th anniversary.
The genre festival is showing a number of other vintage films, including Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm: Remastered, George A. Romero’s undead classic Dawn of the Dead — which will be presented in 3D — and The Beyond, accompanied by a live performance from composer Fabio Frizzi and his seven-piece orchestra. Meanwhile, Stanley Kubrick’s science fiction classic 2001: A Space Odyssey will screen in 70mm with a Q&A featuring stars Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood.
The lineup of new films at this year’s Beyond Fest includes zombie movie The Girl with All the Gifts, Ti West’s John Travolta-starring Western In a Valley of Violence, Paul Schrader’s Dog Eat Dog, and Ana Lily Amirpour’s The Bad Batch, her much-anticipated follow-up to A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night.
Beyond Fest takes place at Hollywood’s Egyptian Theatre Sept. 30 through Oct. 11. The event’s presenting sponsor is the horror streaming service Shudder, which will be hosting free screenings at the Shudder Theatre. Titles featured in that lineup include two more Romero films — Martin and a 4K restoration of The Crazies — along with the Ring/Grudge crossover movie Sadako vs Kayako and the Morgan Spurlock-directed documentary Rats.
Read more about the lineup at the official Beyond Fest website, and see the poster for this year’s event below.TOKYO—Saying it was simply time for drivers to move on, Toyota Motor Corp. issued a recall of its entire 1993 Camry model line Wednesday due to the fact that its owners really should have bought something new by now. “We understand that the 1993 Camry was tremendously dependable, but, honestly, there’s just no excuse for driving a 22-year-old car at this point,” said Toyota spokesman Haruki Kinoshita, adding that, with all the advances in automotive technology that have taken place, no one really had any business driving a vehicle for more than two decades. “We’re not saying you have to buy a new 2015 Camry or splurge on a flashy new hybrid, or even that your new car has to be a Toyota at all. But the bottom line is that you need to start fresh, however you choose to do so.” While Toyota is reportedly confining its recall to the 1993 Camry, it also issued a warning to owners of 1994 to 1998 models alerting them to the fact that they were really starting to push it.
AdvertisementIt's a tough world out there. One day you're the top of the food chain, striking fear in the hearts of all those who behold you. The next, you're being chased down by a group of false killer whales that want to snack on your body like an anchovy.
That's precisely what happened to a lone shark in the crystal clear waters off the coast of Cronulla, south of Sydney, which was caught in this spectacular aerial footage by drone hobbyist, Bruno Kataoka. It's pretty awesome viewing, and also one of the rare times we've spotted mysterious false killer whales (Pseudorca crassidens) in the wild, providing researchers with valuable insight into their bad-ass behaviour.
False killer whales grow to between 3 to 5 metres and are the third-largest member of the oceanic dolphin family and they look quite a lot like orcas, except they're black with a grey thoat and chest rather than black and white.
And just like orcas, the false killer whales also attack and kill other cetaceans, but this footage suggests they might also like to chow down on sharks from time to time.
Rare scenes captured off Cronulla show sharks being hunted by whales. @AdeneCassidy7 #7News https://t.co/wv7z7BWglR — 7 News Sydney (@7NewsSydney) May 10, 2016
At the end of the video, after tiring out its prey, one of the four false killer whales snatches the shark in its mouth like a toy, and then drags it down into the depths.
"We did not expect to see what we saw, it was a really exciting moment," Kataoka told 7 News Sydney. He was flying his drone just off Cronulla beach when he caught the chase on film. "National Geographic guys have been waiting months to get such a thing and we just happened to be there at the right moment at the right time."
The species of shark that meets its untimely end can't be identified from this footage, and it's impossible to officially confirm that the whales we're seeing are false killer whales without getting a closer look, or a sample of their DNA. But marine biologist Georgina Wood tells 7 News that their size and colouring makes it very likely they're the predators in this video.
That's exciting, because we still know very little about the lifestyles of false killer whales - most of our information on them comes from examining stranded specimens.
"It's amazing, that kind of footage is just so rare to catch," Wood adds, explaining that at this time of year, it's the larger humpback whales that are more likely to be spotted off the coast of Sydney.
With more and more amateur drone users out there, let's hope that we catch more of these incredible moments of animals doing their thing in the future. Nat Geo, eat your heart out.Dead or Alive Xtreme 3’s Breast Deformation Will Be PS4 Exclusive, More Details Shared on Owner Mode
Giuseppe Nelva December 18, 2015 3:46:53 AM EST
Yesterday, Koei Tecmo introduced Breast Deformation and the “Owner Mode” for the upcoming PS4 and PS Vita exclusive Dead or Alive Xtreme 3. Today, with a follow-up press release, they provided more information about both features.
First of all, physical deformation, that allows a girl’s breasts and backside to dynamically deform and be squeezed when in contact with objects like floors, walls and poles. will be PS4 exclusive. The PS Vita version will probably have normal jiggle, but no specific information was shared about that.
This isn’t the first feature that ends up exclusive to PS4. The same applies to bikini malfunctions and tan lines. The PS Vita version uses a more agile version of the Soft Engine 2.0, named Soft Engine Lite, and apparently this kind of featureisn’t supported.
On top of that, we learn more about the Owner Mode, that lets you take charge of the island, replacing the overly busy Zack. The new mode will have an “Owner Shop,” where the player can unlock special items and features by spending experience points accumulated while working as the owner.
A high happiness level for the girls will trigger an event in which she’ll change bikini in front of the player, but she will ask him to keep his eyes closed. This introduces a funny trade-off feature. If you decide to be a gentleman and keep your eyes closed, the change will be successful and the happiness level of the girl will raise.
If you want to be naughty and open your eyes without permission, you’ll get to peep at the girl while changing, with her bikini in disarray and showing a bit more skin. As a consequence, the bikini change will fail and the heroine will be displeased, lowering her happiness level.March 17, 2017 Rain, snow to threaten travel across Turkey into Saturday
By Eric Leister, AccuWeather senior meteorologist March 17, 2017, 11:26:14 AM EDT
A potent storm will continue to sweep across Turkey into Saturday with rain,
The storm will lead to travel disruptions, especially in the mountains and across eastern Turkey.
After bringing rain and thunderstorms to Istanbul on Friday morning, a storm will continue to press eastward into Saturday.
As the storm moves eastward, it will intensify, bringing the greatest impacts to the eastern half of Turkey.
Rain or a mixture of snow and rain will end as all snow in Kayseri and Erzincan.
"There can be a coating to 2-5 cm (1-2 inches) in these cities with more substantial amounts and travel problems in the surrounding higher terrain," Pydynowski said.
"Snowfall is more likely to be on the lower end on this range in Erzincan."
When the snow falls lightly during the day, it will struggle to accumulate on paved surfaces.
"Mostly snow is expected across the interior of eastern Turkey on Saturday. This includes in Erzurum and Kars, where snowfall will total around 15 cm (6 inches) or more," Pydynowski said.
There can be local amounts up to 60 cm (24 inches) in the highest elevations.
Related:
Turkey Weather Center
Interactive Turkey weather satellite
Detailed Ankara weather forecast
Elsewhere, warmer air will prevail resulting in rain along the Black Sea coastline and across the lower elevations of southern Turkey.
Rainfall totals of 25-50 mm (1-2 inches) will be common along the southern slopes of the Eastern Taurus Mountains.
Unsettled weather has been lashing Turkey the past several days. Forty-nine people were injured after three hot air balloons were forced to make hard landings in central Turkey on Tuesday, according to the Associated Press.
The balloons were carrying primarily tourists when strong winds suddenly forced the need to conduct emergency landings.
Yet another storm system will bring additional rain and snow to Turkey on Sunday and Monday.
"This storm will be weaker and like it will affect mainly northern and eastern parts of the country," AccuWeather Meteorologist Tony Zartman said.
Report a TypoOver the years, I’ve had many names and titles. For now, you can call me Catherine. I haven’t been totally honest about who I’ve been these long years, but that’s a moot point at this stage.
Done for the story "The Evil Paradox" by AlcatrazStory Description: "
I’m still reminded of what I did to Luna and Celestia every day, but living with it got easier. It’s like a dull ache that never goes away, but you slowly learn how to ignore it, even though you can feel it eating away at you. It’s been fifteen-hundred and sixty, or thirty Earth years since I first came to Equestria. When you’re immortal, the years tend to blur together.
I can’t help but think on what became of Luna since we swapped places. If she’s still alive, dead, married with kids, or begging for change on the street.
Yeah, I’ve got a lot of explaining to do, so if you’ll bear with me, I’ll start at the beginning."
Pretty fun, relatively quick piece of best ponies.When NBC announced their plans to revive Will & Grace as a part of their new 2017 fall line-up 11 years after the beloved Must-See TV staple signed off for good with a questionably dour series finale, we'll admit it—we were a little worried.
Could lightning strike twice? Were NBC audiences willing to tune in to an out-of-vogue format (multi-cam) regardless of who's involved? Would the magic still be there or would the spark present in the original run—now a ubiquitous presence in syndication—be missing? To say that the Peacock network was taking one hell of a high-profile risk was an understatement.
While there have been a few notable exceptions, the rule when it comes to revivals in this reboot-obsessed age is that they usually don't connect—either creatively or with audiences (or sometimes both). For every Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, there's a Prison Break or Twin Peaks: The Return. And none of those shows returned to the same network on the same night in the same time slot that housed much of their original run. Like we said, one hell of a risk.
But here's the good news: Our worries were unfounded.Image caption Vending machines are expected to be banned in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland in February
The sale of tobacco from vending machines has been banned in England, with anyone caught selling cigarettes in machines facing a fine of £2,500.
The Department of Health said the ban had been introduced to prevent under-age sales to children and to support adults who were trying to quit.
The rest of the UK is expected to implement a similar ban next year.
Some pub landlords say it is a further threat to a livelihood that has already been damaged by the smoking ban.
But Cancer Research and the British Heart Foundation have welcomed the move.
According to the Department of Health, nearly all adult smokers started smoking before they turned 18.
'Unsupervised'
Of the children who regularly smoke, 11% buy their cigarettes from vending machines.
It is also estimated that 35 million cigarettes are sold illegally through vending machines to children every year.
Under the new rules, pub landlords will still be able to sell cigarettes from behind the bar but they must ensure all tobacco advertising on vending machines is removed. Any person found guilty of displaying cigarette adverts on a vending machine could face imprisonment for up to six months, a fine of £5,000, or both.
Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said smoking was "one of the biggest and most stubborn challenges in public health", with more than eight million people in England still smoking, causing more than 80,000 deaths each year.
When [smokers have] got to stand in the street and they can't even buy their cigarettes in the pub, then where is it left? There's no point in them going to a pub. Bill Sharp, Pub landlord
He said: "Cigarette vending machines are often unsupervised, making it easy for children to purchase cigarettes from them.
"The ban on cigarette sales from vending machines will protect children by making cigarettes less accessible to them - we want to do everything we can to encourage young people not to start smoking in the first place."
Jo Butcher, the National Children's Bureau's programme director of health and wellbeing, welcomed the ban and said a person's lifetime smoking or non-smoking behaviour was "heavily influenced" by decisions in their adolescence.
"Children and young people tell us that external influences make it even more difficult for them to choose healthier lifestyles.
"It's essential that we create environments that improve health and tobacco legislation is an important part of public health protection and promotion," she said.
Protection
Charities have also welcomed the ban.
Betty McBride, director of policy and communications at the British Heart Foundation, said thousands of children at risk of this "deadly addiction" regularly got tobacco from vending machines, "which conveniently don't ask them to prove their age".
"These children are often blissfully unaware of the damage smoking does to their health and, by the time they realise, they're hooked.
"Scrapping these machines cuts off an easy source of tobacco for existing young smokers and makes it harder for a new generation to start.
"We're encouraging landlords to remove machines completely now so they - and any left-over branding - don't act as dusty old adverts for tobacco," she said.
Eileen Streets, director of tobacco control at the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, said she hoped the ban would play a "significant part in stopping many children becoming the next generation of lung cancer victims".
Other measures
Jean King, of Cancer Research UK, added: "Tobacco kills half of all long-term users and is responsible for one in four cancer deaths.
"Cancer Research UK is determined to protect children from tobacco marketing and through our Out of Sight Out of Mind campaign we are continuing to work for legislation to introduce plain packaging for cigarettes."
But the British Beer and Pub Association described the ban as "an unnecessary measure".
A spokesman said the machines were there for the convenience of adult customers, and that the association did not believe they played a role in childhood smoking.
Although cigarettes can be sold by bar staff, the spokesman said many pubs would not opt to introduce that, as it raised issues about having a "high-value" item behind the bar and interfered with serving drinks.
One London pub landlord, Bill Sharp, said the ban was another "nail in the coffin" of his livelihood.
"I can understand them removing it from public places because that's a view, a health issue, call it what you will.
"But when [smokers have] got to stand in the street and they can't even buy their cigarettes in the pub, then where is it left? There's no point in them going to a pub. They going remove real ale from pubs next?"
Other measures to protect young people from the dangers of smoking are also on the way.
In April 2012, large retailers in England and Scotland will have to get rid of all tobacco displays. Small shops will be expected to comply from April 2015.
Wales and Northern Ireland plan to implement similar regulations.
The government is also due to begin a public consultation before the end of the year on whether to introduce plain packaging for cigarettes in order to lessen their marketing appeal to young people, help make health warnings more effective and help reduce the number of smokers.PHOENIX — Americans upset about illegal immigration have a new outlet for their rage: a fund set up by the State of Arizona that will use private donations to build a border wall.
Critics call the state’s effort to build its own border barriers a foolhardy, feel-good campaign that will have little practical effect on illegal border crossings. But organizers in the State Legislature, which created the fund, say it will allow everyday people fed up with the inability of Congress to address the problem of illegal immigration to contribute personally to a solution.
Beginning during the second Bush administration and continuing in President Obama’s tenure, the federal government has built more than 600 miles of barriers, some designed to keep out cars and others to block individuals from crossing. The congressionally approved construction effort is winding up, but about 82 miles of Arizona’s 388 miles of border remain without a barrier, federal officials say.
The construction has been expensive. The Government Accountability Office said in a 2009 report that the federal government spent $1 million to $3 million for every mile of border fencing. Arizona, though, intends to use low-cost inmate labor to reduce those costs.
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The most likely locations for the state’s planned barriers are on state or private land, organizers say. A committee will determine the details of the wall’s construction after money comes in, according to the legislation creating the border fund, which Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican, signed in April 2010.The NSA declined Shapiro’s requests for documents, citing “national security,” and refused to acknowledge whether these documents existed in the first place. The agencies were not immediately available for comment to VICE News.
Today Shapiro filed a lawsuit against three of those agencies — he had previously sued the CIA — over their failure to comply with his requests for their records.
Among the records Shapiro requested are those concerning the potential involvement of the NSA, the FBI, the DIA, and the CIA in the 1962 arrest of Nelson Mandela — which led to the then anti-apartheid leader’s 28-year incarceration. The allegations of these agencies’ involvement in Mandela’s arrest have circulated widely for years, with little documentary evidence to this day. But if Shapiro has it his way, that may be about to change.
Perhaps more neutrally, the Justice Department called him the “most prolific” requester of Freedom of Information Act documents. He even filed at a pace of two a day during one period in 2011.
Read more
Depending on whom you ask, Ryan Shapiro is either the country’s “FOIA superhero” or a “threat to national security.”
Perhaps more neutrally, the Justice Department called him the “most prolific” requester of Freedom of Information Act documents. He even filed at a pace of two a day during one period in 2011.
Among the records Shapiro requested are those concerning the potential involvement of the NSA, the FBI, the DIA, and the CIA in the 1962 arrest of Nelson Mandela — which led to the then anti-apartheid leader’s 28-year incarceration. The allegations of these agencies’ involvement in Mandela’s arrest have circulated widely for years, with little documentary evidence to this day. But if Shapiro has it his way, that may be about to change.
Today Shapiro filed a lawsuit against three of those agencies — he had previously sued the CIA — over their failure to comply with his requests for their records.
The NSA declined Shapiro’s requests for documents, citing “national security,” and refused to acknowledge whether these documents existed in the first place. The agencies were not immediately available for comment to VICE News.
The FBI called Shapiro’s dissertation on the policing of animal rights activists in the US a “threat to national security.” (They also called animal rights activism itself the “number one domestic terrorism threat.”)
Shapiro, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology PhD candidate, transparency advocate, and animal rights activist, wants to understand why the US government viewed the recently deceased South African icon as a threat to national security — so much so that he remained on the US terror watch list until 2008, long after he was released from jail, elected South Africa’s president and awarded a Nobel Peace prize.
But Shapiro also hopes his lawsuit will shed light on the “crisis of secrecy” he says we are facing in this country. He wants more people to demand the information they have a right to, and if federal agencies won’t comply, he wants those with access to it to leak it.
VICE News caught up with Shapiro on Tuesday. Here’s what he told us.
VICE News: More than half a century has passed since Mandela’s arrest. Why would the federal agencies you cited in your lawsuit still try to keep that information from the public?
Ryan Shapiro: I think there are tricky issues at play. The first is that it will be significantly embarrassing for there to be documentary evidence of the intelligence community’s role in the 1962 arrest of Mandela, leading to his decades of incarceration. There’s been very credible information supporting that, but we don’t have hard documentary evidence, and the CIA has never commented on it and refuses to comment on it, so I do think it will be significantly embarrassing. But I’m not interested in embarrassing the United States. We as a nation need to foster a broader understanding of national security, and when in the name of national security the US government both overtly and covertly aligns itself with the apartheid state and against heroic freedom fighters for racial justice … Not only in 1962 but also keeping in mind that Mandela was on the US terror watch list until 2008, that kind of myopic understanding of national security has devastating consequences. And those consequences, and that understanding of national security are again prevailing in post 9/11 America. Also in terms of targeting of political protesters at home, whether they are animal rights, anti-war or Occupy protesters.
VICE News: So are you hoping that by drawing on a historical example of the US government targeting what it believes are national security threats, we might learn something about its targets today?
Shapiro: Exactly. Mandela today is almost universally held as a heroic freedom fighter, and of course rightly so. We as a nation need to reconsider what we mean by national security, when we view siding with the apartheid state as somehow in the American security’s interest. As Judge Murray Gurfein said in his ruling against the Nixon administration’s infamous attempt to prevent the New York Times from publishing the Pentagon Papers: “The security of the Nation is not at the ramparts alone. Security also lies in the value of our free institutions.” Building upon that ruling, I think we need to foster a broader conception of national security. Democracy cannot meaningfully function without an informed citizenry, and such a citizenry is impossible without broad public access to information about the operations of government. FOIA is sadly broken. The notion that the records of government are the property of the people is radically democratic, but it is broken in practice. We are experiencing a crisis of secrecy, and the various intelligence agencies’ responses to my FOIA requests is evidence of that. But the recent AP report that the Obama administration invoked national security to censor or deny FOIA requests more than ever is also evidence of that.
VICE News: So this is not just about Mandela. You also called on the public to demand more government transparency, saying, “If you see something, leak something.”
Shapiro: People are talking more about the Mandela part, which of course is very important, I’m very happy that that is happening and that they’re talking about the FBI’s response. But “see something, leak something” is the thing that people aren’t talking about as much. The second part, where I’m publicly advocating for leaking, I would be very psyched to see that get more attention as the focus of the story rather than the peripheral element. [I’m doing this] to talk about the specific Mandela issues, but also to highlight the broader crisis of secrecy that we are experiencing. FOIA is one of the most underappreciated elements of the American experiment. The notion that the records of government are the property of the people and all we need to do to get them is to ask for them is democratic, but FOIA is broken.
VICE News: Are you encouraging more people to demand access to government information?
Shapiro: Not only. The US intelligence community is deeply allergic to the Freedom of Information Act. It is fair to say that the intelligence community does nearly everything in its power to avoid compliance with the Freedom of Information Act. So it’s not just that we need more people to make FOIA requests, because the agencies are blatantly violating federal law, flagrantly and consistently violating federal law. If we can’t get the records that way, we need to get the records one way or another; democracy can’t function without an informed citizenry. So if the government is not going to tell us, and if they are going to violate FOIA, the only way to get it is for people to leak it. I am calling on all citizens with access to unreleased records pertaining to illegal, unconstitutional, or immoral government activities to return those records to their rightful owners, the American people.
VICE News: Will the American people care enough? Did the leak of NSA files by Edward Snowden suggest the American public is interested, beyond the initial uproar, in applying sustained pressure on government to be more transparent?
Shapiro: It doesn’t take that many people, it just takes the right ones. When [Daniel] Ellsberg released the Pentagon Papers, that was just one man — or two of them, Anthony Russo did it with him. The Pentagon Papers’ release really showed the whole world that the US President and the Department of Defense had lied to the American people about the war in Vietnam. And the release of the Pentagon Papers was absolutely instrumental in ultimately ending the war in Vietnam. Edward Snowden himself is just one person, and yet prior to the Snowden revelations, there were certainly some of us who were discussing these issues, but there were very few people listening. Now, after the Snowden revelations, people are talking about it, people are interested. So, will the American people respond to the call? I don’t know. But it doesn’t take many to alter this situation. That’s part of the power of information, especially in the digital age, it’s how quickly it can spread. Ellsberg and Russo had the reports photocopied, thousands of pages in what we would now consider antique Xerox machines. Think of how many more pages Snowden was so easily able to get out. As Harvard historian of science Peter Galison has demonstrated, the universe of classified knowledge now far exceeds the universe of unclassified knowledge. That’s a staggering thought. There is far more classified knowledge in the world than unclassified. And that disparity grows all the time.
VICE News: They called you a “FOIA superhero.” How do you feel about that, and do you feel alone in your battle for more FOIA compliance?
Shapiro: There are some journalists who aggressively use the Freedom of Information Act. Jason Leopold is an example, I collaborate with him on some projects. There are a handful of others. But it’s not just FOIA. The project all around is to obtain records about the operations of government and to disseminate those records to the people. Obviously there are different risks associated with leaking documents, but the open government community and the transparency community is strong and growing. There are a number of terrific organizations, journalists, activists, and scholars — all pushing towards the pro-transparency, anti-secrecy project. It would of course be nice to have more.
Follow Alice Speri on Twitter: @alicesperiAccording to scientists, solitary animals are those animals which — with the exception of the evolutionary necessities of feeding and reproduction, including migratory habits — do not live in groups. A significant number of animals are, in fact, solitary. Among mammals are big cats and bears — pet owners of cats will notice their characteristic “indifference” as a remnant solitary behavior. Such solitary behavior presumably originated from territorial necessity, given that the roaming pattern for feeding required a large habitat per individual, but the behavior lingered even when such a necessity was not in play.
A second category of solitary animal is so defined because the animal eludes human and other animal observation, hiding, as it were, from potential predators but, in effect, from everyone. These may seem to elude humans, such as reptiles, when it is just a matter of observation. Others, like the famous hermit thrush, simply blends into their environment well or, like owls, are nocturnal. We call them solitary by default, which makes a significant portion of the world’s animals solitary, or as far as human observation is concerned.
At least three reclusive creatures have been dubbed “hermits”for their solitary behavior or for their penchant for concealment: 1) the hermit crab, 2) the hermit thrush, and 3) the hermit ibis. Other animals could have earned the hermit sobriquet, but a little humor shows why these three have earned the title, at least to this observer.
1. The lowly hermit crab is the digambara of the solitary animals, sky-clad and entirely vulnerable. This crustacean is without shell and takes a covering as it finds it, typically from deceased crustaceans, the garb ill-fitting and object of human derision. Scientists have identified rare accumulations of hermit crabs (analogous to the vast Kumbh Mela festival of India held every 12 years, attracting sadhus and holy pilgrims) wherein the crabs shed their garb and find larger, more suitable garb from their brothers.
2. The hermit thrush delights listeners of its “somewhat melancholy” song, which emanates from deep hidden forests. Scientists have recently confirmed (“Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (US),” Nov. 2014) that the hermit thrush approximates the mathematical structures of human music. Science News reported that
In its somewhat melancholy songs, North America’s Catharus guttatus thrushes mix in strings of short, non-wavering tones. In 54 out of 71 thrush songs, two statistical methods showed those tones related to each other much as notes in human musical scales do, researchers report November 3 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The hermit thrushes “have a strong preference for the same simple ratios [such as 3:2] that humans seem to like,†says paper coauthor Tecumseh Fitch of the University of Vienna.
When recordings of the hermit thrush song are slowed down, the sound is distinctly like that of a flute, so the next question is whether the sound approximates the Japanese shakuhachi, the Indian Carnatic flute, or Mozart. Our preference, especially with the description of “melancholic,” is for the first. Not pursued by distinguished panel was whether humans somehow inherited this capacity from birds as part of evolution or if they imitated the hermit thrush, which is not familiar with Pythagorean mathematical principles. Also to be determined is whether all this singing (bird or human) is simply to attract a mate, much like human behavior in adolescent rock bands, interminably outliving both their youth and reproductive needs.
3. The hermit ibis is also called, less diplomatically, the northern bald ibis, though it winters in southern Africa and flies north along East Africa to Turkey (or, more romantically, East Asia, Anatolia, etc.) The hermit ibis looks like a vulture, and thus lives up to the hermit characteristic of wandering, feeding indiscriminately, and retaining a certain ugliness by worldly standards. (The hermit thrush wisely conceals its good looks to retain its hermit identity.) Like the early desert hermits, the hermit ibis lives in rocky arid places, and achieved a religious respectability with report that it guided Muslim pilgrims to Mecca during the Hajj. Indeed, a 16th-cetury Austrian bishop declared the hermit ibis a protected species, but the species died out in Europe (not unlike thriving eremitism) around the same time. Today, the hermit ibis continues to haunt arid places from Syria to Morocco, indifferent to the conflicts of human populations, their religions, and their disdain for hermits.Crime comics have grown few and far between over the decades since their genre dominance peaked during the days of publishers like EC and Warren, but the few that hold firm on the shelves—Stray Bullets, the work of Brubaker and Phillips, recent stand-out The |
and is yet to win a Test cap.
Hameed's finger is strapped up as he speaks with India captain Virat Kohli
Durham opener Keaton Jennings has emerged as the favourite to replace Haseeb Hameed
Billings is highly regarded by ECB batting coach Graham Thorpe, but his inclusion would mean Joe Root opening with Cook, as he did in the second innings in Mohali, making 78.
Instead, a straight swap of Jennings for Hameed for the final two games in Mumbai and Chennai will cause less disruption to the batting order, allowing Moeen Ali, Jonny Bairstow and Ben Stokes to move back down to Nos 4, 5 and 6.They sounded like rocks at first, three of them pelting the Honda Accord.
Jamie Williford whipped her head around and saw bullet holes in the rear windshield. She yelled speed up to the driver, a "good Samaritan" who moments earlier spotted the crying 16-year-old walking along Jefferson Highway.
The gunfire intensified. Williford tried to duck between the dashboard and the floorboard.
She felt a searing pain between her shoulder blades. Pressure crushed her chest. She put a hand on her back and brought it to her face.
It was covered in blood.
Story by
Jonathan Bullington
- and -
Richard A. Webster
NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune
Of the 20 or so bullets fired the morning of Feb. 18, 2009, one hit a tire, sending the car spinning. As it turned, Williford caught a glimpse of a little blue building and a group of people who came outside to investigate. She saw the horrified looks on their faces, and she thought how they would be the last faces she would see, and how she had hoped for something different out of her life, and how now, with each shortened breath, she just wanted to see her mother.
Williford slumped over. The shooting stopped.
The 36-year-old driver, blood dripping down his neck, managed to gain control of the car. He maneuvered the mile-long trip to Oschner Medical Center's emergency room and, though wounded, pleaded with someone to help the girl whose name he didn't have time to know.
Hospital staff asked her to get out of the car. She could barely speak, except to beg them not to put her on her back.
They lifted her out of the car and placed her face up on a stretcher.
Williford screamed. Her vision went black.
***
Williford was born in Colorado Springs, Colo., and briefly lived in Michigan before her family settled in Alexandria, La.
Her parents were truck drivers, she said, gone for long stretches of time, while she and her three older half-siblings were left to the care of others. Williford said serious problems between her and her parents ended with her, at 13, being placed by authorities in a West Bank foster care group home.
The group home provided no relief though, and tired of what she said were sexual advances from a staff member, Williford ran away.
She was 14, but she managed to convince a woman in a parking lot near the group home that she was older, that she had a fight with her boyfriend and he kicked her out of the car. The stranger drove her across the Mississippi River and dropped her at the foot of Canal Street.
A man in his 20s walked up to her. He took her to get a drink. When she told him she needed a place to sleep, he brought her to his home in the Iberville housing projects.
She left the next morning, and stayed on the run for about a year. With a fake ID, she got a job as a "shot girl" serving drinks at a Bourbon Street daiquiri shop. That lasted until police arrested her for a fight and called her caseworker after running her name.
"I told her, 'If you take me back there I'll be gone in the morning,'" Williford recalled telling the caseworker about her group home. "And she wouldn't listen to me. I told her it was not a happy place. It was not somewhere I wanted to be. And she didn't listen. She kept taking me back, and I kept running away."
Tired of life as a runaway, Williford turned herself in to police about six months before being shot. She said she wanted to join the Marines and "try to get my life together."
"I needed discipline in my life," she said.
A week or so before she was scheduled to leave for a military boot camp, her parents came to visit her in another group home, in Monroe.
"They left me some money to buy some clothes," she said, her eyes welling with tears. "After they left, it just kind of tore a piece out of me, because I was like, they're leaving me again. And it hurt."
Williford took the money for clothes and made her escape. She caught a bus to New Orleans. Back on Canal Street, she stopped in a clothing shop. An employee walked up to her and asked for her number. She said she would take down his instead.
His name was Steven Givens.
***
Nurses and doctors at Oschner Medical Center stood at the foot of her bed when Williford woke up, naked and cold, with no memory of how long she had been out. They asked if she could feel their pin pricks on the bottoms of her feet.
"Can I feel what?" she angrily responded. "You're not doing anything!"
The doctors and nurses exchanged somber looks and walked out of the room. One nurse came back.
"I'm not going to walk anymore, huh?" Williford asked, already knowing the answer.
***
On Feb. 18, 2009, 16-year-old Jamie Williford was shot and paralyzed in Jefferson along with a good Samaritan who stopped to help her. Today, the wheelchair-bound 23-year-old lives with friends in Violet and continues to struggle with the aftermath of her shooting. Photographed Friday, June 24, 2016. (Photo by Michael DeMocker, NOLA.com| The Times-Picayune)
Williford had known Givens, 21, for only a few days when she was together with him and two other men in a car that February 18 morning. She remembered regretting the decision to join them the minute she saw one of the men hand Givens several bullet shells to throw out the window.
They told her they had shot a guy on Banks Street before picking her up, Williford said. Their reason? The man came to give her a ride earlier that same day.
She was scared. She wanted to cry. But Williford knew the danger she was in.
She told them she needed to get back to Metairie, where she had been taking care of an older man who had suffered a stroke. When they said they weren't going that way, she told them she would walk.
They pulled over on Jefferson Highway and let her out.
A man she never met honked, made a U-turn and asked if she needed a lift. Williford got in the Honda Accord and broke down. She told the stranger how she had been in the car with three men who shot a friend of hers, and how she was terrified of them, and how she thought they were coming after her.
She wanted to get out, but the driver said he would help. Then, she spotted the other car parked on a side street, and Givens standing outside. She pointed them out to the good Samaritan.
He told her not to worry.
***
In her dreams, Jamie Williford could walk. And the dreams were so real that when she woke, she was certain she could stand up out of her hospital bed.
"I would just get mad and cry," said Williford, now 23. "I was just frustrated. I was mad at the world. I was in my hospital room. I didn't want anybody to talk to me. I didn't want to eat. I didn't want anybody coming in there. I didn't want any light.
"I didn't want anything. I just wanted to be left alone."
Paralyzed from the neck down, she got used to the routine: Hospital staff came in every morning and lifted her from her bed and strapped her into a high-backed chair, where she would fight to turn her wrist, or wiggle her fingers.
Williford lost perception of time. But she guessed it was maybe two or three months before movement started to return to her hands and arms. One day, while sitting in her chair, she picked up her arm and proudly showed the nurses what she could do.
She was ready for rehabilitation.
But before she spent months learning how to dress herself, how to change her catheter bag, or how to transfer in and out of her wheelchair, she received a phone call from her mother. Authorities had arrested Steven Givens, Randy Lewis and Brandon Tate - the three men who eventually pleaded guilty to wounding Williford and the good Samaritan.
***
On Feb. 18, 2009, 16-year-old Jamie Williford was shot and paralyzed in Jefferson along with a good Samaritan who stopped to help her. Today, the wheelchair-bound 23-year-old lives with friends in Violet and continues to struggle with the aftermath of her shooting. Photographed Friday, June 24, 2016. (Photo by Michael DeMocker, NOLA.com| The Times-Picayune)
The bullet that paralyzed Williford missed her heart by a third of an inch, and in the seven years since, there have been many days when she wished it hadn't.
"Because it's difficult," she said. "It's rough. And I know some people have it harder than me, but it's a rough life. And then especially to have your whole world change literally in a second, at 16, it's hard."
She lives now with her ex-boyfriend's brother and his family in Violet, in St. Bernard Parish. The arrangement is a welcome respite from past situations when supposed friends saw her - and her monthly disability checks - as an easy payday.
"Everybody knows I'm down here alone," she said. "They know my situation. They know there's nothing I can really do. They know that there's nobody coming behind me."
Williford said she takes sleeping medicine, but it does little. Trying to cook on high kitchen counters is exhausting for her arms. She hates putting on shoes.
Her legs convulse regularly, at least 10 times during an hour-long interview. The first time it ever happened, she got excited and thought it meant her legs were "coming back." Now she knows they're just involuntary muscle spasms - painful ones.
She tries not to let the negativity consume her. She thinks about what it would be like to be a motivational speaker, sharing her story to help others.
In the records of gun violence Williford is counted among the fortunate ones - the survivors. But then there are days, recent ones, where she said she sees little point in living.
"I feel like when people look at me they don't see me," she said. "They don't see a pretty girl. They see a wheelchair. They see a responsibility. And it hurts. But whenever I get into it with someone, that's the first thing they bring up - me being in a wheelchair.
"It's always something about the chair. And I just got to the point that I'm numb to everything. I don't care anymore."Top 10 Greatest Completed Poker Challenges
Over the years, a lot of players have set off to accomplish various poker challenges. Many of them failed all together, some succeeded. However, some of those who succeeded will always stand out and be remembered in the poker world due to the difficulty of the challenges they set for themselves. With that in mind, here are the Top 10 Greatest Completed Poker Challenges.
10. The Jesus Challenge: $0 to $10,000
Before Black Friday left his reputation in shatters along with the rest of the original Full Tilt crew, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson was still thought of as a great poker player and in 2006, he proved it with a challenge that inspired a lot of poker players.
The goal was to reach a $10,000 bankroll starting from $0, which meant that Ferguson would have to grind freerolls at first. Investing 10 hours of play a week, Ferguson completed the challenge in 18 months. The hardest part, of course, was building at least some kind of a bankroll to be able to get away from freerolls and it took him nearly 9 months to make just $100.
9. Bok87: $100 to $10,000 in 15 Days
Thomas Boekhoff, better known as “Boku87” online, was one of the first grinders to make a name for himself thanks to his unbelievable challenges. His first major challenge sounded so preposterous that he managed to collect nearly $35,000 in wagers against him successfully completing it.
The challenge was to turn a $100 bankroll into $10,000 in just 15 days playing only sit & go’s with a maximum buy–in of $16. People who put up money against Boku87 started feeling nervous just days after the challenge began when Boku87 steamrolled his way through the games, quickly reaching a bankroll that allowed him to play $16 sit & go’s. Eventually, the challenge was completed in just 14 days.
8. Boku87: $5 into $100,000 in a Year
After completing his 15-day challenge, Boku87 had something even more impressive in store. In June of 2009, Boku87 set another challenge for himself, though this time people were less eager to wager against him, even though the challenge seemed far more difficult than the last one.
Boku87 was going to turn $5 into $100,000 in one year. To be fair, he did have to try it more than once, since his first attempt failed after he busted his initial $5 bankroll. However, his second try was successful and by March of 2010, after playing more than 45,000 sit & go’s, Boku87 had just over $100,000 in his account.
7. Allan Sheik: 75,000 Sit & Go’s in 30 days
Some professional online sit & go players may reach this amount of volume in a year, but in 2010, Brazilian pro, Allan Mello, challenged himself to play 75,000 hyper–turbo sit & go’s in one month while making a profit.
This would be a monumental challenge for anyone and most people believed that he would not be able to pull it off, especially considering that he had no previous record as a well–known volume grinder. To everyone’s surprise, Allan completed the challenge in exactly 30 days, sleeping only six hours per day and averaging 200 sit & go’s per hour. He also ended up with a profit of $3,894, which is even more impressive for such a serious endurance challenge.
6. Nanonoko: 23,493 hands in 8 hours
Soon after Joey Ingram set his record of 50,000 hands in one day, a new challenger emerged who set his sights on an even more spectacular performance. A member of Team PokerStars, Randy Lew, known as “Nanonoko,” has been one of the most feared online players and during the PCA, he decided to set a new record by playing as many hands as possible during eight hours while making a profit.
While the record was eventually set at 24,493 after eight hours, the profit shown was just $7.65. In fact, at one point, Randy was down $1,200 and it looked like the record was pretty far out of his reach. At that point he started playing NL1000 tables, which allowed him to recoup his losses and squeeze by with the tiny profit.
5. Joey Ingram: 50,000 Hands in One Day
In 2009, Joey Ingram, known as “Joeingram1” online, set his sights on a world record that would take some serious endurance to achieve. Joey had to play 50,000 hands at NL25 games and, as if that wasn’t enough, he also had to show a profit for the record to count.
The record was set in just 20 hours and 2 minutes, with 50,470 hands played and a profit of over $800. A nice addition to his winnings was another $30,000 in bets which Joey collected from people who did not believe that this could be done.
4. Chiren80: 1 Million Hands in One Month
In December of 2010, Belgian pro, Bachir Boumaaza, known as “Chiren80,” decided to challenge himself to one of the greatest endurance records the poker world has ever seen – playing at least 1M hands in one month. It is hardly imaginable that anyone would be able to pull off something like this at any decent stakes, so it came as no surprise that Chiren80 would be taking on the NL2 tables for this challenge.
Chiren80 completed the challenge in 31 days, playing an average of 18 hours per day. In the end, he showed a profit of $2,200, which is pretty amazing even for those kinds of stakes considering the constant pressure that was on him.
3. Alex Wice: Supernova in Less than 40 Hours
In the beginning of 2013, a monumental race was taking place between some of the best online players to see who could reach the coveted Supernova Elite status the fastest. The first milestone in that path – reaching Supernova, which put the players a tenth of the way to Supernova Elite. A nice addition to the challenge was provided by PokerStars in the form of a 100,000 FPP shopping spree and a commemoration in the 2013 PokerStars Collectible Card Deck for the winner.
Eventually, it was Alex “AWice” Wice who turned out to be the most relentless of them all, 50-tabling high stakes sit & go’s from the first minutes of the New Year and reaching Supernova status in just 39 hours and 25 minutes. Despite this amazing performance, however, he would not go on to become the first Supernova Elite of the year.
2. Ryan Bell: Supernova Elite in 54 days
While Alex Wice took an early lead in the 2013 race to Supernova Elite status, it was Ryan Bell, known online as “MouldyOnions,” who got there first. Just like Alex, Ryan played high stakes sit & go’s to achieve his goal and was crowned the most coveted VIP status in online poker in just 54 days.
For his amazing run, PokerStars provided Ryan with a Double Points day, which allowed him to pick a 24-hour period during which he would get double his usual amount of VPP and FPP points. This meant that for those 24-hours, he would not be paying any rake for playing, instead PokerStars would be paying him for every game he played.
1. Tomas Kubaliak: Supernova Elite from $150 in Eight Months
While making Supernova Elite in just 54 days is an impressive feat, it can be even more impressive if you start out with just $150. Granted, Tomas “masuronike” Kubaliak did not do it in anywhere close to 54 days, it took him about eight months. However, the enormous skill and endurance that a player must have to successfully complete such a challenge are simply incredible.
Tomas played an average of eight hours per day and made ~$40,000 profit during the course of the challenge. He started out at $3.50 sit & go’s and made his way to the $200+ games as his bankroll grew. From there on it was just a matter of endurance and time.Marysville man hits red-light camera, drives off with it
Authorities arrested 19-year-old Manuel Montano Herrera, of Marysville, Saturday in connection with a hit-and-run traffic collision and grand theft.A blue Toyota truck hit a Redflex Camera pole just after 6:30 a.m. at Third and F streets in Marysville.The crash caused the camera and pole to fall into the truck’s bed.Witnesses said they saw the truck in the Edgewater area, where the driver was trying to remove the camera from the rear of the vehicle.Authorities said Herrera was booked into the Yuba County Jail.
Authorities arrested 19-year-old Manuel Montano Herrera, of Marysville, Saturday in connection with a hit-and-run traffic collision and grand theft.
A blue Toyota truck hit a Redflex Camera pole just after 6:30 a.m. at Third and F streets in Marysville.
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The crash caused the camera and pole to fall into the truck’s bed.
Witnesses said they saw the truck in the Edgewater area, where the driver was trying to remove the camera from the rear of the vehicle.
Authorities said Herrera was booked into the Yuba County Jail.
AlertMeAS the dark cloud of Essendon’s supplements saga looms its largest, a supporter group known as the Purple Bombers is providing the club’s shining ray of light throughout a tumultuous period at Windy Hill.
Striving for equality by eradicating homophobia within the AFL community, the Purple Bombers are the first official LGBTI supporter group in Australian sport and are aiming to provide a safer environment for all fans to be a part of.
TIM WATSON CONFIDENT ON BOMBERS FATE
“Everyone deserves the opportunity to be treated equally,” Essendon midfielder Brendon Goddard, the Purple Bombers’ official ambassador, told Fox Footy at its launch on Monday night.
Despite a candid Goddard admitting to ignorance regarding the issue of homophobia and its ugly prevalence throughout the game in his early years, he said he did not hesitate when approached about an active involvement within the group by Purple Bombers president Jason Tuazon-McCheyne.
“As a young kid, I was very naive and very blinded, I was very judgmental,” Goddard said. “But, as I’ve grown up and matured, I’ve realised everyone should be treated equally, regardless of race, religion, belief or sexuality.”
Although Tuazon-McCheyne thanks Goddard for the difference he’s made since joining, the reaction to his announcement as an ambassador proved just how far groups like the Purple Bombers still have to go in gaining acceptance throughout the AFL community.
Goddard received abuse on social media in the days following the announcement, as the issue of homophobia within the sport reared its ugly head once again.
“In terms of the way I’m portrayed, at the club or to the public, there’s things I can’t control and that I don’t care about,” Goddard said.
“I just hope that one day, we can all be treated equally and that people aren’t looked at in a different way to anyone else.”
Tuazon-McCheyne, a 31-year Essendon member, has first-hand experience of the suffering LGBTI supporters can be put through while simply trying to watch their team play.
They’re experiences no AFL fan, nor anyone in the wider community, should have to deal with.
“My whole life I’ve had to listen to homophobic abuse in the crowd and felt, even recently, really unwelcome,” he told Fox Footy.
“I just want to be myself and talk to my husband and my son and not have to pretend to be something that I’m not.”
With the help and support of Essendon, Tuazon-McCheyne founded the idea of the Purple Bombers last year. More than 12 months in the making, they are now the club’s newest coterie group and are in advanced negotiations for Essendon to play the AFL’s first pride match, against St Kilda, as soon as 2016.
It’s progress that has given Essendon CEO Xavier Campbell reason to smile throughout an otherwise testing period for the club.
“Equality is really important to us as a football club, but it’s becoming more important to us as a society as well,” Campbell told Fox Footy. “For us to be involved in creating a change in how society perceives these sorts of issues is really important.
LISTEN TO THE FIRST EPISODE OF THE SUPERCOACHES BOX PODCAST BELOW:
“We have such a strong brand and such a strong ability to influence a large group of people; it’s a great honour we’re in that position and we’re going to make the most of it.”
But supporting the Purple Bombers is only part of the club’s involvement with the group. Rather, Campbell would rather see ideas and initiatives driven from grassroots fans.
“We need to listen,” he said. “We need to understand from supporters within this group the issues that they face, then we need to create ways to make it easier for them to come to the football and to enjoy the experience.”
While everyone at the Purple Bombers realises the steps taken so far are only small ones to totally eradicating homophobia, Essendon has given reason for Dons fans and the general public, disgruntled or not by the club’s last three years, to feel optimistic about the club and the game’s future.
“I’m so proud,” Tuazon-McCheyne said.
“I love my club more than I’ve ever loved them. I never thought I’d ever be able to have those two worlds coexist like everyone else has.”The ultimate goal of the scientific method is to falsify the closest approximations to reality. There are no absolute truths in science because all theories are liable to perpetual refinement and revision.
In science, plausibility is established not by proving things true but in fact, but by demonstrating that they have not yet been shown to be false. Tentative statements of empirical reality, or hypotheses, are constructed from observations of natural phenomena. The observations are derived from experiential information obtained by the senses. The hypothesis is then tested using carefully-controlled experiments and tests that aim to falsify it. If it continues to survive a battery of falsification tests for a prolonged period of time, then it becomes a theory, which is a conceptual framework that relates facts together into an explanatory structure. Theories can never be proven true but they can only be shown to be false. Acceptable theories are ones that are temporarily not wrong.
Thus, the way that the scientific method claims epistemic authority on anything is by recognizing its own fallibility. A hypothesis must be falsifiable, otherwise it is not an acceptable hypothesis. Repeated failure to falsify a hypothesis does not confirm its absolute truth, whereas just one falsification alone can be enough grounds for rejecting it. Therefore, we cannot be certain about what is true, but we can, however, be certain about what is wrong. There is a possibility of disconfirmation which must always be acknowledged.
Theories can replace preexisting theories if they have more explanatory power. Einstein’s theory of gravity replaced Newton’s theory not because Newton was wrong but because his model was incomplete in accounting for some of the anomalies observed in planetary motion (the problem of Mercury’s perihelion). Einstein’s theory accounted not just for things that the Newtonian model explained but also for the new observations that were found to be incompatible with Newton’s theory. As previously discussed, what theories fundamentally are is that they are conceptual superstructures that describe facts. When there is a better way to relate those facts together, a new theory emerges.
Creationists always like to point to evolution as “only a theory” as if that’s a bad thing. But, in science, a theory is a good thing. In fact, catapulting a hypothesis into the status of a theory means acknowledging its good epistemic value and its high empirical content. In addition to that, creationists never present a side or attempt to support it with evidence. Their only evidence is to attack evolution, which somehow lends credibility to their beliefs that, to begin with, are not really grounded in any testable hypothesis. Creationism is a belief that has no explanatory power and which cannot and does not generate predictions that can be tested against experiment. You cannot deduce any facts from it. And, most importantly, it is a firmly held conviction that leaves no room for falsification. To be a creationist means to have already decided what is true and to be blinded by your preconceived prejudice that anything contradicting your beliefs must be inherently false. If you set up an experiment, you would impose a prejudiced idea of what the results should be like and you would twist the scientific evidence to fit your bias.
But, science never runs on assertions. Science is a discipline that recognises and celebrates uncertainty. This is crucial because it provides opportunities for ongoing refinement and for new ideas to be hatched up. To cling to a belief and will it into existence means to miss out on any new insights and ideas that have been clouded out by your preconceptions. Facts about the natural world should be presented simply as the evidence of reality presents them to our logical faculties. They should not be presented as our assumptions want them to be. Our logic should therefore always derive from and be continually morphed by the evidence of reality because nature is so much more imaginative. To hold a firm conviction prevents that.
“It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.” – Sherlock Holmes
Featured image credit: Hidden London
AdvertisementsThe EU commission wants to finance foreign armies as part of a larger effort to stop people from fleeing to Europe, including in countries with patchy human rights.
A commission draft proposal released on Tuesday (5 July) spells out reasons why it is "necessary to provide assistance to the militaries of partner countries".
Some €100 million that were initially slated for development aid will be diverted to finance military-led border control exploits and other initiatives like mine-clearing.
The EU money can also be used to finance anything from troop transport vehicles to uniforms and surveillance equipment. Even furniture, stationary and "sport facilities" are covered.
The EU has already contracted out some €1 billion from 2001 to 2009 when it came to things like law enforcement and border management.
But this is the first time it will pump money directly into a foreign military structure.
"The direct financing of the military is not possible [at the moment]. Due to exceptional circumstances in some partner countries, it was important to close this gap," notes the document, a joint communication to the European Parliament and EU Council.
The document attempts to quell some concerns over how the money will be used.
It notes, for instance, that it won't fund "recurrent military expenditure", weapons and ammunition, and combat training.
But such limitations are unlikely to be taken seriously by critics.
"This proposal is nothing short of scandalous," said German Green deputy Reinhard Butikofer.
He said the fund is based on the development cooperation article of the EU treaty and should therefore not be used for security and military purposes.
Sudan
Sudan's military may stand to benefit. The ministry of interior has asked the EU to help fund border infrastructure at 17 crossing points.
The Sudanese government militia, the Rapid Support Force (RSF), are tasked to prevent the border crossings.
RSF, which is a part of Sudan's national and intelligence security services, includes men who fought in Darfur with the Janjaweed, a militia of Sudanese Arab tribes that is now part of the RSF.
On Monday they arrested over 300 migrants heading to Libya across the remote desert of Sudan's Northern State.
RSF commander, general Mohamed Hamdan Hametti, who is a former Janjaweed militia leader, said they have deployed troops along the Libyan border.
Around 1,000 RSF troops have been sent to Al Dabbah in the north to help with the efforts.
An activist in Khartoum, who did not want to be identified, told EUobserver the RSF are well known for their human rights violations.
The contact said the EU development aid will not help to control migration.
"All it will do is make it harder for people inside Sudan to live and more difficult for them to leave the country," said the source.
People inside Sudan who oppose president Omar al-Bashir say the money empowers the regime and delays any change.
"It's not adding to the development in anyway, it's not going to change the economic situation because there is a high rate of corruption in the country," said the contact in Khartoum.
Sudan development aid
The EU development commissioner Neven Mimica, for his part, announced a separate €100 million aid package for the country in April following his visit to Khartoum.
"Development and security go hand in hand," said Mimica on Tuesday following the broader announcement to finance armies.
Sudan is led by a president accused of war crimes by the International Criminal Court. It also a major transit zone for people who want to take a boat from Libya to reach Europe.
Sudan's RSF border crack down started shortly after the EU had announced its big development package.
In May, its air force dropped barrel bombs on Heiban, a village in the south. Among the victims were six children from the same family.Unpublished study warns of the global health consequences of delaying by five years a cap on the sulphur content of shipping fuels
A push by the shipping and oil industries for a five-year delay to curbs on toxic sulphur emissions would cause an extra 200,000 premature deaths from lung cancer and heart disease, according to an unpublished International Maritime Organisation (IMO) study.
Fatalities from illnesses such as asthma were not covered by the leaked paper, which was based on shipping satellite data and modelling work.
The shipping industry is by far the world’s biggest emitter of sulphur with SOx levels in heavy fuel oils up to 3,500 times higher than those in current European diesel standards for vehicles. A single large cruise ship can reportedly burn as much fuel as whole towns, and emit more sulphur than 7m cars.
At the end of October, an IMO meeting in London will decide whether to cap the sulphur content of shipping fuels by 2020 or 2025. Current levels can reach 3.5% but the cap would limit them to 0.5%.
The 2020 deadline faces fierce resistance from the oil and gas industry association, IPIECA, and Bimco, a global shipping group, which argue that there is not enough low-sulphur fuel available to meet the global demand that the measure would spur.
The EU has thrown its weight behind 2020, unilaterally imposing the new IMO standard from then. With China enforcing similar emissions control zones, the new benchmark for 2020 is thought likely to pass, although the US and large flag states’ positions remain wildcards.
James Corbett, one of the report’s lead authors, told the Guardian that any slippage on the 2020 start date risked grave consequences.
“An IMO policy implemented on time in 2020 could reduce the health burden on coastal communities, particularly in Asia, Africa and Latin America,” he said. “The inverse is also true. A delay would ensure that health impacts from sulphur emissions persisted in coastal communities that are exposed, where shipping lanes are most intense and communities most densely populated.”
Egypt, Panama, Japan, India, Singapore, the Philippines and China would be among the countries hardest hit, Corbett added.
Sveinung Oftedal, Norway’s lead negotiator at the IMO, said that domestic health concerns had now overtaken fears about the acidifying effects that sulphur has on Scandinavia’s lakes and rivers.
“Air pollution from shipping is not just a local or regional, but a global, problem,” he said. “The question is whether we can really continue to accept its effects, and the answer is: no, we cannot. The 2020 deadline is needed and it is achievable.”
But resentment in the beleaguered shipping trade is unmistakeable, and a sign of future fights to come in the IMO over shipping’s CO2 emissions, which roughly equal those from aviation.
“Most shipping companies are not turkeys voting for Christmas,” an industry source said. “They’re under the impression that a decision to delay to 2025 would be of collective economic benefit. In the real world, shipowners are bleeding money. There is total depression in the industry.”
Thousands of container ships belonging to Hanjin, south Korea’s biggest shipping firm, were left adrift on the world’s oceans carrying a £14bn cargo, after the firm filed for bancruptcy last month.
The International Chambers of Shipping (ICS) says that imposing the new benchmark in 2020 would cost industry an additional $50-100bn a year, owing to the cost of low-sulphur fuels.
Ships today mostly run on cheap blends of the residues and remainders left over from the refining and distillation of crude oil for aircraft jet fuel and automobile diesel.
Bimco argues that a premature move to low-sulphur fuels could have knock-on inflationary effects for other fuels, as increased diesel demand overwhelms supply.
Lars Robert Pedersen, Bimco’s deputy secretary-general, told the Guardian: “Quite frankly, if the IMO decides to ignore these very concrete facts, ships will start to use other fuel streams and there will then obviously be a shortage in those streams and a potential disruption in the flow of energy to supply world markets.”
Corbett estimates the total cost of the measure at $30bn, compared to a value of seaborne trade approaching $5tn in the South China Sea alone. Supporters of an early sulphur cap say that its effect on commodity prices such as shoes or bananas would be little more than a few cents.
Crucially, a second IMO report seen by the Guardian finds that enough refineries will be available in 2020 to guarantee the future availability of a low-sulphur fuel supply for all the world’s ships.
“In all scenarios, the refinery sector has the capability to supply sufficient quantities of marine fuels with a sulphur content of 0.5% m/m or less... to meet demand for these products, while also meeting demand for non-marine fuels,” it says.
A capacity shortage in 2020 would be the only grounds for IMO delegates to delay the proposal, under its terms of reference, which some fear could then be extended indefinitely.
In a reflection of differing opinions in the sea freight trade, the ICS is neutral on the timeline for phasing out sulphur, while calling for a speedy resolution of the issue.
The oil industry too is ambivalent. One analyst with close knowledge of the issue said: “Major oil companies such as Shell and BP don’t have a problem with a move to cleaner fuel in the shipping sector because they have advanced refineries which could sell higher value fuels and increase their revenues and potentially, their profits.”
Later this month, a global CO2 data collection system for ships will be launched. Neither shipping nor aviation firms are covered by the Paris climate agreement, although the ICS has called for the UN’s climate pledging system to be extended to the industry.No Way!
Jeromme exclaimed in utter disbelief.
How come the ship's computer receives a signal in this remote part of the galaxy and yet the computer is unable to decipher it!
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A policeman called Nick Vinson, who allegedly admitted killing his stepfather and said he had driven away from their home in his mother’s Ford Explorer. He told police he was looking for his friends so he could say goodbye and tell them he would be away for a long time, the affidavit says.
He told the officer he would drive home, but police stopped him before he got to the house. The teen was covered with blood and had a large cut on top of his left hand. When Vinson opened the driver’s side door, blood dripped on the ground, investigators said.
A crime scene investigation indicated Owensby had been stabbed near Vinson’s bedroom in the basement of the tri-level home. A trail of bloody footprints led up to the main floor and out to the garage.
Vinson allegedly used a 7-inch blade with a brass-knuckle-style handle to stab Owensby between seven and nine times in the neck, back, side and left shoulder, the affidavit says. His aorta was perforated by a stab wound to his back and police said they found arterial blood splattering the walls of the basement.
Owensby was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Investigators found Vinson’s Snapchat video after the mom of a girl who saw it called police.
Vinson told police he had been arguing with his stepfather in a series of text messages. Owensby wanted him to do chores around the house and chip in money for the household, the affidavit says.
While texting, the two agreed to a fist fight.
An argument started when Owensby returned to the house. He then left the home again to pick up his wife. When they got back to the house, Celena Vinson went downstairs and told her son the three of them needed to talk. Nick Vinson refused to go upstairs.
Vinson told police Owensby stood at the top of the stairs and challenged him to come upstairs and fight. Owensby then went down into the basement and was about to hit Vinson with his fist, when the teen stabbed him near the neck, the affidavit says.
Vinson said he kept stabbing Owensby “to end it” because he didn’t want him to suffer, the affidavit says.Oregon head coach Mark Helfrich has been vocal about his intent to remain open to any late signings. Due to NCAA requirements, he isn't allowed to acknowledge any recruits who have not signed specifically.
Mafileo details what the next step is following the news from the NCAA.
However, most are aware that is directed, at least in part, to Honolulu (Hawaii) Moanalua defensive tackle Ratu Mafileo. Oregon has been recruiting the 6-foot-3, 315-pounder prior to national signing day.
While he has remained patient hoping to gain clearance from the NCAA, that wait might finally be near an end.
DuckTerritory caught up with Mafileo on Sunday afternoon to shed some new light on his clearance issues, which led to some potential big news for the Ducks.
"I just spoke to the NCAA yesterday (Saturday) and they told me they were able to clear me," Mafileo said. "
What does this mean for Mafileo and Oregon?
Come inside to get the full details on this breaking news and what sort of impact this could have for the Ducks.
VIP subscribers, click the link belo:
Mafileo Details His Plan
Helfrich Leaves Door OpenSo, because of my Beuateuqe experience (long story short, they wouldn’t return my emails and falsely advertised a product) the CEO was nice enough to apologize profusely to me, as well as give me two pretty awesome deals. A 25$ credit, and a free Beauty Bag (22$ normally, and a supposed 65$ value)
With my 25 dollar credit, I decided to get the products in the first picture below.
-Etude House Skin mal:gem fresh
-I’m Real Broccoli Masks
The only thing I needed a new thing of was toner, and I also needed to up my price to 25$, so I just got the masks. Of courseeee, after I placed this order, I got the lovely toner in my Thanksgiving Memebox..So I’m thinking I’ll just use one AM (probably Etude House), one PM? Does anybody ever double tone? Like use one toner right after another? I’m being 100% serious here…Or I could just hoard one until the others gone. Guess we’ll see.
Next up is my complimentary Beauty Bag.The ‘theme’ of this was ‘Diva Diner’ as you can see on the card next to the yellow makeup bag which everything came in. I applaud them for their weird, yet kind of smart marketing technique. On the back of the card is ‘Welcome to diva diner, where we’re always open and serving up six delectable, diva worthy beauty specials’. Corny, but I kinda dig it.
Anyways, My favorite color is actually yellow, so bonus points for that. I have a crap ton of makeup bags that store miscellaneous things that aren’t makeup, so this will add to the collection. I’ll be putting my AB samples in this one.
The bag does have 65$ worth of products in it, however, that’s 65$ of inflated American prices.
Here’s a picture of everything I got, and some first impressions. I’ve put the prices that the card gave me beside the products, so keep in mind that, like I said these are the inflated prices. Definitely no RoseRoseShop prices here!
*Mizon White Sleeping Mask (50ml, 12$)
I’m super excited about this because I’ve heard great things. I technically already have a sleeping pack (3W Clinic Snail Mucus Soothing Gel..but its freaking gigantic and will take me forever to use) but using this for awhile will be great. And I know where to get it for half the price if I really like it as much as everyone says.
*It’s Skin Green Tea Lips & Eye Cleansing Pad (13.50$)
These seem pretty cool. I’m in a lazy phase of makeup wearing, so I’m not sure when I’d use these. The scent is also super overpowering. It does not smell nice and gentle like my innisfree green tea essence. I may give this to a friend for Christmas.
*Mizon Collagen Power Firming Eye Cream (16.50$)–gasping at this price as opposed to RRS
Also pretty excited about this. I’m using the last of my current eye cream (a little sample of tarte maracuja c-brightener) and haven’t really researched Asian brands. So if I like it, I know where to get a wicked cheaper version when it runs out.
*Cosmos Facial Blotting Tissue (6$)
Can’t really go wrong with blotting papers. Also..how cute is the little sticky that gets the blotting paper ready for you!?!?! I had no idea blotting papers could get so lazy, but I won fight this little innovation.
*The Face Shop Blackhead Out Aloe Nose Strip (5.25$)
So, it’s still pretty bad to actually use these, right? Or does because it’s the Face Shop make them OK? I have to admit, one of my first loves was Biore pore strips. I’m just recently learning that they’re not that great for you 😦 I may have to try at leastttt one. Old habits die hard, am I right? And then maybe I can give the others to my friends if the overwhelming response is to not keep using them.
*Beauteque Scarf (12$)
No idea where they got this scarf, they could have paid one dollar for it for all I know. There were two options, a floral print, and a blue and white print. On the website they’re not terribly clear http://www.beauteque.com/november-beauteque-beauty-bag-us-edition/ (for reference)
Already having a few floral scarves, I chose the interesting looking blue and white pattern. What a surprise to me, to open up the scarf and see a fucking gathering of long legged deer. Seriously, what is going on in that close up? Is there a person? Does the inner circle of deer have 5 legs?
I don’t know what the hell is going on is the scarf. In all fairness though it is very soft, and I’m a picky bitch when it comes to textures of scarves. And, when you actually put the scarf on, you can’t tell its hundred of deformed deer. I kind of have a love/hate relationship with the absurdity of the scarf. If anything, if I don’t use it I’ll put it up on my wall for a great conversation piece.
In conclusion, ALL of this stuff cost me 5.85$ (the cost of shipping) let me just repeat that.. 5.85$ for 11 full sized items (including the individual sheet masks and makeup bag)
So regardless of the overpowering cleansing pads and weird scarf, I pretty much won with this shipment, and have a lot of great items to use.
AdvertisementsMinister accuses news organisations of ‘trivialising’ grave issues ‘by trying to promote the 2,100 reports as somehow all being serious when they’re not’
Australia’s immigration minister has launched a wide-ranging attack on the Guardian and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, saying he wasn’t going to “be defamed” by their reporting of allegations of child abuse and sexual assault at the Nauru detention centre.
Revealed: Peter Dutton's extensive briefings about risks and harm to children on Nauru Read more
Speaking on the ABC’s AM radio program on Thursday, Peter Dutton criticised reporting about Australian’s detention centre on the Pacific island. He attacked news organisations, refugee advocates and Save the Children Australia, accusing the child rights agency of leaking the more 2,000 incident reports published last week by the Guardian as the Nauru files.
Save the Children issued a robust denial of Dutton’s allegations, saying “claims that we leaked the documents are false”.
The files – the largest cache of leaked documents released from inside Australia’s immigration regime – revealed the devastating trauma and abuse inflicted on children held in Nauru.
The government has faced heavy domestic and international criticism about the files and Labor has launched a push for a Senate inquiry.
Dutton initially played down the files’ significance but the Guardian revealed on Thursday he had received extensive briefings from Save the Children about the ongoing risks of harm to children.
In response to questions on AM about the briefings, Dutton said: “We received correspondence from Save the Children – we do on a regular basis. They’ve leaked the documents, the 2,100 documents that the Guardian’s reporting that the ABC now reports on, and we will look at each of those cases.”
Save the Children's letters to Dutton and Turnbull about harm to children in Nauru – full text Read more
Dutton, a former police officer, said: “I’ve spent much of my professional career investigating sexual assaults and assaults against people and arresting people for that. I take these issues very seriously.
“The trouble, frankly, with the approach of the Guardian and the ABC has been to trivialise the very serious issues by trying to promote the 2,100 reports as somehow all of those being serious when they’re not.
“Many of those reports relate to corporal punishment by children by their own parents. They report about some minor assaults by detainees on detainees, refugees on refugees.
“We are going through all of that information. It doesn’t help that the files leaked by Save the Children, they’ve only put out a redacted version. We’ve asked them for all of the details.”
He later said: “I’m not going to be defamed by the Guardian and by the ABC because we are doing everything within our power to provide support to people.”
'People have self-immolated to get to Australia' – immigration minister's response to Nauru files Read more
Mat Tinkler, director of policy and public affairs at Save the Children, said: “We have respected the terms of our contract with the Australian government, the provisions of the Australian Border Force Act, and the confidentiality of our client that prevents us from speaking publicly about the specific incidents that our staff witnessed in the Nauru detention centre. Minister Dutton’s claims on AM this morning that we leaked the documents are false.”
“Further claims that the government only has access to the redacted versions published on the Guardian website are clearly wrong – the government is in possession of the original copies of all of the incident reports leaked last week.
“The Australian government receives copies of all incident reports authored by service providers on Nauru as part of their contractual obligations. In addition, representatives of the Department of Immigration and Border Protection were actively involved in coordinating, managing and responding to all critical incidents that occurred in the Nauru regional processing centre.”
He continued: “Save the Children also maintained a sophisticated case management tool that included copies of all Save the Children incident reports and the Australian government was provided with a full copy of this data at the conclusion of our contract in October 2015.”
The Australian Council for International Development has defended Save the Children, with its chief executive, Marc Purcell, labelling Dutton’s comments an attempt to “shoot the messenger”.
At a press conference in Canberra on Thursday Purcell said Dutton’s “false allegations against a very reputable child protection agency on cases of harm to children on Nauru... [are] backed up with no evidence”.
He said this was the second time the Coalition government had attack Save the Children, after its Moss review cleared the agency after similar allegations of leaking by Dutton’s predecessor, Scott Morrison.
“There are some very damaged children and young people on Nauru … first they deny allegations, then try to confuse and deflect responsibility, blame the victims and then attack those that seek to expose the truth and protect victims.”
At the Senate inquiry into Nauru in 2015, the dentention centre contractor Wilson Security said that incident reports filed would eventually be provided to Australia’s immigration department.
The Guardian has highlighted the allegations of family violence in the Nauru files and broken down the incident reports by seriousness and category.
On Wednesday a group of legal academics and migration experts, including Frank Brennan, argued that the policy of turnbacks makes punitive detention unnecessary to deter dangerous boat journeys. More than 100 former detention staff have also spoken out about the detention system.
The day after the PNG and Australian governments jointly confirmed the Manus Island detention centre would close, Dutton reaffirmed the government’s position that none of the 854 men held there would ever be resettled in Australia.
But he conceded that “quite a low number... less than 20” men had been resettled in PNG.
Several of the men who had been moved into the PNG community in Lae had made their own way back to the Manus detention centre. In some cases they tried to break back into detention, after being robbed, assaulted, and in at least one case, left homeless in PNG.
For three years, the government has sought “third countries” which might accept refugees from Australia’s offshore detention centres. Only one man, moved from Nauru, has been resettled in Cambodia, but Dutton told ABC’s AM program there were not third-country options available to the men on Manus.
“There is no third-country option available for people out of Manus at this point in time. That’s the reality that we deal with.
“We have a look at these people to help them return back to their country of origin or they settle in PNG. They are the two options available to these people.”
He said those found not to be refugees would be forcibly returned to their countries of origin. Countries such as Iran, however, refuse to accept forced returns.
According to the minister’s department, 98% of the men on Manus who have had their refugees claims assessed have been found to be refugees with a “well-founded fear of persecution” in their homelands, and are legally owed protection.A black feminist researcher who was abused for criticising Scottish nationalism has deleted her Twitter account because she feared for her physical safety.
Claire Heuchan, a Scottish PhD student at Stirling university, said she believed her often abusive opponents were trying to discover where she lived by searching and sharing tweets from her account.
Heuchan was subjected to heavy criticism, and also received substantial support, after writing a Guardian opinion piece supporting claims at the weekend by Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, that there were parallels between Scottish nationalism and racist movements elsewhere in the world. The abuse included a racist comment left on her personal blog.
She was publicly supported by her university on Tuesday, but Heuchan said she had closed her account after becoming “pretty terrified” at the response. “When I saw people were trying to work out my location, [I] became physically terrified. I started shaking and crying. I don’t feel safe.”
In her Guardian article, Heuchan said: “Equating racism with Scottish nationalism is a massive false equivalence, yet both perspectives are reliant on a clear distinction being made between those who belong and those who are rejected on the basis of difference.”
She concluded: “Zeal for national identity invariably raises questions of who belongs and who is an outsider – even ‘civic-minded’ Scottish nationalism needs a ‘them’ to create a cohesive idea of ‘us’.”
She received considerable praise for the piece, while some pro-independence campaigners vigorously rejected her views but defended her right to express them. Many of her critics insist the Scottish independence movement is tolerant, inclusive and multi-racial, pointing to its leading Asian figures and east European activists.
But other prominent nationalists, including the blogger Stuart Campbell, posted abusive attacks. They found her past tweets where Heuchan has described herself as “British and proud”.
Heuchan said the attacks, including a comment on her blog calling her an African who had no right to discuss ethnic white Scottish affairs, were accompanied by calls on Twitter for the University of Stirling to sack her although she is not employed there. Others disputed that she was Scottish.
“I’m studying to be a critical race theorist,” she said. “I can’t help but think it’s very significant that the people most clearly against Khan’s comments, the majority were white. There seemed to be a contradiction between them claiming on the one hand to be in favour of progressive politics, but being unwilling to listen to what Sadiq Khan, an Asian man, said.”
Prof Karen Boyle, head of gender studies at Stirling and Heuchan’s PhD supervisor, said the university had “absolutely no hesitation in condemning any threats to Claire, in the strongest possible terms”.
Boyle said the university was proud of Heuchan’s work, and that the Guardian article was clearly identified as an opinion piece. She said: “Many people who disagree with Claire have done so thoughtfully and respectfully. But whilst it would be absolutely wrong to characterise all disagreement as racist and sexist, much of it has been and exposes the difficulties black women – and many others representing marginalised or minority groups - face when they speak out in public life. This kind of abuse is unacceptable and we condemn it in the strongest terms.”CNN anchor Anderson Cooper and White House counsel Kellyanne Conway shared a contentious interview after President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey.
Cooper asked Conway if she could see why many questioned the timing of Trump’s decision amid investigations into the administration’s ties to Russia. Conway did not immediately answer Cooper’s questions. At one point in the interview, Cooper rolled his eyes.
RELATED: Conservatives are furious over “Family Guy’s” latest swipe at Kellyanne Conway
Though Conway later chalked it up to sexism, actor James Woods took his criticism of Cooper’s eye roll to a different level.
Woods tweeted out a gif of Cooper with a distasteful, homophobic accusation:
As his butt plug dislodges during a newscast… #andersoncoopereyeroll pic.twitter.com/AS6RCbjZdB — James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) May 12, 2017
Woods has since retweeted his own tweet.
RELATED: Please don’t clap: Stephen Colbert was confused when his audience cheered Comey’s firing
Woods also published about six tweets regarding the #FireColbert movement after conservatives reacted negatively to a lewd joke “Late Show” host Stephen Colbert made about President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, at one point even calling it “vile:”
Ironic that what may end #StephenColbert's career at @CBS is not a truly vile attack on a sitting president, but that it was #homophobic… — James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) May 3, 2017All this was the early stages of an audacious public education experiment taking place in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, one that its founder hopes will revolutionize both how students learn and how teachers are trained. Instead of assigning one teacher to roughly 25 children, the New American Academy began the school year with four teachers in large, open classrooms of 60 students. The school stresses student independence over teacher-led lessons, scientific inquiry over rote memorization and freedom and self-expression over strict structure and discipline. The founder, Shimon Waronker, developed the idea with several other graduate students at Harvard. It draws its inspiration, he said, from Phillips Exeter Academy, an elite boarding high school in New Hampshire where students in small classes work collaboratively and hold discussions around tables.
But Mr. Waronker decided to try out the model in one of the nation’s toughest learning environments, a high poverty elementary school in which 20 percent of the children have been found to have emotional, physical or learning disabilities. The idea, he said, was to prove that his method could help any child, and should be widely used elsewhere. “I didn’t want to create an environment that wasn’t real for everyone else and then say, look at my success,” he said.
The challenges have been considerable. Faced with out-of-control classroom situations, Mr. Waronker, 42, had to rethink his idea that his model could work for even the most disturbed children. By January, three children who were violent had been moved to more-structured environments; seven other first graders moved away or withdrew, reducing the class size to 50.
The school was founded with the strong backing of Joel I. Klein, the former schools chancellor, who frequently lauded Mr. Waronker for his efforts as the principal of a tough middle school in the South Bronx. They found a space in an elementary school three blocks from Mr. Waronker’s home in Crown Heights, and in a special deal with the teachers’ union, he won the right to pay teachers on a scale that considered performance.
While the model flies against efforts to keep class sizes low, Mr. Waronker notes that the teacher-student ratio is lower than in most schools. At its heart is the idea that the teachers, not to mention the students, will collaborate and learn from one another, rather than being isolated in separate classrooms. He hired one $120,000-per-year master teacher per class. Most of the others are novice early childhood teachers, which recreates the staff composition in typical high-poverty schools.
New American Academy opened with 126 kindergartners and first graders and at least eight adults per classroom, including intern principals and paraprofessionals assigned to disabled children. It will expand by one grade per year until it reaches the fifth grade, and the teachers will stay with the same children every year, to build accountability for their learning. There is no assistant principal, dean or art teacher, saving money for classroom salaries.
Lessons are a series of complex choreographies. In the 2,000-square-foot kindergarten, for example, each child is assigned a “university”— a grouping by skill level — and another group by color: blue, red or green. Every 40 minutes or so, the children regroup in a different part of the room. During a visit in November, an observer noticed that each move led to the children’s standing up, running, talking, and then having to quiet down again.
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“This is the hardest moment of the day,” said Lorraine Scorsone, the master teacher in the kindergarten, as eight adults tried to wrangle the children into a semicircle for group reading time. “In early childhood, disengaging is very difficult, and moving to another activity is very difficult.”
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Ms. Scorsone, with 23 years of experience, had what appeared to be a magical touch, and the children listened raptly one day in November as she explained how a banana travels from foreign lands to local stores. But the other teachers, who do the bulk of the teaching, had more trouble gaining the attention of the children, who lay on carpets looking at the ceiling or fiddled with belts and shoelaces on the outskirts of lessons.
“Ewww,” squealed a boy named Ethan when he was told that the class would plant a banana tree later that day. Other children began mimicking the sound, which they had been making earlier. “Ethan, stop it,” said his teacher, Pepe Gutierrez. “I don’t know why you are screaming.”
The first grade was tougher, with less-experienced teachers and more children who were violent. In the first two months of school, a student pulled a chunk of an adult’s hair out, and an ambulance crew was called twice to calm a child. Eight weeks into the year, the only student work visible on the blue-painted walls was a poster with finger-painted hand prints and the words “Hands Are Not for Hitting.”
“Many of the children have already had a year in what I would call a state of nature, when Rousseau spoke about people who live under no civilization,” Mr. Waronker said, referring to the children’s experience in a regular public school kindergarten. Fifteen children still could not recognize letters, and only one-third were at grade level. “This is messy work — this is the front lines.”
In the front of the room, Kathleen Kearns, a first-year teacher, strained to get her 20 students to understand how to use a chart to classify similarities and differences between two characters in a book. About half a dozen students refused to sit in their places.
“I need you here; your job is here,” she said to one, trying to be heard. After class, she said, “I am exhausted at the end of the day.”
It is the same struggle that first-year teachers across the city face, but the difference, Mr. Waronker said, is that in his school, it is out in the open. Other teachers can offer advice and pitch in, and they have 90 minutes of joint planning time each morning. The intensive collaboration, he believes, is what will cause his model, while admittedly still in a “trial-and-error” phase, to ultimately surpass others.
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Indeed, by this month, there were significant improvements. Children appeared more focused during lessons. Jahmeer decided to play with pencils rather than do his counting work sheet, but he stayed in his seat, and another child asked if he needed help. One boy started crying, but not because someone pushed him; he wanted to have a turn writing his answer on the board.
“It’s tough on them, it’s tough on all of us,” Keema Flourney, the first-grade master teacher, said of her teachers, “but they are pulling through.”
Next year, Mr. Waronker said, he will hire more-experienced teachers, because expecting that novices could learn quickly enough from the master teachers was wrong. “I put added stressors that shouldn’t have been there,” he said.
Most of the teachers said they felt the school’s model would show good results over time. Several parents praised the school’s inclusiveness and its effort to offer something different. But one father, who withdrew his daughter, said the school was not for her because of her behavior problems.
The first-year teacher who had been leading the penny lesson in November for Thea and 19 other children, Daniella Schonbuch, while the master teacher was away, said she calmed herself after tough days by remembering that she would have years to build progress with her students. By January, she was leading a regular morning French lesson.
“It’s small moments, it really is,” said Ms. McSorley, the first-grade teacher whose chair had been pulled out from under her. “We are still in the process of figuring out what works for the kids, and what works today does not always work tomorrow.”Vanilla Ice has been charged in connection with a home burglary in Lantana, Fla., adjacent to where he was renovating a home for his reality show “The Vanilla Ice Project,” authorities confirm.
Ice — the stage name of Robert Van Winkle — was taken into custody Wednesday and is being charged with burglary and grand theft in connection with an incident that happened sometime within the past month, said Lantana police chief Sean Scheller. Numerous items of furniture, a pool heater, bicycles and more were stolen.
According to a Lantana police press release, during an investigation into the house adjacent to the one Ice was renovating, authorities obtained a search warrant and found several of the stolen items at Ice’s residence in Palm Beach County, determining that the former rapper “played a role” in the crime. The items have since been identified and returned to the rightful owner.
Scheller said Ice has been cooperative in investigations. Ice has hosted his series on the DIY Network, where he improves and flips houses, since 2010.
TMZ first reported the news.A Tampa woman whom we only know as R.W., was raped. She was treated by the rape crisis center, who gave her two emergency contraception pills, one to be taken immediately and one to be taken 12 hours later. When she reported the rape to the police, they uncovered an arrest warrant on R.W. for failure to pay restitution and failure to appear. After she was arrested, a Hillsborough County guard confiscated her second pill, claiming it was against her religious beliefs.
From Courthouse News:
R.W. says she requested her second pill the next morning, but jail employee Michele Spinelli refused. “Spinelli told the Plaintiff that she would not give R.W. the pill because it was against Spinelli’s religious beliefs,” the first amended complaint states.
Although R.W. did not get pregnant, she sued Spinelli and Hillsborough County Sheriff David Gee for gender discrimination and violations of the right to privacy and the right to equal protection under the 14th Amendment.
The Sheriff’s office essentially contended that Spinelli was acting as an individual, and she was not the “final policy maker,” meaning that the government office wouldn’t be accountable.
U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Kovachevich disagreed. She found for R.W., claiming that Spinelli was the final policy maker since she was the only person on duty at the time and she hadn’t been given a directive, one way or another, by Sheriff Gee. The conclusion is that R.W. will be able to sue the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s office.
While it is tough to draw correlations between court decisions regarding government agencies and those effecting private corporations (like pharmacies), this decision does bode well for the women who have been denied access to contraception, simply because the person standing behind a pharmacy counter doesn’t share her beliefs.
Follow me on my new Facebook page or on Twitter, @wendygittlesonAdam Savage of "Mythbusters" channels Indiana Jones during the show's Temple Run test. Discovery Channel
The final episode of "Mythbusters" will air March 5 on the Discovery Channel after 14 seasons, 248 episodes and 2,950 experiments. The program has been one of cable's most beloved and longest-running TV series. What compelled viewers to tune in every week?
Curiosity.
"Mythbusters" and its debunking efforts have always involved experiments, from cement truck explosions to improvised parachutes. These experiments fascinated and entertained viewers, but more fundamentally, they engaged their curiosity. The experiments themselves embodied curiosity in action.
Curiosity is a powerful, undervalued and uniquely human capability that drives discovery. Curiosity leads us to explore, create and innovate. A brief look at some of the most important inventions and scientific discoveries of the past 150 years will reveal curiosity as their common source for inspiration. Albert Einstein famously said: "I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious." Curiosity sets young people on their path to discovery and creativity.
Technical skills and STEM education programs are often mentioned as solutions for developing the next generation of American innovators. Developing a future workforce with the tools and skill sets necessary for technology advancement is undoubtedly an important part of the answer. But it took more than technical skills to inspire Einstein, the Wright brothers and Alexander Graham Bell.
Host Jamie Hyneman makes the boulder used in the opening sequence of a "Mythbusters" episode. Discovery Channel
The key to educating the next generation is instilling in them an entrepreneurial mindset. That process begins with nurturing their intrinsic motivation to make a positive difference in the world – whether or not it has anything to do with technology or "things." After they feel driven to improve the human condition, they have a purpose that drives their curiosity in all things – including technology.
Curiosity does not automatically manifest itself equally in everyone; it requires active awareness, deliberate inquiry and intentional pursuit. Curiosity thrives when it is nurtured, cultivated and exercised in an educational ecosystem that supports it. To go one step further, when curiosity is combined with a sense of purpose in a young person, he or she becomes a force for meaningful innovation and change in the world.
Both of our institutions, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology and Villanova University, are partners of the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN), a collaboration of hundreds of engineering faculty at colleges and universities across the nation educating undergraduates with an entrepreneurial mindset as well as an engineering skill set. We encourage our students to tackle the grand challenges of the 21st century from sustainability to cyber security. If we can feed their passion to help people – and thereby spark their curiosity – we will have succeeded as educators.
Engineers with an entrepreneurial mindset are focused on curiosity, connections and creating value for society. They are always curious about our changing world, connect and integrate information from many sources to gain insight, and create value from unexpected opportunities, learning quickly from failure. Graduates equipped with this mindset, combined with technical knowledge, are versatile and adept at adjusting to changing conditions and have the potential to develop inventive solutions.
It is precisely this kind of 21st century workforce professional who will contribute to economic growth, U.S. global competitiveness, and solving our greatest global challenges. Benevolent purpose and curiosity cannot be experienced by a computer or a robot, and it cannot be outsourced. America needs to provide more educational experiences for students that foster curiosity and give young people the opportunity to exercise it.
We will greatly miss the opportunity to tune in each week to watch new episodes of "Mythbusters" and see what amazing experiment the group would take on next. For young college students on our campuses, "Mythbusters" has been on the air for as long as they can remember. The show has served as an influential force to help inspire their intellectual curiosity, prompting many to become engineers. It is now our responsibility as engineering educators to continue the show's legacy by instilling within our students a mindset that inspires them to be the next generation of innovators that can create real value for the world they will inherit.
James Conwell is president of Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. Gary Gabriele is the Drosdick Endowed Dean and professor of Mechanical Engineering at Villanova University's College of Engineering.
James Conwell, ContributorOne week after a judge set him free, former teen terrorist Omar Khadr has won yet another legal battle with the Conservative government, after the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that he was sentenced as a juvenile, not an adult.
While the ruling doesn't affect the 28-year-old's freedom, it means that if he is returned to jail, it would be to a provincial reformatory, rather than a federal prison.
But the symbolism looms larger than the practical effects. The Canadian government was intent on demonstrating, as it has since the United States military captured Mr. Khadr on an Afghan battlefield when he was 15, and accused him of throwing a grenade that killed a soldier, that it believes he should be punished as severely as the law allows. And the Supreme Court said that the law is much less severe than the federal government thinks it is. Adding insult, it needed only a few minutes after the hearing ended to deliver its unanimous ruling from the bench. Most rulings come several weeks after a case is heard.
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"They're saying, 'That's pretty obvious, isn't it?'" Wayne MacKay, a law professor at Dalhousie University, said of court rulings made during or immediately after a hearing.
Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin said it was a straightforward matter: A U.S. military commission sentenced Mr. Khadr to eight years in prison for the war crime of murder, and the mandatory adult penalty for murder in Canada is life. Therefore it had to be a juvenile penalty. The Canadian government argued that Mr. Khadr had received five concurrent penalties of eight years for murder and other charges. The judges expressed bafflement at the argument.
"We can't slice and dice the eight years," said Justice Marshall Rothstein, a conservative member of the court.
It was the third time the Toronto-born Mr. Khadr got his name on a Supreme Court ruling – which tied Henry Morgentaler for the most Supreme Court appeals.
In 2008, Mr. Khadr defeated the Canadian government at the Supreme Court. It ruled unanimously that the government had to disclose all records of interviews conducted by Canadian officials with him, and information given to U.S. authorities. He was being held by the U.S. government at its prison for suspected terrorists in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
In 2010, the court ruled partly in the government's favour and partly in Mr. Khadr's. It said unanimously that Canadian interrogations of Mr. Khadr, in the absence of counsel, after he had suffered three weeks of sleep deprivation while in U.S. custody, "offends the most basic Canadian standards about the treatment of detained youth suspects." But the court also said it could not force the government to ask the U.S. to send him home to Canada.
Last week, an Alberta Court of Appeal judge rejected a last-ditch attempt by the federal government to deny Mr. Khadr bail while he awaits an appeal of his U.S. convictions. A U.S. military commission found him guilty in 2010 of the war crime of murder and several other charges. The government argued freeing him would irreparably harm relations with the U.S., but Justice Myra Bielby said it had provided no evidence of that from U.S. authorities.
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Pollster Nik Nanos said the string of losses for the Conservative government may simply reinforce Canadians' feelings on the issue, no matter where they stand. "I don't think the Conservatives consider this a significant defeat," he said in an interview. "What the Conservatives want to convey is that they are tough on terror." He said that, while he has not done polling on attitudes |
pay.
“Ms. Riviello has faced retaliation for trying to do the right thing for this patient and all VA patients subject to such harsh and unlawful treatment,” Cannon said in an April 24 letter to the OSC.
A spokesman for VA Albany did not immediately comment.
Cannon said the VA scandal shows her client’s situation is not unique.
“It’s our observation there’s a serious management breakdown in these VA facilities, where employees like Val are trying desperately to give these vets the best possible care they can and when they do so and it displeases management for whatever reason, the ones who are on the losing end are the vets and the staff trying to do the right thing,” the attorney said.
Riviello told FoxNews.com that losing her job has caused her stress. “It makes me feel terrible,” she said. “It makes me feel humiliated.”
She said that by coming forward now she is hoping to help other VA employees who might find themselves in the same situation.
“I don’t want there to be anyone else being asked to do things that are not in the best interest of the patients we take care of,” she said.The economic distress of the Great Recession led to a dip in childbearing among American women, leading to reports of a “baby bust.” But that trend may be ending, at least when it comes to older and highly educated women. A new report found the percentage of childless women ages 40 to 44 reached its peak in 2006 at 20 percent and has declined in the years since, down to 15 percent last year.
The report, released on Thursday by the Pew Research Center, found that for every education level, the percentage of childless women ages 40 to 44 was lower last year than it was in 1994, and that the difference was the most dramatic among women with a medical degree or a doctorate.
This drop in childlessness may seem to be at odds with other fertility reports noting a recent decline in births, but the Pew study said those reports examined fertility only at one point in time, not cumulatively over a woman’s lifetime, and failed to take into account a later age of childbearing.
“Part of what accounts for the low fertility indicated by annual rates is the fact that many women are putting off having children until later in life,” the report said, “both due to broad cultural changes (such as increasing education), and due to the Great Recession, which intensified delayed childbearing, particularly among younger women.”
The report said it’s not clear whether the decrease in fertility among younger women will translate to a lower lifetime fertility rate by the end of these women’s childbearing years. While there is evidence showing that declines in fertility that coincide with high unemployment do indeed decrease lifetime fertility, there’s also evidence showing that women who delay having children do “catch up” in later years. Basically, as Gretchen Livingston, one of the Pew report’s authors, has said before, “It’s complicated.”
The finding that more older women are having children isn’t the only surprise in the report. Pew also found that older and highly educated women are having more children than they used to, and they’re the only group for which that’s true.
One possible reason for this change is that the population of people attaining higher degrees today is very different from what it was in 1994.
According to data from the National Center for Education Statistics, a higher percentage of every racial group in the U.S. had a graduate degree in 2013 than did in 1995. And while there was no measurable difference in the percentage of men and women earning a master’s degree or higher in 1995, women were more likely than men to have earned a higher degree in 2013, at 9 percent and 6 percent respectively. When the group of women who are obtaining higher degrees is expanding and diversifying, it makes sense that childbearing trends among that group would change as well.I don't remember the exact day I started getting heart palpitations but it was early 2002. In January (January 2 to be exact), I started what would be my last diet. When I say diet, I mean consuming fewer calories than my body needed. After failing repeatedly on Weight Watchers, Slim Fast, and Nutrisystem, in 1998 I gave low-carb a try. Low carb was my most successful diet. I almost never cheated and I lost 40lbs and kept it off for a year. I was pleased with my weight loss and hoped for more. I ignored the beginnings of GERD, that my cholesterol was at the high side of normal, the massive sugar crashes, dreams about eating bread, obsession with carbs (the diet required eating two no-carb meals, and one meal with a carbs that had to be eaten in an hour), and what I can only call fun filled nights of heart palpitations.
However after losing weight I stopped at 40 pounds. I weighed about 190 lbs which was still considered obese. And nothing I would did would restart the weight loss. I was also bored by my limited food choices. (The doctors who wrote the diet, recommended eating a salad before the carb meal.) Eventually the cheating started going into high gear. And when I say cheating, it wasn't just eating more carbs, I began bingeing on unhealthy crap.
But in my mind, I thought low carb was the answer. After all failing many times at other diets, I had been somewhat successful on this one.
So back to early 2002, after the low carb failure, I went to the no-carb diet, Atkins which I had been doing for a few weeks. Again I was pleased. I was losing weight again.
Then I tried going to sleep.
My heart felt like it was going to explode. I felt like it was pounding, skipping a beat, and struggling. I went to the emergency room. They couldn't find anything wrong. I went to a cardiologist who discovered I have a slightly prolapsed value, but after an echo, ekg, halter monitor, everything looked okay. He put me on a beta blocker. My gastroenterologist diagnosed me with GERD and put me on nexium. (Actually he told me Atkins was crazy but I should still lose weight.)
But I still couldn't sleep and my heart kept me up. I was terrified it was going to stop in the night which made it race even more. I was doing Atkins induction where you eat 20 grams of carbs or less to get your body in ketosis. (I never got to full ketosis) so I moved out of the induction phase to next one where you could have some carbs.
The heart palpitations went away, so did the weight loss. Then I realized it. This wasn't healthy. I was now on two medications. This crazy dieting had to stop, it wasn't helping me.
So I stopped. However this time around I didn't binge as much. This time around I had something different. Body acceptance.
I've toyed around with body acceptance since I was in college. It was always in the back of my mind. Picking up Marilyn Wann's book in 2001 helped even more. I realized dieting had possibly done irreversible damage to my body. I knew that going to sleep with a dread of not walking up and now being on two medications I didn't previously need that dieting and this obsessiveness with weight loss would kill me. I know that I had to (a) stop dieting and learn actual healthy habits and (b) learn to love and accept that I am fat.
I knew that giving up dieting did not mean I had to give up being healthy. I didn't celebrate the end of dieting with a huge cake. I had to relearn how to eat, because my eating had become so disordered that when I wasn't dieting, I was eating fast and too much. (As if my body didn't think it would ever get food again.) I started to learn to listen to my body. Eat the foods it liked and avoid foods it didn't. I eventually got off the Beta-Blocker and moved from Nexium to an antacid and herbal remedies which have improved GERD's greatly. (I am hoping to stop taking the antacids eventually); I rarely eat more than my body can handle and I am slowly but surely learning to eat normally again. (I don't know if I ever will.)
Every time I get the temptation to diet again, I think about the nights on Atkins where I wasn't sure I would wake up. Because thinking that you are dying isn't healthy. Listening to and loving your body is.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell delivered a speech today in Kentucky. A speech which yet again personifies the disconnect between the insufferable professional republicans within the party and the MAGA insurgency that has taken it over.
WATCH SPEECH HERE
CTH has been transparent with our support for Donald Trump, and the specific reason for it. We want the GOPe machine torn down, dispatched to earth orbit, and nuked while there regardless of consequence, because we’re sick of having to be brutalized and used by Republican liars hiding within it. Period.
If President Trump shows up to the next MAGA rally in a banana costume, 5″ stiletto heels and starts twerking a cardboard cutout of Mitch McConnell, he’d still have our full support.
Senate Majority Mitch McConnell is the personification of the intransigent GOPe. He is quite simply that vindictive doddering fool down the road with the signs on his law forbidding anyone to dare touch the grass. The entire neighborhood hates him. Harsh? No, try reality. THAT is the face of the swamp. Mr. Mumbles. Good grief, no wonder Democrats are always grinning.
For CTH, the elimination of the GOPe machine is ultimately more valuable than anything else. We gave the GOP the House (2010, 2012, 2014, 2016) and the Senate (2014, 2016) and yet we never have received a single benefit to the election victories We The People provided. Why is that?
Here’s where a paradigm shift is needed for many of the political followers who don’t have a deep and specialized knowledge of the Republican agenda.
Citizens United was touted by conservatives as a victory. Why?
Was it because Citizens United was genuinely a win for freedom of speech, or was it actually and substantively because Obama declared it a loss?
Again, paradigm shift time – Citizens United was as much a defeat for “our side” as it was for “their side”. We didn’t need Citizens United to win a massive electoral victory in 2010, Obama’s “Shellacking”; we just showed up to the polls and voted against his policies.
However, the Republican professional political class did need Citizens United to try and stop our efforts in 2012 and again in 2014. I’ll explain.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, led by President Tom Donohue, is the power brokerage for the GOP “establishment”. In short, whatever the CoC wants, their lobbyists on K-Street will insure the CoC gets through campaign contributions to influence the GOP as a Party.
The U.S. CoC is the operational arm of Wall Street, not, I repeat, NOT, Main Street.
The Citizens United decision is what allowed Wall Street to fund the U.S. CoC, which in turn funded the GOP establishment machine. If politics is a blood sport, Citizens United just authorized the unlimited use of STERIODS for the paid gladiators.
How does Wall Street differ from Main Street?
The answer to that question can most easily be reflected by explaining why the Republican Establishment, the professional political class, supports ObamaCare, Common Core and Comprehensive Immigration Reform to include Amnesty.
Wall Street and ObamaCare:
Wall Street, through the CoC, advocate for policies that benefit their interests; their financial interests. The cost of worker healthcare is a liability embedded in the cost of the products sold. If the United Auto Workers healthcare plan costs $10,000 per person, that cost is embedded in the price to manufacture a car.
Unlike their global competitors U.S. businesses (manufacturers) have these costs as part of their product cost, the cost of goods sold.
Globally, other nations have various forms of “government provided” healthcare, and so their products don’t carry the cost directly. In an effort to level the manufacturing playing field, the U.S. CoC, Wall Street, are firm advocates of removing the cost of healthcare from U.S. goods.
Wall Street, supports ObamaCare for an expanded profit margin on financially capitalized businesses – ie. higher profits = higher stock valuations.
Simultaneously, unions support ObamaCare (see SEIU, AFL-CIO et al, visits to White House during ObamaCare construct) because ObamaCare removed the healthcare liability from the union retirees benefits. ie. increased solvency.
The globalists, and progressive Democrats support ObamaCare because it aids their constituency, unions; and also expands the influence of government control which is based on a collective outlook and elimination of the individual freedom.
Wall Street therefore supports both Republicans and Democrats when it comes to the retention of ObamaCare.
That’s why you don’t see Republican Majorities trying to remove it – it’s all hat and no cattle; a ruse, a fraud. Only the promises of actual removal being used to get Pavlov’s sheeple masses to pull levers with hopes/promises of getting repeal pellets.
The GOPe has NO INTENTION of removing ObamaCare.
Wall Street and Immigration:
Like ObamaCare, Wall Street wants comprehensive immigration reform to include amnesty. Again, focused almost entirely on the reduction of the labor costs for goods and services. These are financial balance sheet determinations, not considerations of what’s best for the middle class U.S. worker.
Democrats and Republicans both want immigration reform to include amnesty. Democrats for a voting block and more collectivist ideological approaches, Republicans to do the bidding of their financial interests – The CoC, Tom Donohue, etc.
The multinational agriculture lobby is massive.
We willingly feed the world as part of the system; but you as a grocery customer pay more per unit at the grocery store because domestic supply no longer determines domestic price.
Within the agriculture community the (feed-the-world) production export factor also drives the need for labor. Labor is a cost. The multinational corps have a vested interest in low labor costs. Ergo, open border policies. (ie. willingly purchased republicans not supporting border wall etc.).
Part of the lobbying in the food industry is to advocate for the expansion of U.S. taxpayer benefits to underwrite the costs of the domestic food products they control. By lobbying DC these multinational corporations get congress and policy-makers to expand the basis of who can use EBT and SNAP benefits (state reimbursement rates).
Expanding the federal subsidy for food purchases is part of the corporate profit dynamic. With increased taxpayer subsidies, the food price controllers can charge more domestically and export more of the product internationally. Taxes, via subsidies, go into their profit margins. The corporations then use a portion of those profits in contributions to the politicians. It’s a circle of money.
Neither Democrats nor Republicans are willing to build a border wall to stop illegal immigration.
Wall Street and Common Core Education:
Like ObamaCare and Immigration, Wall Street wants the federalization of education. In part because it generates a consistently similar pool of eligible, who are increasingly Latino, workers; and in part because education is BIG BUSINESS.
Just look at your property taxes to see how much of your local property tax dollars are apportioned to public School and Education funding.
Democrats and Republicans both support Common Core. Democrats because it expands the financial base of local schools to allow greater room for increased labor union (teacher, NEA) wages; and because Common Core affords, yet again, an ideological watering down of individualism in favor of collectivism. Republicans support Common Core because it’s big business, and the CoC funds their advocacy.
Both Democrats and Republicans support Common Core.
In 2013 CoC President Tom Donohue went on record saying his 2014/2015 legislative priorities were:
1 – Full implementation of ObamaCare without repeal.
2 – Comprehensive Immigration Reform to include Amnesty.
3 – Full implementation of Common Core educational standards.
Wall Street, through K-Street, through the CoC, fund these legislative priorities.
The Citizens United decision allowed Wall Street, through K-Street, through the CoC to fund established legislative representatives to continue these legislative priorities.
Conversely, Citizens United, through Wall Street, through K-Street, through the CoC, created the system of Super-PAC’s that funds attacks against any political opponent who would unseat their selected and established candidate. You only need to look at 2014’s Virginia (Ken Cuccinelli), or Mississippi (Chris McDaniels), or Kentucky (Matt Bevin) to see how strongly these interests will work to insure victory.
The same process, with funding from the same groups and individuals, is taking place right now in the Alabama Senate race.
I requested that Mitch M & Paul R tie the Debt Ceiling legislation into the popular V.A. Bill (which just passed) for easy approval. They… — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 24, 2017
…didn't do it so now we have a big deal with Dems holding them up (as usual) on Debt Ceiling approval. Could have been so easy-now a mess! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 24, 2017
The only problem I have with Mitch McConnell is that, after hearing Repeal & Replace for 7 years, he failed!That should NEVER have happened! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 24, 2017
AdvertisementsThis Week In Servo 99
In the last week, we landed 127 PRs in the Servo organization’s repositories.
By popular request, we added a ZIP archive link to the Servo nightlies for Windows users.
Planning and Status
Our overall roadmap is available online, including the overall plans for 2017. Q2 plans will appear soon; please check it out and provide feedback!
This week’s status updates are here.
Notable Additions
hiikezoe corrected the animation behaviour of pseudo-elements in Stylo.
UK992 added some auto cleanup mechanisms for TravisCI.
Manishearth implemented system font support in Stylo.
glennw added groove and ridged border support to WebRender.
bholley converted simple CSS selectors and combinators to use inline storage for improved performance.
MortimerGoro implemented the missing GetShaderPrecisionFormat WebGL API.
WebGL API. sbwtw corrected the behaviour of CSS’ calc API in certain cases.
API in certain cases. metajack removed the DOMRectList API.
BorisChious extended CSS transition support to shorthand properties.
nox improved the parsing of the background-size CSS property.
CSS property. avadacatavra added support for creating Rust-based extensions of the C++ JSPrincipals API for SpiderMonkey.
API for SpiderMonkey. kvark avoided a panic in WebRender encountered when using it through Firefox.
paulrouget clamped mouse scrolling to a single dimension at a time.
Gankro added IPC overhead profiling to WebRender.
stshine improved the inline size calculation for inline block layout.
mrobinson fixed several problems with laying out absolute positioned blocks.
canaltinova implemented support for the -moz-transform CSS property for Stylo.
CSS property for Stylo. MortimerGoro modernized the infrastructure surrounding Android builds.
New Contributors
Interested in helping build a web browser? Take a look at our curated list of issues that are good for new contributors!The United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) in Colorado Springs, Colorado is an institution of inestimable worth to the United States military. In addition to being a service academy graduate and son of a distinguished graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, I’m also the father of two sons, a son-in-law, and a daughter-in-law, each of whom are proud alumni of USAFA. Even my brother-in-law is a proud alum of USAFA. As such, I know well the top-notch standards of stellar professionalism to which most faculty and staff adhere. Unfortunately, I’m also intimately aware of the nightmarish side of USAFA – one that entails ongoing ordeals of blatantly unconstitutional marginalization, humiliation, degradation and abject brutality for large segments of the military personnel on the academy’s installation. The stomach-turning knowledge of this grim reality is backed up by the testimony of literally hundreds of cadets and staff at USAFA spanning a period of at least a dozen years now. My own family’s torment at the hands of the sickening fundamentalist Christian presence at the academy was pivotal in compelling me to establish the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF: www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org). Thus, it was with great skepticism and no small amount of disgust that we greeted the latest “Religious Respect Conference” at USAFA. Clearly this event was to be a proverbial “dog-and-pony show” foolishly meant to assuage those of us who have been blowing the whistle on the ongoing religious civil rights abuses at USAFA for many years now. Sadly, our expectations of the dubious nature of the “Conference” were fully realized even before it began. One would need to hire a seasoned private investigator to decipher the Byzantine complexity and bureaucratic camouflage of the USAFA e-mails and related “public” announcements of this stealth “Religious Respect Conference.” George Orwell’s dystopian society of Oceania, and its lexicon of duplicitous “doublespeak,” could not possibly be more accurately portrayed than in the reprehensible manner in which USAFA designed, announced, and conducted this specious spectacle.
The idea of USAFA blaring its triumphant horns at having “reformed” itself in the field of “Religious Respect” is an odd and uber-ignominious one – folly, indeed. The overtly theistic flavor of the “conference” was belied by the fact that the ever-expanding demographic of agnostic, atheist, humanist, and secular cadets on campus (collectively self-identified as “Freethinkers”) was initially and comprehensively written out of the proceedings of this “respect” conference. It was only through a combination of chance and MRFF’s loud advocacy in the local press that a literal 11th-hour invitation was callously extended to a cadet representative of the academy’s Freethinkers. This “invitation” was classic ass-covering by USAFA and nothing more. According to trusted MRFF sources, in addition to being low-key to the point of achieving a “Where’s Elmo?” level of total obscurity for most academy cadets and staff, the conference was all sizzle and no steak. Its treatment of religious liberties issues internal to USAFA was enormously superficial and utterly meaningless. It accomplished nothing in terms of challenging the prevailing tsunami of ambient fundamentalist Christian religiosity on campus.
The hideous spectacle of USAFA’s head chaplain, Col. Robert Bruno, Dean of Faculty Dana Born (who we just learned will be retiring!), and Superintendent Lt. Gen. Michael Gould taking any cognizable part in a “religious respect conference” is absolutely akin to a trio of intransigent felons celebrating time served in a penitentiary, effusively clapping one another on the back for “reforming” themselves despite all salient evidence to the contrary. Such a display is insultingly absurd on the face of it and indicates a crude and willful attempt at pedestrian deception.
Please permit me to provide merely one of a plethora of illustrative examples of this malicious malfeasance. I, along with many of MRFF’s clients at USAFA, were literally thunderstruck when we read that Retired Col. Frank Clawson, representing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (commonly called the Mormon Church), actually noted his concern that USAFA would “become a secular university with no opportunities for religious respect, and those who wanted to exercise their faith would be so looked down on that there would be no religious discussion at all.” Huh? Come again, Colonel? Secular is now synonymous with “bad?” Exactly which Constitution and its construing case law have you been reading lately?
Anti-secular simpleton Clawson would do well to remember that the recently released Air Force Instruction 1-1 (AFI 1-1) firmly establishes complete religious neutrality throughout the U.S. Air Force (USAF). Violation of AFI 1-1 runs the grave risk of invoking the panoply of punitive measures available under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), including criminal trial by courts martial. USAFA is supposed to be an elite federal military academy devoted to training, among many armed forces specialties, America’s airborne war fighters, pilots, and commanders. USAFA is most certainly not an exception to the ironclad rules set forth in these brand new USAF instructions. USAFA isn’t a sectarian monastery and it’s not a divinity college. However, judging by Clawson’s partisan, religious fanatical fantasies, USAFA would be more akin to the Mormon-owned Brigham Young University or the Southern Baptist fundamentalist Liberty University than an institution that operates under the colorable authority of the Headquarters of the United States Air Force, the Secretary of Defense, and the United States Constitution.
USAFA has a long history of pathetic and predictable recidivism in the field of anti-constitutional religious disrespect and oppression. It has shamefully served for decades as the key link in a chain of fundamentalist Christian supremacy and subversion extant throughout the United States military in general and the Air Force in particular. This subversive undercurrent has dealt severe damage to the morale, good order, and discipline of a significant and growing number of academy cadets and staff, sacrificing their foundational civil rights in the interests of an unconstitutional, theocratic Fifth Column. Whenever possible, this wretched cabal has abused its sworn Constitutional Oath for the pernicious purpose of proselytizing servicemembers and, in the process, has mercilessly trampled the civil and human rights assured to all Americans by the United States Constitution. It’s only due to the perpetual pressure piled on by constitutionalist advocates such as MRFF (and our freethinking clients and related allies at the academy and elsewhere) that these interlocking Christian fundamentalist cliques have been forced to make tactical retreats and temporarily go “underground” on ever more-frequent occasions.
The very fact that these “conferences” occur in the first place serves as the very best confirming testimony to the importance of groups such as MRFF. Indeed, “Religious Respect Conferences” that render nonbelievers nonexistent can never decisively carve out the festering fundamentalist Christian rot gnawing away at cadet discipline, order, and morale. On the extreme contrary, these conferences are a lingering hangover of Cold War phobias regarding the so-called “Godless atheists,” and they can only serve such “witch-hunting” neo-McCarthyite purposes. Unless everyone wins, no one wins. Until USAFA makes bold steps in conjunction with ALL groups at the academy, granting equal respect to faith and non-faith cadets and staff alike, aggressive pressure by First Amendment proponents will remain the order of the day and business as usual in confronting these unconstitutional fundamentalist Christian abuses.There has been a lot of conspiracy theories regarding the 9/11 attack on the United States world trade centers and its very hard to know which ones are real and which ones are made up. One of the theories that I strongly believe is that the US government was involved in the taking down of the world trade centers but not involved in the two planes that crashed into them which started everything. In multiple videos, there have been a series of explosions that happened right before the buildings came down. I believe that it was a drastic attempt with coordinated demolition to take the buildings down safely instead of them falling on there sides and causing an enormous amount more of collateral damage.
Watch 9/11: Decade Of Deception [Documentary]No one is working harder for the impeachment of Donald Trump than Donald Trump. If we have learned anything about this president, it is that he has a compulsion to be the center of attention. He can't bear being out of the limelight and will say almost anything — no matter how offensive, outrageous or dishonest it strikes millions of Americans — to keep the public fixated on him. The more he does this, the more he risks impeachment.
Just whether John Kelly, the retired Marine general who is Trump's new chief of staff, can restrain his boss is unclear. This certainly is a central question hovering over the White House, and it won't be easy.
For months, Trump's behavior has posed a riddle. Why is he so self-destructive? His constant tweets deepen the country's divisions, which he promised to heal. The customary explanation is that Trump is playing to his "base," but recently, this has seemed less convincing. Opinion polls suggest his support has slipped even among loyal backers. (The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll has Trump's approval rating dropping from 42 percent in April to 36 percent in early July.)
In fact, we've been asking the wrong question. It's been widely assumed that Trump's behavior must reflect some political logic. He is, after all, the nation's most important politician. His every move must aim to bolster his popularity and agenda. Although this sounds reasonable, it doesn't fit the facts. Trump's nonstop outbursts alienate, usually needlessly, countless voters: precisely the people he needs to broaden his support.
But the mystery vanishes once we realize that Trump's motives, rather than advancing some grand political strategy, are deeply personal. He can't control himself. In his mind, silence means obscurity, which is unbearable, especially when ending it is only a tweet or two away. It doesn't matter what he says — whether it is true or false, relevant or irrelevant to the issues — as long as he stirs passions and dominates public discussion.
It is personality more than politics that impels Trump to be Trump. With hindsight, his rhetorical escapades can be described as political maneuvers, but this is mostly damage control. See Trump and Russia.
Superficially, the odds of Trump being impeached by the House of Representatives and convicted — ousted from office — by the Senate are long. Impeachment (which resembles an indictment) requires a majority vote in the House. Conviction in the Senate mandates a two-thirds vote. Even if all Democrats voted against Trump, many Republicans would have to join them for Trump to be removed. To convict in the Senate would require 19 Republican votes, if all senators were present, says political scientist Sarah Binder of the Brookings Institution. As yet, an anti-Trump coalition doesn't exist.
Still, nothing can be entirely discounted. That's the reality Kelly faces as chief of staff. Trump is an extreme exhibitionist in a calling — politics — where exhibitionism is normal. His addiction to incendiary tweets will be hard, though not impossible, to break. It may defy political or legal logic — indeed, it places him at further risk, because he may get himself in legal trouble or say something hugely unpopular. But it satisfies his need to "own" the news cycle.
In this sense, Trump can be seen as the strongest and most determined advocate of impeachment. If he must flirt with impeachment to retain his command of the media, so be it. As a practical matter, he might see impeachment (though not conviction) as acceptable. He would be automatically in the spotlight every day for months. He would have a new arena in which to fight and "win."
Perhaps subconsciously, this is his goal: Impeach me, please!
The Washington Post Writers Group
Robert Samuelson is a Washington Post columnist.MIAMI BEACH, Fla. - Miami Beach Commissioner Michael Grieco helped police catch a suspected drug dealer on Sunday, authorities said.
According to an arrest report, Grieco flagged down an officer about 9 a.m. in the 1400 block of Ocean Drive after seeing a hand-to-hand transaction between Jacobo Chigin, 55, and another person.
Police said the officer approached Chigin, and he starting riding away on his bicycle, telling the officer, "I'm not stopping."
Police said Chigin headed west on 13th Street from Ocean Drive, and the commissioner followed him on foot.
Other Miami Beach police units responded to the scene and found Chigin heading toward Washington Avenue.
Courtesy: Miami Beach Commissioner Michael Grieco
Police said Chigin refused orders to stop his bicycle, but was eventually taken into custody in the 1300 block of Ocean Court.
Police said Chigin dropped the drugs he had on him, which included seven small bags of suspected crack cocaine.
Chigin told officers, "I'm a drug addict, and I got to make a living," the report said.
Chigin was taken to the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center, where he is being held on charges of possession of a controlled substance with the intent to sell and resisting an officer without violence.
Copyright 2016 by WPLG Local10.com - All rights reserved.Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
Sep. 13, 2017, 4:42 AM GMT / Updated Sep. 13, 2017, 4:42 AM GMT / Source: Associated Press
MELBOURNE, Australia — A judge awarded Rebel Wilson record damages of $3.66 million on Wednesday over magazine articles the actress said cost her roles in Hollywood films.
A Supreme Court jury in Australia's Victoria state had decided in June the articles claiming she lied about her age, origins of her first name and her upbringing in Sydney were defamatory.
Australian actress Rebel Wilson makes a fist as she leaves the Victorian Supreme Court after winning her case on June 15, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. David Crosling / EPA file
Justice John Dixon said a substantial award amount was required to "vindicate" Wilson after her reputation as an "actress of integrity was wrongly damaged."
Bauer Media, publisher of the Australian magazines Woman's Day, Australian Women's Weekly, NW and OK, said it was considering the judgment.
The 37-year-old Wilson, best known for the comedies "Pitch Perfect" and "Bridesmaids," was in London on Wednesday and her lawyers were unable to immediately talk to her about the decision.
Her lawyer Richard Leder said outside court the damages were about four times higher than the previous Australian record for a defamation case.
Her legal team would also apply for Bauer to pay all her legal costs, Leder said.
"Rebel said that this case wasn't about money," Leder told reporters. "She said that it was about holding Bauer Media to account."
Wilson has previously said via Twitter that any damages she won would be donated to a charity, scholarship or invested into the Australian film industry.Supporters of the proposed Flathead Water Compact, involving the state, the federal government, and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes have a victory to celebrate. The compact, one of the most contentious issues of the current Legislative session not only survived a debate and vote in the Montana Senate, but did so with a sizable margin.
Republican Senator Chas Vincent of Libby, who has been shepherding the bill through the Legislature, opened Wednesday afternoon’s debate admonishing the Senate to pass the compact in its pure form, with no amendments.
“We’re talking about a process that has been long and exhaustive," Vincent reminded his colleagues. "We’re talking about a process that included members of this legislative body on that compact commission. You cannot bind three different parties with unilateral decisions. That’s what an amendment to this bill is. You’re binding two other parties.”
Vincent has been meeting with Senators for weeks delivering the same message: The compact has to pass unchanged from its original form. His work paid off. Three amendments to the measure were introduced, and all three were rejected decisively. Then the debate on the compact began in earnest, with most of the opponents voicing doubts about its most controversial feature: Giving the Flathead tribes water rights outside their reservation.
The strongest objection came from Bozeman Republican Jedediah Hinkle.
“Though I’ve spent more time on this piece of legislation than any other this session, I’m far from understanding all of the over a thousand pages of technical documentation," Hinkle said, "and I will not vote Nancy Pelosi-style and pass a permanent legislation just to find out whether it’s good or bad.
"Do you believe that fishing translates into a water right, and support giving the federal [government] jurisdiction over Montana’s water? Then vote yes."
Senator Fred Thomas, who was presiding over the debate, stepped in.
“We’re going to retract that comment on the congressman, okay?” Thomas said
“I’m finished," Hinkle replied.
A few minutes later, a chastened Senator Hinkle took to the floor again:
“I didn’t actually even consider that it may offend all of you, so I apologize for that, and I’d like to ask for your forgiveness," Hinkle said.
But Senators kept raising the question of whether the Flathead tribes really have a right to water outside their reservation boundaries, a right they claim based on the 1855 treaty that created their reservation. The treaty gave them the right to fish in their usual and customary locations, which the tribes interpret as a right to expect water in those same locations.
Missoula Democrat Dick Barrett posed questions directly to sponsor Chas Vincent, “Can you tell us what the practical implications of assigning those rights are? What the actual quantitative significance of these inflow rights are? And how likely they are to actually have an impact on other water users?”
Vincent replied that no court has yet issued a clear ruling on the matter, but based on past decisions, if the compact is defeated, the tribes will probably win a priority water right in those streams off the reservation, one that dates from 1855, when the Treaty was signed.
“The only thing that’s going to get them dismissed," Vincent said, "is for you to prove that tribe was not there in 1855. And all the other side has to do is stand there with a map from the Smithsonian saying, yes we were."
Senate President Debby Barrett, a member of the commission that negotiated the compact, contends that the other negotiators ignored the state and federal constitutions when they crafted the water deal. She said her vote to forward the compact to the legislature does not mean she agrees with its legal language.
Even though Montana’s attorney general has endorsed the agreement, Barrett contends the compact commission handed the legislature a flawed and possibly unconstitutional document:
“The Montana water Rights Compact Commission did not bring the legislature a negotiated settlement," Barrett said, "they have dropped on the 64th legislature the largest expensive turf war of all time."
But Barrett’s arguments did not convince a majority to reject the deal. As the debate stretched into the dinner hour, the Senate finally voted. Thirty-one Senators said aye, 19 no.
"Senate Bill 262 has passed second reading," Senator Thomas said, gavelling the debate to a close.
A short time later, Chas Vincent received congratulations from other Senators outside the chamber, and said he was pleased with the margin of victory.
“I was hoping for a couple more votes," he said, "but |
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Kids with a negative balance usually receive "a cheese sandwich, a fruit and vegetable, and milk." Then the company contacts the parents about payment.Rob Zombie on Going for Broke With 'Lords of Salem' and Why Making a Third 'Halloween' Would Be "Masochistic"
Rob Zombie impressed many (ourselves included) with his grisly and demented sophomore effort, “The Devil’s Rejects,” only to betray many admirers of that film with his tepid stab at the “Halloween” franchise. After helming the 2009 sequel to that reboot, new film “The Lords of Salem” (which world premiered in Toronto earlier this week in the Midnight Madness section) finds Zombie back in non-remake mode with a gonzo tale that proves the musician turned filmmaker has lost none of his mojo.
A melding of Zombie’s heavy metal background and horror sensibilities, “Lords” centers on a radio station DJ (Zombie’s wife Sheri Moon Zombie) tormented by nightmares and hallucinations involving a coven of Salem witches (and one sadistic-looking baby), after listening to a sinister sounding vinyl record sent to her office.
READ MORE: Toronto Review: Overly Familiar ‘Lords of Salem’ Is Still a Creepy Change of Tune for Director Rob Zombie
Indiewire sat down with Zombie the day following “Salem”‘s world premiere to talk about his latest and find out if he’ll ever return to the “Halloween” franchise.
What’s with you and your fascination with witchcraft? “Lords of Salem” marks your first film to feature a posse of witches, but the witch trials have fueled your songwriting before.
I don’t know that I have a fascination with witches per se — well, maybe I just have a fascination with everything that’s weird. Without really analyzing it, I grew up in Massachusetts, so the Salem witch trials were always something that I was around. The average kindergartner probably doesn’t know about it, except that in Massachusetts, you do, because they’ll take you on field trips to see reenactments and stuff. I always found it fascinating, even though I really didn’t know much about it until I revisited it later, for the film. It’s a fascinating subject.
Why got at it from a modern bent?
Because I feel like that story’s been told. That was one thing also with researching it, you realize how many — besides movies like “The Crucible” — PBS TV movies there’ve been on the subject. I figured we didn’t need another one. Mine, unfortunately, has nothing to do with the reality of the witch trials.
Did you write this after helming “Halloween 2”?
No, I started this a long time ago, six or seven years, maybe? But it wasn’t really like I was working on it. I was like, “Oh, this would kind of be a cool idea. Like, Salem radio station, blah blah blah, music,” and then forgot I even wrote that down.
Then about a year ago, Jason Blum, who’s one of the producers [along with Oren Peli, the team behind “Paranormal Activity”], came to me and was like, “Oh, we’re making these low-budget films” — like they did with “Insidious” and “Paranormal” and stuff — “and if you have an idea, we want to do one with you.” Their only stipulation was, “You have total control, but we would like it to be supernatural in nature.” That’s their model, or it was then.
It was actually Wayne Toth — who does all my special effects — who went, “What about that ‘Lords of Salem’ thing you were talking about years ago?” And I was like, “Oh, yeah.” I had totally forgotten all about it, but somehow he remembered. And that’s what brought it up.
What do you make of the “Paranormal” movies?
I saw the first one and thought it was great. The second one, too, also, but I haven’t seen the other. What I really liked about working with them was that I had freedom. You’ll sign a deal with anyone if they give you final cut.
Have you ever wanted to go down the found footage route?
No, I think those movies are cool, and that “Blair Witch” and “Paranormal” were effective, and there are probably still ones that are very effective, but I feel like it just starts becoming… to me those are quick burn movies. I don’t know if you could really re-watch them. You watch them once and go, “Oh, they’re scary,” and you’re done with it. I like movies where you can come back and re-watch them and admire the cinematography 25 years later. You go, “Wow, how’d they get that shot?” That’s really what I am about.
The reason I asked earlier if you wrote this following “Halloween 2,” is because “Salem” marks such a departure from your “Halloween” films, both in its outlandish style and operatic scope. I got a sense that you made it in an effort to break free from whatever contraints you felt while making those films.
Pretty much, yeah. Making the “Halloween” movies was kind of a nightmare, for two reasons. There’s the expectations of what it’s supposed to be — because any person that’s a fan of “Halloween” thinks, “Okay, this is my idea exactly of how these movies are supposed to go.” So no matter what you do, it feels like this is some weird thing. And the studio looks at it as a franchise that they want to protect.
With my second one I got pretty wacky, but it was a battle. They look at it as a franchise. With this, it was just nice to be told, “You can do whatever the fuck you want as long as you stay on budget.” And that’s essentially what I did. I wanted to just make a crazy movie. Last night when I was watching it, I was sitting in the theater going, “I can’t believe somebody gave me money to do this.” The ending’s so nutty, but those are the type of movies I like. I like movies where sometimes when they end you go, “What the fuck? Huh? What did I just watch. I gotta watch that again. That barely made sense to me.”
It left me saying that, but it also creeped the hell out of me.
The movie’s not violent, it’s not bloody, and it’s not typical horror things — but I like the fact that people kept telling me, “It really bothered me. It gave me a weird vibe that I couldn’t get rid of all night.” That’s how I’ll feel sometimes when I’ll watch, say, a David Lynch movie or a Cronenberg movie. There was nothing in the movie that was that disturbing, but the total vibe of the whole thing — that’s what I wanted to try to achieve with it.
I’m curious — why did you make “Halloween 2”?
Truthfully, a couple things. When the first “Halloween” came out, it was a huge hit, number one movie, and blah blah blah blah. So of course they thought, “He’s gonna wanna do ‘Halloween 2.'” The first words out of my mouth were, “I’m absolutely not doing ‘Halloween 2.'”
Really?
And I didn’t. I didn’t wanna do it because I was like, “I just did this, I don’t wanna do it again.” So they hired another director and other writers. And a couple years went by and I ran into their head of production at some awards thing, and I asked him, “How’s ‘Halloween 2’ going?” Because I thought they were done with it. I thought they’d already made the movie.
He goes, “It’s a disaster. We fired the director. We’re on our tenth set of writers. We can’t get the movie made.” And by that point, I had a different feeling, because I sort of felt possessive of the movie I made and I was pissed that another person was gonna come in and take what I thought of as my actors and my story and fuck with it. So I basically said, “Well, I’m free now. So if you want me to do it, I’ll do it.” And I swear to God within 24 hours we were working on it. It was a fast turnaround.
Again they’re having the same problem. They’ve announced a third one over and over.
So you might do one more?
No. That would just be masochistic on my part.
“Salem” is your first film in which music plays a pivotal part — it’s a song that essentially sets the whole plot in motion. Had you long wanted to make a film that fused the two worlds of yours together so clearly?
I never really thought about it that way, but I did feel like I hadn’t done that yet. I never made movies that had any of my music. I haven’t crossed them over that much. Setting “Salem” at a radio station really put it in a world that I know. I’ve gone to like a million radio stations and the DJs all remind me of people I’ve met a million times.
The music is always super important to me in the movies. I like to have at least one song that becomes a song that, when you hear it on the radio, will make you think of that movie.
You give Sheri Moon her biggest part with this film. Is this your love letter to her?
I wrote it for her, for sure. Sheri would go, “A love letter? Jesus Christ, you tortured me through the whole movie.” But, yeah, I always knew she could do something great, but hadn’t really been given the chance. Not even the movies I worked with her in. Even in “Devil’s Rejects,” it was always split between characters, so yeah, I always wanted to do something like that.
“Salem” is her picture.
Yeah, because she takes it very seriously, and would really invest herself. I knew that she would understand that character and would get it.
Her nightmare sequences are so gorgeously executed. How did you dream those up?
I don’t know. They just pop up. I’ll just see something and file it in the back of my mind.
That baby…
Yeah, that baby thing was weird. That was based on this picture of a real baby that looked like that.
A real baby that looked like that?
A real baby, yeah. And I don’t know what the technical term for that disease is, but its eyes basically were on the outside of its head. I mean, the real baby looks fake. It looks exactly like that thing, which is kind of sad. I feel bad for that child. I don’t know if the baby ever lived, but I saw this little clip of it alive, and I was like, “That is the most fucked up thing I’ve ever seen.” I gave it to the effects guy and when they were sculpting that thing, he was like, “I literally want to vomit working on this thing, it’s so disgusting.”
How did Sheri deal with it?
Oh, she hates it. She wouldn’t even look at it. She wouldn’t even look at it until the moment we had to shoot. She hates everything like that. She is not into any of that stuff.
Well, you sure put her throught the wringer.
I did. She is all happiness and flowers. [laughs]
Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here.Gayle Newland, 25, is accused of pretending to be a man known as “Kye Fortune” to dupe the alleged victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons, into having sex with her.
The alleged victim claims she was sexually assaulted by Newland wearing a prosthetic penis. She said she wore a blindfold throughout, The Guardian reported.
Newland, of Willaston, Cheshire, denies five counts of sexual assault.
She has admitted creating a fake online identity but claims the other woman knew about it when they first met, the BBC reported.
The pair reportedly had a two-year relationship and were engaged, the broadcaster said.
The alleged victim told Chester crown court this week that she spent 100 hours with Newland before realising she wasn’t a man.
She told the court she only realised what was going on when she took her blindfold off to discover she was in fact having sex with Newland, The Guardian reported.
Whenever the pair would meet, she would wear a blindfold, even when watching TV, the court heard.
“Every time I met up with Kye Fortune, I either had the mask on already or he would wait outside the door and I would put it on,” the woman, who gave evidence on Wednesday, said. “I was so desperate to be loved. It’s pathetic, so desperate for love, so desperate.
“If I could go back and scream at me, I would. It does look ridiculous on paper.”An Open Letter To My CEO
talia jane Blocked Unblock Follow Following Feb 19, 2016
Dear Jeremy,
When I was a kid, back in the 90s when Spice Girls and owning a pager were #goals, I dreamed of having a car and a credit card and my own apartment. I told my 8-year old self, This is what it means to be an adult.
Now, seventeen years later, I have those things. But boy did I not anticipate a decade and a half ago that a car and a credit card and an apartment would all be symbols of stress, not success.
I left college, having majored in English literature, with a dream to work in media. It was either that or go to law school. Or become a teacher. But I didn’t want to become a cliche or drown in student loans, see. I also desperately needed to leave where I was living — I could get into the details of why, but to sum up: I wanted to die every single day of my life and it took me several years to realize it was because of the environment I was in. So, I picked the next best place: somewhere close to my dad, since we’ve never gotten to have much of a relationship and I like the weather up here. I found a job (I was hired the same day as my interview, in fact) and I put a bunch of debt on a shiny new credit card to afford the move.
Coming out of college without much more than freelancing and tutoring under my belt, I felt it was fair that I start out working in the customer support section of Yelp/Eat24 before I’d be qualified to transfer to media. Then, after I had moved and got firmly stuck in this apartment with this debt, I was told I’d have to work in support for an entire year before I would be able to move to a different department. A whole year answering calls and talking to customers just for the hope that someday I’d be able to make memes and twitter jokes about food. If you follow me on twitter, which you don’t, you’d know that these are things I already do. But that’s neither here nor there. Let’s get back to the situation at hand, shall we?
So here I am, 25-years old, balancing all sorts of debt and trying to pave a life for myself that doesn’t involve crying in the bathtub every week. Every single one of my coworkers is struggling. They’re taking side jobs, they’re living at home. One of them started a GoFundMe because she couldn’t pay her rent. She ended up leaving the company and moving east, somewhere the minimum wage could double as a living wage. Another wrote on those neat whiteboards we’ve got on every floor begging for help because he was bound to be homeless in two weeks. Fortunately, someone helped him out. At least, I think they did. I actually haven’t seen him in the past few months. Do you think he’s okay? Another guy who got hired, and ultimately let go, was undoubtedly homeless. He brought a big bag with him and stocked up on all those snacks you make sure are on every floor (except on the weekends when the customer support team is working, because we’re what makes Eat24 24-hours, 7 days a week but the team who comes to stock up those snacks in the early hours during my shift are only there Mondays through Fridays, excluding holidays. They get holidays and weekends off! Can you imagine?). By and large, our floor pummels through those snacks the fastest and has to roam other floors to find something to eat. Is it because we’re gluttons? Maybe. If you starve a pack of wolves and toss them a single steak, will they rip each other to shreds fighting over it? Definitely.
I haven’t bought groceries since I started this job. Not because I’m lazy, but because I got this ten pound bag of rice before I moved here and my meals at home (including the one I’m having as I write this) consist, by and large, of that. Because I can’t afford to buy groceries. Bread is a luxury to me, even though you’ve got a whole fridge full of it on the 8th floor. But we’re not allowed to take any of that home because it’s for at-work eating. Of which I do a lot. Because 80 percent of my income goes to paying my rent. Isn’t that ironic? Your employee for your food delivery app that you spent $300 million to buy can’t afford to buy food. That’s gotta be a little ironic, right?
Let’s talk about those benefits, though. They’re great. I’ve got vision, dental, the normal health insurance stuff — and as far as I can tell, I don’t have to pay for any of it! Except the copays. $20 to see a doctor or get an eye exam or see a therapist or get medication. Twenty bucks each is pretty neat, if spending twenty dollars didn’t determine whether or not you could afford to get to work the next week.
Did I tell you about how I got stuck in the east bay because my credit card, which amazingly allows cash withdrawals, kept getting declined and I didn’t have enough money on my BART Clipper card to get to work? Did I tell you that my manager, with full concern and sympathy for my situation, suggested I just drive through FastTrak and get a $35 ticket for it that I could pay at a later time, just so I could get to work? Did I tell you that an employee at CVS overheard my phone call with my manager and then gave me, straight from his wallet, the six dollars I needed to drive into work? Do you think CVS pays more than Yelp? I worked a job similar to one at CVS. A manager spends half an hour training you on the cash register, you watch a video, maybe take a brief quiz, and you’re fully trained to do the entire job. Did you know that after getting hired back in August, I’m still being trained for the same position I’ve got? But Marcus at CVS has six dollars in his wallet, and I’m picking up coins on the street trying to figure out how I’ll be able to pay him back.
Speaking of that whole training thing, do you know what the average retention rate of your lowest employees (like myself) are? Because I haven’t been here very long, but it seems like every week the faces change. Do you think it’s because the pay your company offers is designed to attract young people with no responsibilities, sort of like the CIA? Except these people don’t even throw away their trash, because they still live at home and this is their very first job and they don’t have to take an aptitude test like at the CIA. Do you know how many cash coupons I used to give out before I was properly trained? In one month, I gave out over $600 to customers for a variety of issues. Now, since getting more training, I’ve given out about $15 in the past three months because I’ve been able to de-escalate messed up situations using just my customer service skills. Do you think that’s coincidence? Or is the goal to have these free bleeders who throw money at angry customers to calm them down set the standard for the whole company? Do you think there’s any point in training a customer service agent to learn and employ customer service skills? Or is it better to attract those first-time employees with their poor habits and lack of work ethic with the same wage part-time employees at See’s Candies make for standing by the door in a stupid outfit and handing out free chocolate? Do you think those free chocolates cost $600 a month per employee? Have you ever seen an angry See’s Candies customer? You know what I could do with $600 extra a month? For starters, I probably wouldn’t have to take money from Marcus at CVS just to get to work.
Will you pay my phone bill for me? I just got a text from T-Mobile telling me my bill is due. I got paid yesterday ($733.24, bi-weekly) but I have to save as much of that as possible to pay my rent ($1245) for my apartment that’s 30 miles away from work because it was the cheapest place I could find that had access to the train, which costs me $5.65 one way to get to work. That’s $11.30 a day, by the way. I make $8.15 an hour after taxes. I also have to pay my gas and electric bill. Last month it was $120. According to the infograph on PG&E’s website, that cost was because I used my heater. I’ve since stopped using my heater. Have you ever slept fully clothed under several blankets just so you don’t get a cold and have to miss work? Have you ever drank a liter of water before going to bed so you could fall asleep without waking up a few hours later with stomach pains because the last time you ate was at work? I woke up today with stomach pains. I made myself a bowl of rice.
Look, I’ll make you a deal. You don’t have to pay my phone bill. I’ll just disconnect my phone. And I’ll disconnect my home internet, too, even though it’s the only way I can do work for my freelance gig that I haven’t been able to do since I moved here because I’m constantly too stressed to focus on anything but going to sleep as soon as I’m not at work. Should I sell my car? It’s not my car, actually, it’s my grandpa’s. But the back left tire is flat and the front right headlight is out and the registration is due to be renewed in April and I already know I can’t afford any of that. I haven’t even gotten an oil change since I started this job (in August). But maybe I could find someone on Craigslist who won’t mind all of that because they’ll look at the dark circles under my eyes and realize I need the cash more than they do.
How about this: instead of telling you about all the ways I’m withering away from putting my all into a company that doesn’t have my back, I offer some solutions. I emailed Mike, Eat24’s CEO, about a few ideas to give back to our community for the holidays. He, along with someone named Patty, politely turned them down. But maybe you could repurpose them?
Originally, I suggested that Eat24/Yelp employees volunteer at local soup kitchens and food banks to give back to our Bay Area community (I see on your twitter that you care deeply about the homeless epidemic in our city) while also helping the different departments meet and mingle. Maybe instead, you can help set up something to allow Eat24/Yelp employees to get food from local food banks and soup kitchens? I’m pretty proficient at rice, but some hot soup would sure make up for not being able to afford to use my heater.
Originally, I suggested that Eat24 offer a matching donation with customers where they can choose a donation amount during checkout and Eat24/Yelp would match it and donate those profits to a national food program. Maybe instead, you can let customers choose a donation amount during checkout and divide those proceeds among your employees who spend more than 60% of their income on rent? The ideal percent is 30%. As I said, I spend 80%. What do you spend 80% of your income on? I hear your net worth is somewhere between $111 million and $222 million. That’s a whole lotta rice.
Originally, I suggested that Eat24 offer special coupon codes where half of the code’s value ($1) goes to charity. Maybe instead, you can give half the code’s value ($1) to helping employees who live across the bay pay their transit fares? Mine are $226 monthly. According to this website, you’ve got a pretty nice house in the east bay. Have you ever been stranded inside a CVS because you can’t afford to get to work? How much do you pay your gardeners to keep that lawn and lovely backyard looking so neat?
I did notice — and maybe this was just a fluke — that Yelp has stopped stocking up on those awful flavored coconut waters. Was that Mike’s suggestion? Because I did include, half-facetiously, in that email he and Patty so politely rejected that Yelp could save about $24,000 in two months if the company stopped restocking flavored coconut waters since no one drinks them (because they taste like the bitter remorse of accepting a job that can’t pay a living wage and everyone kept falling over into the fetal position and hyperventilating about their life’s worth. It really cut into the productivity that all those new hires are so prolific at avoiding). I wonder what it would be like if I made $24,000 more annually. I could probably get the headlight fixed on my car. And the flat tire. And maybe even get the oil change and renewed registration — but I don’t want to dream too extravagantly. Maybe you could cut out all the coconut waters altogether? You could probably cut back on a lot of the drinks and snacks that are stocked on every single floor. I mean, I could handle losing out on pistachio nuts if I was getting paid enough to afford groceries. No one really eats the pistachios anyway — have you ever tried answering the phone fifty times an hour while eating pistachios? Those hard shells really get in the way of talking to hundreds of customers and restaurants a day.
Anyway, those are my thoughts. I know they’re not worth your time — did you know that the average American earns enough money that the time they would spend picking up a penny costs more than the penny’s worth? I pick up every penny I see, which I think explains why sharing these thoughts is worth my time, even if it’s not worth yours.
Your Friend In Food,
Talia
UPDATE: As of 5:43pm PST, I have been officially let go from the company. This was entirely unplanned (but I guess not completely unexpected?) but any help until I find new employment would be extremely appreciated. My PayPal is paypal.me/taliajane, my Venmo is taliajane (no hyphen). Square Cash is cash.me/$TaliaJane. Thank you so much for helping my story be heard.
UPDATE 10/11/2017: The Monday after I published this letter (which resulted in me losing my job), the customer support team held one-on-one meetings with support reps who confirmed my letter expressed their grievances, specifically with regards to pay. These meetings were confirmed to a reporter by several employees. And as a result, Yelp raised the wages for its customer support reps (among other changes I also pointed out). Yelp claimed that the raise and other systemic improvements had been “in the works” long before my letter (this is a lie).
For those looking to scold and/or blame me: It has been more than a year since this letter was written. What the hell are you doing? Did you just emerge from a coma? I have two jobs and a roommate now, paying far less than what I had been, and I’m still not getting by. That is because the issues I outlined here are the result of much larger problems within the gig economy. And if you really think someone working full time shouldn’t point out that it’s insane that a full time job isn’t enough to support a single person just doing their best (when the minimum wage was established to support a family of three and has failed to keep up with skyrocketing cost of living), you’re being willfully stupid and that’s not my problem. But if you really need to call me a whiny entitled millennial just to feel superior and/or less afraid of the reality of our world, have at it. I don’t give a shit.Punjab govt pleaded the apex court to declare the LHC order illegal and unconstitutional.
LAHORE: The Punjab government on Tuesday challenged the order of the Lahore High Court (LHC) wherein it suspended the detention orders of alleged Mumbai attack mastermind Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi.
The Punjab government challenged the order before the Supreme Court, pleading the top court to set it aside.
On April 6, a single bench of the LHC ordered to release Lakhvi after suspending detention orders issued by DCO Okara issued under three maintenance of public orders (MPO).
Read: ATC directed to conclude Lakhvi’s trial within 2 months
The Punjab government appealed that the LHC ordered to release Lakhvi without realising the sensitivity of the secret information presented against him in court. The appeal said that Lakhvi’s release would affect the trial since it may influence the statements that the prosecution’s witnesses planned to record against him. The appeal further stated that there may be further unrest in the country following Lakhvi’s release.
Read: LHC orders Lakhvi’s release
Punjab government pleaded the apex court to declare the LHC order illegal and unconstitutional.
The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on April 13 had directed the anti-terrorism court (ATC) to wrap up the Lakhvi trial within two months and subsequently submit a report before the court.
Read: Govt told to produce ‘secret’ files on Lakhvi
Lakhvi has been under detention for over five years over allegations of his involvement in Mumbai attacks in 2008, which left 166 people dead.
Last month, the Punjab government detained Lakhvi before he could be released from jail after a court ordered his release.
Read: LHC seeks Punjab’s reply in Lakhvi’s case
He was granted bail by an anti-terror court in December, a move that infuriated New Delhi. Amid outrage over the possible release of the alleged terror mastermind, Pakistan quickly slapped him with a detention order under the “Maintenance of Public Order”.
Read full storyCanada has determined the historic Franklin Expedition shipwreck discovered in the Arctic last month is in fact HMS Erebus, the vessel on which Sir John Franklin sailed.
It's another puzzle solved in the enthralling story of the famous British expedition that tried to traverse the Northwest Passage but ended in misery with all 129 crew members perishing.
The Erebus was the vessel that Franklin occupied as the commander of the expedition and was the base for the captain's quarters.
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Stephen Harper, whose government had backed annual searches for the lost Franklin expedition as a demonstration of Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic, announced the news of the ship's identification Wednesday in the House of Commons.
The ship was first discovered somewhere in Queen Maud Gulf west of O'Reilly Island early last month and was confirmed as a Franklin expedition ship on Sept. 7.
But Parks Canada required more dives to determine whether the find was HMS Erebus or HMS Terror, the two Franklin expedition ships that disappeared in the mid-19th century.
Underwater archeologists with Parks Canada positively identified the vessel following more than a half-dozen dives in mid-September. They took measurements of the wreck and captured several hours of underwater video and thousands of still photographs at the time.
The divers also observed the wreck up close. It is in excellent condition for a mid-19th century shipwreck, likely because of the preservative qualities of frigid Arctic seawater, and divers were able to glean the identity from looking at specific details of the ship.
The Parks Canada team used measurements gathered directly from the ship as well as multi-beam sonar imagery collected by the Canadian Hydrographic Service. They also relied on physical observations of the wreck and the footage gathered.
The archeologists also conducted a comparative analysis using historical ship drawings.
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The Franklin search team expedition leader was Marc-Andre Bernier, chief of the underwater archeology team at Parks Canada and a member of the dive team that surveyed the wreck.
The dive team also included Ryan Harris, head archeologist for the past seven years of the Franklin search and part of the survey team that made the discovery, as well as Jonathan Moore, senior underwater archeologist and another member of the team that made the initial discovery.
The dive and sonar operations were supported by the research vessel Martin Bergmann, and the Canadian Coast Guard's Sir Wilfrid Laurier as well as the Royal Canadian Navy. Smaller research vessels, R/V Investigator and the Gannett and Kinglett from the Canadian Hydrographic Service, were also used. R/V Martin Bergmann is owned by the Arctic Research Foundation, an organization formed by BlackBerry co-founder Jim Balsillie, who played an instrumental role in the discovery of the Franklin ship.
Victorian England was enthralled by the story of Franklin's expedition, which failed after the vessels become locked in ice and the crews perished. Successive British recovery missions failed to find the ships but managed to chart significant portions of the Arctic – a legacy that benefited Canadians for years to come.
Since 2008, six searches led by Parks Canada have scoured hundreds of square kilometres of Arctic seabed, a hunt driven by what a senior Conservative called Mr. Harper's "genuine, nerdy interest" in the romantic story but also a desire to engage in myth-making that might capture the imagination of Canadians.
It's possible the ship may never be raised but left in its resting place after artifacts are removed because the risks of extraction, and the cost of preservation, will be very steep.
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The Canadian government, meanwhile, is trying to keep private explorers at bay as long as possible. It not only refuses to pinpoint the location of the wreck but also adamantly declines to identify which day it was first found for fear freelance divers may be drawn to the site.
The government says it remains undecided about whether to leave the wreck or remove and preserve it, as Norwegians are doing with explorer Roald Amundsen's ship Maud, which has laid for decades in the harbour of Cambridge Bay, Nunavut.
Canada promised Britain in a 1997 agreement that it would refrain from disturbing or bringing to the surface any human remains discovered on the wreck or in the vicinity, except if they need to be removed to conduct archeological work.
The wreck offers possible answers to what befell the doomed Franklin expedition, but also the prospect of an archeological treasure trove of artifacts, from military equipment to daguerreotype pictures to items sealed in watertight containers.
Gold is one potential find Canada and Britain have already anticipated. The 1997 deal says London will assign Canada ownership of everything recovered except for gold and artifacts deemed important to the Royal Navy. Should gold be discovered, it will be split between London and Ottawa once coins deemed to be privately owned or claimed by third parties are deducted from the haul.
Canada also promised Britain that it wouldn't rush excavation of the shipwreck for publicity.Woman fends off would-be kidnapper
2011-09-15 09:08:00 PST -- A woman thwarted a kidnapping attempt in South San Francisco on Saturday when she fended off the attacker and kicked him to the ground, police said.
The woman was jogging north on Centennial Way, just north of South Spruce Avenue, at around 7:30 a.m. when a man approached her from behind and grabbed her by the waist, police said.
He said "You are coming with me," in Spanish, according to police, but the woman broke away from his grip, turned toward him and kicked him to the ground.
When he fell, she noticed a small utility knife in his hand, police said. She ran north and escaped without injury.
When she reported the incident to police on Wednesday, the woman described the suspect as a Hispanic man in his late 30s with a heavy build, approximately 5 feet 4 inches tall with dark, slicked-back hair, brown eyes and large, round cheeks. He was wearing a black sweatshirt, black crew pants and black shoes.During the third and final presidential debate, Republican nominee Donald Trump accused his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton of paying people to incite violence at his rallies.
"If you look at what came out today on the clips," he said, "I was wondering what happened with my rally in Chicago and other rallies where we had such violence. She’s the one, and Obama, that caused the violence. They hired people, they paid them $1,500, and they’re on tape saying, be violent, cause fights, do bad things."
He continued: "When I saw what they did, which is a criminal act by the way, where they’re telling people to go out and start fist-fights and start violence. In particular in Chicago people were hurt, and people could’ve been killed in that riot. And that was now all on tape started by her."
In case you don’t know about "the clips," Trump is referring to a video released this week by Project Veritas Action, a conservative group that went undercover to secretly record Democratic operatives discussing plans to cause trouble at Trump events.
There’s a lot to unravel in Trump’s comment, and too much remains unknown to put it on the Truth-O-Meter. The video Trump referenced also comes from a controversial group that has been accused in the past of purposefully editing footage to advance their agenda.
But the video is certainly provocative and is likely to be discussed in the days to come. So we thought it important to lay out what we know so far.
The video
Project Veritas is an organization founded by James O’Keefe, a 32-year-old conservative activist. He first came to prominence in 2009 when he posted undercover videos that alleged illegal activity by employees of ACORN, the community action group that helped register low-income people to vote.
Previous sting operations from Project Veritas have led to resignations of Democratic operatives and NPR executives.
The 16-minute video released Oct. 17, part one in what will be a four-part series called "Rigging the Election," dramatically begins with O’Keefe promising to expose the "the dark background dealings of the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign."
"What you’re about to see will make you uncomfortable and angry. It’s graphic, uncensored and disturbing," O’ |
of St George Illawarra forward Will Matthews on a two-year deal.
Matthews, 29, has played 93 NRL games during stints with both Gold Coast and the Dragons.
Vikings coach Denis Betts said: “We have been interested in Will for some time, so I am very pleased to have secured this deal.
Will Matthews of the Dragons. Picture: Mark Evans Source: News Corp Australia
“Will is a quality player and will add a lot to the team with his experience of playing in the NRL.
“He is strong and carries the ball well, but can also offload and support attacking plays effectively too.”
EELS’ ‘CRAZY’ CREW
Parramatta have built a formidable forward pack with the likes of Tepai Moeroa, Manu Ma’u, Nathan Brown, Kenny Edwards and Beau Scott leading the way.
They all have plenty of aggression in their game which is just the way Eels coach Brad Arthur likes it.
“We have a certain style of footy that we like to play,” Arthur told NRL 360.
“Those blokes are tough, they don’t leave anything out on the field. They just have a red hot crack.
“I’m very demanding of our players physically and every one of our players always gives up 100 per cent in the physical department.”
When asked who was the hardest to control, Arthur said: “... Sometimes in the heat of the battle, Manu’s very aggressive and sometimes he might have a slip of the brain... Browny, but I ask them to push the boundaries.
“I ask them to play right on the limit. Sometimes as a coach I’ve got to wear that.”
DALEY TO TITANS?
The Daily Telegraph’s Phil Rothfield wrote on Sunday that Gold Coast are very keen on luring Laurie Daley to the club.
The Titans are looking for a coach following Neil Henry’s sacking and Daley is one of a number of possible contenders.
“He’s not pitching for the job at all, but the people I spoke to at the Titans are looking for more than just a good NRL coach,” Rothfield told NRL 360.
“They’re looking for a corporate person, a face of the club, someone who can control Jarryd Hayne and he is very much in their eyesight.
“They want to talk to him as soon as he gets back from Hawaii.”
FREDDY STILL IN THE DARK
Former NSW Origin star Brad Fittler says he’s yet to hear from the NSWRL about the vacant Blues coaching role.
Fittler is regarded as the favourite to take over the role from Laurie Daley who’s contract wasn’t renewed after another failed series campaign.
Brad Fittler is favourite to get the NSW coaching gig. Source: AAP
“Nothing’s been mentioned as yet,” Fittler told Channel Seven.
“I know the board are meeting in a couple of weeks so I think from there they’ll make a decision on what path they’re going to go down.
“There’s a few people that’d be interested, but in each of those cases things would have to work out with their current employment, like mine at the moment.
“It’s a really good group (of players) coming through.”
‘YOU CAN’T STOP HIM’
Injured Parramatta star Clint Gutherson admits his side has a huge task ahead of them in stopping North Queensland wrecking ball Jason Taumalolo.
The NZ international ran 234 metres against Cronulla on Sunday and will be vital to his side’s chances when they face the Eels.
“I don’t think you really can stop him,” Gutherson admitted on NRL Tonight.
“He’s always going to be damaging and he puts the whole team on his back and you see that weekly.
“He’s the forward, if not player in the world at the moment.
“... If we can go about stopping him, it’ll go a long way to helping us win.”ISLAMABAD: With biggies like ‘Dabangg’, ‘Golmaal-3’ and ‘Guzaarish’ being screened and no new Urdu film being released, Indian movies were the big draw for Pakistani cineastes on Eid Wednesday with filmmakers admitting that the local industry just could not match up.
Pakistani cinema has been on the decline for several years and the situation this year seemed no different. There are hardly any movies being produced in the national language Urdu, and there are few takers for the handful of low-quality Punjabi and Pashto movies that are released.
“On this Eid day, only two Punjabi movies, ‘Ilyasa Gujjar’ and ‘Numberdarni’, have been released in local cinemas,” said “Numberdarni” director Masood Butt.
He expressed the hope that the cinema culture would be revived and Pakistani audiences could see quality films in Urdu. However, Nawab Hasan Siddiqui, CEO of Mandwiwalla Entertainment that runs several cinema houses in different cities, was not very hopeful.
“The local industry is not able to fulfill the demands of the public because the producers are not ready to spend huge amounts on the movies due to high risk factors,” Siddiqui told.
“If we don’t show Indian movies, the cinema culture that has been revived somewhat by Indian movies will also die down,” he observed.
He was of the view that “the quality of Indian films, story line and star cast were enough of a reason to pull crowds to the theatres”.
The Pakistani film industry did provide competition to Indian movies for a few years after partition of the subcontinent in 1947 but gradually went into decline.
There are now hardly any big names left to produce, direct or act in local movies — barely six-eight films, mostly in regional languages, are made each year.
In contrast, the Indian film industry has flourished, producing more than 1,000 movies a year — with Bollywood contributing about 300 films every year.
Indian movies were banned from Pakistani cinemas after the war between both countries in 1965. The decades from then to now saw audiences deserting theatres, many of which were replaced by shopping malls.
Indian movies were allowed to be screened in cinema halls in 2007 during the tenure of former president Pervez Musharraf. New cinemas have since come up and Pakistani audiences are queuing up again.Image caption The Blue Bottle by Fernand Leger was recovered in the estate of an art dealer
Four paintings worth $1m (£625,000) stolen from a New York gallery have been recovered in Germany 24 years on.
A total of six contemporary artworks were taken from the Soloman Gallery in 1988, with one turning up in 2003.
But the remainder of works remained hidden until they turned up in the estate of a dead German art dealer.
The dealer's daughter had attempted to get the paintings authenticated, alerting the Art Loss Register (ALR) to their whereabouts.
The ALR said there was still one painting yet to be found.
Mulberry Centre by Franz Kline was stolen along with five other works by Robert Motherwell, Karel Appel, Jean Dubuffet and Fernand Leger.
In 2003 the Appel canvas was recovered after a solicitor working for the unnamed German art dealer searched the ALR database, alerting authorities to it existence.
The dealer claimed to have unwittingly bought five of the six stolen paintings, but no financial records could be located and none of the other paintings could be located as the lawyer refused to divulge his client's name.
Image caption Ink on Paper by Franz Kline was among the paintings stolen
'Uncomfortable issues'
Four of the paintings were discovered when the daughter of the now deceased art dealer, approached New York's Dedalus Foundation to authenticate one of the artworks.
The organisation alerted the ALR, who despatched a team to identify the artworks.
ALR lawyer Christopher A Marinello said: "We're going to make life difficult for those who attempt to sell stolen art.
"You can hide behind lawyers and look for loopholes in civil law jurisdictions, but eventually you're going to have to deal with some very uncomfortable issues.
"The problem will not simply disappear with the passage of time. Leaving stolen artworks to the next generation is a losing proposition."
The paintings are now owned by the gallery's insurance company which is currently holding talks with the former gallery owners about returning the pictures to their collection.Text and Photos by Adrian Fleur, Feb 7, 2014
Koh Phangan is now notorious for its full moon parties at Haad Rin Beach and has been frequented (some might say ‘plagued’) by backpackers and gap year travellers since the first one kicked off the monthly tradition in 1985. Today, the event draws crowds of 5,000 – 30,000 every month, most of whom are Westerners.
The modern event is now a popular item on the bucket list of many travellers to Southeast Asia, despite any detrimental socio-cultural or environmental effects their choices might bring to the island. In his article, Henton writes, “Parties seem to be yet another hedonistic playpen for actuarial science students whose idea of a spiritual experience is getting a henna tattoo.”
He goes on to mention some notable deaths of party-goers, like the ‘accidental’ shooting of a 22-year-old British tourist, who was struck in his side by a stray bullet while he was merrily dancing away on the beach. The gun was homemade, and the assailant casually apologetic, saying, “I was aiming at someone else but the foreigner got in the way.”
That was on New Year’s Eve 2012, when tourism officials reported that the island had seen at least 80,000 visitors from abroad, which is tens of thousands more than the island ever saw a decade ago. A common sentiment from travellers to the region is that full moon parties were the highlight of their trip to Thailand, while Thais themselves are mostly conservative and modest – qualities which are adverse to the YOLO-themed parties and the reckless attitudes of their attendees.
Natural Koh Phangan beauty.
Drug-taking drunk people in minimal clothing cause Thais to view foreigners in a negative light, and given that what commonly happens at full moon parties is undeniably culturally unacceptable, it’s no wonder there is an underlying shared resentment from the locals. Imagine the nurses, who have to treat ill-mannered injured party-goers; the police, who have to deal with disorderly drunks; the bar staffs, who have to work 16 hour shifts only to clean up the trash and clear out the people before the new work night starts; and the Thais working on the island in any other capacity, whether it be fishing or serving customers at a bike rental shop, who have to be faced with the blatant self-absorption of daytime-drinking travellers in barely-there bikinis and shorter-than-short shorts. It’s no surprise foreigners infested with a decency-lacking disease find themselves in trouble, and authorities tend to sweep them under the sandy rug in a bid to rid themselves of the pests.
On the other hand, Koh Phangan’s spiralling social situation is no excuse for the violent crimes that occur more and more frequently during the high seasons. Shootings often spring up in bars and beaches, which is not shocking when you consider the rate of gun ownership in Thailand is the highest in all of Asia (the figures are believed to be around 15.6 guns per 100 people). Stabbings are common, especially when fistfights escalate, and when alcohol is involved. Rape and sexual assaults at island parties are now something that governments include in their travel warnings to citizens when visiting Thailand, with many of those victims leaving the islands without reporting, or perhaps even remembering, the crime.
And, to put the cherry on the top of the crime-riddled cake, countless allegations of corruption flood the internet’s forums from people who have visited Koh Phangan, where it is supposedly common knowledge that drunk driving and joint-toking goes unpunished. Except, of course, when a member of the Royal Thai Police decides to trick an unsuspecting cannabis-connoisseur by selling them a spliff and then promptly arresting them. Thailand is notorious for its war on drugs, and around 60% of its prisoners are locked up on drug-related offences, many of them low-level dealers and smugglers.
The island still has a small-town feeling despite the thousands of monthly visitors.
To further burn the name of Koh Phangan, in September last year, the Phuket Wan news site quoted Australia’s honorary consul on Phuket, Larry Cunningham, talking about criminals at full moon parties on Koh Phangan as “some of the worst criminals in Thailand... rapists, murderers and thieves, and some are corrupt police.” He recalls an incident of a distressed young woman walking into the Australian Embassy in Bangkok dressed in just a t-shirt and bikini. Sadly, she had been raped and robbed of all her belongings at a party and shoved onto a bus back to Bangkok.
Cunningham added that he felt many of the Australians visiting the islands think they can do as they please, including breaking laws. He goes on to say, “We have got to get the message across that people shouldn’t leave their brains behind when they come to Thailand.” This statement supports the views of Chiang Mai-based Alex, who is the co-owner of the Off The Path Travel website. In his article about Koh Phangan full moon parties, he lists three unavoidable reasons why travellers should skip the party altogether: it negatively affects the environment, it’s corrupt, and it’s dangerous.
Alex writes: “Haad Rin was a pristine beach. Now it’s one of the dirtiest beaches in Thailand.” The guys behind the Environmental Grafitti website agree, stating that Koh Phangan’s full moon parties alone produce around 12 tonnes of rubbish a day. They also mention that “Thailand lacks an infrastructure that is able to deal with waste disposal in any efficient, cyclical way” which is especially harmful for an island, where garbage has to be ferried to the mainland for disposal (or, hopefully, recycling).
Another day, another perfect sunset.
There is hope on the filthy horizon, though. The president of the Koh Phangan Hotels Association, Thanyah Phoolsawad, said it was clear that the island was growing without any direction. He said the damaged environment, lack of safety, skilled labour shortages, and favouring construction of new accommodation over beautiful, unspoiled nature were all crippling positive growth on the island, and that “we need to do something to create sustainable growth in the long term.”
An annual underwater clean-up day is held by The Sail Rock Divers Resort along with help from the Thai navy, government and local volunteers. Participants venture out to Koh Ma and Mae Haad in boats and swim below to where deteriorating dive sites are being suffocated by litter, overfishing, and bad snorkelling practices. They regularly hold clean-up days around the island and promote awareness of marine conservation. Their bar is one of the island’s many nightlife establishments that is catching onto the trend of recycling all their plastic and glass, which in turn attracts more responsible travellers.
The Tourism Authority of Thailand, along with the government, have been scrambling to change the public’s view of party island Koh Phangan by rebranding it as an eco-tourist island, full of eco-adventures and green-friendly accommodations, while plenty of dive schools promote sensitivity to nature, and aim to educate visitors to the fragile aquatic ecosystem which is so vital to the island.
Furry island friends.
protest which pressured the government into revoking oil exploration grants in nearby waters. They called for alternative energy production and low energy systems instead. At present, electricity is provided to the islands by underwater cables, which can only sustain them for the next decade or so. On a larger scale, the Siam Gulf Preservation Network Group, which is supported by Greenpeace, brought the islands of Koh Samui, Koh Phangan and Ko Tao together in 2010 to hold ‘Kill the Drill’, ainto revoking oil exploration grants in nearby waters. They called for alternative energy production and low energy systems instead. At present, electricity is provided to the islands by underwater cables, which can only sustain them for the next decade or so.
the island has its own development plan for the future, and wishes to promote more sports and music-related events. He also says he’s adamantly avoiding Koh Samui’s model of rapid-growth tourism, and instead wants to focus on recreating the popular party spot as a haven for health and wellness, for example, or historical tourism. Tourism and Sports Minister Somsak Pureesrisak says, and wishes to promote more sports and music-related events. He also says he’s adamantly avoiding Koh Samui’s model of rapid-growth tourism, and instead wants to focus on recreating the popular party spot as a haven for health and wellness, for example, or historical tourism.
I’ll leave you with some thoughts about the famous full moon parties of Koh Phangan from Off The Path Travel’s Alex, who writes, “A lot of tourists make the excuse that they ‘just want to see it once’ so it’s not a big deal. The fact is that most travellers only see it once, which keeps all the negative things happening.” So, encouraging visitors to travel responsibly and feel the weight of their decisions in someone else’s country is one way to alleviate the wounds of this particular island, but another way is for us, the public, to not allow or accept the behaviour of tourists ‘merely looking for a good time’ at the expense of the environment, the locals, and the country.The news that PE is set to become a Leaving Certificate subject has students around the country rejoicing at what could be seen as an easy A1 come exam time. It's first exam will be in 2020 and it's expected to be introduced to more than 50 schools. But what form will the curriculum take? Well it should surely take inspiration from his origins as a complete doss class. Here is what PE class should look like now that it's a Leaving Cert exam.
1. If you have a note from a parent you are exempt from the exam and automatically pass the exam
Could prove quite controversial and many students may opt for it.
2. If you forget your gym clothes you automatically fail the exam
There has to be consequences people.
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3. A dodgeball fight to the death will constitute 20% of your grade
One of the only other games that students actually enjoyed in PE playing was dodgeball. Not especially for the love of the game, but more for the opportunity to absolutely lamp the head off some poor chap.
4. If you get stuck in goals you get extra credit
Like the extra credit you get if you do the Leaving Cert 'as Gaeilge'. If you get stuck between the sticks for a prolonged time during any class you should be rewarded in kind. It's only fair.
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5. A customary 'Bleep test'
Ah the fabled bleep test, the bane of many an unfit school kid. Apart from the couple of freaks that could seemingly go for days. This would be 5% of your overall mark.
6. You have to wear your favourite jersey to every class
Standard operating procedure here folks, extra points if they're vintage.
7. For the written part of the Leaving Certificate exam you must write a 2,000 words essay on why you should play football
Every single class of PE started the same way. A brow beaten teacher would try to introduce some diversity into proceedings. unihoc, badminton. anything. But try as they might they would not be able to quell the rallying call that was 'Miss/Sir can we play football?'. But some of the more stubborn teachers would go against the grain much to the chagrin of the soccer loving rabble. So this section of the new PE curriculum would engage students making them create compelling arguments as to why we should play soccer above any other sport.Because of the greatness of the leading man, there’s a spot on Cleveland’s roster that’s often easy to take for granted. That is, of course, until you need him. That roster spot belongs to the backup 3. You know, the guy behind LeBron James. During last year’s postseason run – as injuries continued to mount – the Wine and Gold looked to Mike Miller and Shawn Marion to pick up some of the slack. And while both players were well-established NBA veterans and, in Marion’s case, a potential Hall of Famer, neither provided Cleveland much relief in the later rounds of the Playoffs. Miller played in nine postseason games, but attempted just five shots in the tournament. Marion played in just six contests – and didn’t see a single minute of action in the 2015 Finals. So this offseason, the Wine and Gold picked up a player who’s been nothing short of a massive upgrade at the position – 15-year vet Richard Jefferson. In the regular season, Jefferson was rock-solid in relief of James – playing in 74 games, starting five, and averaging 5.5 points on 46 percent shooting. The 13th overall pick of the 2001 Draft notched double-figures on 15 occasions, led the team in steals nine times, blocks four times and once in scoring – a 20-point effort in Miami. In 15 seasons, Jefferson’s reached the Playoffs in 11 of them – including his first six in New Jersey and just last year with the Mavericks. This spring, R.J. is making his third career trip to the Eastern Conference Finals – and he can say that he’s played a major part in helping his squad reach that point. "I was brought here to add depth and provide some versatility and space the floor." Richard Jefferson - Cavaliers Forward Through Cleveland’s first eight games, he’s been the model of efficiency – shooting 56 percent from the floor and 53 percent from beyond the arc. In the Second Round matchup with Atlanta, Jefferson was nearly perfect – shooting 75 percent (9-of-12) from the field, 83 percent (5-of-6) from long-distance. As the Cavaliers gear up for their Eastern Conference Finals battle with the Raptors, Cavs.com sat down with Jefferson to talk about his first postseason run with the Wine and Gold …
You’ve been to the Playoffs with five different teams over your career. What’s unique about this one?
Richard Jefferson: I would say our balance.
I’m not saying we’re the best team in this league, but I don’t feel like we have a weakness. We have post-up talent, we have interior talent, we have shooting and we have depth. We give teams matchup problems, when you look at what Kevin and Channing bring to the table. We really don’t have a weakness, per se, that you can exploit.
This year, you’ve been LeBron’s backup at the 3, but the coaches have had you both on the floor quite a bit throughout the Playoffs. How effective has that been?
Jefferson: Well, our coaches put LeBron in with the second unit – take him out early at times in that first quarter and let him play with the second unit.
So there’s some different things that we can run, especially with Channing’s ability to spread the floor. It allows (LeBron) to post up. And it makes it tough because it takes their 5 away from the basket. So, if (LeBron)’s posting up or driving, if you go to help, he’s kicking it to maybe our best spot-up shooter.
So there’s a lot advantages that come with that lineup.
You went to the Conference Finals in your first two seasons out of Arizona. What’s that like for a young player?
Jefferson: I thought that’s the way it was! And what’s crazy is that it’s been 13 years since I’ve gone to the Conference Finals.
I’ve been on tons of playoff teams, I’ve been to the Second Round multiple times. But I know how rare it is. I just remember my fifth or sixth year in New Jersey when I could see the team just wasn’t really right; they just had a different feel about them.
I just remember wishing that I was with another contending team. And so, trust me, I’m happy to be here.
I was living in New York, but it was a different time then.
During my rookie year, 9/11 happened, and it was really just a somber time. I remember the Yankees lost in the World Series and then all of sudden the Knicks are terrible and the Nets are great.
It was just a weird time with so much going on in the Tri-State area. People were like: ‘The Nets are good?!’
Yeah, we were. And yeah, we were fun to watch. So that time was unique and that era was a lot of fun.
How do you explain being in such a great rhythm during the current Playoffs?
Jefferson: Well, I just think as an old man, the 82 games is just not for me anymore. (laughs)
I see the benefit where you need me to step in for a game if someone’s out. But over the long haul, that’s what I was brought here for. I was brought here to add depth and provide some versatility and space the floor.
And even though I’m 35 and I’ve played a thousand games, I was available to play all 82. There was no ‘Richard, we’re going to rest you on this day.’
But now that we’re in the Playoffs and we’re playing every other day. We’ve had eight days off – twice! So as far my body and how I feel, my body feels amazing. This is as good as I’ve felt all year. And a lot of guys on this team are in the same space.
What did you bring this team that it didn’t have last year – especially at this time of year?
Jefferson: I knew how much I had in the tank and I knew that I could contribute.
So when I looked at this situation, I can’t say exponentially, but I felt like I could make this a better team. I was like: ‘If I can get here and I can stay healthy throughout the year, I make this a better team.’
As a long-time veteran, what can you say about the job Tyronn Lue has done?
Jefferson: He’s a guy that’s been so respected for so long in this league.
I played together with him in Milwaukee. Guys around this league, they all like T-Lue. You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone that’s ever played with him or had interaction with him that doesn’t love him or think he’s hilarious or doesn’t like being around him.
He works extremely hard, he knows his stuff, he takes his time and everything is well thought out.
Not to take anything from Coach Blatt, but T-Lue and his approaches aren’t really that much different. I think what T-Lue has gotten guys to do is play a little bit faster, increase the pace – which has increased how productive we are. And I think everybody benefits from that.
Where are you at in this stage of your career?
Jefferson: I’m an old man on my way out, but we went to the Playoffs my first six years and it was just like: ‘This is what we’re built for.’
Not every body’s built for 82 games. I’ve played 79 or more I think seven or eight times in my career. This year, I got some DNP’s, but I was ready to go. That doesn’t mean you’re going to be healthy for all 82; you’re never healthy for all 82. But my thinking is: ‘If I’m healthy enough to go out there and not do damage to the team, I’m gonna go play.’
Not everyone has that mindset. You see guys 26 years old taking time off for rest. That blows my mind, but it actually does make sense. Unless you have an active streak like Tristan, you should give your guys their rest. They started doing that for 30- and 35-year-old guys and saw how it prolonged guys’ careers.
I take pride – and I have never taken it for granted – how blessed and fortune I am to be healthy and to have been good teams and in good situations over the course of my career.On his office balcony Jeremy Corbyn has a small olive tree, and he once promised branches for his opponents. But the little tree need not fear being stripped bare: not one branch has yet been proffered. The man of peace shows no magnanimity in his great victory. Instead his gentler, kinder politics is bent on securing an absolute grip on the party, seizing all levers through control over the party’s rule-making body – the national executive committee (NEC). His calls for “unity” are only a call for capitulation and obedience.
If you can’t beat Jeremy Corbyn, you’d better try to learn from him | Andrew Rawnsley Read more
He faces a host of adamant, despairing, irreconcilables on the backbenches. True, he has trounced them so thoroughly that any mutterings of future challenges are an empty blast of sour breath. Some behaved neither wisely nor well – though Owen Smith, who faced the contemptuous daily catcalling with bravery and good humour, deserves more praise than he gets.
Corbyn could apply a little balm to the great gash in his party. If he meant peace and unity, he could stop dead all talk of deselecting MPs, and protect MPs such as Walthamstow’s Stella Creasy and Brighton’s Peter Kyle, threatened by bullies acting in his name. He could just say no, but he doesn’t. When he says “the vast majority” won’t be deselected that’s an unveiled threat. When he says it’s down to the democratic decision of local parties, he makes “democracy” sound like a nuclear weapon – an idea borrowed from his mentor Tony Benn’s Campaign for Labour Party Democracy.
If unity were his mission, he could return to the 2011 rule giving MPs a vote for shadow cabinet places. He can and does ignore the shadow cabinet’s views – but they would get three crucial places on the NEC, and that’s why he refuses.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘If Corbyn meant peace and unity, he could stop dead all talk of deselecting MPs, and protect MPs such as Walthamstow’s Stella Creasy’ (pictured above). Photograph: Linda Nylind for the Guardian
The key rule change he wants from the NEC is to reduce the votes of MPs and MEPs needed to put a candidate on the ballot in future leadership elections from 15% to 5%: that ensures one of his own on the list, and the present party membership would then be able to select a successor in Corbyn’s image.
How shortsighted not to make minor concessions that would put opponents in his debt. All this Machiavellian back-room manoeuvring is out of keeping with his benign, almost devotional image. The few iron-fisted organisers bent on deselections are well hidden from the great wave of sincere followers.
I have been besieged at this Labour conference by thoroughly decent people who cannot understand why I and many Guardian colleagues can’t just get behind Corbyn. Doesn’t he stand for all the things we advocate? Some are young, but many are my age flocking back to Labour after leaving long ago over Iraq and a host of disappointments. Everyone – yes, everyone they know – has joined this mass movement, this great wave for a better society. If only we would see that they are ready to sweep the country off its feet, a Podemos, part of a great global shift – so please, please, join us!
Now Labour’s two sides can start to bridge the great divide | Gary Younge Read more
They are polite and earnest, not brick throwers, but good people who have mainly spent lifetimes in the public or charity sectors. Look at John McDonnell’s strong speech on the economy, which does promise so much I would support, and little in principle I would disagree with – from a higher minimum wage, to taxing the avoiders and investing in industry. So why not?
My answers sound cynical, worldly and unworthy in the face of this surge of belief. Why not? Because Corbyn and McDonnell, burdened by their history, will never ever earn the trust of enough voters to make any plans happen. After George Osborne’s lethally successful branding of Labour as irresponsible, debt-ridden, magic-money-tree feckless borrowers, it will take heavy spadework of reassurance to win back trust. All McDonnell’s plans are popular, but he offers nothing to allay the voters’ fear that Labour doesn’t do “tough choices”.
At one conference meeting when a speaker said Labour must win some Tory votes, someone shouted out: “Why? We don’t want Tories!” So I find myself arguing dry psephology against passionate conviction. It’s depressing, but here’s the Fabian Society’s analysis: Labour needs 104 seats in England and Wales and 40% of the vote to win. In the marginals, four out every five of the extra votes must come from those who were Tory last time. Even if the young are energised and turnout soars to Scottish referendum heights, it gets nowhere close. Even if every single Liberal Democrat and Green vote went Labour, that only gives 29 seats. Even if Ukip were crushed, its vote divides equally Labour and Tory. As Labour wins radical votes, it risks losing moderate votes to the Tories: 2% went that way last time. Read the research yourself and groan. It hurts.
In one fraught conversation after another, I try all this on Corbyn believers but to no avail. No compromise, blocked ears, total denial of electoral facts, a post-truth conviction. You can hear this non-meeting of minds everywhere at this conference, a shutter of incomprehension dividing the two sides. “But we can convince them! People will listen!” They do think Corbyn will be the next prime minister, because conviction moves mountains. These are likable people, and I envy their certainty – the way you can envy the religious their delusions.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest The comedian Eddie Izzard (centre) in the audience at the Labour conference. Photograph: Jon Super/EPA
A solid old councillor from Sunderland spoke up emotionally at one meeting about his experience, week in and week out, on the doorstep. His local party has doubled in size – though none join the small bunch of doughty old canvassers. He finds half the old Labour voters on his patch turning away: not Labour any more, not while Corbyn’s the leader, they say.
The refusenik MPs, struggling to find their footing after this crushing defeat, seem all over the place, thrashing about for a handhold as the abyss opens under their feet. Some are snatching at “No free movement” as a red line in the Brexit negotiations, as if anti-immigration might save them between the Scylla and Charibdis of Ukip and Momentum. But McDonnell struck the better note on cleaving to the single market.
What hope for a party that threatens to be irrelevant for years to come? The best of Labour is in power, in the cities as leaders and mayors, competent and imaginative in struggling with monstrous cuts – from London’s Sadiq Khan to Nick Forbes in Newcastle. Otherwise it’s a matter of waiting until enough party members come to terms with grim electoral reality and decide to compromise with the voters. Does that really need a devastating election defeat?THE HAGUE, Netherlands -- Iran's tortured relations with the United States took a bizarre turn this month when two Iranian judges beat up a Swedish arbitrator involved in settling thousands of claims between the two countries.
The brawl did more than explode the silence normally surrounding the work of the Iran-U.S claims tribunal, created in 1981 as part of an accord that freed 52 Americans held hostage for more than a year at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.
As a result of the beating, the tribunal's deliberations have been suspended, leaving in doubt the future of more than 3,000 claims involving billions of dollars.
The tribunal comprises three American judges, three Iranians and three neutrals -- two from Sweden and one from the Netherlands. It is the only forum in which Americans and Iranians have maintained regular high-level contact.
The future of these contacts has been in jeopardy since about 10 a.m. Sept. 3.
The tribunal's Iranian and American members had taken their seats in the chamber. When Judge Nils Mangard of Sweden walked in, Judges Mahmoud M. Kashani and Shafey Shafeiei ofIran sprang from their seats, grabbed him by the collar, twisted his arm behind his back and began pounding him.
Police rushed to rescue the 69-year-old Lagergren, escorting him out of the chamber. He was not hurt badly, but Iranian-American relations had taken another bashing.
The tribunal's Swedish president, Judge Gunnar Lagergren, immediately canceled all further proceedings.
'It was an incident which appears to be without precedent in the history of international arbitration,' Lagergren said in a letter to the U.S. and Iranian governments.
'I determine that a situation exists in which the conduct of arbitration in an appropriate manner is for the time being not feasible.'
Officials who reported the incident declined to be specific about what set it off. Lagergren says it came after months of pent-up frustration among the Iranians.
The outburst was not the end of the matter. Two days later, Kashani threatened to kill Mangard.
'If Mangard ever dares to enter the tribunal chamber again, either his corpse or my corpse will leave it rolling down the stairs,' he was quoted by diplomats as telling tribunal officials.
Dutch police have taken no action. The incident is regarded as a tribunal matter and all the officials involved have diplomatic immunity.
'There are simply no rules in the international law books on how to deal with an assault by one arbitrator on another,' said Lagergren.
Swedish Embassy officials said their government had no official view on the matter because the judges were involved in an international forum and did not represent Sweden.
U.S. representative John Crook, who witnessed the'simply shocking' attack on Mangard, said the United States is outraged at the Iranians' behavior.
'Dr. Kashani and his collegues have not only refused to apologize for this incident, but they are continuing to use language that is threatening and absolutely unacceptable,' he said.
'We have expressed our outrage to the agent of the Islamic Republic of Iran and we have called upon him to ensure such an incident is not repeated.'
Kashani wrote the tribunal a letter complaining that Mangard is not objective. Although tribunal officials would not reveal the letter's exact contents, they recalled that Iran's bid to have Mangard ousted was turned down in 1982.
To date, neither Iran nor the United States have said what they plan to do about the the future of tribunal, whose judges work with a staff of 70 people from 18 nations.
By June 30, according to a tribunal spokesman, the judges had settled 324 of the 3,800-odd cases left pending by the breakdown in relations that followed the overthrow of the late Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and the subsequent hostage crisis.
The last major settlement came a month ago when the tribunal granted $49.8 million to R.J. Reynolds Tobacco International Inc. of North Carolina to cover payment for tobacco shipments to Iran prior to the U.S. embassy |
every major decision was made in the first 500 days and those were the decisions that had the consequences in the rest of the Bush administration, decisions that we’re living with even ‘til this day. So, at that point, I decided to reshape the whole book and make it focus in on that incredibly important period of 500 days.”Eichenwald said his goal in the book was to have people “understand the full history of what happened and if something’s secret, I want to figure out what it was.”Among his findings were:Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally in North Charleston, S.C., in February. (Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images)
Freeze and fire — opposites in nature, but pillars of Donald Trump’s approach to the federal workforce.
The president-elect plans to freeze federal hiring soon after taking office to fight corruption. Freezes have been imposed before — although not with that contorted reasoning — with results ranging from ineffective to injurious. He also wants to fire federal workers faster in the Department of Veterans Affairs, and two of his top advisers are pushing fast-track terminations government-wide.
There are serious problems with both positions. Depending on the rationale, the freeze plan defies good reason or is simply bad policy. Talk of accelerated firing is red meat for Trump supporters, but without careful planning that could threaten civil service protections for the public.
Let’s examine each proposition — freeze today, fire in a later column.
Trump’s “Contract with the American Voter” calls for “a hiring freeze on all federal employees to reduce the federal workforce through attrition (exempting military, public safety, and public health)” as part of his first-100-day agenda. The contract promotes it as one of six measures “to clean up the corruption and special interest collusion in Washington, D.C.”
The problem with Trump’s logic is obvious. To the extent there is corruption, it certainly is not the fault of those who have not yet been hired by the government. Yet that’s the main group a freeze would affect.
Trump’s transition operation did not respond to questions for this column, but last month Hope Hicks, his campaign spokeswoman, sent me this unconvincing argument for a freeze fighting corruption: “In the long term, a smaller federal workforce will mean a more honest and effective government, in which it is harder to hide corruption.”
Reducing the federal workforce long has been pushed by Republicans, but generally they provide more details than Trump has. House Republicans, for example, endorsed a 10 percent workforce cut through attrition over three years in their fiscal 2012 budget proposal prepared by then-House Budget Committee chairman Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), now the speaker. That document did not, however, call for a hiring freeze. In 2010, a bipartisan commission on fiscal responsibility suggested reaching the 10 percent target with a hiring slowdown — two new employees for every three who leave federal service.
Before Trump rushes to impose a freeze, he should take time to consult history. Required reading should be “Recent Government-Wide Hiring Freezes Prove Ineffective in Managing Federal Employment.” Published by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in 1982, this report examines hiring freezes imposed by former presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.
In addition to having “little effect on Federal employment levels,” the GAO said, those freezes “disrupted agency operations, and in some cases, increased costs to the Government.”
Before Trump proceeds, he needs to know, as the GAO does, that freezes caused staffing problems, damaged recruiting efforts, disrupted government operations and lost money owed Uncle Sam.
In their drive to fulfill their missions, agencies circumvented the freezes, the GAO found. Some agencies hired part-time and temporary workers. Some used contractors and increased overtime. Some simply hired more people than allowed. Furthermore, with the military, public safety and public health agencies exempted, much of the government would be excluded from Trump’s freeze, meaning that whatever impact he foresees would be sharply restricted. The Defense and Homeland Security departments alone account for almost half of federal civilian employees. There are, of course, thousands of public safety and health staffers in other agencies.
President Obama, at his news conference Monday, urged Trump to make sure his policies are “thought through.” If Trump gives serious thought to his freeze proposal, here is another point for him to consider — over several decades, the federal workforce has declined significantly compared with the national population. “Since the 1960s, the U.S. population increased by 67 percent, the private sector workforce increased by 136 percent,” according to Obama’s fiscal 2017 budget document, “while the size of the Federal workforce rose about 10 percent.”
Here’s one more item from the GAO report for Trump to ponder. Because the Carter and Reagan freezes led to the loss of 445 IRS revenue agent and auditor staff-years, the amount of tax dollars lost to the government was more than 20 times the amount saved in salary and benefits.
Trump, you’re a businessman. Does that sound like a good deal?
Read more:
Trump links federal hiring freeze to fighting corruption
Trump win stuns federal employee leaders worried about his policies
Christie on Trump’s plan to fire feds faster and clean out Obama’s peopleImage copyright Other
US company SpaceX has postponed an experiment to bring part of its Falcon rocket down to a soft landing on a floating sea platform.
The firm has now rescheduled the Cape Canaveral demonstration for Friday.
Once the first stage of the rocket launches, and has finished its work, it will head back to Earth to try to touch down on a sea barge in the Atlantic.
If this kind of capability can be proven, it promises dramatically lower launch costs in the future.
All segments of a rocket are usually discarded after use and are destroyed as they fall back down.
SpaceX, however, has been practising the controlled return of the first stage of its Falcon 9 vehicle.
The problem responsible for Tuesday's scrub decision related to a technical issue detected in the steering mechanism of the rocket's upper stage.
The next chance to send up the vehicle will be on Friday at 10:09 GMT (05:09 local Florida time).
SpaceX itself has been playing down expectations, rating the chances of success at no more than 50-50.
"I'm pretty sure this will be very exciting, but, as I said, it's an experiment," cautioned Hans Koenigsmann, vice president for mission assurance at SpaceX.
"There's a certain likelihood that this will not work out all right, that something will go wrong. It's the first time we have tried this - nobody has ever tried it as far as we know."
The primary purpose of the flight is to send the Dragon cargo ship on a path to rendezvous with the International Space Station (ISS).
It will be the first American re-supply mission to the orbiting platform since October's spectacular explosion of a freighter system operated by competitor Orbital Sciences Corporation.
But it is the outcome of the SpaceX experiment that is likely to make the headlines.
The firm believes it can return, refurbish and re-use key elements of its rockets.
To this end, it has been testing first-stage boosters that relight their engines to try to slow their fall through the atmosphere, attaching fins to help guide them downwards, and legs to make a stable touchdown.
So far, there have only been mock landings, in which the stage is brought to a hovering position at the surface of the ocean, where, without a solid platform to set down, every booster has subsequently been lost in the water.
Friday's effort will be different in that SpaceX has sent a floating barge to the targeted return site some 300km northeast of Cape Canaveral, Florida.WATERLOO—A few years ago, planners in this booming region of high-tech startups and higher education did something so revolutionary — or ridiculous, depending on your perspective — that shock waves are still reverberating through the development industry. They looked at planning for the future from the perspective of aging baby boomers.
Waterloo planners found home ownership patterns are changing — to the chagrin of builders.
For decades, new housing here, two hours west of Toronto, had been largely two-storey suburban homes on the farmland fringes. Some developments were sprawling so close to environmentally sensitive moraine lands and aquifers — on which the region depends for 80 per cent of its drinking water — that they ran into fierce community opposition. In 2008, a team of civic officials decided to take stock. They analyzed census data from 1991 and 2006 to classify existing housing in the region by age and type and, most importantly, by the number of people aged 50 and up, including the growing cohort of baby boomers, who owned it.
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“What we were trying to figure out was, how many single detached homes were still owned by baby boomers and how many will turn over and be sold in the next 20 years,” says team leader Kevin Eby, the Waterloo director of community planning and himself a baby boomer. “We realized that what they do with them — whether they stay or sell — will have a huge impact on the kind of housing that will need to be built in the future.” What the team discovered was fascinating, if controversial, and has implications for cities across the country, especially when it comes to the growing number of empty-nesters: baby boomers whose kids no longer live at home. By 2016, this demographic is expected to account for about a quarter of Waterloo region’s roughly 500,000 population — some 129,000 people — up from just 79,000 in 2001. The housing study found older residents who lived in the city’s postwar bungalows, built between 1945 and 1965, tended to stay put into the final years of their lives. And if they did move out of those largely 1,200-square-foot two-bedroom houses, the census data suggested baby boomers often snapped them up.
However, the first generations of suburban two-storey family homes — built starting in 1965 to house young baby boomers having families — were getting newer, younger owners at a surprising rate. The team found turnover as high as 30 to 40 per cent for those 2,500-square-foot-plus, three- and four-bedroom suburban-style homes as the first wave of empty-nest baby boomers started to hit their 60s.
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Out of that, planners came up with a theory: the region didn’t need a whole lot more subdivisions of single-family homes, despite the fact that its population is expected to grow by about 230,000 people by 2031. Baby boomers would supply those homes naturally as they age and... well, moved on to a higher place. The study supported what the region had already determined during its official plan process in 2009: that Waterloo only needed to expand its borders by an additional 80 hectares to accommodate enough suburban homes to meet population growth. Instead regional politicians and planners believed the bulk of future housing had to be better suited to the region’s aging population: highrise and midrise condos close to stores, medical centres and amenities, where residents don’t have to climb stairs or do maintenance and no longer drive. Most of that development would be right downtown, along a new $818-million LRT line slated to open in 2017 that will connect the older cores of Waterloo, Kitchener and Cambridge. Home builders were not happy, especially those who had bought up farmland on the outer fringes in anticipation of continued suburban growth. They argued the region already has a serious land shortage that is choking off the supply of new houses, even as controversial semirural projects like Vista Hills, with 480 houses in the first phase of what could be some 1,600 homes, remain just 30 per cent sold after more than two years. A further 1,050 hectares needs to be rezoned on the fringes, they argued, to allow for enough single-family subdivisions. While Waterloo planners never formally published their housing stock study, it became a lightning rod nonetheless and one of the key issues in a hugely controversial Ontario Municipal Board decision in 2013 that backed the developers’ view. The ruling was seen as largely flying in the face of the province’s 2006 Places to Grow legislation, which is aimed at curbing sprawl and intensifying downtown redevelopment. The region appealed, and the case is still in the courts. While the ongoing appeal has technically left the region in a planning limbo, a very dramatic shift is already taking hold. In 2002, 73 per cent of all new housing across the region was traditional, single-family detached homes and 10 per cent was condos or apartments. As of 2014, just 25 per cent were singles and 42 per cent multi-unit residential. Already, condos and apartments such as the Barrel Yards project, right on the LRT line, are springing up in anticipation of future residents that the line is expected to draw. Among these new developments are Momentum Corp.’s Red Condominiums and The42, located just steps from the new restaurants, shops and bars transforming Uptown Waterloo. Both projects were aimed at the region’s large number of young, high-tech professionals, but the builders were surprised to find half their sales were to downsizing baby boomers, says Momentum partner Brian Prudham, 38. That’s despite a significant issue that could impede a mass move out of big family homes by baby boomers — condos here can cost almost as much as resale detached homes, which still average under $400,000.
WHY THE REGION IS WRONG: Peter Norman, urban economist with Altus Group, who testified for developers in the OMB case: Some boomers will “recycle” their homes, but there is no hard evidence they will age any differently than generations in the past, who tended to stay in their homes as long as absolutely possible. Studies have shown boomers will be more likely to retrofit or renovate so they can “age in place,” close to long-time friends and neighbours. Regional planners and politicians have seriously underestimated the additional homes that will be needed to keep up with immigration, echo boomers starting families and new workers migrating to the high-tech hub. “Canadians want to be in houses. Some of them (millennials) may not want to be there quite yet, but we’re a land-rich country and it’s part of our culture.” WHY THE REGION IS RIGHT: Kevin Thomason, local resident and one of the voices of the region’s anti-sprawl movement: House builders are stubbornly clinging to a past that continues to destroy farmland and requires new roads, schools and other costly services that the region can no longer afford. If boomers aren’t yet moving in big numbers, it’s partly because alternatives like urban townhouses, condos and apartments have only recently even been available in the region. And they’ve largely been built by newcomers and builders from other cities who recognize the great need in Waterloo Region. “We’re seeing signs that the future has got to be different than the past — that demographics are changing, that the current generation doesn’t necessarily want the suburban lifestyle and the expensive automobile they grew up with.” PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE HOMEOWNERS:
Marian Kaska stands outside her home in Kitchener, Ont. ( Hannah Yoon for The Toronto Star )
Past: Marian Kasza Age: 61 Home: 1,300-square-foot, three-bedroom bungalow on 53-by-120 foot lot in older Kitchener, close to church and stores Life now: Kasza and her husband looked long and hard 15 years ago for a reasonably sized house, where they felt they could live until the end, just like many of their neighbours. Kasza wanted a garden to fill her post-retirement hours, so a condo was unthinkable. Her husband has since passed away, but he prepared her well before his death for the one chore of home ownership she worried might be most unmanageable as she aged: He taught her how to use a snow blower. “I wanted to be in a place where I wouldn’t have to worry about stairs or moving again.”
Ian Rawlings stands outside his Lakeshore home in Waterloo, Ont. ( Hannah Yoon for The Toronto Star )
Present: Ian Rawlings Age: 61 Home: 2,000-square-foot, three-bedroom suburban home built in 1996 on desirable North Waterloo street Life now: With their child grown and gone, baby boomer Rawlings and his wife turned a spare bedroom into a home office and debated trading down to a condo close to theatre and restaurants. But they couldn’t accept the notion of trading their spacious $500,000+ home for a small condo that would cost about $375,000, plus hefty monthly maintenance fees — even if it meant never having to shovel their double driveway again. It’s too soon to know what they will do in the long run. “I think we’re going to stay put for a while. I hate moving — so there’s a real disincentive there.”
Karen Scian stands outside her new apartment in Waterloo, Ont. ( Hannah Yoon for The Toronto Star )
Future: Karen Scian Age: 50 Home: Brand new, 1,400-square foot, two-bedroom rental apartment in booming Uptown Waterloo’s Barrel Yards Life now: This former Waterloo-area politician, entrepreneur and empty nester cashed out of her 2,800-square-foot, $500,000+ Laurelwoods suburban home last summer after her two children headed off to university. She felt the house market had reached a peak. Rather than put most of her cash into a condo, she joined the ranks of boomers opting to rent. She’s paying $2,000 a month to be within walking distance of restaurants, theatre and the new LRT stop right outside her door. “I love the lifestyle. I love being able to just shut the door and go away without any worries.”The popular tvN drama, “Misaeng,” concluded its first season, but there seems to be a lot of enthusiasm for the production of a second season.
“The scenes in Jordan from episode 20 should be viewed as a preview to season two,” revealed a staff member. “Author Yoon Tae Ho said the second season will feature a lot of scenes in Jordan.”
During a celebration before the season finale, many cast and staff members talked about regrouping, and CEO of CJ E&M Entertainment requested for another season.
Although the responses to season two have been met with great enthusiasm, the production may take more time than the first season. For starters, the second season of the “Misaeng” webtoon series will release in March next year. The dramatization of a webtoon series is based on the plot of the original webtoon.”
“To be honest, it’s still too early to be discussing production,” said a tvN official. “It may even take two years before the second season is released. All we can say now for sure is that the door is open to the possibility of season two.”The Service Employees International Union, one of the nation's largest and most powerful labor organizations, spent more than $14 million last year to promote the push for a $15 an hour minimum wage, according to a report the union filed with the Labor Department Thursday.
The figure shows the extent to which the movement has been stage-managed by unions, which benefit from higher minimum wages since they make non-union labor less competitive.
SEIU, which claims more than two million members, poured at least $12.7 million in 2016 into various organizing committees involved in staging protests and other events, according to its annual LM-2 filing with the Labor Department. That includes $3.6 million to the Fast Food Workers Committee, the main group behind the "Fight For $15" movement, as well as nearly $9 million to various regional workers committees engaged in similar activism. Kendall Fells, the organizing director of Fight for $15, is listed in the SEIU's filing as a "deputy organizing director" at a salary of $146,000.
Another $1.7 million went to the public relations firm Berlin Rosen, which has been prominent in promoting the movement.
Richard Berman, president of the conservative Center for Union Facts, noted that while the unions have gotten several states to adopt the higher wages, it has yet to help them much in organizing workers. "While the SEIU has scored some legislative victories, the union continues to bleed money with no major restaurant organizing win to show for it," Berman said.
Neither the SEIU nor the Fight for $15 responded to a request for comment.
SEIU has been underwriting the $15 minimum wage movement for years. The movement itself was largely the brainchild of David Rolf, president of SEIU Local 775, which represents Washington state workers. He was instrumental in getting Seattle-Tacoma to adopt a $15 rate in 2014, which boosted similar efforts in other cities and states.
In a candid speech at a forum hosted by the liberal Economic Policy Institute in July, Rolf said the SEIU's efforts began in 2012 with a series of strikes it organized with fast-food workers in New York City. "It was one of three pilot [programs] that we were testing in SEIU about strikes for dramatically better wages," he said. The other two programs SEIU ran involved retail workers in Chicago and coffee shop workers in Seattle. Neither of those were successful, but the New York one got some traction — an estimated 200 fast-food workers walked off their jobs — so the union focused its energies on that sector.
"Nationally we decided to resource this fight for $15 in the fast-food sector to start with," Rolf said.
The Service Employees International Union, one of the nation's largest and most powerful labor organizations, spent more than $14 million last year to promote the push for a $15 an hour minimum wage, according to a report the union filed with the Labor Department Thursday.
The figure shows the extent to which the movement has been stage-managed by unions, which benefit from higher minimum wages since they make non-union labor less competitive.
SEIU, which claims more than two million members, poured at least $12.7 million in 2016 into various organizing committees involved in staging protests and other events, according to its annual LM-2 filing with the Labor Department. That includes $3.6 million to the Fast Food Workers Committee, the main group behind the "Fight For $15" movement, as well as nearly $9 million to various regional workers committees engaged in similar activism. Kendall Fells, the organizing director of Fight for $15, is listed in the SEIU's filing as a "deputy organizing director" at a salary of $146,000.
Another $1.7 million went to the public relations firm Berlin Rosen, which has been prominent in promoting the movement.
Richard Berman, president of the conservative Center for Union Facts, noted that while the unions have gotten several states to adopt the higher wages, it has yet to help them much in organizing workers. "While the SEIU has scored some legislative victories, the union continues to bleed money with no major restaurant organizing win to show for it," Berman said.
Neither the SEIU nor the Fight for $15 responded to a request for comment.
SEIU has been underwriting the $15 minimum wage movement for years. The movement itself was largely the brainchild of David Rolf, president of SEIU Local 775, which represents Washington state workers. He was instrumental in getting Seattle-Tacoma to adopt a $15 rate in 2014, which boosted similar efforts in other cities and states.
In a candid speech at a forum hosted by the liberal Economic Policy Institute in July, Rolf said the SEIU's efforts began in 2012 with a series of strikes it organized with fast-food workers in New York City. "It was one of three pilot [programs] that we were testing in SEIU about strikes for dramatically better wages," he said. The other two programs SEIU ran involved retail workers in Chicago and coffee shop workers in Seattle. Neither of those were successful, but the New York one got some traction — an estimated 200 fast-food workers walked off their jobs — so the union focused its energies on that sector.
"Nationally we decided to resource this fight for $15 in the fast-food sector to start with," Rolf said.Toilet Story
We are a group of &ldquomuckrakers&rdquo following our dreams. It all started when one of us was reading the manga, Dr. Slump on the toilet &ndash and the rest is history. In the beginning, we mainly sold ice cream &ndash a big pile of chocolate ice cream sold in containers shaped like a squat toilet. This humorous spin became a great success.After much planning from all of our partners, we finally took the first step towards realizing our dreams in May 2004 with the launch of the &ldquoMarton Restaurant&rdquo. The restaurant immediately caused a stir in Taiwan with its humorous &ldquoout-there&rdquo design. At the start, many people peered in at the restaurant trying to figure out what we were selling &ndash then had a big smile on their face when they finally worked it out. By continuing to come up with great ideas and making improvements on old ones, we have expanded over the past few years from just ice cream into a fully-fledged theme restaurant with stores all over Taiwan. Our stores have also won the support of devoted fans as well.The Doom 2 Variations - A Tribute to Bobby Prince -
- A re-creation of the Doom 2 Videogame soundtrack, with some minor variations in the basic song arrangements, instruments, etc. These songs are all basically created from the original MIDI files that are easily available just about anywhere you search on the Internet. However, due to re-formatting from the game, the notes are no longer properly "sync-ed" to any proper "beats-per-minute" tempo setting, so I really had to do some serious editing and re-arranging of the notes to get them synced properly.
- I also used more modern sounding drum samples and orchestral instrument samples for a more realistic sound.
- And I took some serious "liberties" with the basic arrangements and added some guitar solos or weird guitars and effects over the more static and repetitive parts that I thought just needed "more".
- Beyond that, the tracks are basically what you would hear in the original Doom 2 game. If anyone knows how to embed mp3s into a game setup mod, please feel free to add my versions of these songs to your current game mods.
Please also note that I do not claim any ownership of these songs. That honor belongs the the original composer, the very talented Bobby Prince. I merely re-arranged and re-performed the material that was already there. These songs are good because of Mr. Prince's skills. Thank you very much Bobby.
1 - MAP01 Intermission and Running From Evil
2 - Endgame
3 - MAP02 The Healer Stalks
4 - MAP03 Countdown To Death
5 - MAP04 Between Levels
6 - MAP05 DOOM
7 - MAP06 In The Dark
8 - MAP07 Shawn's Got the Shotgun
9 - MAP08 The Dave D. Taylor Blues
10 - MAP09 Into Sandy's City
11 - MAP10 The Demon is Dead
12 - MAP18 Waiting for Romero to Play
13 - MAP20 Message to the Archvile
14 - MAP23 Bye Bye American Pie
15 - MAP25 Adrian's Asleep
16 - MAP28 Getting Too Tense
17 - MAP30 Opening to Hell
18 - MAP31 Evil Incarnate
19 - MAP32 The Ultimate Challenge
Notes
All music copyright 1994 bpmusic and/or ID Software. Re-arranged and performed by Dimaension X. Recorded and produced by Dave Lanciani at Dimaex Productions, Leominster, MA.
The only guitar used on this recording is my new Schecter Omen 6. I recorded through my trusty Line 6 POD XTLive direct into my new Dell Inspiron 1525 Laptop. All MIDI tracks were re-created and re-arranged in SONAR HS6. All audio recorded in Reaper.
http://dimaensionxblog.blogspot.com
http://www.last.fm/music/Dimaension+X/The+Doom+2+Variations
http://www.last.fm/music/Dimaension+X/+albums
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=949223
Album The Doom 2 Variations: A Tribute to Bobby Prince Artist Dimaension X Identifier the_doom_2_variations Year 2009A collection of data points that may or may not be more than tangentially related:
— The United States allows its businesses to leave the United States pretty much without impediment. Germany makes very difficult for its businesses to leave Germany. Perhaps this is one reason why the United States has millions more workers than living-wage jobs, whereas Germany has the opposite problem.
— The 2007-8 collapse of the housing bubble and the economy has meant that low-tax white-flight exurbs like Belle Plaine, Minnesota are suddenly faced with having to raise the T-Word.
— Speaking of Minnesota, an administrative law judge has decided that a new solar array would be a better deal for the citizens of the Gopher State than would a new power generator fueled by natural gas. If the Public Utilities Commission agrees, Xcel Energy will soon be drastically increasing its solar investment in Minnesota.
— Speaking even more of Minnesota, the U of M’s Bee Squad wants Minnesota’s gardeners to grow bee-friendly gardens.
What’s buzzing in your neck of the woods?0
A few featurettes for two upcoming films have landed online. Firstly, three new behind-the-scenes videos for director Terry Gilliam’s new film The Zero Theorem offer a look at the costumes, the main set, and Gilliam’s directorial process. The pic stars Christoph Waltz as Qohen Leth, a computer hacker who searches for the meaning of life while being distracted by Management, a shadowy figure from an Orwellian corporation. Also starring Melanie Thierry, Tilda Swinton, and David Thewlis, the film opens in the U.K. on March 14th and is currently awaiting a U.S. release date.
Additionally, a new 4-minute featurette for director Denis Villeneuve’s (Prisoners) twisty thriller Enemy has been released online. The story revolves around a university lecturer (Jake Gyllenhaal) who discovers that he has a double, whom he tracks down and engages, resulting in “a complex and dangerous struggle.” This new behind-the-scenes video offers a look at how Villeneuve managed to create two Gyllenhaals in the same scene. Also starring Maline Laurent, the film is currently available on DirecTV and will open in theaters March 14th.
Here’s the official synopsis for The Zero Theorem:
An eccentric and reclusive computer genius plagued with existential angst works on a mysterious project aimed at discovering the purpose of existence – or the lack thereof -once and for all. However, it is only once he experiences the power of love and desire that he is able to understand his very reason for being.
Here’s the official synopsis for Enemy:This article is over 3 years old
Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama has endorsed Donald Trump for president. In a statement heralding the news, Trump said it was just one stage in “an incredible movement, arising from the people”.
Rubio and Cruz seek to destroy Trump as Republicans wage all-out war Read more
“The events of history have aligned to give the people this fleeting chance to bust up the oligarchy,” Trump said, “to take back control from the ‘Masters of the Universe’ [and] return it to the good and decent and patriotic citizens of the United States.”
At a Sunday at a rally in Madison, Alabama, the most vocal immigration hawk in the upper chamber became the first US senator to endorse the billionaire.
Sessions told a crowd of thousands: “At this time in American history, we need to make America great again.”
He then put on a Trump campaign baseball cap and proclaimed: “I am pleased to endorse Donald Trump for the presidency of the United States.”
Jefferson Beaureguard Sessions III, who has served four terms in the senate, has long been an advocate for reducing immigration into the US and deporting undocumented migrants.
He told attendees that Tuesday’s primary “may be the last opportunity we have for the people’s voice to be heard”, and continued: “You have asked for 30 years and politicians have promised for 30 years to fix illegal immigration. Have they done it? Donald Trump will do it.”
Sessions also attacked the Trans Pacific Partnership free trade agreement as “Obamatrade” and said “a movement is afoot that must not fade away”.
He and Trump have long been closely tied. Sessions helped Trump draft his immigration policy and a long-time Sessions aide recently joined the Trump campaign.
Introducing the senator on Sunday, Trump praised him as “really the expert as far as I am concerned about borders”.
The Alabama senator joins New Jersey governor Chris Christie and Maine governor Paul LePage as major elected officials to have endorsed Trump.
His endorsement will further solidify Trump’s credentials as a fervent opponent of illegal immigration. It also undermines the Texas senator Ted Cruz, who has repeatedly cited his work with Sessions in the fight against comprehensive immigration reform as proof of his conservative bona fides.
Sessions’ support will also give Trump a boost in Alabama’s primary, which is part of this week’s Super Tuesday spate of such contests. Recent polls give Trump a double-digit lead in the delegate-rich state.
In his statement, Trump said: “I am deeply honored to have the endorsement of Senator Jeff Sessions, leader of congressional conservatives.
Trump wavers on calls to condemn former KKK leader and hate groups Read more
“He has been called the Senate’s indispensable man and the gold standard. He led the fight against the Gang of Eight [immigration reform], against Obama’s trade deal, against Obama’s judges, and for American sovereignty. He has stood up to special interests as few have.”
Sessions’ endorsement is not, however, likely to help stem the controversy surrounding Trump’s hesitancy to disavow former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke in an interview with CNN on Sunday.
Sessions has been plagued by allegations of racism. In 1986, prior to being elected to the Senate, he was nominated to federal judgeship by Ronald Reagan. The nomination was rejected by the Senate judiciary committee after accusations by former aides that he had repeatedly made racist statements.
This included the allegation that Sessions had said he though the Ku Klux Klan “were OK until I learned they smoked pot”.Before we start our list, it is important to note that it is almost impossible to objectively select the healthiest fruit in the world, so do not consider this list too seriously. Numbers do not necessarily reflect the most precise order, even though the goal was to be as accurate as possible.
Roughly, the general criteria for healthy fruits should be to have as less sugar as possible, and to have as much as possible of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. If the fruit has some medicinal properties, that will be a bonus.
Let’s start from the end of the Top 15 healthiest fruits list so it would be more interesting (Nutrition facts per 100g):
Plum
Plums may not be so rich in vitamins like most of the fruits from our list, but that is far from not being healthy. They are excellent diet food and are great for preventing constipation because in addition to a lot of fibers, they also contain special sugar called sorbitol which accelerates the the passage of food through the digestive system.
Tangerine
Tangerine is one delicious and convenient fruit that is ranked among the best sources of vitamin C.
Watermelon
Watermelon is rich in carotenoids and lycopene, which protect our skin from sunlight. Some studies indicate that watermelon could help to reduce pressure in people with hypertension.
Pineapple
Pineapple contains a special enzyme called bromelain which helps our digestion and acts against inflammation.
Pomegranate
Pomegranate is a fruit that is very rich in antioxidants and other nutrients such as ellagic acid. Studies have shown that drinking pomegranate juice may improve the health of the heart and of the circulatory system and that it can also lower blood pressure.
Peach
Peach is probably the best dietary fruit because in 100 grams of this fruit there is only 39 calories. One medium-sized peach has about 60 calories. This means that you need to eat as much as 10 peaches to intake as many calories as one average lunch has.
Apricot
Apricots are a great low-fat fruit that is low in calories and full of vitamins. They are particularly rich in vitamin A.
Bananas
Potassium and fiber in bananas can lower blood pressure in people suffering from hypertension. They also regulate our digestion and reduce the risk of colon cancer.
Orange
Oranges don’t have any special healing properties, but they definitely deserve their place among the healthiest fruits. Orange is one of the best sources of vitamin C in general.
Grapes
Grapes are known for their ability to preserve circulatory system health and healthy blood vessels. Also they protect us from heart attack and stroke. Grapes are also effective against inflammations, and they reduce the risk of cancer.
Cranberries
Cranberries are used to prevent urinary tract infections, and recent studies show that they can prevent the formation of kidney stones.
Blueberries
Blueberries have the highest antioxidant capacity of than all other fruits. One study has shown that they can improve memory in the elderly. In addition to this they protect against colon cancer and prostate cancer.
Strawberries
Strawberries promote heart health, strengthen our skin and they have anti-inflammatory properties. And of course, this fruit is so irresistibly delicious.
Raspberries
If you ask a nutritionist what is the healthiest fruit in the world, they will probably tell you simply – “berries”. Raspberries definitely belong to this group. This type of fruit, in addition to vitamins, often has many other phytonutrients and therefore they are considered to be one of the healthiest.
Blackberries
Blackberries are crammed with vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, and contain a very small amount of sugar and calories. According to many, they are precisely the healthiest fruit in the world.Takfiri militants operating against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are using their captives as “human shields,” a monitoring group says.
The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Sunday that terrorist group calling itself Jaish al-Islam has put captive Syrian soldiers and civilians in metal jails on the outskirts of the capital, Damascus.
Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the Britain-based rights group, said that the terrorist group places these cages in public squares in the Eastern Ghouta region in an attempt to "prevent…bombardment" by Syrian forces.
“Jaish al-Islam is using these captives and kidnapped people - including whole families - as human shields,” he said.
The terrorists reportedly keep five men and women in each cage.
Militants from terrorist group calling itself Jaish al-Islam hold a position behind a sand barrier on August 25, |
of things that got to me and made me struggle this year,” Elgey told NRL.com.
“Physically I probably wasn’t 100 per cent. Now I feel as though I am, but the mental game was the battle for me.
“I learned a lot during the year. I’ve seen the ups and downs of footy now, and hopefully I can get back on top.
“I just hope that one year doesn’t wreck my football career.”
Elgey said the physicality of the pre-season under the guidance of new coach Garth Brennan had restored his self-belief.
“There has been a change in the training and we are doing a lot more contact, wrestling and boxing,” he said.
“I’ve gained a lot of confidence from that and for me it is all about getting out there and doing it now.
“I’ve trained enough and it is time to put that work into actions.
“Hopefully I can come out in 2018 and people will see a different player.”
Elgey’s skill, creativity and work ethic at a young age are his strengths. Another is his loyalty.
The Manly Sea Eagles tried to lure Elgey away in 2015. A campaign for him to stay was launched by Gold Coast fan group ‘’Titans Legion’’. It worked.
Elgey is off contract at the end of 2018 and wants to stay, but takes nothing for granted.
“I am a Gold Coast boy and I have been signed here since I was 15, so my first priority would be to stay here,” he said.
“But I know I will have to step it up because there are a lot of quality players coming through.”
There were recent reports Manly were interested in Elgey as a replacement for Blake Green, but that was news to him.
“I haven’t heard a thing about that,” Elgey said.
“This is my home town and the only way I’ll go is if I’m told to walk, so you heard it from me.”
Elgey is looking forward to making his halves partnership with Ash Taylor a winning one in their second season together.
“It was hard after Tyrone Roberts and Ash played so well together the year I missed out, and they were best friends as well,” Elgey said.
“But Ash and I have become close and I think we can build something pretty big here.”
Brennan said he had not settled on his final 17 for next year, but added Elgey would likely be his five-eighth.
“Kane will be given every opportunity to take that jumper in round one,” he said.
“He had a fantastic breakout season, but when Andrew Johns did his ACL at the Newcastle Knights he said it was one of the toughest injuries he had to get over and it took him 12 months to find his feet again.
“Kane has had 12 months to get over that knee injury now. He is training very well and I am excited about how he is looking.
“Kane and Ash can make a great combination. They are both young, talented and enthusiastic.”Philip Rivers kept the postseason hopes of the San Diego Chargers alive by leading the team to a 38-35 overtime victory over the San Francisco 49ers Saturday, but there's a chance the five-time Pro Bowler won't be available in the playoffs.
According to ESPN's Chris Mortensen, doctors fear that a bulging disk in the quarterback's lower back is on the verge of being herniated and that surgery may be necessary soon. Rivers played through a rib injury earlier in the year that Antonio Gates described as "very severe" and elected to play through his back injury despite requiring "urgent treament" two weeks ago and almost concluding his season earlier in December, per NFL Network's Ian Rapoport.
The Chargers finish the regular season with a road game against the Kansas City Chiefs, but aren't guaranteed a spot in the postseason with a victory and would need help. If Rivers is unable to continue in 2014, it would likely be Kellen Clemens relied upon to lead San Diego into the postseason.
Rivers finished Saturday night with 356 yards passing, four touchdowns and three interceptions. He is five passing yards away from eclipsing 4,000 yards passing for the sixth time in the last seven seasons.By Ben Cohen
Desperate to get a Barack Obama of their own, Republicans are looking seriously at Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, who is of Indian extraction (not Native American Indian). Jindal was interviewed by David Shuster tonight to plug his conservative credentials and pitch his solutions for the country. It seems any ethnic minority will do, as Jindal has some serious skeletons in his closet. On the surface, Jindal cuts an impressive figure for the Republican party, a young Oxford educated politician with a very conservative voting record. But Jindal has some extremely dodgy views that make him completely unelectable should anyone do their research (and yes, we do our research here at The Daily Banter). In 1994, Jindal wrote a bizzarre article for the 'New Oxford Review' (a right wing Catholic magazine) about an exorcism he and his friends performed on a troubled person they knew. Here's a passage of the weird (and extremely boring) piece:
Susan has talked with ministers, charismatic
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pastors, and others. It took months before we could reestablish our
friendship and she was able to trust me. Though I do not have the
answers she desperately seeks, I have provided comfort and support
whenever Susan has fears or doubts. With holy water and blessed
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crucifixes, I have even given her physical protection from the demons
that have only once reappeared, and then for a mere moment. We have
resolved the tension in our relationship and I am developing the
ability to selflessly care for others.
It shows you how completely lost the Republican Party is if they have to rely on loons like this. The GOP is having a very hard time finding decent politicians able to sell their barbaric policies, and guys like Jindal are their last hope. They tried with Sarah Palin, and the public saw straight through it (although there are an alarming amount of Republicans who want her to run in 2012), and they'll keep churning out half baked idiots until they realize that the politicians aren't the problem, it's their philosophy.The fools who allow a game's graphics to determine the game's quality are children who are complaining the keys being jingled in their face
The fools who allow a game's graphics to determine the game's quality are children who are complaining the keys being jingled in their face aren't shinny enough. Graphics do not tell you whether a game is good or not. When it comes down to it the most important aspect is the gameplay. And as much as I want to love this game I feel a bit disappointed. This is not GTA 5 and should not be compared to it in any way. What the game should be held up to is Sleeping Dogs or Deus Ex Human Revolution. And in that regard I'd say Sleeping Dogs is a better game, and Deus Ex is leagues better. But I wouldn't say the game is bad, there are some great redeeming factors. But where the game falls short is the missed opportunity to explore the issues regarding Big Brother and NSA issues, the story seems to be misguided. It can't tell whether it wants to be silly like Saints Row 4 or if it wants to be the Dark Knight. The story is the same cookie cutter story you'll see anywhere else. Revenge and betrayal. The driving mechanics are... eh. The cars feel clunky, it's hard to describe what I don't like about the driving. It just doesn't feel smooth or realistic like Sleeping Dogs. Comparing the driving to GTA 5 seems unfair as GTA 5 relied heavily on driving mechanics and with the online mode giving players the ability to race one another they really needed to have the driving down perfectly. Watch Dogs use them as a means of transportation, chasing and escaping. They are not such a big focus as other games had.
Now, my major issue is the gameplay. Sleeping Dogs wanted to give players a modern open world experience but not have guns be the main focus. They did so cleverly, as the country does not allow citizens to own guns. They could make them extremely rare thus focusing more on combat, and the game's fighting was very well done because of it. This game needed to make the gun a last resort. Watch Dogs throws you into way too many gunfights. When the game should have you focus more on hacking and stealth. At times you'll be able to choose hack/stealth or gun it out. I'd recommend giving yourself the challenge to go with hacking and stealth. That is where the game truly shines. Finding a clever way to navigate heavily guarded areas feels rewarding. But the game makes shooting the faster means of solving the problem. Deus Ex Human Revolution gave players the ability to choose stealth or shoot, but you were much more rewarded for using stealth and not killing people. Stealth non-lethal takedowns gave you much, much more experience. And this is why I bring up that game, Watch Dogs needed to break the mold on shoot em up missions by making hacking and tactics the overall better option. Also the times you'll use stealth and hacking to get around you'll notice how repetitive the solutions are. Some are extremely clever and you'll give yourself a pat on the back for doing so. But many times you'll often repeat that one clever solution.
The game is still a lot of fun, I love hacking and stealing data although I wish the world was more full of NPC and buildings you can enter. You'll interactive with the many electronics around the world but you won't interact with the world it's self. But I'd still recommend you try it. The online play is fun and the game will throw you some tough challenges. It's a good start and I hope this game becomes a franchise, because I would love to see it improve in Watch Dogs 2. But ultimately I'd say Deus Ex Human Revolution is a much better game, Sleeping Dogs is better too but that's not to say this game isn't good. I'd give it a meh/10
…Astrophile is our weekly column on curious cosmic objects, from the solar system to the far reaches of the multiverse
(Image: Tim Pyle/NASA)
Objects: Empty orbital slots
Availability: Good
Need somewhere to park your planet? You won’t have to circle the galaxy for long: up to two-thirds of planetary systems have empty spaces where an extra world could comfortably reside.
The gravitational tug-of-war between a star and its orbiting planets means that the worlds must be spaced at particular distances or their orbits become unstable. An overcrowded system will cause planets to wobble around until some tangle, collide or are ejected.
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Astronomers’ current understanding of planetary formation suggests that most – if not all – stable systems should be filled to capacity. But that doesn’t always seem to be the case.
“In the solar system, we know that’s not quite true, because we know that in between Mars and Jupiter you could put another planet,” says Sean Raymond at the Laboratory of Astrophysics of Bordeaux in France. In fact, some astronomers think we started out with more worlds, but gravitational jostling with Jupiter caused some to be ejected about 4 billion years ago, leaving the empty slot.
Spare room
Julia Fang and Jean-Luc Margot at the University of California, Los Angeles, wanted to find out whether other planetary systems are full, or if they also have unoccupied but stable orbits in between their planets.
The pair simulated millions of systems with two, three or four planets in a variety of orbital configurations and compared their models to real star systems seen by NASA’s Kepler space telescope. This told them which of their model systems are spaced right to be stable.
The scientists checked whether any of these systems had orbital slots going spare. “We attempted to stick an additional planet in between two existing planets,” says Fang. They then modelled how the orbits evolved over 100 million years, to see if a new planet caused a collision or ejection.
Conspicuous absence
Fang and Margot discovered that about a third of the stable two- and three-planet systems they modelled would go haywire if they added a planet, rising to nearly half for four-planet systems. That means the remaining majority of systems had exploitable stable zones, although that proportion could be revised downwards as Kepler and other planet hunters make more discoveries.
Pinning down the stable spaces between known exoplanets might be useful for finding otherwise invisible worlds, says Raymond. “You can say, ‘We think there should be a planet on this orbit, go look for it’,” he says.
And if a system has a truly unoccupied slot, could a sufficiently advanced civilisation build its own artificial planet and park it in orbit? “Gravitationally it would certainly work out, I’m just not sure about the logistics,” says Fang. Perhaps it’s time to bring legendary planet designer Slartibartfast out of retirement.
Journal reference: The Astrophysical Journal, doi.org/k6sAtlanta-based left-wing radical talk show host Mike Malloy says that if he sees a long gun open carrier, he’s going to do everything in his power to cause a panicked and potentially deadly police response:
I guess what I’ll do if I’m ever in that situation and I see one of these half-witted yahoos walking in with a weapon, high-caliber rifle like that, I’ll just put on a berserk act.I will just start screaming Gun! Gun! Gun! Watch out, everybody hit the deck! Guns! Guns! Everybody! And then dial 911 and I will say, shots fired, which will bring every g**-damned cop within 15 miles. And then the half-wits with the long guns are going to panic and they’re going to run out of the store and if that rifle isn’t shouldered properly, the cop is going to take a look at that and put a bullet right in their forehead.
Make sure you follow the link (above) to NewsBusters where they have the audio of Malloy’s rant. He’s… something else.
It’s quite apparent in the segment that Malloy takes great delight in facilitating a situation where gun owners (whom he hates) will die at the hands of law enforcement officers (whom he apparently hates more).
What Malloy is talking about is akin to “SWATing.” SWATing is when someone spoofs a 911 call from a location and claims that someone inside has committed some act of violence—typically murder—in order to draw a massive police response to that location.
Amped-up law enforcement officers (including SWAT/ERT tactical teams, which is how the practice earned its name) then respond with everything they have, expecting to face an armed madman who has already killed. In most instances of SWATing, the police respond to find either an empty home, or a clueless (and unarmed) victim, who is quickly released once the location is cleared and the officers realize that they’ve been fooled, at which point they go after the SWATer with a vengeance.
It’s shockingly easy to do, and many people, from journalists to celebrities, have been victims of SWATing. To date, I’m unaware of anyone being injured or killed by officers over-reacting to a SWATing call… but Malloy’s sick idea, broadcast to literally dozens of his fans, amplifies the possibility of violence by calling police to a location where he knows someone is armed, is something far more deadly.
Malloy’s plot is to intentionally incite a public panic, then a false report to police of shots being fired. He’s setting up a situation where responding officers are assured of finding someone with a weapon. His plan ramps up the panic levels of the public, the open carrier, and the responding police to the breaking point. One mistake, one misinterpreted move, could lead to poorly-trained, heavily-armed officers gunning down not just a frightened open carrier who only intended to make a political statement, but innocent bystanders downrange.
Sympathetic fire is a real and commonly phenomenon. If one officer in a tactical unit opens fire, it is common for surrounding officers to impulsively follow the first officer’s lead, even if it was a mistake. The hundreds of rounds fired in two separate instances during the debacle that was the Boston Marathon bomber hunt is a perfect example of this sort incident, but is not unusual.
That Malloy open fantasizes about an open carrier being gunned down in a crisis of his making is very disturbing. It amazes me that a man championing such violence has a syndicated radio show, and perhaps that says much about both the terrestrial and satellite radio stations carrying his message, and a progressive Malloy audience apparently drawn to the idea of tricking law enforcement officers in murdering those that hold differing political views.On a hilly stage 6 of the 2017 Tour of Poland, Jack Haig (Orica-Scott) got himself into a group of GC favourites, attacked on his own with about 20km to go, then rode his way to an impressive solo victory. It was a significant win, not just because he’d beaten some of the world’s best along the way — Vincenzo Nibali (Bahrain-Merida), Wout Poels (Sky) and Ilnur Zakarin (Katusha-Alpecin) were in the group behind — but because it was his first win as a professional. And all in a WorldTour race, no less.
“It’s a really good feeling,” Haig said at the time. “I think to do it on a stage that was so hard and with so many good guys preparing for the Vuelta, it made it even more special.”
Special it was, and also the culmination of many years’ hard work.
The final kilometres of stage 6 of the 2017 Tour of Poland.
Haig joined the WorldTour ranks with Orica-Scott (then Orica-BikeExchange) at the start of 2016 after an impressive rise through the sport. He’d started his career as a mountain biker before switching to the road with the dominant Australian setup then known as Huon-Genesys (now IsoWhey SwissWellness). There he secured some impressive results, including overall wins at the Tour of Tasmania and Battle on the Border in Australia’s National Road Series, a series he won in 2013.
He rode strongly in his time with the Jayco-AIS WorldTour Academy in Italy as well, highlighted by his second overall at the 2015 Tour de l’Avenir.
He impressed as a neo-pro too, highlighted by his second overall at the 2016 Tour of Slovenia. But it was with his stage win in Poland this year that Haig proved to the cycling world — and to himself — that he had what it takes to compete at the highest level of the sport.
“You sort of always think you can make it, when you’re coming through, but until you actually do it you don’t 100% know,” Haig told CyclingTips at the recent Tour of Guangxi. “You’re always like ‘Oh yeah, I reckon I can maybe one day … give it time, I’ll get there’ but it’s not until you actually do it that it sort of clicks.”
Haig has taken a significant leap forward in 2017, and not just with his stage win in Poland. He finished that race in eighth overall, before going on to a very respectable 21st at the Vuelta a España. He managed to get inside the top 20 on six occasions at that race, including 10th on stage 6, in a group of the race’s best climbers.
Haig agrees that he’s progressed well this year, but he’s quick to add that it’s not just on the bike that he’s starting to find his place.
“I think being [a] first year [pro], there’s so many other things you have to organise when you come from Australia to Europe,” said the now-second-year professional. “You organise your residency, your visa, or your house — all this kind of stuff. And in the second year I sort of had all that stuff organised and I could focus on just the riding and the training.
“I think that helped take the next step in the cycling. But also just feeling more comfortable within the team. You’re just happier.”
All of these factors led to Haig’s breakthrough victory at the Tour of Poland, a result which gave the 24-year-old added confidence going into the remainder of his season. And it’s been a busy back-half of the year for the Victorian, with the Tour of Poland being followed by the Vuelta a España, the Road World Championships, three one-day races in Italy (culminating with Il Lombardia), and, finally, the inaugural Tour of Guangxi.
“I sort of went into those Italian one-day races or to the Vuelta, instead of being like ‘Oh maybe I’ll be there, close to the finish’ I’m like ‘No, I should be there. I showed that in Poland. So I should be there.” I think that confidence helps a lot.”
Speaking at the Tour of Guangxi, Haig admitted he was ready for his season to be over. But that didn’t stop him riding strongly in the Chinese tour, finishing 19th on the race’s queen stage en route to the same placing overall. Haig also got up the road on stage 3 in a breakaway that would lead for much of the stage.
Thanks to all the amazing people in Hong Kong for showing me your city. But its time to head back home to Europe???? A post shared by Jack Haig (@jack_haig) on Oct 30, 2017 at 9:32am PDT
But as the Tour of Guangxi ended, so too did Haig’s 2017 season. He headed to Hong Kong afterwards for a week-long holiday, before returning to his European base in Andorra. Just as he did after the 2016 season, Haig will remain in Europe over the off-season, rather than returning to Australia.
“It’s hard to have anything that feels like ‘home’ with so much travel, but the closest thing I have is my house in Andorra,” Haig told CyclingTips from his base in the tiny European principality. “I really enjoy just unwinding up in the mountains, enjoying the quiet and sometimes alone time I can have here.”
Haig plans to make the most of his off-season before training begins for the new season.
“I really enjoyed getting back into skiing last winter, so I will be doing some more again this year to help start my training for next year when the weather is too cold for riding,” he said. “Maybe I’ll head to Nice in France for a little bit to see some friends there. Then I’ll drive up through the Alps doing some hiking and camping for a little bit before I get back onto the bike.”
Haig skipped the Australian summer of racing this year and instead began his season at the Abu Dhabi Tour in late February. While the specifics are yet to be confirmed, he’ll likely take a similar approach in 2018.
“At the moment the race calendar isn’t 100% set, but I’m pretty sure I won’t be racing in Australia,” he said. “After finishing so late this year with Tour of Guangxi it’s hard to have a good off-season and then build back into really good shape for the Australian summer.”
Instead, Haig will work towards other goals later in the year.
“I would really like to do the Giro next year,” he said. “After doing the Vuelta the last two years it would be nice to set a new challenge and head to the Giro. I also still really enjoy Italy after I spent one-and-a-half years there with the national team. It’s a place I always love going back to.”
Also among Haig’s goals for 2018 is a return to the Road World Championships. The 2018 event will be held in Innsbruck, Austria and will feature a very challenging road race course. It’s a challenge Haig is keen for.
“After doing my first elite Worlds this year and with a really hilly course next year I would like to set a goal of making the Australian team again and having another opportunity to represent the country.”
But as Haig heads towards his third season as a professional, it isn’t just specific races that he’s got in mind. He’s also trying to get his general approach right, to “just keep progressing”.
“I think something that I tried to focus on a lot this year was just doing the basic things right,” Haig said. “Just making sure that I train hard, I rest and I just try and do nothing silly. Just the basic things.
“I think as long as you keep consistently working hard and not doing anything crazy you’ll just slowly keep progressing. And I think it’s overcomplicated a lot of the time.”
Speaking to Haig, it’s clear he’s enjoying his racing, and the life that professional cycling has afforded him. That positivity is something he’s keen to harness, to help guide him through next season and beyond.
“I want to keep having fun, enjoying, smiling and taking in all the experiences we get as professional cyclists,” he said. “I think if I can keep doing all those things, continue to keep learning and putting in the hard work, I can hopefully have another good season.”It was only a couple of days ago when we saw HTC Bliss in clear shots, and expressed regret that we could not peak at the latest HTC Sense 3.5, which the device is rumored to run. It looks that the folks in China have heard us today, we get to present you a couple of fresh screenshots of HTC Sense 3.5, running on the yet unannounced HTC Bliss.
The most noticeable visual change in Sense 3.5, compared to 3.0, is the look of the home screen. As you can see above, the typical HTC look, which we have gotten so used to over the past couple of years, has given way to a layout, which features separate menu and phone buttons, along with quick access widgets on the left side. There is also a new notification center display of the wireless network which the device is connected to. The rest of the UI does not appear to be dramatically different from Sense 3.0. We have a few more screenshots of it below.
The other major change in Sense 3.5 is related to the fact that the new UI appears to be optimized to run on lower-end hardware, such as the one which HTC Bliss will offer. In case you haven't followed our previous coverage, we are talking 800MHz CPU, and Adreno 205 GPU, running Android 2.3 Gingerbread. This occurrence raises the question whether or not will Sense 3.5 become available to the serious number of HTC devices out there, running on 1GHz CPUs. After all, HTC Sense 3.0 biggest letdown was its lack of backward compatibility due to the UI's demand for graphic power.
We surely hope that some answers to this question will be found next week, when HTC hosts an event in London. In the meantime, tell us how you like the new look of Sense, and whether you would like to see it on older HTC droids.
Source (in Chinese)|ViaTV Reviews All of our TV reviews in one convenient place.
Game Of Silence Game Of Silence Game Of Silence C- Game Of Silence Game Of Silence C- C- Game Of Silence Season 1 Developed for U.S. television by David Hudgins (based on the Turkish series. Suskunlar. ) Starring David Lyons, Michael Raymond-James, Larenz Tate, Bre Blair, Claire Van Der Boom Debuts Tuesday, April 12 at 10 p.m. Eastern on NBC (moves to Thursdays at 10 p.m. Eastern on April 14) Format Hour-long drama. Three episodes watched for review
Game Of Silence doesn’t only suffer from one of the least compelling titles in television history. It’s based on a Turkish series that itself had more than a few things in common with the 1996 film Sleepers, in which a group of childhood friends get sent to a nightmarish juvenile detention center after a youthful escapade goes wrong. As adults, they reconnect to take down those who abused them in juvie, helped by the leader of the pack who is now an attorney.
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That plot worked well enough for a two-hour Barry Levinson movie, but as a full-fledged NBC series? The jury is still out. The series’ foundation of kids getting physically and sexually abused is tough to take, compounded by a string of unsettling violent acts. In just the first few episodes, we see a man suffocated with a plastic bag, someone get shivved, and someone else killed with a golf club. Children are beaten with belts, forced to fight each other in a cage, and horrifically disfigured by chemicals. Apparently these images are supposed to be horrific enough to entice us into wanting to see the perpetrators eventually get their ultimate beat-down, but as the series drags on, they’re not enough to entice the viewer into giving up their Thursday nights.
What Game Of Silence could use is a compelling whodunnit, but that’s not happening either. There’s a mystery by the end of the first episode about an attack on a former guard, but since he’s obviously a horrible person who deserved to die in the most heinous way possible, who cares? There’s also an overarching conspiracy tied to a crime syndicate and drug trade in Houston and the former warden’s political career, which may be aiming for The Wire, but is hardly The Wire.
An enticing cast could help, but Game Of Silence falls short here too. As the only member of the gang to escape his hometown of Brennan, Texas, attorney Jackson (David Lyons) has the most to lose, a partnership at a prestigious Houston law firm where his haughty fiancée also works. As Jackson, Lyons plays what is essentially Brad Pitt’s part in Sleepers, but he is no Brad Pitt (his gritty accent, an attempt to hide his Australian roots, doesn’t help much). Offering nothing but lies to his perfectly nice but long-suffering fiancée, he helps out his old friends by trying to build a case against their former attackers, where the friends would prefer to deal in straight-up violence. Michael Raymond-James as sexual-abuse survivor Gil especially has some well-played moments, as he tries to get truth out of an old guard by basically making him eat a gun. He’s determined to get at what really happened in the prison, even as he tells Jackson that he’d rather die than have anyone else know about it; as always, Raymond-James rises above the material he is given, but it’s still tough to watch. Larenz Tate also steps up as Shawn, one of the pals, but a car conversation intended to highlight the former friends’ old closeness just feels forced.
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We’ve seen enough crime dramas or procedurals at this point to identify the clichés from miles away. Anyone who gives videotaped evidence is obviously not long for this world. Jackson’s old flame, Jessie (Bre Blair), is now with his old buddy Gil, but there’s not one chance in a million that they’re not going to hook up at someone point. The spot-on cast playing young versions of the gang is excellent, as is the 1988 flashback soundtrack. (There’s an especially effective scene where we see how young Shawn was greeted with racism at every door but Gil’s.) But that just makes it harder to see these kids we like tied up and dragged away screaming in an institution that makes the hospital in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest look like a Hilton.
Game Of Silence taunts with promises of finding solace in the truth, and strength in friendship. But it wades through so much disgusting muck to get there, it seems unlikely that the payoff, when it finally arrives, will actually be worth it.Brendan Rodgers insists Celtic possess something even the apparently limitless resources of Paris Saint-Germain cannot buy as they attempt to become the dominant force in European football.
The Celtic manager believes his club’s history is simply priceless in an era in which rich owners, such as the Qatar Sports Investment group who bought PSG five years ago, are “making a mockery” of Uefa’s Financial Fair Play rules.
Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers arrives to give a press conference at the Parc des Princes stadium in Paris ahead of the Champions League tie with PSG. Picture: Franck Fife/AFP/Getty Images
The French champions, who crushed Celtic 5-0 in Glasgow back in September, are under investigation by European football’s governing body for potential breaches in those regulations in a season in which they have assembled a £400 million front three of Neymar, Kylian Mbappe and Edinson Cavani.
As Celtic prepare for tonight’s daunting return fixture in Group B of the Champions League at the Parc des Princes, Rodgers agrees that it will take time before world football will embrace PSG who were formed in 1970.
“PSG are trying to create a history here and that takes a number of years,” said Rodgers. “The warmth that goes out to clubs like Barcelona, for example, could go back to Johan Cruyff and the era where he was there. Rinus Michels before that, they were creating something. That is history, so it is time, like Manchester City in the English Premier League. You can’t buy history, it is about winning trophies, winning titles. Here, if you think about PSG, you look and I think everyone will agree it is arguably the most exciting front three in world football. But to back that up you have to win trophies and sustain that success over many games. Then you get the kids and people supporting you, because that is what naturally happens in any sport.
“Los Angeles Lakers were popular because they were winning. Liverpool, a big support all over the world, because they won five European Cups. PSG will be supported when they win and win consistently. Barcelona – there is an affection for them because they have been winners.
“Have Celtic got something you can’t buy in terms of that history? Yes, absolutely. You can’t buy that.
“We will never be able to do what PSG are doing in terms of finance. That is why people will think it is wrong in football. But it is modern football in every format.
“But Celtic have something a lot of clubs don’t have – a rich history, a support and a fanbase a lot of clubs don’t have.
“Speak about PSG in 20 years time and see where they are. This is the formation now of a club that has investment and they clearly want to be winners. Can they then sustain that over time?
“If you are talking big, iconic clubs – and for me a big club has history, support, fan base and all that – then Celtic, of course, has all that. But we don’t have anywhere near the finances of a club like PSG.”
Asked if he felt the potential breaches of FFP diminished the Champions League, Rodgers added: “Well, others can spend it, it is whether they decide to or not.
“It certainly does make a mockery of it, because it is hard to find where the fair play is in it when it comes to paying £200m for the buy-out clause for a player.
“But I don’t tend to get bogged down in that side of it. Because there are so many rich clubs out there. Now you have countries looking after clubs, not just rich owners. Ultimately they can bring more of the talents together, where in the past you used to have just two or three talents.
“But I tend not to overthink about it, the money in the game now is astronomical, it benefits so many people, players, owners, fans, but there are rules there to govern the game and they have to try to stick by them the best they can.”Last Chapter Next Chapter
“Your name is Leonard Harlan. Come.”
I had a small iron mortar and pestle in front of me. I tipped it over, very carefully depositing the contents so they formed a straight line in front of me.
Two fires burned, one on either side of me. Running through each fire, I had a ring of salt and a loop of chain. I was grateful for the warmth of the flame.
“You made a mistake, Leonard. The memory has faded to the point that nobody necessarily remembers, it was so long ago. The doctors and nurses who witnessed it have left the world or left the city, your family all deceased.”
I picked up the folded page I’d laid across my lap. I read it, taking my time.
Others were lurking around the area, but they hung back in groups.
The Briar Girl’s spies, more than an attacker of any sort. There weren’t many Others who would be wandering the back of the property, and the circles I’d set out would help ward against them.
Even so, I was glad to have Rose watching my back.
I looked at the page. My grandmother’s description of what had happened. Outside of a microfiche of some newspaper article from years ago, this would be one of the last memories of what had happened to Leonard.
“I summon you, Leonard. I know who you are, I remember your story. I don’t know where you rest, but that place will have changed and moved on. It will have forgotten. The memories are here. Let go and answer me.”
There was a long pause.
“You knew it would be a long shot,” Rose murmured. “The last ghost you tried to call didn’t come.”
“Because it was closer to the North End. It probably got swallowed up by Johannes. This one shouldn’t be far.”
“There isn’t much tying Leonard down,” Rose said. “Maybe he’s gone. Reabsorbed into the ether, or whatever place memories go when they’re gone.”
“Maybe,” I said.
“We’re zero for three, Blake. One ghost that’s apparently a slave to someone else…”
“One of the Duchamps, probably. Or someone with a solid ability to manipulate connections, judging by the feelers they sent back in my direction.”
“Another that probably got swallowed up by Johannes’ Demesne.”
“Something like that.”
“And now another no-show.”
This one was a ghost grandmother had captured. Leonard Harlan. She’d bound him for a ritual, hence the notes, and he’d returned to his former haunting grounds when the ritual was done.
“Maybe you could stop? Take a break, eat?” Rose suggested.
“Soon. I’ll eat to build up my strength, but I’m not feeling too hungry.”
“You’re not feeling tired either,” Rose said. “That’s not a good thing. That’s you being in such bad shape that you’re not registering your basic needs anymore.”
“I know. I get it. I’ll eat a full meal in just a few minutes. I refuse to believe there aren’t any damn ghosts left in this town.”
“Lots of practitioners.”
“Who aren’t supposed to find ghosts of any worth |
first floor was for the production and storage of goods. The temple thus functioned as a center of economic production. Rulers were elevated to divine status; the rest of the people had to toil in their service, as workers in a temple-centered economy.
The ziggurats were “the laboratories for the encoding of human mindsets, the first asylums were the submissive creature was created.“ They were “the first patriarchal households and the first brothels.” The Sumerian priests who constructed them became “the foremost architects of centralised political power.” Their temples grew into cities, cities became states, and empires, and civilization. But the nature of the phenomenon remained the same: “The history of civilization amounts to nothing else than the continuation of a Sumerian society grown in extension, branched out and diversified, but retaining the same basic configuration.”[12] We are still living in Sumer, still living in “this incredible intellectual invention” that “has been controlling our entire history ever since.”[13]
If Sumerian civilization is the thesis, he said dialectically, we need an antithesis, which we can find in, among other places, the Kurdish question.[14] Ethnic resistance to the Sumerian city is ancient as that city itself. Today a transcendence of the Sumerian state may be found in a fully democratic republic, home to both Kurds and Turks.
#
I don’t know anything about Öcalan’s other intellectual influences—the names Wallerstein, Braudel, and Foucault are often mentioned. But it’s clear that in 2002 Öcalan started reading Bookchin intensively, especially Ecology of Freedom and Urbanization Without Cities.
Thereafter, through his lawyers, he began recommending Urbanization Without Cities to all mayors in Turkish Kurdistan and Ecology of Freedom to all militants.[15] In the spring of 2004, he had his lawyers contact Murray, which they did through an intermediary, who explained to Murray that Öcalan considered himself his student, had acquired a good understanding of his work, and was eager to make the ideas applicable to Middle Eastern societies. He asked for a dialogue with Murray and sent one of his manuscripts.
It would have been amazing, had that dialogue taken place. Unfortunately Murray, at eighty-three, was too sick to accept the invitation and reluctantly, respectfully declined.
Öcalan’s subsequent writings show the influence of his study of Bookchin. His 2004 work In Defense of the People is a Civilization Narrative that includes an account of primal communal social forms, like Murray’s “organic society,” the communal form of life that Öcalan renamed “natural society.” In natural society, he wrote, people lived “as part of nature,” and “human communities were part of the natural ecology.” He presented an account of the rise of hierarchy that much resembled Bookchin’s: the state “enforced hierarchy permanently and legitimized the accumulation of values and goods.” Moreover, he said, the rise of hierarchy introduced the idea of dominating nature: “Instead of being a part of nature,” hierarchical society saw “nature increasingly as a resource.” Öcalan even called attention to the process’s dialectical nature: “natural society at the beginning of humankind forms the thesis contrasted by the antithesis of the subsequent hierarchic and state-based forms of society.”[16]
#
Their respective Civilization Narratives have many points of overlap and difference that would be fascinating to explore, but in the interests of conciseness, I’ll limit myself to one, the various ways they wrote about Mesopotamia.
Öcalan, as I’ve said, emphasized that Mesopotamia was where civilization began. Bookchin agreed, noting that writing began there: “cuneiform writing... had its origins in the meticulous records the temple clerks kept of products received and products of dispersed.” Later “these ticks on clay tablets” became “narrative forms of script,” a progressive development.[17] He agreed that hierarchy, priesthoods, and states began at Sumer, although he thought ancient Mesoamerican civilizations underwent a parallel development. But what seems to have been most compelling to him was the traces of resistance: in Sumer, “the earliest ‘city-states’ were managed by ‘equalitarian assemblies,’ which possessed ‘freedom to an uncommon degree.’”[18] After the rise of kingship “there is evidence of popular revolts, possibly to restore the old social dispensation or to diminish the authority of the bala [king].” Even “the governing ensi, or military overlords, were repeatedly checked by popular assemblies.”[19]
And it fascinated him that it was at Sumer that the word freedom (amargi) appeared for the first time in recorded history: in a Sumerian cuneiform tablet that gives an account of a successful popular revolt against a regal tyranny.[20]
Öcalan, after reading Bookchin, noted the use of the word amargi, but otherwise didn’t pick up on this point. But he did trace traits of Kurdish society to the Neolithic: “many characteristics and traits of Kurdish society,” he said, especially the “mindset and material basis,... bear a resemblance to communities from the Neolithic.”[21] Even today Kurdish society bears the cooperative features of organic society: “Throughout their whole history Kurds have favoured Clan systems and tribal confederations and struggled to resist centralised governments.”[22] They are potentially bearers of freedom.
#
As Marxists, Bookchin and Öcalan had both been taught that the dialectical-materialist processes of history are inexorable and function like laws, with inevitable outcomes, like the rise of the nation-state and capitalism. But in The Ecology of Freedom, the ex-Marxist Bookchin was at pains to discredit “such notions of social law and teleology.” Not only had they been used “to achieve a ruthless subjugation of the individual to suprahuman forces beyond human control”—as in Stalinism; they denied “the ability of human will and individual choice to shape the course of social events.”[23] They render us captive to a belief in “economic and technical inexorability.” In fact, he argued, even the rise of hierarchy was not inevitable, and if we put aside the idea that it was, we may have “a vision that significantly alters our image of a liberated future.”[24] That is, we lived communally once, and we could live communally again. The buried memory of organic society “functions unconsciously with an implicit commitment to freedom.”[25] I think that is the underlying, liberatory insight of The Ecology of Freedom.
Reading Öcalan’s In Defense of the People, I sensed an exhilaration that reminded me of how I felt when I first read Ecology of Freedom back in 1985—delighted by the insight that people once lived in communal solidarity, and that the potential for it remains, and inspired by the prospect that we could have it again, if we chose to change our social arrangements. The concept of the “irreducible minimum” simply has taken new names, like socialism. Ecology of Freedom offers to readers what Murray used to call “a principle of hope,” and that must have meant something to the imprisoned Öcalan.
“The victory of capitalism was not simply fate,” Öcalan wrote in 2004. “There could have been a different development.” To regard capitalism and the nation-state as inevitable “leaves history to those in power.” Rather, “there is always only a certain probability for things to happen... there is always an option of freedom.[26]
The communal aspects of “natural society” persist in ethnic groups, class movements, and religious and philosophical groups that struggle for freedom. “Natural society has never ceased to exist,” he wrote. A dialectical conflict between freedom and domination has persisted throughout western history, “a constant battle between democratic elements who refer to communal structures and those whose instruments are power and war.” For “the communal society is in permanent conflict with the hierarchic one.”[27]
Finally, Öcalan embraced social ecology. “The issue of social ecology begins with civilization,” he wrote in 2004, because “the roots of civilization” are where we find also “the beginnings of the destruction of the natural environment.” Natural society was in a sense ecological society. The same forces that destroy society from within also cut the meaningful link to nature. Capitalism, he says, is anti-ecological, and we need a specifically ethical revolt against it, “a conscious ethic effort,” a “new social ethics that is in harmony with traditional values.” The liberation of women is fundamental. And he called for a “democratic-ecological society,” by which he meant “a moral-based system that involves sustainable dialectical relations with nature,... where common welfare is achieved by means of direct democracy.”[28]
How did it all apply to the Kurdish question? Once again, he emphasizes that achieving Kurdish freedom means achieving freedom for everyone. “Any solution will have to include options not only valid for the Kurdish people but for all people. That is, I am approaching these problems based on one humanism, one humanity, one nature and one universe.”[29] But now, instead of through the democratic republic, it is to be achieved through assembly democracy.
“Our first task,” he wrote, “is to push for democratization, for non-state structures, and communal organization.” Instead of focusing solely on changing the Turkish constitution, he advocated that Kurds create organizations at the local level: local town councils, municipal administrations, down to urban districts, townships, and villages. They should form new local political parties and economic cooperatives, civil society organizations, and those that address human rights, women’s rights, children’s rights, animal rights, and all other issues to be addressed.
“Regional associations of municipal administrations” are needed, so these local organizations and institutions would form a network. At the topmost level, they are to be represented in a “General Congress of the People,” which will address issues of “politics, self-defense, law, morality, economy, science, arts, and welfare by means of institutionalization, rules and control mechanisms.”
Gradually, as the democratic institutions spread, all of Turkey would undergo a democratization. They would network across existing national borders, to accelerate the advent of democratic civilization in the whole region and produce not only freedom for the Kurds but a geopolitical and cultural renewal. Ultimately a democratic confederal union would embrace the whole of the Middle East. He named this Kurdish version of libertarian municipalism “democratic confederalism.”
In March 2005, Öcalan issued a Declaration of Democratic Confederalism in Kurdistan. It called for “a grass-roots democracy... based on the democratic communal structure of natural society.” It “will establish village, towns and city assemblies and their delegates will be entrusted with the real decision-making, which in effect means that the people and the community will decide.” Öcalan’s democratic confederalism preserves his brilliant move of linking the liberation of Kurds to the liberation of humanity. It affirms individual rights and freedom of expression for everyone, regardless of religious, ethnic, and class differences. It “promotes an ecological model of society” and supports women’s liberation. He urged this program upon his people: “I am calling upon all sectors of society, in particular all women and the youth, to set up their own democratic organisations and to govern themselves.” When I visited Diyarbakir in the fall of 2011, I discovered that Kurds in southeastern Anatolia were indeed putting this program into practice.[30]
#
By 2004-5, then, Öcalan had either given up on or shifted focus from his effort to persuade the state to reform itself by democratizing from the top down. “The idea of a democratization of the state,” he wrote in 2005, “is out of place.” He had concluded that the state was a mechanism of oppression—“the organizational form of the ruling class” and as such “one of the most dangerous phenomena in history.” It is toxic to the democratic project, a “disease,” and while it is around, “we will not be able to create a democratic system.” So Kurds and their sympathizers “must never focus our efforts on the state” or on becoming a state, because that would mean losing the democracy, and playing “into the hands of the capitalist system.”[31]
That seems pretty unequivocal, and certainly in accord with Bookchin’s revolutionary project. Bookchin posited that once citizen’s assemblies were created and confederated, they would become a dual power that could be pitted against the nation-state—and would overthrow and replace it. He emphasized repeatedly the concept of dual power, I should note, crediting it to Trotsky, who wrote, in his History of the Russian Revolution, that after February 1917, when various provisional liberal governments were in charge of the state, the Petrograd soviet of workers’ and soldiers’ deputies became a dual power against those governments; it later became a driver of the October revolution. Similarly, the communalist confederation would a counterpower, a dual power, in a revolutionary situation.
But Öcalan, in the same 2004 work (In Defense of the People), also sends a contradictory message about the state: “It is not true, in my opinion, that the state needs to be broken up and replaced by something else.” It is “illusionary to reach for democracy by crushing the state.” Rather, the state can and must become smaller, more limited in scope. Some of its functions are necessary: for example, public security, social security and national defense. The confederal democracy’s congresses should solve problems “that the state cannot solve single-handedly.” A limited state can coexist with the democracy “in parallel.”[32]
This contradiction seems to have bedeviled Öcalan himself, who admits in seeming exasperation, “The state remains a Janus-faced phenomenon.” I sense that the issue remains ambiguous for him, and understandably so. Insightfully, he observes that “our present time is an era of transition from state to democracy. In times of transition, the old and the new often exist side by side.”[33]
Bookchin’s communalist movement never got as far, in practical terms, as Öcalan’s has, but if it had, he would surely have faced the same problem. The concept of a transitional program, which Bookchin invoked in such occasions, may be useful here. He used to distinguish between the minimum program (reforms on specific issues), the transitional program (like Öcalan’s), and the maximum program (socialism, a stateless assembly democracy). That distinction has a revolutionary pedigree—Murray used to credit it to Trotsky. It’s a way to retain a commitment to your long-term goals and principles while dealing in the real, nonrevolutionary world.
#
In May 2004 Bookchin conveyed to Öcalan the message: “My hope is that the Kurdish people will one day be able to establish a free, rational society that will allow their brilliance once again to flourish. They are fortunate indeed to have a leader of Mr. Öcalan’s talents to guide them.”[34] We later learned that this message was read aloud at the Second General Assembly of the Kurdistan People’s Congress, in the mountains, in the summer of 2004.
When Bookchin died in July 2006, the PKK assembly saluted “one of the greatest social scientists of the 20th century.” He “introduced us to the thought of social ecology” and “helped to develop socialist theory in order for it to advance on a firmer basis.” He showed how to make a new democratic system into a reality. “He has proposed the concept of confederalism,” a model which we believe is creative and realizable.” The assembly continued: Bookchin’s “thesis on the state, power, and hierarchy will be implemented and realized through our struggle... We will put this promise into practice this as the first society that establishes a tangible democratic confederalism.”
No tribute could have made him happier; I only wish he could have heard it. Perhaps he would have saluted them back with that first recorded word for freedom, from Sumer: “Amargi!”
Listen to the speech here: http://soundcloud.com/freiheitxxi/bookchin-calan-and-the
Notes:
[1] Abdullah Öcalan, Declaration on the Democratic Solution of the Kurdish Question, 1999, trans. Kurdistan Information Centre (London: Mespotamian Publishers, 1999); hereafter Defense; p. 106.
[2] Ibid., p. 44.
[3] Ibid., p. 55.
[4] Ibid., p. 89-90.
[5] Ibid., p. 114.
[6] Murray Bookchin, The Ecology of Freedom: The Rise and Dissolution of Hierarchy (Palo Alto, Calif.: Cheshire Books, 1982); and The Rise of Urbanization and the Decline of Citizenship [later retitled Urbanization Against Cities] (San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1986).
[7] Abdullah Öcalan, Prison Writings: The Roots of Civilization, trans. Klaus Happel (London: Pluto Press, 2007); and Prison Writings: The PKK and the Kurdish Question in the 21st Century, trans. Klaus Happel (London: Transmedia, 2011). Neither Bookchin nor Öcalan was an archaeologist or anthropologist; rather, in their accounts of prehistory and early history, they use such professionals’ published findings.
[8] Bookchin, Ecology of Freedom, chap. 2.
[9] Ibid., pp. 46, 43.
[10] Ibid., Ecology of Freedom, chap. 3.
[11] Öcalan, Roots, p. 6.
[12] Ibid., p. 53, 25, 98.
[13] Öcalan, PKK and Kurdish Question, p. 96
[14] Unlike Öcalan, Bookchin chose not to use the terms thesis, antithesis, and synthesis, considering them an oversimplification of Hegel’s triad an sich, für sich, and an und für sich.
[15] So I was told by the intermediary between Öcalan’s lawyers and Bookchin, who wishes to remain anonymous here.
[16] Abdullah Öcalan, In Defense of the People (unpublished), chap. 1.2, “The Natural Society,” English translation manuscript courtesy of the International Initiative Freedom for Öcalan, Peace in Kurdistan. This book was published in German as Jenseits von Staat, Macht, und Gewalt (Neuss: Mesopotamien Verlag, 2010).
[17] Bookchin, Ecology of Freedom, p. 144.
[18] Ibid., p. 129. He is drawing on the work of Henri Frankfort and Samuel Noah Kramer.
[19] Ibid., p. 95.
[20] Ibid., p. 168.
[21] Öcalan, PKK and Kurdish Question, p. 22
[22] Öcalan, “The Declaration of Democratic Confederalism,” February 4, 2005, online at http://www.kurdmedia.com/article.aspx?id=10174.
[23] Bookchin, Ecology of Freedom, pp. 23-24.
[24] Ibid., p. 67.
[25] Ibid., p. 143.
[26] Öcalan, Defense of People, p. 41.
[27] Ibid., pp. 51, 65, 60.
[28] Ibid., chap. III.4.
[29] Ibid., p. 52.
[30] “Kurdish Communalism,” interview with Ercan Ayboga by author, New Compass (Sept. 2011), http://new-compass.net/http%3A//new-compass.net/article/kurdish-communalism.
[31] Ocalan, Defense of People, pp. 177, 24, 104, 177.
[32] Ibid., pp. 24, 106, 111, 106,
[33] Ibid., pp. 27, 178.
[34] Copy in author’s possession.Quick Access
Review / Favorite Track / For Fans Of / Atmosphere Levels / Links (Music & Social)
Watch out The DUNE! Speed UUUUUUPPPP!
Dune Pilot is doing a giveaway to win their vinyl and a T-Shirt, check it out here, you have until Sunday to try your luck 😉
How is the sound?
Germany is most known for its psychedelic bands like Colour Haze or My Sleeping Karma. But this time these 4 dudes from Munich preferred to take the asphalt way… A dusty road in the middle of the desert among huge dunes, that I’m sure bands like Kyuss and Dozer already took many times in the past, here is Dune Pilot!
Wetlands by DUNE PILOT
Wetlands is a very serious Stoner Rock release, and I think I haven’t heard an album in 2015 that respects so purely this tradition of dusty & heavy riffs! I mean, WOW! They’re a real riff-machine! Catchy as hell, I hope your neck is solid enough to resist the envy to headbang 😉
You’ll find a lot of similarities with Kyuss, and of course Slo Burn (you could have guess huh?!), the production sounds a bit more modern though. It sounds very loud and bassy, a nice punch that’ll hit you right into the face!
Too bad they didn’t develop more that trippy side you hear for example in the beginning of “Changeover“, because yeah, they do it well! It could have bring some more depth to this album, to just let our mind wander a bit more, for some longer periods of time…
But rest assured, have a listen to this colossal dose of HEAVY FUZZ, you won’t regret it!
Why is this album worth listening?
Solid riffage in a heavy desert style we love so much!
Good harsh & catchy vocals!
Fantastic fuzzy guitar solos!
In what situation you should listen to this album?
PILOT THAT FUCKIN’ DUNE!
Something particular to note?
Check out the giveaway that just started
to win Dune Pilot’s first release on vinyl and a T-Shirt!
[cta btn_text=”Go to the Giveaway page Now” btn_url=”https://morefuzz.net/fuzzy-giveaways/dune-pilot/” bg=”#cecece” bg_light=”true” appear=”false”]Let’s try your luck ;)[/cta]One approach to treating cancer is to identify biomolecular processes that occur only in cancer cells and design drugs to disrupt them. For example, in some cancers, the enzyme isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) contains a mutation that causes it to affect cellular metabolism in cancer cells than it does in healthy cells, but a chemical called ML309 can bind to the mutant IDH and render it nonfunctional. Imaging that and other drug–protein complexes could make it easier to identify the most effective drugs. Now Sriram Subramaniam of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, and his colleagues have shown that cryo-electron microscopy may be up to the job.
To determine a biomolecule’s structure with cryo-EM, embed thousands of copies of the molecule in a thin sheet of amorphous ice and scan them with an electron beam. Each image of an individual copy is incomplete and noisy, but aligning and averaging them produces a complete, high-resolution image. Spurred by the advent of faster electron detectors, the technique has seen rapid progress over the past few years. Yet researchers have struggled to image relatively small proteins like IDH (a mere 93 000 atomic mass units), largely because of the difficulty of aligning the individual images.
Subramaniam and colleagues showed that it can be done through a combination of tricks, including using thinner ice sheets and performing algorithms to discard data from molecules damaged by the electron beam. Their structure of the IDH–ML309 complex (shown in the figure with ML309 in red) isn’t quite crisp enough to resolve individual atoms. Even so, it yielded new insights into how the molecules interact: The IDH molecule’s two subunits, shown in yellow and blue, are wedged apart by the ML309 molecule. (A. Merk et al., Cell 165, 1698, 2016.)By Scott Conroy - September 26, 2013
ORANGE, N.J. -- In his otherwise successful 2009 gubernatorial campaign, Chris Christie didn't exactly triumph in this predominantly African-American township west of Newark.
In fact, he chalked up a grand total of 302 votes here -- good enough for 5.7 percent of the vote against incumbent Democrat Jon Corzine.
But if the reaction he received during campaign stops across this urban center on Tuesday is any indication, the Republican governor will do far better this November, bolstering his goal of a massive re-election victory en route to a likely 2016 presidential bid.
Recent polling confirms the enormous strides Christie has made with African-Americans in the Garden State -- Exhibit A when his supporters point to how Republicans can finally attain a foothold with non-white voters in the coming post-Obama era.
Margaret El, an African-American woman in her 60s, was about to sit down for a slice at Pizza Center on Main Street when Christie burst through the doors with a small entourage in tow.
A registered Democrat who voted for President Obama twice, El served as a volunteer on Corzine’s 2009 campaign. Now, however, she is a Christie supporter.
“How many Republicans are you going to see walking up and down these streets like this?” she said. “He’s approachable. I really like that. And I think the people in Orange are really thrilled, whether they’re Democrat or Republican, that he’s here.”
In brief comments at the pizza joint, Christie told the crowd that it wasn’t his first trip to Orange and wouldn’t be his last.
He also vowed to help reopen a recently shuttered public library -- a subject of much concern among the dozens of locals who came out to see their charismatic governor on a sunny, early-fall afternoon.
Dwayne Warren, Orange’s Democratic mayor, accompanied Christie during his stroll down Main Street and praised the Republican for working with him on a range of local issues that included revitalizing the train station and restoring state funding for a summer food program.
“I made no bones about it,” Warren recalled of his initial conversation with Christie after being elected last year. “I called him directly and said, ‘We need your help with some support for projects in Orange.’ And he was responsive to doing it.”
But the response to Christie’s arrival in Orange wasn’t universally positive. Dozens of protesters from the Communications Workers of America union and volunteers for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Barbara Buono carried signs reading “Christie, Get Out of Orange” and shadowed the governor with chants of “Christie’s got to go!”
Despite the organized protests, Christie was in no mood to create one of his famous “YouTube moments” as he greeted the almost uniformly receptive city dwellers he happened upon.
In a Quinnipiac poll released on Wednesday, Christie leads Buono by the eye-popping margin of 64 percent to 30 percent.
Even more stunning, while just 9 percent of African-American voters cast their ballots for the Republican in 2009, he currently earns 36 percent of the black vote, according to the new poll.
Though the sample size of black voters polled by Quinnipiac was small, Christie has polled at or above 30 percent among African-Americans in several other recent surveys.
To put that standing in recent historical perspective, no Republican presidential, Senate, or gubernatorial candidate in the state Jersey has topped 17 percent of the African-American vote in more than two decades.
If Christie can break that 30-percent threshold in November, it will give him a powerful 2016 talking point with Republicans voters from New Hampshire to Nevada, who will be eager to nominate someone with a wide enough appeal to regain the White House after the GOP’s years in the political wilderness.
“One of the things we’re most proud of in this campaign is that we’re really playing on our opponent’s turf,” said Christie spokesperson Kevin Roberts. “That has as much to do with the governor’s personality as it does with the way he’s governed for the last three years. He didn’t get into office and ignore inner cities and urban areas.”
Roberts cites Christie’s work on education reform, mandatory drug treatment for nonviolent offenders, and a concerted effort to build close partnerships with local officials as reasons for the governor’s success on this front.
He also offered some succinct advice for other Republican officials serious about expanding their appeal to minorities.
“Look to New Jersey,” Roberts said. “It’s about showing leadership where people have faith in what you’re doing. Even if they don’t necessarily agree with you on every issue, they know where you stand. They know you’re authentic.”
The authenticity factor was in full bloom Tuesday at an earlier event where Christie delivered brief remarks to hundreds of senior citizens gathered inside a hockey rink in West Orange.
It was not technically a campaign speech, and most of the attendees did not come specifically to see the governor. But after he finished speaking, Christie was swarmed by dozens of mostly African-American, mostly female well-wishers.
Over the loud reverberations of a Motown cover band, he greeted seniors for about 20 minutes, making small talk and posing for photos with everyone who wanted one.
He leaned in closely to share words of encouragement, patted shoulders, and even doled out a couple of kisses on the lips, which may or may not have been intended for a cheek.
For the white Republican politician and the black constituents who surrounded him, the scene had the feel of an informal get-together among close friends, as they showered the governor with tight hugs and glowing compliments about his overweight but noticeably slimming frame.
“I’m getting there,” Christie told one woman who complimented him for his post-surgery weight loss. “Anyone who says it’s easy doesn’t know what they’re talking about.”
Christie may still have an uphill climb in convincing many rank-and-file Republicans who soured on him after his role in last year’s presidential election. But in conversations with several of the older women and men who lined up to greet him in West Orange, it was Christie’s full-throated embrace of President Obama in the aftermath of Super Storm Sandy that emerged again and again as a key reason for the warm feelings inside the hockey rink.
“That was a big deal for me,” recalled Barbara Hill of Newark, who was also in attendance last Sunday when Christie stopped by her Baptist church. “I love him. He’s just wonderful.”
Viston King, also from Newark and a registered Democrat, said that Christie “did a lot for the people, especially in south Jersey” in Sandy’s wake. He added that he would even consider voting for him for president -- on one condition that is not likely to be met.
“I think he’d definitely have to change his party,” King said.
The caricature of Christie as a Democrat-in-disguise is one that his opponents on the right have harped on for the past year.
But with a conservative record on fiscal issues, a pro-life stance, and extensive support among Republican elected officials nationwide, Christie remains grounded in the center-right.
It is not so much his ideology that has attracted Democrats here but rather his ability to combine personal charm with a sincere determination not to cede what might have been his Democratic opponent’s core supporters.Photo
Having recently endured starvation and battered toes in the service of her art, Natalie Portman now encounters another of the ordeals laid out for ambitious young actresses who want to be movie stars. Less than a week after gracing the Golden Globes broadcast in a rose-bedecked gown and collecting an award for her work in “Black Swan,” Ms. Portman pops up on Friday on the big screen in a pre-Valentine’s Day romantic comedy with an instantly forgettable title.
Let me check my notes. The name of this one is “No Strings Attached,” and it also stars Ashton Kutcher, a perfectly nice-looking fellow and an old hand at this kind of thing. His character, a television writer named Adam, is described as “sooo tall” and “almost annoyingly happy,” which pretty much captures Mr. Kutcher’s salient traits.
Ms. Portman, playing Emma, a Los Angeles doctor who works emergency room rotations, is quite a bit smaller and more emotionally complicated. What are these two doing together? A possible solution to the mystery emerges if you recall a particular scene involving Mila Kunis in “Black Swan.” Ms. Portman can now claim what appears to be a unique distinction: She may be the only Golden Globe-winning actress to simulate sex on screen with two former members of the cast of “That ’70s Show.”
While the full import of that astonishing fact sinks in, let me say that “No Strings Attached,” directed by Ivan Reitman from a script by Elizabeth Meriwether, is not entirely terrible. That is high praise indeed, given that this is a film aspiring to match the achievement of “27 Dresses,” “When in Rome” and “Leap Year.”
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Actually, it is rougher and randier than those movies, earning its R rating with a lot of naughty talk and a dose of semi-cynical sexual candor. The first scenes flail in the direction of various coarse comic subgenres, as we see an icky, awkward summer camp encounter, followed by a frat-house blowout in which we catch sight of Greta Gerwig drunk and wearing shorts with the word “whore” emblazoned across the back. Then there is a funeral, some family awkwardness and a drunken evening that leads to morning-after sex in the wake of a one-night stand that did not happen. It’s not really as confusing as it all sounds, but it is hard to escape the feeling that Mr. Reitman shot six or seven movies and then went into the editing room blindfolded to splice them all together.Shirletta Chambly has lost two family members in St. Louis jails: First her brother, and then her 21-year-old son.
Maleek Coleman-Chambly died after a seizure in his bed at the St. Louis City Justice Center on Jan. 31, 2017. Family members claim he told them over the phone that jail personnel had refused to give him his epilepsy medication the night before.
“You don’t deserve your medication or treated like a human being because you’re locked up?” his mother said, incredulous. “These are human beings.”
Jails across the country are required to provide medical care to prisoners who are serving a sentence or waiting on a trial. But a growing number of former inmates in jails run by the city of St. Louis claim they were denied their medication while incarcerated. In some cases, families say, inadequate medical care has led to death.
Six prisoners in jails run by the city of St. Louis died in 2016 and the first two months of 2017, according to the city’s records. Another six died last year in the custody of St. Louis County. Medical examiners ruled half of the deaths due to suicide; they attributed the others to drug overdoses or complications of chronic medical issues.
St. Louis Corrections Commissioner Dale Glass declined to discuss specific cases. But the idea that anyone has been denied medication in his jails is ridiculous, he said.
Part Two: Mary Lou Walker describes conditions in the Medium Security Institution, known as the Workhouse.
“Why would I deny them medication? We have it here, we pay for it. If they have some rare medication, we have contracts, we can get it,” Glass said. “There’s no logical reason to deny a person medication.”
The city of St. Louis paid a private contractor, Tennessee-based Corizon Health, $7.6 million to provide health care to jail inmates over the last fiscal year.
Read more: ArchCity Defenders co-founder is on a new mission: to end cash bail
A federal lawsuit filed by ArchCity Defenders earlier this month includes allegations that medical care in one city jail, the Medium Security Institution, known as the Workhouse, is inhumane and violates prisoners’ constitutional rights. Plaintiffs claimed they were denied medication for infections, allergies and an asthma inhaler.
“He should not be gone.”
Part One: the family of Maleek Coleman-Chambly claims he was denied his anti-seizure medication
Maleek Coleman-Chambly used to keep his chronic seizures at bay with 1,000 milligrams of Keppra twice a day. The father of two took it like clockwork, said his girlfriend, Jerlysha Boyd.
“If he missed that, he’d go into four or five seizures. He had to have that medicine,” Boyd said.
On Jan. 30, 2017, city police arrested Coleman-Chambly at a probation office. According to St. Louis County police, they asked for him to be booked so they could investigate him on suspicion of promoting child porn. His family thinks he was framed. He never made it to a court hearing.
That night, Boyd said, her boyfriend called from jail and told her that guards at the St. Louis City Justice Center had refused to give him his seizure medication.
“He said they didn’t give it to him. He said I asked the guard, a lot of times, a lot of times for my medicine,” Boyd recalled. “She said I don’t care; you’re going to be shaking like a fish out of water.”
The next morning, Coleman-Chambly was found in his bed, dead after a seizure. The St. Louis medical examiner’s office ruled that he died of natural causes. But his mother can’t shake the feeling that he’d still be alive if he had taken his medicine.
“I knew he would never be the one to be killed in the streets. I know things in life happen, it’s crazy like that. But for him to die?” she said. “He should not be gone.”
A Corizon spokesperson declined to discuss specific cases, citing patient privacy rules.
“Our policies and protocols are based on the standards established by the National Commission on Correctional Healthcare, which was established by the American Medical Association to set the standards recognized by the medical profession and the courts as the benchmark for establishing and measuring a correctional health services program,” wrote Martha Harbin, Corizon’s director of external affairs.
Deaths in lockup: a local look
About 1,000 people die in U.S. jails every year. Half of the deaths are due to illness, according to federal statistics. More than 3,000 die annually in state prisons.
Providing health care in jail is complicated. Bad food and unclean surfaces can make chronic conditions worse. Patients may have incomplete medical histories and no recent doctor to contact. But Coleman-Chambly’s family points out that he had served time before in the St. Louis jail system, and nurses gave him his medication then.
Glass, the Corrections Commissioner for the city of St. Louis, said he cannot comment on specific cases. But he pointed to the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, which regularly assesses St. Louis |
, hands clasped tightly above their heads. “I’ve had the best time of my fucking life out here,” he said, and a cheer went up, and then it was truly time for the lift to begin.
—
There always seems to be a special closeness among the people who come together to build the Temple, the most sacred (if that’s not too strong a word) of all the installations at Burning Man. They eat together, camp together, and work together, and they do it away from the rest of Black Rock City. The work – and the heartaches and drama – ultimately binds them together. They will never forget what they did here, and neither will we. The DPW crews that do so much of the other work here are rough and gnarly on the outside, but no less gooey inside. But the Temple folks are much more likely to acknowledge the spiritual nature of their work, and the intention behind their task.
And why not?
The Temple is the place at Burning Man where the people who are no longer with us are remembered and honored. It is a place of joy and sadness, but maybe most of all it is a place of stillness. We remember the people who gave us solace, the people who took us under their wing, the people who gave us the opportunity to redeem ourselves, and we thank them.
There is a great trust placed in the hands of the people who build the Temple, and they are mindful of that trust.
—
As Carmel approached the scissor lift that would take her to her post at the top of the Temple, Syn drew her aside. Syn is a cheerleader as well as a mom. She is exuberant and tireless, and she, like many of the others here, possesses a great sense of moment. So she took her daughter aside and she said, “You’re representing me up there.” They hugged, and then the bubbly and irrepressible Carmel laughed and scrambled onto the machine.
It’s not the first time that Lightning and Syn and Carmel have worked together on a big art project at Burning Man. The past two years, they joined Gregg in building the Otic Oasis out in the walk-in camping section of the city, a respite from the noise on hubbub of Burning Man. They also built the Pistil, which was installed in the Man base last year.
How many families do you know who are bound together by such sense of purpose and joy? Years ago, Carmel wanted to learn how to sew, but Syn didn’t know how, so she got Bunnie to come over and help. You could say that the teaching and the guidance took hold, because today Carmel is studying textiles in college. And Bunnie is here today too, right over there under the Temple shade, getting ready to install acres of fabric on the inside of the Temple as an artist collaborator.
—
Fixit climbed into the cab of the giant crane. Jess, a Temple builder herself, grabbed one of the guide wires that would help stabilize the piece as it was lifted. Heather stood silently off to herself inside the Temple. In a few minutes, she would be 60 feet in the air, climbing around inside the last wooden piece, removing the rigging that was attached for the lift. Heather is fit and lithe, perfect for the task.
The giant wooden diamond was lifted slowly into the air. Cameras snapped, crews oohed and ahhed, and slowly it moved toward the opening at the top of the Temple. And when it started to descend, the moment would arrive when we would find out if all the work had been careful enough, if every detail had been seen to. The piece would fit, or it wouldn’t.
And then … only minutes later … there were cheers. The fit was sure and simple. The jeweler had set the diamond in the ring, and the Temple was a beautiful whole.
—
Gregg was walking from corner to corner now, trying to get the the best angle to see through to the top. He had his cameraphone out, and it was as if an excited first-time-Burner was getting his first look at the Temple. Gregg is quiet and understated, almost always subdued. But there was a gee-whiz quality about him as he looked up at it all, like he couldn’t quite believe it. So had he been worried?
“There was no way for it not to work,” he said quietly and confidently. “What you do along the way makes sure of it.”One line of Kremlin propaganda you hear a lot from Confused Pro-Putin Libertarians and the pseudo-antiwar (but really just anti-Western) left is that there was a “fascist coup” or “right-wing takeover” of Ukraine, and that as a result, Putin needed to invade Crimea (and quite possibly other Ukrainian provinces soon) to “protect” ethnic Russians and Jews from “Nazis” in Kyiv.
Like the most successful lies, this one has a grain of truth to it: the far-right parties Right Sector and Svoboda did play a role in the protests that toppled pro-Russian autocrat Viktor Yanukovych from power, and they did gain representation in the provisional cabinet that followed his ouster.
But the fact is that there has been no resurgence of fascism in Ukraine (at least, in the parts not controlled by Russian spetsnaz and armed separatists), and the claim that Ukrainian Jews are under threat has been refuted and denied by Ukraine’s rabbis and Jewish community. As Timothy Snyder pointed out months ago, “The prime minister is a liberal conservative, one of the two deputy prime ministers is Jewish, and the governor of the important eastern province of Dnipropetrovsk is the president of the Congress of Ukrainian Jewish Organizations.”
Moreover, the protests that drove Ukrainians into the streets were motivated by a desire for liberalism, limited executive power, free trade, and European integration, and against corruption, autocracy, Russian imperialism, and Yanukovych’s murderous riot police. Weakening the president, abolishing stormtroopers, new elections, and international integration: not exactly a typical “fascist” agenda.
But the results of the recent Ukrainian election clinch the matter: Right Sector and Svoboda came in 10th and 11th place, respectively, with a combined 2.3% of the vote. Meanwhile, elsewhere in Europe, right-wing extremism, anti-immigrant xenophobia, and out-and-out fascism really are on the rise, as seen by the ascendency of France’s National Front, Greece’s Golden Dawn, and Hungary’s Jobbik party. The elections thoroughly debunk the claim about a fascist dictatorship in Ukraine, but that likely won’t stop Vladimir Putin and his unwitting allies in the West from idiotically repeating it.The FBI is getting in on the law enforcement app game on the heels of a controversial data mining project by the Homeland Security Department.
Documents recently posted online seek industry input to develop the equivalent of a web alert system.
"I think what you are looking at is a Google news feed specifically targeted for law enforcement, focusing on their specific needs," Frank Ciluffo, who leads George Washington University’s Homeland Security Policy Institute, told Fox News."We're on our mobile phones and we're on our various iPhones, BlackBerrys and the like that transmits data that locates individuals."
The 12-page document, called "FBI Social Media Application," provides a detailed picture of the bureau's specifications. The program must have the ability "to rapidly assemble critical open source information and intelligence... to quickly vet, identify, and geo-locate breaking events, incidents and emerging threats."
Ciluffo, who was also a former adviser in the George W. Bush White House, said tracking social media is the tip of the spear for national security investigations and it raises privacy questions, over whether law enforcement officers are allowed to monitor public social media posts.
“If you’re in law enforcement's shoes, and certainly if you've got a counterterrorism organization, I wouldn't see why they should feel that anyone else can monitor but they can't,” he said.
Ciluffo said technology is running way of ahead, and the government is about to meet the new social network. “We’ve got to figure what is the right balance between privacy and security. And I'm not sure we, as a country, have addressed that question. When you're dealing with known foreign terrorist organizations and sympathizers and known terrorists, to me that's a cut-and-dry kind of case.”
According to the ACLU, who reviewed the FBI documents for Fox News, information pulled from sites like Facebook, Twitter and blogs could be cross referenced with other databases to identify potential threats. Mike German, a former FBI agent who runs the National Security section of the civil liberties group, says the data could be used to increase video surveillance in a neighborhood. German argues fundamental issues are not being addressed.
“Even where you're talking about published information, information people intentionally put out there on the Internet, we still have a right not to have that monitored by the government. The government really doesn't have any interest in tracking someone's Twitter account if they're not doing something wrong or suspected of doing something wrong.”
And German says the information can lead, in some cases, to questioning by federal officers, and getting rid of the “cloud of suspicion” can become virtually impossible. “Part of what we want to protect is the freedom to speak your mind, to criticize government policies without fear that the government will take it the wrong way and start treating you as if you're a threat.”
The FBI told Fox News in a statement that the project was in the research stage, and if it goes ahead, it “will not focus on specific persons or protected groups, but on words that relate to “events” and “crisis” and activities constituting violations of federal criminal law or threats to national security. Examples of these words will include lockdown, bomb, suspicious package, white powder, active shoot, school lock down, etc.”
Fox News asked Facebook and Twitter for comment in an effort to learn whether they would support the FBI program or opt out. Facebook thanked Fox News for the opportunity but had nothing to add. Twitter did not immediately respond.
Fox News' Shayla Bezdrob contributed to this report.
Fox News chief intelligence correspondent Catherine Herridge's bestselling book "The Next Wave: On the Hunt for al Qaeda's American Recruits" was published last year by Crown.Windows 10 preview build 10547 features plenty of new tweaks and improvements, and among them is a preview of the Object RTC (ORTC) APIs for Microsoft Edge, a collection of tools that will make it easier for developers to build audio and video calling into Web apps without requiring any browser plugins.
Skype is a natural fit for ORTC, and sure enough, the Skype team announced Friday that it is working on new versions of Skype for Web and Skype for Outlook.com that take advantage of this new technology.
According to the Skype blog, “Skype users will be able to make voice and video calls without needing to install a plug-in on Microsoft Edge” starting sometime later this year. The Skype team says it’s also working on a plugin-free version of Skype for Business for Edge users, though it didn’t say when it expects to have that ready to rock.
The impact on you: Object RTC isn’t just a Microsoft technology. Instead, it’s a broader effort—of which Microsoft is part—to make it easier to develop Web apps for real-time communications such as videoconferencing and voice calls. Web apps that employ it won’t require you to install a plugin or muck around with a Java applet (as is the case now), but you’ll still need a browser that supports Object RTC for those Web apps to work. We’re still in Object RTC’s early days, but if it catches on, it could make life a little easier for businesses and consumers alike.Life on Gliese 667Cc?
The extra-solar planet GJ667Cc (or Gliese 667Cc) has been declared the most Earth-like object known outside of our solar system. It orbits a type of star which is studied at the Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics.
Figure 1. Click here for a larger version. Comparison of the planets that are currently the promising candidates for potentially habitable worlds. The Earth Similarity Index (ESI) describes how similar an object is to Earth and ranges from zero (no similarity) to one (identical to Earth). The surface temperature, which is the most important factor in the ESI, depends much on the distance to the host star. The zone around a star, where the surface temperature allows for the existence of liquid water on the planetary surface, is called habitable zone. Gliese 667Cc is located in the habitable zone of its host star and is currently the most Earth-like planet known (ESI=0.82). Credit: Planetary Habitability Laboratory @UPR Arecibo.
The discovery was announced already in last November and recently confirmed (see references below). The planet GJ667Cc is even more similar to our Earth than Kepler-22b, which was confirmed as a potentially habitable planet just a few weeks ago. GJ667Cc, the new prime candidate for a habitable world, is only 22 lightyears (or 200 million million kilometres) away, which is in our direct cosmological neighbourhood.
More and more planets
Less than 20 years ago before the discovery of the first exoplanets, we could only speculate about the possible existence of such planets. By now, more than 700 exoplanets are known, while over 2000 candidates wait for confirmation – among them many in the so-called habitable zone around their host stars (see Figure 1). The increasing number of known potentially habitable planets suggests that such planets might be frequent in the universe.
A cool red host star
While Kepler-22b is orbiting a sun-like star, GJ667Cc is accompanying a red dwarf star of spectral type M. Stars of this type, also called “M-dwarfs”, are smaller and cooler than our Sun but make up at least 60% of all stars. M-dwarfs are currently investigated here at the Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics. Most stars that host exoplanets are thus expected to be cool M-dwarfs, which makes the case of GJ667Cc particularly interesting.
Figure 2: See here for a larger version. The planetary system around the red dwarf star Gliese 667C consists of up to three currently known exoplanets of super-Earth type. The planet c is located right in the habitable zone, where liquid water on the planetary surface may exist. For comparison of sizes, the Earth and Mars are shown next to an artist impression of the planet 667Cc.
Credit: Composite figure based on images from the Planetary Habitability Laboratory @UPR Arecibo.
With an effective temperature of 3400 °C on its surface, the host star GJ667C is much cooler than our Sun, which has a surface temperature of 5500 °C. This red dwarf star therefore emits much less radiation than the Sun, reaching a luminosity of only just over one percent of the solar value.
Not too hot and not too cold
The habitable zone around a star is defined such that the temperatures on the surface of a planet are just right for water to exist in liquid form. Liquid water is considered to be one of the most essential requirements for the formation of life. The Earth is located in the habitable zone around the Sun at a distance of 1 AU (astronomical unit). Owing to the much lower energy output, the habitable zone around the red dwarf star GJ667Cc is much closer to this star at distances between 0.11 AU and 0.23 AU (see Figure 2). The Earth would be an iceworld if it orbited this star instead of our Sun. Fortunately, the planet GJ667Cc is located eight times closer to its star (at 0.12 AU), which puts GJ667Cc comfortably into the habitable zone.
Liquid water?
GJ667Cc receives a radiation flux which is about 90% of what we receive from our Sun on Earth. Although most of this radiation is emitted in the infrared (IR), it is most likely enough to allow for liquid water on the planetary surface. The exact surface temperature is nevertheless uncertain and depends on a number of yet unknown factors. The temperature could be a pleasant 30°C if we assume a planetary atmosphere that is similar to the Earth’s. A more massive atmosphere, however, would result in higher temperatures and Venus-like conditions, which are unfavorable for life. Further observations are needed to answer if GJ 667Cc truly supports liquid water and if the conditions on this planet are appropriate for hosting life.
Close to the star
Due to the short distance to its central star, GJ667Cc orbits this star in only 28 days. One year on this planet is thus only 28 Earth days long. This would make it possible to celebrate your 1000th birthday (which is just 77 years on Earth). The days, however, could be very long. As the planet is so close to its central star, it is very likely that the planet is tidally locked. It would rotate synchronously and show always the same side towards the star – an effect that we know from our Moon. Consequently, there could be eternal day on the hemisphere towards the close-by star and eternal night on the other side, which is facing outer space. The temperature differences between both sides could be large and could affect the global climate.
Figure 3: The Sun seen from Earth (left) and an impression of how the red host star could look from the surface of the planet Gliese 667Cc (right). Although the star is much smaller than the Sun, it would appear larger on the sky and cast a faint reddish light on the planet’s surface. The two other stars Gliese 667A and B would be visible on the sky, see upper left corner on the picture to the right.
Credit: S. Wedemeyer, University of Oslo (2012)
Eternal dawn
The short distance lets the star appear much larger on the sky of GJ667Cc than the Sun on our sky. The red dwarf would be seen as a red disk that, in comparison to the Sun, is about 3 times as wide and covers about 10 times the area (see Figure 3). The star casts a faint reddish light on the planet’s surface. Furthermore, GJ667 is part of a triple star system. The distance to other two stars Gliese 667A and B is about 230 AU, which is about six times the distance between Pluto and the Sun and clearly outside the planetary system around Gliese 667C. Nevertheless, these two stars would be prominently visible on the sky. Our Sun would also be seen with the naked eye as a distant star.
A flaring host star
Unfortunately, there is a potential problem with the nearby host star. Many M-dwarf stars – among them GJ667C – are known to emit flares, which are intense bursts of radiation and energetic particles. Flares on the Sun are known to have a direct impact on our Earth and can, for instance, cause problems with satellite and radio communication. Flares on M-dwarfs, however, can be a thousand times stronger than compared to our Sun. Such mega-flares can double the brightness of the star in minutes. Life on the surface of GJ667Cc would have to find a solution for this problem, especially since the planet is close to its flaring host star.
More problems for life
Another problem is connected to the presumably strong magnetism of the star. Many red dwarfs may be often covered by starspots (the analogues of sunspots) that could reduce the energy output of the star by as much as 40% for periods that may last months. Together with the fact that the red dwarf star emits almost no ultraviolet light, these varying light conditions could be a potential problem for the formation of life as we know it.
Living on GJ667Cc – a heavy experience
Being on GJ667Cc would certainly be a quite different experience. The mass of the planet GJ667Cc is estimated to be (at least) 4.5 times that of the Earth. Like Kepler-22b, GJ667Cc is a Super-Earth, i.e. a planet that is slightly larger and heavier than our Earth. The size and density are not known yet which leaves the possibility that GJ667Cc after all could be an inhabitable gas planet. Only a more compact rocky or ocean planet with a corresponding radius between about 1.7 and 2.2 Earth radii would be favorable for the formation of life.
The higher mass of this planet results in a different gravitational acceleration (that’s what keeps us on the ground) compared to our Earth. In the case that GJ667Cc is a rocky planet, the gravitational acceleration on the surface would be up to 60% higher than what we experience on the surface of Earth. In other words, you would feel (up to) 1.6 times heavier (1.6 g). A person with a weight of 75 kg on Earth would thus weigh 120 kg on the Super-Earth.
Furthermore, a heavier planet can keep a more massive atmosphere. Consequently, the atmospheric pressure at the planetary surface is likely to be higher. If GJ667Cc has an atmosphere that scales proportional to the terrestrial one, then the pressure would just be a few times higher. For a more extreme case like a Venus-type atmosphere, the pressure could be several hundred times larger, which corresponds to a water pressure a few kilometres deep down in the ocean on Earth.
Figure 4: Tardigrades or “waterbears” are examples for animals that can exist and develop under extreme conditions here on the Earth. They tolerate extreme temperatures and high radiation doses.
Credit: http://tardigrades.bio.unc.edu
Could there be life?
Although GJ667Cc is located in a habitable zone, the conditions on the planet could be very different from our Earth. Life would be facing some potential challenges, which may include low and varying light conditions, possibly a higher atmospheric pressure, and violent flares. Nature proves to be inventive though. Even on our own planet we find species that show an amazing ability to adapt to extreme conditions. Examples are the so-called tardigrades, which are also known under the charming names “waterbears” and “moss piglets” (see Figure 4). These tiny creatures range in size from just 0.1 mm up to 1.5 mm. They are found in hot springs, ocean sediments, under ice sheets and even on top of the Himalayas. Waterbears tolerate extreme temperatures from just above absolute zero (-273 °C) to about +150 °C. They can survive years without water and a 1000 times more radiation than other animals. These hardened creatures have even been returned alive from studies in low earth orbit where they were exposed to space conditions. Even if the conditions on GJ667Cc might not be favourable for most terrestrial life forms, it certainly leaves room for the imagination. We can only speculate how fauna and flora – if present at all – would evolve under such different conditions.
Written by researcher Sven Wedemeyer.
Read more:
More details about this discovery are available in the HEC project area of the PHL website
Astrobiology at NASA
Exoplanet app for your iPhone
The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets XXXI. The M-dwarf sample, submitted to Astronomy & Astrophysics.
A planetary system around the nearby M dwarf GJ 667C with at least one super-Earth in its habitable zone, to appear in Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets XXXV. Super-Earths around the M-dwarf neighbors Gl433 and Gl667C, submitted to Astronomy & AstrophysicsINDIANAPOLIS -- Former Alabama linebacker Tim Williams acknowledged past failed drug tests at the NFL Scouting Combine on Saturday, confirming one of the reasons NFL scouts are said to have off-field concerns about one of the draft's most gifted pass rushers.
"(I'm a) young player making decisions that I grew from," Williams said. "That's what life is about -- being a man on and off the field, owning up to your mistakes. Everyone makes them. I'm not here dancing around and joking. I know I'm here with something to prove. I'm obviously behind the eight-ball, so I'm here to prove not only to myself but to every organization that if they get me, they're going to get the best player here."
Williams did not say what substance he has tested positive for, nor how many failed drug tests are in his past. Another off-field concern for NFL scouts regarding Williams is a gun charge he incurred last September. Those issues, combined with Williams' prolific ability to pressure the quarterback, make for a tricky draft evaluation for NFL clubs. Williams, for his part, is owning his mistakes and recognizes there is no escaping the thoroughness of the research NFL clubs put into evaluating prospects.
"I'm going in and being completely honest. This is a billion-dollar industry. They've got all their homework and they know everything about you," Williams said. "You can't go in there and just be dishonest, because a first impression is a last impression.... So far they've respected me for that."
As a junior in 2015, he played a substitution role and still managed 10.5 sacks despite rarely playing on first and second down. Last year, with more playing time, he tallied nine sacks.
NFL Network draft expert Mike Mayock ranked Williams as the No. 2 edge rusher in the draft, behind potential No. 1 overall pick Myles Garrett, entering the combine.
Follow Chase Goodbread on Twitter @ChaseGoodbread.North Carolina’s unemployment rate is now higher than it was in January. The rate, 6.8 percent for August, has gone up each month since May. There were 29,000 fewer people on the job in August than in July.
The rate would be even worse if there weren’t so many people vanishing from North Carolina’s workforce. North Carolina’s “seasonally adjusted” workforce is 4.656 million – that’s 28,567 workers fewer than the state’s workforce a year ago.
If North Carolina is, as Gov. Pat McCrory and the folks at the U.S. Census contend, a growing state, where are these workers going? Shouldn’t the state’s workforce grow as the population is growing? Perhaps McCrory can claim victory and vindication. The nation’s stingiest unemployment benefits he and the GOP leadership in the legislature imposed, must have worked.
Back in January McCrory said workers were coming into North Carolina just to freeload. “We had the ninth-most-generous unemployment compensation in the country,” McCrory said during that January interview broadcast on WRAL-TV. “We were having a lot of people move here, frankly, from other areas to get unemployment. … People were moving here because of our very generous benefits, and then, of course, we had more debt. I personally think that more people got off unemployment and either got jobs or moved back to where they came from.” So, 28,567 workers (add a spouse and 1.5 kids and that’s about 85,700 folks) just shuffled on to South Carolina (6.4 percent unemployment rate) or Virginia (5.6 percent unemployment) to sit on the beach and collect unemployment.
Ponder this: If North Carolina’s workforce was the same size today as it was a year ago, the unemployment rate would be 7.3 percent. And, by the way, North Carolina workers are on the job more and bringing home less. Average weekly hours for manufacturing production workers in August increased 42 minutes compared with July to nearly 44 hours a week. Hourly average wages fell by 5-cents, to $16.69.Posted 05 September 2014 - 10:35 AM
All Clan Skins unlocked for purchase
All Vindicator Skins unlocked for purchase
The 'Yard Sale' Warhorn unlocked for purchase
Gameplay
Portions of the hit mesh around the Vindicator's helmet have been changed from center torso to the appropriate side torso.
Taskbar icon will now flash whenever a map load has completed if the game is not in the foreground.
IS ER Large Laser heat down from 8.5 to 8.0
IS ER Large Laser duration increased from 1.0 to 1.5
Clan ER Large Laser damage down from 11.25 to 11.0
Clan ER Large Laser heat penalty down from 12.0 to 4.0
Clan ER Large Laser long range (max damage) reduced from 890m to 740m
Clan ER Large Laser max range (falloff to zero damage) reduced from 1780m to 1480m
Clan ER Large Laser duration down from 2.0s to 1.6s
Clan ER Medium Laser base heat increased from 5.0 to 6.0
Clan ER Medium Laser long range (max damage) reduced from 450m to 400m
Clan ER Medium Laser max range (falloff to zero damage) reduced from 900m to 800m
Clan ER Medium Laser duration down from 1.3s to 1.25s
Clan ER Small Laser base heat increased from 2.0 to 3.0
Clan ER Small Laser long range (max damage) reduced from 200m to 150m
Clan ER Small Laser max range (falloff to zero damage) reduced from 400m to 300m
Clan Large Pulse Laser damage down from 11.8 to 11.6
Clan Large Pulse Laser heat penalty increased from 2.8 to 4.0
Clan Large Pulse Laser base heat increased from 8.0 to 9.0
Clan Large Pulse Laser long range (max damage) reduced from 600m to 525m
Clan Large Pulse Laser max range (falloff to zero damage) reduced from 1200m to 1050m
Clan Large Pulse Laser duration down from 1.3s to 1.2s
Clan Medium Pulse Laser base heat increased from 5.5 to 6.0
Clan Medium Pulse Laser long range (max damage) reduced from 400m to 330m
Clan Medium Pulse Laser max range (falloff to zero damage) reduced from 800m to 660m
Clan Medium Pulse Laser duration down from 0.9s to 0.85s
Clan Small Pulse Laser base heat increased from 2.4 to 3.4
Clan Small Pulse Laser long range (max damage) reduced from 180m to 150m
Clan Small Pulse Laser max range (falloff to zero damage) reduced from 360m to 300m
Clan LRM-5 cooldown increased from 3.25s to 3.5s
Clan LRM-10 cooldown increased from 3.75s to 4.0s
Clan LRM-15 cooldown increased from 4.25s to 4.5s
Clan LRM-20 cooldown increased from 4.75s to 5.0s
Clan Streak SRM-4 cooldown decreased from 5.25s to 5.0s
Clan Streak SRM-6 cooldown decreased from 7.0s to 6.0s
Resolved some memory allocation errors (mainly on 32-bit systems)
Improved IS map loading/unloading, again to lighten the memory load.
Fixed an issue where the generic clan icon is not appearing correctly
Various bug fixes related to unit creation and the IS map.
All Inner Sphere 'Mechs have a new seat that allows for better visibility when free-looking with Track-IR/Oculus Rift.
Greetings MechWarriors!Before we begin this week's patch, we would just like to take a moment once more to thank everyone who helped us out throughout the data center migration process.Whether you were testing out the new features in Public Test, informing fellow-players of the event, monitoring the website, or are involved in providing feedback for our continuing efforts to improve connectivity in various regions of the world, or whether you were simply leaving us well-wishes throughout the process, we grateful for you.This week's patch will be a bit softer than usual as a result of both that maintenance and the Labour day weekend: We are making all Camo Specs available for both the Clan Mechs as well as the Vindicator and introducing a few Clan weapon balance changes. We are especially eager to hear about whether our bug fixes have resolved memory allocation errors for players encountering the 3-GB Barrier issue on 32-bit systems, an issue triggered by our continuing efforts to improve the visual appeal of our newest maps.We are also excited for the first ever Lance Challenge, which we hope will combine the best aspects of previous challenges with the added benefit of focusing on the Group queue.This challenge will be available once the patch has completed. We hope to see you on the battlefield for this event!We thank you for your patience and we look forward to seeing you on the battlefield!- The MechWarrior® Online™ TeamBattery Safety & Other Information
KNOW YOUR BATTERY SAFETY! Please see our battery safety page HERE. CANNOT SHIP BATTERIES VIA DHL! If your order contains batteries and you are outside of the US or Canada, your order will ship via an alternative method of our choosing closest to your original choice.
Battery Testing
At Lightning Vapes, we've always provided the best authentic tools & materials on the market at a price you can afford, shipped within 24 hours. Thanks to a keen eye, honest vendors, and plenty of informatinonal resources, we've been fortunate enough to have avoided ever placing a knock-off cell for sale on our website. However in lieu of recent events regarding more aggressive tactics by companies who sell re-wrapped, mis-labled cells, we have decided to become more aggressive ourselves when it comes to spotting fakes. In addition to thorough visual inspections of every batch of cells we receive, we are also now going to be conducting our own discharge tests. These tests will be made available to you via product gallery photo on the respective product page. To be clear, these tests serve only to validate that the cells are performing as per their manfuacturer stated specifications. We will not be testing any cells above their stated limits. For details regarding our testing equipment & method, please click HEREIF YOU’VE NEVER HEARD OF SÁNDOR KOCSIS, it’s likely that you’re not from Hungary or you’re not a die-hard Barcelona supporter. Held up as a cherished cult hero by both sets of fans, Kocsis’ quality is well known by both the Blaugrana and admirers of Hungarian football history, but outside of those circles he’s generally brought up in conversation rarely – or as a recent footnote, someone whose international goals tally looks set to be inevitably overhauled by Cristiano Ronaldo.
Search his name on Twitter or on Google and he will appear as just another name about to fall victim to Ronaldo’s insatiable appetite for goals. Just two strikes away from equalling his haul, it is only a matter of time until the Portuguese overtakes him, and yes, before the Los Blancos attacker moves past Ferenc Puskás, too, to top the all-time European international goal-scorer list.
But to refer to Kocsis in such a way is to do him a terrible injustice because he is so much more than a milestone to overcome. First and foremost, he is a national hero whose legacy deserves to be celebrated by football fans everywhere and held up in as high regard as the Pelés, Romarios and Silvio Piolas of the beautiful game’s history books.
Aspiring strikers everywhere spend hours studying and mimicking the moves, styles and tricks of their modern heroes, but there is a great deal to be said for delving into the past, plonking oneself in front of a screen and watching old black-and-white footage of someone of Kocsis’ unrivalled ability. Even today, the Hungarian great has a lot of lessons to impart.
After all, a great footballer is a great footballer no matter what era they are from. Not often showered with mainstream praise, it might surprise you to learn, then, that Kocsis is arguably the greatest goalscorer ever seen on the international stage.
He didn’t win the World Cup, European Championship or the European Cup, he wasn’t the highest scoring Hungarian in history and he didn’t rack up an insane amount of 1,000-plus goals in his career. That said, there is still a very convincing argument that we have not seen since his playing days came to an end, nor will ever see again, a striker of his clinical nature.
That’s because in a mere 68 international appearances for his country, he scored 75 times. Just let that sink in for a moment – his goals-to-games ratio was a mind-blowing 1.10 per match. That is, quite simply, an astonishing number that not even Portugal’s Ronaldo can ever hope to get anywhere near. In fact, it has taken the much-lauded Real Madrid captain twice as many appearances to score two less than Kocsis.
Kocsis is said to have been so good in his pomp, in fact, that Gergely Marosi, a prominent Hungarian journalist and expert on all things Magyar-related, believes his goalscoring achievements will not be emulated ever again: “His 75 goals in 68 matches for the national team is, quite simply, insane,” Marosi told These Football Times.
Read | Gyula Grosics: the revolutionary Black Panther of the Aranycsapat
“No-one will get close to that conversion rate in a Hungarian jersey, I think. Probably his personal highlight was the two crucial goals scored against Uruguay in the semi-final of the 1954 World Cup, sending Hungary to the final. He was so exhausted after the game that he could not dress properly.”
Indeed, if there is one big highlight that sticks out in Kocsis’ goal-filled career for his beloved country, it is his contributions on that day in Lausanne on June 30, over 60 years ago.
The rise before the fall, his expertly dispatched double that afternoon marked his 47th and 48th goals respectively in his international career and would go on to cement his status as the top scorer in Switzerland that summer with a remarkable 11 goals, thus claiming the cherished Golden Boot award.
Before gifting Hungary the victory in extra time, though, Kocsis’ heading ability was witnessed for its creativity, proving that he wasn’t simply a finisher, but a provider of assists as well.
As Nándor Hidegkuti – the renowned scorer of a hat-trick in the 6-3 ‘Match of the Century’ win against England – received the ball 15 yards from the edge of the box, he sized up his |
55.16% European, 42.38% Native American and 2.44% African, using LAMP-LD modeling; and 54.38% European, 43.22% Native American, and 2.40% African, using RFMix.[235] An autosomal DNA study from 2014 found the results to be 51.85% (± 5.44%) European, 44.34% (± 3.9%) Native American, and 3.81% (± 0.45%) African.[93][236]
Studies estimates the white population at 20%,[237] to 52.7% of the Chilean population.[2] According to genetic research by the University of Brasilia, Chilean genetic admixture consists of 51.6% European, 42.1% Amerindian, and 6.3% African ancestry.[155] According to an autosomal genetic study of 2014 carried out among soldiers in the city of Arica, Northern Chile, the European admixture goes from 56.8% in soldiers born in Magallanes to 41.2% for the ones who were born in Tarapacá.[238] According to a study from 2013, conducted by the Candela Project in Northern Chile as well, the genetic admixture of Chile is 52% European, 44% Native American, and 4% African.[239]
According to a study performed in 2014,[240] 37.9% of Chileans self-identified as white, a subsequent DNA tests showed that the average self identifying white was genetically 54% European.
Genotype and phenotype in Chileans vary according to social class. 13% of lower-class Chileans have at least one non-Hispanic European surname, compared to 72% of those who belong to the upper-middle-class.[241] Phenotypically, only 9.6% of lower-class girls have light-colored eyes—either green or blue—where 31.6% of upper-middle class girls have such eyes.[241] Blonde hair is present in 2.2% and 21.3%, of lower-class and upper-middle girls respectively,[241] whilst black hair is more common among lower-class girls (24.5%) than upper-middle class ones (9.0%).[241]
Chile was usually an unattractive place for migrants, simply because it was far from Europe and relatively difficult to reach. However, during the 18th century an important flux of emigrants from Spain populated Chile. They were mostly Basques, who vitalized the economy and rose rapidly in the social hierarchy, becoming part of the political elite that still dominates the country.[242][243] An estimated 1.6 million (10%) to 3.2 million (20%) Chileans have a surname (one or both) of Basque origin.[244][245][246][247][248][249][250][251] The Basques liked Chile because of its similarity to their native land: cool climate, with similar geography, fruits, seafood, and wine.[243]
The Spanish was the most significant European immigration to Chile,[252] although there was never a massive immigration, such as happened in neighboring Argentina and Uruguay,[253] and, therefore, the Chilean population wasn't "whitened" to the same extent.[253] However, it is undeniable that immigrants have played a role in Chilean society.[253] Between 1851 and 1924, Chile received only 0.5% of the total European immigration to Latin America, compared to 46% for Argentina, 33% for Brazil, 14% for Cuba, and 4% for Uruguay.[252] This was because such migrants came across the Atlantic, not the Pacific, and before the construction of the Panama Canal,[252] Europeans preferring to settle in countries close to their homelands, instead of taking the long route through the Straits of Magellan or across the Andes.[252] In 1907, the European-born reached a peak of 2.4% of the Chilean population,[254] decreasing to 1.8% in 1920,[255] and 1.5% in 1930.[256]
It is estimated that nearly 5% of the Chilean population is of Asian descent, chiefly from the Middle East—i.e., Jews/Israelis, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese—totaling about 800,000.[257][258] Chile is home to a large population of immigrants, mostly Christian, from the Levant.[259] Roughly 500,000 Palestinian descendants are believed to reside in Chile.[260][261][262][263][264]
About 5% of the Chilean population has some French ancestry.[265] Over 700,000 (4.5%) Chileans may be of British (English, Scottish and Welsh) or Irish origin.[266] Another significant immigrant group is Croatian. The number of their descendants today is estimated to be 380,000, or 2.4% of the population.[267][268] Other authors claim that close to 4.6% of the Chilean population must have some Croatian ancestry.[269]
After the failed liberal revolution of 1848 in the German states,[253][270] a significant German immigration took place, laying the foundation for the German-Chilean community. Sponsored by the Chilean government, to "unbarbarize" and colonize the southern region,[253] these Germans (including German-speaking Swiss, Silesians, Alsatians and Austrians) settled mainly in Valdivia, Llanquihue, Chiloé, and Los Ángeles.[271] The Chilean Embassy in Germany estimated that 150,000 to 200,000 Chileans are of German origin.[272][273]
184,000 are descendants of Italians.[274] Chileans of Greek descent are estimated to number 90,000 to 120,000,[275] most of them living in the Santiago or the Antofagasta areas, Chile being one of the top 5 countries in terms of number of Greek descendants.[276] The descendants of the Swiss number 90,000[277] Other groups of European descendants are found in smaller numbers.
Colombia [ edit ]
The 2005 census reported that the "nonethnic population," consisting of whites and mestizos (those of mixed white European and Amerindian ancestry, including almost all of the urban business and political elite), constituted 86 percent of the national population. The 86 percent figure is subdivided into 49 percent mestizo and 37 percent white. The census figures show how Colombians see themselves in terms of race. Colombia: A Country Study, Colombia: A Country Study; pp. 86-87
The proportion of the Colombian population with primarily European ancestry is estimated at approximately 20%, but in the 2005 Census, 37% of the total population self-identified as white.[7] According to genetic research by the University of Brasilia, Colombian genetic admixture indicates 45.9% European, 33.8% Amerindian, and 20.3% African ancestry.[155]
Within 100 years after the first Spanish settlement, nearly 95 percent of all Native Americans in Colombia had died. The majority of the deaths of Native Americans were the cause of diseases such as measles and smallpox, which were spread by European settlers. Many Native Americans were also killed by armed conflicts with European settlers.
White Colombians are mostly descendants of Spaniards, although Italian, German, Irish, Portuguese, Slavic, and Lebanese Colombians are found in significant numbers. Many Spanish colonists came searching for gold, while other Spaniards established themselves as leaders of social organizations teaching natives the Christian faith and the ways of European civilization. Catholic priests provided education for Native Americans that otherwise was unavailable.
Between 1540 and 1559, 8.9 percent of the residents of Colombia were of Basque origin. It has been suggested that the present day incidence of business entrepreneurship in the region of Antioquia is attributable to the Basque immigration and character traits. Today many Colombians of the Department of Antioquia region preserve their Basque ethnic heritage. In Bogota, there is a small district/colonies of Basque families who emigrated as a consequence of Spain's Civil War or because of better opportunities.[279] Basque priests were the ones that introduced handball into Colombia. Basque immigrants in Colombia were devoted to teaching and public administration. In the first years of the Andean Multinational Company, Basque sailors navigated as captains and pilots on the majority of the ships until the country was able to train its own crews.[280]
The first and largest wave of immigration from the Middle East began around 1880, and continued during the first two decades of the twentieth century. The immigrants were mainly Maronite Christians from Greater Syria (Syria and Lebanon) and Palestine, fleeing those then Ottoman territories.[281] Syrians, Palestinians, and Lebanese have continued to settle in Colombia. Due to a lack of information, it is impossible to know the exact number of Lebanese and Syrians that immigrated to Colombia; but for 1880 to 1930, 5,000–10,000 is estimated. Syrians and Lebanese are perhaps the biggest immigrant group next to the Spanish since independence. Those who left their homeland in the Middle East to settle in Colombia left for different religious, economic, and political reasons. In 1945, Barranquilla, Cartagena, Cali, and Bogota are the cities with the largest numbers of Arabic-speakers in Colombia.[282] The Arabs that went to Maicao were mostly Sunni Muslim, with some Druze and Shiites, as well as Orthodox and Maronite Christians. The mosque of Maicao is the second largest mosque in Latin America. Middle Easterns are generally called Turcos (Turkish).[281]
In December 1941 the United States government estimated that there were 4,000 Germans living in Colombia. There were some Nazi agitators in Colombia, such as Barranquilla businessman Emil Prufurt. Colombia invited Germans who were on the U.S. blacklist to leave.[283] SCADTA, a Colombian-German air transport corporation, which was established by German expatriates in 1919, was the first commercial airline in the western hemisphere.[284] In recent years, the celebration of Colombian-German heritage has grown increasingly popular in Bogota, Cartagena, and Bucaramanga. There are many annual festivals that focus German cuisine, specially pastry arts and beer. Since 2009, there has been a considerable increase in collaborative research through advanced business and educational exchanges, such as those promoted by COLCIENCIAS and AIESEC. There are many Colombian-German companies focused on finance, science, education, technology and innovation, and engineering.[285]
Ecuador [ edit ]
According to the 2010 National Population Census, 6.1% of the population self-identified as white, down from 10.5% in 2001.[286] In Ecuador, being white is more an indication of social class than of ethnicity. Classifying oneself as white is often done to claim membership to the middle class and to distance oneself from the lower class, which is associated being "Indian". For this reason the status of blanco is claimed by people who are not primarily of European heritage.[287] According to genetic research by the University of Brasilia, Ecuadorian genetic admixture indicates 64.6% Amerindian, 31.0% European, and 4.4% African ancestry.[155]
White Ecuadorians, mostly criollos, are descendants of Spanish colonists and also Spanish refugees fleeing the 1936–1939 Spanish Civil War. Most still hold large amounts of lands, mainly in the northern Sierra, and live in Quito or Guayaquil. There is also a large number of white people in Cuenca, a city in the southern Andes of Ecuador, due to the arrival of Frenchmen in the area, who came to measure the arc of the Earth. Cuenca, Loja, and the Galápagos attracted German immigration during the early 20th century. The Galápagos also had a small Norwegian fishing community until they were asked to leave. There are sizable populations of Italian, French, German, Basque, Portuguese, and Greek descent, as well as a small Ecuadorian Jewish population. Ecuador's Jews consists of Sephardic Jews arriving in the South of the country in the 16th and 17th centuries and Ashkenazi Jews during the 1930s in the main cities of Quito and Cuenca.[288]
French Guiana [ edit ]
12% of the population is white, mostly French.[289]
Paraguay [ edit ]
Ethnically, culturally, and socially, Paraguay has one of the most homogeneous populations in South America. Because of José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia's 1814 policy that no white Spaniards and Europeans could intermarry among themselves (they could only marry blacks, mulattoes, mestizos or the native Guaraní), a measure taken to avoid a white majority occurring in Paraguay (De Francia believed that all men were equal as well), it was within little more than one generation that most of the population were of mixed racial origin.
The exact percentage of the white Paraguayan population is not known because the Paraguayan census does not include racial or ethnic identification, save for the indigenous population,[290] which was 1.7% of the country's total in the 2002 census.[291] Other sources estimate the sizes of other groups, the mestizo population being estimated at 95% by the CIA World Factbook, with all other groups totaling 5%.[292][169] Thus, whites and the remaining groups (Asians, Afro-Paraguayans, others) make up approximately 3.3% of the total population. According to Lizcano, in 2005 a fifth of population or 20% are white and 75% approximately is mestizo.[2] Such a reading is complicated, because, as elsewhere in Latin America, "white" and "mestizo" are not mutually exclusive (people may identify as both).
Due to the European migration in the 19th and 20th centuries, the majority of whites are of German descent (including Mennonites), with others being of French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese descent.[293] Many are southern and southeastern Brazilians (brasiguayos), as well as Argentines and Uruguayans, and their descendants.[293] People from such regions are generally descendants of colonial settlers and/or more recent immigrants.[293]
In 2005, 600 families of Volga Germans who migrated to Germany after the fall of the Soviet Union, re-migrated and established a new colony, Neufeld, near Yuty (Caazapá Department), in southeastern Paraguay.[294]
Peru [ edit ]
According to the 2017 census 5.9% or 1.3 million people self-identified as white of the population who were aged 12 and above. This was the first time the census had asked an ancestral identity question. The highest proportion was in the La Libertad Region with 10% identifying as white.[62] They are descendants primarily of Spanish colonists, and also of Spanish refugees fleeing the Spanish Civil War. After World War II, many German refugees fled to Peru and settled in large cities, while others descend from Italian, French (mainly Basques), Austrian or German, Portuguese, British, Russians, Croats, Lebanese, Jordanian, and Syrian immigrant families. The majority of the whites live in the largest cities, and are concentrated in the northern coastal cities of Trujillo, Chiclayo, Piura, and of course the capital Lima. Cajamarca and San Martín Region, and the highlands of northwestern Peru, are also places with strong Spanish, and other European, influence and ethnic presence.[citation needed] The only southern city with a significant white population is Arequipa.
According to a genetic research by the University of Brasilia, Peruvian genetic admixture indicates 73.0% Amerindian, 15.1% European, and 11.9% African ancestry.[155]
Uruguay [ edit ]
A 2009 DNA study in the American Journal of Human Biology showed the genetic composition of Uruguay as primarily European, with Native American ancestry ranging from one to 20 percent and sub-Saharan African from seven to 15 percent, depending on the region.[295]
Between the mid-19th and the early 20th centuries, Uruguay received part of the same migratory influx as Argentina, although the process started a bit earlier. During 1850-1900, the country welcomed four waves of European immigrants, mainly Spaniards, Italians and Frenchmen. In smaller numbers came British, Germans, Swiss, Russians, Portuguese, Poles, Bulgarians, Hungarians, Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Estonians, Dutch, Belgians, Croatians, Lebanese, Armenians, Greeks, Scandinavians, and Irish. The demographic impact of these migratory waves was greater than in Argentina, Uruguay going from having 70,000 inhabitants in 1830, to 450,000 in 1875, and a million inhabitants by 1900, its population thus increasing fourteen-fold in only 70 years. Between 1840 and 1890, 50%–60% of Montevideo's population was born abroad, almost all in Europe. The Census conducted in 1860 showed that 35% of the country's population was made up by foreigners, although by the time of the 1908 Census this figure had dropped to 17%.[296]
From 1996 to 1997, the National Institute of Statistics (INE) of Uruguay conducted a Continuous Household Survey, of 40,000 homes, that included the topic of race in the country. Its results were based on "the explicit statements of the interviewee about the race they consider they belong themselves". These results were extrapolated, and the INE estimated that out of 2,790,600 inhabitants, some 2,602,200 were white (93.2%), some 164,200 (5.9%) were totally or partially black, some 12,100 were totally or partially Amerindian (0.4%), and the remaining 12,000 considered themselves Yellow.[297]
In 2006, a new Enhanced National Household Survey touched on the topic again, but this time emphasizing ancestry, not race; the results revealed 5.8% more Uruguayans stated having total or partial black and/or Amerindian ancestry. This reduction in the percentage of self-declared "pure whites" between surveys could be caused by the phenomenon of the interviewee giving new value to their African heritage, similar to what has happened in Brazil in the last three censuses. Anyway, it is worth noting that 2,897,525 interviewées declared having only white ancestry (87.4%), 302,460 declared having total or partial black ancestry (9.1%), 106,368 total or partial Amerindian ancestry (2.9%) and 6,549 total or partial Yellow ancestry (0.2%).[298] This figure matches external estimates for white population in Uruguay of 87.4%,[299] 88%,[2][300] or 90%.[301]
Recently many European and American immigrants have entered the country seeking peace and security, or escaping from the pollution and voracious tax systems in their countries of origin. In 1997, the Uruguayan government granted residence rights to only 200 European/American citizens; in 2008 the number of residence rights granted increased to 927.[302]
Venezuela [ edit ]
Stefanía Fernández, Venezuelan pageant titleholder is of Ukrainian, Polish and Spanish ancestry
According to the official Venezuelan census, although "white" literally involves external issues such as light skin, shape and color of hair and eyes, among others, the term "white" has been used in different ways in different historical periods and places, and so its precise definition is somewhat confusing.[8] For this reason, White Venezuelan is used to describe the Venezuelan citizen of European origin.
According to the 2011 National Population and Housing Census, 43.6% of the population identified themselves as white people.[8] A genomic study shows that about 60.6% of the Venezuelan gene pool has European origin. Among the Latin American countries in the study (Argentina, Bahamas, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Colombia, El Salvador, Ecuador, Jamaica, Mexico, Peru, Puerto Rico, and Venezuela), Colombia, Brazil, Venezuela, and Argentina exhibit the highest European contribution.[303]
The Venezuelan gene pool indicates a 60.6% European, 23.0% Amerindian, and 16.3% African ancestry.[155] Spaniards were introduced into Venezuela during the colonial period. Most of them were from Andalusia, Galicia, Basque Country and from the Canary Islands. Until the last years of World War II, a large part of European immigrants to Venezuela came from the Canary Islands, and their cultural impact was significant, influencing the development of Castilian in the country, its gastronomy and customs. With the beginning of oil production during the first decades of the 20th century, employees of oil companies from the United States, United Kingdom, and the Netherlands established themselves in Venezuela. Later, in the middle of the century, there was a new wave of immigrants originating from Spain (mainly from Galicia, Andalucia, and Basque country, some being refugees from the Spanish Civil War), Italy (mainly from southern Italy and the Veneto region), and Portugal (from Madeira), as well as from Germany, France, England, Croatia, the Netherlands, other European countries, and the Middle East (Lebanon), encouraged by a welcoming immigration policy to a prosperous, rapidly developing country where educated and skilled immigrants were needed.[citation needed]
Representation in the media [ edit ]
Some American media outlets have criticized Latin American media for allegedly featuring a disproportionate number of blond and blue-eyed white actors and actresses in telenovelas, relative to non-whites.[304][305][306][307][308][309][310][311]
See also [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]
Twinam, Ann. 2015. Purchasing whiteness: Pardos, mulattos, and the quest for social mobility in the Spanish Indies. Stanford: Stanford University Press.The Route 66 Hotel and Casino in Albuquerque has canceled Kathy Griffin’s scheduled appearance after an image of the comedian holding a bloody, decapitated head resembling that of President Donald Trump went viral Tuesday and sparked widespread backlash.
“The performance by Kathy Griffin on July 22nd has been cancelled,” read a note on the New Mexico casino’s Facebook page, promising to refund any guest who purchased a ticket.
Facebook users thanked hotel management for making the decision.
“Thank you for taking a stand against her vile actions,” wrote one commenter on the hotel’s announcement.
“Thank you for showing the world you don’t support vile, disgusting, hate spewing, divisiveness. Hopefully what she had left of a career is over,” another commenter wrote.
“She made a mockery and lessened the lives of the people who have been beheaded and murdered by isis!! Disgraceful!!!” another commenter wrote.
Griffin is also scheduled to perform at the Grass Valley Veterans Memorial Building on June 16 and the Uptown Theatre Napa on June 17.
Uptown Theatre Napa and Grass Vally Center for the Arts did not immediately respond to a query from Breitbart News about the future of Griffin’s scheduled appearances.Image caption The Deepwater Horizon rig explosion last April caused the US's worst environmental disaster
US interior secretary Ken Salazar has rejected claims that BP has reached an agreement to restart drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico.
Media reports have said that the UK oil giant will resume work in July at 10 sites in the Gulf.
Mr Salazar told reporters on Monday: "There is no such agreement, nor would there be such an agreement."
But BBC business editor Robert Peston understands BP has been told privately it should be able to resume soon.
Last April an explosion at BP's Deepwater Horizon rig killed 15 workers and caused the US's worst environmental disaster.
The issue of whether to allow BP to resume work is sensitive for the company and the Obama administration as the oil spill is still fresh in the minds of Gulf communities and environmental groups.
Britain's Sunday Times newspaper, followed by the Financial Times, said that BP had reached an agreement to restart work.
The US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which hands out drilling permits, was swift to respond, saying that "there is no such deal".
I am told that US regulators have given it [BP] an informal nod Read Robert's blog
Now Mr Salazar has added his weight, saying that the reports are a "misconception". BP has declined to comment.
BP would like to restart work on 10 existing wells, all in deep water locations.
The company's rivals have been given permission to resume drilling on existing operations. New deep water explorations are still banned.
Metal deal
Meanwhile, BP has announced that it has agreed to sell Arco Aluminum, a supplier of rolled aluminium sheet used mainly in the production of drink cans, to a consortium of Japanese companies for $680m (£420m) in cash.
BP is hoping to raise $30bn from disposals by the end of 2011 to help pay for the clean-up and compensation for the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
The company has already agreed deals worth a total of more than $24bn.
BP's chief executive, Bob Dudley, said in a statement: "Although a strong business, Arco Aluminum is clearly a non-strategic asset for BP. Today's agreement will deliver an attractive price for the business, unlocking its value for our shareholders."
Later on Monday, BP returns to an arbitration tribunal as part of a continuing dispute with shareholders in its Russian joint venture, TNK-BP.
The shareholders, known as AAR, are trying to block a share-swap and Arctic exploration pact between BP and Russia's Rosneft.
AAR has already blocked the exploration deal, and now wants to block the share swap, arguing that it breaches a pre-existing TNK-BP agreement.Pep Guardiola has got Manchester City playing some beautiful football this season.
Pep Guardiola has never been one to exhibit overt displays of either petulance or pleasure when ex-pros, press, pundits and the public pontificate – positively or negatively – about his coaching capabilities within that English footballing nirvana that is the Premier League.
But even he must have permitted himself a little smile when he heard none other than Alan Shearer, a former English striker and about as English as it is possible to be, announce on BBC’s Match of the Day that this season at Manchester City Pep was “taking football to a new level.”
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Lest we forget this is a coach who less than a year ago was being widely described by many as a fraud; as someone who would not be able to cut it in the Premier League and if he did manage to achieve something it would only be because of the massive financial backing he enjoyed at the Etihad.
Cheap, uneducated shots made as a jingoistic attempt to exalt the praises of their own league not by actually doing anything really exciting like win a Champions League, but by demeaning the achievements of Guardiola in other countries’ competitions.
“Yeah, he might well have done it in La Liga or the Bundesliga, but the Premier League is another story altogether,” was the rallying cry.
READ MORE: Five things we learned from the Premier League weekend
READ MORE: Who can rival Lewis Hamilton for SPOTY in 2017?
A borderline racist attack, sometimes from those who should have known better, but more often than not from that armchair army of badge-kissers, empowered by an anonymity bestowed upon them by the social networks.
Contract status
Story continues
As things stand Pep has just one more season to go on the three-year deal he penned with City and although nothing by way of an extension has yet been discussed at this moment it is almost inconceivable that he will not be extending his stay in the North West of England.
All the important decision makers at the club know precisely his modus operandi and basically the plan is to sit down at the end of the season, take stock and add a further year to his contract.
I feel a two-year deal extension is not going to happen for the simple reason that it is something that he has never done, not even during his all-conquering times at Barcelona. Both on and off the field Pep is a man that has always taken full responsibility not just for his own, but also his family’s, destiny.
After the addition of another year all parties will look at the situation on an annual basis
Nothing is signed yet, but my sources are telling me that Guardiola feels that he does not have enough time left on his contract to achieve everything he wants to at the club and that is not just about merely winning pots but also about laying the foundations for what he believes can become something special.
Whatever he achieves this year – and before we get too carried away let’s be clear that so far at City he has nothing ‘silvery’ to show for his efforts – Guardiola is a past master at knowing when not to overstay his welcome. He left Barcelona when he felt he couldn’t take the club any further following an unprecedented success that made them the envy of the footballing world and a Bayern Munich that he took to three consecutive Bundesliga titles and two German Cups.
Guardiola’s coaching mantra has always steadfastly maintained three things.
Firstly what you need, over and above anything else, are the players to take you and your club where you want to go. He has said this time and time again and now answers “the players” with a mixture of disbelief and incredulity when asked repeatedly what he believes is the most important thing needed at a football club to guarantee success.
READ MORE: De Bruyne doubts City can go unbeaten
READ MORE: Klopp explains what sets City apart
Pep Guardiola in the dugout
And you can take them the way you want by coaching them for months. Only three new players were in the line up against West Brom. Most of what he is constructing now and that makes him so “special” all of a sudden is the work he has put in from day 1 and that only the blind could not see it.
Secondly you need the time not only to get those players of quality you need, but also to ‘teach’, ‘persuade’, ‘convince’, cajole’ – call it what you will – them to play the way you want them to because, quite simply, that is how you want them to play. No middle ground, no compromise.
And thirdly the courage, self-belief, or if you prefer, sheer uncompromising obstinacy and single-mindedness to be fully committed to doing it your way, or no way at all, despite the constant calls and urgings from lesser mortals to change your style, to compromise your principles.
Building a winning machine
No league has even been won after just ten games but with 35 goals scored, 12 more than their closest rivals his side’s performances this year have merely rubber-stamped what we already suspected, namely that this is a City side that, home and abroad, is going to take a lot of stopping this time around.
There are still cynics out there that will claim that anyone could achieve success at a money-no-object Manchester City.
They are wrong of course, although there is certainly a semblance of reality in what they say. In today’s Premier League you will not succeed without spending loads of money (Leicester apart maybe) but the the mere act of writing out a whole host of cheques is never going to be enough to guarantee any success, short, medium or long term.
Leicester City, in fact, achieved less once they actually started to splash the cash following their title winning season and try telling Everton fans that the key to success is all about spending money.
Yes Guardiola has spent, but his greatest achievement has been that he has maximised the potential of those he already had at the club before he started shopping at the end of last season.
The decision to sideline Joe Hart in favour of Claudio Bravo was about as controversial as you could get, not least because the England goalkeeper was something of a cult hero at the club. To add fuel to the fire, his chosen replacement, the poor Claudio Bravo for reasons that no one ever really understood proceeded to play just about every single game with a kitten-like nervousness that suggested this was the first time he had ever played between the sticks.
READ MORE: Guardiola’s side restore five-point lead after defeating West Brom
READ MORE: Guardiola hails ‘special talent’ Sane after win at West Brom
Lesser men would have been swayed. Not Pep. He always knew what he wanted from a goalkeeper and similarly he knew that Joe Hart was too long in the tooth, to set in his ways, to be able to give it to him. The purchase and current form of Ederson has completely vindicated the coach’s stance, and now the silence from those critics that lambasted him, is defeaning.
The Chilean had a nightmare debut season in English football and has lost his place to the impressive Ederson
The purchase of John Stones from Everton for an initial £47.5m from Everton was deemed by many to be insane and, certainly, early on he showed that despite the massive price tag which made him the second most expensive defender behind David Luiz he still had much to learn.
Then England manager, Roy Hodgson despite a paucity of top central defenders considered him good enough to take to the Euros but not good enough to play. Pep never had any doubts and now in defence as well as in launching attacks from the back Stones is looking like he will very soon become one of the greatest defenders in the world. Think Piqué, Ramos and a bit of Puyol and you get the idea.
The defence that haemorrhaged goals last season has conceded just six in the league to date.
Improving Man City’s players
At Euro 2016 a vilified and ridiculed, Raheem Sterling was regarded by many of the so-called experts as someone who was not fit for purpose. Pep, with the rest of his coaching staff has contrived to turn the youngster into currently one of the Premier League’s hottest properties.
And where to begin with Kevin de Bruyne a man who under Guardiola’s tutelage now seems capable of providing more assists per game that allegedly similar players do in a month? Just ten games in and he is already being talked about as a potential player of the year.
City’s defensive frailties last year, particularly on the flank were the stick constantly used to beat Guardiiola over the head with.
Kevin de Bruyne
The purchase of Benjamin Mendy from Monaco and Kyle Walker from Tottenham Hotspur for huge money seemed to address that particular problem until a cruciate knee ligament injury suffered by Mendy has guaranteed that the Frenchman will not be back in contention for a place until April at the earliest.
READ MORE: West Brom v Manchester City – how the match unfolded
READ MORE: Mendy – I’ll be back for Champions League semi-finals
To the rescue has come Fabian Delph, already at the club when Guardiola joined and someone who with the assistance of Pep and his coaching staff has performed heroics coming in as his replacement in the left back berth.
Today Pep is merely reaping what he sowed last year. It hasn’t been all plain sailing and he was genuinely sorry to lose the likes of the 17-year-old Jadon Sancho who went to Borussia Dortmund because Pep was unable to guarantee the English youngster first team football at this stage although with a buy back clause in place there is every chance he will be back at some stage in his career.
But be assured of one thing. When Pep finally does leave Manchester as one day he surely will, he will leave it better and stronger than when he arrived.There are good reasons why fare gates won’t be installed at SkyTrain’s Metrotown Station in time for this fall’s Compass smart card launch. First of all, there isn’t enough space inside the station to fit the many gates needed for the high passenger flow of the station. And that leads to the second point: the station is in need of a major retrofit and expansion in order to not only accommodate current demand but also rapid future ridership growth, which is why expensive fare gate installation prior to these upgrades isn’t such a great idea.
TransLink is currently in the process of planning a major $37 million upgrade for Metrotown Station and its major bus exchange. It is the second busiest SkyTrain station serving 50,000 trips per day and that doesn’t even include the additional 25,000 trips per day counted at its adjacent bus loop. On a Saturday, it’s the closest you’ll get to some of the little, local stations in Tokyo for crowded factor.
Much more ridership growth is anticipated for the station with Metropolis at Metrotown’s role as the region’s largest shopping centre and as the Metrotown area continues to densify. For instance, the Station Square redevelopment and the $1-billion Metropolis development project spearheaded by Sears Canada are among the district’s most significant additions. Unfortunately, Metrotown Station was designed and built before the opening of the major shopping centre and dense neighbourhood it now serves.
As is, virtually all passengers enter and exit Metrotown Station through the narrow east exit stairwell and escalator. The ticketing concourse for the station’s main entrance and the pedestrian overpass that links the station structure with the shopping centre are also grossly underbuilt for current demands.
Altogether, it makes for poor and congested passenger circulation within the Metrotown Station structure and makes fare gate installation prior to major retrofits completely impossible despite the misguided mainstream media and NDP outcries over this faux “oversight” last year.
Virtually all of SkyTrain Metrotown Station’s 50,000 daily passengers use this small staircase and up escalator to enter and exit the platform level. Photo credit: Matt Schroeter.
Why didn’t a upgrade happen years ago when it was already direly needed? Well, funding is always key. The project will cost $37 million, but TransLink isn’t the sole financial contributor to the project (for that matter, the transportation authority currently does not have the financial capacity to completely fund such projects). For this renovation and expansion, the federal government is footing in about $10.5 million while the provincial government is footing a majority share with $21 million. TransLink will cover the remaining $6 million.
These upgrades consist of:
a new east station entrance with an expanded ground-level ticketing concourse, with new stairs and up/down escalators to the platform level;
a new west station entrance with a staircase and up/down escalators to the platform level;
a new staircase mid-platform, connecting to ground level at the central station entrance;
the replacement |
parts inside the drive. This sets a fixed lower limit, which is why the average selling price for both of the major HDD manufacturers has been USD$45–75 since 2007.[14] That said, the price of high-capacity drives has fallen rapidly, and this is indeed an effect of density. The highest capacity drives use more platters, essentially individual hard drives within the case. As the density increases, the number of platters can be reduced, leading to lower costs.
Hard drives are often measured in terms of cost per bit. For example, the first commercial hard drive, IBM's RAMAC in 1957, supplied 3.75 MB for $34,500, or $9,200 per megabyte. In 1989, a 40 MB hard drive cost $1200, or $30/MB. And in 2018, 4 Tb drives sold for $75, or 1.9¢/GB, an improvement of 1.5 million since 1989 and 520 million since the RAMAC. This is without adjusting for inflation, which increased prices nine-fold from 1956 to 2018.
Hard drive cost per GB over time date capacity cost $/GB 1957 3.75 MB $34,500 $9.2 million/GB 1989 40 MB $1,200 $30,000/GB 1995 1 GB $850 $850/GB 2004 250 GB $250 $1/GB 2011 2 TB $70 $0.035/GB 2018 4 TB $75 $0.019/GB
Solid-state storage has seen a similar drop in cost per bit. In this case the cost is determined by the yield, the number of viable chips produced in a unit time. Chips are produced in batches printed on the surface of a single large silicon wafer, which is cut up and non-working samples are discarded. Fabrication has improved yields over time by using larger wafers, and producing wafers with fewer failures. The lower limit on this process is about $1 per completed chip due to packaging and other costs.[15]
The relationship between information density and cost per bit can be illustrated as follows: a memory chip that is half the physical size means that twice as many units can be produced on the same wafer, thus halving the price of each one. As a comparison, DRAM was first introduced commercially in 1971, a 1 kbit part that cost about $50 in large batches, or about 5 cents per bit. 64 Mbit parts were common in 1999, which cost about 0.00002 cents per bit (20 microcents/bit).[15]
See also [ edit ]
Bit cell – the length, area or volume required to store a single bit
Mark Kryder, who projected in 2009 that if hard drives were to continue to progress at their then-current pace of about 40% per year, then in 2020 a two-platter, 2.5-inch disk drive would store approximately 40 terabytes (TB) and cost about $40.
Patterned media
Shingled magnetic recording (SMR)By Tori Rodriguez and Kathleen Smith
Throughout the fall, news about the landmark Affordable Care Act (ACA), designed to extend healthcare coverage to millions of the country’s currently uninsured, has been overshadowed by the egregious technical glitches that plagued its website after its launch. But now that the worst computer issues have been addressed, more attention has begun to turn to ACA’s impact on the delivery of healthcare, including the mental health services that payers must cover under the act. ACA’s expansion of the benefits of the Mental Health Parity and Addictions Equity Act of 2008 means that millions more people will receive mental health benefits, with the mandate that they must be reimbursed at the same level as coverage for physical illnesses. At first glance, that huge growth in the potential insured client pool would appear to be a boon for therapists in private practice, but ACA’s practical impact may not be as favorable as many clinicians expect.
In the interest of efficiency, increased oversight, and cost control, ACA will effect fundamental changes in the ways that healthcare is monitored and delivered. According to Katherine Nordal, American Psychological Association’s (APA) executive director for professional practice, ACA will move insurance companies away from fee-for-service models (paying one provider for one session) toward a global payment model, in which mental health services are “bundled” with fees for other healthcare services relevant to the patient’s…
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(Need help? Click here or contact us to ask a question.)Try googling “Ben & Jerry’s fortune cookie ice cream” and you will see pages and pages of news items on the “Taste the Lin-Sanity” frozen yogurt flavor, which featured fortune cookies and lychee swirls in honor of Knicks basketball sensation Jeremy Lin. After complaints about the ethnic stereotyping of Lin, who is Taiwanese-American, the company replaced the fortune cookie ingredient with a waffle cookie on the side, and apologized “if anyone was offended” by the product.
An article we ran yesterday reviewing the Ben & Jerry’s incident, and also mentioning racial slurs used by ESPN and other media regarding Lin, drew a number of comments on our Facebook page. Some doubted that the fortune cookie ice cream was really a problem.
Yet on Feb. 22 the Asian American Journalists Association felt impelled to issue a “Media Advisory on Jeremy Lin news coverage.”
“In the past weeks, as more news outlets report on Lin, his game and his story, AAJA has noticed factual inaccuracies about Lin’s background as well as an alarming number of references that rely on stereotypes about Asians or Asian Americans,” the advisory says.
Among the “danger zones” the AAJA lists “Food.”
“Is there a compelling reason to draw a connection between Lin and fortune cookies, takeout boxes or similar imagery?” the advisory asks. “In the majority of news coverage, the answer will be no.”
In mid-February, the MSG Network featured Lin’s face above a fortune cookie in a sign held by a fan, with the message “The Knicks’ good fortune.” Andrew Kang, senior staff attorney at the Asian-American Institute in Chicago, told USA Today that he feels it is a “tough call” whether MSG should be criticized for featuring the image.
“I would prefer maybe they didn’t show that – although I could imagine people finding it humorous,” said Kang. “But I think it does go to what people think when they think of Asians. They think of food. Because that is really their only point of contact, or awareness, with the Asian-American community.”
Commentator Kristina Chew at care2.com says, “MSG’s use of the fortune cookie in its graphic underscores how limited many people’s understanding of Asian Americans is. Ben & Jerry’s would have done well to take heed of the concerns.”
Interestingly, fortune cookies are believed to have Japanese, not Chinese, origins.
Photo: mjpeacecorps CC 2.0On Monday, March 13th, Social Sciences Associate Professor and Department Chair at the State University of New York Empire State College Nadine Fernandez spoke in McCabe Library to community members about race in Cuba. Her speech focused on the history of race among Cuban populations in relation to the family unit and relationships. In the audience were students taking Professor Nina Johnson’s Blacks in Diaspora, the directed reading course of the Black studies department this spring semester. This course also participates in the college’s Experiential Learning Program this semester as it culminates with a trip to the island. The course explores Black identity in Cuba in relation to the migration of Black people and their social movements.
Fernandez’s talk framed the construction of race in Cuban circles through the island’s history. She began with describing the island’s colonial plantation economy that imported enslaved people from Africa, led the audience through the Cuban Revolution, and concluded with commentary on the present day. The talk traced how “the sexual economy of race” in Cuba — explained in Cuba’s Racial Crucible by University of Massachusetts Amherst’s Karen Morrison as how different sexual actors; their relationships; their children, if they are present; and their histories are defined by race — influenced perceptions of race on the island. Further, it defined how race mixing, or people of different races coming together in sexual relationships and in interracial relationships, helped to form the island’s layered organization of race.
Blacks in Diaspora dissects the African experience in different societies that are historically related to the African diaspora, defined by late Nigerian historian J. F. Ade Ajayi in his Africa in the Nineteenth Century Until the 1880s as “the migration of Africans to the outside world under the auspices of the trans-Atlantic and other forms of slave trade.” This semester, the course considers Cuba as a society with a stratified construction and classification of Black, brown, and white people. Coleman Powell ’20 detailed how the talk helped to parse the racial system we work within in the U.S. versus that of Cuba.
“The concepts of one Cuban race clash bitterly with my own understanding of a country [the U.S.] still reeling from the legacy of chattel slavery, Jim Crow, and other institutionalized forms of racism,” Powell said. “Cuba has a history of mixing between races and this is helpful when one is trying to understand the stratification of Cuban society [such as] the racial categories of White, Black, Indigenous peoples, and Mulatto/Mestizo.”
Part of the experiential learning course is the participation in research on the particular aspects of the Cuban experience in relation to race. Prospective Black studies major Brandon Ekweonu ’20 outlined his research intentions.
“I am very interested in studying the different ways in which different Black people around the world understand their own identities,” Ekweonu said. “I want to … gather data as part of my research on the different ways in which people understand ‘race’ and its implications if they even believe that it has implications. Again, I am most interested in who might identify themselves as Black, Black Cuban, or Afro-Cuban and how their narratives may differ from those of white Cubans.”
Powell, who is studying Afro-Cuban social movements and whether there are connections between Afro-Cubans and other people throughout the African diaspora, stated that Fernandez’s talk provided perspective into how to better approach differing encounters with race.
“The talk was helpful in helping me to think about race from the standpoint of Cubans rather than as an American,” Powell said. “I will have to be very meticulous with my word choice in interviews [for my research] because my perception of race related questions may be completely different than someone of Afro-Cuban descent.”
A key component to the course is the trip to Cuba following the Spring 2017 semester. The trip will allow students to continue research ingrained in the culture and environment they were studying. Ekweonu highlighted how the trip will provide new opportunities.
“For a while now, I’ve been particularly interested in the way race is constructed in Latin America,” Ekweonu said. “For me, [the trip] is going to be my first time ever being in Latin America, and therefore the first time I will ever have an opportunity to witness race within a Latin American context apart from experiences in Latinx communities in the United States. It is also a trip that I wouldn’t have been able to afford to make on my own.”
Powell did note that the trip, although exciting, is the product of a semester’s worth of exploration, study, and research. The trip will be contextualized by the work performed and produced by the students.
“The trip will be a culmination of this [semester’s] learning. There is a research component to this class, and before I even think about the itinerary of the trip, I must first have this research done.”
Powell then detailed his motivations for understanding the Cuban history of race.
“As a member of the African-Diaspora myself, I am deeply interested in the political implications of a group that is linked based on a shared cultural memory of slavery because the nature of our struggles for liberation have been inherently political,” he said.
Powell also made note of how the course had extensive connections to other social science fields, and he highlighted links to historical power structures in relation to the African diaspora.
“I entered the course with the expectation that I would find linkages between the diaspora and the field of international relations as well as sociology in general, and I have not been disappointed,” Powell said. “There is a clear link between imperialism, colonialism, and the scattering of the peoples of the diaspora. Imperialism and colonialism have to do with how empires were administered, and this represents some of the earliest manifestations of the field of international relations.”
In sum, Powell described his goals of connecting his academic motivations to understandings of history, contemporary politics, and intercultural relationships.
“The trip is important in fostering engaged scholarship across international borders. What I learn in the classroom will always be applicable in the real world, or at least that is my goal. The trip will also be helpful in fostering dialogue between people of the diaspora,” Powell said.
Ekweonu went on to say how the trip will provide important context in the study of Black experiences and demonstrates the importance of racial and ethnic study programs at Swarthmore and beyond.
“I’m someone who has, for a long time, been having trouble deciding whether or not I wanted to pursue Black studies because of the way it seems to be undervalued by a lot of the academic community. A trip like this reassures me, first of all, that there are professors that are extremely invested in Black studies work in the world and here on campus,” he said. “Second, it reminds and reassures me that so many of my fellow students see just as much value in Black studies as I do. This goes, just as well, for areas like the Latin American and Latino studies program … It reminds me that the work I and so many others want to do is valuable. So, I think this trip means a whole lot for every single person involved.”
Powell echoed this sentiment, explaining the multifaceted nature of the program.
“It is also important to note that this is Black Studies course! The importance of Black Studies as an interdisciplinary field cannot be ignored, especially when it is contributing new and dynamic research to academia,” he said. “Black studies provides a space for discussions on identity, culture, and politics that would not be had otherwise. These discussions and the opportunities, like trip, that discussions produce are necessary if progress towards a more socially conscious state is actually what anyone really wants.”
The Blacks in Diaspora course offers students an opportunity to explore race in Cuba through research and an immersive trip. Students largely see this trip as a way to understand race in another societal context and as reason to support racial and ethnic studies on campus.Story highlights Russian hacks are a warning sign of things to come and the US better be prepared, writes Amy Zegart
US government needs to start attributing election-related breaches as fast as possible, she says
Amy Zegart is Co-Director and Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. The opinions expressed in this commentary are hers.
(CNN) Next month, America will elect a new president. Most likely there will be no cyber hanging-chad moment, no massive breach that calls into question election results or faith in the democratic process.
But it would be a mistake to breathe a collective sigh of relief on November 9th and conclude the danger is past. The danger is just beginning. The 2016 election is a warning of darker hacks to come.
Amy Zegart
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper recently announced what many cyber experts had long suspected: High-level Russian officials authorized hacks of the Democratic National Committee and other campaign-related sites.
JUST WATCHED Kasparov: Trump fertilizing ground for civil unrest after election Replay More Videos... MUST WATCH Kasparov: Trump fertilizing ground for civil unrest after election 07:00
This is the first time a foreign power has inserted itself directly into an American presidential election. Russian President Vladimir Putin wasn't just probing our digital systems. He was probing our political response to see how far he could go to sow distrust in the most important cornerstone of any democracy: free and fair elections. Our response has not helped.
FBI Director James Comey has sought to reassure Americans that our decentralized voting system is just too "clunky" for one massive breach to affect the outcome. But sometimes small changes can have big effects. Lyndon Johnson's 1948 Senate victory hinged on a single sketchy precinct where he was popular with dead voters. The 2000 presidential election was decided by just 537 votes in Florida.
Read MoreAustralia may reconsider nuclear power in the long term 24 September 2014 24 September 2014
The Australian government's long-term plan for energy generation could include a role for nuclear power and renewables, in addition to coal and gas, according to preliminary consultation documents.
A Green Paper also published this week by the Australian government's Department of Industry called nuclear power a'serious consideration for future low-emissions energy', in a context of rising prices for gas and the need for capital expenditure to reduce coal emissions.
The Green Paper said that fossil-fuel resource wealth was one reason Australia had not gone down the nuclear route, despite its major world role in uranium export: "Access to abundant low cost energy options, community sentiment and government policy, including legal prohibitions, have resulted in Australia not deploying nuclear power. In addition, Australia now has an overcapacity in generation, which is not forecast to disappear until 2023-24."
It also points out that laws currently prevent the development of an Australian nuclear industry. "Removing legislative barriers to Australia using nuclear power for electricity, when there is an economic case for its deployment, would include amending the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Act 1998 and the EPBC Act to allow construction or operation of nuclear fuel plants."
It did say that a 2013 study from the Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics found that nuclear energy would be cost-competitive with renewable and non-renewable energy sources to 2050 on a levelised-cost basis.
An Issues Paper published in December 2013 by the government said, in the context of developing low-emissions energy sources, "With environmental considerations constraining the further development of hydro-electric sources, nuclear technologies continue to present an option for future reliable energy that can be readily dispatched into the market."
The paper said that coal makes up 69% of electricity generation and gas makes up 23%. "The rise of coal seam gas and shale gas and oil has been transformative here and around the world."
But Australia's Daily Telegraph newspaper quoted industry minister Ian Macfarlane yesterday saying that there is no intention to lead a new debate on nuclear energy, because of the lack of bipartisan political support and lack of widespread public acceptance.
A government White Paper that fully lays out its plans is due later in 2014.
Picture: Detail of Australian export and import flows of energy, in petaJoules, 2010-11. Uranium mined in Australia flows out of the country (upwards arrow) while domestic gas and some domestic coal is used in Australia (arrows to right). Source: BREE 2013, 'Energy in Australia'A solar-powered plane attempting to make an unprecedented flight across the Pacific has been forced to make an unscheduled stop in Japan due to poor weather conditions.
Solar Impulse 2 en route from China to Hawaii has made a detour to Nagoya. It took off early on Sunday for a six-day, six-night, flight over the Pacific Ocean.
Pilot André Borschberg, 62, left Nanjing, in eastern China, at about 2.40am following extended delays due to weather-related safety concerns. The 5,270-mile (8,500km) flight would have been a record for duration by a single pilot.
Borschberg was asked to circle over the Sea of Japan while meteorologists assessed the situation. They have now decided not to proceed, and the plane arrived at the Komaki airfield just before 3pm GMT on Monday.
Speaking to mission control in Monaco from the cockpit of the plane, the pilot said situations like this are to be expected. “Overall from the start I personally had a really wonderful time. But there is always unexpected situations, either from a technical point of view or from a weather point of view, to cope with. It’s taken 18 years to sort technical questions, whether it’s specialists trying to find the right route... so that was really a very interesting start.
“Now we face some changes so we will have to see if these changes are really important. In terms of strategy I think we’ll know more in a few hours, and to keep all the options open. I’m waiting here in the sea of Japan, and the Japanese MCC and authorities have been extremely helpful, extremely open and nice, they accommodate our wishes to have this aircraft integrated into their traffic.
“Part of the programme was to do some holding anyway. We’re doing the holding a little bit earlier than expected, but for the time being it doesn’t change anything. We need to see what the new forecast tells us.”
Bertrand Piccard, who has been watching the flight from mission control, added: “We are not daredevils, we are explorers. We have to put safety at the top of all of our priorities. Everyone is very happy with the plane - but the weather does not fit. We land in Nagoya and we wait for better conditions to continue.”
Solar Impulse 2 is powered by more than 17,000 solar cells built into wings that, at 72 metres, are almost as long as those of an Airbus A380 superjumbo.
Borschberg completed Solar Impulse 2’s first overnight leg, with the aircraft relying solely on batteries charged by the sun’s energy, but poor weather ahead threw the rest of the marathon flight into doubt.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Solar Impulse team explain the delay
A statement was posted on the Solar Impulse website, which helps track the flight’s journey, earlier today. It said: “Yesterday we had the possibility to cross the weather front just before Hawaii on day 5. However, with the forecasts we now have, we don’t see this possibility anymore, which means that for the moment the road to Hawaii is blocked. We need all the data from the next weather forecasts, so that our weather experts can analyse what’s going to happen in the next four to five days.
“Whilst we wait for the forecasts, we have decided to hold the position of the aircraft. We have asked André to stay where he is: it’s fine, the weather is good and the batteries are charging. During this time we will analyse where he will have to go to find a possibility to cross that front.”
The China to Hawaii journey is the seventh and most challenging leg of the attempt to circumnavigate the world using just the energy of the Sun. Solar Impulse 2, which is covered in 17,000 solar cells, took off from Abu Dhabi in March. It has since stopped in Oman, India, Myanmar and China.A man who lives his life passionately pursuing his goals, and living life to the fullest, will have little trouble being successful with women. The results of his efforts will be secondary to the joy of the process of living.
Men who live with passion, and are determined to make a difference in their chosen career path, are the ones who find happiness in life and in relationships. They also inspire the people around them to higher achievement and fulfillment. Imagine a great teacher from your past. I recall my tenth grade English teacher who loved teaching, and enjoyed every day with us. He made the learning process fun, and was a dynamic lecturer. He was engaging to us because he loved what he was doing, and he filled our classroom with this passion.
Many of you might be thinking, “hey listen man, I hear you, but, my job is all I’ve got and I can’t leave it to go into teaching, or saving refugees or nothing, OK?” Well, let me clarify something many of us find our career/job unsatisfying. This may be the result of past challenges, bad luck, or just an unfortunate decision along your career path. Not everyone is Richard Branson, madly loving his work and career.
So, no, I do not suggest that you walk immediately into your boss’ office and resign, then rush off to the nearest Greenpeace office. What I am suggesting is that you take a realistic look at your life, and ask yourself this simple question:
Are you happy?
If you had to hesitate, are confused, don’t know, or answered “no”, let’s examine that. A guy who is unhappy and unfulfilled will probably struggle with women. What I discovered after talking to a lot of men over the years is that many falsely hope that women will bring them happiness. Then they will focus on the other “stuff”. This illustrates the classic problem of placing the cart before the horse.
By now you should understand why this doesn’t work. An unattractive life, filled with negative emotions, is female-repellant! If you are unhappy, NO woman will fix this for you. In fact, this attitude is a fast way to a damaging and unhealthy relationship. No one is responsible for your happiness except YOU. To combat it you must get actively involved in taking responsibility for your own happiness and fulfillment.
When I moved out of Project Hollywood a few years ago, I was miserable. I realized some months later that I had allowed myself to foolishly buy into the idea that a woman could make me happy, which is why I had been chasing them so diligently. Only after taking some time off from “the game” did I realize that I needed to take responsibility for my own happiness and life, and that getting girlfriend would happen as a result of that. I dropped all games, and devoted my energy to the art of living happily. You know what? I was right. Only after I really committed to taking responsibility for my life, my actions and my feelings, did I meet the right woman for me (and I definitely did, I assure you).
Some of you may not suffer this dynamic at its extreme. But, I bet there are areas in your life which do feel unfulfilled or unsatisfied. What I am about to discuss is how to live with more passion, balance and harmony. This is the essential element to building an attractive and meaningful lifestyle. It is a discussion any guy can benefit from.
I want to cover this in three separate sections:
• Lifestyle
• Balance
• Service
Lifestyle
Lifestyle is our first topic. Let’s assume that you are like most people, feeling somewhat trapped in your job and you wake up grumpy in the mornings trying to find the energy to head out to “the office”. This job serves you in some way, otherwise you wouldn’t have it. It could just be a paycheck to you. In fact the majority of people see their jobs as a necessary evil, and not as a place to express their intelligence and creativity.
There are two things though that you have massive control over right now that I am going to discuss. The first is your attitude. If you hate your job, you are forgetting that you are lucky to have one, and that you could spend that “hateful” energy in a positive way by looking for another job, or changing your career path! Make sense?
I am not sure why, but most of us out there lose sight of what we have in favor of being resentful at what we do not have. Amazing, but true. If you really hate your job, find another one. If you hate your career, take action and become self employed or go back to school. Yes, these things take time, but it is remarkable to witness the power of change in one’s attitude when they simply make a decision to begin this process. If this describes you, take stock of this and formulate a plan of action that works for you. Don’t, for example, make the mistake of quitting your job before you have another one! Don’t add the negative emotion of financial insecurity (anxiety) to your plate. Be intelligent and put yourself into action. Find gratitude for the current job that feeds, clothes and shelters you.
If you like and are fulfilled with your work, you are in the minority, and I congratulate you. The key is to have a positive attitude on a daily basis: to see the glass half full, rather than half-empty. If you don’t like your current reality, take action to change it. Empower yourself by stepping out of the victim role, and taking action as soon as you finish this article!
Right now, I want you to finish this phrase:
I would be happy if and only if ____________________________________.
What you wrote in the blank is currently in charge of your attitude. Can you simply decide to be happy in spite of this circumstance? If you can, you can re-assume real power in your life. No thing, person, or place truly owns the rights to your happiness. They can only have it if you have chosen to give that to them. Take it back.
The other area that you have control over is how you spend the rest of your time. What do you do when you aren’t banging away at the office computer all day? Are you a couch potato? Are you out of shape? Do you have an active social circle? Are you involved in any hobbies?
Most of us spend our free time haphazardly, and we call it “spontaneity” or “relaxing”. I do not suggest that you manage your time down to the second. But, I am suggesting that you use this time to encourage more happiness and joy in your daily lives. If you are a great cook, throw a dinner party to revitalize your social circle. If you love to swim, join a swim club at the local gym. Perhaps you love sports – get involved in a local league that is gender-mixed. The outlets for your interests are countless. It might require a little imagination, but you must get involved in the world if you want to bring more positive emotions into your life. To bring it back to our primary aim, this is more attractive to women. Also, by being out in the world, you meet more women with similar interests. The fringe benefits to being active and involved in the world are a sense of meaning and connection. Every man deserves this and is responsible for taking the necessary actions to create this reality.
One exercise that I give my clients is to write out exactly how much time they spend doing what. I call this the time inventory. I encourage you to do the same. I advise you to do this for a solid week, and be brutally honest with yourself too. Writing down how you spend your time will reveal to you what activities you do throughout the day which provide positive emotions, and which provide negative emotions. Try removing, one-by-one, those activities which produce negative emotions, and replace them with ones that produce positive emotions. The more you do this, the more power you assume over your lifestyle, self-esteem and emotional life. This exercise has helped a lot of men, and it can definitely help you too.
To summarize about lifestyle, the facts really speak for themselves. When you are next outside, notice the couples walking hand in hand down the street. How do you think they met? Close to 95% met via their social circle. Enhancing your lifestyle is the best way to grow your social circle. By engaging in activities which interest you, and by deleting those activities which only drag you down, you will naturally meet more people with whom you share commonalities. These women will be much more appropriate for relationships. Growing your social circle, and developing a meaningful lifestyle is far more productive than hitting the bars and “picking-up chicks”.Posted by
Steve Bottjer,
April 2, 2015 Email
Steve Bottjer
On Twitter:
@BottjerRNO Read this on your iPhone/iPad or Android device
With a surname that literally means strength, Toronto FC striker Bright Dike is feeling strong and energized as he aims to have a breakthrough season during a Major League Soccer campaign in which his club is expected to deliver a breakthrough season of its own.
Dike, 28, made his first appearance of 2015 for the Reds last Sunday when he came on in place of Luke Moore in the 79th minute. While the match ultimately ended in a controversial and tough loss for Toronto, the Edmond, Oklahoma native did make a very positive impression in his eleven minutes of action, including an assist on Jackson’s 88th minute goal.
“It is just very exciting to step on the pitch,” Dike told RedNation. “I was full of energy. I was excited and the blood was flowing. I felt it went well. We just needed to keep them from scoring after we had scored. But it is always good when you are able to make an impact right when you are subbed on. Hopefully there are more positive things to come.”
The 6 foot 1 barrel-chested forward is coming off a 2014 season in which he was limited to only two appearances due to a major injury. With that in mind, Dike was pleased to admit that he is more than fully fit and ready to play and be a big part of a successful season for the Reds.
“This is the best I have ever felt,” he explained. “I have been in this league for five years and this is the best I have ever felt after a preseason. We were doing preseason tests and for the 50 meter dash and the verticals, I was still top three on the team, so all the injuries did not affect anything. If anything, it made me stronger because I have focused on my mobility all through the preseason with the coaches. It’s been fantastic.”
“The offseason wasn’t an offseason for me,” Dike added. “I had a couple of colleges that I would practice at and I actually played in the friendlies for the Oklahoma City Energy, just to get in a couple of games and to stay fit. I felt great and I think I prepared really well for this season. During TFC preseason all of the coaches were very helpful and encouraging and they have said that this is some of the best soccer they have seen me play. It’s always great to hear that from the coaches and you just want to keep it going. The goals will come because they are coming in practice.”
As one of five out and out strikers on Toronto’s roster, Dike is particularly excited about the potential of a TFC attack that is very varied and full of players capable of hurting even the most seasoned back lines in the league.
“Our attack is scary,” the Nigeria International said. “I honestly feel sorry for any team that has to go against any of us paired up together. Can you imagine teams worrying about having to defend me and Altidore at the same time? Or having Luke or Findley running just behind? We’re all fast and all crafty. This team is so dangerous in the attack. And then you add Seba in there delivering balls to you. It’s scary.”
“It’s very exciting (being part of this team),” Dike added. “You dream to have a player like Seba right underneath you to just to give you quality balls. It is fantastic.”
Outside of the quality of his teammates, Dike is also buoyed by the style of play that Head Coach Greg Vanney has instituted in his first full season at the helm of the club.
“It suits me a lot because I am a center forward and I feel like our outside backs end up getting more crosses in,” Dike stated. “That’s a really strong point of mine – getting into the box and getting on the end of crosses and set pieces and corners.”
With a current record of 1 win and 2 losses, Toronto has not yet looked like a team that has completely integrated all of the new faces on its roster and realized the enormous potential inherent in the talent of its players.
As a player feeling fully confident in his own abilities, Dike is just as confident in his team’s prognosis with respect to putting it all together and realizing TFC’s potential as a top club.
“When you have world class players like Seba, Jozy, Michael and Cheyrou, those are players that know the game,” Dike explained. “They are top athletes that understand the game, so they come to a quicker understanding of how each other play than maybe the average player. So I don’t think it is something that will take very long, due to having guys that knowledgeable.”The CW released the official description today for the fourteenth episode of Legends Of Tomorrow Season 2 titled “Moonshot” which will air on Tuesday, March 14.
“Moonshot” — (9:00-10:00 p.m. ET) (Content Rating TBD) (HDTV)
HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM — When the Legends track Commander Steel (guest star Matthew MacCaull) to NASA Headquarters in 1970, they learn where Nate’s (Nick Zano) grandfather hid the last fragment of the Spear of Destiny. The team notices a time aberration during the Apollo 13 mission and believes that the Legion of Doom might be involved. As the Legends journey into space to intercept Apollo 13, the Waverider suffers massive internal damage and Ray’s (Brandon Routh) life is left in jeopardy when he is stranded on the moon. Meanwhile, tension grows between Rip (Arthur Darvill) and Sara (Caity Lotz) as to who is the leader of the team. Victor Garber, Franz Drameh, Maisie Richarson-Sellers and Dominic Purcell also star. Kevin Mock directed the episode written by Grainne Godfree (#214). Original airdate 3/14/2017.”Iran said it will issue visas for American wrestlers to join the Freestyle World Cup that will be held on mid-February.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Jabvad Zarif tweeted that his country will issue visas for US wrestlers, following the halt of Trump’s ban by a federal judge as well as requests from Iranian Wrestling Federation and FILA.
“Following the court ruling suspending #MuslimBan & the requests from Iranian Wrestling Federation & FILA, US Wrestlers' visa will be granted,” he tweeted.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi also said Sunday that the decision was made after the US judge halted the discriminatory entry ban against Iranian citizens.
Federal Judge James Robart who presides in Seattle, on Friday halted US President Donald Trump’s entry ban that blocked citizens of 7 Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The countries on the list include: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.
He noted that the executive order adversely affects residents in areas of education, employment, and freedom to travel.
Earlier on Friday, the foreign ministry said Iran will not grant visa to US freestyle wrestling team to enter the country.
The 45th round of the 2017 Freestyle World Cup will be held in Iran on February 16-17, with eight top world teams attending.Big society in action is how civil society minister Nick Hurd described the award-winning Paddington Development Trust (PDT) which he chose for his first ministerial visit in May 2010. |
’ you’re keeping away all the other things that you could own.”
The dragon sat up, his eyes wide. After only a second, he looked down at my sister past his snout and squinted. Reaching up, he dug his claws against his jaw in thought. “Explain,” he demanded.
“Ponies, zebras... our kind,” Lost started, waving a forehoof between herself, Xeno, and The Convert. “We don’t own everything. We keep what few things we have of our own within our homes. That’s how we know what’s ours. But if we owned everything, we wouldn’t need to. Because that would mean we only wanted what we could fit. We’d be giving away everything else to another. You don’t want to be giving up your things to anyone else, do you?”
The dragon rumbled, answering with a deep growl from his throat, “No.”
“So you should be out there. Be the master of it all,” Lost said, lifting her forehooves and spreading them both wide. “Your things will be here when you return, and whether they’re here or out there, they’re still yours. If I walked out, would I stop being yours just because I left the tunnels?”
“No, you are mine regardless. Alive or dead, here or out there,” the dragon answered. He scratched across his underside.
“Exactly. And wouldn’t that be better for all of us?” Lost asked, one ear flicking slightly. She looked over at the tunnel toward me. “To be out and happy?”
“You assume I care about how you feel,” the dragon answered, chuckling. Without another word, he flopped back onto the gold pile. Bits and jewels flew into the air, cascading forward and covering the floor around him. He wriggled about for a moment, getting comfortable, before finally staring at my sister and the two flanking her.
Lost looked stumped. She scooted back a few steps and sat down again. For quite a while she sat silently, staring at the dragon. Her look wasn’t returned, as the dragon seemed to be done with her. He’d closed his eyes and decided to pay no attention to the three in front of him.
My heart skipped a beat. Had Lost’s plan just failed? I knew she was a thinky pony and able to get herself out of most situations, and this one didn’t even involve a gun being pointed at her. “Come on Lost...” I whispered, scooting inches closer and barely letting my steel hooves touch the floor.
Rose snorted behind me.
“You know what’s out there, don’t you?” Lost finally asked. Before the dragon could answer, she continued, “There’s hundreds of ponies, zebras, changelings... There’s ruins as far as the eye can see, and treasure beyond anything I could imagine. But... Do you know what I’ve never seen in my life before?”
Slowly, the dragon cracked one eye open. He stared at my sister, raising his ridged brow questioningly.
“We suggested you find a mate but... I’ve never seen another dragon in my life,” Lost said. “You’re probably the only one left. There’s nothing out there that can compare to you.” She looked the dragon up and down once, tilting her snout down and looking over the rims of her glasses at him. “Nothing to compete with.”
The Convert turned to my sister, she said something quietly, but was shushed quickly by Lost. The glare she gave said it all.
“You’re the top of the ownership chain,” Lost continued, slowly turning away from The Convert. She cleared her throat. “I think, rather than stay in here, with a hoard that’s obviously too small... Do like the pony who said she was a virtue told you... Go get all of it.”
Growling, the dragon smiled. He snorted smoke from his nose and bared his teeth. None of his movements seemed hostile, in fact he looked quite pleased with himself. As if my sister suggesting the same thing that had motivated him once before raised some need within him, he pushed himself to his claws and looked out toward the outside, through the hole in the tunnel that overlooked the cavern.
“She said everything was mine,” the dragon mused, his eyes closing slightly, as if he were reliving a long-forgotten memory. “I could have had it all, flown from peak to peak, collected what I wanted. Been worshipped or feared, taken as I saw fit... Instead I grew complacent, returned to my home. How I loathe this place sometimes.”
“I think it’s time you went to your domain,” Lost suggested. “You belong out there, so that you can see and experience everything you own, not locked in this gilded cage you’ve made for yourself. Whether I’m here or out there with you, I’ll still be yours. Go, enjoy what you own.”
Xeno nodded. “My tribe view you as a messenger of the stars,” she said, closing her eyes. “Youare much more, and also much less. The foals belong with their family, even if theyare yours.” She lowered her head toward the dragon.
He smiled, a pleased rumbling coming from his throat. His wings opened, flexing behind him, and he clasped his claws in front of him, before stretching toward the air. He looked so very happy with what they’d said, so much so that even the gold covering his scales seemed to be shinier. Lowering himself down, he stepped over my sister, my friend, and The Convert. With a single glance, he walked off.
“Know that wherever you go, I will know,” he rumbled as he walked through the tunnel to the outside of the cavern.
For several tense minutes, I waited, watching as he walked through the tunnel and appeared in the hole that led up and out. His legs passed by it, and it wasn’t until the tip of his tail snapped though the air and disappeared past that I finally exhaled. I still laid there, not daring to get up until my sister came and got me.
Lost looked back and forth between Xeno and The Convert. With one massive sigh, she flopped down onto the stone floor, her legs giving out from under her. She smiled, and looked over toward me.
I couldn’t help but smile back at her. She always was such a thinky pony.
* * *
Even with the dragon gone, things seemed to continue as normal. The buffalo, the other adult zebra, and the ponies didn’t seem to do anything different. Most continued cleaning up what was left, having nearly finished while Lost was talking to the dragon. Honestly, it’d amazed me that none of them bothered to interact with the scene as it unfolded. None so much as glanced over, they just kept working in the background to clean while Lost talked the dragon into seeking out his entire domain.
I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Even now that I could sit freely in the main cavern and not have to worry about being burnt to a crisp by the dragon, I just found myself staring forward. I looked past the gold, which now left a sour taste in the back of my throat, toward the others. Stormheart stood with a group of unicorns, spotting for them as they removed one of the last few boulders that’d fallen from the ceiling.
Every so often I glanced back at the hoard of gold and gems. A small part of me wanted to go for them again, but I didn’t dare move my hooves. A little digging in the back of my mind kept me thinking about what happened. Even though Rose and the others were busy discussing how to deal with the others, how to get the foals back safely, and all the other thinky pony things, I couldn’t get it out of my head.
A shiver ran up my spine, thinking of how Rose looked when I first saw her. If a little more bone had been showing, I’d have sworn she was a ghoul just like The Glowing One we met before. It’d always been different, when I got other ponies killed. Gunshot wounds were something I was used to. Goddesses, the fact that I could even think that was horrifying.
I was used to ponies being shot.
I was used to me being shot.
Heaving a sigh, I pressed the cold steel of my forehoof against my head. It helped a little, but I could feel the metal shaking. This had gotten far too stressful for me. Thank the Goddesses Lost was able to keep her head on straight.
Slowly, I rose to my hooves. Walking carefully over to the hoard, I sat in front of it, with the closest of the golden bits resting just in front of my forehooves. I stared down at them, taking in the little gems and jewels. If I could find it...
Looking around, I leaned to see more, but didn’t stand. The hoard was bigger than I was, and it could be anywhere. Not seeing what I wanted, I forced myself up again and started to pace the pile. I weaved through the parts that were knocked free by the dragon as he left, not yet cleaned up by his captives.
“Excuse me,” I whispered to one of the other ponies as I shuffled past, looking at the ground. I remembered all too well what The Convert had said, and I could feel the glare I was getting even as I said it.
The pony I’d past said nothing to me, he just stepped aside. He stomped his hooves on the stone floor and moved to watch me. Others around stopped their work and did the same. None said a word, but Goddesses I knew the looks they were giving me.
Sheepishly, I sped up and tried to get past them. Just as I thought I was free, I bumped into something big and fluffy.
Stormheart turned and stared at me. “When you were first brought here,” he said sternly, “I offered you food. I welcomed you into the community. Do you understand the gravity of what you’ve done?”
I nodded slowly, looking away. Unable to find an excuse, I said, “I’m sorry, I ju-”
“I don’t care for your excuses,” the buffalo answered. “You’re very lucky that your sister is good with words. Things could have been much worse.” He leaned in close and used a forehoof to pull my face toward him. Squinting, he stared into my eyes. “Think before you act, next time.” Dropping his hoof from my face, he pointed away. “Go. We need to finish cleaning so we can rebuild.”
Nodding slowly, I sidestepped him and kept walking. I just needed to find that Goddesses-damned crown, and then I’d be gone. The last thing I wanted was to start more trouble. As quick as I could, I worked my way past the remainder of the ponies and buffalo, until I was at the far side of the hoard. I looked up at it. This had to be where he tossed the two parts...
I stared up at the massive pile. If only I were taller, if only I had wings so I could get a better vantage. I should just ask Fine Tune. He always wanted to be helpful, and I was sure if Lost told him to, he’d do it for me. I stared at the pile.
I still really wanted to take all of it.
I’d settle for the crown though. The two pieces would be a good reminder of what happened, even if they were worthless now. Knowing better than to climb up atop the hoard, I turned away. I walked the opposite direction around the pile, scared to deal with the others who lived here, after that talk with Stormheart. At least he’d been nice. I probably deserved a good smack across the face, at the very least.
After a long walk around the far side, I found myself back where I’d started. I headed down the path where we’d all been before.
“...pretty sure that we won’t need to deal with- Oh, Hidden,” said Lost. She trotted over to me and wrapped her hooves around my neck in a tight hug. Releasing me, she stared me in the eyes. Past her glasses, I could see the worry. She opened her mouth to say something, but it seemed to catch in her throat. “Stay next to me, please,” she finally requested.
“Okay,” I agreed with a nod.
The others all stared at the two of us. After my agreement, they turned back to one another. The Convert and Fine Tune were both in their changeling forms, chirping and chittering back and forth between the two of them. The zebra foals had formed a small circle around a large box and were talking quietly to one another in their native tongue. Xeno had one ear twisted back, listening to them, but she and Rose stood facing my sister and me.
Rose looked a lot better. She wasn’t back to her normal self, but the sloughing of her skin seemed to be almost completely gone. Only a few pits and pale spots remained. Her mane hadn’t grown back yet, not that I was sure if it would, and her eyes were back to normal completely. She stared at me through half-lidded eyes, just shaking her head.
“What’d I miss?” I asked.
“We’re trying to figure out the best way to move...” Lost said, pausing. She lifted a hoof and started pointing it toward the foals. “Oh Goddesses, there’s like a dozen of them.” Facehoofing, she stared at Xeno with wide eyes and a ‘help me’ look on her face.
“Theyare good foals,” Xeno said calmly. “A long walk willnot hurt them. The dragon is not a problem, we only need to worry for the ponies under the ground.” She looked down at the foals and smiled. “Theywill behave...” Raising her voice, she addressed the foals. “Sahihi, watoto?”
The vast majority of them answered, “Ndiyo!”
“Theywill behave,” Xeno repeated, turning back to my sister.
“They’d better,” muttered Rose. She waved a hoof toward me, beckoning me over to her. “My gun,” she requested when I walked over.
“Yeah, sure... Want your cloak too?” I asked, before leaning back to start digging them out.
“I think I can wear it now, without it fusing to me,” she answered.
“Just how bad was it?” Lost asked.
“If you ever really want that answer, I’ll find a dragon to light you ablaze,” Rose answered, grabbing her grenade rifle for me with the haze of her telekinesis. The aquamarine glow was brighter than before, but still far dimmer than it’d been before she’d been scorched. Juggling the gun away, she snatched the cloak from my outstretched hoof and wrapped it around her. Once it was to her liking, she slid the gun strap over her shoulder and settled the weapon over her back. “I’m just glad it’s over. I should be back to full soon.”
“It’s a good thing you’re not a normal mare,” I said, forcing a smile.
“Don’t you ever say that,” she spat back at me. “Being a copy might help me survive sometime, but I’d gladly take being a real pony if it meant I had something to look forward to after I finally kick it.” She turned to Xeno. “And you. You’re lucky I didn’t kill that bitch of a mother of yours... I don’t need a reminder about what I am, y’know.”
“Iam sorry,” Xeno said, her ears drooping and her tail lowering. “At one time she was not so full of hate for others. I left because we could not get along, but she has not always been this way.”
“Let’s just hope she changes,” Lost added. “I understand her being a grieving mother, but we’ve fixed the problems with her and her sadaka, so there isn’t any reason to send foals off to a dragon anymore. You can explain that to her, right?”
“I... Iwill try,” Xeno answered.
“So what’s the plan?” I asked, turning and walking back to the pile of our things. Xeno’d placed it all in her satchel earlier, but now came the task of sorting everything back to what belonged to whom. I took a seat behind it and began to organize things with my steel forehooves.
“I think that depends on who all wants to come with us,” Lost answered.
“We’re not going to force them all?” Rose asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Do you think we can make everyone here come with us? There’s only five of us...” Lost answered, shrugging. “If we force them to come with us, are we any better than the dragon.”
“Yes, yes we are,” shot back the clone mare. She paused, bringing a hoof to her chin. “But not by enough.”
“Convert?” Lost called out, looking at the two changelings at the far side of the tunnel.
Both looked at us, their blue eyes glowing brightly. Twin flashes of bright green fire erupted around them, and after only a moment, Fine Tune and Honey Drip stared back at us.
“It’s The Convert, thank you,” corrected the mare. “What can I do ya for?”
“Will you talk to the others, and find out who wants to come with us, back to civilization?” Lost asked, smiling weakly. She shifted on her hooves, looking back and forth between the two of them.
“Well, I don’t think they’ll want to go... This place is safe and has food, but I’ll ask. Worst case they say no,” she answered. Reaching over, she booped Fine Tune on the nose with her forehoof. “C’mon, cutie. Let’s go do some diplomancing.”
“Oh! Before you go?” I said, hoping to catch them before they could leave.
The two changelings stared at me, with The Convert dropping her hoof.
“Yes, Miss Hidden?” asked Fine Tune. He smiled wide, his tail swishing about behind him happily.
“While you’re over there... Will you keep an eye out for the two halves of the crown the dragon snapped?” I requested, glancing up at my sister.
“Hidden!”
“I just want it to remind me!” I yelled defensively. “I won’t touch any of the other treasure, and if the dragon shows up I’ll make sure to give it back to him!” I clenched my eyes shut, fearing the reaction.
“I say she takes it,” Rose chipped in, “Let her feel what it’s like to be burnt to cinders.”
“I have!” I yelled, opening my eyes and staring daggers at her. “I’ve been nearly killed more times than I can count, thank you very much. You can get the fuck off my back already. I said I was sorry for what happened and I’m sitting here feeling miserable already.”
Lost placed a hoof on my shoulder. She looked down at me reassuringly and said, “Hidden, I think-”
“No. I feel bad, okay. I know what I did was stupid and I know I fucked up. I don’t need to be constantly reminded about it,” I snapped, pulling away from my sister. “You don’t trust me, she hates me, and I’m sure Xeno has her reservations. The only one I don’t think has issues with me is Fine Tune, and that’s just because he seems to love everything.”
The whole group stared at me. The Convert snorted, closing her eyes. Fine Tune just chirped happily. “I like everyone,” he said calmly. “Well, except the old Queen. She was kind of a bitch.” He laughed.
“Kind of? She was a huge bitch!” Lost said, laughing too. “But we’re nowhere near her. And Hidden will behave in the future.” She looked at Rose, over the rims of her glasses. Her ears pinned back and she snapped her tail once, obviously agitated. “If anypony needs to give my sister a lecture about how she acts, it’ll be me. Do you understand?”
In front of me, Loyalty slid forward, not lifting off the ground. It aimed toward Rose.
The two unicorns stared at one another for a moment, before Rose finally smiled. “Just keep her in check,” she said.
The blue glow around Loyalty faded completely, and my sister nodded. “I will,” she said back.
With the tension broken by Lost’s promise to deal with me when I acted up, things relaxed. Fine Tune and The Convert walked off, chatting quietly to one another as they did.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw one of the zebra foals creep up next to Xeno. He rattled some things off to her in their native tongue. Xeno answered back, leaning down to talk to him at his height. After a short back and forth, she nodded and turned to my sister. “Go give it to her,” she said to the foal.
The little zebra skittered back to the group and collected something from the box that they foals had all been sitting around discussing. Whatever he had, it was wrapped in cloth and quite small. Trotting to my sister, he held it up in his mouth and presented it to her.
The blue haze of her magic wrapped around it and she took the gift he had for her.
Once the little treasure had left his mouth, he whispered a few things in his language, before running back to the group sheepishly. As soon as he got back, the others all started talking to him as fast as they could. Whatever they were saying, it made little sense, not only because of the language barrier, but because they seemed so excited.
“He says itis for saving them, and that sheis very bossy,” Xeno translated, looking back and forth between the group of foals and my sister. “I donot know what that means...”
Lost’s eyes went wide behind her glasses. She lifted one edge of the cloth and looked at whatever it was, but didn’t show the rest of us. After only a split second, she wrapped it back up, tucked the little treasure into her saddlebags and smiled. “I do. Tell them I said thank you, please?” she requested.
Xeno nodded and turned to the foals. She said something in her native tongue, and the foals turned to my sister. They said something with far too many syllables to keep up with, and that seemed to appease our zebra friend.
“How long until we can go?” I asked, finishing my sorting of our things. Before getting an answer, I scooped up what I could into my hooves and stuffed it all into my saddlebags. The PipBuck could sort it later. What I couldn’t grab with the steel hooves, I picked up with my mouth and tossed in there. Looking to the foals, I decided to let the filly keep the dress.
As the others grabbed their things in their magic or with their hooves and teeth, Lost shrugged. “As soon as Fine Tune and The Convert get back, we’ll go,” she answered.
“I miss Blackhoof,” I muttered, wanting to go home and be done with this fiasco...
“We’ll be back soon, I promise,” Lost reassured me.
“First things first,” Rose interrupted. “We’ve got zebras and drugs to deal with.”
“No rest for the wicked,” Lost whispered to me, looking at the clone mare.
* * *
I sat at the edge of the cavern’s observation area. Out in front of me, I could see for ages. The sun was just coming up, and still hidden behind the mountains that made up the far edge of the unicorn range. It cast a beautiful shadow, leaving the entire valley dark, while the clouds above were bright. They seemed a little less ominous; fluffy and white, rather than their usual dour grey that constantly threatened rain.
“Makes you feel small, doesn’t it,” Lost whispered. She leaned against me and closed her eyes.
“Kinda. I felt that way seeing the valley the firMonuments caused a bit of a stir this week when they announced that vocalist Matt Rose was no longer involved in the group. The band offered little detail, other than the split was caused by differences between the two parties. Word got out however that Matt Rose had allegedly deleted the band’s YouTube page and email account. Until now, Rose has been quiet on the issue, mostly because he doesn’t have much of a presence in online social networking. This morning, he sent us the following statement explaining his side of the events:
I actually left Monuments before the BOO tour started but decided to carry on for the best of the tour. I was growing increasingly frustrated at the work ethic of the band and at how little music everyone wrote. On our return from the tour we mutually agreed that it was best for everyone including me that we parted ways. I’m not sad at all about this ending and I certainly will not miss the band and all its dramas. My only disappointment comes from the bad blood that seems to have arisen since my departure, which is completely undeserved as I worked very hard whilst I was in the band.
“ The core of man’s spirit comes from new experiences” and I’m already very excited about starting other new musical projects and I’m very much looking forward to hitting the road and playing live with the Qemists who will be supporting Hadouken on their UK tour in April and will be playing festivals in Europe this summer.
My Thanks and appreciation goes out to anyone who came to a show bought a t-shirt or an album or bought me a whiskey whilst I was in the band. I’d also like to thank my label Century Media and Avocado Booking and John Sprich at Euroblast for all their hard work.
You can follow me on twitter – https://twitter.com/matt_spikeboy1
Peace xIn Presidential elections where the Republican candidate wins or comes close, you tend to see the same dynamic unfold in terms of the ideological breakdown of the electorate. The Republican wins between 80 and 85% of conservatives, the Democrat wins between 80 and 85% of liberals, and the Democrat wins moderates by some relatively small percentage. The Republican either wins or comes close based on the strength of the fact that self-identified conservatives usually outnumber self-identified liberals by around 35%-25%. This is the dynamic you saw in both 2004 and 2012, which were both very close elections.
Hidden in today’s CBS’s poll (not included in the crosstabs) is an indication that Trump’s alienation of conservatives is the reason he is behind in this poll.
Perhaps the most startling finding in @CBSNewsPoll:
Among self-described conservatives, 21% now say they’ll vote for Clinton over Trump. — Steven Portnoy (@stevenportnoy) August 1, 2016
Trump’s support among self-ID’d conservatives in our @CBSNewsPoll is at 64%.
Bush in ’04 exits – 84%
McCain in ’08 – 78%
Romney in ’12 -82% — Steven Portnoy (@stevenportnoy) August 1, 2016
It’s impossible to do with 100% accuracy without knowing the ideological breakdown of the sample, which neither CBS nor Portnoy provide (at least not that I can see, but if you assume a sample consistent with the 2004/2008/2012 electorate that is roughly 35% self-ID’ed conservatives, moving that 35% from the usual 82-15 split in favor of the R to a 64-21 split in favor of Trump equates to about a 7-8% swing in the overall electorate.
In other words, if Trump were performing as well as the average Republican candidate among conservatives, he would be winning. He’s tanking (relatively speaking) among that group instead, so he is losing.
Make of that what you will.
UPDATE: One other point worth making. Of the 18-20% of conservatives that Trump has lost (relative to Bush/Romney), it appears that roughly one third of them have gone to outright voting for Clinton, and two thirds to some third option or undecided.
Now, many Republicans have been saying for weeks that there is no substantive difference between the two choices – that any vote for anyone not named Donald Trump is a de facto vote for Clinton. Setting aside the staggering logical problems with this assertion, let’s do the math of what it would look like if all the conservatives Trump lost cast actual votes for Clinton instead of protest votes for Gary Johnson or writing in Ted Cruz or whatever. In such a scenario, the swing among the overall electorate moves from 7-8% to 10-11%, meaning that instead of being behind by 6% in this poll, Trump would be behind by 9 or 10%.
Which is yet another illustration of the fact that no, a vote for a third party candidate is not the same as a vote for Clinton, and Trump voters should be glad for that fact.Kotaku East East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.
Winner of several visual novel game awards, If My Heart Had Wings is a romance title centering around a high school glider club known as the “Soaring Club.” It is a touching story about loss, love, and passion that grips you right by the soul from beginning to end.
Like many visual novels, a large part of the game is falling in love with and then dating the girl of your choice. If My Heart Had Wings is rather strong in this regard as it has a diverse and well-rounded cast. There is Ageha, the childhood best friend character who is transitioning from tom boy into a popular girl; Amane, an eccentric genius who has repeatedly failed her senior year in order to remain in the Soaring Club; Asa, the cute, excitable (and totally inept) freshman; and Yoru, Asa's twin sister and seemingly polar opposite.
However, the main girl of the story, Kotori, is by far the most interesting character in the cast. While in some ways a typical tsundere character, she—like the cast of 2012's excellent Katawa Shoujo—has a physical disability, namely the loss of the use of her legs. Much of the story centers around her dealing with—and striving to overcome—her disability while at the same time looking at the psychological effect on a teenage girl of losing the ability to walk.
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The player character, Aoi, also has a physical disability (a messed up knee); and while it does not affect his everyday life, it does prevent him from pursuing his passion, cycling. It is through his understanding of their respective losses that he is able to get her to open up little by little.
Loss is the central theme of If My Heart Had Wings—be it physical or emotional loss—and each character is used to explore that concept in their own unique way. From there, the story looks at the dilemmas stemming from loss—like the difference between “making a fresh start” and “running away from your problems” and the difficulty of finding a new passion in life.
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Another strength of If My Heart Had Wings is how it takes an obscure hobby, in this case gliders, and over the course of the game educates you about it. You learn about everything from basic aerodynamics, to glider flight, to the actual process of building a glider. And along with the personal and emotional stakes of the story, these sections of exposition are not only interesting but also often serve as vital plot points as the story goes on.
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Like many Japanese visual novels, If My Heart Had Wings had several explicit sex scenes upon its original release in Japan. However, all of these scenes have been cut wholesale from the game and additional nude or risque scenes have been heavily edited in the Western version.
Some of these edits result in scenes that seem silly in context—like a girl inexplicably wearing a full body towel while bathing alone (and holding a separate bath towel) or describing one of the female character’s “big round eyes” while the camera and spoken Japanese dialogue are clearly focused on her chest.
Still, edits or no, the meat of the story itself seems largely unaffected by these cuts and its emotional resonance remains superb.
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When it comes to the visuals, I generally enjoyed the overall art style of the game, but there was one glaring exception. For the most part, the game is told via a collection of 2D character models over 2D backgrounds. However, from time to time there is a scene of the glider flying—and for some reason the glider is, unlike nearly every other model in the game, a 3D model. Simply put, the styles clash. But even more than that, because of the pixelated edges, the model already looks dated.
What's odd about this choice is that there is already a fair amount of clever animation in the game—shaking the screen and changing the cockpit view during take-off or watching the dotted line on a road pass underneath you as you ride a bike, for example. So there's really no reason the glider needed to be an ugly 3D model.
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But despite the occasional out-of-place 3D model or odd bit of censoring, If My Heart Had Wings really is an excellent visual novel. If you enjoy a good, romantic, slice-of-life story from time to time or have ever dreamed of flying above the clouds, this game won't let you down.
If My Heart Had Wings was released for the PC in English on June 28, 2013, and can be purchased at MangaGamer.
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Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.
This Is Kotaku East As more and more publications are dialing down their Japan coverage, Kotaku had this crazy idea:… Read more Read
AdvertisementThe video appeared on Facebook over July 4 weekend (Picture: Facebook)
As Americans everywhere were celebrating July 4 over the weekend, something far less patriotic was happening.
Emily Lance, of Philadelphia, was urinating all over a red, white and blue.
Video shows teacher splitting toddler's head after hurling tot against cabinet
She posted the video on Facebook and has since received death threats and even claims there’s a $3,000 bounty on her head via Craigslist.
Lance wrote: ‘Freedom (of speech/expression) means that I’m entitled to do and say as I please, EVEN if you don’t like it, so long as I am not physically hurting someone – and no, your precious feelings don’t count, that’s your own problem.
Lance has defended her actions, calling it freedom of expression (Picture: Facebook)
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‘What don’t you people understand? You’re celebrating freedom while damning me for doing the same. You can’t have it both ways. FREEDOM OR NONE. Practice what you preach or shut the fuck up.’
The video shows her using a funnel to stand and pee over a flag resting across a toilet seat until it falls into the water.
'I've seen starving North Korean women executed for eating their own children'
It has since vanished from her account, but a string of messages posted since the video show no signs of remorse.
She wrote: ‘People are wishing illness, harm, and suffering upon me over a piece of fabric. People are willing to MURDER someone over a flag. It’s so sad that people don’t realize how brainwashed they are. I’m gross for peeing on a symbol? LOOK AT YOURSELVES. You people epitomize all that is foul.’
One guy claims there’s a bounty on her head via a Craigslist ad, though a search of the website does not confirm this.
Lance uses a funnel to pee on the American flag (Picture: Facebook)
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Jeremy Miller wrote: ‘YOU MADE IT TO CRAIGSLIST PHILLY TOO. LOL. THERE’S A $3,000 BOUNTY ON YOUR HEAD. You do realize there’s crazy ppl out there that are desperate for money, right?’
Lance has since pleaded people to stop attacking her father after he was targeted.
In another post, she explained her dad called her to say that he and his place of work have been subject to abuse.For more than five hours on the afternoon of April 4 the man who sees himself as synonymous with the destiny of Zimbabwe, and who has made himself the country’s dictator to ensure it, remained locked in a meeting in Harare, the capital, with his four-dozen-member politburo. The man was Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s president, and the session was taking place in the upper reaches of the ruling party’s headquarters, Jongwe House. Everyone in Harare knew that Mugabe had to be up there; the soldiers of his presidential guard were still lolling around outside, in their distinctive gold berets. Mugabe was chairing the meeting himself, in a dark suit and polka-dotted tie. On Mugabe’s flanks were the men and women who fought victoriously with him 28 years ago to transform white-ruled Rhodesia into black-ruled Zimbabwe. Now, six days after elections for parliament and president, this group was facing certain defeat. Although the government had not yet officially announced the results, and despite strenuous efforts to rig the election, it was clear that Mugabe’s zanu-P.F. party had lost not only its parliamentary majority but the presidency as well. The purpose of the meeting was to decide whether to accept the loss gracefully and relinquish power to Mugabe’s bitter rival, the Movement for Democratic Change (M.D.C.), led by Morgan Tsvangirai (pronounced Chahn-gur-eye), or to fight on, manipulating the results so as to force a second round of voting for the presidency. Mugabe’s party is divided now between hawks and doves, between hard-liners and conciliators, and it is riven as well by rival succession candidates. Mugabe’s clan totem is Gushungo—meaning “crocodile” in Shona, the language of most Zimbabweans—and on the occasion of his 83rd birthday, last year, a giant stuffed crocodile was presented to him as a symbol of his “majestic authority.” But even the wiliest crocodiles eventually tire and die, and the word on the street was that he had been stung by the extent of his defeat, and that his young wife, Grace, had urged him to step down and enjoy his last years with their three children in his 25-bedroom mansion. The mood in Harare was expectant, even giddy. I grew up and was educated in Zimbabwe, served as a conscript, and maintain close ties to the |
loved that game.
Cars broke, girls left me. Hard jobs, hard days, and I’d put my face in your fur and you’d purr and it would be OK.
When I first got you home I let you out of the box in a dark quiet room. So you wouldn’t be scared. First day or so I’d just sit there and talk to you. When you trusted me enough I put out my hand. I don’t think you’d been petted before. You walked around me in a circle with your tail up, beside yourself with pleasure. Six weeks ago I started brushing you at night to entice you in earlier. You’d act just the same.
When you were little and I fed you, petted you, I’d make that ch-ch-ch sound so you’d know it meant good things, and I called you in with that every night. I want to make that sound now. Have you come in. Where are you, I can’t sleep if you’re out. Coyote might get you. I’ll go out in the dark and walk around. Call for as long as it takes for you to come. You’d come running up, follow me inside. Get in bed, knead the blanket with your claws and lay with me in the cold. Bud you can’t be gone. I come home and it’s not home now. Just stuff. Coming up the driveway without you running in the corner of my eye, scared of running you over. You weaving yourself into my legs while I was on the toilet. You crunching Meow Mix next to me while I was in the bath. Rustling the blinds perched in the bedroom window sill, always next to me. You stayed with me.
I moved your food bowl and I want to collapse. Leaving the door open waiting for you to come bounding in. You can’t be gone. Don’t be gone. They let me say goodbye but you’d already left. Brain swollen up from being shaken, on a respirator with a clip holding out your tongue. They let me touch you but you weren’t there. They’ll give me your ashes in a clay pot. It will have a nice paw print, the vet said. An expert at watching people cry. But I don’t think she’d seen anything like it.
God, I wish it was me. But then how would your life be after. I was the only one you trusted. It was a joke with the girls: the cat hates you. The man across the street came with a card. He said Bud was in my yard for years but never let me pet him. When you got fleas I gave you a bath myself because you’d have hated the groomer. I didn’t want you to be scared.
I’m sorry you were hurt and scared when you died, Bud.
I moved your food bowl and I want to put it back. Closed the door and now you can’t come in. I’m not ready for you to go. I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you. I love you forever and I can’t let you go, I can’t.
You were a sweetheart. You were a tough bastard. You were a lap dog. You were a wild murderous savage; you’d uproot the gophers with their earth mover claws, laugh off the mockingbirds dive bombing you. You gave the dogs hell until they moved in with that killing machine. I think about killing him but he’s just an animal too.
You had a good life and a good home. You loved me and I loved you. I’ll let your ashes go in the park. When night comes and the wind blows in over the grass you’ll come home.
**********
You can look into adopting a cat here.
You can support the Burbank Animal Shelter here.New York City’s famed Roseland Ballroom will close its doors in April, according to an internal e-mail obtained by Billboard, though no official announcement has been made.
The venerable venue, owned by developer Larry Ginsberg and booked by Live Nation, opened at its 52nd street location, a converted skating rink, in 1958 and is a sentimental favorite for many bands. The history of the venue in New York dates back to 1919, when it was located at 51st and Broadway, and prior to that in Philadelphia.
Evolving from ballroom dancing in the ‘20s to popular music, Roseland has for years been a favored New York play for a wide range of bands from the early days of rock, through disco, grunge, modern rock, jam, pop, urban and EDM. The venue found a new gear with a $1 million production/rigging renovation in the early ‘90s, funded by Ginsberg, which led to more high profile bookings of multiple dates on bands like Red Hot Chili Peppers, Nirvana, and other hot acts when competition in that cap range was not as fierce.
The room sits its in a sweet spot in terms of capacity at about 3,500, just right for developing bands climbing up the venue ladder as well as bigger bands, including the likes of the Rolling Stones, Madonna and Radiohead, that want to create buzz with an underplay. But its capacity is also a highly competitive space in the market, with AEG’s Best Buy Theater at about 2,500, the 3,500-cap Hammerstein Ballroom, Bowery Presents' Terminal 5 at 3,000 cap and the 2,800-cap Beacon Theatre, operated by Madison Square Garden.
Still, Roseland remains a busy room, and one artists and agents prefer in many cases, so the move to close is likely related more to property values than the venue’s bottom line.
The closing of Roseland will be “a huge loss for concerts in New York City,” says Ken Fermaglich at the Agency Group, who was surprised to hear the venue would shutter. “I love the venue and always have. I saw Nirvana there and will never forget that show.”
Among the acts currently on the Roseland calendar are Danzig, Fitz & the Tantrums, the Wanted, Pretty Lights, Hoodie Allen, and Panic! At the Disco. While no announcement has been made, it is likely that high profile artists will want to send the building off in style.
Live Nation New York and Roseland could not be reached for comment at press time. This story will be updated as more information becomes available.
Register For the 2013 Billboard
Touring Conference & Awards
Nov. 13-14, 2013 in NYCOverview (4)
Mini Bio (1)
Born on November 21, 1944 in Chicago, Illinois, Harold Allen Ramis got his start in comedy as Playboy magazine's joke editor and reviewer. In 1969, he joined Chicago's Second City's Improvisational Theatre Troupe before moving to New York to help write and perform in "The National Lampoon Show" with other Second City graduates including John Belushi, Gilda Radner and Bill Murray. By 1976, he was head writer and a regular performer on the top Canadian comedy series SCTV (1976). His Hollywood debut came when he collaborated on the script for National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) which was produced by Ivan Reitman. After that, he worked as writer with Ivan as producer on Meatballs (1979), Stripes (1981), Ghostbusters (1984) and Ghostbusters II (1989) and acted in the latter three. Harold Ramis died on February 24, 2014 at age 69 from complications of autoimmune inflammatory vasculitis.
- IMDb Mini Biography By: tonyman5
Spouse (2)
Trade Mark (3)
Deep resonant voice
Frequently cast himself in small roles
Frequently cast fellow Second City alumnus Bill Murray
Trivia (25)
Was a member of the Board of National Neurofibromatosis Foundation.
Was a member of the Board of Trustees of Washington University in St. Louis.
Attended and graduated from Nicholas Senn High School in Chicago, Illinois (1962).
Attended and graduated from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri (1966). He later received an honorary degree (Doctor of Arts) from the university (1993).
Was a former active member of Zeta Beta Tau fraternity at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.
Once a mental ward orderly before finding work as a joke writer for Playboy magazine.
Sketch comedian best known for his character Moe Green on SCTV (1976).
The proton packs worn in Ghostbusters (1984) were much heavier than they looked, and some were heavier than others depending on what a scene demanded while filming. According to director Ivan Reitman, none of the actors enjoyed wearing the packs, but Harold complained the least (Reitman would not say which actor complained the most).
Once worked at a public school in Chicago, Illinois (1968). Attempted graduate school for a week, which did not pan out.
When he was doing his audition for The Second City, it was him performing a sketch to a full house.
Best remembered by fans of all ages as Dr. Egon Spengler in Ghostbusters (1984) and Ghostbusters II (1989).
Said in an interview that his working relationship with actor Bill Murray ended while filming Groundhog Day (1993) due to differing views on what the film should be about (Murray wanted it to be more philosophical, Ramis wanted it to be a comedy). Ramis also cites that Murray's real life personal problems at the time (specifically the ending of his first marriage) was having a ripple effect on his behavior at work as another factor in the unfortunate ending of their working relationship.
His paternal grandparents were Ukrainian Jewish immigrants and his maternal grandparents were Polish Jews.
Following his death, he was interred at Shalom Memorial Park in Arlington Heights, Illinois.
He was awarded a star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame in St. Louis, Illinois on May 16, 2004.
After not speaking to each other for a number of years, Bill Murray, reportedly visited Ramis before his death and they both made their peace with each other.
The Writers Guild of America posthumously honored him with their lifetime achievement award, the Laurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement (2015).
Two years after his death, The Second City founded the Harold Ramis Film School in his honor, the first film school to focus solely on film comedy (2016).
He was first hired to write a draft for 1941 (1979), but was fired due to creative differences between John Milius and Steven Spielberg
He had no involvement with European Vacation (1985), as he was busy working on Ghostbusters (1984).
Personal Quotes (27)
I never work just to work. It's some combination of laziness and self-respect.
[Remarks to the New York Times on the ecumenical popularity of Groundhog Day (1993)] At first, I would get mail saying, "Oh, you must be a Christian because the movie so beautifully expresses Christian belief". Then, rabbis started calling from all over, saying they were preaching the film as their next sermon. And the Buddhists! Well, I knew they loved it because my mother-in-law has lived in a Buddhist meditation centre for 30 years and my wife lived there for five years.
[on whether he and Bill Murray would consider doing a third Ghostbusters movie] My attitude is generally like Bill's old attitude -- there's no point unless it has some interesting quality or something to say about the subject. Personally, I don't rule it out. I'm skeptical, but maybe it'll work.
Everything we see has some hidden message. A lot of awful messages are coming in under the radar - subliminal consumer messages, all kinds of politically incorrect messages.
Chicago still remains a Mecca of the Midwest - people from both coasts are kind of amazed how good life is in Chicago, and what a good culture we've got. You can have a pretty wonderful artistic life and never leave Chicago.
I'm at my best when I'm working with really talented people, and I'm there to gently suggest or guide or inspire or contribute whatever I can to their effort. It's not like I'm gonna tell Robert De Niro how to act - but I could provide him with useful anecdotal material from my own life or other people I've known, or actual psychological information, or insights into his character. The technique's up to him. But, there are ways to gently urge an actor to pick up the pace or slow it down or focus more, to go bigger or smaller. Some actors are very open right at the beginning - they say, "You only need four words with me: Bigger, smaller, faster, slower.".
Well, I never made big films to make big films; the scale's been appropriate to the content.
Well, for me, it's the relationship between comedy and life - that's the edge I live on, and maybe it's my protection against looking at the tragedy of it all. It's seeing life in balance. Comedy and tragedy co-exist. You can't have one without the other. I'm of the school that anything can be funny, if seen from a comedic point of view.
[on the death of his friend Douglas Kenney in 1980] Doug probably fell while he was looking for a place to jump.
It's hard for winners to do comedy. Comedy is inherently subversive. We represent the underdog as comedy usually speaks for the lower classes. We attack the winners.
The best comedy touches something that's timeless and universal in people. When it's right, those things last.
[on directing Robin Williams and Eugene Levy in Club Paradise (1986)] I'd say, "Robin, could you play that scene faster?" And he would say, "Faster isn't a direction." So I'd say, "Your character is feeling a sense of urgency right now." By contrast, I went to Gene and said, "You did that scene in a minute-twenty. Could you do it in a minute?" And he said, "Sure".
At SCTV (1976), we were virtually self-directed. Whoever wrote the piece pretty much determined how the piece was going to play. We directed each other. Joe Flaherty kind of appointed himself my director. He would tell me stuff like "Open your eyes real big".
I'd like to think I'd never do a gratuitous fart joke.
No matter what I have to say, I'm still trying to say it in comedic form.
I never read Playboy before I started working there and stopped reading it the day I quit.
How one handles success or failure is determined by their early childhood.
Whenever a critic mentions the salary of an actor, I'm thinking, He's not talking about the movie.
As much as we'd like to believe that our work is great and that we're infallible, we're not. Hollywood movies are made for the audience. These are not small European art films we're making.
You probably can't name more than a handful of comedies that would qualify for Best Picture. I can think of a lot of comedy screenplays; Woody Allen has had numerous nominations for his screenplays. But most comedies are calculated. They tend to pander. They're not about anything important.
I can barely watch Caddyshack (1980). All I see are a bunch of compromises and things that could have been better. Like, it bothers me that nobody except Michael O'Keefe can swing a golf club. A movie about golf with the worst bunch of golf swings you've ever seen! It doesn't bother golfers, though.
With both Caddyshack (1980) and National Lampoon's Vacation (1983), it's not like the subjects were serious enough that they engaged my interest for another round. I love the characters, and the actors were great, but I didn't see the need to make another Vacation movie.
My characters aren't losers. They're rebels. They win by their refusal to play by everyone else's rules.
Multiplicity (1996) was a movie that tested really well. People seeing the movie really liked it, but then the studio couldn't market it. We opened on a weekend with nine other films.
I really only worked for about a month on Meatballs (1979). What happened was that Ivan Reitman figured out that studios wanted to meet everybody involved with Animal House (1978) except the producer. So he thought he'd better start directing.
Analyze This (1999) is a good movie because Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal are really good. But without the material to put on the play, of course, they couldn't be good. For me, it starts with the writing. I always think that the writer is doing the vast majority of the director's work, in a sense.For other people with the same name, see William Fiske (disambiguation)
William Meade Lindsley Fiske III (4 June 1911 – 17 August 1940) was the 1928 and 1932 Olympic champion bobsled driver and, following Jimmy Davies, was one of the first American pilots killed in action in World War II.[2] At the time Fiske was serving in the Royal Air Force (RAF). He was one of 11 American pilots who flew with RAF Fighter Command between 10 July and 31 October 1940, thereby qualifying for the Battle of Britain clasp to the 1939–45 campaign star.[3]
Between his Olympic career and his military service, Fiske was instrumental in the early development of the Aspen ski resort. He and a partner built the first ski lift and lodge in the remote Colorado mountain town. Others would continue their work after the war.
Early life [ edit ]
Fiske was born in New York in 1911, the son of Beulah and William Fiske, a New England banking magnate.[1] He attended school in Chicago, and then went to school in France in 1924, where he discovered the sport of bobsled at the age of 16. Fiske attended Trinity Hall, Cambridge in 1928 where he studied Economics and History.
In 1936 Ted Ryan, an heir of Thomas Fortune Ryan, brought some photographs of mountains near Aspen, Colorado, to Fiske. They had been given to Ryan by a man trying to interest him in investing in a mining claim. Fiske and Ryan, however, saw in them ideal terrain for downhill skiing, and the ski resort the pair had been talking about establishing in the United States, similar to those in the Alps where Fiske had competed in the Olympics.[4]
Fiske and Ryan visited Aspen, then a faded mining town decades removed from its boomtown years in the 1880s. Many of the abandoned properties around town were available for very low prices. Fiske bought an option on one, and he and Ryan had blueprints drawn up for a ski lodge. For the next season, they hired guides, including Swiss ski champion André Roch, then studying at Reed College in Oregon. The lodge opened at the end of 1937, and a few weeks later the Boat Tow, an early ski lift, opened. These events are considered the beginning of skiing in Aspen.[4]
Fiske then worked at the London office of Dillon, Reed & Co, the New York bankers. On 8 September 1938,[5] Fiske married Rose Bingham,[6] Countess of Warwick, in Maidenhead.[7]
Bobsled career [ edit ]
In 1928, as driver of the first five-man US Bobsled team to win the Olympics, Fiske became the youngest gold medalist in any winter sport (he was not eclipsed until 1992 by Toni Nieminen), aged just 16 years[8] at the 1928 Winter Olympics in St. Moritz, Switzerland. His American team-mates were Geoffrey Mason, Nion Tocker,[9] Clifford Gray and Richard Parke.[10]
Fiske competed again at the 1932 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid, New York, USA, where he carried the United States' flag at the opening ceremony. The format of the race was altered to a four-man team, but again Fiske and his team-mates, Clifford Gray, Eddie Eagan, and Jay O'Brien[11] took gold.[12]
Fiske was invited, but declined to lead the bobsled team in the 1936 Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany. It is believed by some that this decision was due to his disagreeing with the politics in Germany at the time, which may also explain his later decision to join the war effort in 1940.[13]
Fiske was also a Cresta Champion, and was well known for jumps from the Badrutt's Palace Hotel's bar chandelier in St. Moritz.[citation needed]
World War II [ edit ]
Shortly before the outbreak of World War II, Fiske was recalled to the New York offices of Dillon, Reed & Co, but on 30 August 1939 he returned to England aboard the Aquitania accompanying a bank colleague who was also a member of No. 601 (County of London) Auxiliary Air Force Squadron. Fiske was one of seven US aircrew personnel who fought in the Battle of Britain, although due to the neutrality of the United States, Fiske pretended to be a Canadian.[1] He joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve and was promoted to the rank of Pilot Officer on 23 March 1940.[14]
Fiske undertook his flying training at No. 10 Elementary Flying Training School at RAF Yatesbury, Wiltshire, before moving to RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, for advanced flying training. As an American citizen, he "duly pledged his life and loyalty to the king, George VI,"[7] and was formally admitted into the RAF. In his diary, a joyous Fiske wrote, "I believe I can lay claim to being the first U.S. citizen to join the RAF in England after the outbreak of hostilities."[15]
On 12 July 1940, Fiske joined No. 601 Squadron RAF, a Hawker Hurricane unit, at RAF Tangmere, West Sussex, the so-called "Millionaires' Squadron", carrying out his first sorties with the squadron on 20 July, when he flew two patrols.[16] On 16 August 1940, in the midst of the Battle of Britain, No. 601 Squadron RAF were scrambled to intercept a squadron of German dive-bombers. Fiske was flying Hurricane serial number P3358.[7] The Squadron destroyed eight Junkers Ju 87 Stukas, but after just 15 minutes of flying time, a German gunner put a bullet through Fiske's fuel tank.[17]
With his aircraft badly damaged and his hands and ankles burnt,[18] instead of bailing out, Fiske nursed his Hurricane home, gliding over a hedgerow to the airfield. Although he landed his aircraft safely back at Tangmere, Fiske had to be extracted from the aircraft by ambulance attendants. Shortly after, his fuel tank exploded. Fiske was taken to the Royal West Sussex Hospital in Chichester for treatment, but he died 48 hours later from surgical shock. Fiske was 29 years old.[7]
Fiske's funeral took place on 20 August 1940. Six members of Tangmere's ground staff carried Fiske to his final resting place. His coffin, covered in the Union Jack and the Stars and Stripes, was borne on a bier to Boxgrove Priory Church and buried.[7]
Of Fiske's role in the Battle of Britain, Bill Bond, founder of the Battle of Britain Historical Society, wrote:
...although Billy made several sorties he didn't shoot anything down, so that his impact on the battle in that respect was negligible, but he is most definitely still very much a hero in our book.
Fiske's Flight Commander, Sir Archibald Philip Hope, 17th Baronet, added:
Unquestionably Billy Fiske was the best pilot I've ever known. It was unbelievable how good he was. He picked up so fast it wasn't true. He'd flown a bit before, but he was a natural as a fighter pilot. He was also terribly nice and extraordinarily modest, and fitted into the squadron very well.[19]
The grave of William Meade Lindsley "Billy" Fiske III
Memorials and tributes [ edit ]
William Meade Lindsley "Billy" Fiske III stained glass window at Boxgrove Priory
Fiske is buried in St Mary and St Blaise[1] churchyard in Boxgrove, Sussex.[20] The inscription on his gravestone reads simply: He died for England.[21] The funeral was publicized for propaganda purposes.[22] A memorial stained glass window was dedicated to him on 17 September 2008 at Boxgrove Priory.[23] At the dedication service, a number of former colleagues attended and his green Bentley car was on display.[24] Fiske is listed on the Battle of Britain Monument in London and the Battle of Britain Memorial, Capel-le-Ferne.
On 4 July 1941, a plaque was unveiled in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral, London. The inscription reads: An American citizen who died that England might live. The decision to unveil this plaque on American Independence Day was probably a political one; the United States had not officially joined the war and the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, was keen to popularise Fiske's story.[25] The plaque was unveiled by Sir Archibald Sinclair, the Secretary of State for Air. He said at the ceremony:
Here was a young man for whom life held much. Under no kind of compulsion he came to fight for Britain. He came and he fought and he died.
Other tributes to Fiske include a memorial tablet dedicated to him in the crypt of the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, New York. The United States Bobsled and Skeleton Federation also created the Billy Fiske Memorial Trophy as a posthumous tribute to him. The trophy is awarded to the national champion four-man bobsled team each year.
In addition to a 2005 documentary (American Warrior: Billy Fiske), Red Valley Productions performed a new play based on his life called Billy Fiske: King of Speed at the Alexandra Theatre, Bognor Regis from 20–25 July 2010.
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]That decision frustrated some clients, who complained to Coatue that the move would lock in losses as opposed to giving the money manager a chance to make up some of the losing trades, according to a person familiar with the situation.
A spokesman for Coatue declined to comment.
Coatue appears to have listened. The firm recently told investors that the capital return will likely be delayed until the end of the year, according to the person. The amount of money given back will also be reduced: Coatue will downsize the flagship fund to between $5.5 billion and $6 billion, not $5 billion as previously announced.
Read MoreGoldman'stop tech banker jumps ship for Coatue
So far, the plan is working. The firm's flagship fund gained 5.1 percent from May 1 to May 23, according to a person with direct knowledge of the returns. It's still down 6.6 percent overall in 2014. By comparison, the Absolute Return Technology Index—which tracks hedge funds that invest in the sector—is up 0.16 percent through April.
Coatue has also told investors that there were no significant redemptions—requests from clients for their money—for the June 30 withdrawal period, according to the person.
Read MoreHedge funds burned by favorite stocks
Part of the rationale for decreasing the amount returned is that Coatue has delayed fundraising for a new $500 million "hybrid" fund that plans to invest in both public and private companies. New money for the venture-capital style vehicle would have added to the size of the main hedge fund.
—By CNBC's Lawrence DelevingneThis story has been updated with additional information.
MEXICO CITY -- Mexican authorities said late Monday they may have killed the top leader of the notorious Zetas paramilitary force in a gun and grenade battle in the state of Coahuila, in what would be the most important blow to powerful drug cartels in the six-year government of President Felipe Calderon.
In a brief statement, the Mexican navy said there were "strong indications" that special forces had killed Heriberto Lazcano, maximum leader of the Zetas. He was one of two people killed in a skirmish with a marine patrol on Sunday near the town of Progreso, the navy said.
The marine patrol was responding to citizens' reports of armed individuals in the area when it came under gunfire and a barrage of grenades, the statement said. The patrol returned fire, killing two men. Initial forensic tests indicated one of the dead men was Lazcano, the navy said.
With Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman, head of the vast Sinaloa cartel, Lazcano was at the top of Mexico's most-wanted list. Authorities offered a bounty of more than $2 million for his capture. The U.S. also offered a reward of $5 million.
Lazcano was a soldier in the Mexican army who quit in the late 1990s and was recruited as one of the original members of the Zetas, formed initially as the paramilitary force working on behalf of the Gulf cartel. Under Lazcano, the Zetas broke from the Gulf cartel nearly two years ago and rose to become the strongest criminal organization after the Sinaloa cartel.
Under Lazcano, the Zetas quickly branched out from drug-running to a large array of crimes including the trafficking of migrants and kidnapping. The Zetas have been locked in a deadly battle to wipe out the Gulf cartel and challenge Sinaloa as the groups vie to control northern and central Mexico.
[Updated at 10:50 p.m.: Nicknamed the Executioner, Lazcano is held responsible for some of the most grisly massacres and attacks in Mexico's drug-related history. In 2004, a crusading newsmagazine coincidentally named Zeta, based in Tijuana, identified Lazcano as having been the triggerman in the slaying of an editor, Francisco Ortiz, in front of his two children. The folklore around Lazcano includes stories that he fed some of his victims to his collection of lions and tigers.
The navy said additional forensic tests would be conducted in the coming hours to confirm the dead man’s identity.
If it is Lazcano, his demise would represent an important victory in Calderon’s military-led offensive against drug cartels, launched shortly after he came to power in December 2006. The final months of his government -- he steps down Dec. 1 -- have seen a dramatic push that has led to the capture or killing of a number of top cartel capos, primarily from the Gulf and Zeta groups.
In most of the successful strikes, Mexican forces have worked with intelligence provided by U.S. agencies active in Mexico and especially in the northeast corridor that abuts Texas.]
Latest Mexico drug arrest may cripple Gulf cartel
Venezuela President Hugo Chavez wins reelection, officials say
Latin American governments congratulate Chavez win in Venezuela
-- Tracy Wilkinson
Photo: This undated file photo from the Mexico attorney general's office website shows alleged Zetas drug cartel leader and founder Heriberto Lazcano in an undisclosed location. Credit: Associated PressSeveral free online programs help students learn about biology, chemistry and other subjects covered on the MCAT. (iStockphoto)
It's safe to say medical school is a costly investment. Tuition can reach as high as $50,000 or more per year. Prospective students' wallets often take a hit from simply preparing for the medical school entrance exam: A quick online search reveals test preparation courses ranging from $2,000 to $11,000.
"Commercial prep courses are very expensive," says Lynne Holden, president of Mentoring in Medicine, a nonprofit organization that helps disadvantaged youth and adults become health care professionals.
"I don't think our students budget anything [for the MCAT]," Holden says.
[Prepare for the MCAT with these tips.]
Recognizing that many prospective students like Holden's have limited finances, the Association of American Medical Colleges has teamed up with free online education service Khan Academy and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to provide free online resources for students taking the revised MCAT, which debuts in 2015.
This collaboration is one of many ways organizations are responding to the financial hurdles students face while trying to enter graduate school. Recently, several online options have become available that make studying for graduate school entrance exams, such as the MCAT, a more cost-efficient process.
"We view this effort as an important addition to the work the nation's medical schools and teaching hospitals are doing to encourage and attract future physicians from diverse backgrounds, including students from economically and educationally disadvantaged communities," said Darrell Kirch, president and CEO of the AAMC, in a press release distributed April 2.
The three organizations are sponsoring a video competition to encourage medical students and residents to create educational tutorials on subjects that will be tested by the new MCAT. By fall, the free tutorials will start to appear on the academy's website and on the Pre-health Collection section of the AAMC's MedEdPORTAL iCollaborative, a free online database of instructional materials.
[Find out how the new MCAT will affect aspiring doctors.]
For prospective students taking the MCAT before 2015, there are a number of cost-efficient test prep programs available. Here are a few resources recommended by health care professionals.
Dr. Flowers Test Prep: James Flowers has been helping students prepare for the MCAT since the early 1970s and spent his fourth year at Harvard University's medical school writing an MCAT test preparation book. Holden, who's also an emergency medicine physician at Montefiore Medical Center, used his study materials when preparing for the exam more than 20 years ago. She liked his teaching so much that she uses it with her students at Mentoring in Medicine.
"He goes from the basics up to the more complex and he tests you all the way," she says. Flowers offers his study materials online. Prices for the various study curricula range from about $100 to $800.
"I couldn't even really afford to take the test when I was a student," says Flowers, who grew up on welfare. He now practices as a general internist outside of Las Vegas. "I'd be a little sick if I wanted to make people pay through their noses now."
[Learn which medical schools receive the most applications.]
AAMC: In addition to offering free tutorials for the 2015 MCAT, the Association of American Medical Colleges has resources available now for aspiring doctors studying for the exam.
"For students who have economic need, they get a free official guide, they get a free self-assessment package and then we have a free practice test that's available to everyone," says Karen Mitchell, senior director of the admissions testing service at the AAMC. For $30, students can purchase the AAMC publication "The Official Guide to the MCAT Exam." The online self-assessment package is available for $104, and seven additional practice exams are available for $35 each.
MOOCs: Massive Online Open Courses are online classes that are essentially open to the public. "[Students] can go in and sign up for a biology course or a chemistry course or a physics course. And there's no cost," Mitchell says.
No matter what resource a student chooses for studying, Holden encourages aspiring doctors to place studying for the MCAT at the top of their priority list.
"You have to learn the language of the MCAT," she says. "You have to devote time to it."In a rare moment of agreement with the Obama administration, I have never been in the camp that says the United States should overtly provide offensive arms to the Ukrainian government in its fight with Russia. To me, this is just not a well thought-out strategy. As someone who has visited Russia often, America arming Ukraine will just play into Russian President Vladimir Putin’s strategy of making the United States the enemy. This is not America’s fight; although, we can assists in other ways, smarter ways, since rightly, the American government has decided that a free Ukraine is in the long-term interests of the United States.
I think Mr. Putin wants America to arm the Ukrainians. Russian media thrives on this stuff and therefore the people will believe, even more than they already do, that America is the enemy. The Ukrainian conflict is not all about taking territory in the East and keeping Ukraine from NATO and the European Union. It is also about keeping Mr. Putin and his minions in power. This conflict was started by the Kremlin for a reason. If you really look at what is happening in Russia, the scenario is telling.
There is an argument to be made that Mr. Putin came to power on the back of the conflict in Chechnya, which he won decisively and brutally. Again, the Chechen conflict had its purpose. Russians longed for a strongman that could win the war and give them certainty, make them proud of Russian strength. Sound familiar? It’s familiar because it is.
Do you remember what happened in Moscow only a few years ago? Hundreds of thousands of people marched and demonstrated against the Putin regime. This was not acceptable to the Kremlin. Something had to be done about this. Today this is not only impossible because you would be arrested, it is impossible because the thinking among the Russian people has changed. Mr. Putin has won the propaganda battle and Russians have bought it hook, line and sinker.
Mr. Putin is using the same playbook in Ukraine. He is giving the Russian people something to feel proud about. He is showing strong leadership. He is pushing all the right buttons. If America arms Ukraine, all we will be doing is strengthening Mr. Putin’s grip on power. That is a simple fact. We cannot provide enough weapons to defeat Russians in their own back yard. That goal is nonsense. All we will do is push the world toward World War III.
So what should America do? Nothing? That’s not what I am saying. We are supposed to be an enlightened, smart people. So why not be really smart and cunning about this problem? The best way to help Ukraine is to arm them not with weapons, but with economic progress. This is what scares the Kremlin the most, a prosperous Ukraine associated with the West.
Correctly, the International Monetary Fund is attempting to force Ukraine internally to change its corrupt system. This is the only way forward, to break the Soviet legacy of bribes and graft. The West should be firm in this goal and continue along this path. If Ukraine wants to continue along the Soviet model, then let them go. We can’t save them. That model is not worth spending American blood and treasure. We simply can’t afford that conflict. A corrupt Ukraine will implode eventually anyway and fit right in with the Russian system. So change is the only way forward.
The West needs to be much smarter and more effective in the information warfare campaign. We have Madison Avenue for goodness sake. Get creative. Tell the story of freedom, not just to Ukraine but to Russia as well. We used to do this |
schools and modernizing another 20 over the next four years.Our ‘Six UK Small Press Creators to Watch in 2015’ coverage resumes today as I chat with Alice Urbino, an artist whose work in the graphic medicine strand of comics narratives I first featured in this column at the end of last year when I put a spotlight on her webcomics work here. Since then I’ve also reviewed her self-published series Dimension here describing it as “one of the most inventive uses of the graphic medicine genre of comics I have seen for a long time.”
A fantasy-tinged exploration of living with depression and anxiety, Dimension follows the trials and tribulations of twentysomething Terry whose gradual withdrawal from interaction with the world around him takes a strange turn when he finds a portal to another reality in the plughole of his bathtub.
After our hugely popular interview with Danny Noble on Monday, my discussions with this sextet of artists I firmly believe deserve to be propelled to the next level of recognition continues today. Join us as Alice (below right) and I talk about why the comics form is so effective at communicating personal experience, her involvement with the Comic Book Slumber Party collective, and the future for her series Dimension…
ANDY OLIVER: As one of my ‘Six UK Small Press Creators to Watch in 2015’ list here at Broken Frontier this year, Alice, let’s begin with the obvious introductory question. What was Alice Urbino’s original route into the world of comics?
ALICE URBINO: I’ve been drawing cartoons practically all my life. As a kid I was very sick and ended up getting diagnosed with M.E. on top of other things. I had to leave school at around 14 which led to me spending a lot of time at home in bed by myself. I think most kids in that situation usually end up turning to the internet as their form of escapism.
It subsequently led to me making a lot of online friends that I still keep to this day, all of them having their own webcomics. I think you know Sarah Burgess (you can read my review of Sarah’s The Summer of Blake Sinclair last year here – Andy), she ended up being the first person to really open my eyes and tell me that I could pursue comics further and study them at university. I didn’t even know that was an option, and I had never drawn a proper comic before, but I guess I wanted to follow in my friends’ footsteps.
In terms of both solo work and anthology contributions where have your comics been printed to date?
I feel like I’ve been in so many zines that seemed to just disappear off of the face of the planet. I don’t know if a lot of my stuff ever got printed or not. I guess the main things I’ve done are self-publishing Dimension and being in the Comic Book Slumber Party anthology…
Left to right – Dimension #1 with full cover dress, the original illustration for the cover of Dimension #2, and one of Alice’s haunting images that touches on associated themes
While many small press self-publishers come from an art school background you are rather unique in that you actively studied the form at undergraduate level and gained a BA in Cartoon and Comic Arts from Staffordshire University. What attracted you to that course in the first place?
After I was set on studying comics I originally applied to study sequential illustration at the same college Sarah went to, but I didn’t make the cut. Instead of giving up I googled around and found that Staffordshire University had opened the course for the first time that year. It kind of felt like fate I guess. I was in the right place at the right time.
What areas of comics practice did the course cover and how do you feel your style evolved as a result?
Since the course was band new, it was kind of in a trial run and I guess you could say our class were the guinea pigs. I already knew a lot of stuff but I think what the course was great at was giving me a reason to draw comics. I was given lots of prompts and challenges and it was fun seeing what I could create.
Interior pages from Dimension showing off Alice’s considered use of colour as a narrative device (see discussion below)
I improved at a really fast rate while studying there. It was great to be in an environment full of other people passionate about comics and I learned so much from the other students. I started out drawing in a more cutesy cartoony style but by the end of uni I ended up evolving into a style that can be taken more seriously.
I recently reviewed your ongoing self-published series Dimension in this column saying your “command of the form to impart information and immerse the reader in [the] characters’ emotional mindscape shows an exceptional talent in the making.” For readers yet to enter this dark metaphorical fantasy can you provide us with a basic premise of the series and the characters involved?
Dimension is basically a story about the dangers of running away from your problems instead of taking responsibility for them. The main character (Terry) finds a portal to another dimension in his bathtub and ends up getting lost in his own world instead of facing reality. You see how his actions affect the people around him and how his depression and anxiety end up affecting the environment around him also. It’s really a slice-of-life character piece masked with surreal fantasy elements. I promise the action happens in part 3! Haha..
Yes, while Dimension is ostensibly a fantasy series its core focus is really an examination of the effects that depression and anxiety can have on a sufferer’s life, both directly and indirectly. What were your creative reasons for tackling these issues in a narrative framework that is more allegorical in structure?
I think a lot of my favourite stories take on a more surreal/psychological element to them. I like it when emotions manifest themselves into physical things, I like stories you can read into and interpret in your own way. And I feel like it was only natural for me to write about subjects that draw from my own experiences.
How long do you see Dimension being as a series? Does it have a projected endpoint?
The entire story is written out and I have a clear ending. The first two issues felt very rushed to me because of university deadlines, so part 3 (see teaser image above right – Andy) seems like where the real story kicks off. I’m currently in the middle of drawing part 3 and ideally I’d like it to be the last part but it will probably end up being too long and turning into a 4-parter.
Can you tell us a little bit about your use of colour as a storytelling tool in Dimension?
When starting Dimension I used it as a way to experiment with different styles. I think I’m still trying to find the right medium I feel comfortable with, but until then I’m going to try as many different things as I can. I thought the idea of using colour for the dimensions really highlights the fact that the greyscale of his reality reflects his depression and escaping to a bright, vibrant, colourful world is something he cannot resist.
Examples of Alice’s graphic medicine work…
Aside from Dimension you’ve created a number of short comics that can be read on your tumblr dealing with subjects that fall firmly in the graphic medicine strand of comics. Your formidable use of visual metaphor to depict depression in ‘Twister’ for example, or the cuttingly succinct ‘S**t People Say to Chronic Fatigue Sufferers’. What is it about comics as a form, do you think, that makes them such a powerful medium for conveying personal experience?
I think it is much easier for an audience to relate to an image than words alone. Being able to add metaphorical images next to your words really helps people understand what you’re trying to put across in a much simpler way. I wouldn’t say I’m the best writer in the world… It’s hard for me to express myself in words.
The moment I add images to my feelings it suddenly becomes a valid form of art that people can relate to, instead of being just me whining and writing about my problems. The moment I add drawings to my experiences it’s no longer about me anymore, it’s about the reader. One of the most touching experiences of my life was reading through the comments and tags of ‘S**t People Say to Chronic Fatigue Sufferers’ and seeing how many people saw themselves in it. The comments are filled with people sharing their own stories.
Your recent contribution to the Comic Book Slumber Party: Fairytales for Bad Bitches anthology (right, cover by Becca Tobin) – a gruesomely witty retelling of the Cinderella story – was the story I marked out as the highlight of the issue when I reviewed it here at Broken Frontier. Its violent slapstick humour was a real change of pace from some of your other material. How did you become involved in the Comic Book Slumber Party collective?
I met Hannah [Chapman] who runs CBSP through… Sarah! (yet again!) I don’t really remember how I ended up being in the anthology though… I did go to one of the CBSP workshops in Plymouth and somehow ended up living with her and a bunch of other artists I really admire for a week and we all got along like a house on fire. I have no idea how that happened. I think Hannah is just a super nice person who decided to give me a chance!
Visually, your comics have a very fluid, malleable feel to them that is highly expressive in terms of both characterisation and emotional resonance. Whose work influences your art, both within and outside of the comics world?
Oh man… I think my style is a mixture of so many influences I can’t even pick them all out. There was a point in my life where literally everything I looked at I was inspired by. I think one of the main reasons I started being more fluid and raw was after becoming a huge Daniel Johnston fan. I like the way his drawings and music look like they are just spilling out of his brain. I got so hung up on anatomy and perspective and then his work kind of taught me to let all of that go and just be yourself. Just draw what you feel. I like how truthful it all is. I still have to remind myself to be more loose sometimes… I’m still learning.
I also got really inspired after seeing Sam Vanallemeersch’s stuff in Big Mother #2. And my friend Kira Leigh‘s art is a huge inspiration also… Oh and how could I forget Charles Burns!
I think I’m pretty much inspired by the art of every comic I own.
Comics aren’t the only medium you work in. Could you give us some background on your artistic practice outside of the world of sequential art?
I did fine art as an A-level and ended up doing a lot of oil painting. Everyone wanted me to pursue my oil paintings further but I was a big nerd and in my heart I knew I always wanted to draw cartoons, even if I wasn’t as good at them. Cartoons and comics are what I love and oil paintings are what I’m probably best at.. I still do them every now and then for bands that want album art. Man, you should have seen the look on people’s faces when I said I was going to university to study cartoons… utter disappointment.
Are there any hints you are able to drop about upcoming comics projects you’re involved in?
Other than Dimension part 3, nothing is set in stone. I hope to be doing more with Comic Book Slumber Party in the near future. There have been talks of putting out my own little book but I still have yet to come up with a solid idea for it. Expect me to pop up every now and then in random zines and see me post one-offs on my blog. I’m just gonna see where the wind takes me.
For BF readers inspired to check out your work further how can they get hold of it? Which shops are currently stocking Dimension, for example? And are you planning on exhibiting at any shows this year?
I know Gosh! Comics and Orbital Comics in London both stock it. And I think Dave’s Comics in Brighton stocks it too. I think I’m planning to go to ELCAF, Brighton Illustration Fair, Thought Bubble and maybe an MCM this year. Most of them I’ll probably be with Hannah at the CBSP table though. Come and see me!
And, finally, what targets have you set for yourself for 2015? Where would you like to be with your comics practice by the end of this year?
I still consider myself fairly new, I’ve got plenty of time to work on my art, I just need to take it slow and set myself small goals. Finish Dimension. Stop procrastinating. Don’t let art block conquer me! If I can get Dimension finished and be at a place where I’m happy with it, I’ll be proud.
For more on Alice Urbino’s work check out her site here. You can also follow Alice on Twitter here.
For regular updates on all things small press follow Andy Oliver on Twitter here.EY Switzerland will become the first advisory firm in the world to accept Bitcoin.
Formerly known as Ernst and Young, the professional service company announced via a press release on Friday, that it would be integrating Bitcoin as part of a greater digitization process. All EY Switzerland employees will be issued Bitcoin wallets through a custom wallet app. This will also include a publicly accessible two-way Bitcoin ATM at its headquarters in Zurich.
As EY Switzerland CEO Marcel Stalder notes, the pro-Bitcoin push is necessary to get his company and employees familiar with Blockchain technology, which will likely dominate the future of the finance industry:
“We don’t only want to talk about digitalization, but also actively drive this process together with our employees and our clients. It is important to us that everybody gets on board and prepares themselves for the revolution set to take place in the business world through Blockchains, smart contracts and digital currencies.”
He adds:
“Blockchains are a very quickly developing technology that can permanently change many sectors. In Switzerland’s role as an important financial and industrial center and to further its development as a digital hub, it is essential that it be a pioneer in this area.”
EY is third of the four largest accounting firms in the world, also known as the “big four,” which also includes Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers and KPMG.
Switzerland fast becoming a hub of digital innovation
This latest integration by a major company serves to further solidify Switzerland’s reputation as a Blockchain-friendly nation. At SBB train station ticket machines all around the country, customers can buy Bitcoin to top up their wallets. The town of Zug, in the famed “crypto valley” which is home to several Blockchain-based startups, will accept Bitcoin payments for town services through the remainder of this year as part of a trial run to test the digital currency. Earlier this year, the Swiss parliament moved to deregulate Blockchain startups to exempt them from strict financial disclosure laws and spur innovation.
Switzerland long maintained a reputation as the global center for financial privacy because of legendary banking secrecy. With Bitcoin representing the next wave of financial privacy after Swiss bank accounts, it would make sense for Switzerland’s financial services to embrace leading technology to maintain a competitive edge in the industry.
The financial world races towards digitalization, prompted by Bitcoin
The success of Bitcoin, the great pioneer of Blockchain technology, has spurred a great push towards the digitalization of global finance. Several nations, including Ukraine, South Korea and Tunisia, have all begun plans to implement digital currency. Senegal has joined the ranks of nations sporting a digital currency, and may soon be followed by a host of other African nations. The IMF predicts that within five years time, banks around the world will likely adopt digital currencies into use.Iraqi forces have captured the town of Hawija and the surrounding area from ISIL, one of their last strongholds in Iraq.
With the capture of Hawija, the only area that remains under control of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group in Iraq is a stretch alongside the western border with Syria.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said in Paris on Thursday that "I want to announce the liberation of the city of Hawija today," calling it a "victory not just of Iraq but of the whole world".
He said that the fight against ISIL is now focused on the border zone with Syria.
The offensive was carried out by US-backed Iraqi government troops and Iranian-trained and armed Shia paramilitary groups known as Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF).
"The army's 9th armoured division, the Federal Police, the Emergency Response division and … Popular Mobilisation liberated Hawija," said a statement from the joint operations commander, Lieutenant-General Abdul Ameer Rasheed Yarallah, on Thursday.
Major General Raid Shaker Jawdat, commander of Iraq's Federal Police, said, "The federal forces liberated the district of Hawija, the Hawija hospital as well as the Askari, Nidaa and Thawra neighbourhoods, and are in control of the centre of the province of Hawija in full".
Strategic importance
Hawija lies between two main routes north of Baghdad; one leading to Kirkuk and the autonomous Kurdish region, the other to Mosul and further on to the Iraqi border with Syria and Turkey.
Its geographical location in the oil-rich province of Kirkuk and its proximity to Mosul and the Iraqi Kurdish region has made it a centre of conflict between rival powers ever since the US invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Hawija is also one of the most important agricultural areas and the second-largest source of vegetables in Iraq.
The area's mainly Sunni Arab population of 450,000 is deeply hostile to both the Shia-led government in Baghdad and to the Kurds who form the historic majority in adjacent areas, which - in part - was what buoyed ISIL's control of the area.
In 2013, activists and political parties called for the conversion of Hawija from a province into a governorate, but the Kirkuk provincial council blocked the proposal.
US-led coalition troops nicknamed Hawija the "Kandahar in Iraq" after it put up fierce resistance to the 2003 US invasion, similar to that in the Taliban's bastion in Afghanistan.The Union Budget for 2017-18 is very likely to lower corporate tax rates. That is not only because of the faltering economy, but also because the finance minister had promised in his 2015 budget speech that corporate tax rate will be reduced from 30% to 25% over the next four years, together with the phasing out of exemptions and deductions. The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has urged a reduction in the corporate tax rate to 18%. Is the industry lobby pushing its luck too far?
Not really. The current headline corporate tax rate in India is 30% plus cess and surcharge. As the chart shows, that works out to a rate of 34.6%. What the chart also shows is that we have one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world. China and Indonesia have corporate tax rates of 25% and rates for Thailand, Singapore, Korea, Malaysia and Hong Kong are even lower. So there’s a clear case to fast-forward the promise to bring down the corporate tax rate to 25%.
There is, however, a catch. The effective tax rate or the rate of tax actually shelled out by many companies is lower due to a slew of exemptions and tax holidays that they have been enjoying. Finance minister Arun Jaitley said in his last budget speech, “The effective collection of Corporate Tax is about 23 percent. We lose out on both counts, i.e. we are considered as having a high Corporate Tax regime but we do not get that tax due to excessive exemptions." So if the average corporate tax rate comes down to 23% or so, after all the exemptions are taken away, that won’t be much of an improvement in the tax rate for a large chunk of the corporate sector. That is why the CII’s proposal to get the corporate tax rate down to 18% makes eminent sense.
If the prime minister is serious about making a paradigm shift in the Indian economy and improve the ease of doing business, as he said at the Vibrant Gujarat summit, he should tell his finance minister to dramatically reduce the corporate tax rate. Such a move will also enable the formal sector of the economy to expand, which the government has been saying is one of its prime objectives in its effort to get rid of the black economy. It will reduce the incentive to hide income and increase the number of decent jobs. Any revenues lost to the government should be more than made up in the long term, by the benefits it brings to the economy.Share
Doctors have been diagnosing certain diseases by sniffing patients’ breath as far back as 400 B.C.
That old methodology could soon get a fresh lease of life, courtesy of new research from the American Chemical Society. What researchers involved with the project have established are unique “breathprint” identifiers for a range of different diseases — including ones like kidney cancer and Parkinson’s disease that you might not immediately assume come with a signature smell.
“In this study, we tested the ability of a nano-based intelligent technology to detect and classify a large number of diseases by the analysis of exhaled breath,” Professor Hossam Haick, one of the researchers on the project, told Digital Trends. “We analyzed breath samples obtained from 1,404 subjects, either categorized as healthy controls or having one of 17 different diseases. The nano-based intelligent system was able, after a training phase, to diagnose and classify the samples according to the healthy condition [or] disease of the donor with 86 percent accuracy.”
The analysis was carried out using a technology called mass spectrometry, a technique in which chemical species are ionized and the ions sorted based on their mass-to-charge ratio. The team discovered that each disease produces a unique volatile chemical scent, based on differing quantities of 13 components.
“Our system is based on an array of nano-materials-based sensors, modified with a sensing organic layer,” Haick continued. “Bioinspired by the mammalian sense of smell, these sensors perform semi-selective analysis of the target volatile molecules in exhaled breath, and with artificial intelligence [are capable of learning and detecting] the unique patterns associated with each disease.”
Impressively, the AI tool is able to detect additional diseases even when one is already present.
Right now, the work exists in the form of a research paper, although Haick said that the plan is to develop a breathalyzer-type portable technology that could be used for early diagnosis in the field. “This is an ongoing process and hopefully soon could reach the daily use in the clinics,” he noted.Statue of General Lee coming down in New Orleans on Friday
FILE - In this Sept. 2, 2015 file photo, the statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee stands in Lee Circle in New Orleans. The city of New Orleans plans to take down the confederate statue on Friday, May 18, 2017, completing the southern city’s removal of four Confederate-related statues that some called divisive. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert, File)
The city of New Orleans will take down a prominent statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee on Friday, completing the southern city’s removal of four Confederate-related statues that some called divisive.
Unlike the first three statues, city officials plan to take Lee’s statue down during the day, with Mayor Mitch Landrieu planning a major speech Friday afternoon to explain his reasoning.
In a news release obtained by The Associated Press, the city said the statues were “erected decades after the Civil War to celebrate the ‘Cult of the Lost Cause,’ a movement recognized across the South as celebrating and promoting white supremacy.”
The city plans to have extra security around the Lee statue Friday morning and will block off a one-block radius around Lee Circle to cars before and during the removal in anticipation of protests.
“Citizens have a right to assemble and exercise their First Amendment rights to free speech and peaceful protest,” city officials said in the release. “We understand there are strong emotions surrounding this subject, and we ask that the public remain peaceful and respectful while demonstrating.”
Landrieu had proposed the removal of the monuments after the 2015 massacre of nine black parishioners at a South Carolina church. The killer, Dylann Roof, was an avowed racist who brandished Confederate battle flags in photos. That recharged the debate over whether Confederate emblems represent racism or an honorable heritage.
The Robert E. Lee statue was a familiar landmark for tourists and commuters who travel busy St. Charles Avenue by car or on one of the city’s historic streetcars.
Erected in 1884, Lee’s is the last of four monuments to Confederate-era figures to be removed in accordance with a 2015 City Council vote.
The city removed a statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis last week; a statue of Confederate Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard on Wednesday; and a monument memorializing a deadly 1874 white-supremacist uprising in April.
Those three statues were taken down in the pre-dawn hours without advance public notice, a precautionary measure after officials said threats had been made against contractors and workers involved in the effort.
Of the four monuments, Lee’s was easily the most prominent, with the bronze statue alone being close to 20 feet tall. It’s an image of Lee standing tall in uniform, with his arms crossed defiantly, looking toward the northern horizon from atop a roughly 60-foot-tall column.
It towered over a traffic circle — Lee Circle — in an area between the office buildings of the city’s business district and stately 19th century mansions in the nearby Garden District.
Landrieu drew blistering criticism from monument supporters and even some political allies. But he insisted throughout that the statues honoring the Confederate figures must go.
“We will no longer allow the Confederacy to literally be put on a pedestal in the heart of our city,” Landrieu vowed last month after the first statue came down.
In the news release Thursday, the city said it has received offers from public and private institutions to take individual monuments, so it will solicit proposals on where they will go through an “open and transparent selection.” Only nonprofits and governmental entities will be allowed to take part in the process, and the city said the process will include the Battle of Liberty Place monument as well as the statues of Davis and Lee. The final resting place of Beauregard’s statue will be considered separately because of legal issues.
Anyone who submits a proposal to take one of the statues will have to describe how they will “place the statues in context both in terms of why they were first erected and why the city chose to remove them in 2015,” the city said. They also cannot be displayed outdoors on public property within the city.
The city plans to leave the column where Lee’s statue stood intact and will mount public art in its place.
An American flag will stand where the Davis statue used to be, and the area where the Liberty Place monument used to stand “will remain as is.” The City Park Improvement Association, civic groups and the city will decided what will go where the Beauregard statue used to stand.
The city wants to finish the work during its tricentennial year in 2018.
___
Jesse J. Holland covers race and ethnicity for The Associated Press. Contact him at jholland@ap.org, on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/jessejholland or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/jessejholland.
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Associated Press reporters Kevin McGill and Rebecca Santana in New Orleans contributed to this report.An Itch for New Beginnings
Several years back I bought Tortoise & the Hare Cafe with hopes of turning it around.
Because the name was known in town I decided to keep it. But as time went on I realized the name didn't have as much drawing power as I anticipated, and people weren't coming to visit since they never knew there was an ownership change.
With limited means to spread the word, and an unimpressive atmosphere, it became my largest regret that I didn't start from scratch.
But alas, I was stuck pouring my resources into the business just to keep it afloat. There was no turning back as livelihoods were on the line. With the name and its stigma working against me, business stayed stagnant.
That's when I finally said enough is enough. Something needs to be done. I got the itch to do something wholly my own, representative of my family's roots. I needed a new concept from my heart that I could sink my teeth into, that would be unique to the community, and inspire people to come and experience southern charm.
Enter Community Crowdsourcing
Inspired, I approached Bristol Rising, the downtown crowdsourcing community, on whether they could provide me ideas for a fresh name, experience, and beginning.
These Bristol Rising members got right to work, brainstorming ideas for names, tag lines, menu items, decor, and more. Surveys and feedback were collected and data was hand delivered to me.
I sat down with the family and we choose some of our favorite ideas, and were even inspired to create new suggestions of our own. After some back and forth, we finally settled on a new concept. 457 Mason Jar. 457 because it's the street address on North Main, and Mason Jar because it's representative of my southern roots and influences. It reminds me so much of the relaxed good time atmospheres I've enjoyed in Carolina, where neighbors offered you company and savory tastes of the south.
My BBQ Nacho. Credit: Stacy McCarthy Photography
A Second Chance
This Kickstarter campaign represents a second chance for me to correct a regretful miscalculation. It's an opportunity to do this thing right, and I won't disappoint. With excellent food in tow, and a re-tooled menu that fits the brand, this is a true first-time introduction of my passions to the community, with a brand representative of the quality, experience, and honesty of my family and our generational recipes.
Your Donations
It's a difficult and expensive ordeal to rebrand a restaurant. Every dollar of your donation is appreciated and will be stretched to its fullest. There are many items that we would need to purchase. In order to stay somewhat reasonable with our ask, we tried to focus on the ones we can't live without, so we can make sure this thing's the success we know it will become. Here's some big ticket items that will be purchased if we reach our goal:
++ Logos & Design. The logo you see in this campaign is based off our input, but we didn't design it, a graphic artist did. We would like to compensate him for his fine job, knowing full well it might be spiffed up a bit before our full launch date.
++ Signage and Mounts. These items are the most expensive, but is a necessary initial purchase. We're looking to have two signs made that hang off a perpendicular metal mount extending off the building. Kind of like the image below. We're looking to get the signs created by one of our contacts to keep with a high value theme, but also to keep costs in check. This new signage will be able to catch drivers and pedestrians eyes with little effort, while fitting in with a boutique New England setting.
++ Dining Room Lighting. The current fluorescent lighting is more reminiscent of an office than a quaint dining room. Our customers hate it, and so do we. We're hoping we can rip out the fluorescent lighting and suspended ceiling, and install a brand new lighting system that would create an ambiance truly of southern origins.
++ Paints, Patchwork, and Decor. With a new brand, comes a new experience. We want to be able to bring this to life through use of colors and thematic decor that creates a crisp, clean, down home kinda feeling. Sorta like how grandma's house made you feel. But better.
++ Menus and Materials. We cook. We don't design graphics. We want to make sure our brand of southern hospitality is properly extended into everything you pick up and touch.
Make it Happen
We're truly thankful for any level of your support. If we reach our goal you'll have afforded us something we never had, a brand that defines who we are as a people, and an authentic southern experience we want to offer when you walk through those doors.
We're confident we'll deliver. And we thank you for considering giving this ol' guy a fresh start. That to us, is priceless.
Contribute
1.) CREATE a Kickstarter account: You only have to give your email address.
2.) SIGN IN at Amazon.com - if you already have an account, you're all set. If not it only takes a moment.
3.) DONATE what you are comfortable giving. If you find yourself wanting to help but unable to donate please skip to the next step to help us spread the word. Your card will only be charged in the event we reach our goal.
4.) SHARE this with your friends, family, colleagues, and anyone walking the street. Let the world know you want 457 Mason Jar in town!
Lastly, we thank you all for your time, kind contributions, and for sharing our campaign. We're excited to give you a full lathering of southern hospitality at 457 Mason Jar in January 2014!Information was released by the Athletic Department regarding how to buy tickets for the 2010 football season. This year, season tickets will cost students $218.
The process is not extremely challenging, but missing any step in the process would mean spending much more money to buy either season tickets or individual tickets to each game.
Step One: Ticketmaster Account
To buy student season tickets, you will need a Ticketmaster account. After you head to the Ticketmaster site, you will need to enter basic information about yourself. While you do not have to enter credit card information at this point, it is advisable, as it will save time later on in the process.
Step Two: Pre-registration
If you are an incoming freshman or incoming transfer student, you do not need to pre-register. However, for all other students, pre-registering is mandatory. If you do not pre-register, you won’t be allowed to participate in the process to get student season tickets.
Pre-registration starts on May 27 at 8 a.m. and ends on June 2 at 5 p.m. This time period applies to both undergraduates and graduates alike. This Ticketmaster site will have the pre-registration during this time period. Make sure to have your nine-digit student id number ready, as you will need it for both this step and the next.
Step Three: Buying the Tickets
There will be five different sale dates for the five different classes. The dates for purchasing the tickets will be from June 21-June 25. There are no official purchasing dates for each of the classes yet, but by going off of last year’s order, we think it will be:
Seniors (91.1 credits or higher) – Monday, June 21.
Juniors (59.1-91 credits) – Tuesday, June 22.
Sophomores (27.1-59 credits) – Wednesday, June 23.
Freshmen (27 credits or less) – Thursday, June 24.
Graduate students – Friday, June 25.
Final confirmation of the exact order will happen on May 20. Also on May 2o, the exact time on these dates that you can begin purchasing will be given out. Again, if it’s like last year, each class will start at 7 a.m., except freshmen, who will start at 8 p.m. All sales will be available at this Ticketmaster site.
Final Thoughts and Tips
As an extra word of advice, if you miss the very beginning time of your sale date, don’t worry! Last year, I woke up extremely late and was freaking out about not getting tickets. However, a very wise person told me to try anyway. It ended up that tickets were still available later during my available time slot. So stay calm, follow these guidelines, and get your tickets!
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About the Author
Michael Berton I grew up in a Philly suburb, then moved to a different one. I am now at Penn State, where I can actually sate my giant appetite for sports. Other than writing, I also play the cello in the Penn State Philharmonic.
East Renovation Continues With Approval For Sproul, Geary Halls Penn State’s Board of Trustees approved the next phase of East Halls renovations at its meeting Friday, setting the stage for construction to begin on Sproul and Geary Halls.World
Over 80 Terrorists Killed, Wounded in Clashes with Syrian Soldiers in Dara'a
TEHRAN (FNA)- Syrian Army troops fended off an offensive of Fatah al-Sham Front (the newly-formed al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group previously known as the al-Nusra Front) on their positions in Northern Dara'a, killing at least 20 and wounding over 60 militants.
Fatah al-Sham launched attacks on government positions from the villages of Ibta'a and Da'el to prevail over army's defense lines near a desert battalion in Northern Dara'a, but their assault was repelled by the army men.
Fatah al-Sham suffered a heavy death toll and its military hardware sustained major damage in the failed attack.
Meantime on Saturday, Syrian military forces continued to attack terrorists' centers in and outside Dara'a city, killing and wounding at least 33 militants.
At least 11 terrorists were killed in the Syrian soldiers' offensive on their positions in al-Naimeh in Eastern countryside of Dara'a city.
In the meantime at least 22 militants were killed or wounded in the Syrian army men's attacks on terrorist groups' concentration centers in al-Saad neighborhood, Eastern side of Busra Rotary, the Southern side of the power company and in the Eastern side of Khazan al-Karak.Treasure Hunter
How much does a fistful of stones weigh? If you were an adept treasure hunter you'd know that. There are times in a man's life where he finds himself suspended above a pit full of spikes and vipers. Yes, both. You're upside down and blood has started rushing to your head, you're starting to become dizzy. You keep wondering who filled the pit with snakes and how they weren't harmed in the process. It doesn't matter, the point is you've been here a thousand times. You've sought out riches far and wide and you aim to make your pockets heavier. The older and mustier a treasure is the better.
Net Worth
A man is only worth the silver in his pocket, right? Starting at 3rd level, you may directly exchange your precious gold pieces for the following benefits. Each of these benefits can be stacked up to three times, however, you cannot have more than two of the below choices active at the same time. The GP amounts should be adjusted by your Dungeon Master.
Net Worth Table
Gold Amount Bonus 100 GP +1 to attack/DMG for 1 Round 100 GP +1 to AC for 1 Round 200 GP Reroll attack or SavingThrow 1000 GP Reroll enemy attack roll 2000 GP Reroll Death Saving Throw
More Than Meets The Eye
At 3rd level by taking this archetype you are able to |
.
"In fact, more than a dozen or so have been fired today according to the factions here on the ground.
"On a symbolic level, at the end of the day the Palestinian people remain here on the ground, having paid a very heavy price though.
"Their position was one of steadfast defiance. The fact that they can stay and essentially... claim that they have been able to stave off this aggression, in terms of the leadership and the command and control structure of Hamas and the government here, is certainly a sign for many here that they have been victorious."
At least 16 rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into Israel on Sunday morning after it declared its ceasefire.
'Extremely fragile'
Israel responded with air attacks, according to Israeli sources.
Barnaby Phillips, Al Jazeera's correspondent, reporting from near the Gaza-Israel border, said that the situation is extremely fragile.
"This ceasefire... could go horribly wrong at any moment. There are thousands of troops in Gaza. We did see some withdraw we think this morning, we are not sure of numbers but they are in close proximity to Hamas fighters," he said.News
Power outage
The server was down today between 11:04 and 14:20 (CEST) because of a major power outage in Hetzner datacenter. Everything should be up and running again now.
24 May 2018, 12:41:34 UTC · Discuss
GPU version fix
There was a serious bug in GPU version: https://github.com/SChernykh/Amicable/commit/3470ed855d244100f37b0b7ab4c912d2b9365a93
Unfortunately, it skipped some numbers in an unpredictable way for "large primes" work units for the last 20 days 9 days. I'll have to reissue all such work units to cover everything missed. The GPU versions for all platforms are already updated.
Sorry for the mess, but it's good that the bug is fixed relatively early, because it was hard to notice.
27 Mar 2018, 17:45:25 UTC · Discuss
MacOS GPU version released
GPU requirements are the same as for Windows and Linux versions: AMD (HD 5xxx or newer) or NVIDIA (GTX 4xx or newer) GPU with OpenCL support and at least 2 GB of video memory.
The MacOS GPU version has been confirmed to work on OS X El Capitan and MacOS Sierra. Older MacOS versions have poor OpenCL support and may fail to run the GPU version.
16 Sep 2017, 8:24:36 UTC · Discuss
The search up to 2^64 is complete!
Congratulations to everyone who took part in this search!
- There are 2,390,655 amicable pairs with smaller member below 2^64 in total
- BOINC volunteers found 552,874 new amicable pairs below 2^64
A more detailed analysis of amicable pairs distribution will follow later this month. And don't forget to edit your preferences and check that you're all set up to run the current search up to 10^20.
16 Aug 2017, 7:26:12 UTC · Discuss
Credits for the old application (search up to 2^64) doubled
It's sad to see everyone leave the old (and unfinished) application "Amicable Numbers up to 2^64" so I decided to double credit points for it.
Everyone can switch their CPUs back to gain some more credits.
Note that you can run "Amicable Numbers up to 2^64" on CPU and "Amicable Numbers up to 10^20" on GPU on the same PC at the same time!
Here's what you need to set in project preferences:
Use CPU, AMD/ATI GPU, NVIDIA GPU = yes
Run application 2^64 = yes
Run application 10^20 = no
Accept work from other applications = yes
With these settings your CPU will get tasks (and more credits in general) from "2^64" only, and your GPU will get tasks from "10^20" thanks to "Accept work from other applications = yes" selected.
3 Jul 2017, 16:09:14 UTC · Discuss
The search up to 10^20
It will be started tomorrow (July 1st)!
I've decided to speed up the launch of the next search due to performance issues with GPU version that everyone experiences now.
What will happen on July 1st:
1) "Amicable Numbers up to 10^20" application will start receiving tasks.
2) All GPU versions for the old application "Amicable Numbers up to 2^64" will be deprecated.
3) Credit points for both applications will be re-balanced to make sure that RAC doesn't change.
So all GPUs should automatically switch to the new application, and the old application will remain as CPU-only until it finishes.
30 Jun 2017, 16:11:33 UTC · Discuss
New application for double checking current search
I've launched a new application called Amicable Numbers up to 2^64 (double check). It will re-run some of past work units.
If you don't want to run WUs which were already done before, you can deselect this application on the preferences page: https://sech.me/boinc/Amicable/prefs.php?subset=project
NOTE: If you are unable to achieve 100% GPU load (to maximize RAC) with work units from the main application, I recommend to switch to this new application: it will have GPU-friendly work units.
16 Jun 2017, 14:27:55 UTC · Discuss
Finish line of the current search and next steps
Hello all crunchers!
The search for amicable numbers up to 2^64 is almost done: all previously known numbers are already covered by the search, zero numbers were missed which is very good and gives me confidence. It's extremely unlikely to find anything in the remaining WUs, but they need to be processed to complete the search.
The next steps will be:
1) Double check a small portion of the search space to increase confidence that nothing is missed. It will be a separate application so everyone will have choice whether to move to the next search range or help verify the current range.
2) Start the search for amicable numbers up to 10^20. It will be a separate application as well and it will become the default application as soon as the current search runs out of WUs. CPU version is ready, GPU version is work in progress and hopefully will be finished before the start of the search.
8 Jun 2017, 10:19:57 UTC · Discuss
Credit badges for 100, 200 and 500 thousand total credit
There are new entry level badges on the project: white hollow stars for 100, 200, 500 thousand total credit.
14 Apr 2017, 13:07:16 UTC · Discuss
Credit badges
I've added credit badges. The first badge is given for 1,000,000 total credit, the last badge is given for 1,000,000,000 total credit. I chose 1 million as an entry level because there are already 258 users above that value and their contribution is 97.2% of project's total credit. So if you've been active on the project, you should already have one of these badges.
Bronze stars: 1, 2, 5 million total credit
Silver stars: 10, 20, 50 million total credit
Gold stars: 100, 200, 500 million total credit
Big gold star: 1 billion total credit
8 Apr 2017, 10:59:54 UTC · Discuss
News is available as an RSS feedThe "wellness" brand Goop, which is owned by Gwyneth Paltrow has not had a good year. Over the last several months, the brand has made headlines for promoting some truly bad and weird ideas... and now the company has been justly rewarded.
Yep, you probably shouldn't put jade eggs in your "yoni" (what normal people call a vagina). And what about "bio frequency healing" stickers? A little scientific outfit called NASA has smacked them down on that front.
So it is perhaps fitting that Goop has been awarded the first ever "Rusty Razor" award by The Skeptic Magazine, as the "best" promoter of the worst pseudoscientific nonsense. The award came as part of the mag's annual "Ockham Awards" which celebrates scientific and skeptical activism.
What the award statue actually looks like, if Paltrow wants to collect it.
Goop was apparently invited to collect its award, which was being handed out at the QED Conference in Manchester - but sadly no one from the company responded.
Skeptic Magazine Editor Deborah Hyde said: "We were surprised at quite how many public vote nominations GOOP received for the 'Rusty Razor' award for pseudoscience - it's certainly a popular win. When there are so many issues affecting public health today - the rise of measles and whooping cough due to reduced rates of vaccination, for instance - it's a shame that many people prefer to contemplate their yonis than engage with evidence-based reality".
Here's hoping the award serves to remind people of the importance of looking for scientific evidence when seeking medical interventions. Or at least remind Paltrow that she's probably better off sticking to running Stark Industries.HOW TO ORDER
1. Select: Choose the shoe, boot or accessory you wish to be tattooed. We recommend tan leather as other colours do not produce the desired effect.
2. Design: Decide on your design. It can be anything from initials to a bespoke illustration, be inspired by previous requests on our archive.
3. Discuss: Fill in the tattoo form with as much information as possible or contact customer services. Prices start from £25 for initials.
4. Order: Once received, our team will be in touch within two working days to finalise the tattoo and give you a final quote. If you are happy to go ahead, our Tattooist-in-Chief will set to work.
5. Relax: Our Tattooist-in-Chief will tattoo your item, and it will then be packed and delivered to you within two weeks of your order date.We’re living in the age of the rock star academic.
Everyone is trying to make sense of financial crises and the old economics textbooks don’t work so well anymore.
So it’s natural to turn to the people who study this stuff for a living.
Thomas Piketty, a French academic, sold 1.5 million copies of his book “Capital in the Twenty-First Century,” while Nobel prize-winning economists like Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz can be found burning up social media, the newspapers, and the conference circuit.
But not everyone with influential ideas on economics and finance is as well-known.
Here are the academics that are changing the world behind-the-scenes. The list isn’t exhaustive. If you think we’ve missed anyone out then please email in suggestions.
1: Ha-Joon Chang, University of Cambridge
Alma Mater: Seoul National University
Big Idea: Developed countries talk a lot about the free market but really use their power and financial strength to profit at the expense of emerging economies.
Chang’s ideas are controversial, centering on the role that international bodies like the IMF and World Bank play in the world economy.
In books such as Kicking Away the Ladder and The Myth of Free Trade he argues that the governments of bigger economies help out their own companies, while preaching the benefits of the free market to developing nations.
2: Katherina Pistor, Columbia Law School
Alma Mater: University of Freiburg
Big Idea: The rule of law must be suspended for financial markets in a crisis, or the whole system will collapse.
Pistor, who won the Max Planck academic research award in 2012, is developing a legal theory of finance to work out how laws affect its shape and composition.
She discovered that, in a crisis, the regulations that build markets aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on. Political power is the driving force behind who gets hit in the heat of the moment.
3: Charles Calomiris, Columbia Business School
Alma Mater: Yale University
Big Idea: Financial collapses don’t happen at random and aren’t inevitable.
They come from complex bargains between politicians and bankers that spiral out of the government’s control. That’s one of the reasons why the US has had 12 major banking crises since 1840, while Canada has had none.
4: Jon Danielsson, London School of Economics
Alma Mater: Duke University
Big Idea: Trusting your risk models will lose you money in a crisis.
Risk models will generally tend to have the same outcomes when everything is going well, even if they have different mathematical foundations.
This tricks people in to thinking that they work all the time. But when all hell breaks loose, the models will give you wildly different risk assesments, leaving you flying blind.
This is bad for banks and hedge funds but even worse for central banks, who have to make policy decisions for everyone else.
5: Marianne Bertrand, University of Chicago Booth
Alma Mater: University of Brussels
Big Idea: CEOs are rewarded for luck rather than performance. Also, employers judge applicants on their name as much as their qualifications.
Bertrand is one the reasons why there’s been such a shareholder backlash against CEO pay, after proving their huge bonuses are based on luck rather than genius.
In a 2003 paper, she and Sendhil Mullainathan also famously replied to help-wanted ads in Chicago and Boston with fake names. Some applicants used names like Emily and Greg, while others used names like Lakisha and Jamal.
“The results show significant discrimination against African-American names,” the authors wrote. “White names receive 50% more callbacks for interviews.”
6: Alvin Roth, Harvard University and Stanford University
Alma Mater: Columbia University
Big Idea: You don’t need money to make a stable market for something.
Roth, along with Lloyd Shapely, won the Nobel Prize in 2012 for showing that people can make a market based on mutually-beneficial swaps rather than cash to satisfy a specific need.
This was particularly useful for easing the shortage of kidney donors in the US. Roth used game theory to pair up donors with patients they didn’t know, making it easier for people to swap their organs and find a match.
7: Richard Portes, London Business School
Alma Mater: Yale University
Big Idea: Bondholders can often work together to get concessions from a borrower.
Portes, now professor of economics at London Business School, laid down the groundwork for collective action clauses, where sovereign bondholders use their bargaining power to impose conditions on a debtor country. The work has been especially important in cases like Greece or Argentina.
8: Charles Goodhart, London School of Economics
Alma Mater: Cambridge University
Big Idea: Goodhart’s Law.
Goodhart said that as soon as governments or central banks turn a statistic, such as the stock market, into an implicit policy target, it ceases to become a reliable statistic.
This is because players in financial markets change their investment strategies to pre-empt the policy.
Goodhart was one of the orignal members of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee in 1997, and a veteran of financial crises in 1970s.
9: Alberto Alesina, Harvard University
Alma Mater: Bocconi Univerisity, Milan
Big Idea: Far from hurting growth, austerity measures can actually help economies recover.
In 2009, Alesina and Silvia Ardegna published a paper called Large Changes in Fiscal Policy: Taxes Versus Spending.
It was an important part of the debate in the years that followed over whether austerity and reducing debt or boosting government spending were the best strategies for economies recovering, cited by fiscal hawks.
This article is published in collaboration with Business Insider. Publication does not imply endorsement of views by the World Economic Forum.
To keep up with Agenda subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Author: Ben Moshinsky is a senior finance reporter, covering markets and banks. He previously worked for Bloomberg News in Brussels and London.
Image: French economist and academic Thomas Piketty, poses in his book-lined office at the French School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS), in Paris. REUTERS/Charles PlatiauSALMON, Idaho (Reuters) - A bill to strip Idaho’s public school teachers of much of their collective bargaining rights won final passage in the state Legislature on Tuesday and was awaiting the governor’s signature to become law.
The measure, which cleared the Republican-controlled House on a vote of 48-22, would restrict collective bargaining for the state’s 12,000 unionized teachers to salaries and benefits only, removing from labor negotiations such issues as class size and teacher workloads.
The legislation, which supporters have said is necessary to help rein in education spending, also would eliminate teacher tenure, limit the duration of teachers’ labor contracts to one year and remove seniority as a factor in determining the order of any teacher layoffs.
Moreover, it would bar collective bargaining by a teachers’ union altogether unless the union local could prove that it represented more than 50 percent of the teachers in that school district.
Crafted by Idaho’s elected schools chief and backed by Republicans such as Governor Butch Otter and legislative leaders, the bill has sparked demonstrations by thousands across a state where public protests are relatively uncommon.
The outcry comes as efforts are under way by Republican leaders in Wisconsin and other states to curb unions representing teachers and other public employees.
The measure won approval last month in the Senate, also dominated by Republicans.
State Rep. Bob Nonini, chairman of the Idaho House’s education panel, on Tuesday said the measure had less to do with labor relations than giving local school boards greater authority to reward good teachers and fire poor ones.
“We cannot leave good teaching to chance,” he said.
Democratic lawmakers who opposed the measure sought to slow its passage by requiring the 25-page bill to be read aloud.
Boise Democrat Brian Cronin said the legislation was aimed at silencing teachers.
“Let’s stop pretending this has anything to do with the classroom or our children,” he said.
The measure is part of a broader push by Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Luna to overhaul the public education system for kindergarten through high school.
The overhaul would lay off more than 750 teachers, expand class sizes and require students to complete online courses to graduate.
Luna said the plan places students first and saves millions of dollars when the state is facing a shortfall in tax revenues to fuel its budget.
The Idaho Education Association, the union representing the state’s elementary and secondary school teachers, was behind a protest February 22, the first of several opposition rallies across the state.
Students in Idaho intend to stage another walkout on Wednesday, with protests planned from the small ranching community of Salmon to upscale resort towns such as Sun Valley.The New Year's Six bowls -- all of them, not just the two College Football Playoff semifinal games -- go much deeper than Nick Saban vs. Urban Meyer and Jameis Winston vs. Marcus Mariota.
There's Michigan State. And Boise State. TCU and Baylor. And Arizona, just to name a few.
In addition to the top four playoff teams, there are eight programs in the new system's most prestigious bowls -- teams that were just on the cusp of contention, and were selected and seeded by the 12 members of the CFP selection committee. While every coach participating in the New Year's Six bowls can tell you how his team achieved its record, those outside of the top four are a little less certain about the committee's path to the final playoff ranking.
"I'd love to sit in the room and hear what they had to say," said Boise State coach Bryan Harsin.
Take a number.
"If I'm a kid from TCU, I'm still trying to figure out how that worked."
The selection committee worked behind closed doors all season, leaving its weekly rankings and the comments from committee chair Jeff Long as the only insight into how the group collectively thought. For the majority of coaches in the New Year's Six bowls, the heart of their playoff evaluation mirrored that of many fans, centering around the unpredictable weekly rankings and whether or not four teams is enough. None of the coaches were spewing vitriol about the new system -- they're still just trying to understand it.
"There are some questions of how they arrive at their final destination," said Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio. "I think that's a pretty standard conversation going on across the nation, but that's controversy, that's college football, and that's going to happen with the two BCS teams as well. That's just the nature of it. There's going to be controversy."
None bigger than in the Big 12, where TCU was ranked ahead of Baylor all season in spite of the Bears' head-to-head win, only to fall from No. 3 to No. 6 behind Baylor in the final ranking.
"If I'm a kid from TCU," deadpanned Georgia Tech coach Paul Johnson, "I'm still trying to figure out how that worked."
"I'm not sure anybody could figure out what the criteria was," he said. "It makes no sense [to] me for Florida State to be undefeated and keep dropping in the rankings. I think everybody knew if they didn't lose, there was no way they could exclude them, so it was just kind of a shell game."
TCU coach Gary Patterson learned something about the College Football Playoff from the Seminoles' ranking, though.
"I learned you need to be undefeated," said Patterson, "then you can control your own destiny.... The only way [FSU coach Jimbo Fisher] controlled his own destiny was he was undefeated. If he's not, then I think either us or Baylor would've both jumped them."
In spite of being jilted out of the top four at the last minute, Patterson said he'd like to see the system play out for a couple of years before determining whether anything needs to be changed.
Boise State head coach Bryan Harsin hopes that a Group of 5 team would be able to crack the semifinals at some point. AP Photo/Cathleen Allison
"If there was a mistake they made, it was probably putting us at No. 3," he said. "A lot of people would've been OK if we were No. 4 and you got bumped to 5, and knowing the controversy with Baylor and them moving us to No. 6, and I think a lot of people would've understood that behind the scenes, but outside of that it's all the same."
Baylor coach Art Briles said the only change he might suggest would be waiting longer to release the rankings.
"I'm not sure I would go through eight weeks of rankings until we got to the last," Briles said. "Maybe come out two weeks prior to what your final ranking is and roll from there, because there's so much fluidity in the last two or three weeks before the final comes out. It's impossible to really chart that many teams and stay on top of it over a long period of time."
The coaches, though, are willing to be patient and let the system play out.
"It's a process," Harsin said. "I do like the way they did it this year. I like the way it worked out for us where all of a sudden we're in the mix and Game 8 and Game 9 we're getting talked about. All of a sudden it's like, 'OK, we maybe have a chance of playing in one of these games.' We've got to finish what we started, and that's fun. It's fun to chase that as a coach and a team. We didn't try to hide it."
For the Group of 5 conferences -- the American Athletic, Conference USA, Mid-American, Mountain West and Sun Belt -- this new system guarantees the highest-ranked league champ a spot in one of the New Year's Six bowls.
Boise State, though, is hoping the door to the top four is open as well.
"I don't know that, but I hope it's that way," Harsin said. "I'd like to believe that. I'd like to believe our body of work hopefully continues to be successful like it's been, and when it comes down to those decisions, that will hopefully help us in the future.
"At some point, people would like to see Boise State in the four and say, 'OK, here you've got your chance. See if you can get it done.' Probably half would want to see us fail and half would want to see us succeed. Let's pair Boise State against Alabama and see what happens. They'd expect Alabama to come in there and thump us or we find a way to win and we're playing in that championship game for it all. I'd like to believe we have the ability to do that, and I think this playoff is the only way we'd ever have a chance to do that, so I'm all in favor of it."
Johnson called the playoff "a step in the right direction," but said he'd like to see it expand to eight teams "at least." When asked if he thought the committee got it right this year, Johnson said, "Who knows?"
"I think it's OK now, but I think in the future there will be a trend to eight or six to make sure every conference is represented."
"Anytime there's subjectivity in it, it's always going to be hard," he said. "I wouldn't want to have their jobs, that's why I say eight teams would make it pretty easy. Five conference champions, the highest-ranked non-Power 5 team and maybe two at-large. Then maybe they can argue the at-large, but the others would pretty much be set in stone."
Arizona coach Rich Rodriguez agreed.
"It's tough when you have two or three other deserving teams that should maybe be in it," he said. "There was probably talk of going to an eight-team playoff. But I didn't think there was room before this year. I think it's OK now, but I think in the future there will be a trend to eight or six to make sure every conference is represented."
Dantonio said he wouldn't mind seeing the playoff expand to eight teams. After all, No. 8 is right where his Spartans landed.
"I think it sets things in motion to help determine a true champion," said Dantonio. "I think that's the positive thing. The negative thing is that it becomes a little bit like the Final Four atmosphere in that if you're not in it, you become a little bit of the forgotten. I don't think that's necessarily good for college football for all of the teams involved, but that would be the only negative."“Today, at the One World Observatory in New York City, Yuri Milner and I launched a mission to the stars. Mark Zuckerberg lent his support by joining the board of our new initiative, Breakthrough Starshot.
Within the next generation, Breakthrough Starshot aims to develop a ‘nanocraft’ – a gram-scale robotic space probe – and use a light beam to push it to 20 percent of the speed of light. If we are successful, a flyby mission could reach Alpha Centauri about 20 years after launch, and send back images of any planets discovered in the system.
Albert Einstein once imagined riding on a light beam, and his thought experiment led him to the theory of special relativity. A little over a century later, we have the chance to attain a significant fraction of that speed: 100 million miles an hour. Only by going that fast can we reach the stars on the time-scale of a human life.
It is exciting to be involved in such an ambitious project, pushing the boundaries of ingenuity and engineering” write Dr.Hawking on his facebookDoes it boost testosterone levels?
There are many claims that this oil can help balance hormones. In the context of testosterone, it is mentioned that it is only beneficial for men with low testosterone levels.
So where are the studies?
There are many reasons why studies haven’t been done on this oil. Plants that essential oils come from are living things in the public domain and therefore can’t be patented. Where there’s no patent, there’s often no profit and therefore no reason to conduct studies.
For example, supplements that have a patent may receive funding for research by the owners of the patent. These studies may actually be biased and done to mold a desired image of the product.
So in some cases research does not really provide 100% evidence a product works.
This is why even though there is no studies were done we have to take in consideration on its historical use. If a remedy has historical use of hundreds or even thousands of years with no studies it is still best to keep an open mind and conduct your own trial of the remedy.
How to use Sandalwood
There are many ways you can apply essential oils and each oil generally has its own preferred application. There are 3 types of ways to use Essential oils
inhalation
topical
ingestion
Most pure essential oils can be used all three ways — but be careful: Not all essential oils are pure.
Inhalation
Inhaling essential oils are also known as aromatherapy. Inhaling is probably the best way to use sandalwood oils. When you inhale an essential oil it stimulates more than 1000 receptors in the nasal cavity. When essential oils reach the lungs a large number of blood vessels in the lungs absorb the oils and then circulate them throughout the body. Using a diffuser can help you experience the benefits of essential oils.
Inhaling certain essential oils may:
help improve mood, emotions, and libido
support sleep quantity and quality
increase focus or alertness
reduce feelings of stress or occasional anxiety
Topically
Essential oils have a very small size and of the chemical weight of less than 1000m (m = weight of molecule). According to scientific testing, any substance with a molecular weight below 1000m should be absorbed by the skin.
This means that essential oils are able to penetrate the skin and pass into the bloodstream and into different areas of the body for internal therapeutic benefits.
Be Sure to use all natural carrier oils Coconut oil is the best, most widely available and generally most affordable natural oil to use as a carrier oil.
Ingestion
Essential oils can be used as a powerful form of medicine but it should be remembered that again, essential oils are powerful. Most essential oils are safe for internal use but a little bit goes a long way. Usually, 1-3 drops is plenty mixed with water.
Some oils need to be diluted and shouldn’t be taken internally for more than 1 week. So if you don’t have experience with essential oils I would stay clear of this method of application.
Conclusion
Would I use Sandalwood as a testosterone booster? Probably not. Due to there not being enough evidence on these claims It wouldn’t make sense to take this approach especially when there are many easier ways to boost testosterone levels. Although I would still give this oil a try for its Antispasmodic and Sedative effects which would make it a great aphrodisiac to experiment with. Due to Sandalwood being so rare and expensive it may be hard to find a reliable product. I have just ordered some Indian Mysore Sandalwood Essential Oil, 100% I will update this post with some feedback soon.HERE IS an obvious but startling fact: for roughly 20 of the last 30 years, Ireland has been ruled by men with, to put it mildly, a bad attitude to money.
Former taoisigh Charles Haughey and Bertie Ahern were raking in very large sums from private donors for their own use. Albert Reynolds did not do this. But he was told in 1992 that Pádraig Flynn had received £50,000 from Tom Gilmartin – and did nothing about it.
The following year, he wrote to Owen O’Callaghan, who was then lobbying his government in relation to a stadium development, seeking a very large donation for Fianna Fáil.
O’Callaghan, according to the Mahon report, felt he had “little choice but to comply”. O’Callaghan understood that “a failure on his part to so contribute would impact negatively” on his plans. The tribunal finds that Reynolds thus “actively engage(d) in... pressuring a businessman” for money – “an abuse of political power and government authority”.
So, for two-thirds of the last 30 years, we’ve been ruled by men who abused political power in order to raise money either for themselves or their party. When something is as common as this, it is not the exception – it is the norm. It is not the weather – it’s the climate. It is not a crime against our system – it is our system. Or, to put it another way, the freaks at the top of Irish politics since the 1980s are those who have not abused the authority of government for personal or party financial gain.
And this systematic abuse of power did not occur in a dictatorship. Between them, these men won six general elections. There has been, in other words, large-scale public consent to the abuse. People may claim that they were afraid to challenge the system, but Ireland is not Burma. No one was tortured or murdered for speaking out. With a secret ballot, it is very easy to put a silent mark on a piece of paper to register one’s disgust.
People may, say, too, that they were fooled. They were not. Haughey openly flaunted his vast wealth even though he’d been in full-time politics since 1957. Ahern won a general election even after he’d admitted that he was on the take.
To whinge now about having been misled and betrayed is to insult one’s own intelligence. If you were stupid enough not to see the venality that was written up in lights, you’re not fit to be an urban district councillor, much less, as with Micheál Martin, an aspirant to the office of taoiseach. But even beyond the inner circles of politics, it took wilful blindness not to have a decent sense of how the system worked.
It was public consent that made abuse of power the norm. When, in a free society, there is nothing deviant about roguery, it can only be because it accords with the values – or lack of values – of a large mass of people. This is what we have to confront. We can spit on Bertie Ahern till our mouths run dry, but he didn’t invent the amorality of our public culture. He was never a large enough figure to be able to shape the way Irish society thinks and feels. He was just an artful dodger, a skilled exploiter of the opportunities created by widespread tolerance for ingratiating chancers.
We can’t take refuge, either, in comforting explanations for this deep-rooted amorality. The pat answer would be to link it to the decline of religion and in particular of the authority of institutional Catholicism. But the facts don’t support this thesis: Haughey came to power in 1979, when church control was still in its prime. He, Reynolds and Ahern governed as conservative and devout Catholics.
So what does account for the amorality? Powerlessness, surely. Power corrupts, but so does a sense of powerlessness. Civic virtue comes from a belief in both rights and responsibilities, but too many Irish people don’t really believe they have either the rights or the duties of citizens. They don’t have the right to public services – so they wheedle with TDs to get them. Why, then, would they demand high standards of probity from those politicians? If they weren’t cunning enough to pull strings and extract favours, what use would they be?
What it all means is that there’s really no point in making one or two cosmetic reforms in response to Mahon. Systemic corruption demands systemic change. And the purpose of that change has to be the wholesale reinvention of Irish democracy. Irish people won’t stop wheedling and nodding and winking until they believe they really have the power to shape the public realm in which they live.
Powerlessness has made us a nation of chancers. It lets us off the hook – someone else is always in charge: the Brits, the church, Fianna Fáil, Frankfurt. The one chance we’ve never taken collectively is the risk of believing that we have full responsibility for ourselves and each other. Unless we demand the creation of a real republic – built the hard way, from the bottom up – we will breed many more Berties.Moravec's paradox is the discovery by artificial intelligence and robotics researchers that, contrary to traditional assumptions, high-level reasoning requires very little computation, but low-level sensorimotor skills require enormous computational resources. The principle was articulated by Hans Moravec, Rodney Brooks, Marvin Minsky and others in the 1980s. As Moravec writes, "it is comparatively easy to make computers exhibit adult level performance on intelligence tests or playing checkers, and difficult or impossible to give them the skills of a one-year-old when it comes to perception and mobility".
Similarly, Minsky emphasized that the most difficult human skills to reverse engineer are those that are unconscious. "In general, we're least aware of what our minds do best", he wrote, and added "we're more aware of simple processes that don't work well than of complex ones that work flawlessly".
The biological basis of human skills [ edit ]
One possible explanation of the paradox, offered by Moravec, is based on evolution. All human skills are implemented biologically, using machinery designed by the process of natural selection. In the course of their evolution, natural selection has tended to preserve design improvements and optimizations. The older a skill is, the more time natural selection has had to improve the design. Abstract thought developed only very recently, and consequently, we should not expect its implementation to be particularly efficient.
As Moravec writes:
Encoded in the large, highly evolved sensory and motor portions of the human brain is a billion years of experience about the nature of the world and how to survive in it. The deliberate process we call reasoning is, I believe, the thinnest veneer of human thought, effective only because it is supported by this much older and much more powerful, though usually unconscious, sensorimotor knowledge. We are all prodigious olympians in perceptual and motor areas, so good that we make the difficult look easy. Abstract thought, though, is a new trick, perhaps less than 100 thousand years old. We have not yet mastered it. It is not all that intrinsically difficult; it just seems so when we do it.
A compact way to express this argument would be:
We should expect the difficulty of reverse-engineering any human skill to be roughly proportional to the amount of time that skill has been evolving in animals.
The oldest human skills are largely unconscious and so appear to us to be effortless.
Therefore, we should expect skills that appear effortless to be difficult to reverse-engineer, but skills that require effort may not necessarily be difficult to engineer at all.
Some examples of skills that have been evolving for millions of years: recognizing a face, moving |
Park in California. Marc Davis, an animator who created Cruella De Vil from "101 Dalmations" and Cinderella, designed the characters.
Disney died in 1966 and the resort was shelved, but the jamboree joined the lineup at Walt Disney World here. The banjo-playing bears with James Carville accents were such a smash that Disney installed them in its California park a year later.
But by the late 1980s, the bears, expensive to maintain, looked as if they had played one music hall too many. And the crowds had thinned, drawn instead to new shows like "Captain EO," a 3-D short film starring Michael Jackson and his sidekick, Fuzzball. Country Bear Jamboree closed in California in 2001. A movie based on the characters, "The Country Bears," flopped in 2002. The Orlando show powered on, but did not pull its weight; at the peak of the summer season, you could often walk right in.
It was starting to become a museum exhibit, a dreaded situation for Disney.
Vaughn said his team considered a series of questions. How could they make the show relevant to modern kids? How could new technology be introduced to make it better? Are there ways to integrate new Disney or Pixar characters into the show?
But Disney has learned the hard way that change can enrage fans. When the company tried in 1998 to update the Enchanted Tiki Room, a 1960s-era revue starring singing flowers and robot birds, fans greeted the changes with venom. The Enchanted Tiki Room: Under New Management — featuring Iago from "Aladdin," voiced by Gilbert Gottfried — was abandoned last year, and Disney reinstalled the original. ("Occasionally, you're going to get a miss," Vaughn said.)
Disney has successfully updated some attractions, like Pirates of the Caribbean, the Spanish Main ride that spawned the movie series, but when fans caught wind that changes were afoot at Country Bear Jamboree, the blogosphere lit up. "Keep those bears the same, dag nabbit!" one fan wrote on the site WDWRadio.com.
Last week, the company unveiled the new show. Exhale: Disney has a sense of humor, too. "Buford" remains, as do Trixie and Liver Lips McGrowl, who sings "My Woman Ain't Pretty (But She Don't Swear None.)" The Sun Bonnet triplets — Bunny, Bubbles and Beulah — still perform "All the Guys That Turn Me On Turn Me Down."
No new characters were added, not the giant demon bear from "Brave" or Justin Beaver or reality TV's Honey Boo Boo, as some fans worried.
Vaughn's main change was length. The revue is now 11 minutes instead of 16, accomplished by removing two numbers — "Fractured Folk Song" and "Pretty Little Devilish Mary" — and some banter from the peanut gallery: mounted animatronic buffalo, moose and deer heads that serve as this show's version of Statler and Waldorf. (Gone are their fat jokes, for instance: "That's a mighty big song, Trixie!" Response: "That sure ain't all that's big.")
The faster pace, Vaughn said, reflects the speedier way that people speak today and the rise of interactive media. It's not necessarily that attention spans are shorter, he said, it's that kids raised on video games are not as accustomed to more passive entertainment experiences.
There are new costumes, props, lighting, stage curtains and sound systems; modernized backstage controls give Disney the ability to add seasonal changes easily. Fresh animatronics give the bears "an increased sense of aliveness," Vaughn said.
How is it going over?
For some fans, the changes may take some getting used to. Tom Bricker, writing on Twitter, complained, "the wittiest attraction at Walt Disney World dumbed down." Pixiedustmaker, a commenter on WDWmagic.com, where the Country Bears discussion ran to 34 pages on Friday, declared it "garbage."
But Disney also got applause for keeping some of the cheekier numbers and many comments were quite positive.
Touring Plans, a company that publishes unofficial guides to Walt Disney World, live tweeted from the first performance of the new show. While it "feels very abrupt," Touring Plans also said in one Twitter post that it liked the "really great new sparkly hat and parasol" on Teddi Barra, who performs on a swing.
"It did not feel butchered at all," Aladdin2007 wrote on WDWmagic.com, while a visitor to that site commented: "I can't say I'm angry about it. It's nice to see the bears looking in such good condition."
The visitor wasn't so sure about some of the new coifs, though. "Liver Lips' hair does look weird," he wrote.Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has pledged to win his country's long-running civil war while acknowledging his troops are struggling to maintain control over territory amid lack of manpower.
In a televised speech on Sunday before local dignitaries in Damascus, Assad tried to justify why the Syrian army has given up some areas of Syria, including the northwestern city of Idlib.
He said it was due to military priorities.
"It was necessary to specify critical areas for our armed forces to hang on to. Concern for our soldiers forces us to let go of some areas," he said.
"Every inch of Syria is precious."
Syria's army once had around 300,000 members, but it has been significantly reduced in size by deaths, defections, and a rise in draft dodging.
"There is a lack of human resources... Everything is available [for the army], but there is a shortfall in human capacity," Assad said.
"But that doesn't mean we can talk about collapse... We will resist... The armed forces are capable of defending the motherland."
The Syrian army has faced a series of battlefield setbacks since March: It lost most of Idlib to an opposition alliance including the Syrian al-Qaeda branch, the Nusra Front, and important areas of the southern border region to mainstream groups of the self-styled Southern Front.
The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group also seized the central city of Palmyra from the Syrian military in May.
'State of despair'
In the speech, Assad also said he supported any political dialogue to end his country's conflict, even if its effects are limited.
But he said any initiative that is not based on fighting "terrorism" will be "hollow" and "meaningless".
He said increased support from states backing opposition fighters, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, was the reason for recent setbacks that had created "a state of despair" among Syrians.
Syria is in a war funded by the richest and most powerful states, Assad said.
Nevertheless, he struck a defiant tone, saying there would be no compromise solutions, and he dismissed the view that Syria was heading towards partition into areas run separately by his government and the armed groups fighting him.
Feature: Syria's war victims find healing in Jordan
The government's military setbacks have led to renewed pledges of support from Assad's main regional allies, the Shia government of Iran and the Lebanese group Hezbollah, which is fighting alongside the Syrian army.
Assad said Iran's role was limited to the provision of military experts, while publicly crediting Hezbollah for its "important" and "effective" role for the first time.
Military reversals for Assad have reduced his control beyond the main population centres of western Syria that comprise the cities of Damascus, Homs, Hama, and the coastal region forming the heartland of his Alawite sect.Advertisement
A Syrian migrant was smuggled into Britain on a Ryanair flight using a bogus passport supplied by a group of political extremists, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
In an astonishing security lapse, Bashar Habib, 18, walked unchallenged through a series of checks at Athens airport before claiming asylum on arrival at Stansted.
He said he had been given the passport less than 24 hours earlier by No Borders, whose members include British anarchists accused of stirring trouble among migrants in refugee camps across Europe.
Breach: In an astonishing security lapse, Bashar Habib, 18, walked unchallenged through a series of checks at Athens airport before claiming asylum on arrival at Stansted
Bashar said he bought a one-way ticket in cash from the Ryanair desk at the Greek airport and was carrying only hand luggage – but this did not arouse suspicion.
‘I’m a genuine person and want to be a doctor to help people in Syria – but I could have been a jihadi or a criminal,’ Bashar told The Mail on Sunday. ‘It’s just luck that I had good intentions.’
He boarded the plane at Athens International Airport unchallenged, despite differing markedly in appearance from the owner of the passport, Austrian Marius Brem, who has longer hair, different coloured eyes and is seven years older.
On board Flight FR1016 he celebrated by taking selfies and was on UK soil less than four hours later.
Home Office documents seen by this newspaper show that he was questioned on arrival and his nationality established by his Syrian identity card.
Police checks yielded ‘no issues’. By 8.27pm he was free to go and was taken to a hostel in South London by pre-paid taxi.
Bashar’s case has astounded politicians and security experts.
Chris Phillips, former head of the National Counter Terrorism Security Office, said: ‘He could have been anyone. It raises the question: how many more people are coming in by this route?’
Conservative MP Charlie Elphicke described the case as ‘extremely concerning’ and said the Home Office should now consider ‘proscribing No Borders because it is undermining national security’.
Our revelations come as Theresa May is due to visit to the United Nations this week, where she will lead calls for tighter airport security around the world amid concerns that terrorists linked to Islamic State are exploiting lax procedures.
A Home Affairs Select Committee has also called for security to be stepped up at smaller ports amid fears that they are being used by criminal gangs to bring in migrants.
Rob Whiteman, the former head of the UK Border Agency, estimated last month that up to one million illegal immigrants may be living in Britain, while figures published last week also show rising numbers of Britons are smuggling migrants into Europe. Europol said 136 UK suspects had been identified in 2016 so far, up 32 per cent on the 103 reported in the whole of 2015.
Helping hand: He said he had been given the passport less than 24 hours earlier by No Borders, whose members include British anarchists
Bashar said he bought a one-way ticket (pictured) in cash from the Ryanair desk at the Greek airport and was carrying only hand luggage – but this did not arouse suspicion
Bashar, who is now living in a hostel in the north of England, flew to Britain on August 8 – the day after he was introduced to No Borders, an anti-capitalist, pro-free movement network, by a Syrian interpreter at a refugee camp near the Greek port city of Thessaloniki.
Bashar had been there for more than three months, having fled his home in Deir Ezzor, eastern Syria, which has been under attack from Islamic State for two years.
The home he shared with his four brothers was destroyed and Bashar claims he was forced to witness the beheading of his best friend. ‘They executed him because he was smoking,’ he said.
How many more people are getting in this way?
He said he and his brothers bribed a military helicopter pilot to fly them out, before embarking on a perilous journey to Greece via Turkey. They were placed in a camp near Idomeni, close to the Macedonian border, for three months before being moved to Thessaloniki.
After listening to Bashar’s harrowing story, a female activist burst into tears and, he said, ‘the group then took pity on me’.
Later that day he was invited to a meeting at the No Borders HQ in Thessaloniki by the interpreter who told him the group wanted to help.
Bashar said: ‘He said, “You don’t need to know my name, just call me a friend.” Then he said, “Don’t tell anyone about this, it is a secret”.’
He boarded the plane at Athens International Airport unchallenged, despite differing markedly in appearance from the owner of the passport (stock image)
Bashar said the No Borders interpreter handed him the passport belonging to Brem, a 24-year-old Austrian, who graduated from the University of the West of England in Bristol in 2014, enough money to cover the bus fare to Athens and the one-way plane ticket to London.
‘He told me that I was Marius now and to memorise the details because on the journey people might ask me them and I needed to know them without checking the passport so as not to look suspicious,’ he said.
Bashar said the interpreter, who was in his 20s, did not say how he acquired the passport. There is nothing to suggest Brem – who was not among the No Borders group at the camp – knew it was being used.
They gave me passport - and cash for tickets
Brem, the son of a wealthy former record company executive, is himself linked to far-Left groups. While a university, where he studied drawing and applied arts, he was involved with Counterfire, a splinter group from the Socialist Workers’ Party.
And last year he was one of a number of activists who staged an environmental protest in Bristol, chaining themselves to trees to stop them being felled for a bus route.
Since graduating in 2014, Brem has spent time working for a charity at a refugee camp in Serbia, and one former university friend said yesterday that the last she heard ‘he was living in Greece’. Bashar insists he has never met Brem, who could not be contacted last week.
Recalling his flight to the UK, the asylum-seeker recalls waking up on August 7 and smoking cigarettes with his brother when ‘these people came to the camp who wanted to help them’.
Bashar said the No Borders interpreter handed him the passport belonging to Marius Brem (right), a 24-year-old Austrian who graduated from UWE in 2014
They identified themselves as No Borders activists and asked Bashar about conditions in the camp and his experiences in his homeland. ‘An Italian woman in her 20s was crying from the heart,’ he said. Afterwards the Syrian interpreter asked which country he wanted to go to and he replied: ‘England.’
Later, after visiting the man at the No Borders HQ, he was told: ‘I already have the passport you need but travelling to England is not easy. Maybe they will catch you and take the passport so you need to think carefully about how you will act.’
The man insisted that the passport was valid.
Scruffily dressed and carrying a small holdall containing a few clothes, Bashar felt conspicuous among the hordes of tourists at Athens airport.
He maintains that he passed through five points where his passport was checked, and he was allowed to walk on unchallenged, and it was only when he failed the digital security checks on arrival Stansted that he was finally rumbled.
I was given tips to stop me getting caught
First though, he had to navigate the Ryanair ticket desk.
‘There was a lady there,’ he said. ‘I told her I wanted a ticket to England, London. She replied, “London Stansted” and I said, “Yes”, though I hadn’t heard of Stansted. It was going to cost €224 and I had €244 so I was full of happiness.’
‘She took my passport and asked me if Marius was my name. I said, “Of course that is my name” The passport picture is similar to me in some ways but he had long hair and I have short hair. The man’s eyes were blue and mine are brown.’
At the check-in desk, his passport photo was ‘looked at five times in 20 seconds’ but he was eventually waved on. There were three more checks before he boarded the flight, he said, but nobody stopped him. He added: ‘It was wonderful. Maybe it was help from God to give me the power to calm down. I am a good man and I told myself I deserve this. When I got on the plane I felt happiness but only in silence.’
At Stansted, he was asked at the electronic passport gates to look into a camera to match his image against his passport. It failed three times, the Home Office documents say.
Bashar said that a woman in a Border Force uniform then carried out a manual check, then turned to her colleagues and said calmly: ‘We have a little problem.’
Bashar insists he has never met Brem (pictured), who could not be contacted last week
He was asked for his wallet where officers found his Syrian identity card. Bashar recalls one said: ‘Oh you are Syrian? First question, why did you come here?’. Bashar hesitated and the man then asked if was seeking asylum to which Bashar said ‘Yes’.
‘I was scared but he was very kind. When he found out I was a Syrian I think he wanted to help me because I came from a war. He asked me to go with him and answer a few questions but he asked if I was hungry, tired or felt cold. In Greece I have seen some bad people but since I have been in the UK nobody has been bad. They respect you.’
What surprised Bashar next was that officials did not want to know how he made it to the UK. Instead they asked about the situation in Syria. ‘He was shocked,’ Bashar said of one of the officers. ‘I think he wanted to know that I deserved to be a refugee. They were very kind with me. I was feeling happy because I could not believe I had reached the UK. It was like Heaven.’
He said a taxi ferried him late that night to a hostel where he stayed for three days. When he rang his mother she ‘was crying with happiness’.
Bashar now lives on £5 a day which he uses to buy cheap food and spends his days watching films on a small TV. The Fast And Furious US action movies are his favourites.
‘Life is peaceful, like I cannot describe,’ he beamed.
Recalling the war in his homeland, he said: ‘If you stay in Deir Ezzor you die because there is no food, no bread, no internet or electricity. But every second of my time here I have been met by kind people who just want to help.’
Aviation expert Julian Bray said: ‘Worryingly, coming in on a scheduled flight is now becoming a mainstream opportunity for unauthorised people to get into Britain.
‘He could have been anybody getting on that plane. There’s absolutely no excuse for it and the Greek authorities must raise their game...the airline must also increase its security. The only good news is that he was picked up this end.’
Ryanair declined to comment and Athens International Airport did not respond to questions.A young girl is taking a stand against PETA's most recent anti-wool campaign by posting a photo of herself in a shearing shed.
She shared the photo on Facebook next to the the animal rights group's disturbing image of a naked model and bloodied sheep.
Danni Johnson, 29, grew up on a 45,000 acre property in Nyngan, near Dubbo in central west NSW.
Her father is a shearer and her brother and sister are farmers.
She told Daily Mail Australia she has worked in ‘thousands’ of sheds and never seen the abuse outlined in PETA’s campaign.
Danni Johnson, 29 from Nyngan, NSW is taking a stand against PETA's recent anti-wool campaign by sharing a photo of a real shearing shed on social media
She says she wants people in the city to realise how sheep are really treated, and invites those concerned to the country to watch shearers at work
‘In my honest opinion I think PETA has paid someone to create these images of shearers abusing sheep.
‘I am 29 years old, have grown up in the industry and have never ever seen someone do that.’
The campaign video shows men throwing sheep against timber floors, and bashing them with their tools and fists.
‘I just don’t believe it would happen, in country towns people talk and if shearers did that they wouldn’t be able to get any work,’ she said.
‘Obviously sheep make movement when they’re being shawn but shearers rarely cut them, I have cut my legs worse shaving then I have cut a sheep shearing.’
The young woman's post went viral in a matter of days, she says she has cut herself shaving worse than she has cut a sheep shearing
The young woman says the wool industry runs in her veins, and she has never seen animals harmed in the way PETA's campaign shows
PETA spokeswoman, Claire Fryer, says the video was taken as part of an investigation into the wool industry and says it includes 'footage of 235 incidents recorded in Victoria alone and more than 40 pages of formal legal complaints – which investigators documented at shearing sheds visited at random.'
' The industry will say whatever they can to draw attention away from the punching, kicking, cutting and other abuses endured by sheep used for wool,' Ms Fryer said.
'We are confident that, after watching the undercover footage, consumers will make the right decision.'
But Ms Johnson says shearers don’t harm the sheep because it isn’t profitable for them to do so.
‘If they hurt the sheep they’re responsible for stitching them back up, which takes time.
The young woman (pictured left) says she has helped work sheep since she was a child
She says she still goes home during peak shearing times to help her family on the property
‘They get paid per sheep so they can’t afford to spend that extra time fixing up a badly shawn sheep.’
But Peta says the way shearers are paid doesn't protect the animals.
'Shearers are paid by yield instead of by the hour, encouraging careless work and leaving little consideration for the animal’s welfare,' Ms Fryer said.
Ms Johnson was shocked by how many people her Facebook Post actually reached.
‘I had it on private at first, but then I realised how many of my friends had shared it, I changed it to public and within a few hours it had been shared more than 500 times.’
So far it has had more than 2000 shares and 7000 likes.
‘I just want city people to realise this is not a reflection of shearing sheds in Australia.
‘People who are worried about this kind of thing should come and visit a country town, ask at a pub for a shearer, and to see a shed.
‘Country people are kind and compassionate and care about their animals, the whole point to farming is reproducing so when this video says shearing kills it doesn’t even make sense to me because that defeats the whole purpose of farming.’
The naked truth campaign 'hit close to home' for Ms Johnson who grew up in shearing sheds alongside her father - a veteran shearer of 37 years
A model in PETA's last campaign poster posted this image of a shearer stitching a poorly shawn sheep
A previous anti-wool campaign by PETA showed a similar sheep
The fake sheep being made-up for the campaign shoot and video
She took the anti-sheep campaign personally.
‘This campaign was a little bit close to home,’ she said.
‘It is my life, and it effects everyone in my life.’
‘My grandfather, was a farmer and shearer – I have childhood memories of working in the sheds, at shearing time we would take a week off school for mustering and helping in the yards.’
Ms Johnson's father, who has been shearing for 37 years, since leaving school taught her how to shear.
‘There is a photo of me when I was eight-years-old with my dad in the shed, he was holding a hand piece and showing me how it worked.
‘I wanted to be a shearer just like him.’
The young woman says shearing sheep protects them from harm.
'It is animal abuse not to shear a sheep, it causes health problems,' she said.
But PETA put that down to genetic modification.
'In their natural climate, sheep who have not been bred specifically for an overburden of wool will only produce enough to protect themselves from the elements. If sheep, who are not native to Australia, were not being bred and exploited for their wool, there would be no need to shear them.'Campus censorship has become so common that a radical preacher being prevented from speaking at a university’s Islamic Society barely registers a raised eyebrow. Yet when Haitham al-Haddad was prevented from talking about sharia law as part of the University of Kent’s ‘Discover Islam Week’ last year, it became newsworthy. Because unusually, it wasn’t students protesting against al-Haddad’s alleged homophobic and anti-Semitic views. NUS officials did not issue edicts demanding his invitation be rescinded. No, it was university managers who intervened to stop the talk from going ahead. In the post-mortem that followed, the student union was chastised for failing to act upon its No Platform policy.
This example sheds light on the way that campus censorship works today. It makes clear the convenient correlation between Prevent, the government-backed campaign against extremism, and No Platforming. Universities have a legal duty under the 2015 Counter-terrorism and Security Act to demonstrate that they are actively countering radicalisation and religious extremism and are preventing terrorism. This involves vetting external speakers and barring those likely to incite hatred on the grounds of race or religion or supporting a proscribed terrorist group. The NUS has waged a high-profile campaign against Prevent. However, universities are often spared from having to act on this censorious and illiberal legislation because students’ unions beat them to it. What’s more, student No Platform goes further than Prevent and requires no justification other than someone, somewhere, possibly being offended by the suggested speaker. This cosy relationship has worked well for universities. Student officials have taken (well-deserved) flak for being ban-happy authoritarians. University managers, meanwhile, have been able to avoid getting their hands dirty. With a few honourable exceptions, such as Louise Richardson, vice chancellor of the University of Oxford, they have had little to say when students No Platform speakers or ban newspapers. Only now, as spiked’ss latest Free Speech University Rankings show, universities are catching up with students’ unions and being far more upfront about restricting free speech on campus. Increasingly explicit institutional restrictions on what can and can’t be said are not a result of student officials losing their censorious impulse. Nor are they a result of a breakdown in the relationship between students’ unions and university managers. In fact, the opposite is the case, and the connections between the two are more intertwined than ever.
Throughout its almost 100-year history, the NUS has only rarely been a thorn in the side of universities. It has always aimed at cultivating future leadership, as attested to by the long list of former NUS presidents who have carried their anti-democratic impulses with them into parliament or journalism. Likewise, the NUS has always had an interest in commercial activity, generating revenue from selling travel, insurance or beer. What’s changed over the decades is that the NUS has dropped its independence from universities and become increasingly incorporated within institutional management structures. The intimacy between universities and students’ unions has been driven by a number of factors. The 1994 Education Act clarified that students’ unions were charities and, as such, had to comply with charity law. Having dropped the ‘no politics’ clause from its constitution only 25 years earlier, the NUS had to stop putting resources into general political campaigning and focus solely upon issues that affect ‘students as students’. Since then, students’ unions have become more focused on ‘core activities’ concerned with ‘advancing the education of students.’
These changes in the aims of the NUS have occurred in parallel with universities being keener than ever to demonstrate that they elicit and respond to the ‘student voice’. Students’ unions play a key role in capturing the student voice and feeding this back to academics to ensure customer satisfaction. When the NUS campaigns around issues such as student feedback, their demands are treated with the utmost seriousness. Such campaigns can be used by university managers as a weapon against academics – demands from students carry more weight than institutional edicts. This reverence given to the student voice has been exacerbated by a question recently added to the National Student Survey, completed annually by final-year students, asking them about the performance of their students’ union. The use of the NSS results to compile league tables makes it vital that students rank their unions highly. Universities have a vested interest in making this happen. All these changes have occurred in conjunction with students’ unions suffering massive decreases in the commercial revenue they generate: all those cheap pints sold in plastic beakers made for a consistently large income stream. This lost revenue has made unions more reliant upon an institutional ‘block grant’, funding received directly from the university and often based upon student numbers and planned projects. This money is not free: institutions clearly expect something back in return and have clear expectations about how the money will be spent.It’s the story that seemingly won’t go away. The Alouettes lost by 20 points last week, yet all anyone can talk about is Boris Bede — the kicker.
The beleaguered Bede remains the Als’ kicker for now, but the team brought three more players — including Anthony Alix — in for auditions Sunday afternoon, after practice concluded at Stade Hébert. It started raining heavily, so the tryouts were abbreviated. The players are expected to return Monday morning, with the potential of more reinforcements, according to general manager and head coach Jim Popp.
Popp wouldn’t commit to whom will handle the kicking chores Thursday night, at Edmonton. It could still be Bede, it could be a newcomer, or it could be a combination of Bede and a new player.
“Boris has done plenty of good things in practice. It’s not his physical skills. Right now he’s fighting it. We’ve gone game to game here,” Popp said. “Odds are we’ll make some kind of a change.
“We’ll try something different at this stage with him and try to help him overcome his problems.”
The Als worked out three kickers — Hugh O’Neill, Brett Lauther and Drew Basil — more than a week ago. Popp wants to compare them with the new crew to see if more practical alternatives exist. Alix, a 29-year-old from Mont Tremblant, has Canadian Football League experience with Toronto and Ottawa.
Bede’s problems have been well documented. He has made seven of 16 field goals after connecting at a 90 per cent success rate last season, as a rookie. He made one of two against British Columbia last Thursday, but missed his first attempt, from 38 yards, on the Als’ opening possession when they were already trailing, 3-0.
He also punted four times, for a 33.5-yard average. He fumbled one snap, but still kicked the ball 48 yards. He shanked another that went 12 yards, resulting in an illegal punt penalty — his third this season.
To say that Bede single-handedly has been responsible for any of Montreal’s four defeats would be unfair and inaccurate. But neither is he helping an offence that’s struggling and could use every point. This is a team that deliberately has decided against attempting long field goals of late.
“I take pride in helping out my team. I’m pretty upset with myself because I’m not able to put up those points,” Bede said. “Even though we didn’t lose by two or three points, I still consider myself a momentum creator. You put up these points and you help the momentum of the team and you help the spirit.
“I’m here to back up the offence when we don’t get in the end zone. I’m here to help the defence and give them the best field position.”
Bede even brushed off apparent in-game criticism he received, twice, from an animated Duron Carter. According to Bede, Carter was encouraging him to perform better.
“I have a hell of a leg. I figure I’m going to work through this. It’s nothing too bad. I don’t think it is,” Bede said. “Hopefully, the organization will still be patient — which I think they’re doing a great job right now with me.
“I can tell you I’m feeling really lucky right now. At one point you have to give something (back) for them to take that risk.”
Bede said he has contemplated visiting with a sports psychologist, but for now, stated he’ll try to overcome the situation by himself. Popp said a number of sports psychologists are made available to every player through the team’s medical staff.
Kavis Reed isn’t a sports psychologist, but has attempted every motivational tool to assist Bede. That has included massaging his ego, but Reed also has demonstrated some tough love and has gotten in the kicker’s face, giving him an earful of criticism.
Reed, the Als’ special teams coordinator, wants to make it clear the organization hasn’t given up on Bede and will continue working with him. But Reed, and everyone else associated with the team, is judged by wins and losses.
“To start a game with points is critically important in the CFL. To not have those points, it does a lot for the team’s energy — right, wrong or indifferent. It has an effect on the team,” Reed said. “We try not to put that burden on Boris, but that’s the reality. He knows that. He’s not trying to miss, but it still affects the team.
“Every point matters and counts. He has to understand we’re trying to win football games. He’s a significant part of this. I’m a significant part of helping him do better. I really feel like he’s trying to do too much, based on the success he had last year. The bar was set so high for him. He’s starting to feel like he has to be Superman.”
Reed said he believes Bede’s operating with the weight of the world on his shoulders. Reed’s worried what the long-term effects might be.
“I’m starting to be very concerned about his mental and emotional health. I want to make certain he’s okay understanding a lot of great kickers have gone through slumps. Unfortunately for him, this isn’t an opportune time,” Reed said.
Notes — The Als are considering replacing left-guard Philip Blake with Jake Piotrowski. Montreal allowed six sacks last week. … QB Thomas DeMarco, released by the Eskimos one month ago, worked out with the Als on Sunday. He also has CFL experience with B.C. and Ottawa.
hzurkowsky@postmedia.com
twitter.com/HerbZurkowsky1Ron Adler started storing bicycles and motorcycles at his two-acre compound in Rye, Arizona 25 years ago. In that time he amassed approximately 9,000 motorcycles, bicycles, cars, and other things with wheels. On Saturday night, they were all destroyed in a massive blaze.
The fire started in the back corner of Adler's storage area for the bikes, which is called, conveniently, All Bikes. The fire grew and consumed the entire area, destroying 25 years of Adler's collection.
The fire was incredibly hard to fight. Rye has no fire department and there were no hydrants near the scene of the blaze. Arizona's fire fighting force is also spread thin at the moment battling some simply outrageous wildfires that claimed the lives of 19 firefighters this weekend.
19 Firefighters Killed While Battling Huge Wildfire in Arizona Nineteen firefighters battling a massive wildfire in Yarnell, Arizona have died. The Yarnell Hill… Read more Read
In the end, the fire took out all of Adler's motorcycles and displaced about 20 to 30 more people nearby. It's another hardship for Arizona right now, and at a time when the state really doesn't need it.
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(Hat Tip to $kaycog)University of Arizona scientists have discovered an unknown mechanism that establishes polarity in developing nerve cells: the length of a signaling molecule.
Understanding how nerve cells make connections is an important step in developing cures for nerve damage resulting from spinal cord injuries or neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s.
They found that embryonic nerve cells manufacture a signaling enzyme called Atypical Protein Kinase C (aPKC) in two varieties: a full-length one and a shorter one.
Both varieties compete to bind the same molecular partner, a protein called Par3. If the short form of aPKC pairs up with Par3, it tells the cell to grow a dendrite, and if the long one pairs up with Par3, it will make an axon instead.
When the researchers blocked the production of the short form, the nerve cell grew multiple axons and no dendrites. When they created an artificial abundance of the short form, dendrites formed at the expense of axons.Hungry, hungry humans Farm life without modern tech looks beautiful and backbreaking
As I was writing up my interview with Ethiopian farmers Birtukan Dagnachew Tegegn and Dadi Buta Bedada, I found myself surfing Google Earth, looking for images that would give me a sense of what life was like in their part of the world. I was happy to find this video, from the Perennial Plate, which is full of those images.
A couple things strike me about this. First, it’s beautiful: the landscape, the golden straw from the teff, the craftmanship apparent in the house with its built-in stove. Second, the work! Plowing with oxen, and separating those tiny grains from the chaff. Imagine what your calluses would be like after stripping seed heads by hand for a few days. I can understand why farmers would seek labor-saving technologies.(CBS) — Imagine this: A kidnapper takes an Oak Lawn couple’s newborn son in 1964.
Two years later, a boy matching his description is found and returned to the couple.
Now, it turns out, the boy they raised isn’t really their son. KLAS-TV in Las Vegas first reported the story; CBS 2’s Dana Kozlov picks it up from there.
“I also want to find out who I am and why I was abandoned,” Paul Fronczak says, reading from a letter.
It’s an emotional message he wrote to his parents — Chester and Dora Fronczak of Oak Lawn — after finding out they weren’t his biological parents after all.
The Fronczak saga began in April 1964 at the now-demolished Michael Reese Hospital. That’s where Dora gave birth to her son, Paul. Sixteen hours later, while she was feeding her son, a woman appearing to be a nurse told her the baby was needed for tests.
Dora handed her newborn over. Hours later, she learned her baby had been kidnapped.
A massive FBI hunt ensued. It went nowhere until two years later, when someone found a toddler –- |
All sensitive data is encrypted and decrypted locally before syncing with LastPass. Your key never leaves your device, and is never shared with LastPass. Your data stays accessible only to you.
While it would be pretty hard to prove that claim, it is interesting to take a look at how they implement their zero-knowledge encryption. The LastPass browser extensions are a mess of minified JavaScript, but they’ve been kind enough to publish an open-source command line client, that’s quite readable C code. I was interested to see what we could learn from the CLI, and while it won’t prove that they can’t read your passwords, it will help to understand their design.
All of my observations are from their git repo as of commit d96053af621f5e4b784aab3194530216b8d2ef9d. I’ll try to include code snippets as well to provide context in addition to line number references.
Deriving Your Encryption Key
Let’s start by looking at how your encryption key is determined. Looking at kdf.c, we see the following function:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 void kdf_decryption_key(const char *username, const char *password, int iterations, unsigned char hash[KDF_HASH_LEN]) { _cleanup_free_ char *user_lower = xstrlower(username); if (iterations < 1) iterations = 1; if (iterations == 1) sha256_hash(user_lower, strlen(user_lower), password, strlen(password), hash); else pdkdf2_hash(user_lower, strlen(user_lower), password, strlen(password), iterations, hash); mlock(hash, KDF_HASH_LEN); }
A couple of things worth noting: pdkdf2_hash is a function that uses different underlying functions on different platforms (OS X vs Linux), but just performs a basic PBKDF2 operation. It takes, in this order: salt, salt length, password, password length, number of iterations, and output buffer. It uses HMAC-SHA256 as the underlying crypto primitive. (And the misspelling of pbkdf2 as pdkdf2 is theirs, not mine.)
Also worth noting is the special case when iterations equals 1. Entirely as speculation on my part, but I suspect this indicates that they formerly did a plain SHA-256 (well, SHA-256 of the username and password concatenated) for the encryption key. This is genuinely speculative, but why else special case 1 iteration? 1 iteration of PBKDF2 is valid, though incredibly weak, so there would be no need for the 1 round case.
Other than the special case, this looks to me like a perfectly normal PBKDF2 implementation to get a strong encryption key from the password.
Deriving Your Login Hash
So, if the encryption key is generated that way, how do they authenticate users? Obviously, using the same hash would be problematic, as LastPass will then get the encryption key. Obviously, passing anything with fewer rounds would just allow someone to apply the extra rounds and derive the encryption key, so we need something else. Let’s take a look (conveniently also in kdf.c ):
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 void kdf_login_key(const char *username, const char *password, int iterations, char hex[KDF_HEX_LEN]) { unsigned char hash[KDF_HASH_LEN]; size_t password_len; _cleanup_free_ char *user_lower = xstrlower(username); password_len = strlen(password); if (iterations < 1) iterations = 1; if (iterations == 1) { sha256_hash(user_lower, strlen(user_lower), password, password_len, hash); bytes_to_hex(hash, &hex, KDF_HASH_LEN); sha256_hash(hex, KDF_HEX_LEN - 1, password, password_len, hash); } else { pdkdf2_hash(user_lower, strlen(user_lower), password, password_len, iterations, hash); pdkdf2_hash(password, password_len, (char *)hash, KDF_HASH_LEN, 1, hash); } bytes_to_hex(hash, &hex, KDF_HASH_LEN); mlock(hex, KDF_HEX_LEN); }
A little bit longer than the encryption key, but pretty straightforward nonetheless. Assuming you have more than one iteration (as any new user would), you get the same hash as generated for the encryption key, and then use the password as a salt and do 1 PBKDF2 round on the encryption key result. This is essentially equivalent to an HMAC-SHA256 of the encryption key with the password as the HMAC key, which means converting the login hash to the encryption key is as difficult as finding a 1st preimage on SHA256. Seems unlikely.
It’s obvious to see that there’s still special-casing for one iteration. In that case, you get (essentially) sha256(sha256(username + password) + password). It’s still computationally infeasible to invert, but an attacker with the hash & associated username can trivially apply a dictionary attack to discover the original password (and hence, the encryption key). It’s a good thing they’ve moved on to PBKDF2. :)
How do they encrypt?
So, how do they handle encryption and decryption? Well, it turns out that’s interesting too. Looking at ciper.c, there’s a lot of code for RSA crypto, but that’s only used if you’re sharing passwords with another user. What does get interesting is when you look at their decryption method:
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 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 char *cipher_aes_decrypt(const unsigned char *ciphertext, size_t len, const unsigned char key[KDF_HASH_LEN]) { EVP_CIPHER_CTX ctx; char *plaintext; int out_len; if (!len) return NULL; EVP_CIPHER_CTX_init(&ctx); plaintext = xcalloc(len + AES_BLOCK_SIZE + 1, 1); if (len >= 33 && len % 16 == 1 && ciphertext[0] == '!') { if (!EVP_DecryptInit_ex(&ctx, EVP_aes_256_cbc(), NULL, key, (unsigned char *)(ciphertext + 1))) goto error; ciphertext += 17; len -= 17; } else { if (!EVP_DecryptInit_ex(&ctx, EVP_aes_256_ecb(), NULL, key, NULL)) goto error; } if (!EVP_DecryptUpdate(&ctx, (unsigned char *)plaintext, &out_len, (unsigned char *)ciphertext, len)) goto error; len = out_len; if (!EVP_DecryptFinal_ex(&ctx, (unsigned char *)(plaintext + out_len), &out_len)) goto error; len += out_len; plaintext[len] = '\0'; EVP_CIPHER_CTX_cleanup(&ctx); return plaintext; error: EVP_CIPHER_CTX_cleanup(&ctx); secure_clear(plaintext, len + AES_BLOCK_SIZE + 1); free(plaintext); return NULL; }
What’s the significant part here? If your eyes jump to the strange conditional, you’ve found the same thing I did. What’s the difference in the resulting OpenSSL calls? It’s subtle, but it’s EVP_aes_256_cbc() versus EVP_aes_256_ecb(). If the ciphertext begins with the letter!, the next 16 bytes are used as an IV, and the mode is set to CBC. If it doesn’t begin with that, then ECB mode is used. This is interesting because this suggests that LastPass formerly used ECB mode for their encryption. If you don’t know why this is bad, I strongly suggest the Wikipedia article on block cipher modes of encryption. Hopefully this has long been addressed and the code only remains to handle a few edge cases for people who haven’t logged in to their account in a very long time. (Again, this is all speculation.)
For what it’s worth, just a few lines further down, you’ll find the function cipher_aes_encrypt that shows all the encryption operations, at least from this client, are done in CBC mode with a random IV.
If you’re wondering why the comparison looks so strange, consider this: if they just checked the first character of the ciphertext, then 1/256 ECB-mode encrypted ciphertexts would match that. Since ECB mode ciphertexts are multiples of the block length (as are CBC ciphertexts), checking for the length to have one extra character ( len % 16 == 1 ) rules out these extra cases.
Transport Security
This section, in particular, is only relevant to this command line client, as the browser extensions all use the browser’s built-in communications mechanisms. http.c shows us how the LastPass client communicates with their servers. It really attempts to emulate a fairly standard client as much as possible – sending the PHPSESSID as a cookie, using HTTP POST for everything. One very interesting note is this line:
1 curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_SSL_CTX_FUNCTION, pin_certificate);
They pin the Thawte CA certificate for their communication to help reduce the risk of a man-in-the-middle attack.
Blobs, Chunks, and Fields
I’ve only had a quick look at blob.c, which contains their file format parsing code, but I think I have a rough idea of how it goes. Your entire LastPass database is a blob, which consists of chunk s. chunk s can be of many types, one of which is an account chunk, which contains many field s.
Interestingly, if you look at read_crypt_string, it makes it obvious that, rather than encrypting your entire LP database or encrypting each account entry, fields are individually encrypted. Looking at account_parse, you can see that a lot of fields seem to be unused by the CLI client, but it’s interesting to see all the fields supported by LastPass. One of the most interesting findings is, in fact, right here:
1 entry_hex(url);
It can be confirmed by using a proxy to examine the traffic, but it turns out that the URL of sites in your LastPass account database are stored only as the hex-encoded ASCII string. No encryption whatsover. So LastPass can easily determine all of the sites that a user has accounts on. (This is genuinely surprising to me, but I triple-checked that this is actually the case.)
Future Work
I think it would be interesting to dump the entire blob in a readable format. There’s some interesting things in there, like equivalencies between multiple domains. (If an attacker could append one of those, they could get credentials for a legitimate domain sent to a domain they control.) I’d also like to poke at the extensions a little bit more, but reversing compiled JavaScript isn’t the most fun thing ever. :) (Suggestions of tools in this space would be welcome.)
One thing is important to understand: no evaluation can say for sure that LastPass can’t recover your passwords. Even if they’re doing everything right today, they could push a new version tomorrow (extensions are generally automatically updated) that records your master password. It’s inherent in the model of any browser extension-based password manager.Security researchers are appealing for help after discovering that part of the Duqu Trojan was written in an unknown programming language.
Duqu is a sophisticated Trojan reckoned to have been created by the same group behind the infamous Stuxnet worm. While the finely tuned Stuxnet worm was designed to home in on specific industrial control systems – namely systems controlling high-speed centrifuges used by Iran's controversial nuclear enrichment plants – Duqu was created to fulfil the slightly different role of a backdoor where intruders could slip into SCADA-based systems and nick confidential information.
Securo-boffins at Kaspersky Lab have discovered during their research that Duqu uses the mystery code to communicate with its Command and Control (C&C) servers once it infects a compromised machine. Researchers at the Russian anti-virus firm have named this unknown section the "Duqu Framework".
Unlike the rest of Duqu, the Duqu Framework is not written in C++ and it's not compiled with Microsoft's Visual C++ 2008. The Kaspersky research team has gone some way in unravelling the mystery language used by the Duqu Framework, but still needs addition help. So far, the researchers have worked out what the mystery code does, but are still mostly in the dark about the grammar and syntax of the programming language, they said.
Kaspersky Lab researchers explained:
It is possible that its authors used an in-house framework to generate intermediary C code, or they used another completely different programming language. However, Kaspersky Lab researchers have confirmed that the language is object-oriented and performs its own set of related activities that are suitable for network applications. The language in the Duqu Framework is highly specialised. It enables the Payload DLL to operate independently of the other Duqu modules and connects it to its dedicated C&C through several paths, including Windows HTTP, network sockets and proxy servers. It also allows the Payload DLL to process HTTP server requests from the C&C directly, stealthily transmit copies of stolen information from the infected machine to the C&C and even distribute additional malicious payload to other machines on the network, creating a controlled and discreet form of spreading infections to other computers.
Having gone as probably as far as they can, Kaspersky Lab is appealing to the programming community for support in analysing the mystery language used to build the malware. It wants to hear from coders who recognise either a framework, toolkit or a programming language that can generate similar code.
The creation of a dedicated programming language to construct the communications module shows how skilled the developers were, as well as providing evidence that significant financial resources were ploughed into developing the Duqu Trojan project.
"Given the size of the Duqu project, it’s possible that an entirely different team was responsible for creating the Duqu Framework as opposed to the team that created the drivers and wrote the system infection exploits," explained Alexander Gostev, chief security expert at Kaspersky Lab. "With the extremely high level of customisation and exclusivity that the programming language was created with, it is also possible that it was made not only to prevent external parties from understanding the cyber-espionage operation and the interactions with the C&Cs, but also to keep it separate from other internal Duqu teams who were responsible for writing the additional parts of the malicious program."
Duqu was first detected in September 2011, but Kaspersky Lab reckons the first trace of Duqu-related malware dates all the way back to August 2007. The Russian security firm has logged more than a dozen incidents of Duqu infection, with the vast majority of victims located in Iran.
More details about the Duqu Trojan and its mystery communications modules can be found on Securelist, Kaspersky Lab’s research site, here. Researchers at Kaspersky, which has carried out a great deal of top-notch analysis work on the topic, were the first to find the "smoking code" linking Stuxnet and Duqu. ®Apparently, Googlers aren’t supposed to be tweeting the details of the Google Phone, but they have no problem tweeting about how awesome it is. And they also apparently have no problem showing it off. And not surprisingly, pictures of the device are starting to hit the web. Without further ado, this is it.
Cory O’Brien, a San Francisco-based blogger, got his hands on one tonight and tweeted out that picture. He also notes that, “Google Phone = iPhone + a little extra screen and a scroll wheel. Great touch screen, and Android.”
As you can see, the Google Phone, which is apparently being called the “Nexus One” (for more on that, see here), does look exactly like the HTC Passion, which everyone was including in their posts earlier. You’ll also notice that there’s a key difference: It’s not HTC-branded at all.
Update: And here are some others that Engadget and others dug up:
[thanks Alberto]“I am getting calls from supporters asking questions about things like martial law,” Mr. Warner said. “And remember I am a moderate!” He added, “The absence of other substantive legislative activity makes this all the more in focus.”
Republican leaders tried their best to highlight the alternative universe on Capitol Hill, where they insist lots of lawmaking is going on. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, tried to turn the talk to health care most of the week, suggesting on Thursday that people who pick up their children from school were likely to be in a tizzy over the hobbled health care exchanges in his home state.
But in their offices, gyms and cloakrooms, lawmakers and their staff members pondered with colleagues the speed and depth of Mr. Trump’s careening presidency. Republicans privately fretted that their bosses would have little to brag about when they spent August back in their home states. “Drama is not helpful in getting things done,” Mr. Ryan conceded.
The meltdown of a nascent presidency would distract even the most active and engaged Congress. But in many ways this Congress seemed particularly primed for huge distraction. Republican lawmakers — who control both chambers of Congress — have been doing most of their significant policy work on health care and to a lesser degree tax reform without Democrats.
Republicans are loath to bring bills to the floor that Democrats will try to festoon with politically infused anti-Trump amendments. They fear any bill that would deal with, say, law enforcement would be used by Democrats as another vehicle to criticize Mr. Trump.
The Trump administration has been slow to send over its nominees for consideration, and Democrats have done their best to use procedural tricks to slow the process to a crawl and avoid assisting Republicans in any form.
There is very little legislation of significance emerging from committee rooms and hitting the Senate floor, and a major bill to repeal the health care law this month took most of the time of the House this spring.Addressing the UN General Assembly for the first time, US President Donald Trump did not mention the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Not one word on the issue in his extensive Sept. 19 speech about all the world’s problems, menaces and opportunities.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reacted to the speech as if he had just heard the best musical concert of his life. Indeed, Trump’s words on revising the Iran deal, fighting Islamic terror and destroying North Korea were music to his ears — especially the silence on the Palestinian issue. In his own UN address, Netanyahu characterized the speech as the most pro-Israel one he had ever heard throughout his political career.
Netanyahu rejoiced over this speech, a far cry from former President Barack Obama’s diplomatic approach to conflict resolution and his striving for collective diplomacy, including within the United Nations. Trump's speech included no call for a two-state solution and no criticism of the settlements, unlike Obama's speeches. For a moment, while addressing the world from the UN podium and meeting with Israeli reporters, Netanyahu could forget the perils he left behind in Jerusalem, namely the two police investigations of which he is a suspect.
A senior Israeli diplomat who was part of Netanyahu’s New York delegation told Al-Monitor that Netanyahu was double-satisfied by his visit to New York. Not only did Netanyahu feel vindicated in the case he made to Trump about the Iranian regional threat and the irrelevance of the Palestinian issue, he also senses that he now has a free pass to pursue the diplomatic policies that will keep his right-wing government intact.
According to this Israeli official, one can foresee a continuation of settlement expansion, in a somewhat restrained way, and setting strict conditions for negotiations with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Netanyahu will probably demand that negotiations be bilateral and without Palestinian preconditions. He will insist right at the beginning of any such negotiations on Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and on Israeli overriding security responsibility over all the West Bank, even after permanent status. It was obvious to the official that his ministry need not prepare for a peace conference or so-called peace negotiations in the foreseeable future.
The reaction of Abbas was the extreme opposite. According to a senior PLO official, Abbas considers Trump’s speech the kiss of death for any eventual US-led two-state solution process. The official, who also took part in the dialogue with the US president’s peace envoys, claimed that the New York visit, including Abbas' Sept. 20 meeting with Trump, was a watershed away from diplomacy. In addition to the Trump disappointment, Abbas was also taken aback by the positions of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. Abbas was clearly frustrated with the openly cordial meeting between Sisi and Netanyahu in New York, as well as Sisi’s speech at the General Assembly meeting, calling on Israelis to give peace a chance.
According to the PLO official, most of the Palestinian leadership senses it must change its strategy. Abbas can no longer ignore growing voices that openly support a binational state solution with equal rights for Palestinians. He claimed that Abbas met with a group of Fatah hawks who made this a demand.
The PLO official explained the rationale behind such a Palestinian position: “Israel under Netanyahu refuses to enter serious negotiations on a two-state solution. The international community is paralyzed due to President Trump’s isolationist policies. The time has come, in the mind of many Palestinian leaders, to beat Israel at its own game. The alternative to a two-state solution is a binational state, in which Palestinians will demand and fight for equal rights. Within a few years we will be the majority between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and the world will not accept an apartheid state. Actually, we may even dismantle the Palestinian Authority and the Oslo Accord and demand [from Israel] equal political and national rights in what is clearly today becoming a binational state.”
One should not underestimate this Palestinian position. This is not their immediate vision, but in the long run many Palestinian leaders truly believe that such a strategy will defeat Israel. According to this PLO official, for most Palestinian leaders this is still a tactical position only — a way to pressure Israel and the United States into a two-state solution process. Yet in the eyes of several prominent Palestinian politicians and intellectuals, the support for a binational state is gradually turning into a strategic choice.The Web Development Series is supported by Rackspace, the better way to do hosting. Learn more about Rackspace's hosting solutions here.
We've teased you in the past with promises of code snippets from bona fide Ruby experts — for all you advanced Rubyists, here's the code, ready for your dissection and possible implementation.
We've also got some more general insights from our panel of seven Ruby experts on the strengths and limitations of the Ruby programming language and their favorite Ruby apps and tools.
If you're just starting out as a new Ruby dev, check out our tips for Ruby novices, which includes introductory-level advice from the same group of experts. And if you're an intermediate developer looking to improve your skills, also check out tools and advice for mid-level Ruby programmers.
Jacques Crocker: Core Library Substitutes
Jacques Crocker is a Rails Jedi based out of Seattle who loves working on early-stage startup ideas and launching new products. He's helped launch almost a dozen Rails apps this year including HeroScale.com (automatically scale your Heroku workers and dynos) and WordSquared.com (a massively multiplayer online word game). Next year, he's planning on using Rails to launch 24 new web apps.
He says the tools in place for sharing code are one of his favorite things about the Ruby ecosystem. "GitHub and especially RubyGems.org make releasing a library to the world trivial. You’ll be able to find an existing gem for just about every API or interface you can imagine."
When it comes to Ruby's limitations, Crocker says, "Some of the core libraries have stagnated. Luckily, almost every crusty old Ruby standard library has a decent third-party gem alternative that usually fixes things up... Solid replacements for Ruby’s standard library are coming out every week, and it sounds like there’s some talk about Ruby 2.0 allowing an easier approach for swapping out standard libraries."
For example, he cites using Typhoeus rather than HTTP, Nokogiri for XML, RSpec instead of Test:Unit, and Psych for YAML.
Crocker also recommends therubyracer, a library that wraps Google V8 with Ruby bindings ("I use this currently to execute CoffeeScript natively within Ruby using the coffee-script gem"), and MacRuby, which re-implements the Ruby language in an Objective-C environment for native access to Cocoa objects when building Mac apps in Ruby.
Yehuda Katz: Refactoring Code
Yehuda Katz is a member of the Ruby on Rails core team, and lead developer of the Merb project. He is a member of the jQuery Core Team and a core contributor to DataMapper. He contributes to many open source projects, like Rubinius and Johnson, and works on some he created himself, like Thor.
He says, "Even though most of the Ruby development community is focused around the Rails framework, there are standalone libraries for just about everything, like virtually every new NoSQL database and connectivity with services like Twitter and Facebook."
Another thing Katz loves about Ruby is "the ability to refactor code from any context (including class bodies) into a method without changes to that code. The two features that make Ruby shine in this respect are executable class bodies and Ruby's block semantics."
Here are Katz's examples:
If we found that we were using that attr_accessor logic repeatedly, we could extract it out into a method that we could use in multiple classes.
"This is a relatively simple example," said Katz, "but it demonstrates the refactoring power of Ruby's single-context approach."
He continued that blocks have similar power.
"Consider the classic case of synchronization locks, which many languages implement as language features:"
"Ideally," Katz says, "we'd be able to abstract the mutex lock and unlock into a synchronize method. In Java, that is impossible, because closures do not exist at all, so synchronize is a language keyword. Even in languages like JavaScript, which do have closures, it is not trivial to make this modification. Let's take a look at an attempt to extract the mutex lock into a separate function in JavaScript:
"The problem here is that the return in the function passed to synchronize is returning from the inner function. Moving the unsychronized code into a synchronize block does not work reliably.
"In contrast, Ruby's blocks can handle this problem:"
"In short," Katz concludes, "Ruby is designed around making it easy to refactor code into methods, and the single-context principle (class bodies work the same as method bodies), and Ruby's block semantics deliver on this promise."
Obie Fernandez: RailsForZombies and the Non-Commercial Aspect
Obie Fernandez is the founder and CEO of Hashrocket, a Florida-based web consultancy and product shop. He's a well-regarded blogger and speaker, and he's also a series editor and book author for higher-education publishers Addison-Wesley.
For Ruby development and deployment, he says Heroku is "amazing," and he also recommends RailsForZombies.org, which has a web-based, interactive Rails sandbox environment. "It gives people a no-setup, no-excuses way to get started on Rails and is based on some pretty cool underlying use of the technology," he says.
While Fernandez says he loves making money from the "competitive advantages" of the Ruby programming language, he also says one of Ruby's strengths is its corporate independence.
"There is no big commercial vendor getting all capitalistic on us and causing problems like you see with Oracle and Microsoft and their developer communities. Almost everything that gets done in our space, 99% is done for open-source love and passion and because it is useful to the person doing it. We don't have any big, ivory-tower producers that I'm aware of."
Ryan Bates: Blocks and Better Memory Handling
Ryan Bates is the producer and host of Railscasts, a site full of free Ruby on Rails screencasts.
Bates says, "One thing I miss most when using another language is Ruby's block syntax. It makes simple, everyday tasks, such as remapping an array, convenient and beautiful."
However, he cites Ruby's "poor support for concurrency" as one of the language's flaws. "Being a Rails developer," he says, "I usually do not run into this problem because it is easy to spin up multiple instances of an app. In that case, memory can be a problem. I would love to see better memory handling and management in Ruby."
As far as clever hacks go, Bates says, "This little trick for exposing any Ruby object over the web is pretty ingenious (and madly insecure):"
Desi McAdam: Ruby's Bad Rap for Slowness
Desi McAdam is a Ruby developer at Hashrocket. She also co-founded and regularly contributes to the technical blogging group DevChix.
McAdam says, "I am constantly surprised by the expressiveness of the language. I enjoy coding in Ruby because it allows me to write beautiful code very easily."
When it comes to Ruby's downsides, McAdam's statements lean more toward the language's reputation than its actual flaws. "I don't know how many times someone has given me the excuse of 'Ruby is too slow' as a reason not to use the language. There are of course some situations where this might be true; but in most cases, it's just not important and can be handled through other mean."
Cool Ruby-built apps she recommends checking out are MercuryApp, which lets you track how you feel about certain things over time; DesksNear.Me, a co-working app and Rails Rumble winner; and Commendable Kids, a positive feedback system for reinforcing good behavior in kids.
Raquel Hernández: IRB, RVM, Sinatra and Homebrew
Raquel Hernández is an experienced hacker/mathematician with a background that includes many programming languages and many work environments, from freelance and contract work to startups and larger companies. However, she's made a particular focus of Ruby and Rails.
While Hernández praises the strength of the ever-growing Ruby community, she says its biggest limitations are "speed and scalability, which are a problem today — but improvements are happening at all times to prevent this. I don't think this would be a problem in the near future."
She also says, "I couldn't survive a single day without IRB. It's one of Ruby's most popular features." She also recommends reading this list of tips and tricks for IRB. She likes RVM for giving her the ability to work with multiple Ruby environments, Sinatra for quickly pushing out Ruby apps, and Homebrew for OSX package management.
José Valim: Objects, Inheritance, and the builder Library
José Valim is the founder of Plataforma Tec, a web development shop and consultancy. He's also an open source developer and a Rails Core Team Member.
Valim also sings the praises of the Ruby community, saying, "We have a community that values software craftsmanship: well-developed, tested and documented code."
He also shares some code samples that exemplify "what makes Ruby so pleasant to work with."
"This one shows two Ruby features: everything in Ruby is an object (including numbers!) and classes in Ruby are open for modification. This means we can extend integers in Ruby (that are Fixnum objects) with new methods.
"The example above was extracted and simplified from the Rails framework and allows you to write: 3.days.ago or 5.minutes.from_now as valid Ruby expressions. Working with time intervals is common in web applications, and such modifications make pleasant and easy to manipulate them."
"This second example shows inheritance, Ruby blocks (pieces of code that can be passed around and invoked on demand) and method contracts. Most languages implement switch/case statements (which in Ruby is called case/when ) internally. Ruby, on the other hand, specifies that, in order to pass an object to a when statement, you just need to implement a method named ===. While the example above is simple and could be implemented using if/else statements, it shows the flexibility you can achieve with the Ruby language as everything is an object and as the language relies heavily in method contracts."
"The last example uses a third-party library called builder that makes XML creation simple. It relies on a feature from Ruby called method_missing. Every time you invoke a method in a Ruby object and this method is not defined in it, Ruby invokes a method called method_missing that should handle the scenario accordingly. In this case, the builder library implements this method in a way that makes XML creation a breeze."
Specific Questions or Tips?
If you're a crack Ruby developer and you have a question, feel free to drop it in the comments! Our panelists are likely to stop by with more feedback.
Likewise, if you you feel like answering questions or passing on some great advice of your own, please leave a comment and school us all.
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Image of José Valim courtesy of Flickr, levycarneiro.A number of news outlets claim the near collapse of the Oroville dam’s emergency spillway in California is a glimpse of what man-made global warming could bring.
“Oroville Is a Warning for California Dams, as Climate Change Adds Stress,” the New York Times reported. “Broken California Dam Is a Sign of Emergencies to Come,” reads an article published in Scientific American, adding that “[c]limate change is leading to more extreme rainfalls that can overwhelm infrastructure.”
Nearly 200,000 Californians were evacuated from their homes Sunday after part of the Oroville dam’s main spillway collapsed, in turn causing the dam’s emergency spillway to reach the limit of what it can handle.
Heavy rains this year overwhelmed Oroville, pushing the dam to capacity, and sparking concerns from environmentalists and reporters that global warming would bring more extreme rains that could damage infrastructure.
“Drought, climate change, and aging infrastructure combined to create a looming catastrophe that forced 188,000 Californians to evacuate,” reads an Atlantic subheadline.
Roger Bales, an engineering professor with the University of California, Merced, said global warming was to blame for California’s unusually wet winter.
“It doesn’t take much warming to change snowstorms into rainstorms,” Bales told The Guardian. “With a warmer climate, we get these winter storms, which dump rain rather than snow.”
Michael Dettinger, a U.S. Geological Survey hydrologist, countered that while global warming may play a future role in rain storms, it probably hasn’t had much of an impact yet.
“California’s climate has always had the potential for a year like this,” he told The Guardian. “So far, except for how quickly [not how much] the precipitation has piled up, there is nothing record-breaking here.”
California has a history of abruptly switching from drought conditions to torrential rain. One weekend of rain storms in January, brought by an atmospheric river, basically ended California’s six-year, state-wide drought.
Despite this, precipitation around Oreville hasn’t trended upward much in the last century — only about 0.8 inches over the last century or so, according to federal climate data.
Oroville’s problem was a corroded main spillway, put under stress by heavy rains. Had workers caught the main spillway problems during the dam’s last inspection in July 2015, this may have been averted.
Oroville’s main spillway handled more water during heavy rains in the 1990s, but the dam was in better condition.
Officials say repairing the dam could cost as much as $200 million.
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meetingZim Shipping: New Evidence suggests Six Months Foreknowledge of the September 11th Attack Date and Potential Involvement in the Israeli Deep Cover Operation
Zim American-Israeli Shipping (“Zim”) was the predecessor company of the present Zim Integrated Shipping Services and was 49 percent owned by the Israeli government on 9/11. In 2004, the Israeli government sold their interest to the Israeli Ofer Brothers Group, which then became the sole owner of the company.[1] On 9/11, Zim’s headquarters was in Haifa, Israel, and it had worldwide regional offices in Hong Kong, Hamburg, Germany, and Manhattan, New York/Norfolk, Virginia.[2]
At the time of the 9/11 attacks Zim was one of two Israeli companies with lease contracts at the World Trade Center. The other Israeli tenant, Clear Forest, had a small office of 18 employees on the 47th floor of WTC 1 (the North Tower). According to the Jerusalem Post, Clear Forest had only four or five employees at the WTC on 9/11 and all escaped uninjured.[3] Although there were some variances in the WTC 1 tenant rosters between various media organizations, the majority showed that Zim occupied all of the 16th floor (WTC floor space approximated 50,000 square feet), 10,000 square feet of the 17th floor, and some space of the 29th floor of WTC 1.[4] Zim had about 250 employees at the WTC before its move-out, which would require somewhere in the vicinity of 50,000 to 60,000 square feet of office space.[5]
Amazingly fortunate for Zim, the company moved out of the WTC around Sept. 4, 2001 and into a newly built office building in Norfolk, VA, even though they had a significant remaining lease obligation at the WTC.[6] In fact, Zim picked this lucky move-out date about six months before they actually moved. An April 3, 2001 article in the Virginian-Pilot stated that Zim “expects to open its new [Norfolk] building by Sept. 4 and will eventually employ 235 people.”[7] Coincidently, pilot hijackers Mohammed Atta and Marwan Shehhi were inexplicably in the Norfolk/Virginia Beach area in February and April 2001 at the time Zim was apparently in the search and planning process for their Norfolk building.[8] Although Zim is reported to have had about 10 of its purported 20 remaining employees at the WTC on 9/11, none were killed or injured.[9] However, other media reports stated that Zim had 35 sales and marketing people and additional computer personnel remaining at the WTC on 9/11, indicating Zim had a small percentage of its remaining staff at the WTC on 9/11.[10]
Zim found the site in Norfolk, obtained all permits, drew up the architectural plans, and built its 2-story 45,000 square-foot steel frame/brick veneer office building in only six months, which is about as fast as humanly possible for a commercial office project.[11] It is so fast, that they even have a special name for it in real estate jargon; it’s called fast tracking, as a typical development period would be closer to one year.[12] [13] Fast track construction is utilized when a company needs to have their building completed in a short time as standard design and construction procedures are compressed to meet that goal. The added development challenges and construction risks of fast tracking were summed up by Zim’s real estate company when they stated in April 2001, “Since accepting Zim’s fast track project last month, Hunter has been involved in assisting with site location, selecting the development team of architects and general contractor, and developing strategic relocation plans for Zim’s employees… It is a terrific assignment that presents many challenges, not the least of which is to ensure that the site is completed by move-in by September 2001.”[14]
Zim’s remaining lease term had long been a point of debate, with 9/11 conspiracy debunkers claiming there was no evidence that Zim’s WTC lease term extended beyond their move-out date. However, a FOIA request to the Port Authority of New York-New Jersey by LetsRollForums.com resulted in a copy of the WTC tenant roster with lease expiration dates.[15] The Port Authority document showed that Zim entered into a 10-year lease contract starting on March 1, 1996 and expiring on Feb. 28, 2006, or about four and a half years after Zim’s September 2001 move-out date.[16] Confirmation that Zim’s remaining lease extended beyond their move-out date was further established by a Crain’s New York Business article on April 9, 2001 that stated, “Rising rent wasn’t an immediate concern [for Zim’s relocation decision] — several years remain on the lease.”[17]
Assuming Zim leased around 60,000 square feet at $30/square-foot at the WTC, its four and a half year remaining lease obligation would have been about $8 million.[18] Strangely, Zim did not seem concerned about high leasing costs when it entered into a relatively long 10-year lease in March 1996, and there is also no evidence that Zim tried to sublease its space in the six months they were planning and building their new office building in Norfolk. This is not the expected action of a company that stated their reason to vacate the WTC was to cut costs. Fortunately for Zim any worry about their $8 million lease liability disappeared when the WTC came crashing down on 9/11.
The burning question is why did Zim have to chance the added risks and challenges of fast tracking the development of their Norfolk office to guarantee its completion by Sept. 4, 2001 when it still had perfectly fine office space at the WTC with an existing four and a half year $8 million lease obligation? Zim’s public excuse that they moved to cut costs does not explain why it was mandatory that the Norfolk office be completed by Sept. 4, 2001. The fast track development process cost Zim more money and added unnecessary development risks. What difference would six months have made (i.e., fast track vs conventional development time period) when they still had occupancy rights with a significant lease obligation at the WTC? Apparently, Zim knew they had to be out of the WTC before September 11th, and that is why they did everything in their power to ensure they would be out of the WTC and in their new Norfolk office by Sept. 4th.
CIA Israeli Intelligence Assessment Regarding Zim Shipping and Mossad
A 1979 CIA Assessment of Israeli Intelligence shows that the CIA has long suspected that Zim has been used for Israeli intelligence support and cover.[19] [20] The CIA Israeli Assessment had this to say about Zim:
Other Israeli government organizations that provide support to the [Israeli] intelligence and security community are the Ministries of Finance and tourism, El Al, and the national shipping line, Zim. Unofficial Zionist organizations based in Israel and Jewish communities throughout the world also give aid to Israel operations when needed… Official organizations used for [Israeli intelligence] cover are Israeli Purchasing Missions and Israeli Government Tourist, El Al, and Zim offices, Israeli construction firms, industrial groups and international trade organizations also provide non-official cover. Individuals working under deep or illegal cover are normally charged with penetrating objectives that require a long-range, more subtle approach, or with activities in which the Israeli Government can never admit complicity.[21]
The CIA Israeli Assessment provides additional insight into Israel’s intelligence apparatus, including its methods and processes. In an interview with Israeli newspaper Ma’ariv in the early 80’s, former Mossad chief Isser Harel called the assertions of the document “malicious, dilettantish, distortions… but probably authentic,” and stated that the publication of the document had been a nightmare for him.[22] The CIA document basically shows that Israel has the means and experience to carry out false flag attacks by recruiting Arabs as deep cover operatives in covert operations, something they could also have done in the 9/11 operation. Deep cover operatives are often planted years in advance of the execution of an operation and can take on identities and backgrounds to fit the operation. Among many other important findings, following are some Israeli intelligence processes and methods that could have been pertinent to the 9/11 operation (references to sections of the CIA Israeli Assessment are given in parentheses):
The Israeli intelligence and security community is completely loyal and if the government requested the execution of a certain task, legal and illegal, it would be accomplished. (Section A3.b)
Mossad is also charged with inciting disturbances calculated to create mutual distrust among the Arabs and to draw Western sympathy away from the Arab cause. (Section B1)
The fact that Lebanon has a mix of Christians, Druze, and Muslim population has made that country attractive for intelligence projects and Israel has covert assets and has run operations in Lebanon. (Section B1)
Much of the activity against the Arabs in the Near East is based on “deep cover operations” by Israeli illegals or the recruitment of Arabs in third-countries followed by their dispatch or normal rotation back home to Arab areas. (Section B2)
Elishu (Eli) Cohen, an Egyptian-born Jew, was involved in Israeli sabotage operations (false flag attacks) against American and British installations in Egypt in 1952. (Section B2) Cohen’s sabotage operation became known as the Lavon Affair, a confirmed Israeli false flag operation against the US.[23]
The CIA Israeli Assessment provides two examples of Israeli “deep cover” operations, where Israeli operatives were put in place years in advance to establish other identities and backgrounds (i.e., “legends”). One operation required Eli Cohen to take the identity of a Syrian Arab while the other operation required an Israeli Johann Lotz to move to Germany for a couple of years to establish an identity of a German African Corps officer.[24] (Section B2) (Similarly, three of the pilot hijackers spent several years in Hamburg, Germany where they allegedly became radicalized Islamists.[25])
Mossad activities are generally conducted through Israeli official and semiofficial establishments, deep cover enterprises in the form of firms and organizations, some especially created for, or adaptable to, a specific objective, and penetrations effected within non-Zionist national and international Jewish organizations. (Section B4)
Many Israelis have come from Arab countries where they were born and educated and appear more Arab than Israeli in speech, demeanor, and attitude. By forging passports and identity documents of Arab and western countries and providing sound background legends and cover, Mossad has successfully sent into Egypt and other Arab countries Israelis disguised and documented as Arabs or citizens of European countries. (Section B4)
The Israelis have used false-flag recruitment pitches extensively and successfully. In several cases they approached citizens of Western European nations under the cover of a national NATO intelligence organization for operations in Arab target countries. (Section B4)
Shin Beth has picked up local Arab espionage agents on their way back to neighboring countries and doubled them (turned them into Israeli spies) in coordination with Military Intelligence. (Section C4)
Israel’s long history of false flag terror operations intended to blame Arabs is extensive and beyond the scope of this article; however, there are several confirmed and dozens of suspected operations since Israel’s creation in 1948.[26] Israel’s skillful use of deep cover Arab operatives and other covert tactics listed above sometimes makes it difficult to link Israel directly to the false flag events. A case in point is where the CIA notes above that Israeli intelligence operatives working for Zim are “normally charged with objectives that require a long range approach where the Israeli Government can never admit complicity.” This covert activities concept is often referred to as “plausible deniability” and is used to remove any direct connection to the covert operation. Even though Israel’s fingerprints have been all over many false flag attacks in the past, the smoking gun has been eliminated by design. Thus, one has to look at all other evidence in likely false flag operations to assess involvement and guilt.
Pilot Hijackers Exhibit Modus Operandi of “Non-al-Qaeda” Deep Cover Operatives
There are many anomalies and contradictions in the backgrounds, timelines, and activities of the 9/11 pilot hijackers which indicate they could have been deep cover operatives in a broader 9/11 conspiracy. A good analysis of the many hijacker contradictions between the 9/11 Commission findings (or omitted facts), the FBI’s Hijacker Timeline, and various media reports can be found at Historycommons.org.[27] A prime example of one of the many contradictions is that at least two hijackers ended up on alleged Zionist Jack Abramoff’s connected Suncruz gambling boat on Sept. 5, 2001 when the FBI Hijacker Timeline showed the hijackers elsewhere.[28] The 9/11 Commission also ignored this evidence and much more in their report.
The hijackers also did their best to leave behind an obvious trail of evidence that was easily found and quickly gave the FBI the support to tie them to the 9/11 operation stymieing any substantive investigation of the many anomalies and contradicting evidence.[29] [30] Not to mention the obvious plants of evidence like hijacker passports in the WTC and other wreckage.[31] Lastly, military operation Able Danger identified several al-Qaeda connections inside the US as early as December 1999, including Atta and other alleged 9/11 hijackers; however, the operation was shut down by senior military officials and lawyers who also prevented the unit from sharing the valuable information with the FBI for reasons that were wrong and inaccurate.[32]
Although the facts and evidence around the many hijacker anomalies and falsehoods are very detailed and complex and beyond the scope of this paper, following is a brief summary of some of the evidence suggesting the pilot hijackers were not what the US government said they were, and indicating that they may have been deep cover operatives (the Endnotes include references and links to sources with more detail).
Mohammed Atta — Journalist and author Daniel Hopsicker did very good investigative work around Atta when he interviewed various individuals who came across Atta; and found that Atta’s real life persona was nothing like the portrait painted by the FBI and the 9/11 Commission. In his book, “Welcome to Terrorland,” Hopsicker found among other things that Atta drank alcohol and ate pork (against Muslim beliefs), did drugs and partied heavily, slept with strippers, and spoke Hebrew.[33] [34] This is not the behavior of a devout Muslim who is planning to kill himself and then hopes to go to heaven and be greeted by 99 virgins. If Atta was not the Muslim extremist who believed deeply in his faith, as the US government made him out to be, then who was he? Atta came from an upper middle class Egyptian family and was fluent in 5 different languages, including English, despite supposedly never having spent any time in an English-speaking country before 9/11.[35]
Ziad Jarrah — Jarrah came from an affluent Lebanese family and by all accounts was a non-political non-devout Muslim brought up in private Catholic schools. Ziad’s two Lebanese cousins, Ali and Yusef Jarrah, were confessed and convicted spies for Israel. Although the February 2009 New York Times stated, “the men [Ziad and Ali Jarrah] were 20 years apart in age [actually 16] and do not appear to have known each other well,” it is apparently a subjective statement that is not based on any specified fact.[36] On the contrary, an October 23, 2001, article in the Los Angeles Times indicates that the cousins came from a “close-knit family” and that Ziad spent lots of time at the cousins’ house in Marj, as Ali’s apparently younger brother, Salim Jarrah, was Ziad’s age.[37] Marj is a small town in the agricultural Bekka Valley area of Lebanon where Ali had been a spy for Israel since around 1983. As it appears that Ali helped recruit his brother Yusef as a spy for Israel, it is likely that he could have done the same for his cousin Ziad.
The contradictions and discrepancies with the official story concerning Jarrah are revealing and significant. An excellent and well referenced article by Paul Thompson in Sept. 2002, entitled “The Two Ziad Jarrah’s” shows that there were two similar Ziad Jarrah’s in different places at the same time on several occasions and that Ziad’s real life persona was also nothing like the one portrayed by the 9/11 Commission.[38] Thompson also shows many timeline discrepancies in Jarrah’s alleged travels and activities, and that a slew of people who knew him best said he never exhibited devout Muslim tendencies nor did he ever express extremist ideology. Ironically, the 9/11 Commission’s sole support for Jarrah’s radicalization comes from a July 2002 classified German intelligence report.[39] The only noted source in the 9/11 Commission report on Jarrah’s Islamic radicalization comes from his girlfriend, Aisel Senguen, whose earlier statements in the press (as pointed out by Thompson) contradict statements attributed to her by the Commission.
Marwan Shehhi — Shehhi was Atta’s right hand man and shadowed him in the US for the 15 months before 9/11. He was also in the military of the United Arab Emirates (a US ally) while attending school in Hamburg from 1996 to 1999. Atta, Jarrah, and Shehhi allegedly went to Osama Bin Laden’s training camp in Afghanistan in December 1999 and met OBL for the first time. According to the 9/11 Commission, the speed with which OBL chose the three for the 9/11 operation was remarkable.[40] Why did OBL so quickly choose three unknowns he had just met for the biggest and most complex terrorist operation in history, or could the three potential deep cover operatives actually have proposed the 9/11 plans to him?[41] Was this “choice” actually a fictitious part of the official story of 9/11 intended to portray OBL as the culprit?
Hani Hanjour — Saudi pilot hijacker Hani Hanjour arrived for a second time in the US in April 1996, the exact month and year that Jarrah and Shehhi went to Hamburg, suggesting the deep cover operation may have begun as early as then.[42] Although Hanjour was the most experienced of all the pilot hijackers, he was not allowed to rent a single-engine Cessna airplane several weeks before 9/11 because the instructors, after taking three test flights with him, judged his flying skills too poor. However, the plane Hanjour allegedly flew on 9/11 (Flight AA 77 targeting the Pentagon) executed a very difficult turn and descent that reminded observers of a fighter jet maneuver, with one air traffic controller commenting, “The speed, the maneuverability, the way that he turned, we all thought in the radar room, all of us experienced air traffic controllers, that that was a military plane.”[43] Hanjour’s sophisticated flying maneuver on 9/11 is contradicted by all the other information corroborating his poor flying skills.
Zim and Other Israeli Groups Potential Involvement in the 9/11 Deep Cover Operation
The fact that Zim probably had at least six months foreknowledge of the specific attack date would suggest they probably had foreknowledge of the entire 9/11 operation. Indeed, even the alleged 9/11 hijackers did not start making their 9/11 flight reservations until Aug. 25, 2001.[44] However, Zim’s 9/11 connections do not end with their timely move-out of the WTC or with their known support and cover for Israeli intelligence (with its history and means of false flag attacks against the US). Zim also happened to be a tenant in a building that was most likely taken down by controlled demolition and there is evidence linking explosives to other Israeli groups in the NY/NJ area.[45] Coincidently, the owner of all three WTC towers that came down crashing down in controlled demolition style on 9/11, Larry Silverstein, was friends with three ex-Israeli Prime ministers, including Benjamin Netanyahu, to whom he was speaking weekly with at the time.[46]
An in-depth investigative report In December 2013 by this author on the “Celebrating/Dancing Israelis” shows that the FBI detected explosives in the Israelis’ van when they were apprehended on 9/11.[47] Although the FBI analyzed explosive samples taken from the Celebrating Israelis’ (CIs) vehicle, the lab results were never revealed in the FBI investigative documents, and were curiously still pending about two weeks after they were taken.[48] There is no rational or explainable reason for the FBI not to have completed the explosive tests in this time frame and the most logical reason for the FBI not showing the results is because the van tested positive for explosives.
The CIs happened to work for an Israeli-related moving company in the NJ/NY area, Urban Moving Systems (“UMS”), which was also apparently searched for explosives two days after 9/11.[49] (There were also at least three other Israeli-related moving companies in the immediate area with one under investigation by the FBI in conjunction with moving one of the hijackers.[50]) Coincidently, CI Yaron Shmuel worked for an Israeli explosives company after 9/11, which suggests he may have had a background in explosives.[51] In addition, five of fourteen Israeli Art students, or 37 percent, who provided their Israeli military backgrounds to US investigators worked in explosive ordnance units.[52] Thus, Israel had the expertise and human resources in the US to wire the WTC’s for demolition and the moving companies to help transport the explosives and devices.
It just so happens that at least two of the CIs were Mossad operatives and were involved in other US counterintelligence investigations according to various media sources.[53] The New York Times noted that the FBI even initially suspected the CIs of assisting the hijackers.[54] Several news agencies also reported that UMS was an Israeli intelligence front company.[55] The owner of UMS, Dominik Suter, fled back to Israel on Sept. 14, 2001 after being questioned by the FBI two days earlier.[56] In May 2002 the names of Suter and his wife appeared on an FBI 9/11 Watch List Report, which included among others, OBL, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (“KSM”), all 19 hijackers (why if dead?), and 15 Arab individuals from Hamburg.[57] Out of over 300 names, those of Suter and his wife are two of just a few that are not Arab names.[58] This author’s investigative report showed that there was an obvious FBI cover-up in the investigation and that the CIs had foreknowledge of the attacks and that the CIs and other Israelis were probably more deeply involved in the 9/11 operation.[59]
Given the CIs and UMSs various connections to Israeli intelligence and explosives, and Zim’s known support and cover for Israeli intelligence, there is the possibility that the explosives used to take down the three WTC towers were manufactured in Israel and imported to the US on Zim ships. Coincidently, Zim’s main NY/NJ shipping port on 9/11 was Red Hook Port (“RHP”) in Brooklyn, which is a mere 3-mile drive to the WTC and by far the closest and most conveniently accessible to the WTC of the four NY/NJ area ports.[60] However, RHP is also the smallest (less than 4% of total NY/NJ port volume) and most logistically inferior of all the ports with no rail or air service and poor highway access. A December 1996 New York Times article noted that RHP excels in “specialized cargoes” and products that can be uploaded quickly and delivered to the immediate New York City area at night.[61] Although Zim received New York City tax credits in conjunction with the move to RHP, no other large international shippers like Zim appear to have chosen the small and inefficient RHP as their primary NY/NJ port. Zim is not at RHP now, and they may have moved out as early as November 2002.[62]
There are also several other potential Israeli connections to the Red Hook Port. At least one, and as many as four of the Celebrating Israelis, lived about one and a half miles from RHP.[62] In addition, another large Israeli related moving company (Moishes Moving) had an office/warehouse within a couple miles of RHP and two rental trucks found at UMS shortly after 9/11, were from a rental company located about two miles from RHP.[63] Zim first entered into its RHP contract in November 1996, and there is a confluence of alleged pilot hijackers and Israeli-connected events around that time which suggests the possible initiation of the 9/11 deep cover operation:
March 1996 — Zim Shipping extends its lease at the WTC to February 28, 2006, locking itself into a long 10-year lease obligation with no apparent concern for high leasing costs (see above).
April 1996 — Alleged pilot hijacker Ziad Jarrah arrives in Greifswald, Germany, and Marwan Shehhi moves to Hamburg (Jarrah moves to Hamburg around September 1997).[64]
April 1996 — Alleged pilot hijacker Hani Hanjour moves to the US for seven months. Hanjour will have several stays in US and allegedly come back for the last time in Dec. 2000.[65]
November 1996 — Zim Shipping transfers its NY/NJ port operations from the area’s most modern and busiest port of Port Elizabeth to the much smaller and logistically inferior Red Hook Port.[66]
April 1997 — The likely Israeli intelligence front company Urban Moving Systems is incorporated.[67]
A second confluence of events between the hijackers and various Israeli groups takes place in late 1999/early 2000, perhaps indicating a subsequent phase of the deep cover operation:
December 1999/January 2000 — Hamburg pilot hijackers Atta, Jarrah, and Shehhi allegedly attend OBL’s training camp in Afghanistan and allegedly are quickly chosen by OBL for the 9/11 operation (though the hijackers Afghanistan travel is not substantiated by the redacted FBI Hijacker Timeline).[68] [69]
November 1999 — Zim renews its Red Hook Port contract with the City of New York, probably for the same three-year period as in the original contract.[70]
December 1999 — Zim claims that they started looking for a new office location; although there is no other evidence to support this claim.[71]
Around October 1999 — Urban Moving Systems moves from a personal residence into its Weehawken office.[72]
Beginning of 2000 — Israeli Art Student activity begins in the US.[73]
Beginning 2000 — Hijackers Khalid Mihdhar and Nawaf Hazmi enter the US and move to San Diego.[74]
At least two of the CIs apprehended on 9/11 were under investigation in relation to other US counterintelligence investigations including one in San Diego.[75]
Other Important Geographic Nexus’ Between Pilot Hijackers and Zim
It has been well documented that certain Israeli groups had very close geographic and timeline connections to the three Southeast Florida 9/11 hijacker cells and the one in Paterson, New Jersey. The largest concentration of Israeli Art Students just happened to be located in Southeast Florida where the largest concentration of 9/11 hijacker cells were located.[76] The Paterson hijacker cell was in very close proximity to the CIs, UMS, and at least three other Israeli-related moving companies in that immediate area.[77] Zim’s WTC location was 25 miles from the Paterson cell’s apartment and Zim also has an office in Miami about 25 miles south of the hijackers’ main area of Hollywood, Florida. Coincidently, the pilot hijackers spent time in 8 of the 11 US cities where Zim had offices on 9/11, also including Atlanta and Savannah, Georgia, Jacksonville, Florida, Chicago, and Los Angles.[78] There is no obvious explanation for Jarrah’s two trips to Jacksonville and Atta and Shehhi’s stay in Brunswick, Georgia just happened to be approximately 75 miles between Savannah and Jacksonville.
Another critical area of activity for the alleged 9/11 hijackers was Hamburg, Germany. Hamburg was home to three of the pilot hijackers who had been living there since at least 1996 and where the 9/11 plans allegedly started to take form around early 2000.[79] Coincidently, one of Zim’s four worldwide offices is in Hamburg, giving them a significant presence in two of the three areas most crucial to the alleged hijackers and the 9/11 operation (New York and Hamburg).[80] In addition, 8 of 17 (44 percent) Israeli Art Students with known embarkation cities came to the US from Frankfurt, Germany in late March 2001.[81] Also, CI Yaron Shmuel just happened to hold a German passport.[82] Unfortunately, it is not known if, when, and where, Yaron Shmuel lived in Germany and if he had any potential connections to the Hamburg cell. In its investigation of the CIs, the FBI did not check with German intelligence to determine if Shmuel lived in Germany and if he may have had any association with the alleged Hamburg cell.[83]
Zim also had another of its four German offices in the river port city of Dusseldorf, a city which pilot hijacker Ziad Jarrah visited at least six times from October 2000 to August 2001.[84] The story is that Jarrah had a German-born girlfriend of Turkish descent in the Dusseldorf area (Bochum), and that is why, in the midst of the allegedly most sophisticated terrorist operation of all time (that would lead to his death); he visited her regularly in the year before 9/11. Jarrah’s Dusseldorf girlfriend may have been a cover story similar to that of Israeli operative Johann Lotz, who married a German woman (while still being married to an Israeli woman) in order to establish his deep cover identity/legend while part of an Israeli intelligence operation.[85]
Between three of his trips to Dusseldorf Jarrah also visited Lebanon, a country bordering Israel and the home of his family, including his two cousins who were spies for Israel at the time. Jarrah’s travels during this time period also included stopovers in cities where Zim had other offices, including Hamburg, Munich, Athens, Newark/New York, Atlanta, Jacksonville, and Miami. Lastly, Jarrah inexplicably visited the city of Thessaloniki, Greece (May 16 to 22, 2000), a month before coming to the US, another city where Zim has an office.[86] Dusseldorf and other cities may have been “debriefing” locations for Jarrah. Ziad’s Israeli spy cousin, Ali Jarrah, was debriefed by his Israeli handlers in Belgium, Italy and Israel, and also obtained travel documents to Israel from Greece, Turkey, and Jordan.[87] Zim has offices in Belgium, Italy, and Greece, and Ziad Jarrah travelled to Greece and Jordan, and had a stop-over in Istanbul on Dec. 26, 2000 before continuing on to Lebanon the next day (per FBI Hijacker Timeline).
A final confluence of hijacker and Israeli group activities kicks off at the end of 2000 and continues through to the 9/11 attacks:
November/December 2000 — The number of Israeli Art Student incidents increase at this time and continue through at least June 2001.[88]
December 2000 — Hamburg pilot hijackers Atta, Jarrah, and Shehhi spend their supposed first time in the Southeast Florida area which is the area of the largest concentration of Israeli Art Students.[89]
December 2000 — Pilot Hijacker Hani Hanjour re-enters the US for the last time.[90]
March 2001 — Zim enters into a fast track development contract to guarantee completion of its Norfolk office building by Sept. 4, 2001 (see above). Zim probably started its due diligence and negotiations of the development project a couple of months before.
March 2001 — At least eight Israeli Art Students enter the US in Dallas from Frankfurt, Germany (see Endnote 81).
April to June 2001 — The thirteen “muscle hijackers” (aka patsies) enter the US, primarily from Jeddah Saudi Arabia, a renowned CIA consulate/outpost.[91] [92]
April 2001- Alleged hijacker cells headed by Atta, Jarrah and Shehhi begin to be set up in the Southeast Florida area.[93]
May 2001 — An alleged hijacker cell headed by pilot hijacker Hanjour is set up in Paterson, New Jersey.[94] Alleged hijackers Khalid Mihdhar and Nawaf Hazmi are also members of this cell.
May to July 2001 — Four of the five CIs start working at UMS and appear to enter US around this time.[95] At least one, and possibly two CIs, had round trip air tickets coming from Israel to Newark on June 15, 2001 and returning Sept. 12, 2001, suggesting at least three months foreknowledge of the specific attack date. The other four CIs also had air tickets leaving the US immediately after Sept. 11th, suggesting not just foreknowledge, but probable involvement in the 9/11 operation.[96]
May to 9/11 (approximately) — Employment at Urban Moving Systems increases.[97]
July 2001 — Saudi hijacker Khalid Mihdhar re-enters the US for the last time.[98]
July/August 2001 — UMS inexplicably rents a second warehouse in Bayonne, New Jersey, next to Port Jersey, which is several miles south of the WTC and the second closest NY/NJ port to it.[99]
July 2001 — Alleged Zionist and Israeli-connected Larry Silverstein closes on the acquisition of WTC Towers 1 and 2.[100]
Zim America’s president, Shaul Cohen-Mintz, was quoted in the Journal of Commerce on October 18, 2001: “Naturally, no one is debating any more whether we had to move or not… Some people said it [the move] was like an angel sitting on our shoulders.”[101] Unfortunately, Zim’s move had a lot less to do with an angel and divine intervention than with giving the devil his due, with the devil wearing the Star of David while waving the Zim Shipping flag. And the debate now is not whether Zim had to move — they knew they had to — but how much foreknowledge Zim had and how deeply they may have been involved in the 9/11 operation.
The evidence presented in this article shows that Zim most likely had six months or more foreknowledge of the 9/11 attack date and was probably more deeply involved in what was almost certainly a false flag operation. The evidence further suggests that at least two pilot hijackers (Atta and Jarrah), and possibly all four, were probably deep cover operatives, put in place as many as five years in advance to establish identities and backgrounds (legends) of Islamic extremists. The evidence in this article has also touched on the many anomalies and contradictions involving the official story around the 9/11 hijackers and the alleged plans of the 9/11 operation between the key parties of OBL, KSM, and the pilot hijackers. Indeed, an overwhelming amount of the US’s evidence on the 9/11 plans relies on testimony garnered from torture and that is probably why KSM, Ramzi Binahshibh, and others still await trial more than 10 years after being apprehended.
Given Israel’s known history and practice of utilizing Arabs in deep cover intelligence operations, coupled with the atrocious and poorly transparent US investigations of the 9/11 attacks, it’s naïve and even ignorant to disregard the likelihood that some or all of the 9/11 pilot hijackers were used in a deep cover covert capacity by Israel. Israeli undercover intelligence officials working for Zim, UMS, and other Israeli groups in the US on 9/11 could well have been handlers for the hijackers or protected them from arrest, or even assisted them in the operation as once suggested in the New York Times on Sept. 13, 2001. The evidence presented in this article clearly points in this direction.
References and Endnotes
[1] Wikipedia, Zim Integrated Shipping Services, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zim_Integrated_Shipping_Services
[2] Zim Integrated Shipping Services Website, www.zim.com/aboutus/pages/factsandfigures.aspx. Zim was in transition from its America’s headquarters at the WTC to its new office in Norfolk, VA.
[3] Miriam Shaviv, “Zim Workers Saved by Cost Cutting,” Jerusalem Post, September 13, 2001. http://s3.amazonaws.com/911timeline/2001/jerusalempost091301.html
[4] Wikipedia, List of Tenants in One World Trade Center, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tenants_in_One_World_Trade_Center See also Endnotes 3 and 16 which confirm that Zim occupied the entire 16th floor.
[5] “Hunter Retained for Staten Island Office Project (for Zim American Israeli Shipping Co.),” Real Estate Weekly, November 14, 2001. http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-80776351.html
[6] Dennis O’Brien, “Shipping Firm Moves Headquarters to Norfolk, VA,” The Virginian Pilot, Sept. 4, 2001 http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-77831553.html. Although there were several articles that had Zim moving into their Norfolk office between one to two weeks before 9/11, this article and most of the others stated Zim moved in a week before 9/11.
[7] Christopher Dinsmore, “Firms Move to Norfolk Will Create 235 New Jobs, Shipping Company to Relocate Headquarters to Hampton Roads from New York City,” The Virginia Pilot, April 3, 2001. http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-72716654.html In addition to stating that Zim expected to open its new building by Sept. 4, it also states that a Zim official said the company started looking to move its headquarters in December |
team. The city’s previous bid was denied in 2015 and awarded to Minnesota, whose team opened play this year.
“I do believe Major League Soccer will come here in the future,” Lashbrook said.
Twelve cities are competing for four MLS expansion clubs. Las Vegas did not make a bid this time, but Goodman hinted at another attempt in the future.
“Bill Foley showed us how to do it,” Goodman said, referring to the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights owner. “We also have Brett Lashbrook to lead the way, and we appreciate the LVCVA and the 51s for the support.”
Reno’s Greater Nevada Field is also home to both a minor league baseball team and USL squad.
“We have a great relationship with the 51s,” Lashbrook said. “They were one of the first people we met with. Look around the country, other stadiums are sharing baseball and soccer. It has worked.”
Las Vegas has added two pro teams in the past 13 months. The Knights were approved in June 2016 to join the NHL, and the NFL in March allowed the Raiders to relocate from Oakland to Las Vegas.
Lashbrook and the USL plan to introduce the team to fans in August. Team name suggestions are being taken on VegasProSoccer.com.
Councilman Ricki Barlow threw out the Las Vegas Neons as a possible team name.
“I got plenty of team names, but I won’t say them right now,” Goodman said.
Contact Gilbert Manzano at gmanzano@reviewjournal.com. Follow @GManzano24 on Twitter.
Ahead of today's #lvcouncil discussion about bringing pro soccer to Cashman, a rendering of what it could look like: https://t.co/IVufMvjaBW pic.twitter.com/iV77abQ8Mt — City of Las Vegas (@CityOfLasVegas) July 19, 2017Radamel Falcao had to be substituted during Monaco's victory over Fenerbahce.
Radamel Falcao hopes that he will be fit for Monaco's Champions League playoff matches despite being forced off against Fenerbahce on Wednesday and confirmed he plans to stay with the club.
Falcao, 30, made Monaco's opening goal and scored the second from the penalty spot as they beat the Turkish side 3-1 at home in the second leg of their third qualifying round tie.
That result was good enough for the principality club to qualify 4-3 on aggregate but Falcao did not feature in the second half due to a hamstring injury.
"I felt a pain in my leg," the Colombian striker told reporters after the game. "I hope I can be back for the playoff.
"It's a great qualification. We played very well and put a lot of energy in from the first minute. We were determined. I've been feeling very good since the start of preseason."
On his future, Falcao added: "Yes, I'm going to stay with Monaco this season."
Monaco vice-president Vadim Vasilyev said: "I spoke with Falcao. He's going to have some tests. We hope it's not too serious because he's very motivated."
The Champions League playoff first legs will take place on Aug. 16/17 and the second legs are scheduled for Aug. 23/24.
Vasilyev also said that prized assets like Falcao and Fabinho will be staying with the club for the remainder of their European adventure.
"We don't need to sell. Our accounts are balanced," he said.
Monaco were leading 2-0 when Falcao was replaced by Guido Carillo and their manager Leonardo Jardim was happy that they managed to respond to Fenerbahce's second-half fightback.
"Few people saw Monaco going through but we've qualified," he said. "When you talk about Falcao, you're talking about one of the best attackers in the world. When he goes off, it's not good news.
"But I think that Carillo and the other players retained a great attitude and good tactical discipline. I think we managed the second half well. Over the two games, we deserved to qualify."
Valere Germain scored twice on the night and Vasilyev is happy to see the striker back at the club following his loan spell at Nice last season.
"He's a child of the club,"' Vasilyev told reporters. "I'm very happy for him. He was very good for Nice but we prefer to have him with us."
Mark covers European football for ESPN FC. Twitter: @mroddenWEBSTER – Building Inspector Theodore Tetreault III said Friday he is “very close” to issuing an occupancy permit to a medical marijuana company for its manufacturing and distribution operation.
The Planning Board in August unanimously approved a site plan and special permit for Mass Organic Therapy's medical marijuana business, in a warehouse at 30 Worcester Road. That was the final significant local action prior to building.
The company will only grow the product here and dispense it to patients elsewhere.
Company officials at that time said the business plan calls for bar-coded, seed-to-seal tracking and operation from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. seven days a week.
The state allowed one cultivation site and up to three dispensaries for approved companies such as Mass Organic Therapy.
The company website, massorganictherapy.org, said it was awarded a provisional certificate of registration from the state in May, and its second certificate in July. Its dispensaries will be located in Hanover and Oxford.
The cultivation facility in Webster is located in a warehouse with five other tenants, and the company's building is 50,000 square feet. It initially built out 23,000 square feet.
Mr. Tetreault said the company built “exactly what they said.”
He added that the biggest holdup right now is with power. It is running on temporary power until National Grid can figure out a way to separate power from the former Cranston Print operation, which was originally two buildings, he said.
The medical marijuana company is putting 4,000 amps of power into the building, Mr. Tetreault said.
The inspector said the company is looking to the end of April through the second week in May to go online.
“But they want to start germinating seeds, and then after that it will be another three weeks, and then the full grow facility should be online, at least Phase 1 of it,” Mr. Tetreault said.
Joseph Lusardi, president of PalliaTech, an operations consultant for Mass Organic Therapy, has spoken in generalities about the company running a redundant security system that would be monitored by a third party, with every inch of the operation under surveillance, and each room to be accessed with identification control cards. He had declined to discuss security in greater details.
“Once this thing starts, nobody goes in,” Mr. Tetreault said. “Nobody. Security is pretty tight.”
Meanwhile, officials from the state Department of Public Health were intending to visit the building next week, to sign off on all of the company’s conditions, Mr. Tetreault said. That is needed before the inspector can approve occupancy, he said.
A DPH spokesman did not respond to an e-mail Friday.
Webster selectmen entered an agreement that mirrors the first-in-the-state cultivation agreement between Amesbury and Alternative Therapies Group Inc., which is growing medical marijuana for a dispensary in Salem for $50,000 per year, with ATG contributing no less than $5,000 to Amesbury public charities annually.
Patrick Johnson, Mass Organic's chief executive officer, has said the cultivation operation is expected to bring 20 to 30 full-time, high-paying jobs to Webster.Watchmen and V for Vendetta author has previously said ‘I have doubted that people will even be able to pick it up’
Comics legend Alan Moore has finished the first draft of his second novel, Jerusalem – and it runs to more than 1m words.
His daughter, Leah Moore, made the announcement on Facebook on Tuesday, adding with a wink that “now there’s just the small matter of copy editing” a book of that length, “and it’s all done”. To put that “more-than-a-million-word document” into context: Samuel Richardson’s doorstopper, Clarissa, runs to around 970,000 words, 200,000 more than the Bible. War and Peace is around 560,000 words long.
Moore, revered for creating comics including Watchmen and V for Vendetta, has been working on Jerusalem since 2008. It focuses on a small area – half a square mile across – of the town where he grew up, Northampton, and explores its history through stories from his family’s past, Moore’s take on historical events, and of course fantasy. “Any editor worth their salt would tell me to cut two-thirds of this book but that’s not going to happen. I doubt that Herman Melville had an editor – if he had, that editor would have told him to get rid of all that boring stuff about whaling: ‘Cut to the chase, Herman’,” he told the New Statesman in 2011.
Moore added at the time: “I have doubted that people will even be able to pick it up. I’m not averse to some kind of ebook, eventually – as long as I get my huge, cripplingly heavy book to put on my shelf and gloat over, I’ll be happy.”
The author has revealed intriguing details about the book in the past, telling the BBC in 2008 that a section will feature his brother’s adventures in the fourth dimension, while the “middle bit” is “a savage, hallucinating Enid Blyton”.
According to other interviews, there is also a “Lucia Joyce chapter, which is completely incomprehensible … all written in a completely invented sub-Joycean text”, a chapter in the form of a Samuel Beckett play, because the author once visited the town to play cricket, “a noir crime narrative based upon the Northampton pastor James Hervey, whom I believe was the father of the entire Gothic movement”, and “a combination of the ghost story and the drug narrative”.
“I am currently on the last official chapter,” he told the Guardian late last year, “which I am doing somewhat in the style of Dos Passos. It should be finished by the end of the year or close to it. I don’t know if anyone else will like it at all.”
There is no word yet on an official release date for the book, and Comics Beat reports that it has not yet got a publisher. “Now, how many years do you think it will take to give the first draft a run through?” wrote Heidi MacDonald. But “no matter how long it takes. Jerusalem will be an event when it finally appears.”One of the main goals while designing the Java language was to make application portability a reality. Java was designed in such a way that the same.class files created in one operating system can run seamlessly in another operating system or another computer without fail as long as the target system has a working Java Runtime Environment installed in it. Initially released Java runtimes had significantly slower performance when compared to other languages and their compilers such as C and C++. Subsequent releases of Java saw improvements at compiler level.
To give better performance at runtime, complex dynamic compilers called Just-In-Time(JIT) were introduced. JIT compilers selectively takes bytecodes of most frequently used methods in the application and convert them to native code during runtime. When method is compiled, JVM directly calls compiled method’s executable machine code rather than interpreting bytecode line by line. Due to the improvements done at compiler level in the various releases, JIT compilers run really fast these days and have enhanced the overall performance of Java applications.
But there are certain drawbacks with this approach. In case of a large and complex Java application, JIT compilers may take a long time to warm up. Java applications may contain methods that are not frequently used and hence never compiled at all. These methods may have to be interpreted while invoked. Due to repeated interpreted invocations, there could be performance problems.
Graal
Graal is an Oracle project aimed at implementing a high performance dynamic Java compiler and interpreter so that JVM based languages can achieve performance of native languages during runtime. There is a Java Enhancement Proposal [JEP 295] which has been put forward to use Graal with Java for Ahead Of Time Compilation.
Current Limitations Of AOT Compiler
It is not officially supported by Java 9 but is added as an experimental feature. Furthermore, AOT is currently restricted to 64 bit Linux based systems. Ahead Of Time compilation is done using a new tool jaotc instead of javac.
To use Ahead Of Time compilation, users need to use the same JDK for compilation and execution. Version information about jaotc used for compilation is added as a part of the libraries and are checked during load time. If the Java runtime is updated, you need to recompile the AOT compiled modules before executing them. Mismatch in jdk versions used for compilation and execution may result in application crashes.
Lambda expressions and other complex concepts of Java, which uses dynamically generated classes at runtime are not currently supported by AOT compiler. To generate shared object (.so) files, the system needs libelf to be pre-installed.
All these limitations maybe addressed in further releases in future.
Using AOT Compilation
Java AOT compiler can be invoked in same way as javac:
jaotc –output libTest.so Test.class 1 jaotc – output libTest. so Test. class
To execute the above AOT compiled binaries, we can execute:
java –XX:AOTLibrary=./libTest.so Test 1 java – XX : AOTLibrary =. / libTest. so Test
During startup, JVM’s AOT init module looks for shared libraries in known locations or those libraries specified using -XX:AOTLibrary construct. If there are no shared libraries, AOT will be turned off for the current JVM instance.
Important Runtime Flags And Options For AOT Support
Flag Description -XX:+/-UseAOT Use or don’t use AOT compiled files. By default, this flag is turned on. -XX:AOTLibrary One or more AOT compiled.so files can be specified with this tag. If there are more than one libraries, they are separated using a colon ( : ) -XX:+/-PrintAOT Enable/disable printing of used AOT classes and methods. -XX:+/-UseAOTStrictLoading Enable/disable AOT strict loading. If it is enabled, it directs JVM to exit if any of the AOT libraries have a configuration different from the current runtime configuration. –class-name List of java classes to compile. –jar List of jar files to compile. –module List of java modules to compile. –directory List of directories where files to compile can be found. aotclassload Creates a log when corresponding class is found in the.so file. exclude Exclude the specified methods during compilation. compileOnly Compiles only the specified methods. compile-for-tiered Generates compiled code with profiling. By default, profiling is not done. exit-on-error Exits on compilation error. info Prints information on compilation phase. debug Allows debugging. help Help menu for jaotc. version Prints version of jaotc. compile-with-assertions Generate compiled code with assertions. By default, assertions are not created.
Outcomes Of AOT
It is not always guaranteed that all applications will benefit from AOT compilation. Various limitations of current AOT compiler implementation in Java 9 were listed earlier in this article. If a user finds that an application created after compiling with jaotc starts up with a slower performance than usual, he is advised to switch off AOT compilation using -XX:-UseAOT and then recompile using javac compiler.
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La guerra contra el narco es una desgracia, pero yo no culpo a Calderón porque no es una guerra voluntaria sino una obligación del gobierno combatir al crimen.
Muchos dirán que hay más de 60 mil muertos y estoy de acuerdo en que es una tragedia, pero ¿Acaso el gobierno creó el narcotráfico? ¿Acaso el gobierno persigue a los narcos nada más para darse gusto? Claro que no, yo creo que si pudieran desaparecer el problema ya lo hubieran hecho por que les ha afectado mucho electoralmente.
Sesenta mil es un número escandaloso y la violencia siempre es trágica, pero habrán de saber que México tiene la tasa de homicidios per cápita más baja de Latinoamérica. ¿Eso no lo sabían verdad? Abajo está un link con mi fuente informativa. Sepan también que en el mismo sexenio de Calderón habrán muerto unas 144 mil personas en accidentes de tráfico, unas 240 mil por tabaquismo y unas 150 mil por alcoholismo. ¿También le van a echar la culpa del tabaquismo, el alcoholismo y las distracciones al manejar?
A todos los que recriminan al gobierno por enfrentarse al narcotráfico yo les pregunto si prefieren eso o que tengamos gobernadores cada vez más descaradamente narcotraficantes como el de Tamaulipas o el de Veracruz… y hasta el de Michoacán que quería meter a su primo Godoy de diputado para que no cayera a la cárcel. Y qué decir de las policías infiltradas de secuestradores y narcotraficantes.
Yo soy de los que piensa que si no se hubiera actuado con energía en este momento pronto íbamos a tener un problema como fue el de Colombia, donde Pablo Escobar ponía a los presidentes.
Desde ahora sé que me van a tachar de Prianista y de vendido y de idiota. Si no quieren abrirse al diálogo sólo demuestran su fanatismo.
Aquí están mis fuentes:
–http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/05/12/sociedad/042n1soc
–http://www.mexicomaxico.org/Voto/MortalidadCausas.htm
–http://www.sexenio.com.mx/articulo.php?id=12257
Cortesía de Mario MorenoThis has now become the strangest, most poorly acted episode of SVU anyone has ever seen. And anyone taking to any form of internet commentary to celebrate a still-in-doubt outcome of this sickening display is only fooling themselves.
As has been reiterated here time and again from Jump Street in this whole debacle, the numbers as a result of the culture we live in always said that this was going to go away with only the slightest inconvenience to Garbage Dick and any hockey proceedings, and now that is all but assured. But absolutely no one comes off looking even the slightest bit professional in this, from the DA to Kane’s camp to the accuser to most emphatically Hawks fans.
While District Attorney Frank Sedita tried to reclaim some semblance of control of the case with their press conference this morning, clearly things spiraled beyond their reach to allow things to get to this point. It was always going to be a “three ring circus” (Sedita’s exact words this morning), but the manner in which it got here could have been predicted by no one. Even from the get go, the sad predictability of the bar owner’s comments tainted public perception early on and it’s only worsened. It seems very unlikely that there is any way this can get even a clean grand jury proceeding let alone an actual trial, and Sedita’s regime will forever wear this case and will hurt the electability he does not mince words about craving.
The Hawks themselves, particularly John McDonough, will also be defined by this. A career’s worth of public relations genius is nearly totally undone at this point, as the team is inexorably linked with the player and this nightmare by their own doing. They chose to stand by their player, reluctantly or not, and give him the pulpit from which to profess his innocence as well as create no consequence for their franchise centerpiece in the crowning event of a lifetime of being enabled. The league itself also showed extreme cowardice in their mealy-mouthed buck passing to the Hawks. Last week at this time the consensus was that the press conference in South Bend was the absolute nadir of the situation, and yet it has gotten exponentially worse since then, with the team and league now being complicit in all of it, particularly telling female fans that being good at sports is a greater asset from a public relations standpoint than being under investigation for a sexual assault is a detriment.
Kane himself and his inner circle have always looked like clowns with his antics prior to these events, if choking women and hurling anti-semitic slurs can be labeled “antics”. But with the aforementioned bar owner and the compromised chauffeur/Buffalo police sergeant on Kane’s payroll coming more to the forefront, things only looked worse for all of them with the raised stakes, even with his complete bungling of his own press conference wherein there was not a question left unappreciated.
And sadly, the victim’s camp is now left with a mark as well. The truth to the origins and motivation behind the mystery evidence bag will likely never come out, but the last 16 hours have all but sealed the fate of this case. Their representation did them a profound disservice by not only going public with the information before it was fully vetted, but also by inadvertently serving up her actual name to the CHUDs. But it’s yet another shining example of the victim being on trial in sexual assault cases. Despite doing everything correctly on paper in going to the hospital and police immediately and not being a part of any kind of settlement talks, the process is still undermined by a mistake on her part, one which she may not have even been party to. And it’s a sickening and saddening commentary on this rape culture that a man with a history of grotesque behavior towards women is given far more benefit of the doubt than the accuser, even if this is a world class fuck up by her mother and her attorney. It once again goes back to intent versus outcome here. Regardless of whatever technicality or misstep that allows Patrick Kane to remain unpunished and enabled, the fact remains this woman felt wronged enough to go through the horrific re-victimization process, which speaks louder to the fact that something terrible happened that night in August than anything else.
But most of all, this has been an all-time ass-showing for any kind group of sports fans, right up there with the Penn State zombies. The response from people, the vast majority of which are white men, has been sickening and emblematic of just what exactly rape culture is. As Sam touched on yesterday even shouting “wait for the facts” from the highest mountain is a passive aggressive pile on to what makes it so difficult for women to come forward in situations like this, when it’s with someone famous or not. That things have spiraled out into the harassment of the victim on any form of social media available to people with only recently developed opposable thumbs is a revalidation of what the point here has always been: that sports and the men who play them are more important than any semblance of a feeling of safety women wrongly think they have a right to. That Julie DiCaro had to be held out of work today because of threats made against her for doing her job is absolutely revolting. And because of that the comments will be closed. We will in no way risk even passively providing a forum for such terrible behavior, let alone one with every single one of our real names attached to it. It is not possible to remove all vitriol and harassment from the internet, but we will control what we can here and on any other communication outlet that we can be found on.
Any so-called Hawks fan persisting that it’s a loud minority or that these people aren’t representative of them now need to take this cue and stand up and shout down these wretched wastes of oxygen. Anything less is tacit endorsement. Even if it’s as a result of the inalienable right of internet commenting being taken away being more important than any rights a woman has the arrogance to believe she has, at least it’s a half-assed step in the right direction. But it’s already too late. The damage has been done here and there will be no reclamation of dignity, let alone any justice done.The United States is working hard to recalibrate its national security strategy with an Asia-Pacific focus. If China can act boldly, it has multiple avenues for countering it.
For the past several months, the United States has been busy promoting its “pivot” toward the Asia-Pacific and Indo-Pacific regions. Free from conflict in Iraq, and with the winding down of its involvement in Afghanistan apparently accelerating, the U.S. now has more freedom to focus its strategic muscle on this dynamic part of the world. Through pronouncements in the press, and with some carefully crafted diplomatic and strategic jockeying, the United States is gradually reasserting itself in the region.
Such a shift is no surprise to anyone who has been following recent geopolitical events. Militarily, the United States made its intentions clear in the 2007 Maritime Strategy report under the George W. Bush administration. While still engaged in two wars in the Middle East, U.S security planners were still crafting a change of strategy well before the withdrawal of forces in Iraq and Afghanistan had been finalized.
In March 2011, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton all but declared that a new game was afoot. “We are in a competition for influence with China,” she told the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “Let’s put aside the humanitarian, do-good side of what we believe in. Let's just talk straight realpolitik. We are in competition with China.”
Such a shift makes sense for a number of reasons. The Asia-Pacific and Indo-Pacific regions are home to some of the world’s fastest growing economies. With America’s precarious economic position, gaining access to such markets offers the prospect of more American jobs and a boost to a still sluggish economy.
But it’s hard to escape the reality that China is the key reason for the U.S. refocusing. With the United States having spent the better part of the last decade fighting conflicts in the Middle East, China has meanwhile gone to great lengths to enhance its strategic position in East Asia. Beijing has steadily increased its armed forces budget over the last decade. With its advances in anti-access weapons and asymmetrical arms, U.S. forces are, according to one scholar, “On the wrong side of physics.” While U.S. military forces outgun their Chinese rivals, recent studies suggest China’s military budget will double by 2015, meaning a China-centric strategy makes sense.
Still, it’s important not to overstate the speed with which the U.S. pivot – and the associated China concerns – have taken place. The fact is that U.S. -China tensions aren’t exactly new. Indeed, seemingly lost in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks is the fact that the United States and China faced off in the Taiwan Strait in 1996 and in 2001 over an aircraft collision near Hainan Island. In The Diplomat last May, Frank Ching correctly pointed out, “Bush himself had already repudiated the Clinton administration’s policy of forging a strategic partnership with China, calling Beijing a strategic competitor, rather than a strategic partner.” Several days after the return of its EP-3 surveillance crew, the U.S. offered Taiwan a massive arms package. With tensions brewing “shifts in attitudes in both nations seem to be pointing to a showdown.”Jesselyn Radack came into the Justice Department through the Attorney General’s Honors Program and worked as an ethics adviser until she found herself embroiled in a scandal that arose because she dispensed advice senior political appointees didn’t want to hear. The scandal became aggravated when Justice officials made false statements about her advice in representations to a federal judge. Radack, a recipient of the 2012 Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award, is now the director of national security and human rights at the Government Accountability Project, where she counsels and represents whistleblowers. I put six questions to her about her book, Traitor, and her career battling for ethics compliance at a powerful institution that sometimes takes the low road to success.
1. In a recent speech at Northwestern University in Chicago, Attorney General Eric Holder cited the John Walker Lindh prosecution as an important accomplishment for the Justice Department in battling terrorism. Lindh, a young man described by President Bush as a “Marin County hot-tubber,” was vilified by the Justice Department after his capture in late 2001 as the “American Taliban.” Is there something about the Lindh case that Holder doesn’t know?
I’m surprised Holder brought up Lindh’s case, much less hailed the Justice Department’s anemic performance as an achievement. Lindh, our first capture in the Afghanistan war and one of its most prominent prisoners, became a symbolic surrogate for bin Laden in an extremely high-profile terrorism case that ultimately imploded.
Holder is too smart not to “know,” or to remember, the trophy photos of Lindh—naked, blindfolded, tied up, and bound to a board with duct tape—that circulated worldwide. That was our first glimpse of American-sponsored torture, and we didn’t even flinch. Lindh’s treatment was a harbinger of what would occur on a much larger scale at the American-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and elsewhere.
But Holder may be unaware that the criminal case collapsed in large part due to the government’s mistreatment of Lindh and its mishandling of the case. I was the Justice Department legal-ethics adviser who warned not to interrogate Lindh for purposes of a U.S. criminal case without his counsel present. I gave that advice after the Department had been told, unambiguously, that Lindh was represented by an attorney. My advice was ignored. I then advised that the tainted interrogation should not be used against him in a criminal prosecution. Again my advice was disregarded, and it later disappeared from the office file while the Justice Department was under a court order to produce it.
The main legal issue in the criminal case against Lindh turned on whether the confession he made to FBI interrogators in Afghanistan should be admissible at trial. My emails were central to that question. They documented that he was represented by counsel and could not be interrogated without his lawyer, and that the FBI had committed an ethics violation in doing so, the fruits of which could not be used against him in a prosecution.
Lindh faced the possibility of three life sentences, plus an additional ninety years in prison. Holder has conveniently “forgotten” that the case ended suddenly on the day the suppression hearing was due to begin, which would have determined the admissibility of Lindh’s interrogation. Lindh ended up pleading guilty to two relatively minor regulatory infractions, one of which was not even related to terrorism.
2. So the Justice Department misled the district-court judge, T. S. Ellis III, by failing to disclose the advice you gave, which would have confirmed that Main Justice knew Lindh had a lawyer and had advised FBI agents that they were ethics-bound, for the purposes of building a criminal case, not to interview him without his lawyer present. Did the Justice Department ever investigate who purged the relevant documents from the file?
Despite my lawyer’s request in June 2002 and a request by Senator Edward M. Kennedy in March 2003, the Justice Department did not investigate who purged the file. My attorney provided the Justice Department’s Inspector General with information about this.
Sometimes an IG investigation focuses on troubling facts that a whistleblower has disclosed; other times the IG starts investigating the whistleblower instead—and that’s what happened to me. After seven months of a pretextual investigation, the IG told my attorney that he had “looked into” my whistleblower allegations, and that he was “not going to pursue it.” Obviously the IG didn’t look very deeply. He didn’t even bother to ask me, the whistleblower, what had happened. Not bothering to interview the complainant shows where the IG’s priorities lay. Moreover, Justice never responded to the congressional request.
Instead, in 2003, the IG placed me under criminal investigation (for what, I was never told), referred me to the state bars in which I’m licensed as an attorney (based on a secret report to which I did not have access), and put me on the No Fly List. Although the criminal case was dropped a year later without charges ever being filed, and although the Maryland bar quickly dismissed the charges as unfounded, the D.C. bar referral against me is still pending after more than eight years. Meanwhile, even though the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that John Yoo and federal judge Jay Bybee, who wrote the infamous torture memos, had engaged in serious professional misconduct, it never referred their cases to bar associations. But it did bring charges against me for dispensing correct ethics advice, the existence of which later proved embarrassing to the Department. These two cases say a lot about the Justice Department’s attitude toward professional ethics.
3. What role did the media play in the railroading of Lindh?
Lindh’s capture occurred shortly after 9/11, and the resulting attention was nothing short of mass hysteria, with both the Justice Department and the public at large clamoring for his death.
Newsweek first broke the story, dubbing Lindh the “American Taliban.” Colin Soloway of Newsweek interviewed Lindh on December 1, while he was waiting to be taken into military custody, even though Lindh was barely alive, seriously wounded, disoriented, and suffering from dehydration and hypothermia. Then there was the even more famous televised interview by CNN freelancer Robert Young Pelton, who interviewed Lindh at a naval hospital about a week later. Lindh was delirious and in critical condition, but he told Pelton multiple times not to film him. Lindh had a bullet in his thigh, shrapnel wounds, and was sedated. Pelton filmed him despite his protestations, and that interview was televised around the world.
People in political and media circles demonized Lindh. The case was constantly in the news, and every journalist in print, radio, and television seemed to be reading off the Justice Department’s script as the government released a steady stream of false, misleading, and inflammatory propaganda to the media. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, and Senators Clinton and McCain made prejudicial statements that Lindh was an Al Qaeda fighter, had fired his weapon, had attended a terrorist training camp, and had foreknowledge of 9/11—even though the government, from the first day of Lindh’s capture, possessed facts to the contrary. The media acted largely as a stenographer, rather than doing any independent investigation.
Shortly before Lindh’s suppression hearing (which would determine whether his interrogation—the one I advised against—could be used against him), I heard a radio broadcast stating that the Justice Department had “never” taken the position that Lindh was entitled to counsel, a sentiment that I learned had been expressed repeatedly during the preceding weeks and months. I knew this statement was untrue. It also indicated to me that the Justice Department had not turned over my emails to the court pursuant to the discovery order. I did not believe the department would have the temerity to make public statements contradicted by its own court filings if the emails had indeed been provided. This led me to blow the whistle.
4. Who had the most to lose had the facts about document destruction come out?
Clearly the government. It would have revealed prosecutorial misconduct that would probably have led the government to drop the case. More significantly, it would have revealed the government’s torture program during its embryonic stages. After 9/11, John Yoo worked in the Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, which used to be considered the “conscience of the Justice Department.” That office takes up the most significant and sensitive topics facing the federal government. As the government’s ultimate legal adviser, its memoranda have the effect of binding legal authority on the government. Yoo drafted a set of secret legal opinions that later became known as the “torture memos.” They advised the president, CIA, and defense department on the use of mental and physical torture techniques—such as waterboarding—and stated that such acts might be legally permissible under an expansive interpretation of presidential authority during the “War on Terror.”
In 2008, the book Bush’s Law, by Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Eric Lichtblau, revealed that the White House knew that providing documents to Lindh’s defense team would produce damning details about his custody and the nascent torture program. The head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, Michael Chertoff, got word through back channels that White House officials—who are supposed to be insulated from the Justice Department—were meeting to discuss what to do about Lindh and the discovery issue. The Justice Department was ticked off that it was being cut out of the loop, but White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales (long before he became Attorney General) made clear that the White House was calling the shots. Gonzales, in his capacity as White House Counsel, had decided not to turn over any documents to Lindh’s defense lawyers. “We’re not going to provide discovery,” Gonzales said—as if discovery were optional and not a legal obligation, and as if it were the White House’s call to make. So the decision to defy the court’s orders was actually made in the White House, and the evasion was completely deliberate.
Because of the plea agreement, however, it wasn’t until the Abu Ghraib scandal in May 2004 that the torture memos started leaking out—the start of a steady drumbeat of horror that became one of the biggest scandals of the Bush Administration.
5. You have titled your book Traitor. What do you mean by this? Who is the traitor?
“Traitor” is meant as a double entendre. Lindh was demonized as the traitor incarnate, but he turned out to be an inconsequential figure. The Bush Administration seized upon him because it had failed to find any of the key leaders—Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, or Mullah Omar. I started out as a well-regarded Justice Department ethics attorney, but was transmogrified into a “traitor,” “turncoat,” and “terrorist sympathizer” (in the words of anonymous government officials) simply for doing my job and dispensing ethics advice. Another layer to the title is that whistleblowers are often disparaged as “snitches” or “traitors” for reporting fraud, waste, abuse, and illegality. But in the end, the Bush Administration was the real traitor. It took illegal, unethical, and unconstitutional actions—contrary to American democratic principles and values, and the rule of law—to achieve dubious ends. And unfortunately some of those unlawful practices continue today under the Obama Administration, pursued in the name of national security and fighting terrorism.
6. If the Justice Department in fact used deceit and misrepresentation to secure a plea bargain with Lindh that resulted in a twenty-year jail sentence, wouldn’t it |
necessary something you may need right away but if you are making music in today’s world, you know bass and 808s are the name of the game (At least in pop culture for now).
So if you want to add some extra bass (Low end) to your mixes with crystal clear precision, adding a studio subwoofer to studio monitors may help.
Especially with the Yamaha HS8s.
Relax...
It’s just another friendly jab at the HS8s but in reality it’s actually true. They lack bass. However, with a studio monitor subwoofer, I’m sure they more than make up for it.
So just to reiterate, studio subwoofers are necessary but if you think your studio monitors lack bass, at least now you have an option.
If a company is making studio monitors, they are mot likely making their own subwoofer as well. However, it’s not necessary to get a subwoofer from the same brand.
Studio Controller
Now this may seem more of an additional accessory in the beginning but once you start making good music, you would want to speed up your workflow. Just so you can make music much faster and more of.
You might have seen this little silver or grey box with a knob or two in some studios.
What you saw was most likely something known as a studio controller.
To speed things up, a studio controller (Sometimes referred to as a switcher) can definitely help. I’m actually looking for one myself.
Once you get good, the idea is to dramatically speed things up and if you have a studio subwoofer attached, you can use this controller for not just the studio monitors but even your subwoofer as well.
This studio controller by Mackie seems to be quite popular.
80 Reviews Mackie DJ Controller, 2x2 (Big KNOB Passive) Excruciatingly simple 2x2 monitor controller
Choose between two sources and two monitor pairs
Pristine audio quality
Sturdy built-like-a-tank design
Classic Big knob volume control
Best Way To Select Studio Monitors
Now after you’ve done some research and I hope this page helped, the final test is to go to your local music store and hear the difference yourself.
That’s how everyone buys them so don’t worry about asking the clerk.
They expect it.
Anyways, this is how everyone else does it and how I did it myself as well (I went down to the local Tome Lee Music we have here).
In fact, it was because of this ‘listening test’ that I completely got sold on the Neuman KH 120 A. The size is perfect for my small room (Definitely the best small studio monitors), the highs are super clear especially when compared to the KRK Rokits (Which is just horrendous) and the bass is way better than Yamaha HS8s (Which I originally went in to get).
How To Connect Your Studio Monitors
To setup your studio monitors, you need a few things.
After all, it’s not like you’re connecting a pair of regular speakers.
Here is what you will need:
Music desk
XLR Cables (6Ft minimum)
Power Bar
Audio Interface
Studio Monitor Stands (Maybe optional)
Music Desk
For obvious reasons, you do need a place to set your studio monitors on. As long as your desk is sturdy and wide enough to place your studio monitors, you should be good.
You can always look into studio monitor stands but again, it depends on the room you have.
XLR Cables
Well professional studio monitors aren’t something you can just plug in with normal everyday wires. After all, they do pass a lot of information so the wires need to be strong enough to carry such strong electrical signals.
XlR cables are heavy duty cables that help transfer massive information (High quality audio) from your daw through your speakers.
In the professional music equipment world, xlr cables are kind of a standard.
Power Bar
You don’t necessarily need a power bar but if you can get one it would just keep things intact. I got one and it definitely helps. Especially as you start to expand your home studio with other things that may require external power.
Audio Interface
Now the main ingredient to this entire equation is an audio interface.
An audio interface serves as a bridge between your powerful monitors and your computer.
[Show Visual]
Yo can try connecting them to your computer directly but either your computer is going to get super over heated or your monitors will blow up. Either way, it’s a safety hazard.
Plus having an audio interface allows you to control other things as well like your professional microphone, an external instrument like a guitar and a few others.
Basically, an audio interface is designed to help you balance the load of not just your studio monitors but anything else that’s external.
This could be mics, external instruments like a guitar or a drum set, multitrack recorders and the list goes on.
I guess you can say that an audio interface is the “load bearer” for many other professional add-ons or other instruments that you may want to try playing with.
So long story short, it’s a definite necessity.
Studio Monitor Stands
Finally, if you think you need them, it’s always good to get studio monitor stands. You can also look into desktop studio monitor stands (Stands to place on the desks rather than beside it). They are a easily managed and can simply be placed on your existing desk.
Well that’s pretty much it.
Now after you setup your studio monitors, the final step is to keep making music on a regular basis.
Where To Buy Studio Monitors
Today Studio Monitors are available at all proper music equipment stores. Online and Offline. Whether you live in North America, Malaysia, Singapore, NZ (New Zealand), Perth or just someone looking for studio monitor stands in India, you will find them around at pretty much any music store.
Just make sure you get them from a very large and trusted store (Online or brick and mortar) so you get them at the best price possible.
Can you use studio monitors for regular speakers?
You sure can.
However, I encourage you to keep your studio monitors separate because first they are going to be the moat expensive part of your home studio and second, just buy some regular speakers for a few hundred bucks at the most and use them.
Why spoil your nice studio monitors for no reason right?
How To Connect Studio Monitors To pc?
As mentioned earlier, to connect your studio monitors to your pc or macbook pro, you need an audio interface. An audio interface will help take the load of your Studio Monitors so your pc or mac performance isn’t effected or overloaded at all.
How to connect studio monitors to an audio interface?
To hook up studio monitors to an audio interface, you would need to get your self some XLR cables. Each XLR cable should also have a male socket on one end and a female one on the other. XLR cables are especially designed to withstand the high electrical power that is transported in the process.AsianScientist (Nov. 9, 2016) – Scientists in China and the UK have carried out a study investigating to what extent natural variability and human economic activities affect the regional climate of Northeast Asia. Their findings were published in Advances in Atmospheric Sciences.
Northeast Asia includes the areas of Northeast China, the Russian Far East, Japan and the Korean Peninsula. Climate variability and change impose enormous challenges for this region, with its rapidly developing economy and large population. Natural climate variability and human economic activites (anthropogenic forcings) both modulate regional climate, particularly in regions sensitive to global climate change, such as Northeast Asia.
According to the findings of scientists from the University of Reading in the UK and the Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, warming in surface mean temperature is accompanied by significant changes in certain temperature extremes: increases in the summer mean daily maximum temperature; daily minimum temperature; annual hottest day temperature; and annual warmest night temperature.
Climate model experiments that include changes in sea surface temperature (SST), sea ice extent (SIE) and anthropogenic forcings reproduced the general patterns of observed changes. Meanwhile, experiments that simulated individual forcings suggested that changes in SST and SIE play a dominant role in summer mean surface warming, but reduced aerosol precursor emissions over Europe play an important role in changes of some temperature extremes.
“As long as greenhouse gas concentrations continue to increase and anthropogenic aerosol precursor emissions over both North America and Europe continue to decrease, the abrupt summer surface warming and increases in hot temperature extremes over Northeast Asia since the mid-1990s will probably sustain in the next few decades,” predicted corresponding author Dr. Dong Buwen from the University of Reading.
The article can be found at: Dong et al. (2016) Abrupt Summer Warming and Changes in Temperature Extremes over Northeast Asia since the Mid-1990s: Drivers and Physical Processes.
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Source: Chinese Academy of Sciences; Photo: Pixabay.
Disclaimer: This article does not necessarily reflect the views of AsianScientist or its staff.Republicans, super mad at CNBC. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
As you certainly know by now, the third Republican debate, moderated by anchors from CNBC, was an excruciating exercise in throwing insults at the 2016 Republican field. Or so one might think if he were to read the reviews after the fact.
The Republican Party was so incensed at CNBC's behavior that on Friday it cancelled a future debate that was sponsored by NBC. This was not done because the party itself was under fire from candidates for their handling of the event, and it was not because CNBC is relatively impotent, and it was not because the Republican base hates the media and this could be a good way for the also-disliked party to make good with its voters. It was not because of those reasons! It was because the CNBC people were so bad, is why.
I mean, why do I have to spell this out when one of the candidates made the point better than I could? "If I were sitting at home and watching this back and forth," the candidate said, "I would be inclined to turn it off. … I think it's important we get to the issues, because that's what people want." Preach, brother! Get to the issues, moderators!
Granted, that was Gov. John Kasich (R) talking to the moderators at the second Republican debate, hosted by CNN. But we assume he really was thinking ahead to the much-more-unfair CNBC debate to come.
The CNBC debate was so unfair and so mean that we are sure you'll have no trouble picking out the totally rude questions their moderators asked on the quiz below. Should be obvious! After all, the RNC didn't end its relationship with Fox News or CNN.HARRISON TOWNSHIP, MI - Aircraft from Selfridge Air National Guard Base will fly over the Detroit area and other spots in Michigan Tuesday. The military flights will soar over the Detroit River, capitol region in Lansing, and the Mackinac Bridge Tuesday morning and afternoon, officials from the base said. During that time, people might "see or hear two or three different types of military aircraft" in the area. The aircraft will be flying at lower altitudes than typical, according to the base, but will still be "well within Federal Aviation Administration safety standards." Selfridge Air National Guard Base, one of the oldest military air fields in continuous service, has operated since July 1, 1917. The base also houses units from the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection.
Ian Thibodeau is the business and development reporter for MLive Media Group in Detroit. He can be reached at ithibode@mlive.com, or follow him on Twitter.The polls close at 7 pm on Tuesday night in what may prove the most closely watched House special election in years — the race for Georgia’s Sixth Congressional District.
Democrat Jon Ossoff has emerged as the leader in a crowded field of 18 contenders vying to replace former Rep. Tom Price, now President Donald Trump’s health and human services secretary. Ossoff has raised more than $8 million, far more than any of the other candidates, and most polling — though notoriously unpredictable for special elections — pegs him at around 43 percent of the vote.
However, Ossoff isn’t just looking to get more votes than anyone else — he’s hoping to clear 50 percent of the vote total, which would allow him to avoid a runoff in June against the second-place candidate.
Doing that would probably require the leading Republican contenders — Georgia’s former Secretary of State Karen Handel and Bob Gray, a local council member and business executive — to see dramatic falls in GOP turnout from November’s election.
And that’s far from a sure bet.
“It becomes a huge deal if [Ossoff] actually wins outright — then you can say, ‘Wow, there really is something to this political strength of this resistance here,’” said Charles Bullock, a political scientist at Georgia State University, in an interview on Monday. “But if he gets a little over 40 percent and fails to clear the runoff, that’s a good showing for the Democrats but not particularly extraordinary.”
Who is running?
Georgia’s congressional races operate by what’s called a “jungle primary”: They’re open to all parties, and if any one candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote (which for this race happens on April 18), then that candidate takes the seat outright.
But if nobody clears the 50 percent threshold, then the two candidates who got the most votes — regardless of party affiliation — advance to a second round, held for this race on June 20.
The possibility of making it to a runoff has led 18 candidates — 13 Republicans and five Democrats — to enter the race.
Ossoff is the only Democrat to poll above single digits. The 30-year-old is a former congressional aide and campaign manager for Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA), who represents Atlanta. On the trail, Ossoff talks of staffing national security issues for Johnson and his degree from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, but the Georgia GOP has tried to paint him as something of a frat boy.
A $1.1 million Star Wars–themed TV ad buy from a GOP Super PAC depicts him playing beer pong and dressing as Han Solo in an attack on his “experience.” Ossoff also does not live in the district, which Republicans have mentioned in attack ads against him.
Handel and Gray, the leading Republicans, have both been polling at around 15 percent. Handel is widely viewed as the candidate of the Republican establishment — she has been endorsed by the state Republican Party’s campaign chair, as well as Sandy Springs Mayor Rusty Paul and former US Sen. Saxby Chambliss.
Gray, meanwhile, has tapped into the more fiercely conservative voters in the Georgia Sixth. The Club for Growth, a conservative advocacy group, has launched an ad campaign against Handel, trying to denounce her as “big-spending career politician” due to her record as secretary of state.
Gray has also tried to position himself as the candidate to help President Trump “drain the swamp,” launching attacks against Handel that could fracture the Republican electorate even if they can keep Ossoff below 50 percent.
“It’s time to stand with President Trump, and I intend to be a willing partner to move this country forward,” Gray said at a recent East Cobb gathering of Republicans, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “It’s time to drain the swamp.”
Why does this matter?
This district is not one Democrats would normally have any business seriously contesting. Republicans have held the district, mostly composed of affluent suburbs north of Atlanta, with ease since 1979. Newt Gingrich and Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA) both held the seat. It’s gone red by about 30 points in each of the past five races, including in 2016, when Tom Price won it in a landslide.
“It’s a gerrymandered, suburban, Republican district,” says Phil Lunney, legislative liaison for the Fulton County Democrats. “It’s a really hard place for us to win.”
But though they were crushed at the local level, something in November’s returns gave Georgia’s Democrats a cause for hope. In a dramatic swing from the past four presidential elections, Trump only won the Georgia Sixth by 1.5 points. (Mitt Romney won it by 24 points in 2012.)
Trump seems to have noticed, and he recorded a robocall that went out to voters in the district on Monday:
A loss today for Georgia Republicans, particularly after their party’s scare in Kansas earlier this month, would signal that the grassroots anti-Trump activism following the election could translate into real electoral success. And that’s something Democrats would be very eager to celebrate.
Correction: A previous version of this story misstated the poll closing time.Energy Secretary Rick Perry was reportedly the target of Russian pranksters who convinced him he was speaking with officials on behalf of Ukrainian Prime Minister Vladimir Groisman.
The 20-minute conversation focused on the cooperation between Kiev and Washington on energy issues, cybersecurity, and the nation's efforts to "develop" a new biofuel.
Russian pranksters, Vladimir Kuznetsov ("Vovan") and Alexei Stolyarov ("Lexus") sparked Perry's interest in a new biofuel that they said Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko invented himself. According to Pravada Report, the pranksters told Perry the fuel was made from a mixture of home-brewed alcohol and pig manure.
In response, Perry sought more detailed information about the "scientific development."
The pair has a history of pranking U.S. lawmakers. In February, they pranked Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky to talk to them about anti-Russian sanctions. They also recently pranked Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., causing her to express worry over Russia's "offensive on Korea."
In 2015, the pair famously pranked Elton John claiming to be Vladimir Putin shortly after the singer criticized his stance on LGBT rights.
"Secretary Perry is the latest target of two Russian pranksters," Energy Department spokeswoman Shaylyn Hynes said in an email to the Washington Post. "These individuals are known for pranking high-level officials and celebrities, particularly those who are supportive of an agenda that is not in line with their governments. In this case, the energy security of Ukraine."Yes we’re still talking about Godzilla, because the G train doesn’t have brakes. Today we’re here to talk about how there’s only one copy of the original Godzilla roar.
The roar belonging to the OG Godzilla from the 50’s is easily one of the most iconic noises in all of movie history, only being trumped by universally recognised noises like the Wilhelm scream, Darth Vader’s cough and the sound Jaws makes when he farts.
Now originally the people behind the 1954 Godzilla movie toyed with the idea of using a combination of various animals cries mixed together for Godzilla’s roar, however, no combination of animals cries seemed right. Simply put, even combining the noise made by a chorus of bears being attacked by a flock of lions and mixing it in with a future Iron Maiden concert didn’t make a noise that properly conveyed how awe-inspiring Godzilla was.
After countless tries at creating something interesting, the task of creating a distinctive cry for Godzilla was handed off to one, Akira Ifukube, who created the now legendary cry by rubbing a leather glove along the strings of a bass guitar. Yes, that awesome, spine-chilling noise that has been reproduced countless times in hundreds of forms of media was produced by a guy bitch-slapping a bass guitar.
Regardless of how it was created, the cry has since taken on a life of its own and it is now literally one of the most recognisable sounds in cinema history. Which is doubly impressive when you realise that their is only one copy of the original recording in existence.
If you’re not sure why this is important we’ll try to explain while hopefully not getting too technical. Now the original copy created 60 years ago is an analogue recording because, well, they didn’t have any other choice back then, luckily though analogue recording is largely regarded to be superior to digital recording because it captures everything. The downside of this superior quality though is that analogue recordings are more prone to degradation than digital recordings which is kind of a problem when you only own one copy.
As you may or may not know, every time you copy something you invariably cause it to degrade ever so slightly, so even if they managed to produce a high quality copy of the G Man’s roar from this original recording, it would never be as good by definition. So as you can imagine, Toho (the people who own the rights to the character) are very careful with what they do with the only surviving recording of it. Of course you could always say that they could just record the roar again, but let’s be honest here, people would know and they’d never stop complaining about it.
Which is what makes Toho’s decision to send Legendary the only copy of the roar so amazing, they literally sent Legendary a piece of the original Godzilla and let them use it while creating their version of the character. So now every time this new version of Godzilla roars, he’s technically roaring just like his granddaddy! Awwww!
As if that wasn’t cool enough on it’s own, the crew apparently constructed a several thousand watt speaker system and played it at max volume just so they could experience a Godzilla roar, for real. We’ll be honest, if that was an experience you could pay for, we’d have sent these guys our wallets when they first started making this movie.New WWE NXT talent Kana just spoke with Brian Fritz of SportingNews.com to discuss her signing. The full interview is at this link. Below are highlights:
First of all, congratulations on your signing with WWE. Why is now the right time for you in your career to make this decision?
“I have been in this business for 10 years and have accomplished almost everything there is to accomplish. I was looking for a new challenge and when the opportunity came up with WWE, the timing just felt right.”
Have you always thought about coming to the WWE, or is this something you entertained more recently before it came together?
“Even though I was in Japan the majority of my career, I was always captivated by the allure of WWE and their worldwide appeal. There is no bigger stage in sports entertainment, so it has always been in the back of my mind.”
What is your relationship with Triple H (Paul Levesque) and what did he say to you about joining the company and how he envisions you fitting in?
“He has been my favorite WWE Superstar of all time, so it has been amazing to interact with him and get his feedback. He told me he was expecting a lot from me, and I want to make him proud.”
I mentioned some of the talented women in the company. Is there any one or two in particular you look forward to getting in the ring with and why?Media playback is not supported on this device Shelvey wins young player award
Liverpool midfielder Jonjo Shelvey has set his sights on a first-team spot at Anfield after winning the Football League's young player of the month award while on loan at Blackpool.
The 19-year-old won November's award after scoring four goals in five games.
"I have got to try to force my way into the Liverpool team and stay there," Shelvey said. "I feel this is a good chance for me to kick on.
"Being at Blackpool has helped get me back into Liverpool's plans."
Shelvey was recalled by the Reds at the end of November after a season-ending injury to Lucas Leiva and played for three minutes as a substitute at the end of Saturday's victory over QPR.
DID YOU KNOW? Shelvey says the last award he won was for a golf tournament in Liverpool shortly after moving to Anfield in May 2010
With Liverpool skipper Steven Gerrard still on the sidelines and midfielder Jay Spearing missing the next two games through suspension, Essex-born Shelvey is keen to make the most of the opportunity.
The former Charlton man, who joined Liverpool for an initial £1.7m in May 2010, added: "There is only so much I can do on and off the pitch - selection is down to [manager] Kenny Dalglish but, if he does come calling, I will be ready - and hopefully I can take my chance.
"I think that going out on loan has helped me get my confidence back up and I think I am showing that in training back here."
Shelvey made the loan move to the Seasiders at the end of September after asking Dalglish if he could leave Anfield temporarily in search of first-team football.
"When you are not playing at Liverpool it gets you down, and you sometimes need to go away and play games," he said.
He scored six goals in 10 games during the full spell, including a hat-trick in a stunning 5-0 win at Leeds.
And he is adamant his spell at Bloomfield Road also helped him sharpen his match fitness after finding his route to the first team at Anfield blocked.
SHELVEY'S STORY Still only 19, the midfielder made his Charlton debut against Barnsley aged 16 years and 59 days in April 2008
The youngest player to score for Charlton with an FA Cup goal against Norwich in January 2009 - 55 days before he turned 17
Bought by Liverpool in May 2010 for an initial £1.7m
Loaned to Blackpool on 30 September, scoring six goals in 10 games
Has represented England at U16, U17, U19 and U21 level
Shelvey said: "Every time you play you get sharper - it brings you half a yard closer to the ball and you no longer feel sluggish.
"Blackpool is a great club to play for and the attacking way they play suited me down to the ground."
Seasiders boss Ian Holloway said Shelvey's performances for the Championship club had given everyone at the club a lift.
"He was fantastic," Holloway said. "He had a lot of frustration when he first came.
"I think he has all sorts of talent and will never lose that. Hopefully he will get the chance to use that and shine because he really suited us.
"The boy is good enough to play anywhere and in our system floating in off the right he was dynamic. He has gone a long way to giving us some confidence and making us realise we can win some games.
"I hope his career goes from strength to strength."
Liverpool play Aston Villa at Villa Park on Sunday, marking the start of a sequence of five top-flight games in 16 days over the festive period.
Shelvey's only appearance this season prior to his loan move was as a late substitute in the 3-1 Carling Cup win at Exeter on 24 August.
He made 21 appearances during the 2010-11 season, but just four were starts and he failed to score.Mr Hockey's case was a microcosm of the main underlying problem, she said. The Treasurer was awarded $200,000 in damages for a poster by the Sydney Morning Herald and two tweets by The Age relating to the "Treasurer for sale" story about a Liberal Party fundraising group. He failed in the core of his claim relating to the underlying articles. Fairfax will pay just 15 per cent of Mr Hockey's recoverable costs following a Federal Court decision on Wednesday, leaving the Treasurer with a possible shortfall of around $300,000.
Justice Gibson said that the Defamation Act was rife with drafting problems and needed a complete overhaul that included redefining what a publication was, taking into account electronic media and whether damages should be the same for all publications.
Responsible reporting
Among concerns was the continued rejection by Australian courts of the statutory qualified privilege defence, which was initially anticipated as a bulwark protection for serious and investigative journalism. Journalists must show they acted responsibly according to a checklist, including taking steps to verify the facts and seeking comment from the claimant.
"How do you give someone sufficient notice or include their reply if you are sending a tweet?" queried Justice Gibson.
"Should you offer them 70 of the 140 characters? Defamation legislation, especially defences, are poorly designed to cope with electronic publication."
There was also no "science" in the award of damages, Justice Gibson added.
Last year a student was ordered to pay a NSW school teacher $105,000 for defaming her on Twitter and Facebook. The large award has been partly blamed for a spike in claims, particularly by unrepresented litigants, which many hope could be dampened by Fairfax's success against Mr Hockey in the battle over legal costs.
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Judge Gibson said a "serious harm" threshold should be introduced to prevent trivial claims.
"If we don't have a serious harm test, at least we could have some sort of common law developed concept of proportionality that would enable courts to say you can't spend a million against an old lady over a cake recipe."
Former Fairfax in-house counsel, barrister Mark Polden, said the low marginal cost of production in cyberspace meant low-grade defamatory comment was on the rise – and there were risks to mainstream media if they elected to carry it.
Defamation remained extraordinarily plaintiff-friendly, he said.
"It presumes that what has been published is completely false, and once publication has been proven it also presumes damage to reputation."
Tweets and other forms of social media were similar in some ways to a newspaper poster, which the law treated as a stand-alone publication, he said, but there were important differences.
"Some, perhaps most, readers will have viewed the individual tweet or Facebook post in context with other comments in the feed.
"That means that an individual tweet or post which cannot reasonably be understood as defaming the plaintiff on its own may still attract a defamation action based on other material accompanying the feed."
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Law on the back foot
Minter Ellison partner Peter Bartlett said that advances in technology had been so rapid the law could not keep up.
The $366,000 cap on damages had not reduced the number of claims and claims involving social media had increased. Plaintiffs were claiming multiple caps by lodging multiple claims over the same story run in a publisher's various papers and online publications, he said.
"Many of these actions create real problems for the judiciary as the issues raised are complex but one or other of the parties is unrepresented by lawyers," Mr Bartlett said.
Mr Bartlett said the defence of qualified privilege, upon which Fairfax failed in the Hockey case, had been so narrowly interpreted by the courts that it was "basically useless".
"Judges have interpreted the defamation laws in such a way that few can fully understand them. Even judges cannot always agree on what the law is," Mr Bartlett said.
Most defamation lawyers said overall there had been an increase in the number of complaints and the figures did not account for the vast majority of disputes which were resolved short of legal action.
The number of NSW District Court actions doubled from 31 in 2013 to 61 in 2014, while in the NSW Supreme Court filings reduced from 67 in 2013 to 58 in 2014.
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Melbourne Law School professor Andrew Kenyon said legal costs remains a major problem in defamation law.
"It is such a high-risk legal action for each side that I think many potential plaintiffs are dissuaded from bringing actions, while many defendants feel pressured to settle quickly to avoid higher legal costs," Mr Kenyon said.
Laws in the UK and Canada provide greater protection to media organisations while provisions in the United States make it much harder for politicians to bring claims.
Justice Gibson said that the problem with law reform in Australia is that it would require the agreement of the states and there were no votes in fixing defamation law.Back in February of this year, the first registered case of the Ebola virus was recorded in West Africa. The virus then started spreading at an alarming rate making its way into the territories of Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra-Leone. Shortly after, the Doctors without Borders organization declared that the scale of the epidemic is unprecedented. For the past few months, the Ebola virus has already caused the death of almost 900 people.
And despite the best efforts of the medical professionals on the ground, they were unable to contain the spread of the disease. Moreover, the virus is not only causing havoc in Africa but is also making its way overseas. In New York, one person who recently returned from West Africa was hospitalized after showing symptoms of the disease. While just before, another individual returning from Sierra-Leone died as she was passing through customs in London.
But the most worrisome aspect of the situation is that even though the Ebola virus was recorded back in 1976, no cure has been found for the disease.
This is why the Cointelegraph decided to act and write to the World Health Organization about the new opportunity to solve this problem and stop the virus in its tracks via Bitcoin:
Dear WHO, We at Cointelegraph have recently been made aware of the Ebola virus outbreak currently sweeping across Africa. With the death toll of almost 900 people in several months, and with several cases reported in the UK and the US, we cannot just stand by the wayside and do nothing, especially since it has become easier than ever to do something. Back in 2008, Bitcoin emerged on the scene as the first peer-to-peer decentralized currency. In 2014, this digital currency has grown and matured. Now anyone can send money instantly to any point in the world with almost zero friction and for a negligible fee compared to conventional money transfer methods. With Bitcoin’s popularity on the rise on the African continent in particular, it is a no brainer for us that this technology can make a real difference on the ground in Africa. Specifically, this money will go to the World Health Organization who will use it to develop a cure and vaccine for the Ebola virus. This is why we have set up a digital wallet for donations, where everyone from anywhere in the world can send any amount instantly. We believe this is the next generation of crowdfunding that circumvents any red tape, bureaucracy, and is the most effective tool currently available to gather the necessary funds to resolve this urgent problem.
Here's the wallet address for donations: 1Ea4UQWmj4sbS4ewq3C2M4jU64mYoWQ4ti
We encourage everyone to send in their donations and help the World Health Organization not only develop a cure, but to also prove that digital currencies like Bitcoin aren’t simply tools for buying something anonymously on the black market or enabling criminal activity - it is the most effective and quickest way to fund scientific research, develop new vaccines and solve some of the world’s most pressing problems, peer to peer.
- Full-size image can be seen hereThe Spanish striker insists he is happy in Turin and says the atmosphere - and lack of egos - at the club makes it feel like "a big family"
Alvaro Morata has hailed his Juventus team-mates for their humility and approachability in a thinly-veiled attack at his former Real Madrid colleagues.
The Spanish striker joined the Old Lady from the European champions in a €20 million transfer in the summer of 2014, but Madrid retain an option to resign Morata at a later date.
Yet the 22-year-old has expressed his thanks to Juventus for injecting his game with self-belief after he suffered a crisis of confidence in the Spanish capital, and has praised the more humble atmosphere in the Juve ranks.
"I don't want to leave Juventus. This club brought me back to life because last year I had no confidence. We're not a team here, but a big family," he told Tuttosport.
"At Juventus, there is no one in the dressing room that feels more important, even if he has been a World Cup winner and is a football legend. Here you go to eat with everyone, talk to everyone, and lead a normal life.
"For me it was amazing being able to talk about something with Gianluigi Buffon, or with Andrea Pirlo. It impresses me to think that they give me a hand with everything. They helped me so much to settle in well."
He added that one player in particular has left a major impression on him since arriving at Juventus Stadium.
"Pirlo is an amazing guy, very different to the image he has of being a calm, quiet person," he said. "After our training sessions he always stays on and practises some free kicks, so I try to stay and observe him, trying to learn something."
Morata had a difficult start to life in Italy, suffering a serious knee injury in his first training session, and he has thanked the club for helping him to make a quick comeback - as well as putting his initial fears to rest.
"In the summer when I got injured, it was frightening. I was afraid I might be out for seven or eight months, but luckily it wasn't that serious in the end.
"The medics did a great job, along with my mental strength. Here in Italy we work more on physical condition, so the first two months were really hard for me."
The striker is now part of a Juventus side challenging on three fronts. The Bianconeri are 14 points clear at the top of Serie A and have booked a Coppa Italia final clash with Lazio, while they remain in the hunt for the Champions League with a two-legged quarter-final against Monaco due to begin on Tuesday.
And Morata believes the victory over Borussia Dortmund in the round-of-16 has shown that Juve have what it takes to compete for the European crown.
"The Champions League is going to be very hard, but our strength is to be a solid group. We'd definitely need some luck, too.
"But Atletico Madrid won La Liga and almost won the Champions League. If they did them so can we. With the Dortmund win we sent a message to all of Europe."Who speaks for John D. Rockefeller?
Is it Rex Tillerson, the chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Exxon Mobil, who presides over the forest of oaks that began in 1870 in Cleveland as Rockefeller's little acorn known as Standard Oil?
Or is it the descendants who speak for the grand old man (1839-1937), who invoke the family name in their efforts to make Exxon more positive about global warming and more aggressive in the pursuit of renewable energy sources?
Tillerson is in the Rockefeller mode, Mark I. He knows how to make money. For the first quarter, Tillerson turned in a profit of nearly $11 billion. It's the kind of figure that enrages people paying $4 a gallon and certainly galvanizes Democrats eager to impose windfall taxes—whereas the real criticism should be that not enough of the very necessary profit is invested to develop the viable fuels of the future. Most of the money Exxon makes goes to dividends and stock buybacks—returns have averaged an annualized 24 percent or more in the past five years—which is why at their Dallas meeting, 60 percent of the shareholders didn't vote for a change in the company's conduct. Shareholders are not by nature inclined to look beyond tomorrow's stock tables.
John D. was a lot more adventurous than that. As his economist great-granddaughter Neva Rockefeller Goodwin put it, "my |
ever blocked any of those numbers.
Instead of merely relying on a blocklist, RoboKiller's technology analyzes the audio fingerprints of calls and can thus block many robocalls from spoofed numbers. Robokiller took first place in a contest the Federal Trade Commission held in 2015 to find the most promising new anti-robocall technologies, and the company has been busy improving its technology ever since. Despite that, RoboKiller had never flagged any of those 36 numbers as suspicious, so it wouldn't have helped France during her five-day robocall deluge.
The Caller IDs were spoofed. In some cases, the Caller IDs mimicked real numbers that may be owned by real people. In most cases, the numbers calling France were totally fake, coming from area codes (like 411) or exchanges that don't exist. In other words, the spoofing attack used many random phone numbers instead of ones that might appear to be legitimate.
Scammers seeking money often spoof local phone numbers so that the victims think it's a valid call. The one targeting Kim France didn't bother—the only apparent goal was disruption.
There's still a possibility that it wasn't a targeted attack and that France's problem was caused by a bug in auto-dialing software used by telemarketers or scammers. It's also possible it was a "fax scam that went awry," Garr said.
But based on the evidence, it was most likely a targeted attack, the RoboKiller team concluded. There's no financial value from calling someone hundreds of times with fax-like noises—most scams try to extract money from the victim. The noises themselves were likely used to confuse France as to whether the calls were legitimate or not.
"Our theory, and I feel pretty confident, is that this... was someone trying to attack Kim France," Garr said.
No challenge for determined attacker
We don't know if someone had a vendetta against France, or if a dedicated prankster just happened to target a widely available phone number. But in either case, Garr says pulling off such an attack wouldn't have been too difficult.
"My developer said, just to give you an idea, if he wanted to do this to you right now he could set this up in 30 minutes," Garr said.
Searching the Web for "fake fax sounds" quickly turns up websites that provide fax noise files. Using those sound files, a little programming knowledge, and easily available tools, a malicious person could have launched a similar attack.
“I’ve never heard of this”
There are some online services that let you make calls from spoofed phone numbers. While there are legitimate reasons to make such calls, auto-dialing and spoofing can also be used for malicious purposes.
"I know a developer who got so angry at someone one time that he simply wrote some code to call a number a gazillion times and just drive that person crazy," Garr said. (Garr added that he does not condone such behavior.)
RoboKiller owner TelTech runs a spoof calling service, called SpoofCard, but it doesn't allow automated calls and thus almost certainly could not have been used by France's attacker, Garr said. Businesses have long used spoofed Caller IDs so that employees can call customers from a single number, Garr noted. Garr's stepfather, a veterinarian, uses SpoofCard to call patients' owners from home at night without revealing his home phone number. The point is, Caller ID spoofing technology is widespread and easy to use for both legitimate and malicious purposes.
But as easy as it is, the specifics of the France case were new to Garr. That helps explain why RoboKiller doesn’t block the kinds of calls that disrupted France’s real estate business.
"I’ve never heard of this being an issue,” Garr told Ars. “As soon as you sent this, I wondered if we need to block fax noises."Please enable Javascript to watch this video
ENCINITAS, Calif. -- A man was found lying on the ground and bleeding at a North County gas station early Thursday, the San Diego County Sheriff's Department said.
A passerby called 911 at 4:26 a.m. after noticing the man in the parking lot of the Valero gas station at Encinitas Boulevard and Saxony Road. Deputies arrived at the scene a few minutes later and determined that the victim was alive. He was taken to the trauma center at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla. His condition was not known.
Investigators said the man had multiple stab wounds to his abdomen and his back. The victim was not able to give a description of his attacker and investigators did not know if he had been stabbed near the gas station or at another location. Even so, there was no threat to the general public, a sheriff's sergeant told FOX 5.
The victim is a 45-year-old homeless man who was recently released from jail, where he had served time for drug charges, sheriff's Capt. Theresa Adams-Hydar said.
Investigators cordoned off the gas station with crime tape and remained on the scene looking for clues as of 9 a.m.Stateside’s conversation with Brad Cardinale, an ecologist at the University of Michigan.
Biodiversity.
It's one of those scientific terms we hear and think, "That's a good thing. We need it,” without truly knowing why it's a good thing.
A University of Michigan and Smithsonian study now helps us understand. The researchers found biodiversity is even more powerful and important than they thought it would be.
Study co-author Brad Cardinale, a University of Michigan ecologist, joined Stateside to talk about the power of biodiversity.
Listen to the full conversation with Stateside's Cynthia Canty above, or read highlights below.
On past studies of biodiversity
Cardinale defined biodiversity simply “as the variety of life."
“Since about 1990 there has been this hypothesis in the field of ecological sciences that the modern rates of species extinction, which are about 1000 times faster than normal, is going to affect the productivity of the ecosystems,” Cardinale said.
This hypothesis spawned hundreds of studies, but, while 90% of the studies supported the hypothesis, they were all on a small scale and skeptics doubted the results would hold up outside of small samples in the lab.
Cardinale’s study changed that by synthesizing data from 600,000 locations in the real world. Cardinale called it “the true test of whether biodiversity actually matters.”
On the results of this study
“We found that biodiversity matters, and it matters a whole lot more than we had expected,” Cardinale said.
"We found that biodiversity matters, and it matters a whole lot more than we had expected."
“We found that biodiversity is important for sustaining humanity. One of the key points of this study is that biodiversity seems to control the production of biomass in most of the world’s ecosystems.”
Cardinale said that biodiversity seems to be more impactful on biomass, or "living tissue," production than any other factor, including carbon dioxide, nutrients, and temperature.
Biodiversity not only contributes to the amount of natural resources we have available and the quality of our air, but it also seems to work as natural disaster prevention. Organic biodiversity can help protect against things like hurricane flooding and climate change. Cardinale called it an “insurance policy.”
“So, if biodiversity, and our loss of biodiversity, affects the production of biomass, it’s going to affect people’s ability to live,” Cardinale said.
On the planet's future
“We know biodiversity is important, but we don’t have enough time, we don’t have enough people, and we do not have enough money to save everything,” Cardinale said. “Some things are going to go extinct and the estimate is that within our lifetime, by the time I die, around 30% of everything on this planet will be extinct.”
Cardinale said his next job is going to be figuring out how to distribute the resources he does have to identify and save key species.
“We need to start protecting that biological infrastructure in the same way we protect our physical infrastructure,” he said.
(Subscribe to the Stateside podcast on iTunes, Google Play, or with this RSS link)A Saskatchewan hockey mom has been sentenced to two years behind bars for sexual interference with three 14-year-old boys.
Kelley Minogue of Warman, a town north of Saskatoon, earlier pleaded guilty to the offences in December 2010.
"It happens to young boys; it's no different than it happening to girls," the stepfather of one of the boys said outside court. "It's sexual abuse and it shouldn't be tolerated."
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Court heard the divorced 37-year-old woman hosted drinking parties for the boys, all hockey players, and had sex with two of the boys at the same time.
A third boy, who was heavily intoxicated when she led him into her bedroom, later told police he didn't want to lose his virginity to her.
Judge Barry Singer said Ms. Minogue was responsible for the boys' well-being, comparing her to a teacher. However, he did take into account that Ms. Minogue "did not force them against their wishes."
Senior Crown prosecutor Sheryl Fillo said she is happy Judge Singer indicated that Ms. Minogue breached a position of trust.
"I don't believe that just because she was a woman that that should be a major factor in reducing any sentence that she receives," said Ms. Fillo.
"She'd be the first one to admit that she was naive and did some foolish things that hopefully some programming might cause her to better reflect on how to be a parent," said defence lawyer Mark Brayford.
Ms. Minogue apologized in court for her "inappropriate behaviour."
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The victims' names are banned from publication.
Her DNA is to be kept on file for life, and she'll have to register as a sex offender upon release from prison.WATCH: A closer look at President Duterte's health
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) — President Rodrigo Duterte discussed his health condition on Monday, saying he experiences bouts of migraine, aside from suffering from a rare disorder called Buerger's disease.
In his speech at the Wallace Business Forum in Malacañang yesterday, the President said he is having severe headaches and spinal issues.
"I have this migraine every day. I had a bad slip the last one was this... and I hit the cement," he said.
Duterte said he prefers not to have surgery as something might go wrong with the operation.
"I have a lot of issues with my spinal... My doctor would want to operate. But you know my wife was a nurse and she used to work in the US. She said a lot of operations for the spinal that went awry, that went wrong," he said.
The President also brushed aside rumors he had cancer.
Duterte said he had Buerger's disease — a disorder affecting blood vessels.
"Don't believe in cancer. What I have is Buerger's disease. It's an acquired thing that you get when smoking because of nicotine. Nicotine constricts the vessels. Alcohol dilates the vessels," he said.
The disease, which is usually found in heavy cigarette and tobacco smokers, constricts blood vessels. It causes veins and arteries to swell, producing clots that block blood from reaching extremities.
In severe cases, the disorder can cause extreme pain. Left unchecked, Buerger's disease may lead to skin damage, infection, and in severe cases, gangrene.
Duterte had earlier come clean about his condition during the campaign. But questions continue to hound his health.
Aside from the cancer issue, there were also rumors in November he passed out before attending a meeting in Malacañang.
In June, Duterte criticized a journalist who pressed him about his health and asked for his medical records.
The President also missed several appointments because of migraine.
Despite this, the Palace is assuring the public that Duterte is fit to attend to his duties.
It adds the President is in good shape.Michael Turchin and Lance Bass, who married in 2014, at the Environmental Media Association’s awards on Sept. 23 in Santa Monica, Calif. (Jerod Harris/Getty Images for Environmental Media Association)
This week, after sending his love and support to the victims of the mass shooting in Las Vegas, former boy bander Lance Bass also expressed his anger.
Bass, who is gay, tweeted his frustration with the Food and Drug Administration’s continued ban on blood donation from men who have sex with men.
“How is it STILL illegal for gays to donate blood??!! I want to donate and I’m not allowed,” the former member of ‘N Sync wrote Monday night.
How is it STILL illegal for gays to donate blood??!! I want to donate and I'm not allowed. 😤 — Lance Bass (@LanceBass) October 3, 2017
Federal law prohibits men who have sex with men from donating blood for 12 months after their last same-sex encounter. That year-long deferment is a revision of the previous lifetime ban, which had been in place from the height of the AIDS epidemic in 1982 until 2015.
On Wednesday, the Human Rights Campaign, a national LGBTQ advocacy group, echoed Bass’s sentiments.
“The policy stigmatizes gay and bisexual men and simply cannot be justified in light of current scientific research and updated blood screening technology,” said David Stacy, HRC’s government affairs director. “HRC is committed to working towards an eventual outcome that both minimizes risk to the blood supply and treats gay and bisexual men with the respect they deserve,” Stacy added.
On its website, HRC lists ways that its more than 3 million members can help the victims of the Las Vegas mass shooting, including donating blood.
Bass, who married Michael Turchin in 2014, has been an outspoken advocate for LGBTQ rights since coming out on the cover of People magazine in 2006. The host of “90’s House,” an MTV series, is a member of the onePULSE Foundation’s board of trustees. That organization was created in the wake of the mass shooting at Orlando’s Pulse nightclub in 2016. Bass hosted the star-studded Hollywood benefit that raised money for the victims of that attack.
Bass and Turchin visited the club one month after the tragedy there.
“It feels so real,” Bass said at the time. “When you see it on TV and you see all the tragedies happening, but when you’re here it definitely affects you. I didn’t expect to be so overwhelmed with emotion... you just feel it.”MUMBAI: Investigators in the Mumbai terror attack are leaving nothing to chance and they have even booked Ajmal Kasab, the lone gunman captured, for entering the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) without a railway ticket.Kasab and his associate Mohammed Ismail Khan had gunned down 59 commuters at CST on November 26 last year.Kasab was caught by police at Girgaon Chowpatty while his associate Khan involved in the CST attack was killed during an exchange of fire."Kasab has been booked under various acts including Arms Act, Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, Explosives Act, Customs Act, Waging war against country and other various sections of Railway Act. Entering the railway premises without proper ticket is also one among the various offences registered against him," Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Rakesh Maria said.Though it was a small offence compared to other offences registered against him, crime branch officials said all these will have to be registered and showed in the chargesheet into the terror attacks, which is expected to be filed within a day or two.The names of Indian nationals Fahim Ansari and Sabauddin Ahmed, who had allegedly conducted the recce before the attacks, will be also listed in the main chargesheet, officials said.Code: #include <std_disclaimer.h> /* * Your warranty is now void. * * I am not responsible for bricked devices, dead SD cards, * thermonuclear war, or you getting fired because the alarm app failed. Please * do some research if you have any concerns about features included in this ROM * before flashing it! YOU are choosing to make these modifications, and if * you point the finger at me for messing up your device, I will laugh at you. */
kexec hardboot is supported.
Quote: Feature - Working on Stock camera - OppoCamera port - CameraNextMod?
Switching front/back cam - No - Yes - Yes
Camcorder <=1080p - No - Yes - Yes
4K Recording - No - No - Yes
The ROM comes with ancient Launcher2. Launcher3 is not included. I will post this as an attachment.
Picture in apps are sometimes automatically zoomed out (and distorted) and can not be zoomed in. Is this a common problem among AOSP-based Marshmallow ROMs? I tried AOSP and CAF sources, and they both have the same issue.
disabled
DT2W
However, I may not be able to solve them since schoolwork is so heavy... And this ROM may not be updated regularly.
Quote: 1. Kernel Compatibility
The kernel of this ROM is based on CM12.1, but not exactly the same. You can not use kernels built for CM12.1 with this ROM. Marshmallow requires new features like updated SELinux, uid_cputime, etc, but CM12.1 source does not contain these features. You can take a look at commits and it will be clear.
Quote: 2. Recovery Compatibility
I am using TWRP 2.8.7.0 with MultiROM support (TWRP_multirom_bacon_20150803-00.img from MultiROM thread). If you can not get the ROM installed properly, please try updating your recovery.
Quote: 3. Rooting
Since this is a experimental build, I have turned off SELinux completely. SELinux is permissive. Just flash SuperSU 2.50 zip in the recovery and it will be fine.
Quote: 4. F2FS Support
The kernel has F2FS driver builtin and corresponding entries in fstab file (as CM does). Vold has F2FS files as well, so you can give it a try. But I can not guarantee that it will work flawlessly.
EDIT: Some people tested and reported it not working. Make a backup before you try.
Quote: 5. GApps
I'm using DeltaGapps with SetupWizard removed (yes it is the one that keeps force closing. you can disable that via adb as well). I think the lack of permissions(appops_whitelist.xml I guess) caused this failure. After allowing every permission required by Google apps and adding the account manually, Sync and Store works as expected. Now on Tap seems broken. Maps is working, and gets a lock in secs..
There are some other GApps package links in the first few pages. Some people say Now on Tap works with them, you can have a try.
Quote: 6. Disabling HW Keys and Enabling Softkeys - The Easy Way
Code: echo qemu.hw.mainkeys=0 >> /system/build.prop reboot # enables soft keys echo 0 > /proc/touchpanel/keypad_enable # disables hw keys, need to do this on every boot
Quote: 7. Where Is The App Switcher?
If you are comfortable with softkeys, goto 6.
If you are not, goto 3 and take a look at http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...&postcount=115 double tap the home key.
Quote: 8. LCD Density
Code: wm density 440 # if you want 440 wm density reset # self-explanatory Above will lead to corrupted pics.
Change
Code: ro.sf.lcd_density=480
Code: ro.sf.lcd_density=VALUE_YOU_WANT to(Note: I did this before installing GApps, not sure if this is related to Google Now Launcher FCs)
Quote: 9. DT2W Workaround
Code: echo 1 > /proc/touchpanel/double_tap_enable # do this on every boot
Code: key 255 POWER
DT2W has been added into settings since 20151027.
Quote: 10. Apps Not Working
Settings -> Apps -> YOUR_APP -> Permissions -> Turn on everything
Quote: 11. Fixing random freezes
http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...&postcount=682
Thanks @The Dork Knight Rises
20151018
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bwk...ew?usp=sharing
Mirror by @http://c43211.com/aosp_bacon-ota-eng...r-20151018.zip
Mirror by @http://d-h.st/9fOO
Fixed network mode selection (2G/3G/4G switch)
Fixed network location
DT2W workaround: see Q&A
20151015
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bwk...ew?usp=sharing
Mirror by @
Mirror by @
Mirror by @
Thanks!
20151018Mirror by @ c43211 Mirror by @ Killer.shubham Fixed network mode selection (2G/3G/4G switch)Fixed network locationDT2W workaround: see Q&A20151015Mirror by @ itskapil at http://downloadmirror.co/android/tx/...ng.hamster.zip Mirror by @ Killer.shubham at http://d-h.st/3oBU Mirror by @ c43211 at http://c43211.com/aosp_bacon-ota-eng.hamster.zip Thanks!
Hello everybody, I'm glad to share these days' work of bringing Marshmallow to the OnePlus One.This ROM is based on CAF release LA.BF.1.1.3-00110-8x74.0, with some little modification to some components to make it build. The kernel is based on CM12.1. You can check the kernel source on my GitHub. Links will be posted later.Nearly all basic feature should be working: 4G data, 4G->3G fallback on calls, SMS, camera/camcorder, BT, WiFi, MTP, 4K recording, HW decoding etc.1. Stock camera doesn't work well. Here is a list of comparison:(maybe I should get a monospace font in Firefox)2. Battery drains... a little faster? (Just a little)3.Launcher3 has been added since 201510184.Need to change DPI via build.prop5. Security related: SELinux ispermissive in 20151018. HW Crypto is not working. Software-based credentials storage.6. No gestures (etc)7. Kernel panics/reboots on switching adb on & off.8. WiFi AP still runs on 2.4G even when 5G is selected.If you find more issues, feel free to post here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxjnTae2nCM - How to install ROM and Gapps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWZcxVs992c - How to get root https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZ7qW4j3Kso - How to enable softkeys, Now on TapThanks!Now screenshot spoiler (with Google Now Launcher):20151027Marshmallow's native DT2W setting (thanks CM)USB MIDI support (What for?)Fixed some crashes by removing SeempLog (try TiBu and network settings)Double tap on Home key now brings up Recent ViewAdded a reboot option in power key menu/global actions menuNote: if you have drain when NFC is on (or NFC setting is grayed out), please attach a logcat of booting process. I can not reproduce this on my phone... Thanks!(I'm using TWRP 2.8.7.0 and it works well with this package.)Kernel: https://github.com/updateing/android...neplus_msm8974 (marshmallow branch)Device tree: https://github.com/updateing/android..._oneplus_bacon Blobs: https://github.com/updateing/proprietary_vendor_oneplus local_manifest: http://www.hastebin.com/netamapate.xml Hope you can enjoy the new feel of Marshmallow!METAIRIE, La. -- Steve Gleason has inspired a bill signed into law by President Barack Obama, spoken to the United Nations and journeyed to the summit of Machu Picchu, among many other remarkable accomplishments during his crusade against ALS.
Now, Gleason’s heartbreaking, inspiring story is headed for the big screen at the Sundance Film Festival.
"Gleason," chronicling the former New Orleans Saints player’s battle against the debilitating disease, was selected Wednesday for the full-length documentary competition at the annual festival. It will premiere in January.
Former Saints player Steve Gleason was given a diagnosis of ALS in 2011. AP Photo/Gerald Herbert
“We could not be more honored to screen the film here in front of tens of thousands of people in Park City [Utah] this January,” Gleason said in a statement. “As you may know, this project began as a series of personal video journals for our son Rivers, as a way of sharing my life, who I am, and love for him, when I was first diagnosed with ALS in 2011. Although it has been a uniquely difficult journey at times, we believe it is an important message to share. Our film is not just focused on living with ALS, but on a more universal story, exposing the resilience of the human spirit, when faced with extreme adversity.”
The film was directed by J. Clay Tweel. The description from the Sundance website reads: “At the age of 34, Steve Gleason, former NFL defensive back and New Orleans hero, was diagnosed with ALS. Doctors gave him two to five years to live. So that is what Steve chose to do: Live -- both for his wife and newborn son and to help others with this disease.”
“The hope is that this film will be a catalyst for positive change and choices for those who face major challenges in life,” Gleason said in the statement. “Thanks to my extraordinary family, friends, ‘film guys’, as well as talented director J. Clay Tweel, that this story will be told. If there is a takeaway, we believe those who watch might think differently about life, love and family.”Rishi Kapoor had angered Congress leaders by criticising the naming of national assets after the Gandhi family.
Making light of reports that a public toilet in Allahabad has been named after him, actor Rishi Kapoor said he is thrilled to read about it as at least he will of some use to someone.The 63-year-old actor has courted controversy and faced wrath of Congress party after he attacked what he called the practice of naming all the major assets of the country after the Gandhi family members during the Congress rule.The Kapoor & Sons star had also said people from the film industry should also have buildings named after them. Following the controversy, Congress workers in Allahabad recently named a public toilet in the city after the Bollywood actor.Asked about it, Mr Kapoor joked, "I am thrilled. At least, I will be of some use to someone. These people (Congress loyalists) are of no use to anyone. I take pride in the fact that the Sulabh Shauchalaya is named after me because it is the Prime Minister's pet project right now."However, he said he is not against the Nehru-Gandhi family but has a problem with people exploiting their family name."On a serious note, it really doesn't matter to me what they do. They seem to have not understood what I implied by my tweets. I have nothing against the Nehru or Gandhi family. I am against the people exploiting their family name," he was quoted as saying. "What I am saying is of national importance; people should realise the folly of naming everything after two families. This is just an observation by a citizen of the country and I have every right to voice my opinion. I know I have ruffled a few Congress feathers but they have misunderstood my intentions," he said.The following chart shows how much experience is needed for each level in Black Desert Online.
Leveling XP Table [ edit ]
Level Exp required 0 1.00 1 1.00 2 1.00 3 1.00 4 1.00 5 161.00 6 471.56 7 1181.49 8 2626.44 9 5319.41 10 10005.00 11 17720.61 12 29864.84 13 48273.09 14 75300.36 15 113911.25 16 167777.16 17 241380.69 18 340127.24 19 470463.81 20 640005.00 21 857666.21 22 1133804.04 23 1480363.89 24 1911034.76 25 2441411.25 26 3089162.76 27 3874209.89 28 4818908.04 29 5948238.21 30 7290005.00 31 8875041.81 32 10737423.24 33 12914684.69 34 15448049.16 35 18382661.25 36 21767828.36 37 25657269.09 38 30109368.84 39 35187442.61 40 40960005.00 41 47501047.41 42 54890322.44 43 63213635.49 44 72563143.56 45 83037661.25 46 94742973.96 47 118571374.00 48 158997683.00 49 207619316.00 50 415238632.00 51 830477264.00 52 1245715896.00 53 1868573844.00 54 2802860766.00 55 8408582298.00 56 21021455745.00 57 52553639362.50 58 105107278725.00 59 210214557450.00 60 630643672350.00 61 1261287344700.00 62 2522574689400.00 63 5045149378800.00 64 10090298757600.00 65 20180597515200.00 66 403611950304000.00 67 403611950304000.00 68 403611950304000.00 69 403611950304000.00 70 403611950304000.00 71 403611950304000.00 72 403611950304000.00 73 403611950304000.00 74 403611950304000.00 75 403611950304000.00 76 403611950304000.00 77 403611950304000.00 78 403611950304000.00 79 403611950304000.00 80 403611950304000.00 81 403611950304000.00 82 403611950304000.00 83 403611950304000.00 84 403611950304000.00 85 403611950304000.00 86 403611950304000.00 87 403611950304000.00 88 403611950304000.00 89 403611950304000.00 90 403611950304000.00 91 403611950304000.00 92 403611950304000.00 93 403611950304000.00 94 403611950304000.00 95 403611950304000.00 96 403611950304000.00 97 403611950304000.00 98 403611950304000.00 99 403611950304000.00 100 403611950304000.00
Party Experience Share [ edit ]
Party Size XP Per Player Total XP 1 100% 100% 2 60% 120% 3 50% 150% 4 50% 200% 5 50% 250%
Strategy Guide/Tips [ edit ]
When Mobs become ANGRY (from 10:00PM to 7:00AM), the experience you get from killing them is higher (though they are also tougher to kill)
Add more tips here!UH to pay McConaughey $135,000; actor will donate money to charity
Happy birthday Matthew McConaughey
We collected some of the best lines from some of Matthew McConaughey's finest roles in honor of the Texas icon's birthday. Well, at least the lines that don't include the delightful usage of profanity.
Click through, people, it's worth it... less Happy birthday Matthew McConaughey
We collected some of the best lines from some of Matthew McConaughey's finest roles in honor of the Texas icon's birthday. Well, at least the lines that don't include the... more Image 1 of / 28 Caption Close UH to pay McConaughey $135,000; actor will donate money to charity 1 / 28 Back to Gallery
Matthew McConaughey's celebrity has certainly drawn a spotlight to the University of Houston - though perhaps not for the reasons the school had hoped.
UH's ability to hook the Academy-Award winning Texan - most closely associated with a certain school in Austin - to deliver its first university-wide commencement in recent memory at a shiny new football stadium was supposed to be a sign of its rising stature. But news coverage soon shifted to UH's silence on the subject of how much McConaughey would make off the speech.
On Tuesday, more than a month after the Houston Chronicle asked that question, UH finally answered it, saying it would pay McConaughey $135,000, which the actor intends to donate to charity.
RELATED: How we'll always remember Matthew McConaughey
Initially, when asked how much it had to spend to lure the well-known Longhorn, UH - a public institution funded by tax and tuition dollars - demurred, citing a rare confidentiality clause in its agreement with the booking agency it hired to find a celebrity speaker. The school had to give the agency, Celebrity Talent International, a chance to resist disclosure.
Celebrity Talent filed a brief opposing a freedom of information act request submitted by the Chronicle.
SEE THIS: Texas celebrities when they were young
The agency argued that if UH tells the public how much it plans to pay McConaughey, a "reporter or someone" might create "unfair negatives online."
But all that changed on Tuesday. Though the attorney general has yet to rule on the case, the university revealed McConaughey's fee and said it plans to cover his travel costs.
The school will also pay Celebrity Talent International, the booking agency that arranged the speaking gig - and argued UH should stay silent on the details - $20,250, or 15 percent of his fee, for booking the actor.
"The University has concluded its business with CTI and, therefore, is no longer bound by its confidentiality agreement with the agency," the university said in a statement.
A UH spokesman was unable to say Tuesday whether, or how much, the university had paid commencement speakers in the past. Its commencements typically have been for individual colleges within the university.
UH will pay McConaughey with revenue generated by its continuing education program, which offers certificate programs, online courses, workshops and more to non-UH students.
McConaughey will give the $135,000 to the jk livin Foundation, a charity he started to "empower high school students by providing them with the tools to lead active lives and make healthy choices for a better future," UH said in the statement.
Universities regularly shell out thousands of dollars to lure big-name speakers.
Students at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas protested after the school announced it planned to pay Hillary Clinton $225,000 to speak at an event last June.
A report by Bloomberg News last year found that California universities paid more than $7.5 million for speeches and performances since 2012, including paying singer Tony Bennett $110,000 and actor William Shatner $75,000.
The University of Texas at Austin, McConaughey's alma mater, doesn't pay commencement speakers, a spokesman said.Iraqis and supporters rally outside the Theodore Levin United States Courthouse on Wednesday in Detroit. (Carlos Osorio/AP)
A federal judge has temporarily halted the deportations of more than 1,400 Iraqi nationals who advocates say could face death, persecution and torture upon returning to their native country.
U.S. District Judge Mark Goldsmith issued a stay of removal Monday night for about 1,444 Iraqi nationals who immigration authorities have said are at immediate risk of deportation, including about 85 who have recently been arrested and were expected to be sent back to Baghdad as soon as Tuesday.
The mass deportation effort comes on the heels of a deal earlier this year between the Trump administration and the Iraqi government. Iraq, seeking removal from President Trump’s then-travel ban on citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, agreed to start accepting deportees without travel documents — a move that U.S. immigration authorities say has facilitated their efforts to remove a “backlog” of people the United States wanted to deport because they committed crimes at some point.
[A charter flight left the U.S. carrying 8 Iraqis. A community wonders who will be next.]
Acting on that arrangement, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) earlier this month arrested scores of Iraqis across the country, setting off protests in Iraqi immigrant communities, particularly among Detroit’s large Chaldean Christian population.
Goldsmith, a federal judge in Detroit, moved last week to grant a request by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to halt the deportation of 114 Iraqis swept up in the Detroit metropolitan area, many of them Chaldeans. His decision Monday expands the stay to include all Iraqis with final orders of removal nationwide, allowing individuals an additional two weeks to file requests to reopen their cases in immigration court.
The ACLU said it had requested the court’s action on behalf of “all Iraqi nationals in the United States with final orders of removal, who have been, or will be, arrested and detained by ICE as a result of Iraq’s recent decision to issue travel documents to facilitate U.S. removal.”
At the crux of the immigration attorneys’ argument is the assertion that Iraq is too dangerous — more dangerous than it was when the government first ordered the Iraqis’ deportations — and that serious safety concerns entitle them to an opportunity to reopen their claims for asylum or protection under the Convention Against Torture, due to changed country circumstances.
“At its core, this case is about process, that the government shouldn’t be |
is the No. 66 recruit, the No. 11 defensive tackle and the No. 9 player in Texas, according to the 247Sports Composite rankings. Other schools to offer include Arkansas, Miami, Michigan and Oklahoma.
Despite the fact that the big defensive tackle weighs in a 346 pounds currently, he carries little body fat. And despite his obvious bulk, he hasn't been lifting weights as long as many other prospects his age, so he will continue to add a great deal of functional strength once he gets into a collegiate strength and conditioning program. Combine those elements with his gentle nature and it becomes clear that Jones has unlimited upside -- as long as he can learn to play with a mean streak.
Because of his mass, Jones was extremely difficult to stop at the Nike Opening Regional Dallas back in March. Once he gets his shoulder past an offensive linemen, he becomes an irresistible force.
When Jones learns how to use his hands effectively, he will become extremely difficult to block, even when going against the double teams that he faces constantly in high school.
Jones is now the ninth pledge in the 2016 Alabama recruiting class, which ranks No. 10 nationally and No. 5 in the SEC, according to the 247Sports Composite rankings.A Canadian driver received a traffic citation for wearing a ferret around the neck while driving. The ticket was one of 2,442 given out by Edmonton police during a 24-hour traffic stop. Photo by christels/Pixabay
Feb. 21 (UPI) -- A ferret netted its owner a driving ticket after the driver was pulled over during a 24-hour traffic stop in Canada.
The ticket was one of 2,442 citations handed out by Edmonton police during its "big ticket event," when police cited the driver for distracted driving for wearing the ferret around his or her neck.
Officers also issued 1,886 speeding tickets, 10 Criminal Code offenses and 456 fines for seatbelt infractions, red light violations and other Traffic Safety Act violations.
During the event, police also caught vehicles that appeared to be participating in a street race and made a stop that resulted in the arrest of a woman with 30 outstanding warrants.The Trump International Hotel in Washington. A watchdog filed a lawsuit against President Trump in January saying he has breached the emoluments clause because Trump-owned buildings take in rent, room rentals and other payments from foreign governments. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
A part-owner of several New York City hotels and restaurants has joined a lawsuit alleging that President Trump has violated the Constitution’s emoluments clause, which bars federal officials from taking payments from foreign governments.
Eric Goode is a part-owner of four boutique hotels and three restaurants in Manhattan. On Wednesday, he officially joined a lawsuit that was filed just days after Trump’s inauguration by a watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. That group formerly had strong ties to Hillary Clinton's campaign, but it says it has cut those ties and become a nonpartisan entity.
The lawsuit alleges that Trump is in violation of the Constitution because his business continues to accept payment for hotel rooms, banquet halls and food from foreign states and state-owned businesses. Although Trump has said that he no longer has day-to-day control of the Trump Organization — having passed it to his sons Donald Jr. and Eric — documents show that Trump remains the beneficiary of his businesses, and he can legally withdraw money from them at any time.
[What is the ‘Emoluments Clause’? Does it apply to President Trump?]
The heart of the lawsuit has remained the same since January: Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington asked a federal judge to bar Trump from accepting foreign payments and to provide financial records to prove he has done so. The group’s complaint says that Trump “has violated the Constitution since the opening moments of his presidency and is poised to do so continually for the duration of his administration.”
The Trump Organization declined to comment Thursday, noting that the president — and not his business — was formally named as a defendant in the case. White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders did not respond to a request for comment.
Trump’s attorneys have said previously that the plaintiffs are misinterpreting the emoluments clause. It was designed to stop foreign kings from bribing ambassadors and officers of the young United States with gifts. But, the attorneys said, it does not preclude Trump from taking payments for things of value — like, for instance, accepting a fee to rent a banquet hall to a foreign embassy.
The lawsuit against Trump will face a key legal hurdle at the outset. Before the plaintiffs can make their case about the meaning of “emolument,” they must convince a judge that they have standing to sue Trump. To do that, the plaintiffs will need to show that they suffered harm because of Trump’s conduct.
Previously, three plaintiffs were involved in the suit, each with a different rationale for why they had standing.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics claimed it had been injured by an increase in its workload. The argument was, in essence, that Trump’s conduct was so wrong that it required this good-government group to work harder in response.
Another plaintiff is Jill Phaneuf, who runs a Washington-based business that books hotel banquet rooms. Phaneuf's claim to standing was that Trump’s D.C. hotel might take business away from her, if foreign embassies move their events to the president's hotel to curry favor.
The other plaintiff was an association whose members include restaurants. Again, the argument was that foreign governments would shift their business to the president’s properties.
Goode, the new plaintiff, partly owns the Maritime Hotel in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, the Jane Hotel in the Meatpacking District, and the Bowery and Ludlow hotels on the Lower East Side. He also is part-owner of three restaurants. The legal complaint notes that Travel & Leisure magazine called them “buzzy.”
Goode doesn’t know of a specific instance in which he has lost business to a Trump-owned hotel or restaurant. But the complaint contends he might, saying that Trump’s businesses and Goode’s occupy similar niches in the same city.
“The case is really about changing the marketplace with unfair competition,” said Jordan Libowitz, a spokesman for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics. He meant that Trump’s businesses could offer foreign clients something Goode could not: a chance to impress the president.
Goode did not respond Thursday to a request for comment.The Trump administration has taken yet another giant step backward when it rescinded the directive issued by the Justice Department last August ordering the Bureau of Prisons to “phase out” the use of private prisons.
In an ominous sounding memo, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, no friend to criminal justice reform, said private prisons would be necessary “to meet the future needs of the federal correctional system.”
We all know what that means. After several years of welcome reform—supported by both parties and a majority of the American public—the nation’s federal prison population began a steady decline.
Between 2009 and 2015, the most recent year for which the government has end-of-year statistics, the number of sentenced people in federal custody fell 5 percent, representing 7,981 people. At the same time, the nation’s crime rate remained at a 20-year low.
But that progress is about to be stopped, or reversed. The president’s law-and-order rhetoric and his promised “military action” against millions of undocumented immigrants portends a new day for the private prison industry. In fact, private prison stocks jumped in value as soon as the Sessions memo was made public—a gift to an industry that contributed generously to the Trump campaign.
The growth of the private prison industry is one of the most toxic byproducts of the so-called war on drugs. This privatization of punishment has led to predictable and grave human rights violations—predictable because the desire for higher profits inevitably leads to cutting corners when it comes to conditions of confinement. Numerous lawsuits have been filed against the Corrections Corporation of America (recently renamed CoreCivic), the GEO Group, and other companies charging unconstitutional prison conditions including lack of medical care and excessive use of force and solitary confinement.
Just as insidious, private prisons have an incentive to maximize the number of days served by each person by meting out excessive infractions and thereby preventing earlier release. A 2015 study in Mississippi, where 40 percent of prison beds are in private prisons, showed that people assigned to private prisons had an increase in their sentence of 4 to 7 percent, which equaled 60 to 90 days for the average person in prison. That extra time translates into an average of $3,000 more per person in custody at the expense of fairness and equal treatment.
This reversal is not going unnoticed or unaddressed by those working to end mass incarceration in America. As with other unpopular announcements from the new administration, it will spur public discussion and protest. The National Prison Divestment Campaign will redouble its efforts to add to the growing list of academic and religious institutions and municipalities that have already dumped millions of dollars’ worth of shares in the industry.
Banks like Wells Fargo, also a major funder of the Dakota Access Pipeline, are currently being targeted for bankrolling the private prison industry’s debt during a period of contraction following the Obama administration’s phase-out. In January, in response to demands made by the Afrikan Black Coalition, the University of California announced it was discontinuing $475 million worth of contracts and its $300 million line of credit with Wells Fargo.
During the campaign, candidate Trump asked black Americans what they had to lose. The answer appears to be another generation of their children to the privatization of punishment. As a young man, I was incarcerated for six years in New York State prisons. My take away from that experience was that our criminal justice system suffers from a severe case of hypocrisy and racism. Rather than rehabilitate, it grinds people down and leaves them with the life-long stigma of a criminal record.
Those of us in the movement of formerly incarcerated peoples will not rest until mass incarceration is a thing of the past. Ending private prisons and the monetization of misery remains a vital part of our struggle.It's not often that we cover music news, but this one's too good to pass up on and we know there are Daily Dead readers who will be interested in attending this event. It has just been announced that Maurizio Guarini and Claudio Simonetti will perform the soundtrack for Suspiria live during a screening of the film in Austin:
AUSTIN, Texas—It’s exactly six months before horror and metal collide in Central Texas at the inaugural Housecore Horror Film Festival – the ultimate 3-day, underground fan event celebrating the twisted line where horror films and heavy metal meet. Today, festival creators – legendary metal frontman Philip H. Anselmo and best-selling true crime author Corey Mitchell – announce that influential Italian progressive rock band Goblin will be performing their iconic score to Dario Argento’s 1977 horror masterpiece, Suspiria, live at Housecore Horror Film Festival.
Marking their first-ever performance in North America, Goblin’s horror rock maestros Maurizio Guarini and Claudio Simonetti will fulfill fans’ dreams and nightmares as they perform their notably eerie soundtrack for Suspiria live during a screening of the classic and revered horror masterpiece.
Says Anselmo of the epic performance, “Goblin is, in my view, one of the ultimate horror bands in the history of the genre. I still listen to them often, especially on tour. To have Goblin play the Housecore Horror Film Festival is like I’m living in a strange, dark dream, where nothing is quite geometrically correct, but I want to keep delving further while Goblin dirges onward underneath the bleak imagery.”
Formed in the early 1970s, the progressive rock group is best known for creating the suspenseful and tense soundtracks for horror movie classics including Joe D’Amato’s Buried Alive (aka Beyond Darkness), George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead, and Dario Argento’s Deep Red and Suspiria.
“We are beyond excited to bring the sounds of Goblin and Suspiria to the United States for the very first time! And to be able to perform the score before a live audience while they watch Dario Argento’s masterpiece on the big screen is incredible,” says Maurizio Guarini of Goblin’s involvement. “We are thrilled that Philip Anselmo has asked us to come perform at the Housecore Horror Film Festival. It will certainly be an event for everyone to remember.”
With Suspiria, Argento was able to create a new level of terror by playing with the viewers’ imaginations via his use of screaming, vibrant colors and the horrifying, heavy sounds created by Goblin. The release of the horror classic was a watershed moment for artistic direction in horror films. Rarely before had a horror director leveraged such stylistic flair to expose the depths of our darkest thoughts.
“There are few bands more technically adept at creating an actual atmosphere of tension, occult speculation, or delicate knife-twisting suspense, than Goblin. Their use of sonic keyboards and electronic soundscapes is beyond unique,” says Anselmo.
“All hail the mighty Masters of The Macabre timbres!” he adds.
The Goblin/Suspira screening joins an already heavy list of festival performances, screenings and special events that have been announced to date, including concerts from Down, Crowbar, Philip H. Anselmo & The Illegals, EyeHateGod, and Warbeast; special guest appearances by noted and notorious filmmakers Coffin Joe, Jörg Buttgereit, and Jim VanBebber; and Void ov Voices – another one time only, metal-meets-horror event with extreme metal vocalist Attila Csihar (best known from iconic black metal band Mayhem) using sonic manipulations to create a live soundtrack for The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Many more bands, special guests, films, and special events to be announced over the next few months.
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For more information, visit: http://housecorehorrorfilmfestival.com/This post will shed some light on the differences between arrays and pointers specifically when it comes about referencing string literals. We will base our discussion on the following two programs:
array.c
char a[] = "ROSEdu" ; int main( void ) { a[ 0 ] = 'r' ; printf( " %s
", a); return 0 ; }
pointer.c
char *p = "ROSEdu" ; int main( void ) { *p = 'r' ; printf( " %s
", p); return 0 ; }
Program array.c defines an array of char whose elements are initialized with character string literals, while pointer.c defines a pointer to char and initializes it with the address of a memory area holding a string literal.
Notice array a and pointer p allocations in the image above. Can you make a guess about size of a and size of p?
Next, both programs modify the first character of the string literal "ROSEdu".
Are these two programs equivalent? At the first glance the answer seems to be positive, but let’s have a minute and actually run the code.
$./array rOSEdu $./pointer Segmentation fault
While we could modify array a, our program was killed attempting to modify string literal pointed by p.
We will now have a look at the generated assembly code and notice the section where string literal "ROSEdu" is stored.
$ gcc -S array.c -o array.s $ cat array.s.globl a.data.type a, @object.size a, 7 a:.string "ROSEdu"
$ gcc -S pointer.c -o pointer.s $ cat pointer.s globl p.section.rodata.LC0:.string "ROSEdu".data.type p, @object.size p, 4 p:.long.LC0.text
We can see that array a is stored in data section, which is writable and there is no problem when it is modified. On the other hand, we can notice that p is a pointer stored in data section but it points to a read only memory location, thus accessing it results in Segmentation Fault.
C99 standards (Section 6.7.8) states that:
contents of the array a is modifiable.
is modifiable. if an attempt is made to use pointer p to modify the contents of the array, the behaviour is undefined.
So now we see why pointer.c program crashed. gcc decided to store string literal pointed by p into read only data section. One must remark that this is not mandatory, and its implementation dependant.
We invite you to answer following questions:Amid debate over dynastic politics, Supreme Court judge Justice Jasti Chelameswar on Saturday said money power and dynastic system “negate political justice” contemplated by the framers of Constitution.
Lamenting the “lack of political justice” in India, he said the role money and dynasty play in the electoral process undermines political justice as not everyone can effectively aspire to contest an election.
“Coming to equality and justice in political sphere, while the elementary step is achieved -- we have abolished monarchy and rules of primogeniture -- how far we have secured political justice in the sense that all people of the country can aspire to effectively participate in the democratic electoral process?” Justice Chelameswar said.
He was speaking on the topic- ‘The Preamble Pledge of Social, Economic, and Political Justice: Are We Out of Order’- organised here as part of the Justice P D Desai Memorial Lecture.
“The kind of role which money plays in electoral process, itself is a negation of political justice contemplated by the Constitution in its Preamble,” Justice Chelameswar said.
“Ultimately it is the money power, which determines the eligibility of a man to becoming a member of the legislative body,” he said, adding it is up to the next generation to handle the situation for “a better society, for better governance and getting a better set of people”.
“Another facet of political injustice is the age-old problem of this country -- the syndrome of hierarchy, the seniority rule, the dynasties,” Justice Chelameswar further said.
“Invariably, when somebody becomes a member of the legislative body, his wife, children, everybody line up to occupy the slot.
“This is another form of political injustice. Everybody is entitled, there is nothing wrong in that. But the only determining factor has come to be a person’s relation to the existing member in the public life,” he said.
Justice Chelameswar said the framers of the Constitution were aware of the problems our society faced and ensured that issues were resolved.
Soon after achieving freedom, India had to grapple with food crisis, but the situation has improved over the years. Untouchability and women’s equal rights were also tackled in the Constitution, and the situation is now changing, he said.
“When the Preamble of the Constitution speaks of social justice, each of these problems were in the mind of the framers.
“It is in this background that Constitution makers demand from the society that Constitution governance will provide justice in all spheres of social, economic and political area,” he said.
About the process of framing of the Constitution, Justice Chelameswar said the Constitution was required for a “clear goal for a new India.”
“It is the knowledge of history and the knowledge of mistakes committed by our ancestors and consequences of the mistakes that bring wisdom to later generation to enable them to not commit the mistakes.
“(The framers of the Constitution) realised, from the knowledge and history of this country and mankind, how power corrupts. Governments in future ought to be prevented from that kind of practice of abuse of power. Therefore, there was a need to create a Constitution, which limits the power of governments,” he said.
“In sum, the Constitution is a document which strictly prescribes the limit beyond which a government cannot function, because permitting anybody to exercise authority beyond a particular limit will be detrimental to human liberty and happiness,” Justice Chelameswar said.
First Published: Sep 17, 2017 09:30 ISTKent P. Jackson and Robert D. Hunt, "Reprove, Betimes, and Sharpness in the Vocabulary of Joseph Smith," Religious Educator 6, no. 2 (2005): 97–104.
Reprove, Betimes, and Sharpness in the Vocabulary of Joseph Smith
K ent P. Jackson and Robert D. Hunt
Kent P. Jackson was a professor of ancient scripture at BYU when this was written.
Robert D. Hunt has a master’s degree in ancient Near Eastern studies from BYU.
Noah Webster's 1828 dictionary is a valuable resource to help us understand the language of Joseph Smith's day.
As a prisoner in the squalor of Liberty Jail in March 1839, the Prophet Joseph Smith gave us some of the most beautiful and inspiring words contained in the Doctrine and Covenants.[1] Among those is section 121:43, which counsels the Saints of the necessity of “reproving betimes with sharpness, when moved upon by the Holy Ghost; and then showing forth afterwards an increase of love toward him whom thou hast reproved, lest he esteem thee to be his enemy.” Much commentary has been written and spoken on this verse, admonishing us how to reprove betimes with sharpness. In this article, however, our interest lies in the words themselves. We will attempt to discover what the words reprove, betimes, and sharpness mean—more accurately, what they meant to Joseph Smith when he uttered them in the winter of 1839.
The context of Doctrine and Covenants 121:43 makes it clear that the words are Joseph Smith’s and not the Lord’s. This section of the Doctrine and Covenants begins with the Prophet’s pleading to God on behalf of the Saints (verses 1–6). The Lord then provides counsel and comfort (verses 7–25). Then in verse 26 there is a subtle shift of speakers as the first person changes to the third, and Joseph Smith resumes his own speech.[2] This is an important observation for the analysis of the words, because although Joseph Smith was inspired as he dictated this part of the text to his scribe, he apparently did so in his own language and his own vocabulary.
Dictionaries do not establish what words mean. Lexicographers collect examples of how words are used by speakers and writers, and they create definitions based on what they observe from that usage. Over time, the meaning of a word evolves, and many words today do not have the same meaning that they had in the days of Joseph Smith. In a historical document, a word means not what it communicates to modern readers but what the historical speaker or writer thought it meant. Thus the best way to understand the word is to see how the speaker or writer regularly used it. To know best what Joseph Smith meant with reprove, betimes, and sharpness, we must examine his every known use of those words in their original contexts. Fortunately, we possess a tremendous record of the Prophet’s sermons, statements, journals, letters, and other writings.[3] We also have the scriptures that he produced. We do not view the Book of Mormon or the revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants as the creations of Joseph Smith, yet because the Lord communicates with people “after the manner of their language” (D&C 1:24), we see in those books a manifestation of the English vocabulary and usage of the Prophet and others of his day. Sometimes we do not have a sufficient number of occurrences to allow us to tell with absolute confidence what Joseph Smith had in mind with a word. When that is the case, we turn to other documents contemporary with him and geographically and culturally proximate to him. The cultural and geographical proximity is significant because, for example, a learned treatise published in Cambridge, England, in 1839 will likely tell us much less about Joseph Smith’s word usage than will an article published in a contemporary American newspaper. We have found Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language to be an important tool that collects and preserves the English words of Joseph Smith’s time and place.[4] That work provides a view of the American English language as Noah Webster perceived it in 1828, the year before the Book of Mormon was translated. Thus it is an unparalleled resource for the dialect of the Restoration. Webster’s limitations include the fact that it records more formal than informal usage and relies on written sources (many of them old) rather than on speech. But those are the limitations of virtually all dictionaries.
The immediate context of Joseph Smith’s religious language includes the King James translation of the Bible. Even though the language of early nineteenth-century America was significantly different from that of the King James translation, much of the religious vocabulary of Joseph Smith and his contemporaries derived from, or was profoundly influenced by, the vocabulary of the English Bible. Thus any examination of Joseph Smith’s words must include an examination of how those words were employed by the King James translators. Frequently the key to understanding King James Version words from the Old Testament is in the mirror-image vocabulary of parallel couplets.
An additional avenue for understanding what a word means is to learn its origin. Etymology, the study of the origin of words, is an important tool for understanding how language works and for narrowing the range of possible meanings of any given word. Etymological dictionaries, as well as dictionaries of the languages from which English words derive or are translated, contribute in significant ways to help us know what English words mean. The massive and magisterial Oxford English Dictionary preserves the most complete history in existence of words in our language.[5] It provides not only detailed etymologies but also in-context citations of words from their earliest appearances to the twentieth century. For all we can learn from the Oxford English Dictionary, however, it relies to a very great degree on formal, upper-class writing, with less-than-needed representation of common speech. Moreover, the further chronologically a word is removed from its origin, the less meaningful its history is in determining what a writer or speaker has in mind when using it. Etymology tells us where a word came from, not necessarily what it means when any given person uses it.
The following brief discussions of reprove, betimes, and sharpness will make use of these tools. We acknowledge their limitations and the tentativeness of our conclusions. Yet we are convinced that in order to understand fully the thoughts of Joseph Smith, or of any other historical speaker or writer, we first must understand the words.
Reprove
The English word reprove is borrowed from the Old French reprover, which comes from the Latin reprob~re, meaning to disapprove or condemn.[6] Noah Webster’s 1828 dictionary observes reprove being used with the meanings “blame,” “censure,” “charge with a fault to the face,” “convince of a fault,” “refute,” “disprove,” and “excite a sense of guilt.”[7] Common definitions today include “chide as blameworthy” or “censure,” yet the standard American English dictionary shows that the word’s semantic range is broad enough to include “seek to correct esp. by mild rebuke.”[8]
In the Old Testament, reprove is typically translated from the Hebrew verb ykh, which usually means “rebuke” or “chasten.”[9] The Lord said to Judah through Jeremiah: “Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee” (Jeremiah 2:19, emphasis added), placing the verbs correct and reprove (yk) in synonymous parallelism. In the New Testament, reprove is translated from the Greek verb elénchÇ, which connotes a similar meaning of “convict,” “expose,” or “correct.”[10] All of these definitions seem to fit generally within the range of the word as used by the Prophet in Doctrine and Covenants 121:43. Early Latter-day Saint periodicals show the word being used with the same meaning; for example, “It is also the privilege of the Melchisedec priesthood, to reprove, rebuke and admonish.”[11]
Reprove is used only three times in the Book of Mormon, and all three are in quotations from Isaiah.[12] It is found in only three passages in Joseph Smith’s revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants.[13] In Doctrine and Covenants 84:87 the Lord states: “Behold, I send you out to reprove the world of all their unrighteous deeds, and to teach them of a judgment which is to come.” The Lord appears to be sending His servants to reprimand, or more precisely to correct, those to whom they preach. The parallel word teach, however, may allow for an interpretation of “disprove,” meaning to disabuse the listeners of the misconceptions and false ways of the world. The attestations of reprove in Joseph Smith’s recorded sermons and writings also fit these definitions. The Prophet said: “If I did not love men I would not reprove them,”[14] and “I have no enmity ag[ain]st any man. I love you all—I am their best friend & if persons miss their mark it is their own fault—if I reprove a man & he hate me he is a fool—for I love all men especially these my brethren & sisters.”[15]
Betimes
The word betimes is the most arcane word in Doctrine and Covenants 121:43 and is found only five times in the King James Bible, all in the Old Testament.[16] Its only appearance in modern-day revelation is in the verse under consideration here, and Joseph Smith is not recorded as having used it elsewhere. By his day, the word was already uncommon. Despite its scarcity, however, the Prophet’s meaning of betimes in this verse presents less difficulty than either reprove or sharpness. Betimes comes from Old English and is derived from “by time,” or “by the time.”[17] The Oxford English Dictionary provides some illustrative definitions, including “at an early time,” “in good time, in due time, while there is yet time, before it is too late.” In the early nineteenth century, the word was generally understood to mean “seasonably,” “in good season or time,” and “soon,” as noted in Noah Webster’s 1828 dictionary.[18]
The translators of the King James Version used betimes as “early” in their translation of the Hebrew verb škm, which means to “do early,” “get up early.”[19] In addition, they translated the verb šr, “search,” “be on the lookout for,” three times with the help of betimes.[20]
Taking the evidence together, it appears that the Prophet’s counsel was to correct a person at an appropriate time, early, and before it was too late. Wisdom and experience, coupled with the history of the word itself, show that a timely correction—or a well-timed correction—will always be more successful than an immediate correction.
Sharpness
Of the three words in Doctrine and Covenants 121:43, sharpness may be the most difficult to apply an exact definition to. The Oxford English Dictionary observes sharp being used in a number of ways, ranging from “acute or penetrating in intellect or perception” to “severe, strict, harsh” or “cutting in rebuke.”[21] Noah Webster’s 1828 dictionary includes such definitions as “acute of mind; quick to discern or distinguish” but also “severe; harsh; biting.” Sharpness is defined as “not obtuseness” but also as “acuteness of intellect; the power of... discernment; quickness of understanding” and “quickness of sense or perception.”[22] “Discernment,” “understanding,” and “perception” are most interesting, considering that the reproof is to be given only “when moved upon by the Holy Ghost.”
A few passages from the Old and New Testaments add further insights. Almost all of the passages containing sharp refer to sharp objects like weapons or tools. However, the Hebrew noun ozqâ, usually meaning “strength” or “force,”[23] is once translated in conjunction with a preposition as “sharply” in the King James translation (Judges 8:1).[24] As in the Old Testament, most New Testament attestations of sharp refer to weapons. The Greek adverb apotómÇs can mean “severely” or “rigorously,”[25] and a cognate noun is twice translated as “severity” in Romans 11:22. In 2 Corinthians 13:10, however, Paul writes that his sharpness was “to edification, and not to destruction,” which likely preserves the intent of Joseph Smith in using the same word.[26]
The Book of Mormon gives us good examples of how Joseph Smith apparently understood sharpness. In 2 Nephi 1:26, the Prophet used it in his translation of Lehi’s words to his recalcitrant sons Laman and Lemuel. Lehi said: “Ye have murmured because [Nephi] hath been plain unto you. Ye say that he hath used sharpness; ye say that he hath been angry with you; but behold, his sharpness was the sharpness of the power of the word of God, which was in him; and that which ye call anger was the truth” (emphasis added). Laman and Lemuel interpreted Nephi’s sharpness as anger, yet Nephi was likely neither “harsh” nor “cutting” in his dealings with his brothers. 1 Nephi 16:2 teaches that “the guilty taketh the truth to be hard, for it cutteth them to the very center” (emphasis added). Lehi clarified that Nephi’s words were given in plainness, without anger, and that he possessed the Spirit of the Lord. In Moroni 9:4, Mormon wrote to his son Moroni that he labored with the Nephites “continually” and that when he spoke, he spoke “the word of God with sharpness [that] they tremble[d] and anger[ed] against” him (emphasis added). But when he used no sharpness, “they harden[ed] their hearts against it.” In Doctrine and Covenants 15:2, the Lord said: “I speak unto you with sharpness and with power,” reflecting the intent of ozqâ in the Hebrew Bible—strength. That seems to be the way in which Mormon also spoke to the Nephites. The scriptures commonly record the angry reactions from the wicked when they are admonished or “reproved” for their misdeeds, and the Nephites’ reaction to Mormon was no different as he spoke to them with plainness, strength, and truth, as did Nephi.[27]
Finally, two examples from Church history help clarify the meaning. In 1835 Elders Orson Hyde and William E. McLellin recounted their dealing with a Church member who was teaching false doctrine: “He was shown his error and reproved sharply. He saw it and confessed his fault and made an humble acknowledgment.”[28] In an 1834 meeting, Joseph Smith expressed his displeasure with some Church members. The minutes record that the Spirit “rebuked” them, and that the correction was given “in sharpness,” even “with great sharpness.” The result—perhaps surprising to us—was that the sharp rebuke “occasioned gladness and joy, and [they] were willing to repent and reform in every particular, according to the instruction given.”[29] The fact that these rebukes came from the Spirit, were specific in their instruction, and resulted in confession, humility, repentance, and “gladness and joy” once again leads to the conclusion that sharpness, in the vocabulary of Joseph Smith, meant plainness, truth, and clarity.[30]
Although the definitions of sharpness are broad enough to allow for “harshness” and “cutting,” such caustic responses are unlikely to correct a wayward person and are devoid of the spirit in which the counsel is given. Joseph Smith was explicit when he added that we reprove “when moved upon by the Holy Ghost,” which is not present when harshness and anger are used. And the subsequent “increase of love” suggests that love must already be present when the reproving takes place. The Holy Ghost inspires a person to higher degrees of intellectual power and discernment, quickness of understanding, and quickness of perception. These are among the qualities embodied in the word sharpness.
In summary, our reproving with sharpness needs to be done at an appropriate early occasion, and the reproof must come with plainness and discernment—and only when the Holy Ghost so instructs. These definitions fit not only the semantic range of the words in 1839, but they also fit the spirit of Joseph Smith’s inspired teaching.Let be the Liouville function, thus is defined to equal when is the product of an even number of primes, and when is the product of an odd number of primes. The Chowla conjecture asserts that has the statistics of a random sign pattern, in the sense that
for all and all distinct natural numbers, where we use the averaging notation
For, this conjecture is equivalent to the prime number theorem (as discussed in this previous blog post), but the conjecture remains open for any.
In recent years, it has been realised that one can make more progress on this conjecture if one works instead with the logarithmically averaged version
of the conjecture, where we use the logarithmic averaging notation
Using the summation by parts (or telescoping series) identity
it is not difficult to show that the Chowla conjecture (1) for a given implies the logarithmically averaged conjecture (2). However, the converse implication is not at all clear. For instance, for, we have already mentioned that the Chowla conjecture
is equivalent to the prime number theorem; but the logarithmically averaged analogue
is significantly easier to show (a proof with the Liouville function replaced by the closely related Möbius function is given in this previous blog post). And indeed, significantly more is now known for the logarithmically averaged Chowla conjecture; in this paper of mine I had proven (2) for, and in this recent paper with Joni Teravainen, we proved the conjecture for all odd (with a different proof also given here).
In view of this emerging consensus that the logarithmically averaged Chowla conjecture was easier than the ordinary Chowla conjecture, it was thus somewhat of a surprise for me to read a recent paper of Gomilko, Kwietniak, and Lemanczyk who (among other things) established the following statement:
Theorem 1 Assume that the logarithmically averaged Chowla conjecture (2) is true for all. Then there exists a sequence going to infinity such that the Chowla conjecture (1) is true for all along that sequence, that is to say for all and all distinct.
This implication does not use any special properties of the Liouville function (other than that they are bounded), and in fact proceeds by ergodic theoretic methods, focusing in particular on the ergodic decomposition of invariant measures of a shift into ergodic measures. Ergodic methods have proven |
faq-question"><h3>Resetting or changing your Voice Messaging access code</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer2" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><h4>On fido.ca</h4><ul><li><a href="/web/page/portal/Fido/Ecare_voiceMail_land">Reset your Voice Messaging access code</a> by logging into My Account</li></ul><h4>Using our Self-serve menu</h4><ul><li>Alternatively, you can use our self-serve menu by dialling6-1-1 from your Fido phone or by dialling1-888-481-3436 from any other phone: <ul><li>Press <strong>"1"</strong> to use the self-serve menu.</li><li>Press <strong>"3"</strong> to access the services menu.</li><li>Press <strong>"2"</strong> to change your Voice Messaging access code.</li><li>Follow the instructions to create a new Voice Messaging access code.</li></ul></li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Listening to your voice messages</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer3" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>From your Fido phone:</p><ul><li>Press and hold the <strong>"1"</strong> key on your phone for a few seconds to access your Voice Messaging service.</li><li>Enter your access code when prompted.</li><li>Follow the instructions to listen to your messages.</li></ul><p>From any other phone:</p><ul><li>Call your own Fido phone number.</li><li>Press the <strong>"#"</strong> key during your greeting message.</li><li>Enter your access code when prompted.</li><li>Follow the instructions to listen to your messages.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Storage capacity and functionality</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer4" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><table class="table-calls-forwarding" border="0"><thead> <tr><th> </th><th>Voice Messaging</th><th>Premium Voice Messaging</th><th>Enhanced Voice Messaging</th></tr></thead> <tbody><tr><td><span class="txtb">Number of messages</span></td><td>3 voice messages</td><td>35 voice messages</td><td>35 voice messages</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Length of messages</span></td><td>3 minutes each</td><td>5 minutes each</td><td>5 minutes each</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Storage of new messages -(unheard)</span></td><td>3 days</td><td>10 days</td><td>10 days</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Storage of saved messages</span></td><td>3 days</td><td>10 days</td><td>10 days</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Personal greeting</span></td><td>A 60 second voice signature</td><td>A 3 minute personal greeting or a 60 second voice signature</td><td>A 3 minute personal greeting or a 60 second voice signature</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Special greeting</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>A 3 minute special greeting</td><td>A 3 minute special greeting</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Distribution list</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>20 distribution lists of 50 members each</td><td>20 distribution lists of 50 members each</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Instant reply</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>Included</td><td>Included</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Text transcription</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>Included</td><td>N/A</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Now you can extend your voicemail to six rings from four rings. <a href="https://www.fido.ca/consumer/contact-us">Contact us to set-up Voicemail Ring Extension</a> on your number.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Managing your greeting</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer5" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>To modify your personal greeting message:</p><ul><li>Press and hold the <strong>"1"</strong> key on your phone for a few seconds to access your Voice Messaging service.</li><li>Enter your access code when prompted.</li><li>Press the <strong>"3"</strong> key to access the customization menu.</li><li>Press the <strong>"1"</strong> key to access the Voice Messaging cuztomization menu.</li><li>Press the <strong>"3"</strong> key again to access the greeting customization menu.</li><li>Follow the instructions to delete your current greeting and/or record a new one.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Managing your messages</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer6" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>For assistance in using your Voice Messaging service and navigating within it, consult the following menus and options:</p><!-- VoiceMail--><h4>Voice Messaging</h4><ol><li> <ol><li>Listen to a voice message<br />During Playback <dl> <dd>1. Go back 8 seconds<br /> 11. Go to beginning of message<br /> 2. Pause message/ Continue playback<br /> 3. Go forward 8 seconds<br /> 33. Go to end of message<br /> 5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 77. Delete message immediately without hearing the full message<br /> #. Skip to next message (message is saved automatically)<br /> *. End playback and return to main menu</dd> </dl> After Playback <dl> <dd>5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 7. Delete message<br /> 9. Save message</dd> </dl> </li><li>Customize your Voice Messaging service</li></ol></li></ol> <dl> <dd> <dl> <dd>1. Modify your access code</dd> <dd>2. Modify your Voice Signature (recording of your name)</dd> <dd>3. Modify your Greeting Message</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl> <!-- // Voicemail --> <!-- --><h4>Premium Voicemail-To-Text</h4><ol><li> <ol><li>Listen to a voice message<br />During Playback <dl> <dd>1. Go back 8 seconds<br /> 11. Go to beginning of message<br /> 2. Pause message/ Continue playback<br /> 3. Go forward 8 seconds<br /> 33. Go to end of message<br /> 5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 77. Delete message immediately without hearing the full message<br /> #. Skip to next message (message is saved automatically)<br /> *. End playback and return to main menu</dd> </dl> After Playback <dl> <dd>5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 7. Delete message<br /> 9. Save message</dd> </dl> </li><li>Send a voice message to a Fido number</li><li>Modify the Voice Messaging service</li></ol></li></ol> <dl> <dd>1. Personalize the Voice Messaging service <dl> <dd>1. Modify your acces code</dd> <dd>2. Modify your voice signature (recording of your name) <dl> <dd>1. Erase and record again</dd> <dd>2. Save the current voice signature</dd> </dl> </dd> <dd>3. Modify your greeting message <dl> <dd>1. Record new greeting</dd> <dd>2. Erase current greeting</dd> <dd>3. Save greeting</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl> </dd> <dd> <dl>2. Manage distribution lists <dd>1. Modify existing distribution list</dd> <dd>2. Create a distribution list</dd> <dd>3. Erase a distribution list</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Setting the Voice Messaging Retrieval Number (VMR)</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer7" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>If you have a non-Fido phone or if your Voice Messaging settings have been deleted, simply program the following number into the settings of your device in order to retrieve your voice messages:</p><ul><li>Voice Messaging Retrieval Number: +1-416-821-6549</li></ul><p>Note: There are no long-distance charges for calling this number on the Fido network while you are in your local calling area (LCA), even if the number is from a different province.</p><h4>To set the Voice Messaging Retrieval (VMR) number for iPhone:</h4><ul><li>Access your phone keypad</li><li>Dial *5005*86*+14168216549# and press Call</li><li>The screen will flash briefly indicating the number has been programmed</li><li>The above instructions may not work for all models of iPhone</li></ul><h4>To set the Voice Messaging Retrieval (VMR) number for Android<br /> (instructions may vary based on Operating System version):</h4><ul><li>Go to Settings > Call Settings > Voicemail Settings > Voicemail Number</li><li>Enter +14168216549</li><li>Save the settings</li></ul><h4>For all other phones:</h4><ul><li>Alternately this number can be programmed either in the voicemail settings or as a quick-dial or contact.</li><li>For assistance with a non-Fido phone, please consult the manufacturer of your device.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Using your Voice Messaging while travelling</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer8" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>To access your messages from anywhere in the world simply press and hold the <strong>"1"</strong> key on your phone.<br /> The following rates apply:</p><table class="table-calls-forwarding" border="0"><thead> <tr><th>Location</th><th>Retrieving your messages</th><th>Message deposited in your voicemail</th></tr></thead> <tbody><tr><td>While on the Fido network in your Local Calling Area</td><td>Airtime charges apply.</td><td style="text-align: center;" rowspan="5">No charge</td></tr><tr><td>While on the Fido network outside your Local Calling Area</td><td>Airtime and long distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="/web/content/ldtravelling">View our rates</a></td></tr><tr><td>While roaming on another network in Canada</td><td>Airtime and long distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="/web/content/ldtravelling/can_roaming">View our rates</a></td></tr><tr><td>While in the USA</td><td>Airtime and long distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="/web/content/coverageroaming/roaming_us_rates">View our U.S. Roaming rates</a></td></tr><tr><td>While in an international destination</td><td>Airtime and Long Distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="http://www.fido.ca/web/page/portal/Fido/FidoOptions?forwardTo=internationalRoamingInfo">View our International Roaming rates</a></td></tr></tbody></table></div></div></div> how_tos manage_your_calls voice Primary Support 10 Support Voice Messaging | Fido Support EN /consumer/content/postpaid-voice-messaging_EN Voice Messaging | Fido Support manage_your_calls how_tos Support messaging voice Voice Messaging | Fido Support Mobile Support Fido messaging monthly <div class="rui-support-resulttypes support-tabs"><ul><li><a href="/consumer/content/prepaid-voice-messaging"> Prepaid </a></li><li class="active"><a> Postpaid </a></li></ul></div><p> </p><p><strong>Voice Messaging:</strong> Allows a person who calls you to record a message when you’re unavailable to answer.<br /> <a href="/web/content/manageyourcalls/calldisplay_minivoicemail">How much does it cost?</a></p><p><strong>Premium Voicemail-To-Text:</strong> Allows you to listen to and READ your messages without dialing into your Voice Messaging service. Available for any mobile phone that supports Picture and Video Messaging (MMS).<br /> <a href="/web/content/manageyourcalls/visualvoicemailplus&lang=en&lang=en">How much does it cost?</a>.</p><p><strong> Enhanced Voice Messaging:</strong> Allows a person who calls you to record a message when you’re unavailable to answer.<br /><a href="/web/content/manageyourcalls/enhancedvoicemessaging&lang=en">How much does it cost?</a></p><h3>How to use Voice Messaging</h3><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>First time set-up</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer1" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>Press and hold the "1" key on your phone for a few seconds to access your Voice Messaging service.</p><p>The first time you access your Voice Messaging service, you'll be prompted to create the following:</p><ul><li>Your own personal access code (4 to 5 digits long)</li><li>A personal greeting and a recording of your name (your voice signature) <ul><li>Note: You can’t keep the default greeting, and your voice signature can’t be deleted once it’s recorded.</li></ul></li></ul><p><strong>Having trouble setting up your voicemail?</strong></p><p>If you’ve tried setting up your voicemail yourself but it’s still not working, we can help. Just <a href="https://www.fido.ca/consumer/contact-us" target="_blank">contact us</a>.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Resetting or changing your Voice Messaging access code</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer2" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><h4>On fido.ca</h4><ul><li><a href="/web/page/portal/Fido/Ecare_voiceMail_land">Reset your Voice Messaging access code</a> by logging into My Account</li></ul><h4>Using our Self-serve menu</h4><ul><li>Alternatively, you can use our self-serve menu by dialling6-1-1 from your Fido phone or by dialling1-888-481-3436 from any other phone: <ul><li>Press <strong>"1"</strong> to use the self-serve menu.</li><li>Press <strong>"3"</strong> to access the services menu.</li><li>Press <strong>"2"</strong> to change your Voice Messaging access code.</li><li>Follow the instructions to create a new Voice Messaging access code.</li></ul></li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Listening to your voice messages</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer3" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>From your Fido phone:</p><ul><li>Press and hold the <strong>"1"</strong> key on your phone for a few seconds to access your Voice Messaging service.</li><li>Enter your access code when prompted.</li><li>Follow the instructions to listen to your messages.</li></ul><p>From any other phone:</p><ul><li>Call your own Fido phone number.</li><li>Press the <strong>"#"</strong> key during your greeting message.</li><li>Enter your access code when prompted.</li><li>Follow the instructions to listen to your messages.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Storage capacity and functionality</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer4" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><table class="table-calls-forwarding" border="0"><thead> <tr><th> </th><th>Voice Messaging</th><th>Premium Voice Messaging</th><th>Enhanced Voice Messaging</th></tr></thead> <tbody><tr><td><span class="txtb">Number of messages</span></td><td>3 voice messages</td><td>35 voice messages</td><td>35 voice messages</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Length of messages</span></td><td>3 minutes each</td><td>5 minutes each</td><td>5 minutes each</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Storage of new messages -(unheard)</span></td><td>3 days</td><td>10 days</td><td>10 days</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Storage of saved messages</span></td><td>3 days</td><td>10 days</td><td>10 days</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Personal greeting</span></td><td>A 60 second voice signature</td><td>A 3 minute personal greeting or a 60 second voice signature</td><td>A 3 minute personal greeting or a 60 second voice signature</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Special greeting</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>A 3 minute special greeting</td><td>A 3 minute special greeting</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Distribution list</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>20 distribution lists of 50 members each</td><td>20 distribution lists of 50 members each</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Instant reply</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>Included</td><td>Included</td></tr><tr><td><span class="txtb">Text transcription</span></td><td>N/A</td><td>Included</td><td>N/A</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Now you can extend your voicemail to six rings from four rings. <a href="https://www.fido.ca/consumer/contact-us">Contact us to set-up Voicemail Ring Extension</a> on your number.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Managing your greeting</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer5" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>To modify your personal greeting message:</p><ul><li>Press and hold the <strong>"1"</strong> key on your phone for a few seconds to access your Voice Messaging service.</li><li>Enter your access code when prompted.</li><li>Press the <strong>"3"</strong> key to access the customization menu.</li><li>Press the <strong>"1"</strong> key to access the Voice Messaging cuztomization menu.</li><li>Press the <strong>"3"</strong> key again to access the greeting customization menu.</li><li>Follow the instructions to delete your current greeting and/or record a new one.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Managing your messages</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer6" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>For assistance in using your Voice Messaging service and navigating within it, consult the following menus and options:</p><!-- VoiceMail--><h4>Voice Messaging</h4><ol><li> <ol><li>Listen to a voice message<br />During Playback <dl> <dd>1. Go back 8 seconds<br /> 11. Go to beginning of message<br /> 2. Pause message/ Continue playback<br /> 3. Go forward 8 seconds<br /> 33. Go to end of message<br /> 5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 77. Delete message immediately without hearing the full message<br /> #. Skip to next message (message is saved automatically)<br /> *. End playback and return to main menu</dd> </dl> After Playback <dl> <dd>5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 7. Delete message<br /> 9. Save message</dd> </dl> </li><li>Customize your Voice Messaging service</li></ol></li></ol> <dl> <dd> <dl> <dd>1. Modify your access code</dd> <dd>2. Modify your Voice Signature (recording of your name)</dd> <dd>3. Modify your Greeting Message</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl> <!-- // Voicemail --> <!-- --><h4>Premium Voicemail-To-Text</h4><ol><li> <ol><li>Listen to a voice message<br />During Playback <dl> <dd>1. Go back 8 seconds<br /> 11. Go to beginning of message<br /> 2. Pause message/ Continue playback<br /> 3. Go forward 8 seconds<br /> 33. Go to end of message<br /> 5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 77. Delete message immediately without hearing the full message<br /> #. Skip to next message (message is saved automatically)<br /> *. End playback and return to main menu</dd> </dl> After Playback <dl> <dd>5. Get message header (time, date and caller's number - if available)<br /> 7. Delete message<br /> 9. Save message</dd> </dl> </li><li>Send a voice message to a Fido number</li><li>Modify the Voice Messaging service</li></ol></li></ol> <dl> <dd>1. Personalize the Voice Messaging service <dl> <dd>1. Modify your acces code</dd> <dd>2. Modify your voice signature (recording of your name) <dl> <dd>1. Erase and record again</dd> <dd>2. Save the current voice signature</dd> </dl> </dd> <dd>3. Modify your greeting message <dl> <dd>1. Record new greeting</dd> <dd>2. Erase current greeting</dd> <dd>3. Save greeting</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl> </dd> <dd> <dl>2. Manage distribution lists <dd>1. Modify existing distribution list</dd> <dd>2. Create a distribution list</dd> <dd>3. Erase a distribution list</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Setting the Voice Messaging Retrieval Number (VMR)</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer7" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>If you have a non-Fido phone or if your Voice Messaging settings have been deleted, simply program the following number into the settings of your device in order to retrieve your voice messages:</p><ul><li>Voice Messaging Retrieval Number: +1-416-821-6549</li></ul><p>Note: There are no long-distance charges for calling this number on the Fido network while you are in your local calling area (LCA), even if the number is from a different province.</p><h4>To set the Voice Messaging Retrieval (VMR) number for iPhone:</h4><ul><li>Access your phone keypad</li><li>Dial *5005*86*+14168216549# and press Call</li><li>The screen will flash briefly indicating the number has been programmed</li><li>The above instructions may not work for all models of iPhone</li></ul><h4>To set the Voice Messaging Retrieval (VMR) number for Android<br /> (instructions may vary based on Operating System version):</h4><ul><li>Go to Settings > Call Settings > Voicemail Settings > Voicemail Number</li><li>Enter +14168216549</li><li>Save the settings</li></ul><h4>For all other phones:</h4><ul><li>Alternately this number can be programmed either in the voicemail settings or as a quick-dial or contact.</li><li>For assistance with a non-Fido phone, please consult the manufacturer of your device.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Using your Voice Messaging while travelling</h3><span class="action"> <em class="rui-icon-plus"></em> </span></div><div id="answer8" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>To access your messages from anywhere in the world simply press and hold the <strong>"1"</strong> key on your phone.<br /> The following rates apply:</p><table class="table-calls-forwarding" border="0"><thead> <tr><th>Location</th><th>Retrieving your messages</th><th>Message deposited in your voicemail</th></tr></thead> <tbody><tr><td>While on the Fido network in your Local Calling Area</td><td>Airtime charges apply.</td><td style="text-align: center;" rowspan="5">No charge</td></tr><tr><td>While on the Fido network outside your Local Calling Area</td><td>Airtime and long distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="/web/content/ldtravelling">View our rates</a></td></tr><tr><td>While roaming on another network in Canada</td><td>Airtime and long distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="/web/content/ldtravelling/can_roaming">View our rates</a></td></tr><tr><td>While in the USA</td><td>Airtime and long distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="/web/content/coverageroaming/roaming_us_rates">View our U.S. Roaming rates</a></td></tr><tr><td>While in an international destination</td><td>Airtime and Long Distance charges apply. <br /> <a href="http://www.fido.ca/web/page/portal/Fido/FidoOptions?forwardTo=internationalRoamingInfo">View our International Roaming rates</a></td></tr></tbody></table></div></div></div> manage_your_calls messaging monthly voice Voice Messaging: Allows a person who calls you to record a message when you’re unavailable to answer. AB BC MB NB NL NS NT NU ON PE QC SK YT Voice Messaging | Fido Support Support /consumer/content/postpaid-voice-messaging Mobile consumer /consumer/content/postpaid-voice-messaging_EN regular manage_your_calls Mobile Support voice messaging voice Voice Messaging | Fido Support messaging voice regular /consumer/content/postpaid-voice-messaging_EN /_/R-%2Fconsumer%2Fcontent%2Fspotify_EN /pages/support /Fido 0 Spotify Premium regular 257 Spotify Premium Promo Ending | Fido Support <div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Spotify Premium promo ending</h3></div><div id="answer1" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>As of July 30, 2018, customers who subscribe to a <strong>Fido Pulse<sub>TM</sub></strong> plan will no longer receive the first 6 months of a Spotify Premium subscription for free. Promo codes distributed before this date must be redeemed by July 30, 2019.</p><p>This promotion might be over, but there’s still a ton of exciting bonus features for Fido customers to enjoy:</p><ul><li><strong><a href="https://www.fido.ca/consumer/mobile/get-new-perks-and-deals-every-thursday-with-fido-xtra?icid=ba-hpcacon-fx-ffcwrls-05031817">Fido XTRA</a>:</strong> Get new perks from awesome brands like Adidas, Foodora, La Senza and more. Every Thursday at no extra cost.</li><li><strong><a href="https://www.fido.ca/consumer/mobile/databytes">Data Bytes</a>:</strong> Get 5 extra hours of data with Fido Pulse plans.</li><li><strong><a href="https://www.fido.ca/consumer/mobile/travel">Fido Roam</a><sub>TM</sub>:</strong>Use your plan’s talk, text and data while travelling for a low daily price.</li></ul><p>Thanks for choosing Fido! For more info on Spotify, please go to <a href="http://www.spotify.com">www.spotify.com</a>.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>What is Spotify Premium<sup>®</sup>?</h3></div><div id="answer2" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p><strong>Spotify® Premium</strong> is a paid subscription service currently priced at $9.99 per month.</p><p>It gives you all the music you’ll ever need, and premium features:</p><ul><li>Play millions of songs on your phone, tablet or desktop computer instantly and ad free.</li><li>Search, play and skip <strong>any song</strong> in the Spotify catalogue.</li><li>Take your tunes offline and keep your music with you wherever you are.</li></ul></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>How do I activate my 6 months of FREE Spotify Premium?</h3></div><div id="answer3" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: #333333;"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px;">If you’re a Fido PulseTM plan customer who’s activated your plan between October 25 2017 to July 30 2018 never subscribed to Spotify Premium before, you’re eligible to enjoy the first 6 months of a Spotify Premium subscription for free. Offer must be redeemed within one year.</span></span></p><h3>Follow the activation steps below to subscribe to Spotify Premium and activate your free 6 months:</h3><p>Within 48 hours of activating your Fido Pulse plan you’ll get a text message from us welcoming you to enjoy 6 months of free access to Spotify Premium. The link in the welcome message contains an embedded Spotify promo code:</p><ol><li>Tap on the link to go to the Spotify website where you can redeem your code and activate your Spotify Premium account.</li><li>If necessary, sign up for a Spotify account, or sign in to an existing account.</li><li>Your 6 months of free Spotify Premium access begins once you’ve successfully completed the activation steps.</li></ol><p>Keep in mind, as part of activating your 6 months of free access to Spotify Premium, you’ll be asked to register a payment method.</p><p>If you signed up for a Fido Pulse plan and within 48 hours you didn’t receive a text link from us for 6 months of free Spotify Premium, or in case you accidentally deleted that message, you can get a copy of the link any time in <a href="https://www.fido.ca/pages/#/login?m=login" target="_blank">My Account on Fido.ca</a>.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Why does Spotify need my credit card information?</h3></div><div id="answer4" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>During the activation process you’ll be asked to provide your credit card information. No charges will be billed until the 6 months is up. When your promotional offer has expired, Spotify will charge your payment method $9.99 per month. To cancel your paid subscription, visit <a href="https://www.Spotify.com" target="_blank">Spotify.com</a>.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>How will I know when my 6 months of free access to Spotify Premium is over?</h3></div><div id="answer5" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>Unfortunately, we can’t remind you when your 6 months of free access to Spotify Premium has expired. Therefore, we suggest that you schedule your own reminder if you don’t want the service to continue so you that you can cancel through <a href="https://www.Spotify.com" target="_blank">Spotify.com</a> before you’re charged.</p><p><strong>Residents of Québec only:</strong> If you reside in Québec, you’ll automatically revert to the free version of Spotify at the end of the 6-month promotion.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>If I change price plans or cancel my service with Fido, do I lose my 6 months of Spotify Premium?</h3></div><div id="answer6" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>Nope! You will continue to enjoy Spotify Premium in all of its glory until your 6 months has expired.</p></div></div></div><h3>What else should I know about the offer and Spotify Premium?</h3><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>I subscribed to Spotify Premium in the past. Why doesn’t my Spotify username qualify for the offer?</h3></div><div id="answer7" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>This offer only works with Spotify usernames that haven’t previously subscribed to Spotify.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Where do I download the Spotify app?</h3></div><div id="answer8" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>Android users: <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spotify.music&hl=en" target="_blank">Download Spotify</a> from the Google Play store.</p><p>iPhone users: <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/spotify-music/id324684580?mt=8" target="_blank">Download Spotify</a> from the App Store.</p></div></div></div><div class="faq-container"><div class="faq-question"><h3>Can I use Spotify Premium on devices other than my phone?</h3></div><div id="answer9" class="collapse"><div class="faq-answer"><p>Absolutely! In addition to your phone, you can listen to Spotify on your tablet, computer. Additionally, you can stream Spotify on some smart TVs and other media devices with Spotify Connect, AirPlay |
policy changes.Going into 2012, Republicans were well positioned to take back the Senate. They needed four net seats, or three net seats, plus the presidency, to win control of the upper chamber, and they had opportunities everywhere: Ohio, Wisconsin, Montana, North Dakota, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Nebraska, Florida, Missouri, Virginia. The Democrats, by contrast, had maybe two possible pickups — Maine and Massachusetts — but for the most part their top priority was holding the line against a Republican onslaught.
Today the map looks much different. Republicans are trailing in nearly all of their pickup states (save North Dakota and Nebraska). Democrats have over-performed in Massachusetts and Maine. And weak GOP candidates in Indiana and Arizona have put two very unexpected red states into play.
The TPM Polltracker currently forecasts Democrats losing one seat on November 6. That’s consistent with other polling aggregators. Real Clear Politics also puts the race at 52-48. Nate Silver’s forecast suggests there’s a decent, though slim chance that Dems will either hold the line entirely or even pickup a seat or two.
Either way, it’s a devastating forecast for the GOP — for the party’s governing and electoral strategies, but also for its forward-looking agenda.
Without a Senate majority, Republicans can’t control the budget process. Which means they can’t cram their entire agenda into a reconciliation bill that’s immune from the filibuster. It means that even if they force votes on repealing the Affordable Care Act, they’ll need 60 votes — or about a dozen Democratic defectors. Not likely. President Romney would have to stymie implementation of the law from within the executive branch — a difficult task — and his tax agenda would be a non-starter. So would his plans for Medicare and Medicaid. He’d still be able to appoint Supreme Court justices and lower court judges, but Democrats would be able to block conservatives they deemed too objectionable.
In other words, if the Senate math holds, this election has transitioned from one of great consequence, and great potential for the conservative agenda, into something altogether different. Well, at least until 2014.We talked to Raina Bird, who grew up in an honest-to-god hippie commune led by the alleged embodiment of God, and she told us...
Kids these days are so spoiled with their modern cults. It's all Hollywood actors and slick suits politely offering personality tests. What about the good old-fashioned sex, drugs, and unquestioning obedience of the Charles Manson-era cults? This was a time when hordes of Americans wandered off into the desert to find out exactly how weird a human life could get.
5 Of Course, There Was A Lot Of Weird Sex Stuff Going On
The '60s and '70s were as saturated with hippie cults as they were bad fashion, but Adi Da (real name Franklin Jones) was one of its more notable figures. After realizing his degree in English literature probably wouldn't make him rich, Jones started his own religious movement known as Adidam, because all that reading failed to make him even a little creative. His philosophy is probably pretty familiar to you if you've spent much time around anyone who's a little too into yoga, with the important distinction that he had claimed to literally be God incarnated...
Adidam.org
Apparently, even deification doesn't get you out of male pattern baldness.
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Somehow, thousands of otherwise perfectly sane and intelligent people heard this and thought it sounded great and in no way ripe for a mess of abuse. Two of those followers later had a daughter named Raina ("Hi!) who eventually moved to the Mountain of Attention, one of Adidam's main compounds in California. Things got exponentially weirder from there. For starters, as the Adidam website itself explains, "many people do'sense something very unusual'" in the presence of the cult's founder. By "something very unusual," they mean his dong.
"Despite the fact that celibacy was the order of the day and everyone was supposed to be getting enlightened, not banging," Raina says, the guru decidedly did not practice what he preached. While one lawsuit against the guru in the 1980s accused Jones of ordering his followers, "to perform aberrant, perverted and degrading sexual acts, including... sodomy, urination, defecation and dildo assaults on one another," it usually didn't get that kinky and/or nonconsensual. Mostly, "the guru REALLY liked fucking and plowed his way through almost every hot female in the cult," Raina says. "My mother was always bummed that she never got to have sex with the guru."By Vadim Pushkin
There are ongoing negotiations to make a cruiserweight unification between WBA champion Denis Lebedev (28-2, 21KOs) of Russia and IBF champion Victor Ramirez (22-2-1, 17KOs) of Argentina.
Lebedev had a big year in 2015 and now won three in a row since getting knocked out by Guillermo Jones in eleven rounds in May of 2013. Jones tested positive for a banned weight cutting agent in the aftermath, but the official result of the contest was never officially changed. Jones was eventually stripped of the belt, which the sanctioning body returned to Lebedev.
He won a twelve round unanimous decision in April over mandatory challenger Youri Kalenga. He then came back in November, and stopped undefeated Nigerian fighter Lateef Kayode in eight rounds.
Ramirez became the world champion after beltholder Yoan Pablo Hernandez was stripped for a very long stint of inactivity. Ramirez captured the interim-IBF world championship when he defeated Ola Afolabi last May, and then he came back in October to win a twelve round split draw with Ovill McKenzie of the UK.
"There were discussions with Ramirez. We have an interest in a fight with him," said Lebdev's promoter Andrei Ryabinsky of World of Boxing. "But I can not give any details just yet, because we have not yet reached an agreement. There are negotiations taking place. I want to Denis to get a second title."Microsoft isn't acknowledging the development, or even the existence, of the Xbox 360's successor (codenamed "Durango"), but that isn't stopping potential details from leaking out of Redmond. The latest report comes via console overview documents (known as "white papers") provided to Kotaku by the same source who provided information on the next PlayStation (codenamed "Orbis"), and it spells out some things we've yet to hear. Namely, the console will ship with a new version of Microsoft's motion-sensing camera controller, Kinect, and that the device, "must be plugged in and calibrated for the console to even function," the piece says. The new Kinect -- which we've heard of in the past -- is said to capture up to six people at once, and an alleged image demonstrating the difference between new and old versions of the camera puts much higher specs on said device (1920x1080 color resolution, more trackable joints, improved depth resolution, etc.).
The new console is also reported to employ multitasking, enabling multiple games or apps to run concurrently, similar to mobile phones and tablets; how many apps that could mean is unclear, if true. Sony's PlayStation Vita already employs such functionality, making the claim all the less far-fetched.
The piece also states supposedly final retail hardware specs for Microsoft's next game console, including a 64-bit D3D11.x 800MHz GPU, an 8-core x64 1.6GHz 4MB L2 CPU, 8GB DDR3 RAM, 500GB of on-board memory, USB 3.0, HDMI-out, and an optical drive for 50GB discs. For its part, Microsoft's staying mum -- "We do not comment on rumors or speculation. We are always thinking about what is next for our platform, but we don't have anything further to share at this time," a Microsoft spokesperson told us -- and Sony's the only game in town with even an event scheduled in the near future.
[Photo credit: Kotaku]Editor’s note: The following guest post was written by Ashkan Karbasfrooshan, founder and CEO of WatchMojo.
While Yahoo! remains the best positioned digital media company around, Wall Street remains unconvinced.
Yahoo!’s revenues are not growing as fast as other online media companies (GOOG, AMZN, Facebook, etc). Moreover, between Facebook’s grip on display ad inventory and DSPs changing the way advertisers buy inventory, Yahoo’s core business (display, reach) is under threat.
If that weren’t enough, the Alibaba/Alipay situation illustrates that it’s only a matter of time before investors, analysts and the media force Yahoo! to shed its Asian assets. Once the company unloads those assets, the cash on its balance sheet will soar, but its enterprise value (market cap + debt – cash) will plummet.
Block and Tackle, but Look for Hail Marry as Well
As Yahoo! plays catch up investing in video... it might realize that it needs to make some tuck-in acquisitions and consider throwing a hail marry, too.
Post Asian asset sales, Yahoo! will find itself with:
lots of cash on its balance sheet
a lower enterprise valu
tepid revenues
growing threats
an opportunity to grow in video.
Yahoo! will be able to use some of the cash on its books to acquire Hulu to compete with Netflix, Google/YouTube and Amazon more effectively. Otherwise, the status quo means a company that will become gobbled by one of the larger companies out there. Not a bad fate in of itself, but not a fate it needs to back itself into either. Yahoo! can also be taken out by a private equity firm, something that I’ve long argued would have its share of benefits.
Content is a Woman, Distribution is a Man
I’ve cut hundreds of deals with distribution companies. The conclusion I’ve reached is that—for lack of a better analogy—Content is a woman, Distribution is a man. In other words, historically distribution companies
make no commitments,
never make any promises,
have no-strings-attached offerings,
rarely seek exclusivity, and
when they do, it’s usually too good to be true.
Content owners, meanwhile,
enter distribution deals with expectations,
believe the promises they hear,
expect a commitment, and
want a guarantee.
As a man, I can’t help but admit that in the end, women prevail and men have to come around if we want to play along.
As a content owner, it’s reassuring to know that.
Is Hulu a Content or Distribution Company?
In case you’re asking: is Hulu a content or distribution company, well, it’s a hybrid. Technically it’s a distribution company but its pedigree is content (via its owners). If someone buys them and gets exclusive rights, it becomes more of a content play than a distribution or tech play. The reality is that to most buyers its traffic and technology are worth less than its content rights, especially if those rights become exclusive.
Welcome to an Era of Exclusivity
Meanwhile, I expect Facebook to move away from being a pure-play platform and move further into becoming a media company striking content deals, including exclusive content rights and content acquisition deals (learning from Google/YouTube’s early missteps and trying to jump some steps and save time to justify its $70 billion market cap despite relatively low revenue figures).
Lost in the recent “will Hulu sell?” talk is “why would Hulu’s owners want to sell?” Its owners are of course some of the largest traditional media companies (TMCs) including News Corp., Disney and Comcast (via NBC Universal).
Hulu raised $100 million at a $1 billion valuation. It’s unclear if the consortium of media companies and the private equity firm Providence share a vision for the exit, or end game. Even if Hulu’s value has risen since that deal, the increased value on the TMCs’ balance sheets means little to media companies. Moreover, Providence realizes that without the rights to the content, no buyer would take a stab at Hulu.
The Mother of All Pivots?
So a company like Yahoo! will be tempted to “pivot” its plodding aircraft carrier and acquire Hulu and then use the cash left from the Asian assets (net of the $1-2B rumored to buy Hulu) to then fork over licensing fees to the media companies as a carrot to lock in rights—dare we say exclusive rights—for years to come.
As much as some pushed the “non-exclusive” and “hyper-distribution” mantra, those are dead in the water. The web will “regress to the mean” of media and advertising and see more and more exclusive deals. Those are the kind of deals that make television a $70 billion advertising industry and $250 billion ecosystem including other revenue streams.
Hulu’s Strategic Options
This begs the question: what about an IPO? If Hulu goes public at a valuation of $1-2B and sells 10-50% to the public it will only generate a few hundred million dollars; not nearly enough to be used to pay off the big media companies that now own Hulu in licensing fees. Combined with Hulu’s low margins, this means an IPO won’t maximize Hulu’s value, which means the big media companies won’t have an incentive to pursue the IPO path.
Of course, Hulu’s current investors could sell some shares in the IPO, or hold onto their stakes and sell later in a secondary offering in the hopes that the valuation goes higher if they continue to improve the content they give Hulu and/or increase revenue. But, let’s be realistic here, media companies are risk-averse and realize that if they can sell Hulu, give up some exclusive content in the process and concurrently lock in a decent annuity that is more than a positive outcome for what was once labeled Clown Corp. by an influential blog a few years ago. This is all even more pertinent considering that the cloud overhanging Hulu’s content licensing terms and profit margins will remain risk factors in its prospectus.
However, Hulu in the hands of someone like MSFT/YHOO/GOOG would be able to pay the TMCs hundreds of millions of dollars per year in licensing fees. While a ballooning value on paper and increasing goodwill on their balance sheet does little to move the needle for the TMCs, hundreds of millions of dollars in annuities on their income statement will.
Combine this with the facts that:
Google/YouTube is eager to use $100 million (if not much more over time) to offer Fortune 500 marketers the kind of content they’re used to advertising alongside,
Facebook is armed to the teeth with hundreds of millions in cash from operations and the sale of stock to DST, Goldman, etc., and increasingly eyeing content,
Netflix is opening its wallet to TMCs for content,
then you can imagine that Yahoo! realizes it needs a new playbook and the TMCs want to create more competition for their content.
As it turns out, Sumner Redstone was dead right: with new distribution channels the value of content rises. While content and distribution are equally important and one without the other is worthless, suddenly content companies will find themselves in a landscape of heightened competition which will see the value of their content rise.
Disclaimer: YouTube, Hulu, Yahoo! are all WatchMojo’s distribution partners.IT LOOKS LIKE WE'VE MADE IT! BUT...
We only have a few hours left! Even though it looks like we have hit our goal, we still heartily encourage you to donate to this project. Our budget was very bare bones and anything we get on top of our goal will only go into making this documentary even more awesome!
You still have time to be a part of this and get your name in this film. Thank you. All of you!
For a couple years now we Laughter Against The Machinists (W. Kamau Bell, Nato Green, and Janine Brito) have been doing shows in Northern California with a few toe dips into the Pacific Northwest. Warm, familiar, liberal places (except Sacramento) where we were pretty sure most of the audience would welcome us with open arms (except Marin). But the time has come for us to leave our creature comforts. It’s time for us to step away from the land of organic quinoa, gourmet coffee made by bespectacled hipsters, latex-free butt plugs sold by androgynous feminists, and venture into less familiar territory. The time has come for us to put our money where our mouth is and wade into the most polarized quagmires in the US, the flashpoints of American ignorance and upheaval. Like Doctors Without Borders, but with jokes instead of penicillin, LATM roams the country bringing humor to the people who need it the most.
AND we’ve got Mike Paunovich and Evan Donn, some amazing filmmakers, to follow our journey, but we can’t do it alone and absolutely need your help. Filming this documentary won’t be easy or cheap. There are multiple plane tickets, hotel accommodations, safe houses, camera crews, best boys, riot gear, and bail bonds to be bought! The tour is planned, but we can’t afford to set foot out the door without your support up front. We’re hitting seven hot spots (with potentially more to be added)!
LATM TOUR DATES
Sept 10 Phoenix, AZ Space 55
Sept 14 Chicago, IL Greenhouse Theater
Sept 16 Dearborn, MI Henry Ford Comm. College/ Adray Auditorium
Sept 17 Madison, WI Bartell Theatre
Nov 9-10 Washington, DC DC Arts Center
Nov 11-12 New Orleans, LA La Nuit Comedy Theater
Nov 14-15 Oakland, CA New Parish Theater
TICKETS FOR ALL DATES: www.LATMComedy.com/
ABOUT THE COMEDIANS
W. KAMAU BELL is one of the fastest-rising socio-political comics in the United States. Praised by Punchline Magazine as “one of our nation’s most adept racial commentators with a blistering wit,” Kamau has been voted San Francisco's best comedian by three publications. His stand-up album, Face Full of Flour, was named one of the Top 10 Best Comedy Albums of 2010 by both iTunes and Punchline Magazine. Kamau is best known for his critically-acclaimed solo show "The W. Kamau Bell Curve: Ending Racism in About an Hour," which he performs across the country and will take to the Edinbugh Fringe Festival. He recently performed at the Facing Race Conference, the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal, and the New York Comedy Festival, where he was a critic’s pick in Time Out NY (“FOUR STARS: Bell finds comic gold in the wide range of material he mines, offering provocative insights into an ugly reality"). The SF Weekly has called Kamau “smart, stylish, and very much in the mold of politically outspoken comedians like Dave Chappelle and Margaret Cho,” though he was more excited that they called him “handsome.” Visit him online at wkamaubell.com
NATO GREEN, a San Francisco native, was named The SF Weekly's Best Comedian of 2010 for putting on "legendary" shows that keep audiences "doubled over." He continues the tradition of hard-hitting brainy Jewish comedians like Lenny Bruce, Mort Sahl, and Joe Lieberman. Nato is the creator of Iron Comic, the Iron Chef-spoofing hit comedy game show that packed houses at SF Sketchfest four years in a row and the Bridgetown Comedy Festival 2010 and 2011. The East Bay Express reported that onstage Nato "has a knack for pushing boundaries," the San Francisco Chronicle wrote that Nato "had the hordes howling." Daniel Handler, aka Lemony Snicket said, “Righteous and hilarious, bracing and a hoot, Nato Green is like finding a shot of bourbon at your co-worker's stupid vegan potluck.” His website is www.natogreen.com
JANINE BRITO started doing standup comedy in St. Louis and has performed at clubs and theaters throughout the US and Hong Kong. A rising star on the San Francisco scene, she is a regular at the Punch Line, winner of the 2009 SF Women's Comedy Competition, recipient of Rooftop Comedy's 2010 Silver Nail Award, and was just named the 2011 “Best Comedian with a Message” by the East Bay Express. A sarcastic, snarky smart bomb of comedy funk straight from the 80's, Janine has been praised by 7x7 Magazine as "one of SF's more daring voices" and one of "the 7 funniest people in town.” The SF Weekly also called her “a mean lesbian,” but she’s pretty sure that they meant it in a good way. www.janinebrito.com
ABOUT THE DESTINATIONS
Phoenix, AZ
From Sheriff Joe Arpaio, to banning ethnic studies, to the fact that it’s now so illegal to be Mexican that people are putting ketchup on their tacos, Arizona is now the heavyweight champion of crazy. Arizona has gotten too weird for people from Florida. Even Alabama is keeping its distance.
Chicago, IL
Chicago isn't normally thought of as a political hotspot, but it's the City that elevated improv, blues, community organizing, machine politics, anthropology, and the inspiring (and successful) Republic Windows & Doors factory occupation in 2008. And we all have family connections here.
Dearborn/Detroit, MI
Dearborn is home to America’s largest Muslim community. LATM will prove once and for all that Islam is no scarier than Christianity...OK, good point. It’s probably way less scary. Meanwhile, is Detroit a decaying carcass of a rusty metropolis, or is something being born here more exciting than Eminem’s kids?
Madison, WI
Republican Governor Scott Walker’s attempts to eliminate union rights for public workers have galvanized a student-labor movement to save the state. Governor Walker’s hubris may turn Wisconsin into the Waterloo of the Tea Party. But first the Tea Party will have to look up the word “Waterloo.”
Washington, DC
We’ll visit the people who live in the seat of our democracy, the denizens of the capital of the world’s last superpower...ok most recent superpower, until China decides to collect. DC is where even baristas have lobbyists. PS – Let’s see if we can get that President guy to show up. He’s supposed to have such a good sense of humor...
New Orleans, LA
Remember how New Orleans was destroyed by a hurricane and everybody said it would be rebuilt so college kids could keep getting drunk for Mardi Gras? And then remember how Kanye West called George W. out on TV? And then we got a black president? Everything must be back to normal down there now right? Hey, what’s that black spot in the ocean?
Oakland, CA
Here we’ll perform for people who have a nice view of the most liberal city in the country, while experiencing crushing poverty, crime, and that rapid displacement of black people known as gentrification. LATM comes home to Oakland, bringing back the wisdom of our travels and lessons from the American heartland.On a snowy winter night I decided to go outside. It was dark, I couldn’t see anything, yet continued to walk towards the pitch black abyss in front of me. Dressed in shorts and a tank top I felt the wind having its effect on me. A chill began to run down my spine and the hair of my skin stood up, not because of the weather, but because of uncertainty. Where was I heading? Why did I do it? The answers to those questions I did not have at that time. It was an enlightening experience as I was able to face fear which I had deliberately created.
Where Was I
The situation wasn’t real, as in, I actually wasn’t in danger of any kind. My home was just nearby and there was no possibility of me freezing to death. However, for a slight moment I perceived it as reality. I began to imagine, what if? What if it were real? What if I was in actual wilderness with no safety around me? What if, instead of it being a casual stroll on a winter night, it would’ve been a survival scenario?
I would’ve had to rely solely on my killer instinct and try to not freeze over, to which I’m no stranger to (What I learned at sniper school / My cold thermogenesis practice). Despite that I still had to face fear and uncertainty.
The Safety Net
It made me realise that safety is just an illusion, something bestowed upon us which isn’t natural to have. Our entire society is resting upon this fragile constructed comfort which we’ve become so dependent of.
There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s just that man alone, if not conditioned appropriately, would perish in nature. Any other person, with no previous experience, in a real situation, would not have made it through the night.
Another realisation hit me. Not about the cold or discomfort, but about something a lot more important which this is all about. This situation was a template for overcoming any resistance and thus surthriving. Not only surviving by making ends meet but, instead, rising above the turmoils of life, becoming self-empowered and thriving as a being.
The Struggle is Real
In the unforgiving environment of nature one is on the verge of destruction. It’s a constant struggle. Uncertainty will always be there.
Being afraid is a natural response to exertion and pushing oneself. It occurs when we’re forced to roll the dice and take the step into the pitch black abyss from which we don’t know if we’re going to return.
But we will, despite the scars endured and point of exhaustion reached, as greater than before. It’s necessary to do so. Face fear and you have the possibility to grow. Don’t and fall victim to the tides of stagnation and eventually death.
Follow the Anxiety
Fear is a compass leading us in the direction we’re supposed to be heading towards. The things we’re afraid of the most are the things we need to be doing. It comes from the ego’s desire to protect itself. To not expand and maintain inner equilibrium. There is no difference between running from predators, gasping for air between waves or rolling the dice and taking a chance in anything we do. It’s all equally as scary, yet necessary.
Because of the anxiety and dread it creates, fear scores quite low on the scale of consciousness. It’s a lower vibration which tries to prevent us from rising to transcendent levels. The antidote to that is courageousness, the ability to face fear despite it’s presence and ultimately defeat it. This trait is characteristic to heroes, great men and self-empowered beings. It operates as a gateway between the lower and higher stages of existence.
In order for us to transform and evolve as a person we need to be growing. This doesn’t imply towards equilibrium but motion. It means we have to face fear in everything we do. Without anxiety and uncertainty it wouldn’t feel right. It’s presence is necessary for us to recognize the right course. The impediment it creates is but an illusion to test our worth. No obstacle is overcome without climbing it, no dragon is slain without confronting it in battle. There is no other way around it. Luckily, there is a way through it.
Face Fear and Become a Lion.
It might seem dangerous, and it certainly is to the ego. Being scared is a part of the process and necessary. Those who face fear are lionchasers. That is the perfect illustration for this, as it sounds like the worst profession to have. To go after the king of the savannah.
Despite the anxiety and uncertainty that accompanies the charge they make their own terms with the sovereign. The foe is a lot bigger and stronger but the look in the eyes of a lionchaser signifies towards a lot more power. Bordering with obsessive, that of the good kind, it flashes in the sun and reveals the true intention of the hunter. The lion now also has to face fear. Whoever manages to overcome the inner feeling of resistance and manifest it externally wins.
To conquer this feeling we have to face fear head on. Like said, it’s an illusion played by the ego to prevent us from taking action, which causes exertion and could potentially put our survival in jeopardy. However, whether we make it or not is determined by our degree of conditioning and skill, not by the situation we’re in. The effort we put into confronting it is a lot more important. Without the necessary reference experience it would turn into an insurmountable force.
The Lion-Wrestler
Hercules, the hero of Ancient Greece, did exactly this. The Nemean lion had been terrorizing the local people for a long time. King Eurystheus gave Hercules the task to bring him the beast’s invulnerable skin.
During his chase Hercules realised that his arrows had no effect on the target. When the lion had escaped into its cave the hero followed. In close quarters he entered into hand-to-claw combat and eventually choked his foe to death. After that he took his skin and started to wear it as a cloak himself.
Hercules had to face fear, did it despite the danger and, figuratively speaking, became the lion he had slain. Not only was he now a much better fighter but also managed to display his self-mastery to himself.
His success was the result of his courageousness. The lion must’ve been shocked when Hercules entered the cave and decided to wrestle with the beast. No one had ever done that. Hercules overcame the anxiety and was able to face fear despite being between its jaws. He was victorious because of being able to take control of his thoughts and actions.
Face Fear and Transcend.
Facing our fears is a lot more important than to simply rise above any form of resistance that impedes our greatness. It’s also a means towards transcendence.
The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying and The Egyptian Book of The Dead have one common scene in them concerning what happens after death. When a person dies their soul will be summoned to a room. In Egypt inside the pyramids, in Tibet inside a mountain. It’s the purgatory that Christianity talks about and where the idea was conceived.
Before the soul can enter the spiritual realm, become one with the all, it has to go through a trial. It’s done to find out whether or not the individual is worthy enough and understands the law. In front of him will be summoned monstrous beings, all trying to scare him. They’re not real but instead manifestations of the person’s own mind.
If the soul is conscious enough and able to face fear despite it’s presence he will not falter. Once the realisation has been made, that it’s all an illusion, enough perseverance will grant access to another realm. If the trial is failed and the soul becomes frightened then he is not aware of his inner turmoil. There isn’t enough self-mastery to face fear, not internal nor external. The soul will be thus expelled from the purgatory and cast back to the Earthly realm where he will be reincarnated.
The soul will then have to go through the circle of life again to gather enough wisdom and become conscious enough. To realise the fact that in order to transcend his mode of being he needs to become aware of who he is and that he is in control of his own reality.
How To Face Fear
There is definitely a lot to be learned from this. Face fear, become a lion and transcend are only some of the rewards we can get. However, it ought not to be done to receive some sort of a prize or to arrive somewhere. Hercules slayed the lion to save the people and become a renown hero, in addition to manifesting his true greatness. The soul who passed the trial did so to reach higher levels of consciousness, not as a means to an end but because it recognized itself in the midst of chaos, not by accident but because of its habitual mode of being. That’s the way we should approach this aswell.
Our means to face fear are the end themselves. The courageousness that is cultivated in the process is the best reward and enables us to reach higher levels of consciousness. The only way to overcome these obstacles is to have self-mastery. The act itself becomes a manifestation of our greatness and is done as evidence of our assertive expertise over ourselves.
The first step is to know the foe. Knowledge about fear and its nature gives us enough resources to face it. If we know what it is (an illusion) why it occurs (to protect our current self) and what we need to overcome it (courageousness) then doing so becomes the natural thing to do. What’s written here has plenty of information about this. We simply have to understand it and then take the next step.
Once knowledge has been gathered courageousness has to be summoned. It’s a much higher vibration than fear and therefore has more power. Without it we would simply become paralyzed by anxiety. If we can’t find bravery in our hearts then there is no self-mastery either. Remember, fear is our own creation and can be thus controlled. Courageousness can be summoned using our inner currents of energy. By becoming conscious in the present moment and aware of the turmoil that’s happening within. ( It’s a much higher vibration than fear and therefore has more power. Without it we would simply become paralyzed by anxiety. If we can’t find bravery in our hearts then there is no self-mastery either. Remember, fear is our own creation and can be thus controlled. Courageousness can be summoned using our inner currents of energy. By becoming conscious in the present moment and aware of the turmoil that’s happening within. ( How to take control of your thoughts and emotions.
Next to fear there now exists a counterforce with a lot more power. It’s vibration is a lot higher because it operates from a place of abundance and next level awareness, instead of scarcity and anxiety. The stage is set for battle, what needs to be done next is for it to commence. Whether or not it turns into a massacre depends on the degree of self-mastery. The weapon of choice for the hero is deliberate action. It’s steadfast motion towards the ranks of fear. Despite the feeling of anxiety and uncertainty that accompanies the charge those with enough courageousness are able to ignore it. It’s having enough confidence and faith in oneself, in one’s self-mastery, that assures victory. There is no place for doubt or timidness, those are all manifestations of fear. It’s about telling oneself that it’s possible and realising that it’s natural to be feeling this way.
Overcome Your Fears
Like me on that cold winter night, like Hercules who went on to accomplish many more feats of strength, like the soul that reincarnated, we all need to face fear in some shape or form. It manifests itself in almost everything we do, when we’re trying to rise to become better, conduct change and rise to higher levels of consciousness.
For me it happened when I was writing my book, as I’m writing this and most definitely it impedes the path towards what I intend to do next with my life.
However, as I’ve managed to prove to myself countless times, I’m able to overcome it. It’s presence will never go away or get smaller, just my skill in dealing with it improves. Becoming a self-empowered being is about being able to face fear, stare into the eyes of the lion and remain conscious enough even when between its jaws.
Recently I published my first book called Becoming a Self-Empowered Being: Achieving Body-Mind-Mastery and Living One’s Calling. In addition to this topic it also talks about nutrition, exercise, meditation, motivation, purpose and much more. It reveals the principles of self-mastery and how to apply them, in order to become a self-empowered being. Read it and change your life.
Like this: Like Loading...Students shout slogans during a protest in Madrid November 30, 2013. REUTERS/Susana Vera/Files
MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish police searched the headquarters of the ruling People’s Party (PP) for 14 hours as part of a corruption investigation that earlier this year threatened to destabilize the government of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.
Police entered late on Thursday on the order of examining Magistrate Pablo Ruz, searching for documents and invoices that might provide evidence of off-the-book payments linked to renovation work on the building carried out from 2005 to 2011, a PP spokesman said. They left the central Madrid building on Friday morning.
The outcome of the raid was not known, a judicial source said.
Ruz is looking into an alleged slush fund operated by former PP treasurer Luis Barcenas, who has testified to channelling millions of euros of cash donations from construction magnates into the pockets of party leaders.
Rajoy and other PP leaders have denied wrongdoing and have not become direct targets of Ruz’s investigation.
Rajoy’s popularity rating, already hit by an economic crisis which has left one in four working Spaniards without a job, fell sharply when the scandal broke, though with the focus of the investigation still firmly on Barcenas, it has since recovered.
According to court documents, Barcenas hid up to 48 million euros in Swiss bank accounts. The former Treasurer is in jail pending trial on charges including money laundering and tax fraud in a separate corruption case.
He has also been charged in the slush fund case.Putting pressure on children builds stress, which they then associate with the particular food they’re being told to eat Pryshchepa Serii
For many families, the holiday season is as much about stuffing your face as it is about stuffing stockings. Goodbye baked chicken breasts; hello pot roast with chestnut-braised green beans and pumpkin pie à la mode. And who wants cornflakes when it’s perfectly acceptable—festive, even—to indulge in eggnog French toast instead?
These same gustatory delights can make the holidays a nightmare, however, for the parents of fussy eaters. Your kids’ untouched dinner plates spark snide, rum-fueled comments from your entire extended family, and the worst part is, some are well-deserved. Good lord, I really have been letting Johnny eat nothing but white bread and macaroni and cheese for the past three months, haven’t I?
First—and I’m not just saying this because I was a picky eater, though I was—it’s normal for children to be wary of unfamiliar foods. The technical term for this behavior, which peaks between the ages of 2 and 6, is food neophobia, and it may actually be a relic of an evolutionary survival tactic: Animals old enough to forage for food alone but too inexperienced to know what’s safe are less likely to accidentally poison themselves if they are cautious about trying new foods. (Young chimpanzees and rats behave this way, for instance.) And unless a fussy child’s weight-for-age percentile is quickly dropping, he or she is probably not in any health danger from eating only bagels for a few weeks, says Lucy Cooke, a psychologist and public-health scientist at University College London. Kids can get enough nutrients from just a handful of foods, and hey, there are always |
"logos" (Greek), "way" (Christian) and even 'tao" (Chinese). None of these is entirely accurate and none conveys the full force of the term in Sanskrit. Dharma has no equivalent in the Western lexicon.
Dharma has the Sanskrit root dhri, which means "that which upholds" or "that without which nothing can stand" or "that which maintains the stability and harmony of the universe." Dharma encompasses the natural, innate behavior of things, duty, law, ethics, virtue, etc. Every entity in the cosmos has its particular dharma -- from the electron, which has the dharma to move in a certain manner, to the clouds, galaxies, plants, insects, and of course, man. Man's understanding of the dharma of inanimate things is what we now call physics.
British colonialists endeavored to map Indian traditions onto their ideas of religion so as to be able to comprehend and govern their subjects; yet the notion of dharma remained elusive. The common translation into religion is misleading since, to most Westerners, a genuine religion must:
1) be based on a single canon of scripture given by God in a precisely defined historical event;
2) involve worship of the divine who is distinct from ourselves and the cosmos;
3) be governed by some human authority such as the church;
4) consist of formal members;
5) be presided over by an ordained clergyman; and
6) use a standard set of rituals.
But dharma is not limited to a particular creed or specific form of worship. To the Westerner, an "atheistic religion" would be a contradiction in terms, but in Buddhism, Jainism and Carvaka dharma, there is no place for God as conventionally defined. In some Hindu systems the exact status of God is debatable. Nor is there only a single standard deity, and one may worship one's own ishta-devata, or chosen deity.
Dharma provides the principles for the harmonious fulfillment of all aspects of life, namely, the acquisition of wealth and power (artha), fulfillment of desires (kama), and liberation (moksha). Religion, then, is only one subset of dharma's scope.
Religion applies only to human beings and not to the entire cosmos; there is no religion of electrons, monkeys, plants and galaxies, whereas all of them have their dharma even if they carry it out without intention.
Since the essence of humanity is divinity, it is possible for them to know their dharma through direct experience without any external intervention or recourse to history. In Western religions, the central law of the world and its peoples is singular and unified, and revealed and governed from above.
In dharmic traditions, the word a-dharma applies to humans who fail to perform righteously; it does not mean refusal to embrace a given set of propositions as a belief system or disobedience to a set of commandments or canons.
Dharma is also often translated as "law," but to become a law, a set of rules has to be present which must: (i) be promulgated and decreed by an authority that enjoys political sovereignty over a given territory, (ii) be obligatory, (iii) be interpreted, adjudicated and enforced by courts, and (iv) carry penalties when it is breached. No such description of dharma is found within the traditions.
The Roman Emperor Constantine began the system of "canon laws," which were determined and enforced by the Church. The ultimate source of Jewish law is the God of Israel. The Western religions agree that the laws of God must be obeyed just as if they were commandments from a sovereign. It is therefore critical that "false gods" be denounced and defeated, for they might issue illegitimate laws in order to undermine the "true laws." If multiple deities were allowed, then there would be confusion as to which laws were true.
In contrast with this, there is no record of any sovereign promulgating the various dharma-shastras (texts of dharma for society) for any specific territory at any specific time, nor any claim that God revealed such "social laws," or that they should be enforced by a ruler. None of the compilers of the famous texts of social dharma were appointed by kings, served in law enforcement, or had any official capacity in the state machinery. They were more akin to modern academic social theorists than jurists. The famous Yajnavalkya Smriti is introduced in the remote sanctuary of an ascetic. The well-known Manusmriti begins by stating its setting as the humble abode of Manu, who answered questions posed to him in a state of samadhi (higher consciousness). Manu (1.82) tells the sages that every epoch has its own distinct social and behavioral dharma.
Similarly, none of the Vedas and Upanishads was sponsored by a king, court or administrator, or by an institution with the status of a church. In this respect, dharma is closer to the sense of "law" we find in the Hebrew scriptures, where torah, the Hebrew equivalent, is also given in direct spiritual experience. The difference is that Jewish torah quickly became enforced by the institutions of ancient Israel.
The dharma-shastras did not create an enforced practice but recorded existing practices. Many traditional smritis (codified social dharma) were documenting prevailing localized customs of particular communities. An important principle was self-governance by a community from within. The smritis do not claim to prescribe an orthodox view from the pulpit, as it were, and it was not until the 19th century, under British colonial rule, that the smritis were turned into "law" enforced by the state.
The reduction of dharma to concepts such as religion and law has harmful consequences: it places the study of dharma in Western frameworks, moving it away from the authority of its own exemplars. Moreover, it creates the false impression that dharma is similar to Christian ecclesiastical law-making and the related struggles for state power.After my previous post some people asked why did I invent what was invented already? Why did I try to write another std::function? Well, from the begining I planed to compare custom and standard approach. So here we are.
Thought stl provides a great way to store functions and call them later it simply not fulfils my requirement - function callbacks should be added and removed runtime. Also the same function shouldn’t be added twice. std::function doesn’t have a comparison operator. You can say that there’s the std::function::target() method that returns a pointer to a callable type. But can we use it with member functions? Recall that in order to create a wrapper around a member function we need to bind it with std::bind() :
function<void()> f{ bind(&SomeStruct::someMemberFunc) };
And std::bind() returns an unspecified type. That means that each compiler will have different implementation for this type. Also the standard doesn’t say that instances of this type should be comparable. Take a look at the following code:
SomeStruct obj; // same function binded twice function<void()> f{ bind(&SomeStruct::someMemberFunc, obj) }; function<void()> f2{ bind(&SomeStruct::someMemberFunc, obj) }; // get the type of underlying callable object using RetType = decltype(bind(&SomeStruct::someMemberFunc)); auto a = f.target<T>(); auto b = f2.target<T>(); bool b{ a == b }; // false
Here I binded the same function of the same object to different wrappers. Though can’t compare std::function objects directly, but I can get the underlying callable objects. With Visual Studio I can compare this objects but anyway they are not equal!
Since I can’t compare std::function objects directly I decided to use some sort of hashing. Let’s look at the example:
template<void(*funcPtr)()> void add() { uintptr_t ptr{ reinterpret_cast<uintptr_t>(funcPtr) }; string hash{ to_string(ptr) }; }
I took a pointer to a function and converted it to the string - now I have unique key which I can compare. The documentation says:
"Any pointer can be converted to any integral type large enough to hold the value of the pointer (e.g. to std::uintptr_t)".
Sounds easy, right? But cplusplus wouldn’t be cplusplus if it was so easy. The pointer to member is not an usual pointer and reinterpret_cast doesn’t work with it, i.e. the following code is incorrect:
template<typename T, void(T::*funcPtr)()> void add() { uintptr_t ptr{ reinterpret_cast<uintptr_t>(funcPtr) }; // cannot convert to 'uintptr_t' string hash{ to_string(ptr) }; }
In other words - there’s no simple way to get a pointer to member as uintptr_t and even void*. But we can do some hack:
template<typename T, void(T::*funcPtr)()> void add() { auto ptr = funcPtr; void* ptr2 = &ptr; // get address of the pointer char arr[sizeof(uintptr_t)]; memcpy(arr, ptr2, sizeof(uintptr_t)); // copy the contents of pointer (which is the address to the function) uintptr_t ptr3 = *(reinterpret_cast<uintptr_t*>(arr)); // cast to necessary type }
It can work. But it’s not guaranteed. All this looks like I should forget about hash string. At least at that moment I don’t know how to get string representation of member function robustly. While I’m searching for the way to do it I decided to take the dumbest approach - pass a string tag together with data:
template<void(*funcPtr)()> void add(const string& tag) { } template<typename T, void(T::*funcPtr)()> void add(const string& tag) { }
It’s not elegant and it adds some complexity to a code but at least it’s robust, haha. Now I can start to implement the Dispatcher class (remember previous post) with std::function.
template<typename T> class Dispatcher; template<typename Ret, typename...Args> class Dispatcher<Ret(Args...)> { public: template<Ret(*funcPtr)(Args...)> bool add(const string& tag) { addImpl(tag, funcPtr); return true; } template<typename T> bool add(const string& tag, shared_ptr<T> t) { addImpl(tag, *t.get()); return true; } bool remove(const string& tag) { auto it = find(tags.begin(), tags.end(), tag); if (it == tags.end()) { return false; } auto index{ distance(tags.begin(), it) }; tags.erase(it); delegates.erase(delegates.begin() + index); return true; } void operator()(Args... args) { for (auto& delegate : delegates) { delegate(args...); }; } private: bool addImpl(const string& tag, function<Ret(Args...)> delegate) { if (find(tags.begin(), tags.end(), tag)!= tags.end()) { return false; } delegates.push_back(delegate); tags.push_back(tag); return true; } private: vector<function<Ret(Args...)>> delegates; vector<string> tags; };
The addImpl() function accepts a std::function as a second parameter. In different add() functions we’re passing a callable object to it which will be converted to std::function implicitly. Curious reader already noticed that I didn’t provide an implementation for a member function. Why? Because it’s not trivial. Let’s find out why:
struct UserStruct { int member(int a, float b) { return a + static_cast<int>(b); } }; UserStruct us; function<int(int, float)> f{ bind(&UserStruct::member, us, placeholders::_1, placeholders::_2) }; f(5, 10.0f);
That’s how we bind and call a member function. Have you noticed std::placeholders? If we don’t know what parameters we’re going to pass to a wrapper - we have to use this stubs. Remember that we’re trying to build "generic" system and we chose to use variadic parameter pack for arguments. Because of this we don’t know the number of placeholders beforehand. And as you have guessed we need to generate them!
After some search we can end up in this documentation and it looks like what we need. And even with an example! It states that we can use our own custom placeholder if we’ll follow certain rules. Let’s try:
template<size_t> struct MyPlaceholder{}; namespace std { template<> struct is_placeholder<MyPlaceholder<1>> : public integral_constant<size_t, 1>{}; template<> struct is_placeholder<MyPlaceholder<2>> : public integral_constant<size_t, 2>{}; } function<int(int, float)> f{ bind(&UserStruct::member, us, MyPlaceholder<1>{}, MyPlaceholder<2>{}) }; f(5, 10.0f)
Wow, it works! But we don’t like this enumeration in std namespace, do we?
template<size_t> struct MyPlaceholder{}; namespace std { template<size_t N> struct is_placeholder<MyPlaceholder<N>> : public integral_constant<size_t, N>{}; } function<int(int, float)> f{ bind(&UserStruct::member, us, MyPlaceholder<1>{}, MyPlaceholder<2>{}) }; f(5, 10.0f)
Much better. Now we need to remove placeholder’s manual instantiation in std::bind() function. In one of my previous posts I wrote about integer sequence and it seems we can use it here too. Let’s wrap std::bind() and replace our placeholders with a function-generator:
template <size_t N> MyPlaceholder<N + 1> getPlaceholder() { return {}; } template <typename T, typename Ret, size_t... Idx, typename... Args> auto bindImpl(T* obj, Ret(T::*funcPtr)(Args...), index_sequence<Idx...>) { return bind(funcPtr, obj, getPlaceholder<Idx>()...); // getPlaceholder() will be expanded } function<int(int, float)> f{ bindImpl(&us, &UserStruct::member, index_sequence_for<int, float>{}) }; f(5, 10.0f)
The getPlaceholder() will receive an integer (starting from 0 ) as template argument and will be called the number of times equal to the number of callback’s arguments. Exactly as in my previous post. Since placeholders should start from 1 we’re adding +1 in the argument - MyPlaceholder<N + 1>. In our case this code will be generated:
MyPlaceholder<0 + 1> getPlaceholder() { return {}; } MyPlaceholder<1 + 1> getPlaceholder() { return {}; } auto bindImpl(UserStruct* obj, int(UserStruct::*funcPtr)(int, float), index_sequence<0, 1>) { return bind(funcPtr, obj, getPlaceholder<0>(), getPlaceholder<1>()); }
Done! Now let’s put it in our Dispatcher :
template<size_t> struct MyPlaceholder{}; namespace std { template<size_t N> struct is_placeholder<MyPlaceholder<N>> : public integral_constant<size_t, N>{}; } template<typename T> class Dispatcher; template<typename Ret, typename...Args> class Dispatcher<Ret(Args...)> { public: //... other code... template<typename T, Ret(T::*funcPtr)(Args...)> bool add(const string& tag, shared_ptr<T> obj) { addImpl(tag, bindImpl(obj.get(), funcPtr, index_sequence_for<Args...>{})); return true; } //... other code... private: //... other code... template <typename T, size_t... Idx> function<Ret(Args...)> bindImpl(T* obj, Ret(T::*funcPtr)(Args...), index_sequence<Idx...>) { return bind(funcPtr, obj, getPlaceholder<Idx>()...); } template <size_t N> MyPlaceholder<N + 1> getPlaceholder() { return {}; } //... other code... }
Noe we can use our dispatcher this way:
Dispatcher<int(int, float)> dispatcher; auto ptr = make_shared_lambda([](int a, float b)->int { return a + static_cast<int>(b); }); dispatcher.add("lambda", ptr); dispatcher.add("lambda", ptr); // will not add because wrapper with this name already binded auto ptr2 = make_shared<UserStruct>(); dispatcher.add<UserStruct, &UserStruct::member>("member", ptr2); dispatcher(5, 10.0f); dispatcher.remove("lambda"); dispatcher.remove("member");
See my previous post for make_shared_lambda() implementation.
Now when we have two implemenations we can compare their performance. I binded a lambda, global function and a member function to both dispatchers and call them 10'000'000 times while measuring the time needed to make this amount of calls. Also I added "raw" function call (direct call without any wrappers). I ran this test 10 times and averaged the result. This is what I got with Visual Studio 2015 (release mode, optimizations):
lambda raw: 21 lambda dispatcher: 235 lambda function dispatcher: 31 global raw: 21 global dispatcher: 85 global function dispatcher: 38 member raw: 22 member dispatcher: 233 member function dispatcher: 38
Sorry, no fancy charts today. The results are interesting and unexpected for me. Delegate version I wrote is incredibly slow but std::function is pretty fast though 50% slower than the raw function call. For me the choice is obvious - I can live with managing unique identifiers for std::function, the speed for me (as a game developer) is much more important.FreeBSD News Flash
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25 November: The second RC build for the FreeBSD 12.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, armv7, arm64, i386, powerpc, powerpc64, powerpcspe and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
17 November: The first RC build for the FreeBSD 12.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, armv7, arm64, i386, powerpc, powerpc64, powerpcspe and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
10 November: The fourth BETA build for the FreeBSD 12.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, armv7, arm64, i386, powerpc, powerpc64, powerpcspe and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
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16 July: New committer: John Hixson (ports)
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14 February: The FreeBSD Project is pleased to announce its participation in Google's 2018 Summer of Code program, which funds summer students to participate in open source projects. This will be the FreeBSD Project's fourteenth year in the program, having mentored over 210 successful students through summer-long coding projects between 2005 and 2017.
Past successful projects have included improvements to Linux ABI emulation, NFSv4 ACLs, TCP regression testing, FUSE file system support, and countless other projects. Many students go on to become FreeBSD developers, as well as participating in FreeBSD developer events around the world through continuing support from the FreeBSD Foundation.
Prospective participants are invited to apply; more information is available, including proposal and deadline information, on the FreeBSD Summer Projects page.
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January 2018
25 January: New committer: Jeb Cramer (src)
4 January: About the Meltdown and Spectre attacks: FreeBSD was made aware of the problems in late December 2017. We're working with CPU vendors and the published papers on these attacks to mitigate them on FreeBSD. Due to the fundamental nature of the attacks, no estimate is yet available for the publication date of patches.
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27 February: The FreeBSD Project is pleased to announce its participation in Google's 2017 Summer of Code program, which funds summer students to participate in open source projects. This will be the FreeBSD Project's thirteenth year in the program, having mentored over 200 successful students through summer-long coding projects between 2005 and 2016.
Past successful projects have included improvements to Linux ABI emulation, NFSv4 ACLs, TCP regression testing, FUSE file system support, and countless other projects. Many students go on to become FreeBSD developers, as well as participating in FreeBSD developer events around the world through continuing support from the FreeBSD Foundation.
Prospective participants are invited to apply; more information is available, including proposal and deadline information, on the FreeBSD Summer Projects page.
13 February: The October to December 2016 Status Report is now available.
10 February: New committer: Mahdi Mokhtari (ports)
8 February: New committer: Tobias Kortkamp (ports)
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25 August: The second RC build for the FreeBSD 11.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, aarch64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
13 August: The first RC build for the FreeBSD 11.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, aarch64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
10 August: New committer: Toomas Soome (src)
10 August: The FreeBSD Core Team has released a statement about the recent freebsd-update and related vulnerabilities.
6 August: The fourth BETA build for the FreeBSD 11.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, aarch64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
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20 March: The third Release Candidate build for the FreeBSD 10.3 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
13 March: The second Release Candidate build for the FreeBSD 10.3 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
5 March: The first Release Candidate build for the FreeBSD 10.3 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
1 March: New committer: Christoph Moench-Tegeder (ports)
1 March: The FreeBSD Project is pleased to announce its participation in Google's 2016 Summer of Code program, which funds summer students to participate in open source projects. This will be the FreeBSD Project's twelfth year in the program, having mentored over 180 successful students through summer-long coding projects between 2005 and 2015.
Past successful projects have included improvements to Linux ABI emulation, NFSv4 ACLs, TCP regression testing, FUSE file system support, and countless other projects. Many students go on to become FreeBSD developers, as well as participating in FreeBSD developer events around the world through continuing support from the FreeBSD Foundation.
Prospective participants are invited to apply; more information is available, including proposal and deadline information, on the FreeBSD Summer Projects page.
February 2016
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26 June: A new article, FreeBSD Support for Leap Seconds, gives a quick overview of leap second handling. The next leap second will occur at 2015-Jun-30 23:59:60 UTC.
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14 November: FreeBSD 10.1-RELEASE is now available. Please be sure to check the Release Notes and Release Errata before installation for any late-breaking news and/or issues with 10.1. More information about FreeBSD releases can be found on the Release Information page.
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02 November: FreeBSD 1.0, the first official production-ready release of FreeBSD was announced 21 years ago today, on November 2nd, 1993. See the original announcement here.
October 2014
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21 August: It all started with this commit from Jordan Hubbard on August 21, 1994:
"Commit my new ports make macros. Still not 100% complete yet by any means but fairly usable at this stage."
A video was prepared to celebrate the event!
14 August: New committer: Alonso Schaich (ports)
10 August: New committer: Dan Langille (ports)
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11 March: The FreeBSD Project is pleased to announce its participation in Google's 2014 Summer of Code program, which funds summer students to participate in open source projects. This will be the FreeBSD Project's tenth year in the program, having mentored over 160 successful students through summer-long coding projects between 2005 and 2013.
Past successful projects have included improvements to Linux ABI emulation, NFSv4 ACLs, TCP regression testing, FUSE file system support, and countless other projects. Many students go on to become FreeBSD developers, as well as participating in FreeBSD developer events around the world through continuing support from the FreeBSD Foundation.
Prospective participants are invited to apply; more information is available, including proposal and deadline information, on the FreeBSD Summer Projects page.
February 2014
10 February: We are pleased to announce the availability of the FreeBSD Journal! It is the new online Journal, that the FreeBSD Foundation is publishing, that is all about FreeBSD. Click here to find out how to get the first issue that is focused on FreeBSD 10.
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26 August: The third RC build for the FreeBSD-9.2 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
16 August: The second RC build for the FreeBSD-9.2 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
6 August: We are pleased to announce the publication of our 2013 Semi-Annual Newsletter! This is a chance for you to read about what we are doing to help make FreeBSD the best operating system available.
Read about funded development projects to improve FreeBSD, sponsored conferences, developer and vendor summits to create face-to-face opportunities, research, how we are doing on our fundraising efforts, and so much more!
The 2013 semi-annual newsletter is available online here.
5 August: The first RC build for the FreeBSD-9.2 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
July 2013
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27 May: Enhanced commit privileges: Chris Rees (doc, ports)
14 May: Six months have passed since the November security incident which brought the Project's binary package building capacity offline; we are pleased to announce that all services are now restored.
Read the official announcement here.
12 May: The January to March 2013 Status Report is now available with 31 entries.
9 May: The FreeBSD Foundation is pleased to announce Ed Maste's new role as the Foundation's part-time Director of Project Development. Ed has served on the Foundation's board for two years, and has stepped down in order to accept this new position.
Read more...
8 May: The third RC build for the FreeBSD-8.4 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, i386 and pc98 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
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23 August: The first RC build for the FreeBSD-9.1 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, i386 and powerpc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
21 August: New committer: Andrey Zonov (src)
1 August: New committer: Bryan Drewery (ports)
July 2012
24 July: The FreeBSD Core Team is glad to announce that Gábor Páli has assumed the role of Core Team Secretary.
16 July: The first BETA build for the FreeBSD-9.1 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the architectures amd64, i386, powerpc64, and sparc64 are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.
11 July: The FreeBSD Project is pleased to announce the completion of the 2012 Core Team election. The FreeBSD Core Team acts as the project's "board of directors" and is responsible for approving new src committers, resolving disputes between developers, appointing sub-committees for specific purposes (security officer, release engineering, port managers, webmaster, etc...), and making any other administrative or policy decisions as needed. The Core Team has been elected by FreeBSD developers every two years since 2000.
More information about the election (together with a list of the new members of the Core Team) can be found in the official announcement.
3 July: New committer: Niclas Zeising (doc/www, ports)
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16 December: New committer: Jason Helfman (ports)
9 December: The third (and probably last) RC build for the FreeBSD-9.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the architectures amd64, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64, and sparc64 are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites. One of the many new features in 9.0 we would like to be tested is the new installer, so we encourage our users to do fresh installation on test systems. Alternatively, users upgrading existing systems may now do so using the freebsd-update(8) utility.
8 December: New committer: Pedro Giffuni (src)
2 December: New member for the Ports Management team: Beat Gätzi
November 2011
October 2011
23 October: The first RC build for the FreeBSD-9.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the architectures amd64, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64, and sparc64 are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites. One of the many new features in 9.0 we would like to be tested is the new installer, so we encourage our users to do fresh installation on test systems. Alternatively, users upgrading existing systems may now do so using the freebsd-update(8) utility.
6 October: New committer: Alexander V. Chernikov (src)
September 2011
August 2011
22 August: New committer: Raphael Kubo da Costa (ports)
17 August: New committer: Eitan Adler (ports)
9 August: The FreeBSD Foundation has published their first Semi-Annual 2011 newsletter which summarizes what they have done to help the FreeBSD Project and community.
1 August: The first test build for the FreeBSD-9.0 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the architectures amd64, i386, ia64, powerpc, powerpc64, and sparc64 are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites. One of the many new features in 9.0 we would like to be tested is the new installer, so we encourage our users to do fresh installation on test systems.
July 2011
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27 April: The January-March, 2011 Status Report is now available with 34 entries.
March 2011
29 March: New committer: Artem Belevich (src)
27 March: The FreeBSD Project is pleased to announce its participation In Google's 2011 Summer of Code program, which funds summer students to participate in open source projects. This will be the FreeBSD Project's seventh year in the program, having mentored over 100 successful students through summer-long coding projects between 2005 and 2010.
Past successful projects have included improvements to Linux ABI emulation, NFSv4 ACLs, TCP regression testing, FUSE file system support, and countless other projects. Many students go on to become FreeBSD developers, as well as participating in FreeBSD developer events around the world through continuing support from the FreeBSD Foundation.
Prospective participants are invited to apply; more information is available, including proposal and deadline information, on the FreeBSD Summer Projects page.
18 March: New committer: Sofian Brabez (ports)
13 March: New committer: Pawel Pekala (ports)
10 March: The FreeBSD Ports Management Team is pleased to announce Thomas Abthorpe as a full voting member.
5 March: New committer: Steven G. Kargl (src)
February 2011
January 2011
25 January: The October-December, 2010 Status Report is now available with 37 entries.
23 January: The second Release Candidate build for the FreeBSD-7.4 release cycle is now available. ISO images for Tier-1 architectures can be downloaded from most of the FreeBSD mirror sites. Please see the official announcement for further details about this release.
16 January: The second Release Candidate build for the FreeBSD-8.2 release cycle is now available. ISO images for Tier-1 architectures can be downloaded from most of the FreeBSD mirror sites. Please see the official announcement for further details about this release.
December 2010
27 December: The first Release Candidate builds for the FreeBSD-7.4/8.2 release cycles are now available. ISO images for Tier-1 architectures can be downloaded from most of the FreeBSD mirror sites. Please see the official announcement for further details about these releases.
16 December: The FreeBSD Foundation has published their End-of-Year newsletter which summarizes what they have done in 2010 to help the FreeBSD Project and community.
11 December: The first of the test builds for the FreeBSD-7.4/8.2 release cycles is now available. ISO images for Tier-1 architectures are now available on most of the FreeBSD mirror sites.
7 December: New committer: Florian Smeets (ports)
November 2010
October 2010
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29 May: The first of the test builds for the FreeBSD-8.1 release cycle is now available. ISO images for Tier-1 architectures are now available on most of the FreeBSD mirror sites.
24 May: The FreeBSD Project again received many high quality applications from students participating in Google's Summer of Code program. This year 18 student proposals to work with the FreeBSD Project were accepted as part of this program. For those with projects that were not accepted this year, we'd like to note that the FreeBSD Project is always willing to help mentor students so they can learn more about operating system development through our normal community mailing lists and development forums.
Please read the official announcement for more information. The complete list of student projects selected for funding can be found in the FreeBSD Summer of Code wiki. Coding started on May 24, so please join us in welcoming the 18 new students to our community.
19 May: New committer: Jayachandran C. (src)
April 2010
March 2010
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Old announcements: 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, 1998, 1997, 1996, 1993Primarily housed in the S. Dillon Ripley Center, our Studio Arts classes are easily accessible and centrally located on the Mall. We offer over 200 classes and workshops per year and pride ourselves on the |
“ammunition” sales, along with “pornography.”
On April 15, two weeks after The Daily Signal shared Lichterman’s story, bankers at HomeTrust Bank walked back their refusal. A treasury management sales officer at HomeTrust Bank contacted Lichterman by email offering him two different payment service options—a third-party payment processor or the bank’s internal payment service program.
Lichterman said he decided to accept the olive branch and stay with HomeTrust Bank. On May 20, Lichterman said, he received his login credentials.
Lichterman said the bankers at HomeTrust Bank “didn’t admit” denying him service because of Operation Choke Point, “but it looked to me like they were under the impression that Operation Choke Point was in effect,” he said.
The Daily Signal sought comment from the Justice Department about the current status of Operation Choke Point. It has not yet responded, but back in April, it said the department “has not and will not target businesses operating within the bounds of the law.”
Republicans in both the House and the Senate have attempted to take down Operation Choke Point or similar initiatives for more than a year now. In February, the House of Representatives passed a bill that would prohibit the program with bipartisan support. In April, two weeks after The Daily Signal shared Lichterman’s story, Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Mike Lee, R-Utah, introduced an identical bill in the Senate. That measure has not yet been scheduled for a vote.
In February, the White House publicly opposed that bill, called the Financial Institution Customer Protection Act. In a statement, the administration said, “Restricting the federal banking agencies in this way could unnecessarily and dangerously hinder or compromise important law enforcement and national security efforts.”
Lichterman said he doesn’t hold a grudge against HomeTrust Bank for its actions, but is pleased that they’ve “seen the light.”
“They discovered after being led to it that no, there’s no reason to deny an honest upstanding young fellow like myself this service,” Lichterman, who’s 75 years young, said.UFC mixed martial arts event in 2005
UFC 53: Heavy Hitters was a mixed martial arts event held by the Ultimate Fighting Championship on June 4, 2005, at the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The event was broadcast live on pay-per-view in the United States, and later released on DVD.
History [ edit ]
This event was originally scheduled to take place at the Yokohama Arena in Japan with an Interim Heavyweight Championship bout between Andrei Arlovski and Mirko Filipović serving as the main event. However the lack of sponsorship for the event forced the event to be moved to Atlantic City.[1]
Initially, former champion Ricco Rodriguez was slated to contend for the Heavyweight Championship, but withdrew from the bout, citing complications with his training camp.[2] Headlining the card opposite of Interim Heavyweight Champion Arlovski, instead, was Miletich protégé Justin Eilers. Although there was some criticism directed at the UFC for giving Eilers a title shot after coming off a knockout loss to Paul Buentello at UFC 51, the UFC explained that Buentello was not medically cleared to fight when the main event was originally scheduled.
This was Forrest Griffin's first fight after winning The Ultimate Fighter show.
Results [ edit ]
^ [3] For the interim UFC Heavyweight Championship. It was realized that Eilers had injured his knee in the bout, prompting the referee to stop the fight as Eilers could not defend himself. ^ For the UFC Middleweight Championship ^ The bout, although preliminary, was aired on the broadcast. ^ The bout, although preliminary, was aired on the broadcast. ^ The bout, although preliminary, was aired on the broadcast.
See also [ edit ]
Sources [ edit ]The screw-worm fly was the first pest successfully eliminated from an area through the sterile insect technique, by the use of an integrated area-wide approach.
The sterile insect technique (SIT)[1][2] is a method of biological insect control, whereby overwhelming numbers of sterile insects are released into the wild. The released insects are preferably male, as this is more cost-effective and the females may in some situations cause damage by laying eggs in the crop, or, in the case of mosquitoes, taking blood from humans. The sterile males compete with wild males to mate with the females. Females that mate with a sterile male produce no offspring, thus reducing the next generation's population. Sterile insects are not self-replicating and, therefore, cannot become established in the environment. Repeated release of sterile males over low population densities can further reduce and in cases of isolation eliminate pest populations, although cost-effective control with dense target populations is subjected to population suppression prior to the release of the sterile males.
The technique has successfully been used to eradicate the screw-worm fly (Cochliomyia hominivorax) from North and Central America. Many successes have been achieved for control of fruit fly pests, most particularly the Mediterranean fruit fly (Ceratitis capitata) and the Mexican fruit fly (Anastrepha ludens).
Sterilization is induced through the effects of irradiation on the reproductive cells of the insects. SIT does not involve the release of insects modified through transgenic (genetic engineering) processes.[3] Moreover, SIT does not introduce non-native species into an ecosystem.
History [ edit ]
Raymond Bushland and Edward Knipling developed the SIT to eliminate screw-worms preying on warm-blooded animals, especially cattle. They exploited the fact that female screw-worms mate only once to attack screw-worm reproduction. The larvae of these flies invade open wounds and eat into animal flesh, killing infected cattle within 10 days. In the 1950s, screw-worms caused annual losses to American meat and dairy supplies that were projected at above $200 million. Screw-worm maggots can also parasitize human flesh.
Entomologist Edward F. Knipling
Bushland and Knipling began searching for an alternative to chemical pesticides in the late 1930s when they were working at the United States Department of Agriculture Laboratory in Menard, Texas. At that time, the screw-worm was devastating livestock herds across the American South. Red meat and dairy supplies were affected across Mexico, Central America, and South America.
Knipling developed the theory of autocidal control – breaking the pest's reproductive cycle. Bushland's enthusiasm for Knipling's theory sparked the pair to search for a way to rear flies in a "factory" setting, and to find an effective way to sterilize flies.
Their work was interrupted by World War II, but they resumed their efforts in the early 1950s with successful tests on the screw-worm population of Sanibel Island, Florida. The sterile insect technique worked; near eradication was achieved using X-ray-sterilized flies.
Successes [ edit ]
The map shows the current (orange) and former (yellow) distribution area and the approximate seasonal spread of the screw-worm fly
In 1954, the technique was used to eradicate screw-worms from the 176-square-mile (460 km2) island of Curaçao, off the coast of Venezuela. Screw-worms were eliminated in seven weeks, saving the domestic goat herds that were a source of meat and milk.
During the late 1950s to the 1970s, SIT was used to control the screw-worm population in the US. In the 1980s, Mexico and Belize eliminated their screw-worm problems with SIT. Eradication programs progressed across Central America in the 1990s, followed by the establishment of a biological barrier in Panama to prevent reinfestation from the south. The map shows the current and former distribution area and the approximate seasonal spread of the screw-worm fly.
In 1991, Knipling and Bushland's technique halted a serious outbreak of New World screw-worm in northern Africa. Programs against the Mediterranean fruit fly in Mexico, Florida and California use the SIT to maintain their fly-free status. The technique was used to eradicate the melon fly from Okinawa and in the fight against the tsetse fly in Africa.
The technique has suppressed insects threatening livestock, fruit, vegetable, and fiber crops. The technique was lauded for its environmental attributes: it leaves no residues and has no (direct) negative effect on nontarget species.
The technique has been a boon in protecting the agricultural products to feed the world's human population. Both Bushland and Knipling received worldwide recognition for their leadership and scientific achievements, including the 1992 World Food Prize.[4] The technique were hailed by former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman as "the greatest entomological achievement of the 20th century."
African trypanosomiasis [ edit ]
Sleeping sickness or African trypanosomiasis is a parasitic disease in humans. Caused by protozoa of genus Trypanosoma and transmitted by the tsetse fly, the disease is endemic in regions of sub-Saharan Africa, covering about 36 countries and 60 million people. An estimated 50,000 – 70,000 people are infected and about 40,000 die every year. The three most recent epidemics occurred in 1896 -1906, 1920, and 1970.
Studies of the tsetse fly show that females generally mate only once (occasionally twice). Studies found this process to be effective in preventing the scourge.
Successful programmes [ edit ]
Targets [ edit ]
History of transboundary shipment of sterile insects [ edit ]
Transboundary shipment of sterile insects has taken place on a continuous basis for 55 years (since 1963). The total number of sterile insects shipped has been estimated at more than one trillion in thousands of shipments across borders to 23 recipient countries from 50 sterile insect factories in 25 countries. During this long period and many precedents, no problems associated with possible hazards have been identified, and thus the shipment of sterile insects have never been subjected to any regulatory action. The table shows the history of transboundary shipments which started in 1963 with the shipments of sterile Mexican fruit fly (Anastrepha ludens, Loew), from Monterrey, Mexico, to Texas, US.[15]
Drawbacks [ edit ]
Naturally low population periods or repeated pesticide treatment are sometimes required to suppress populations before the use of sterile insects.
Sex separation can be difficult, though this can be easily performed on a large scale where genetic sexing systems have been developed as for the Mediterranean fruit fly.
Radiation, transport and release treatments can reduce male mating fitness.
The technique is species-specific. For instance, the technique must be implemented separately for each of the 6 economically important tsetse fly species.
Mass rearing and irradiation [16] [17] require precision processes. Failures have occurred when unexpectedly fertile breeding males were released.
require precision processes. Failures have occurred when unexpectedly fertile breeding males were released. Area-wide approach is more effective, as migration of wild insects from outside the control area could recreate the problem.
The cost of producing sufficient sterile insects can be prohibitive in some locations but decreases with economies of scale.
Conclusion and perspectives [ edit ]
Biotechnological approaches based on genetically modified organism (transgenic organisms) are still under development. However, since no legal framework exists to authorize the release of such organisms in nature,[18][19] sterilization by irradiation remains the most used technique. A meeting was held at FAO headquarters in Rome, 8 to 12 April 2002 on "Status and Risk Assessment of the Use of Transgenic Arthropods in Plant Protection". The resulting proceedings[20] of the meeting have been used by the North American Plant Protection Organization (NAPPO) to develop NAPPO Regional Standard No. 27[21] on "Guidelines for Importation and Confined Field release of Transgenic Arthropods", which might provide the basis for the rational development of the use of transgenic arthropods.
Economic benefits [ edit ]
Economic benefits have been demonstrated. The direct benefits of screwworm eradication to the North and Central American livestock industries are estimated to be over $1.5 billion/year, compared with an investment over half a century around $1 billion. Mexico protects a fruit and vegetable export market of over $3 billion/year through an annual investment around $25 million. Medfly-free status has been estimated to have opened markets for Chile's fruit exports up to $500 million. Eradication of tsetse has resulted in major socioeconomic benefits for Zanzibar.[22] When implemented on an area-wide basis and a scaled rearing process, SIT is cost-competitive with conventional control, in addition to its environmental benefits.[23]
See also [ edit ]This makes it on of the largest private technology companies behind Uber which is worth around $66 billion and Alibaba's payment affiliate Ant Financial, which is worth $60 billion.
Didi declined to disclose the investors in the latest round or its valuation when contacted by CNBC. But sources told CNBC that previous backers Softbank, Bank of Communications, China Merchant Bank are involved, with Silver Lake being a new addition.
Uber and Didi were in an intense battle in China until last year when the Chinese firm bought the U.S. ride-hailing app's business in the world's second-largest economy. At the time, this valued the company at $35 billion. The latest valuation is significantly higher. Uber has a roughly 20 percent stake in Didi as a result of the transaction.
Didi founder and chairman, Cheng Wei, holds a non-voting seat on Uber's board.
The company has some high-profile investors including Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, iPhone maker Apple and venture firm DST Global.
Didi has been expanding aggressively and has even invested more than $1 billion in U.S. Uber rival Lyft. Didi's president Jean Liu has said the company is "definitely going global" — and that inevitably means challenging Uber in other markets (like Brazil, where it announced a "strategic investment" in ridesharing startup 99 in January).
Didi's latest mega-round would give the company more firepower to boost its presence in China and beyond.
The start-up has also been investing in new technology, particularly artificial intelligence. In March, it launched Didi Labs in Mountain View, California — a research and development center aimed at boosting its AI capabilities. The latest funding round will help Didi in its AI efforts.
"Building on its competitive AI-based analytics capabilities, Didi is working towards systemic breakthroughs in intelligent driving technologies and smart transportation architecture," the company said in a statement.
CNBC's Deirdre Bosa and Sally Shin contributed to this report.sinuosity for an oscillating curve. Calculation offor an oscillating curve.
Laces on mountain road with high sinuosity at Luz Ardiden
Rio Cauto at Guamo Embarcadero, sinuosity index is > 1. The meanderingat Guamo Embarcadero, Cuba, is not taking the shortest path downslope. Therefore, itsis > 1.
Two ski tracks with different degrees of sinuosity on the same slope
Sinuosity, sinuosity index, or sinuosity coefficient of a continuously differentiable curve having at least one inflection point is the ratio of the curvilinear length (along the curve) and the Euclidean distance (straight line) between the end points of the curve. This dimensionless quantity can also be rephrased as the "actual path length" divided by the "shortest path length" of a curve. The value ranges from 1 (case of straight line) to infinity (case of a closed loop, where the shortest path length is zero) or for an infinitely-long actual path.[1]
Interpretation [ edit ]
The curve must be continuous (no jump) between the two ends. The sinuosity value is really significant when the line is continuously differentiable (no angular point). The distance between both ends can also be evaluated by a plurality of segments according to a broken line passing through the successive inflection points (sinuosity of order 2).
The calculation of the sinuosity is valid in a 3-dimensional space (e.g. for the central axis of the small intestine), although it is often performed in a plane (with then a possible orthogonal projection of the curve in the selected plan; "classic" sinuosity on the horizontal plane, longitudinal profile sinuosity on the vertical plane).
The classification of a sinuosity (e.g. strong / weak) often depends on the cartographic scale of the curve (see the coastline paradox for further details) and of the object velocity which flowing therethrough (river, avalanche, car, bicycle, bobsleigh, skier, high speed train, etc.): the sinuosity of the same curved line could be considered very strong for a high speed train but low for a river. Nevertheless, it is possible to see a very strong sinuosity in the succession of few river bends, or of laces on some mountain roads.
Notable values [ edit ]
The sinuosity S of:
2 inverted continuous semicircles located in the same plane is S = π 2 ≈ 1.5708... {\displaystyle S={\tfrac {\pi }{2}}\approx 1.5708...}
a sine function (over a whole number n of half-periods), which can be calculated by computing the sine curve's arclength on those periods, is S = 1 n π ∫ 0 n π 1 + ( cos x ) 2 d x ≈ 1.216... {\displaystyle S=\textstyle {\tfrac {1}{n\pi }}\int _{0}^{n\pi }{\sqrt {1+(\cos x)^{2}}}dx\approx 1.216...}
Example with 270° angle
With similar opposite arcs joints in the same plane, continuously differentiable:
Central angle Sinuosity Degrees Radians Exact Decimal 30° π 6 {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{6}}} π 3 ( 6 − 2 ) {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{3({\sqrt {6}}-{\sqrt {2}})}}} 1.0115 60° π 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{3}}} π 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{3}}} 1.0472 90° π 2 {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{2}}} π 2 2 {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{2{\sqrt {2}}}}} 1.1107 120° 2 ⋅ π 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {2\cdot \pi }{3}}} 2 ⋅ π 3 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {2\cdot \pi }{3{\sqrt {3}}}}} 1.2092 150° 5 ⋅ π 6 {\displaystyle {\frac {5\cdot \pi }{6}}} 5 ⋅ π 3 ( 6 + 2 ) {\displaystyle {\frac {5\cdot \pi }{3({\sqrt {6}}+{\sqrt {2}})}}} 1.3552 180° π {\displaystyle \pi } π 2 {\displaystyle {\frac {\pi }{2}}} 1.5708 210° 7 ⋅ π 6 {\displaystyle {\frac {7\cdot \pi }{6}}} 7 ⋅ π 3 ( 6 + 2 ) {\displaystyle {\frac {7\cdot \pi }{3({\sqrt {6}}+{\sqrt {2}})}}} 1.8972 240° 4 ⋅ π 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {4\cdot \pi }{3}}} 4 ⋅ π 3 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {4\cdot \pi }{3{\sqrt {3}}}}} 2.4184 270° 3 ⋅ π 2 {\displaystyle {\frac {3\cdot \pi }{2}}} 3 ⋅ π 2 2 {\displaystyle {\frac {3\cdot \pi }{2{\sqrt {2}}}}} 3.3322 300° 5 ⋅ π 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {5\cdot \pi }{3}}} 5 ⋅ π 3 {\displaystyle {\frac {5\cdot \pi }{3}}} 5.2360 330° 11 ⋅ π 6 {\displaystyle {\frac {11\cdot \pi }{6}}} 11 ⋅ π 3 ( 6 − 2 ) {\displaystyle {\frac {11\cdot \pi }{3({\sqrt {6}}-{\sqrt {2}})}}} 11.1267
Rivers [ edit ]
In studies of rivers, the sinuosity index is similar but not identical to the general form given above, being given by:
SI = channel length downvalley length {\displaystyle {\text{SI}}={\frac {\text{channel length}}{\text{downvalley length}}}}
The difference from the general form happens because the downvalley path is not perfectly straight. The sinuosity index can be explained, then, as the deviations from a path defined by the direction of maximum downslope. For this reason, bedrock streams that flow directly downslope have a sinuosity index of 1, and meandering streams have a sinuosity index that is greater than 1.[2]
It is also possible to distinguish the case where the stream flowing on the line could not physically travel the distance between the ends: in some hydraulic studies, this leads to assign a sinuosity value of 1 for a torrent flowing over rocky bedrock along a horizontal rectilinear projection, even if the slope angle varies.
For rivers, the conventional classes of sinuosity, SI, are:
SI <1.05: almost straight
1.05 ≤ SI <1.25: winding
1.25 ≤ SI <1.50: twisty
1.50 ≤ SI: meandering
It has been claimed that river shapes are governed by a self-organizing system that causes their average sinuosity (measured in terms of the source-to-mouth distance, not channel length) to be π,[3] but this has not been borne out by later studies, which found an average value less than 2.[4]
See also [ edit ]The New York Times had a piece Tuesday on how security lines at airports are getting longer—in many cases, dramatically so, with waits of several hours at some times and airports. For example, the Times reported,
Ben Cheever, a support engineer for a cybersecurity firm, recently missed a flight in Seattle despite getting to the airport two hours ahead of his 6 p.m. departure to San Diego. Two lines spilled into the airport lobby, he said. A third was reserved for passengers who had signed up to a trusted traveler program called T.S.A. PreCheck that allowed them speedier access.
A lot of people love PreCheck. People not only like speedier lines, but it also plays to the natural human tendency to appreciate special treatment. But as I have noted before, there are serious questions about where this background-check program is headed. What is now a whitelist for a select few may turn into the normal manner of travel, subjecting virtually every passenger to increasingly intrusive database checks, excluding only an unfortunate few who become effectively blacklisted. As I observed last year,
by manipulating the system and the lines, the TSA can push more and more people to seek refuge from poor treatment within a government background check program that demands an ever-increasing amount of information about our lives.
What does the TSA say is the solution to longer security lines? According to the Times,
Both the airlines and the T.S.A. said that one way to alleviate the longer wait is to sign up for PreCheck, which allows eligible passengers to go through the speedier lanes without having to take off their shoes and belts or remove laptops and other electronic devices from their bags.
Is the TSA intentionally making everybody stand in long lines in order to pressure passengers into "voluntarily" submitting to (and paying for) background checks? I don’t believe that 3-hour waits are part of an intentional PreCheck-boosting plot, and the agency has incentives to avoid political backlash as angry travelers call their members of Congress. The Times cites a shortage of TSA screeners, budget cuts, and a growing number of passengers as the explanation for the longer waits. Nevertheless, when conditions are bad it’s a natural question to ask. The agency has a stated goal of moving as many Americans as possible into PreCheck, and will no doubt make use of the current situation to increase pressure on people to do so, as we saw officials doing in their comments to the Times. The structural logic of the situation gives the TSA an incentive to make life difficult for those who resist joining their background check program. It’s a parallel to the airlines’ incentive to make seats as uncomfortable as possible for those lowly passengers who hold out paying fees for “upgrades.” As Tim Wu put it, “in order for fees to work, there needs be something worth paying to avoid.”blog archives February 2019 (5) January 2019 (4) December 2018 (17) November 2018 (14) October 2018 (6) September 2018 (1) August 2018 (1) July 2018 (3) June 2018 (2) May 2018 (2) April 2018 (9) March 2018 (11) February 2018 (12) January 2018 (11) December 2017 (9) November 2017 (3) October 2017 (4) September 2017 (3) August 2017 (1) April 2017 (4) March 2017 (5) February 2017 (6) January 2017 (11) December 2016 (9) November 2016 (6) October 2016 (7) September 2016 (5) August 2016 (7) July 2016 (9) June 2016 (12) May 2016 (10) April 2016 (6) March 2016 (9) February 2016 (10) January 2016 (13) December 2015 (14) November 2015 (11) October 2015 (16) September 2015 (15) August 2015 (19) July 2015 (18) June 2015 (17) May 2015 (20) April 2015 (17) March 2015 (19) February 2015 (19) January 2015 (24) December 2014 (26) November 2014 (26) October 2014 (39) September 2014 (30) August 2014 (24) July 2014 (24) June 2014 (18) May 2014 (31) April 2014 (26) March 2014 (24) February 2014 (24) January 2014 (24) December 2013 (34) November 2013 (24) October 2013 (27) September 2013 (27) August 2013 (24) July 2013 (16) June 2013 (15) May 2013 (24) April 2013 (29) March 2013 (29) February 2013 (22) January 2013 (26) December 2012 (21) November 2012 (26) October 2012 (24) September 2012 (29) August 2012 (26) July 2012 (29) June 2012 (32) May 2012 (35) April 2012 (44) March 2012 (35) February 2012 (37) January 2012 (36) December 2011 (35) November 2011 (38) October 2011 (30) September 2011 (43) August 2011 (33) July 2011 (37) June 2011 (33) May 2011 (44) April 2011 (36) March 2011 (49) February 2011 (34) January 2011 (37) December 2010 (47) November 2010 (44) October 2010 (41) September 2010 (47) August 2010 (34) July 2010 (49) June 2010 (54) May 2010 (41) April 2010 (45) March 2010 (56) February 2010 (45) January 2010 (41) December 2009 (47) November 2009 (44) October 2009 (49) September 2009 (50) August 2009 (51) July 2009 (59) June 2009 (68) May 2009 (44) April 2009 (63) March 2009 (60) February 2009 (49) January 2009 (64) December 2008 (49) November 2008 (48) October 2008 (71) September 2008 (56) August 2008 (51) July 2008 (50) June 2008 (61) May 2008 (49) April 2008 (69) March 2008 (76) February 2008 (63) January 2008 (83) December 2007 (65) November 2007 (65) October 2007 (84) September 2007 (60) August 2007 (83) July 2007 (78) June 2007 (75) May 2007 (57) April 2007 (63) March 2007 (77) February 2007 (48) January 2007 (62) December 2006 (60) November 2006 (56) October 2006 (51) September 2006 (49) August 2006 (59) July 2006 (58) June 2006 (56) May 2006 (62) April 2006 (64) March 2006 (64) February 2006 (60) January 2006 (76) December 2005 (58) November 2005 (60) October 2005 (49) September 2005 (53) August 2005 (51) July 2005 (48) June 2005 (51) May 2005 (47) April 2005 (37) March 2005 (40) February 2005 (33) January 2005 (30) December 2004 (27) November 2004 (35) October 2004 (39) September 2004 (46) August 2004 (48) July 2004 (35) June 2004 (46) May 2004 (46) April 2004 (54) March 2004 (60) February 2004 (39) January 2004 (63) December 2003 (47) November 2003 (43) October 2003 (49) September 2003 (60) August 2003 (64) July 2003 (68) June 2003 (77) May 2003 (57) April 2003 (71) March 2003 (80)It is something of a ritual for young 20-somethings to read Walden; or A Life in the Woods, and pine for the simple truths of life to reveal themselves while amongst nature, to follow the path laid out by the 19th century transcendentalist, Henry David Thoreau:
“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms.”
Combine this spiritual quest with the modern incarnation of the American frontiersmen, the Tea Party constitutionalist, who wishes to escape the clutches of the bureaucratic police-state, and be left alone to fly his Gadsden Flag and watch Alex Jones, and you have the 21st century Neo-Homesteader.
Time has shown that the conservative battle-cry ‘don’t tread on me’ to be a laughable proposition. Teh gubmint gots all ‘duh big guns. Just ask Randy Weaver. As Republicans relinquish their position and voice on political and economic issues and insist on their right to be ‘left alone’, the progressives march onward, encountering the but the most feeble opposition in their quest to create John Lennon’s Garden of Eden, codified in their hymn Imagine.
It’s not just disposessed white men who hear the battle call. Women love to romanticize country living, particularly after they’ve stayed at a friend’s farm, been glamping, b&bing or watched a few westerns. Reading about canning, preserves, home brew, raising chickens and bunnies, and how to clean your bolt-action 22 is good fun, inspiring the backwoods rebel and channeling the spirit of our founding stock ancestors (in my case, Tasmanian farmers). Having a couple of kids, teaching them how to live a more traditional life away from the vagaries of tv-programming, vibrant public schools, twerking kiddie pop stars and junk food ticks all the boxes. ‘Muh Freedoms!
It all sounds great, and part of me still wants to revisit it but some harsh realism is in order. You will always need money. Lots of it. As soon as financial problems emerge, all the bunny stew and home-made jam in the world won’t make you feel any better. Life is only going to get more expensive. Spending 8 hours per day to produce $15 worth of groceries and heating is a luxury. It is not being frugal. Those who think like that have the equation all wrong, and the only people who can really afford to do it without it becoming a nightmare are rich people. If you’re deluded enough to think your cottage business selling beeswax candles and acorn necklaces on Etsy can actually make money then not even this article can help you.
For the middle-class reactionary fed up with city or suburban living or just modernity in general, you can move way out to a collapsing rural area, and spend five hours a day commuting. It’s a bad trade. The last sixty years have not been kind to the country. Everything works against you. You can’t safely drink and drive anymore. Fuel prices are always increasing. You have to spend an inordinate amount of time driving for the most basic things, especially if you want quality. You can spend lots of your money on farm toys for your hobbies like fishing, hunting, prepping, gardening etc but if you want a decent income (which means full-time work), you won’t get value out of it, (you won’t have the time) you still have to pay lots of tax, the local kids will be rough and probably a bad influence on your own.
You likely won’t find cultured or intellectual neighbors who have undergone your philosophical transformation that you imagined them to have. If you’re within commuting distance, don’t expect your neighbors to join you to drink beer and shoot deer without a tag. You will spend more and more time online, try and get to the city whenever you can for a bit of stimulation and then begrudge the cost. Drinking your home-brew alone gets tired after a couple of months. Your dog will become wild (not a good thing), despite your harsh punishment. Your woman will start neglecting herself and become increasingly quarrelsome. People in the city will think you’re beneath them, despite (or because of?) your willingness to talk Faust and Hayek.
I know all of this because I’ve tried it. I thought I was living out the culmination of five years of libertarian study and personal development. It’s quite a thing to radically transform your life in an attempt to actualise your worldview. But reality doesn’t care about your worldview, or how you think people ought to behave. You can take the boy out of the suburbs, but you can’t take the suburbs out of the boy.
We associate higher incomes with more consumption. But poorer people are amongst the biggest consumers out there. They are the ones you see in People of Walmart, Monster Truck Rallies and dive bars. Dialing down your income does not mean that you become freer to embark on your path to self-actualisation.
By making your financial position more precarious, you consume yourself with the existential worry that defines the proletariat that you romanticised as poor in material wealth, yet rich in spiritual wealth and freedom.
Now that I’ve extinguished your homesteading dreams, let me add this caveat. There are some that can and have pulled this off. They just usually aren’t middle class professionals who read LewRockwell.com. They might have a connection to a community through friends or family, have an in-demand trade qualification, marry into a farming dynasty or just have lots of money. But regardless of whether they can make country living work, they probably aren’t living in their 1776 paradise. It doesn’t exist.
I haven’t given up on the idea of owning some land somewhere remote and taking another Thoreau-break to write and eat beans. But I’ve realised that the basis of the strong, prosperous rural community is intact families who have farmed for generations and are profitable. This is scarce, and it’s not something that can be created with a ‘treechange’. Maybe if enough third-worlders immigrate, plantations will become viable again. But until the Rapture comes, you will be of more use to your brothers and sisters by participating in the world, networking, reading, writing, creating parallel institutions than you will by searching for Galt’s Gulch.
Gustav
AdvertisementsLet's Learn Algorithms: An Introduction to Bubble Sort
This is the first post in the Let's Learn Algorithms series, so if you are unfamiliar with what to expect I suggest you click the link and get a basic understanding of how this series works.
If you want to watch this in a video with examples using cards you can watch the video below. Otherwise continue on and read the article. The same content is covered in both places.
Now, without wasting any time, let’s jump right into learning about our first algorithm, bubble sort!
What is bubble sort?
Bubble sort is a sorting algorithm (duh!), which essentially means that |
or on imported cherries.
There are few such restrictions on other fruits and vegetables, Sherman said. But the harvest of other edibles doesn’t fluctuate as wildly as tart cherries. With so much of the nation’s supply grown in a tiny corner of one state, virtually the entire tart cherry crop can be devastated by one bad storm. At the other extreme, a good crop could flood the market and lower cherry prices to the point that it drives farmers out of business.
Whether that restriction system works is a point of debate in the tart cherry world, and now in the courts.
The restrictions don’t apply directly to cherry growers, but to cherry processors – the companies that buy tart cherries and can them (primarily for pie filling) or freeze them for processing into other foods, such as cherry juice.
That brings us to the lawsuit, now being heard by an administrative judge within the USDA. The details are complicated even for cherry growers, so let’s leave it at this: there’s a fight over how many tart cherries can be sold by different cherry processors nationally.
Companies that freeze tart cherries don’t have a problem with the restrictions, because they can fall back on cherries they’ve kept in storage, according to the lawsuit. Cherries freeze really well – they can be kept for at least four years. “As long as your freezer’s working, it’s almost indefinite,” said John E. Pelizzari, chief operating officer at Burnette Foods.
Canned cherries, though, like the pie filling canned by Burnette Foods, have a shelf life of about a year. So in a year with high restrictions, the northern Michigan company may have to import cherries for its pie filling, while cherries are rotting on the ground in orchards a few miles away.
Cherry death panels
In 2009, 30 million pounds of tart cherries were left on the ground nationwide, with the vast majority of those in Michigan. That’s enough to serve a cherry pie to every resident of Michigan, with 5 million pies left over to take home in doggie bags.
In the lawsuit, Burnette Foods asks that the USDA tart cherry restrictions be removed because the restrictions don’t impact every processor equally, and don’t take into account sales of imported cherry products. Burnette also claims the cherry board, made up of cherry growers and processors from around the country, is dominated by people with ties to the frozen cherry processors.
The cherries have to be harvested from the trees whether they are sold or not, so in a high-restriction harvest, farmers “shake” trees and leave a lot of fruit on the ground. Farmers don’t have the option of giving away large quantities of the fruit, either, because tart cherries are only used in products, and not eaten raw.
“It’s not that we didn’t have the capacity to process, hold or sell the cherries, they’re telling us that if we do, it would somehow be destructive,” Sherman said. “There were growers that literally dumped them alongside the road.”
That doesn’t happen every year. With a 10 percent restriction this year, processors likely will take all the cherries that are produced and hope to use or store them. David White, a cherry grower in Elk Rapids, said he’s had to leave cherries on the ground four times since 1990.
More than leaving some cherries on the ground, White’s main complaint with the restrictions is that they’ve done little to increase prices for growers.
The restriction “takes the peaks and valleys out (of cherry prices), but it really knocks the peak off,” White said. “Our costs on the farm keep going up. Some of our biggest costs, spraying for insects and fungal diseases, keep ratcheting up. And you know the price of fuel is going up. And we’re not seeing the results in our pricing. When you adjust for inflation, I think we’re going the wrong direction.”
Most growers favor restrictions
But cherry grower Jim Nugent of Suttons Bay said he thinks prices would be worse without the USDA crop restrictions. “The main way they help the growers, they don’t put so much product on a market that it depresses prices,” said Nugent, one of several Michigan cherry growers currently serving on the cherry board.
A 2008 Cornell University study, conducted on the behalf of the Cherry Board, came to the same conclusion. “Our research shows that the (government restrictions) increased returns to tart cherry growers by $212 dollars per acre annually,” the report states. “Thus the estimated benefit... is $7.8 million annually higher than the farm gate value would have been if the industry was operating without the marketing order.”
But a study conducted for Burnette Foods found the opposite – that cherry prices are mostly influenced by factors outside the control of the USDA, like the weather.
Tart cherry growers and processors across the country had a chance to get rid of the market restrictions this spring, but about three-quarters voted to keep them.
Nobody likes to leave crops in the field, but “we have an inelastic demand,” Nugent explained, marking perhaps the first time a story about cherry pie has included the phrase inelastic demand.
If tart cherry economics wasn’t confusing enough, in March, an administrative law judge in Washington, D.C., hearing Burnett’s lawsuit ruled that the restriction should be lifted – but only for companies that can cherries, not for those that freeze cherries.
That ruling is on hold pending an appeal.
Politics, money, lawyers. A combination that makes cherry pie as American as, well, that other pie.A factory-floor robot tasked with filling peanut butter jars is on the fritz. The manufacturer dispatches a technician by plane to figure out what's wrong. But until she is on hand to identify the problem and prescribe a fix, the peanut butter idles on the assembly line, delayed on its way to market. What if that same technician could diagnose and repair the robot without ever leaving her office? And what if, a week earlier, the robot had let the technician know that it needed maintenance?
That opportunity exists right now, thanks to the Industrial Internet of Things, which refers to robots and machinery networked with sensors and software. The idea is this: “Smart" factory and assembly-line machines transmitting real-time data to technicians, executives and salespeople aren’t only more efficient, but also require less maintenance downtime and may reduce product-manufacturing costs—all of which could translate to lower prices at point-of-sale.
While the IIoT is by no means a fixture of today's assembly lines, interest is high among manufacturers surveyed by Morgan Stanley. Many expressed plans to increase spending on the technology, and the potential for growth in the coming years is strong.Anti-Trump RINO Jeff Flake Says He’s Writing Law to Prevent Abusers From Buying Guns – Which Is Already a Law!
RINO hack Jeff Flake can’t go away soon enough.
Jeff Flake is calling for a new law which would prevent a person convicted of domestic abuse from purchasing a gun. Maybe someone needs to tell Jeff Flake that we already have that exact law on the books. Brilliant.
In 1996, Congress enacted 18 U.S.C. §922(g)(9), sometimes called the Lautenberg Amendment, which bars any person convicted of a “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” from possessing a gun.
Jeff Flake took to his Twitter account Tuesday to announce he is writing a bill to prevent anyone convicted of domestic violence from buying a gun.
You mean like the law we already have on the books?
Writing a bill w/ @MartinHeinrich to prevent anyone convicted of domestic violence – be it in criminal or military court – from buying a gun — Jeff Flake (@JeffFlake) November 7, 2017
Jeff Flake then claimed a ‘loophole’ was exploited by the Texas shooter which enabled him to purchase a gun.
In reality, the Air Force failed to enter Kelley’s name into the national criminal database following his dishonorable discharge from the Air Force for assaulting his wife and child.
If being proactive means closing the #DomesticViolenceLoophole exploited by the #SutherlandSprings Texas shooter, you’re right. https://t.co/8S89dgaTuK — Jeff Flake (@JeffFlake) November 7, 2017
Laura Ingraham blasted Jeff Flake for his stupidity, saying, “OMG Jeff Flake needs to retire effective immediately”
Many others in the media pointed out that we have existing laws which of course failed us (AGAIN).
The “Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban” has been the law in America since 1996, and does ban those people from ever possessing a gun. https://t.co/girfZCSBcg — David Hookstead (@dhookstead) November 7, 2017
It exists already. It’s called the Lautenberg amendment. It was Enacted in 1996. https://t.co/D9tYPNqMdl — Joe Biggs (@Rambobiggs) November 7, 2017
Criminals and murderers will always find a way to obtain a gun. Stricter gun laws always end up disarming law abiding citizens while keeping the bad guys armed.
When are liberals and RINOs going to realize that?33 Tempting E-Commerce Icons [Freebie]
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Today we are happy to feature a set of 33 flat e-commerce icons, created exclusively for Smashing Magazine by Responsive. The icons are ideally suited to e-commerce projects and include many popular payment providers, including Bitcoin.
Today we are happy to feature a set of 33 flat e-commerce icons that were exclusively designed and created for Smashing Magazine by the team at Responsive. The icons are ideally suited to e-commerce projects and include many popular payment providers, including Bitcoin.
The icons come in different-sized PNGs (32 × 32, 64 × 64, 128 × 128 and 256 × 256 pixels), and the set includes Photoshop and Illustrator files containing all of the icons. Released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license, freely available for private and commercial projects.
Responsive’s e-commerce icon set (33 Icons, PNG, PS, AI).
Easily change the color to suit your project.
The icons can also be adapted for mobile applications.
Meet Smashing Book 6 — our brand new book focused on real challenges and real front-end solutions in the real world: from design systems and accessible single-page apps to CSS Custom Properties, CSS Grid, Service Workers, performance, AR/VR and responsive art direction. With Marcy Sutton, Yoav Weiss, Lyza D. Gardner, Laura Elizabeth and many others. Table of Contents →
Bank notes icon from up close.
Download The Icon Set For Free!
A preview of all the icons in the set.
Behind The Design
As always, here are some insights from the designers:
“At Responsive, we create a lot of e-commerce websites, occasionally using freebie icons found on Smashing Magazine. We thought it was time to give back! This pack has been created for modern stores and other e-commerce websites, and all of the icons are completely free to use. The set is designed to be flat and minimalist. In designing the icons, our goal was to create a multipurpose set in which the icons could function not only as icons, but as actual buttons; for example, for payment options and navigation. Because the layered source files are included, the icons can be easily modified or transformed into something entirely new.”
A big Thank You to the team at Responsive for the fantastic icon set — we all sincerely appreciate your hard work!
Further Reading on SmashingMag:
(al) (ea) (il)Posted by Sir Cucumber at on Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Now that’s what I’m talking about! If I’m gonna spend ten hours with my arms outstretched clawing at two horribly painful controllers until I have to guzzle rapid-release Tylenol and lay flat on my back, it might as well be for a title that actually takes advantage of this revolutionary new motion-sensitive gaming technology, instead of cheaply re-purposed multi-platform crap.
Except for the three-dimensional bone rotation. I don’t do well with the three-dimensional bone rotation. In eighth grade I had to put a bunch of pegs in holes for some lady with a stopwatch to get a psychological exemption from wood shop before Mr. Cirillo flunked me for repeatedly failing to make a box. So I do appreciate continuously variable difficulty levels and have no qualms about using it.
Continue Reading >>
Spatial retardation and an instinctual avoidance of excruciating pain are why I played the first Trauma Center on my DS, and as enjoyable as I find this game I wouldn’t be suffering through it if it hadn’t been Doomeru’s holiday gift to me. I got him one of these, but don’t tell him because I didn’t order it until realizing he’d bought me something so it hasn’t arrived yet.
Anyway, what I love about this game, besides the impossibly inane plot and dialogue, is that it’s really fucking hard. I’m no Dr. House, nor even Dr. Turk, but I imagine the satisfaction- not to mention complete and total exhaustion- I feel after finally finishing a level (on the ninth attempt) is about a fraction of what an ER surgeon must feel from finishing a day without killing anyone or getting sued. Minus the shitty hours and constant risk of infection, of course.
But getting back to the inane plot and dialogue- why is it that every single person who comes into contact with these magical doctors inevitably gets sick and has to be operated on? What aren’t they telling us about this “healing touch?”
And, you crazy fucking japs, its one thing for a lonely misunderstood Solid Snake to be constantly jabbering at anyone foolish enough to give him their radio frequency and something else entirely for doctors to stop and deliver long-winded soliloquies about their drive to save lives while their patients are cut open and bleeding to death on the table.
Now watch my Trauma Center Montage!Something wonky in the design? Check it out on the web for the best possible view.
December 2013, #1
The Film Collaborative’s Festival Real Revenue Numbers and Comments regarding Transparency Trends
Dear Collaborators and Friends,
We hope you had a lovely Thanksgiving holiday and Chanukah for those who celebrate either.
We at TFC were thankful for the fact that transparency in film has become more of an expectation than an aberration. As most of you know, The Film Collaborative launched in January 2010 and has modeled and pursued transparency in film ever since. We are pleased to see some taking inspiration, for whatever reason. We also want to keep the pressure up and the analysis sharp.
With that in mind, we offer some recent observations from The Film Collaborative staff:
Regarding FilmBuff’s recent commitment to post weekly Multi-Screen Gross (MSG) numbers that are received from distributors for their day-and-date titles.
“While I applaud any entity for taking a step toward greater transparency in the film industry, I think FilmBuff could be doing more with this reporting. The same 3 films they released numbers for on November 19 are the only ones still listed, but I think as a sales agency/distributor, Cinetic/FilmBuff must be handling many more titles and seeing the revenue statements of all. Why not add more of their own titles at least?
If anyone would like to see an example of transparent reporting for film releases, have a look at 3 reports prepared by UK based SampoMedia and the British Film Institute on the impact of day-and-date releasing of 3 films (click to see each film’s report, in PDF format): A Late Quartet, What Maisie Knew and A Field in England. (One additional film report will also be released…see their announcement about the reports.)
All give in depth information not only on multiplatform revenue, but the positioning, marketing spend and tactics used to release those recent films. THAT’S the transparency we need in order to be well prepared for releasing the films being produced. Gross revenues don’t actually tell creators or investors anything about how recoupable or profitable a film is, only how much top line revenue was generated. Study those reports well! Let's see what US based entity will take on reporting titles like this.”
—Sheri Candler
“While it may appear to be a wonderful step forward for transparency it is more likely a publicity stunt to highlight three modestly successful films (one of which will undoubtedly be a money loser due to its almost 1/2 Mil price tag). Companies have always been happy to tout massive successes ( Bachelorette, Margin Call, etc), but if this were really about transparency, RADIUS and Film Buff would reveal how all of their recent releases performed. As such, the need for proper reporting of VOD numbers is still sorely lacking.”
—Bryan Glick
“In general, while some companies know they have to share more in order to gain trust now that the standards have changed, I still see resistance to revealing real numbers, both on the filmmaker side and on the distributor side. In helping filmmakers do deals, I see distributors still withholding details about middle men services and fees and also about the marketing and their splits on the Cable VOD-front. Knowledge is power, filmmakers. The more you share, the more you will know to make the best decisions moving forward. Don’t take no for an answer. Demand complete transparency. If everyone does, every filmmaker will benefit and there is no losing in that model.”
—Orly Ravid
Answering the question, “how much money can one’s film make from Festival screening fees?”
The Film Collaborative has always shared all revenue and expense information with its filmmakers and also with anyone who asks. Since not all filmmakers want their data broadcast, we decided to share information per category of film.
This information was culled and is presented by Jeffrey Winter:
The Film Collaborative is well known these days as one of the leading companies distributing films to the Film Festival circuit, helping to maximize both potential market value and potential revenue that can be earned directly from Festival screenings.
As such, we are asked all the time, “how much money can my film make from Festival screening fees?”
Of course, as always in this business, the answer is highly specific to each individual film, especially in terms of quality-of-film, niche, and often most important, where the film actually premiered on the Circuit.
While the over-arching answer to the festival revenue question is probably $0 - $100,000 (or slightly more), to offer some guidelines, here are some statistics that we have put together from films we have handled in the last three years.
By FILM CATEGORY:
A) Premiere @ Sundance Film Festival:
Range: $13,500 - $72,000
Median: $32,650
B) Premiere @ SXSW Film Festival:
Range: $22,000 - $87,000
Median: $34,483
C) Did not premiere at an "A level" Festival:
Range: $0 - $30,690
Median: $12,825
D) Social Justice / Human Rights films:
Range: $6,217 - $56,000
Median: $12,400
E) Environmental films:
Range: $4,925 - $18,197
Median: $8,645
F) LGBT-themed films:
Range: $4,925 - $87,000
Median: $20,282
In considering the question of potential Festival revenue moving forward—these are probably the three most important questions to ask.
Where did my film premiere (or where is it most likely to)…because, simply put…premiere matters. How many niches does my film fit into? Because niche festivals matter…and the more niches you fit into, the merrier. Do I know how to handle the Festival circuit myself, or will I need a representative to advocate for me? After considering these questions…you'll find you probably fit somewhere into the statistics above. In truth, most average, non-niche films will probably not command significant revenue on the film festival circuit, but for special films that are well-handled, the upper level of our ranges are certainly realistic and in fact may even be exceeded.
A big happy shout out to our Spirit Award nominees!
Pit Stop (John Cassavetes Award)
James M. Johnston, producer of Pit Stop (17th Annual Piaget Producers Award)
A River Changes Course (19th Annual Stella Artois Truer Than Fiction Award)
and
The Foxy Merkins from Madeline Olnek (20th Annual Someone To Watch Award)
TIDBITS: News You May Have Missed Uber sales agent Josh Braun of Submarine Entertainment gave a great interview at the Toronto International Film Festival called The Art of the Deal. Anyone working in documentaries should listen to what he says about split rights and what the consequences are; how to work with a sales agent for your film; and what if your film doesn't have an attractive positioning statement for a sale (ex Searching for Sugarman, Act of Killing ).
, ). Speaking of distribution case studies…producer Ted Hope has started compiling a master list of low budget independent film case studies on his Hope for Film blog. If you are a producer, you need to be aware of this distribution reality for many low budget films in order navigate new release waters. If you have written such a case study, submit it to his site so that we may all learn from it.
And last but not least, TFC will be supplementing Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul with new blogs and case studies, with an eye focused on Europe, starting January 2014!
Twitter FacebookMan charged with unleashing dachshund to attack Lake Eola swan
A witness said a man took the dog off its leash and allowed it to attack
"Orlando Police Detectives were able to establish through the investigation that this was an intentional act by the dog owner," OPD Sgt. Jim Young said in an email.
Labonte, 51, was arrested Saturday in Seminole County on an arrest warrant charging him with cruelty to animals and fighting or baiting animals.
Lawrence Labonte unleashed his dachshund on Joe the swan at Lake Eola, sending the prized waterfowl to his death, police announced late Saturday.
Officials at the Winter Park Veterinary Hospital were forced to euthanize the Lake Eola Park swan last week.
Park rangers reported the attack to police Tuesday morning. A witness told the ranger she saw a man take the dog off its leash at the downtown Orlando park so it could attack the 1-year-old white male swan at about 4 p.m. Sunday.
The witness took photos of the dog attack and the owner's face and submitted the photos to police.
Doctors at the Lee Road animal hospital examined swan and determined that it had nerve damage to his leg and had "little chance of recovery," according to police documents.
Chris Wallace, park manager, said the swan – named Joe just before it was put down – would never have been able to walk on the injured leg or care for itself if the veterinarian had kept him alive.
Swans have been a fixture at Lake Eola since the 1920s, Wallace said. Joe was one of more than 50 swans that inhabit the park. He was hatched on the park grounds in 2012 and was valued at about $500.
dstennett@tribune.com or 407-420-5447Sebastien Buemi does not consider Toyota’s failure to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans or either of the FIA World Endurance Championship titles to be down to bad luck alone despite winning five races this season.
Alongside Toyota co-drivers Anthony Davidson and Kazuki Nakajima, Buemi claimed his fifth win from the nine-race WEC season in last month’s Six Hours of Bahrain, marking a new LMP1 record in the series.
Despite the string of victories and arguably having the quicker car for much of the season, Buemi still finished 25 points adrift of the championship-winning Porsche team, with a lack of reliability at Le Mans costing Toyota dearly.
“As we did in the last few years, in general we were managing to have a competitive car, but somehow Le Mans didn’t work out,” Buemi told Sportscar365.
“I don’t consider it bad luck any more. I consider that we are not doing everything as we should be doing.
“We’ve been trying to understand exactly what happened on the cars. Hopefully we’ll finally nail it next year.”
While happy to see the No. 8 Toyota TS050 Hybrid take a fifth win of the year in Bahrain, the result only added to team technical director Pascal Vasselon’s frustration after a third straight season without a title.
“[Winning in Bahrain] was our target, and we achieved it. It makes the whole thing even more frustrating,” Vasselon said.
“Now we can say we’ve dominated six races from nine and in the end we still lost the title, and everything. It was a bit frustrating.
“We had three cars at Le Mans and all three had issues. That was really the frustration. That’s where the nature of the season for us changed.
“We did a lot of mistakes this season. That’s what it is, and why you call it motorsport.”
Nine Wins But No Titles For Buemi
Across his racing duties in both sports cars and Formula E, Buemi enjoyed a remarkable calendar year that saw him win nine of the 19 races he entered – but came away with no championships and no Le Mans win to show for it.
Buemi won four Formula E races through 2017 after winning an additional two in the 2016 races over the winter calendar season, but failed to win a second title after missing the New York double-header due to clashing WEC commitments and managing not to score any points in the Montreal finale.
Added to his five WEC wins, Buemi ended 2017 with a win ratio of 47 percent, with his performances giving him some solace despite the lack of silverware.
“I’m a bit disappointed. At one point I was leading both championships, and then I ended up finishing second in both championships,” he said.
“I’m kind of sad about that situation, because all in all I could have done better, I could have done worse.
“But before starting the season I knew that the problem of the clash could happen and I had to accept it anyway, so I’m not going to blame the loss of the [Formula E] championship on New York.
“But certainly when you don’t race two races and get disqualified twice, and you end up with four times zero points, even if you win lots of races, it’s difficult to compensate.
“I take the positives out of it, and we cannot do anything any more. We can only look forward and try to do better.
“Even though I didn’t win the championship, it’s one of the best seasons I had. I had good seasons the past two or three years, but this has been a good one, yeah.”Megan Monroe, right, and Brian Fuentes drop of their ballots at an electoral drop box, in Boulder, Colo., Friday, Oct. 31, 2014. Mail-in voting in Colorado means that most voters cast their ballots before Election Day. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley) Election day is Tuesday, Nov. 4, and CPR News has answers to your questions to ensure that last-minute voters are prepared.
More: Election 2014 coverage | Voters guides
Though it's too late to mail a ballot in the state of Colorado, voters still have time to be counted.
Am I allowed to vote?
In the state of Colorado, you can vote if you:
• will be at least 18 years old on Nov. 4,
• are a United States citizen,
• have lived in Colorado for 22 days "immediately before the election at which you intend to vote", and
• are not serving a sentence, or on parole.
Can I still register to vote?
Yes. Colorado law allows voter registrations all the way through Election Day. You can register online to vote or you can register at a voter service center in your county. If you registered online after Oct. 27, you still need to pick up your ballot at a center.
Where do I vote?
Just Vote! Colorado, a non-partisan election protection program, has a tool to find the nearest locations for you.
When can I vote?
Polls close Tuesday at 7 p.m.
I can't mail my ballot after Nov. 1? What do I do with my completed ballot that's not been mailed?
Finished ballots must be dropped off at an official location in the county where you are registered to vote. To find a location near you, the Colorado County Clerks Association has this tool.
The Secretary of State website warns that "[B]allots must be in the hands of the county clerk by 7:00 p.m. on Election Day in order to be counted."
What if I lost my ballot or spoiled my ballot?
You can vote by going to a voter service center. Denver Elections Division spokesman Alton Dillard explains the voting system will only record one ballot from one voter, so the lost ballot would be "null and void."
How do I find out more about the issues?
We've prepared extensive voter guides for candidates running for the U.S. Senate, Colorado governor as well as other statewide and federal races.
What about the judges on my ballot?
Colorado voters choose to retain or release their judges based on merit not political party. Every election, a non-partisan committee of 10 people who have appeared before the judge, four attorneys and six people who are not attorneys, evaluate the judge and make a recommendation.
Those recommendations are available online from the Office of Judicial Performance evaluation.
Enjoy voting and be sure to check back for our live blog of election results Tuesday night.
Editor's Note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said citizens on probation could not vote. They can, according to the Secretary of State.Warner Bros Pictures and co-financier Legendary Pictures said today that its Superman reboot earned more than $500 million worldwide Saturday with some international territories still to open. Warner Bros Pictures President of Domestic Distribution Dan Fellman and President of International Distribution Veronika Kwan Vandenberg said 3D Man Of Steel has earned $248.7M domestically and $271.7M internationally for a worldwide total of $520.4M to date. It opened #1 in the U.S. and Canada with the biggest June release ever and also #1 one in many international territories and continues its roll out with record-breaking bows. The film is still to open in Brazil and Japan. The PG-13 film continues to set records worldwide in IMAX theatres, where it has earned an estimated $27M domestically and $18.9M internationally for a worldwide total of $45.9 million. “This success for Man of Steel is a great 75th birthday present for this iconic character. The film took Superman back to his roots for a new generation of moviegoers, who have once again embraced Krypton and Kansas’ favorite son,” Fellman said in the official statement. “The film’s strong CinemaScore tells us that word of mouth should keep the Man Of Steel flying through the summer.” The studio thanked director Zach Snyder profusely but didn’t mention Christopher Nolan, who mentored and produced and co-wrote the story as well as handpicked Snyder, or screenwriter David S Goyer. Both Snyder and Goyer are prepping the sequel.
Related:
Is ‘Man Of Steel’s Big Spoiler Turning Off Audiences As Sequel Ramps Up?
EXCLUSIVE: Legendary And Lionsgate To Meet This Week; Details On What Tull WantsLegislation requiring doctor’s appointment is latest attack on women’s rights in Poland and violates shared EU values, says MEP
The Polish government has been accused of launching a “sexual counter-revolution” that is an affront to European values after passing legislation reducing women’s access to the morning-after pill.
A law signed off by the Polish president, Andrzej Duda, in defiance of human rights groups and European medicines agency guidelines turns emergency contraception into a prescription drug.
Women and girls 15 and over will now need to make an appointment with a doctor. Polish campaigners and MEPs in Brussels say the change will have the greatest impact on rape victims and those living in isolated areas of the country.
The Dutch liberal MEP, Sophie in ’t Veld, said the legislation was a violation of shared European values.
“The current populist national-conservative Polish government is enforcing a sexual counter-revolution, against the health interests and wishes of Polish women and girls,” she said.
“Restricting access to the morning-after pill, combined with the right of doctors to refuse treatment based on religious grounds, will have far reaching consequences.”
The European commissioner for health, Vytenis Andriukaitis, “personally regretted” the Polish government’s legislation, a spokesman said.
A cross-party group of members of the European parliament visited Poland in May to talk to campaigners about their concerns with the legislation, and other aspects of the government’s attitude to reproductive health.
But while there are deep concerns in Brussels over an array of legislation passed by Poland’s rightwing Law and Justice government, the relevant area of law falls firmly within the competences of member states.
A spokesman for the International Planned Parenthood Federation said: “On women’s rights, we are faced with a two-speed European Union where girls living in the right place can get free contraception, including over-the-counter emergency contraception, while others face an uphill struggle.
“In Poland, even if you are a teenage rape victim, you will now have to fight to find a doctor who might, or might not, help you.
“The new Polish law passed by the country’s chauvinist authorities allow abuse of power by doctors who may feel that they have a right to judge the sexual lives of women based on their own moral convictions. As Europeans we cannot stay still and watch.”
Poland’s health minister, Konstanty Radziwiłł, has claimed the legislation was necessary as hormonal means of contraception were being abused and could result in harmful health effects.
But in 2014 the EMA’s committee for medicinal products for human use advised that ellaOne, the most widely stocked morning-after pill in Poland, “can be used safely and effectively without medical prescription”.
Draginja Nadaždin, director of Amnesty International in Poland, said of the legislation: “We consider it as another blow to women’s rights, will affect teenagers and those in remote rural areas, and will have a particularly catastrophic impact on rape survivors.”
Poland also has some of the most restrictive laws on abortion in Europe. Current legislation bans all terminations unless a pregnancy is the result of incest or rape, it presents a health risk to the mother or if the foetus is found to be severely deformed.
Last year the Polish parliament rejected a bill proposed by the government that would have permitted abortions only in cases where a woman’s life was at risk. MPs were stirred into opposition in part by street protests attended by tens of thousands of women.The last four years have witnessed an astonishing implosion of a previously unquestioned investment strategy. No, I don't mean "Buy a house"; I'm talking about "Go to law school." Law school was never quite as safe as people thought, but except for John Grisham, almost no one wrote about the desperate people who end up at the bottom of the legal food chain. Then, during the Great Recession, when you'd expect graduate school applications to be spiking, something unthinkable happened: they started to fall.
The response was entirely rational, as Paul Campos laid out in my interview with him about his book, Don't Go to Law School.
Now that we have real data, I estimate that the median salary of ABA law school graduates a year after graduation is around $45,000, and this may be if anything optimistic. And median educational debt is around $150,000 and climbing rapidly.
So what used to be (as you say) a risk averse choice for people who decided to give up on writing the great American novel has turned into an extremely risky and indeed often flat out reckless gamble, wihch still retains the appearance of a sensible and prudent thing to do in the eyes of clueless baby boomer parents etc.
Now the Wall Street Journal suggests that the same transition may be happening to people with MBAs:
Formerly, the traditional M.B.A. was mainly the product of a full-time, two-year program. But beginning in the early 1990s, many schools created part-time and executive M.B.A. programs, with lower-ranked schools often following in the footsteps of academic leaders. Online degrees also gained in popularity.
As a result, the number of M.B.A. degrees granted has grown faster than the population, says Brooks Holtom, a management professor at Georgetown University's McDonough School of Business.
"An M.B.A. is a club that is now not exclusive," he says. "You should not assume that this less exclusive club is going to confer the same benefits."
The article is crammed with sad anecdotes. But when you dig into it, I'm not sure how much of this is news. Almost all the discussion is of third-tier regional schools. It was a commonplace when I was applying to business school, way back in 1999, that there wasn't much point in getting an MBA unless you could get into a top-tier school; the degree simply wouldn't repay the investment of time and money. That clearly hasn't changed, but I'm not sure there's much evidence that it's gotten worse, either—except in the sense that more people are getting degrees of questionable value.
For graduates with minimal experience—three years or less—median pay was $53,900 in 2012, down 4.6% from 2007-08, according to an analysis conducted for The Wall Street Journal by PayScale.com. Pay fell at 62% of the 186 schools examined.
It's not unusual for starting pay to fall during a weak economy. What this really highlights is what business schools rarely tell you when they're selling you on their school: students with weak experience and lower-tier degrees aren't getting the six figure salaries that people associate with an MBA. Students with more experience do better--but need the credential less. The high-paying employers that people hope to wow with their degrees don't recruit very far down the prestige ladder, as one person they interview acknowledges:
Casting a wider net remains a challenge. "It's always difficult to get those upper-tier companies to come and recruit," says T. Vernon Foster, who oversees career services. "Once they do, they are always impressed."
It strikes me as a real problem that more people are paying a lot for degrees that don't necessarily boost their earning potential. It's a symptom of two worrying economic trends: the relentless push for ever more educational credentials, and the stagnant labor market.
Lackluster economic growth means that there are fewer opportunities for young workers to move up, or try new industries if they don't like where they've found themselves. Or find a job, if their last one didn't work out. The natural instinct is to seek some sort of swing mechanism that can get them out of a tight spot in the labor market.
For decades, that mechanism has been a |
of the problems that Microsoft caused was by not following their own guideline of not throwing exceptions in the Dispose method. The using statement is an excellent and common pattern for automatically disposing IDisposable objects at the end of the code block. Avoiding Problems with the Using Statement describes how even though the WCF client is disposable, developers should NOT use the using statement with them.
The C# "using" statement results in a call to Dispose(). This is the same as Close(), which may throw exceptions when a network error occurs. Because the call to Dispose() happens implicitly at the closing brace of the "using" block, this source of exceptions is likely to go unnoticed both by people writing the code and reading the code. This represents a potential source of application errors.
Microsoft demonstrates in that article how to clean up "correctly" when an exception occurs.
try {... client.Close(); } catch (CommunicationException e) {... client.Abort(); } catch (TimeoutException e) {... client.Abort(); } catch (Exception e) {... client.Abort(); throw ; }
It is important to understand that if the client is in a State of Faulted, then the only action that should be taken by client code is the Abort method. As documented in Expected Exceptions the TimeoutException, CommunicationException and any derived class of CommunicationException are 'expected' exceptions from the WCF client.
If an expected exception occurs, the client may or may not be usable afterwards. To determine if the client is still usable, check that the State property is CommunicationState.Opened. If it is still opened, then it is still usable. Otherwise you should abort the client and release all references to it. Caution: You may observe that clients that have a session are often no longer usable after an exception, and clients that do not have a session are often still usable after an exception. However, neither of these is guaranteed, so if you want to try to continue using the client after an exception your application should check the State property to verify the client is still opened. Code that calls a client communication method must catch the TimeoutException and CommunicationException.
However, all this talk of checking for the State property is cautioned by Accessing Services Using a WCF Client:
Checking the value of the ICommunicationObject.State property is a race condition and is not recommended to determine whether to reuse or close a channel.
If you were to check the State property in order to determine whether to Abort or Close, depending on your approach there could be a race condition. For instance the following code could result in a race condition:
if ( this.State == CommunicationState.Faulted) { this.Abort(); } else { this.Close(); }
The race condition could occur because when the State property is checked to see if it is Faulted it might be Opened at that point in time. However, by the short time that Close method is reached, the State might now be Faulted, and when Close is called an exception would be thrown. This code alone is not sufficient.
The Communication State Enumeration documentation explains the meaning of each possible State :
The Closed state is equivalent to being disposed and the configuration of the object can still be inspected. The Faulted state is used to indicate that the object has transitioned to a state where it can no longer be used. There are two primary scenarios where this can happen: If the Open method fails for any reason, the object transitions to the faulted state.
If a session-based channel detects an error that it cannot recover from, it transitions to the faulted state. This can happen for instance if there is a protocol error (that is, it receives a protocol message at an invalid time) or if the remote endpoint aborts the session. An object in the Faulted state is not closed and may be holding resources. The Abort method should be used to close an object that has faulted. If Close is called on an object in the Faulted state, a CommunicationObjectFaultedException is thrown because the object cannot be gracefully closed.
The article Understanding State Changes describes how the State property can transition to different states. This article expands upon and somewhat contradicts the previous by indicating that if the object is in the Faulted state then the Close method will call Abort for you and return.
The Close() method can be called at any state. It tries to close the object normally. If an error is encountered, it terminates the object. The method does nothing if the current state is Closing or Closed. Otherwise it sets the state to Closing. If the original state was Created, Opening or Faulted, it calls Abort().
I'm confused - how about you?
To remedy my confusion, I went to the source of truth - the code. The reference source for CommunicationObject shows us that the Close method handles being called from any State value, and that it will perform an Abort if required. In addition, if the State was Faulted, the Close method actually will throw a CommunicationObjectFaultedException.
... switch (originalState) { case CommunicationState.Created: case CommunicationState.Opening: case CommunicationState.Faulted: this.Abort(); if (originalState == CommunicationState.Faulted) { throw TraceUtility.ThrowHelperError( this.CreateFaultedException(), Guid.Empty, this ); } break ;...
The article Understanding State Changes also explicitly states that the Abort method can throw exceptions.
The Abort() method does nothing if the current state is Closed or if the object has been terminated before (for example, possibly by having Abort() executing on another thread). Otherwise it sets the state to Closing and calls OnClosing() (which raises the Closing event), OnAbort(), and OnClosed() in that order (does not call OnClose because the object is being terminated, not closed). OnClosed() sets the state to Closed and raises the Closed event. If any of these throw an exception, it is re-thrown to the caller of Abort.
No sample code from Microsoft or anywhere else that I have seen handles the situation where the Abort method throws an exception.
Stack Overflow has an interesting thread about how to work around the using block issue and perform the close/abort pattern. Their top-voted solution for the close/abort pattern, to fix the race condition is:
bool success = false ; try { if (State!= CommunicationState.Faulted) { Close(); success = true ; } } finally { if (!success) { Abort(); } }
In this code, if the State is already Faulted or the execution of the Close method throws an exception (which is implicitly caught and ignored), then finally the Abort method will be called. That's pretty good. But as we now know, the Abort method can throw exceptions, and that code does not handle it.
Exception Catching Order
The article Sending and Receiving Faults shows us that we need to catch the exceptions in a specific order - especially in relation to the SOAP-based FaultException.
Because FaultException derives from FaultException, and FaultException derives from CommunicationException, it is important to catch these exceptions in the proper order. If, for example, you have a try/catch block in which you first catch CommunicationException, all specified and unspecified SOAP faults are handled there; any subsequent catch blocks to handle a custom FaultException exception are never invoked. Remember that one operation can return any number of specified faults. Each fault is a unique type and must be handled separately. Closing the channel can throw exceptions if the connection cannot be cleanly closed or is already closed, even if all the operations returned properly. Typically, client object channels are closed in one of the following ways: When the WCF client object is recycled.
When the client application calls ClientBase.Close.
When the client application calls ICommunicationObject.Close.
When the client application calls an operation that is a terminating operation for a session. In all cases, closing the channel instructs the channel to begin closing any underlying channels that may be sending messages to support complex functionality at the application level. For example, when a contract requires sessions a binding attempts to establish a session by exchanging messages with the service channel until a session is established. When the channel is closed, the underlying session channel notifies the service that the session is terminated. In this case, if the channel has already aborted, closed, or is otherwise unusable (for example, when a network cable is unplugged), the client channel cannot inform the service channel that the session is terminated and an exception can result. Abort the Channel If Necessary Because closing the channel can also throw exceptions, then, it is recommended that in addition to catching fault exceptions in the correct order, it is important to abort the channel that was used in making the call in the catch block. If the fault conveys error information specific to an operation and it remains possible that others can use it, there is no need to abort the channel (although these cases are rare). In all other cases, it is recommended that you abort the channel. For a sample that demonstrates all of these points, see Expected Exceptions.
And here is the sample code from that article:
using System; using System.ServiceModel; using System.ServiceModel.Channels; using Microsoft.WCF.Documentation; public class Client { public static void Main ( ) { SampleServiceClient wcfClient = new SampleServiceClient(); try { wcfClient.SampleMethod( "hello" ); wcfClient.Close(); } catch (TimeoutException timeProblem) { wcfClient.Abort(); } catch (FaultException<MyCustomFault> myCustomFault) { wcfClient.Abort(); } catch (FaultException<MyOtherCustomFault> myOtherCustomFault) { wcfClient.Abort(); } catch (FaultException unknownFault) { wcfClient.Abort(); } catch (CommunicationException commProblem) { wcfClient.Abort(); } } }
Note the following about this sample code:
The client is not closed or aborted if there is an unexpected exception; and
There is no concern about catching exceptions from the Abort method.
Other Exceptions
There is one more type of exception that never seems to be mentioned in sample code or in any literature I have seen related to WCF, and that is the ThreadAbortException.
When this exception is raised, the runtime executes all the finally blocks before ending the thread. Because the thread can do an unbounded computation in the finally blocks or call Thread.ResetAbort to cancel the abort, there is no guarantee that the thread will ever end.
The ThreadAbortException is a special exception that can occur asynchronously. If the WCF client is called from within a thread, and if the thread is aborted, then it might be prudent to clean up the client before the thread finishes.
The top-voted solution from Stack Overflow does partially and elegantly handle this situation, as well as the other asynchronous exceptions such as OutOfMemoryException and StackOverflowException.
Oh My!
So does all that sound complicated enough? No wonder so many don't get it right...
How To Do It Correctly?
In my opinion, the most correct solution would:
Perform the Close/Abort pattern without a race condition
Handle the situation when the service operation throws exceptions
Handle the situations when both the Close and Abort methods throw exceptions
and methods throw exceptions Handle asynchronous exceptions such as the ThreadAbortException
Below is my proposed solution for correctly using a WCF client.
SampleServiceClient client = null; try { client = new SampleServiceClient(); var response = client.SampleOperation( 1234 ); // Do some business logic } catch (FaultException<MyCustomException>) { // Do some business logic for this SOAP Fault Exception } catch (FaultException) { // Do some business logic for this SOAP Fault Exception } catch (CommunicationException) { // Catch this expected exception so it is not propagated further. // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for gathering statistics... } catch (TimeoutException) { // Catch this expected exception so it is not propagated further. // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for gathering statistics... } catch ( Exception ) { // An unexpected exception that we don 't know how to handle. // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for support purposes... throw; } finally { // This will: // - be executed if any exception was thrown above in the 'try'(including ThreadAbortException); and // - ensure that CloseOrAbortServiceChannel() itself will not be interrupted by a ThreadAbortException // (since it is executing from within a 'finally'block) CloseOrAbortServiceChannel(client); // Unreference the client client = null; } private void CloseOrAbortServiceChannel(ICommunicationObject communicationObject) { bool isClosed = false ; if (communicationObject == null || communicationObject.State == CommunicationState.Closed) { return ; } try { if (communicationObject.State!= CommunicationState.Faulted) { communicationObject.Close(); isClosed = true ; } } catch (CommunicationException) { // Catch this expected exception so it is not propagated further. // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for gathering statistics... } catch (TimeoutException) { // Catch this expected exception so it is not propagated further. // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for gathering statistics... } catch ( Exception ) { // An unexpected exception that we don 't know how to handle. // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for support purposes... throw; } finally { // If State was Faulted or any exception occurred while doing the Close(), then do an Abort () if (!isClosed) { AbortServiceChannel(communicationObject); } } } private static void AbortServiceChannel(ICommunicationObject communicationObject) { try { communicationObject. Abort (); } catch ( Exception ) { // An unexpected exception that we don 't know how to handle. // If we are in this situation: // - we should NOT retry the Abort () because it has already failed and there is nothing to suggest it could be successful next time // - the abort may have partially succeeded // - the actual service call may have been successful // // The only thing we can do is hope that the channel's resources have been released. // Do not rethrow this exception because the actual service operation call might have succeeded // and an exception closing the channel should not stop the client doing whatever it does next. // // Perhaps write this exception out to log file for gathering statistics and support purposes... } }
Well, that's quite depressing, isn't it! Imagine that you have an application that calls many services. If you were to tell me that I should duplicate all that code every time I want to make a service operation call, as a developer I won't be happy.
Unfortunately that is exactly the situation that Microsoft has forced upon developers.
You could take some short-cuts and not do all the exception handling, but no doubt on the day that one of those perhaps rare exceptions happen (and it will!), you will be glad that you handled those edge cases.
Please Tell Me There Is a Better Way!
In my next article, I will show you how to use some programming tricks to significantly reduce the amount of code that developers have to write and provide a nice, clean API for working with WCF clients.How Can a Business Partner Be Beneficial
When you think about starting a business on your own, you might want first to see what are all the responsibilities that are awaiting you. The easiest way to do this is to visit a business and ask a veteran business owner to give you some advice or explain how things will go in the first year or so for you. almost every business owner will give you the advice to start a business with a friend of yours and treat him like a business partner because it will help you out a lot. this is very beneficial especially when you don’t have any previous experience or if you don’t have enough money to start up your business. However, the money issue can be fixed with some other solution like the HBSwiss automated trader, but that is up to you.
Less Responsibilities
Something that only a business partner can help you out is taking half of your responsibilities as a business owner. This will be a great help, and you will be able to focus much more on improving your business because you will have more free time. therefore, we strongly recommend that you get yourself a business partner.
The broadcast networks, including Fox which aired the “NASCAR Sprint Unlimited”, took a backseat to the cable network TNT which topped all platforms with “NBA All-Star Saturday Night” from Brooklyn, NY. With 6.082 million total viewers and a 2.8 rating among adults 18-49, it marked the most-watched All-Star Saturday Night since Feb. 25, 2012 (6.24 million).
Immediately following the NBA exhibition, the TNT telecast of “Neighborhood Sessions with Jennifer Lopez” which featured some portions of Lopez’s June 2014 concert at Bronx’s Orchard Beach as well as a profile of her hometown of Bronx, NY, drew 1.78 million total viewers from 11:05 p.m.-12:05 a.m.
For mobile users, you may scroll this table horizontally.
PROGRAM HH/SHR VWRS(000) A18-34 A18-49 A25-54 8:00 MOVIE: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) 1.3/2 2366 0.4/2 0.6/2 0.8/2 PROGRAM HH/SHR VWRS(000) A18-34 A18-49 A25-54 8:00 Crimetime Saturday: NCIS: Los Angeles (r) 3.0/6 4756 0.3/1 0.5/2 0.8/2 9:00 Crimetime Saturday: Criminal Minds (r) 2.5/5 3726 0.3/1 0.4/2 0.7/2 10:00 48 Hours 3.6/7 5463 0.3/1 0.7/3 1.2/3 PROGRAM HH/SHR VWRS(000) A18-34 A18-49 A25-54 8:00 Dateline Mystery 3.6/7 5588 0.4/2 0.8/3 1.3/4 10:00 Saturday Night Live (repeat) 3.2/6 5139 0.9/4 1.3/5 1.8/5 PROGRAM HH/SHR VWRS(000) A18-34 A18-49 A25-54 8:00 Sprint Unlimited Pre-Race 2.4/5 4039 0.6/3 0.9/4 1.3/4 8:35 2015 NASCAR Sprint Unlimited (thru 10:24) 3.2/6 5606 0.6/3 1.2/4 1.7/5 PROGRAM HH/SHR VWRS(000) A18-34 A18-49 A25-54 5:55 Liga MX (thru 8:00) 0.5/1 849 0.4/2 8:57 Sabado Gigante 0.9/2 1805 0.6/2
For the entire week of February 9-15, 2015 in Total Day (8 p.m. to 5:59 a.m.), Adult Swim is up 6 percent in total viewership (1.242 million vs. 1.168 million) and up 8 percent among Adults 18-49 (712,000 vs. 657,000) from one week earlier; the network is also up 4 percent in total viewership (1.242 million vs. 1.194 million) and up 4 percent among Adults 18-49 (712,000 vs. 686,000) from the same week one year ago(February 10-16, 2014). (tvmediainsights.com)
TIME PROGRAM HH VWRS(000) A1849rtg 8:00 Sit Down, Shut Up (r) 0.53 749 0.15 8:30 King of the Hill (r) 0.56 772 0.21 9:00 King of the Hill (r) 0.70 931 0.30 9:30 Rick and Morty (r) 0.62 903 0.29 10:00 Robot Chicken (r) 0.63 980 0.31 10:15 Robot Chicken (r) 0.58 914 0.30 10:30 The Boondocks (r) 0.62 902 0.30 11:00 American Dad (r) 1.0 1579 0.6 11:30 Family Guy (r) 1.2 1820 0.8 3:30a American Dad (r) 0.4 559 0.3 4:00a Rick and Morty (r) 0.5 644 0.3 4:30a Robot Chicken (r) 0.5 642 0.3 4:45a Robot Chicken (r) 0.5 610 0.3 5:00a King of the Hill (r) 0.5 662 0.3 5:30a King of the Hill (r) 0.5 671 0.3
TOONAMI – SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2015
TIME PROGRAM HH VWRS(000) A1849rtg A1849(000) 12:00a Dragon Ball Z Kai 0.9 1258 0.5 635 12:30a Kill La Kill 0.7 997 0.4 501 1:00a Naruto: Shippuden 0.7 897 0.4 488 1:30a Inuyasha: The Final Act 0.6 823 0.4 478 2:00a Gurren Lagann 0.5 748 0.3 437 2:30a One Piece 0.5 698 0.3 422 3:00a Deadman Wonderland 0.5 689 0.3 426
Source: Live+Same Day data, Nielsen Media ResearchCanadian author Margaret Atwood says Donald Trump's America reminds her of Europe in the 1930s
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Frankfurt am Main (AFP)
Award-winning novelist Margaret Atwood on Saturday said Donald Trump's America reminded her of Europe in the 1930s, and warned that the world was "at a moment of change and disruption".
"I think it's a moment of turmoil everywhere," the 77-year-old author said at the Frankfurt book fair.
"This feels like the 1930s," she told a press conference, referring to the rise of populist leaders and fascism that ultimately led to World War II.
"And what's surprising to many people in Europe is that this is also happening in the United States" which was long seen as "a beacon of democracy", Atwood added.
George Orwell's "1984" and her own 1985 book "The Handmaid's Tale", about a totalitarian regime where fertile women live in sexual servitude, were resonating right now because those worlds no longer seemed so far-fetched.
"People suddenly feel that it's a possible reality for them," said Atwood, a prolific Canadian author and poet famed for her cautionary tales.
"The Handmaid's Tale" is now a major television show, and the story's trademark red cloaks and white bonnets have been donned as symbols of protest at US demonstrations against threats to women's healthcare under Trump.
"There's a widespread feeling of dissatisfaction and resistance, but no leading figure has appeared yet," Atwood said.
The US Republican party is "in disarray", she said, while the Democrats had yet to formulate a response.
"One wonders what the Democrats are going to come up with because so far... 'hello, where are you?'" she said.
Asked what she would say to Trump, Atwood jokingly replied: "Could you get that Twitter account away from him, please?"
- Weinstein criticism -
But she also praised the power of social media in giving a voice to the voiceless, as highlighted in the sexual assault scandal surrounding Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein.
"He had nothing to do with our show," she said, before adding that the exploitation of young women by powerful men has been going on "for really quite a long time".
But the recent downfalls of some of these men showed that things were changing.
"I think there have been a number of cases involving large powerful men with lawyers in which, partly due to social media, it has become possible for people to speak about it publically in a way they would not have been able to do once upon a time."
"It all comes down to the question: who is a person? The only reasonable answer to that has to be: everyone is a person," she said.
"(And) they should not be treated the way Harvey Weinstein was treating people."
Atwood was in Frankfurt to receive the German book trade's annual "Peace Prize" for her prescient body of work, due to be awarded on Sunday.
Regularly tipped for the Nobel Prize for Literature, Atwood was asked whether she was disappointed when the accolade went to British novelist Kazuo Ishiguro last week.
"I am very used to not winning the Nobel prize. So it's really not a concern for me," she quipped.
© 2017 AFPDebris from the crash in 2014. Credit:Kate Geraghty Borodai is not the only one of Russia's self-proclaimed volunteer fighters to reappear here. As the conflict in east Ukraine has reached a stalemate, hundreds of volunteers have returned to Russia, and the early rebel leadership, many of them native Russians, have resumed comfortable, increasingly public lives in Moscow. Wrapped in a tight Armani Exchange T-shirt and a week's stubble, Borodai said he had not been in Donetsk since October and his focus now was to revive his consulting company. Business is bad. Several international companies, which he declined to name, severed their contracts when he was sanctioned by the United States and the European Union. Consulting "is an intimate business that requires a personal touch," Borodai said, which was lacking while he was out of town. "People go to war, fulfil their duty, and then go back to peaceful, productive lives," he said. "I don't think this is especially interesting."
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop delivers a statement at the UN Security Council. A vote for a resolution on the downing of MH17 was vetoed by Russia. 38 Australian citizens and residents were on the plane. Credit:Trevor Collens/DFAT Borodai's respite from the spotlight may be short-lived, as Russia and the West are on a collision course over the MH17 investigation. The West has blamed rebel leaders, of whom Borodai was the most visible, and Russia for supplying them with sophisticated anti-aircraft weapons. Russia denies this, vetoed a UN tribunal and criticised the Dutch investigation as opaque. Indictments are expected near the end of the year. "I don't have an answer. Let's wait and see," said Borodai, when asked whether he would go to the Netherlands to face trial if accused. "This is a story that is long in the past for me, and I have done everything that I thought necessary and needed to support a full investigation." Even if separatist leaders are formally accused, there are few signs Moscow would comply with the investigation or an extradition request. In the meantime, the gang's all here. You could have bumped into Marat Bashirov, the former prime minister of the separatist Luhansk People's Republic, at the Moscow Economic Forum this March, where he gave a lecture titled "Risks, sanctions, lobbying". Bashirov, a Moscow government relations consultant once employed by the oligarch Viktor Vekselberg's holding company, was sanctioned by the European Union in July 2014 along with Borodai.
A snappy dresser, he remarked on a government airstrike on his headquarters in July last year in a dry post on Facebook: "It seems my Tom Ford suit has been killed. Now I will hold government sessions in camouflage." There is also Igor Girkin, the battle commander who once bragged that if not for his attacks on police stations in April last year, there would be no war in Ukraine. He now appears at lectures with far-right nationalists and has gone spectacularly off message, accusing Russia of abandoning the separatist republics in Ukraine that it helped to create. "The village crazy," Borodai said with a smile. He claimed his armed guard had to tie up Girkin in order to return him to Russia. Borodai and Girkin are veterans of the ethnic conflicts that emerged with the fall of the Soviet Union. Borodai fought alongside ethnic Russians in Transnistria, Chechnya and Tajikistan during the 1990s. After each conflict, he returned to Moscow. "For them, this is just another war," said Alexei Makarkin, a commentator on politics who studied alongside Girkin at a university in Moscow in the 1990s. "It isn't something that feels extraordinary; they fought in the '90s, after all."
Sceptics, and there are many, say that Borodai is either paid by Russia or is an employee of Russia's security services. He denies both charges but said he passed information from Donetsk to Vladislav Surkov, the Kremlin apparatchik said to be curating Russian policy on Ukraine. Some events point to Russian control, such as the surprise arrivals of Borodai and Bashirov at a time of political chaos for the separatists. Others suggest miscommunication: When the rebels in May last year held referendums seen as a prelude to annexation, the Kremlin ignored them. It was an awkward moment for both sides. "I believe he acted carefully and competently," Borodai said of President Vladimir Putin's policy in Ukraine. "I can't criticise his actions because in the end he has far more information than I do." Russians returning from the war have diverse political views, and a small number are even openly hostile to Putin. Many more say they support Putin but believe he should have supported the volunteers more. "The government has hindered us more than anything," said Vladimir Yefimov, a volunteer leader with a flowing beard who led 50 volunteers to war this winter. "But I can say that because I am from here and allowed to criticise the government."
Some believe that Russia's support for volunteers fighting in Ukraine could provoke instability or blowback. There have been worrying incidents: A former separatist sniper will soon stand trial in Moscow for the killing of two police officers last autumn. And the Federal Security Service has built a 100-kilometre trench on the Ukrainian border because of concerns of weapons smugglers bringing automatic rifles and grenades from Ukraine. But, there have not been clear signs yet that returned volunteers pose an urgent threat to Russia as either criminals or politicians. "First, there just are not that many of them," Mark Galeotti, a security expert who visited Moscow this summer, said of returning volunteers. "I think that the Russians should be more concerned about the soldiers who are coming back." The soldiers are Russian servicemen, some of whom have died under mysterious circumstances and are believed to have been fighting in Ukraine. Putin has shrugged off the accusations. Those who fought openly, calling themselves volunteers, are a more eccentric lot: nationalists or far-leftists, war veterans, thrill seekers and a few would-be philosophers.
Sergei Kavtaradze, an aide to Borodai in Donetsk once labelled "the hipster with a machine gun," returned to Russia last year and is now finishing a film adaptation of his doctoral dissertation. Titled "MilkForMadness," it investigates "the archetypes of war," Kavtaradze said, and the effects of war on its participants. "It makes people go crazy," he said. In a trailer for the film, which Kavtaradze said was produced over the past five years, scenes of combat, torture and sex are cut together in quick succession under a heroic soundtrack. He said that he also filmed "a little bit" in Donetsk, when there was time.
"Hopefully, it may be in some Western festivals next year," Kavtaradze said of the film. Washington Post Follow FairfaxForeign on Twitter Follow FairfaxForeign on FacebookImage caption A number of financial institutions are being investigated by regulators and criminal prosecutors
The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has confirmed that it has formally launched an investigation into the rigging of inter-bank lending rates.
The case could lead to criminal charges being brought against individuals.
Its involvement follows an investigation by US and UK regulators into the manipulation of Libor, which resulted in a record fine for Barclays.
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Danny Alexander, said he was "delighted" by the decision.
"As a government, we will make sure the SFO has all the resources it needs to conduct this investigation in full," he said.
"I want the SFO to follow the evidence wherever it goes, to bring prosecutions if they can."
Last week the bank agreed to pay £290m in penalties after its traders tried to rig inter-bank lending rates, sometimes working with staff at other financial institutions.
Regulators are continuing to look into possible rate manipulation at other banks, while the US Department of Justice is carrying out its own criminal investigations.
Serious Fraud Office Independent government agency established in 1988
Deals with complex, high value fraud cases
Average length of case is 4-6 years
Carries out investigations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, this is done by the Crown Office's Serious and Organised Crime Division
An SFO spokesperson confirmed that a dedicated case team had now started work, but would not say whom it was investigating.
Its short statement said only: "The SFO Director David Green QC has today decided formally to accept the Libor matter for investigation."
The Libor affair, described by the prime minister as a scandal, has led to the resignation of three of Barclays' most senior executives in a matter of days, including chief executive Bob Diamond.
He appeared before MPs on the Treasury Select Committee this week, when he called the behaviour of those responsible for Libor rigging at the bank "reprehensible".
Regulators in the UK and the US found that Barclays staff had tried to affect rates over a number of years, first for profit and then to reduce concerns about how much it was being affected by the financial crisis.
The SFO is responsible for investigating allegations of serious and complex frauds. It considers whether to prosecute using a number of criteria, including whether it is a matter of public concern, and whether the value of any fraud is more than £1m.
The government agency said a few days ago that it was considering whether a criminal prosecution was appropriate and possible, and said this could take a month.
"Normally when there is such a public outcry, the law enforcement agencies manage to act in a more accelerated pace," said Bradley Simon, a former US federal prosecutor who now defends clients in fraud cases.
He said the SFO would be sensitive to criticism that it had been slow to respond in the past.
"They have to show they are on top of this. There are a lot of angry people out there," he told BBC News.Update, 4:40 p.m. Berkeleyside has spoken with the mother of the girl who was hit. The cyclist is a freshman at Berkeley High and plays French horn in the honors band. The girl has a dislocated kneecap, and was discharged from the hospital Friday afternoon. She still hopes to play in the Band and Orchestra (BAO) winter concert Friday at 7 p.m., her mother said. The show is free and open to everyone. It takes place in the Berkeley Community Theater at BHS, 1930 Allston Way.
Earlier in the day, her fellow band members took up a collection and sent the girl flowers in the hospital. They also sent a group selfie to wish the girl well. Band and Orchestra Director Karen Wells said she was impressed the young woman still hopes to play in the Friday night concert: “She’s pretty determined,” Wells said of the young woman.
Scroll down below the photographs for details of the crash.
Original story, 1:35 p.m. A girl on her bike was struck by a hit-and-run driver Thursday night on Telegraph Avenue, according to police and community reports.
The crash happened at about 7 p.m. at Telegraph Avenue and Parker Street, said Lt. Andrew Rateaver of the Berkeley Police Department.
Rateaver said police and firefighters responded to the scene after a collision was reported there.
“The vehicle, described as a black SUV, apparently fled the scene after colliding with a bicyclist,” he said Friday. No description of the driver was immediately available.
The bicyclist was taken by ambulance to a local hospital, Rateaver said. The degree of injuries, and current condition, were unknown Friday. It was also unknown whether alcohol could have been a factor in the crash. Rateaver said no further details were available Friday.
Berkeleyside also reviewed scanner traffic during the police response. The cyclist was identified as a girl who was taken to Children’s Hospital in Oakland for treatment. Community members on the scene said this information was consistent with what they saw and heard there.
According to unconfirmed scanner traffic, the girl’s father rode with her in the ambulance, and she asked authorities to be sure to secure her musical instrument, which she’d had with her at the time of the crash.
Berkeleyside reader A.D. Mobley captured video of the aftermath of the crash. It appears below.
PCS members standing for TUSC on Thursday
The civil servants' union, the PCS, have been at the forefront of the fight against austerity. Two members of the PCS's leadership, the assistant general secretary Chris Baugh and vice-president John McInally, sit on the TUSC steering committee in a personal capacity. Sixteen PCS activists are standing for TUSC on 22nd May. Here some of them explain why:
Mark Benjamin (Click to enlarge)
"I am standing for TUSC in the local council elections as I believe that working class people deserve the opportunity to vote for a candidate who is willing to stand up for them, and say no to austerity and no to all cuts to public services. I have been involved in the local Save Ealing Hospital A&E campaign by participating in the marches, leafleting the public and gathering signatures for petitions".
Joe Foster
"All my life I have listened to big-business politicians spout how they are going to solve the problems of poverty, hunger, homelessness and unemployment but they never have! My wife has, like many people, been through ATOS and tribunals to get disability benefit. At work we are facing another round of redundancies. The government want me to work longer to get my pension yet also may want to sack me. I wish they would make their minds up!
"I do not want to see future generations struggling just to maintain an existence. Standing for TUSC is a big part of fighting to change that with socialist policies".
"I am standing to offer an alternative to the three main parties in the council election who all, without exception, accept cuts in council services and |
Kirk Cameron’s SAVING CHRISTMAS
James Franco / THE INTERVIEW
Nicolas Cage / LEFT BEHIND
WORST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Shaquille O’Neal / BLENDED
Johnathon Schaech / LEGEND of HERCULES
Kelsey Grammer / EXPENDABLES 3 and TRANNIES #4
Ah-Nuld Schwarzenegger / EXPENDABLES 3
Morgan Freeman / TRANSCENDENCE
Jack Black / SEX TAPE
Liam Neeson / A MILLION WAYS to DIE in the WEST
Russell Crowe / WINTER’s TALE
Mel Gibson / EXPENDABLES 3
Kiefer Sutherland / POMPEII
T.J. Miller / TRANNIES #4
media_camera Can’t have your cake and eat it too... Jennifer Aniston is on course for an Oscar nod for her indie film Cake, but may receive a Razzie for Horrible Bosses 2.
WORST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Sophia Miles / TRANNIES #4
Jamie Pressley / A HAUNTED HOUSE #2
Susan Sarandon / TAMMY
Brigette Cameron / Kirk Cameron’s SAVING CHRISTMAS
Carrie-Ann Moss / POMPEII
Amanda Seyfried / A MILLION WAYS to DIE in the WEST
Cameon Diaz / ANNIE
Megan Fox / TEEN-AGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES
Jane Fonda / THIS IS WHERE I LEAVE YOU
Emily Browning / POMPEII
Nicloa Peltz (The Newest Michael Bay “Discovery”) TRANNIES #4
Have the Razzies got it right this time? What were the worst films of 2014? Comment below.
Originally published as List of 2014’s worst movies leakedThe Network Addon Mod (NAM) combines all transportation network-related fixes, additions and new creations that have been released so far. It will add countless new features to the existing network tools, such as new overpasses, highway onramps, intersections, ped-malls, a ground light rail network, roundabouts and turning lanes. This is the standard release version of the 36th edition of the NAM, NAM 36, for the Windows platform. Click "More" for installation details and a list of new features.
INSTALLATION
To install NAM 36, run the enclosed file "NetworkAddonMod Setup 36.exe", and follow the instructions. More details are in the enclosed "read-first-nam36.html" file.
DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, UNINSTALL YOUR PREVIOUS NAM VERSION if you are an existing NAM user. The NAM installer can detect your previous installation options by reading the folder, and as such, it is safe (and recommended) to install NAM 36 on top of your old version. If you remove the previous install, however, you may not remember exactly which options you had selected, which could potentially cause issues in your cities.
SUPPORT
The official support forum for NAM 36 is located at SimCity 4 Devotion, where the NAM Team is most active. You can find it here.
REQUIREMENTS
NAM Version 36 requires a retail disc or digital download copy of SimCity 4 Deluxe, updated to at least 1.1.638 (the version number for disc copies, with the EP1 patch applied--most retail digital download copies are pre-patched to Version 1.1.641).
Note that the Origin retail digital copy of the game is not compatible with the NAM, due to that service's decision to sell unpatched and unpatchable copies of the game. For more details, see SimTarkus.
New features in Version 36--September 13, 2017
New FLEX Turn Lanes (FTL) feature added, providing a more intuitive and flexible alternative to the old Turn Lane Extension Pieces (TuLEPs, now deprecated).
Draggable Elevated RealRailway (RRW) viaducts added at L1 (7.5 meter) and L2 (15 meter) heights.
One-Way Road Signalized Intersection and Turn Arrow Project (SITAP) expanded to cover intersections with FLEX Turn Lanes and Road-based multi-tile NWM networks.
Street Addon Mod (SAM) Set 11 - IndustrieSAM by mgb204 added, providing a new, industrial-style Street texture.
Draggable Wide-Radius Curve functionality added to all applicable Street Addon Mod (SAM) override networks.
RealRailway (RRW) FlexTrack functionality expanded to cover additional setups.
R5 radius Multi-Radius Curves (MRCs) added to the Road network.
Diagonal FLEX On-Slope Transitions added to the RHW, supporting 1 and 2-level transitions for the RHW-2, RHW-4, and MIS networks.
R4 and R5 radii Multi-Radius Curves (MRCs) added to the RealHighway (RHW) system, with support for the L0 RHW-2, L0 RHW-4, and L0 RHW-6S netwoks. Overlap ability also added to the ground-level R2 curves for the RHW, allowing for smoother loop ramps.
Diagonal MIS Connection support added to the One-Way Road Roundabouts.
Texture glitch fixed with the Euro version of the L1-L4 RHW-6S Type A2 FLEXRamps/DRIs.
Minor pathing fix to improve zone access on the TLA-7 network in the Network Widening Mod (NWM).
The compression scheme on the NAM Installer has been changed, making it such that the external 7-Zip SFX layer surrounding it is no longer needed.
New edition of the NAM documentation started, marking a return to the HTML format used prior to the NAM 31.x releases of 2013. Please note that due to the incredible scope of the mod, and the amount of time to adequately document features, that some sections may remain in an incomplete state.
Special Thanks: The NAM Team would like to extend its sincere thanks to all the members of the community for their continued support over the past 13 1/2 years the mod has existed.I took Trevor to go see ‘Wreck-It Ralph’ for his birthday last week. We both thought the movie was awesome and took a few different messages away from it. To see what he thought, which was a much more general message and very uplifting, click here!
I was really happy with the way all the characters were done. I felt that perhaps the love situation was a bit forced, but it is a Disney movie, what can I expect. I’ve heard some people complain about the progress stopping to explain things, but at the same time I saw people not getting certain reference that to those of us who at one time played in an arcade, so I’m not sure if I really saw that happening.
But, what I enjoyed most, as a female who has played games for a very long time, as the one who has been kicked off games or knocked out of line because I must not really want to play this thing, was the little girl who existed outside of the arcade system.
To me it shows a very large step forward in the video game industry of actually admitting that girls play games. What a thought, right? More importantly, she seems to play a wide array of games and doesn’t really care if they aren’t meant for girls. She plays the first person shooter(which Jane Lynch as the lead character is awesome as well), she wants to play the racing competitive game, and she plays the classics.
Yet, as with what happens in games, there is always someone who thinks they are better and she is denied the chance to play some of these games. That does not become a deterrent though. She simply moves to something else. She knows that there is nothing that really stops her from playing ultimately, the bullies are just a minor stumbling block. She really is the positive message that people need to see when thinking about girl gamers.
But not just girl gamers. When thinking about anything that is not the status quo or outside of a stereotype. I don’t care who you are or what you enjoy doing, as long as you can respect the same about me. To me, that was the biggest message of this movie…and it was echoed in the plot as well, I feel.
Anyway…what else is in the pipeline for me? I have some reviewing to do for a deck building game called ‘Shadowrift’, my thoughts on this arc of Captain Marvel, and still trying to figure out a deck to play for the Open in December that is not Bant Midrange.
AdvertisementsLONDON — The U.K. Cinema Association, which represents British movie-theater owners, said Friday Screening Room represents “a massive risk” to the industry.
In a statement, the association said: “‘The Screening Room’ represents a massive risk to the future prosperity not only of this association’s members and their counterparts in other territories, but also of colleagues across the wider film industry.”
The organization, which represents 90% of U.K. cinema operators, added: “It is difficult to envisage how this proposal — if adopted — could do anything other than present an unprecedented opportunity for film piracy while at the same time damaging the foundations of a cinema business which remains the key driver of revenue for the entire business.”
The statement continued: “The cinema experience represents not only over 40% of total film revenues, but also generates ‘word of mouth’ marketing which benefits every other subsequent platform. This proposal would therefore inevitably lead to a loss in overall income for the film industry.
Screening Room, the brainchild of entrepreneurs Sean Parker and Prem Akkaraju, offers movies for $50 at the same time as they open in theaters.
The British exhibitors’ body claimed: “There is no evidence to suggest that significant numbers of people are willing to pay £35 ($50) to watch even the biggest films at home on day of release.”
On Wednesday, U.S. exhibitors’ lobbying group the National Association of Theatre Owners dismissed the startup, while reaffirming its commitment to theatrical release windows.The details on 341 County Road 702: This land located in TX 75956 is currently for sale for $4,500,000. 341 County Road 702 is a 4,677 square foot land with 6 beds and 4.5 baths that has been on Estately for 748 days. This land is in the attendance area of Buna Elementary School, Buna High School, and Buna Junior High School.
Listing Courtesy of: HAR and Martha Turner Sotheby's.
© 2019 Houston Realtors Information Service, Inc. All information provided is deemed reliable but is not guaranteed and should be independently verified. Houston Realtors Information Service, Inc., Estately and their affiliates provide the MLS and all content therein “AS IS” and without any warranty, express or implied. The information included in this listing is provided exclusively for consumers’ personal, non-commercial use and may not be used for any purpose other than to identify prospective properties consumers may be interested in purchasing. The information on each listing is furnished by the owner and deemed reliable to the best of his/her knowledge, but should be verified by the purchaser. Houston Realtors Information Service, Inc. and Estately assume no responsibility for typographical errors, misprints or misinformation. This property listing is offered without respect to any protected classes in accordance with the law.
Copyright © 2019 Estately, Inc. Data displayed here has not been verified by Estately.Buy Photo A map of the potential high school boundaries. (Photo: (Iowa City Press-Citizen))Buy Photo
Iowa City Community School District leaders have presented the school board with an initial boundary scenario that split Coralville Central and Wickham elementary students between two junior high and high schools.
The 2017-18 proposals assigned all students attending South East Junior High to City High, all students attending Northwest Junior High to West High and all students attending North Central Junior High to Liberty High.
However, students attending Coralville Central and Wickham elementaries either would attend Northwest and West or North Central and Liberty, depending on where they live.
The school board on Tuesday also called for two new sets of secondary school boundary scenarios to examine during a March 10 work session.
Board members asked that the new scenarios be geographically compact and efficient. They asked for one proposal that does not account for current elementary and junior high boundaries and one that does.
The initial proposals included the following elementary school assignments:
•Alexander: Northwest, West
•Borlaug: Northwest, West
•Coralville Central: Northwest and West or North Central and Liberty
•Garner: North Central, Liberty
•Grant: North Central, Liberty
•Hills: Northwest, West
•Retiring Hoover: South East, City
•New Hoover: South East, City
•Horn: Northwest, West
•Kirkwood: North Central, Liberty
•Lemme: South East, City
•Lincoln: Northwest, West
•Longfellow: South East, City
•Lucas: South East, City
•Mann: South East, City
•Penn: North Central, Liberty
•Shimek: South East, City
•Twain: Northwest, West
•Van Allen: North Central, Liberty
•Weber: Northwest, West
•Wickham: Northwest and West or North Central and Liberty
•Wood: South East, City
Read or Share this story: http://icp-c.com/1E5GUekOne of the Toronto Blue Jays top prospects, pitcher Roberto Osuna, appears to be getting closer to his return to game action.
Today, for the first time since undergoing Tommy John surgery last year, Osuna threw off the mound in a bullpen side session. The 19-year old right-hander recapped what sounded like promising progress on Twitter.
Threw my first side today, everything felt good. Off to a great start and continuing to get better each and every day. — Roberto Osuna (@RobertoOsuna1) March 24, 2014
He threw off flat ground for the first time on March 3rd and tweeted that he felt “great”, “new” and “everything is doing excellent.”
Five starts into last season, Osuna began to feel discomfort in his right throwing elbow. He was diagnosed with an UCL tear but it wasn’t clear at first if Osuna would require surgery. After resting for a month, he returned to the hill in June but by the start of July it was clear he wasn’t himself and ended up going under the knife later that month.
The recovery time for Tommy John surgery has been greatly reduced in recent years with a recover time now down to 9-12 months according to Sports Illustrated.
Osuna sounds like he is right on track and might even be a bit ahead of schedule since it’s only been about eight months since his surgery and, at least by his own account, is already throwing pain-free.
This is great news for fans of the Toronto Blue Jays since it looks like Osuna should be ready to build on the 43 or so innings he’s thrown the past two seasons if he’s able to return by June or so to a full bill of health. I’m sure the Blue Jays will be cautious with him out of the gate so it will likely be a slow build back up for Osuna.
Will he be the same explosive pitcher when he returns to the mound? Only time will tell but if the recent history of Tommy John surgery is any indication, there’s a good chance that he’s back and 100% ready to go by the beginning of July (or maybe even earlier).BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Japanese electronics company Panasonic and U.S. electric car maker Tesla said Tuesday they plan to begin production of solar cells at a factory in Buffalo, New York.
The two companies said they finalized an agreement calling for Tokyo-based Panasonic to pay capital costs for the manufacturing. Palo Alto, California-based Tesla made a “long-term purchase commitment” to Panasonic.
Their statement gave no financial figures.
The factory in Buffalo is under development by SolarCity Corp., a San Mateo, California-based solar panel company owned by Tesla. The photovoltaic cells and modules will be used in solar panels for non-solar roof products and solar glass tile roofs that Tesla plans to begin making, the announcement said.
Production is due to begin in mid-2017. Tesla said it will create 1,400 jobs in Buffalo, 500 in manufacturing and plans further expansion in Buffalo.
Panasonic also is to work with Tesla on next-generation technology, the companies said.
New York state has committed $750 million to build and outfit the plant at Buffalo’s RiverBend site, the centerpiece of Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s “Buffalo Billion” program to revitalize the upstate region’s largest city.
SolarCity has committed to investing $5 billion over 10 years in New York state, hiring almost 1,500 workers at the Buffalo plant for five years and employing at least 2,000 more people across New York in exchange for use of the state-owned plant.
In October, when word emerged about the possible manufacturing collaboration, the head of New York state’s economic development agency said SolarCity will be held to job creation promises made when the state committed funding to build and outfit the plant, which is expected to begin production next summer.Foto: Sindre Kinnerød/Flash Studio
Her flyr han som «Batman»
(VG Nett) En av deltakerne i dokumentarserien «Oppdrag Sognefjorden» fikk seg en helt spesiell bursdagsgave: Flyvende menn som passerer centimetre unna i ekstrem fart.
Publisert: 27.03.11 18:30 Oppdatert: 27.03.11 20:42
TV-serien følger 12 ekstremsportutøvere på jakt etter stunts.
I fjerde episode får deltakeren Karina Hollekim (33) seg en spektakulær overraskelse på bursdagen. Mange av deltakerne er samlet på en fjellskrent over Solvorn da to av de andre deltakerne kommer flyvende i det som på ekstremsportspråket kalles en «flyby».
VGTV: Se det utrolige «flyby»-stuntet her!
Flere nyheter på Rampelys-forsiden!
De to kommer flyvende i en hastighet på mellom 200 og 250 kilometer i timen, og befinner seg under én meter over bakken.
VG Nett har fått tilgang på klippet hvor de to utøverne passerer like over hodene på de andre.
- Jeg ble skremt, og fikk helt vondt i magen: «Shit, de er for nære», forklarer bursdagsbarnet Karina i videoen.
Det ser livsfarlig ut, men hva slags marginer har man egentlig? Kan et vinddrag feie deg i bakken, spør vi Jokke Sommer, en av de flygende gutta:
- Nja, ikke når vi flyr i den hastigheten som vi gjør her. Det kan gå galt med et kraftig vindkast, men vi hopper aldri i sterk vind. Når vi gjorde dette opptaket var det helt perfekte forhold, forklarer han.
- Det aller viktigste i en flyby er siktingen. Her siktet jeg på et tre som står ved siden av deltakerne, så justerer jeg skuldrene slik at jeg får vinkelen jeg trenger for å komme dit. Når jeg ser det er 100 prosent trygt, kan jeg gi litt ekstra helt på slutten, fortsetter han og konkluderer:
- Det er ganske likt hvordan fuglene flyr!
Hele episoden er tilgjengelig på Nrk.no og vises på TV neste søndag.
FRI SOM FUGLEN: Jokke Sommer (24) flyvende over Sognefjorden i en wingsuit Foto: Sindre Kinnerød/Flash StudioPierce Brosnan is the new face of Pan Bahar, an Indian brand of “paan masala,” a concoction of areca nut, a stimulant, and spices often chewed along with tobacco or betel leaf by millions in South Asians.
The debonair actor, a former James Bond, is appearing as a pitchman for the mixture, which carries a government-mandated warning declaring that it is “injurious to health.” The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies the areca nut as carcinogenic to humans.
A front-page ad in the Times of India on Friday featured a photo of a bearded Mr. Brosnan in a tuxedo holding a container of Pan Bahar's paan masala above the slogan “Class never goes out of style.”
“We know today that we are the world capital for mouth cancers,” said Dr. Vishal Rao, a Bangalore-based oncologist with Healthcare Global Enterprises Ltd., a network of cancer centers in India. “India removes so many jaws, throats, tongues,” he said.
Pierce Brosnan on the front of The Times of India Friday Photo: The Times of India
“My message to Pierce Brosnan is do not endorse a product you do not use,” he said. “Pierce Brosnan’s lips are pink, not red,” Mr. Rao said, a reference to the stained teeth and lips many who chew such concoctions develop.
A representative at the London-based Lisa Richards Agency said the company represents Mr. Brosnan, but that his agent, Richard Cook, was out of the office and not available to field queries on the campaign. Mr. Cook didn't immediately respond to a request for comment sent via email.
In an ad posted on YouTube, Mr. Brosnan is shown endorsing the company's mouth freshener.
It shows Mr. Brosnan pulling up in front of what looks like a hotel in flashy sports car with a woman who says, “best of luck, agent.”
Once inside, Mr. Brosnan knocks out an enemy with a can of the mouth freshener, made by Ashok & Co. Pan Bahar Ltd., and defeats four ninjas in the time it takes for him to throw a can of the stuff in the air and catch it again.
Vikash Shukla, head of marketing for the manufacturer, said it didn’t matter whether Mr. Brosnan was a paan consumer or not. “It is kind of the expression on his face, his maturity,” that led the company to choose him, he said.
Asked how much Mr. Brosnan was paid for the endorsement, Mr. Shukla said the information was “confidential.”
The social media reaction to Mr. Brosnan’s new endorsement meant that his name was trending on Twitter.
Of course India is shining. Look even James Bond has #panbahar....though I wonder if it is shaken or stirred?!#PierceBrosnan pic.twitter.com/I8SPUSbZyQ — Rashi Kakkar (@rashi_kakkar) October 7, 2016
Braking news : 94% of #panbahaar consumers don't know who #PierceBrosnan is & 97% of those getting agitated by the ad don't eat pan masala. — Jitender Dabas (@dabas_jeetu) October 7, 2016
Braking news : 94% of #panbahaar consumers don't know who #PierceBrosnan is & 97% of those getting agitated by the ad don't eat pan masala. — Jitender Dabas (@dabas_jeetu) October 7, 2016
For breaking news, features and analysis from India, follow WSJ India on Facebook.
Corrections and amplifications:
Mr. Brosnan was holding a can of Pan Bahar's mouth freshener in the ad posted on YouTube. An earlier version of this article stated that Mr. Brosnan was holding a can of paan masala in the YouTube ad.Apple is seeking an engineer with thin films experience as applied to semiconductor or solar manufacturing, suggesting the company is investigating viable alternative energy source for future mobile products like a smart watch.
Apple's large solar array at its Maiden, N.C. data center.
The post, discovered on the Jobs at Apple website, describes a position for the Mobile Devices group, with suitable candidates having experience with thin film deposition technology in either semiconductor processing or solar industries.Looking into the Key Qualifications section of the listing, which was posted on Thursday and spotted Friday, it appears that the position will deal with the applications side of R&D, rather than the development phase. Applicants are asked to have experience in sputtering, vacuum evaporation, electroplating and other technologies commonly associated with disposing thin-films on circuitry.While the word "solar" is mentioned twice in the listing, it may not necessarily mean that Apple is working to bring a solar-powered iPhone to market. Many advanced technologies require engineers to have multidisciplinary backgrounds, as these systems are intricately tied together.Perhaps most interesting is a qualification that reads, "Knowledge of thin-films in the context of RF shielding is highly desirable." This suggests Apple may be looking to develop a new method of radio interference blocking for its smartphone lineup that could possibly reduce dependence on the current metal RFI shielding seen in wireless-capable devices.As with many Apple job postings, other desirable qualities include experience in working with Asian manufacturers, problem solving skills and an ability to work as part of a team.Apple has a number of patents regarding solar-powered devices, many involving portable devices like the iPod and iPhone. Most recently, the company outlined a system that uses a display's electrodes to both collect sunlight and act as capacitive touch sensors.Solar power is becoming increasingly popular as light conversion efficiency increases, but the technology is not yet at the point where a panel can simply replace wall charging. A more likely scenario would be battery life augmentation for smaller portables, like a watch. Interestingly, Apple's smart watch patent, discovered by AppleInsider in February, directly mentions such a solution.Swordfish may look like formidable beasts, what with their namesake prong jutting out from their noses. That pointy-looking nose, however, isn't as strong as it may look, thanks to a thin section of bone at its base that shares the space with a particularly large gland. Now, after years of puzzling over its purpose, scientists believe they finally have the answer: the gland helps swordfish swim faster by coating their heads in oil.
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In a recent study published this week in the Journal of Experimental Biology, scientists from University of Groningen in the Netherlands say that the mysterious gland is linked to pores on the fish’s head through a system of capillaries. These pores then secrete an oily film that could potentially reduce the drag that swordfish experience when swimming—with top speeds reaching over 62 miles per hour, Mary Beth Griggs reports for Popular Science.
Over the last 20 years, study authors John Videler and Roelant Snoek meticulously studied the swordfish, using magnetic resonance imaging scans (MRIs) to figure out how the nosy fish could swim so fast. They discovered the gland at the time, but weren’t sure of it’s purpose, Ashley Taylor reports for The Scientist. Then, last year another group identified the weak spot at the base of the swordfish’s sword, and Videler and Snoek took another look at the gland. At first, they didn’t find anything new—but then, Snoek accidentally dropped a light right on the fish’s head.
“All of a sudden [Snoek] saw this network of vessels that were connected to the oil gland,” Videler says in a statement. “And then we found that by heating up the gland you could see oil come out of these tiny little holes.”
According to Snoek and Videler it’s possible that this oil, combined with the swordfish’s sandpaper-like skin, helps to reduce drag on the fish by allowing the oil to coat as much surface area on its head as possible. By repelling water molecules from its head as it swims, the oil could be one reason swordfish are so speedy, Sarah Laskow writes for Atlas Obscura.
“I find this quite fascinating,” ecologist Jens Krause of Berlin’s Humboldt University, who was not involved in the study, tells Taylor. “Much is really left as speculation. Nevertheless, I think it’s an interesting idea that deserves publication and will undoubtedly require testing.”
While the next step in investigating this theory would generally be to test it on a living fish, in this case that’s easier said than done. Because swordfish are large and fast swimmers, it is very hard to keep them in captivity, Griggs reports. To get around this, Videler and his colleagues may have to resort to using models to try and determine whether this oil does in fact reduce drag as the fish zooms through the sea. In the meantime, other researchers are curious to see whether this gland is unique to swordfish, or if there are other similar fish that use the same technique to speed up their swimming.
“I’ve got lots of billfish heads in my freezer,” Krause tells Taylor. Perhaps they too grease up for speed.Story highlights Temperatures in the water dropped too quickly for the young turtles to swim to warmer spots
About 450 went to aquariums, others to a private turtle rehab center
Some are ready to be released back into the sea near the Florida-Georgia border
(CNN) The quick drop in temperatures off the North Carolina coast this week caught several hundred sea turtles in water suddenly too cold for them to swim.
About 600 juvenile turtles needed help, Claire Aubel, a spokeswoman with the North Carolina Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores, said.
An aquarist at the facility, Michele Lamping, told CNN affiliate WCTI of New Bern that the turtles were cold stunned, a condition similar to hypothermia. This can happen when temperatures sink quickly in shallow water, the station reported.
"These guys should be in the 70 degree temperatures, and they were down in the 50s," she said.
When a turtle is cold stunned, it stops swimming and just floats with the current. Some end up on shore. Some die, and some become prey.
Read MoreIf you’ve been in the world of web development during the past two years you’ve probably heard the term Progressive Web Apps (PWAs for short). PWAs are essentially web applications that provide a near-native experience on mobile devices. According to Google they must be:
Reliable — Load instantly and never show the downasaur, even in uncertain network conditions.
— Load instantly and never show the downasaur, even in uncertain network conditions. Fast — Respond quickly to user interactions with silky smooth animations and no janky scrolling.
— Respond quickly to user interactions with silky smooth animations and no janky scrolling. Engaging — Feel like a natural app on the device, with an immersive user experience.
So how can we make sure our Angular applications follow these tenets and provide the best user experiences?
Well let’s take a simple app I’ve already written and turn it into a PWA.
git clone --branch v0.0 https://github.com/MichaelSolati/ng-popular-movies-pwa.git cd ng-popular-movies-pwa npm install
This app depends on The MovieDB’s APIs. Get an API key (check this out) and put it as the moviedb environment variable in your src/environments/environment.ts and src/environments/environment.prod.ts.
Now that we have everything set up, lets run our application npm run start:pwa, open up Chrome and go to localhost:8080 and see what it does.
Well it runs, and if you click on a movie we can get more details about it. AWESOME! But what happens when we’re offline?
Hmm… that’s not that good… If there was a test for PWAs that would definitely fail it…
Wait a sec! There is a test for PWAs! Google provides an extension for Chrome called Lighthouse (install it!) that will run a barrage of tests against our application and will generate a report on how well the app did.And, as I expected, this app failed hard.
We can do better than this, so lets make this app more reliable!
The first thing we can do to address a lot of these issues is to use a Service Worker. A Service Worker enables our PWA to load instantly, regardless of the network state. It sits as a proxy between our application and the outside world, and puts us in control of the cache and how to respond to resource requests. Our Service Worker allows us to cache essential resources to cut down on our dependence on the network, giving an instant and reliable experience for your users even when there is no internet.
Now the Angular team actually provides us with an easy tool to add a Service Worker as well as another set of tool (we’ll get into them later), so let’s install our tools with the following.
npm install --save @angular/service-worker @angular/platform-server ng-pwa-tools
That was easy, but we will also need to update our.angular-cli.json to tell it we want to include a Service Worker. That way, every time we make a production build, it will include our Service Worker.
ng set apps.0.serviceWorker=true
Now if we run a production build ng build --prod and check our dist/ folder, we’ll see a file called ngsw-manifest.json and if we look into it we will see all of our assets that will be cached by our Service Worker.
{ "static": { "urls": { "/polyfills.859f19db95d9582e19d4.bundle.js": "afac7bb7a75d8e31bca1d0a21bc8a8b8d5c8043c", "/main.9058c5e7c9cdfe8d2b7e.bundle.js": "93293a45586e8923695e614746ae61d658cde5ed", "/sw-register.e4d0fe23aa9c2f3a68bb.bundle.js": "2a8aea5c32b446b61dab2d7c18231c4527f04bdc", "/vendor.1fd4688f90e61a7dc14d.bundle.js": "92513639a29f19b868733d40bb37732fc051b326", "/inline.6e6ae94836243f3c1fa2.bundle.js": "7e89339e980b3fe1ac59ed6ee44800ad1c647084", "/styles.b11de945749bdbf0b1ca.bundle.css": "3e920bb539d1da98370748436c09677e81a50d46", "/assets/.DS_Store": "edc93fc6e9f594928b74bd2e15a23417aa68ac5d", "/assets/app-icon.png": "cd65256eb15ba9d4150e783ddaf93399799f605f", "/favicon.ico": "c31b53fba70406741520464040435aabaaed370e", "/index.html": "3953d6c604ff7dc6b9e77e8310cd7877d2b49b0d" }, "_generatedFromWebpack": true } }
But this doesn’t include our routing configuration, so we can create one with the ngu-sw-manifest tool (part of ng-pwa-tools we installed before).
./node_modules/.bin/ngu-sw-manifest --module src/app/app.module.ts
Aaaand, you probably got some error like this…
ENOENT: no such file or directory, open 'app.component.html' ;
Our ngu-sw-manifest tool isn’t able to traverse through our application when there are relative paths for our component’s templates and stylesheets. So we’ll add moduleId: module.id to the @Component decorator of our three components. ( src/app/app.component.ts, src/app/home/home.component.ts, and src/app/movie/movie.component.ts ) So we should have decorators that look like this.
@Component({ moduleId: module.id, selector: 'app-root', templateUrl: './app.component.html', styleUrls: ['./app.component.scss'] })
And if we run the failed ngu-sw-manifest command again we should see:
{ "routing": { "index": "/index.html", "routes": { "/": { "match": "exact" }, "^/movie/[^/]+$": { "match": "regex" }, "/movie": { "match": "exact" }, "^/.*$": { "match": "regex" } } }, "static": { "urls": { "/favicon.ico": "c31b53fba70406741520464040435aabaaed370e", "/index.html": "551a50f7e2847f7ed85cda1f8e4b7877bfdbb492", "/inline.341ede62d3a808c130e1.bundle.js": "79d61daf91c3d745aac6c274fadc4ac826332358", "/main.07650488997a7b2dfcc1.bundle.js": "49be3a9f04ebc4383806652e13f3be4ca58b3902", "/ngsw-manifest.json": "29a96adf2f918b27cc37be64b7ee24d15d095963", "/polyfills.859f19db95d9582e19d4.bundle.js": "afac7bb7a75d8e31bca1d0a21bc8a8b8d5c8043c", "/styles.b11de945749bdbf0b1ca.bundle.css": "3e920bb539d1da98370748436c09677e81a50d46", "/sw-register.e4d0fe23aa9c2f3a68bb.bundle.js": "2a8aea5c32b446b61dab2d7c18231c4527f04bdc", "/vendor.f47d925e37c84559515b.bundle.js": "cd70a6deaa413652cc98b444f793f5cf1e837be6", "/worker-basic.min.js": "93904d94c0bef0479f1ec0b182788f4301d9f28e", "/assets/.DS_Store": "edc93fc6e9f594928b |
since 2011. His work has been featured on VICE Motherboard, Business Insider, RT’s Keiser Report, and many other media outlets. You can follow @kyletorpey on Twitter.Despite being born white, a Florida man says he feels more comfortable leading life as Filipino.
Ja Du, formerly known as Adam, said he considers himself to be “transracial” — a term that describes someone who was born one race or ethnicity but identifies as another.
He claims to have come to the realization after learning about Filipino life for years. From a young age, the Tampa resident said that he was drawn to the country’s food and traditions, according to news station WTSP.
“I’d watch the History Channel, sometimes for hours, you know, whenever it came to that, and you know, nothing else intrigued me more but things about Filipino culture,” Ja Du told WTSP.
Besides the name change, Ja Du said he embraces the new identity by driving a purple Tuk Tuk.
Ja Du said that he worries how others will react to him living as a Filipino man, but wants people to understand he’s sincere.
“Whenever I’m around the music, around the food, I feel like I’m in my own skin,” he said.
Ja Du’s transracial identity is not the first case to garner media attention.
Former NAACP leader Rachel Dolezal made headlines in 2015 when she was outed as a white woman who for years passed herself off as black.
“If I would have had time to really, you know, discuss my identity,” Dolezal told the BBC. “I haven’t identified as African-American. I’ve identified as black. And black is a culture, a philosophy, a political and social view.”A rather odd Saab entry for the marketplace category this time, which was christened ‘CX‘. Now this is not some original factory one-off but a custom Saab designed and built by a guy from Oslo, Norway, called Per Ekstrøm. 1997 for the 50th anniversary the Norwegians Per Ekstrøm presented in Trollhättan its own SAAB.
Basically it’s a chopped 1975 Saab 99 and pretty well chopped. It’s kind of butch, that low roofline and fat tyres encased in those grey plasticky bits for some reason really add something to the car without looking vulgair. Per used many bits here and there from newer Saab models which is probably why it still looks like Saab and not like a botch-job from a shed. Car apparently comes with a 200hp Saab 900 T16 engine and with that it will probably go like stink.
Saab EX
Curiously the guy who designed this car also built a similar model called the ‘EX‘ which alongside the CX turned up at a Saab festival in Tröllhättan a few years ago.
image source: clubsaabespana.com(CNN) The mosquito was never going to win any popularity contests, but as the " deadliest animal in the world " spreads the Zika virus, it's become the target of tough talk and powerful pesticides.
"The mosquito kills more people than any other animal on earth," Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta, this week. "Is there any redeeming feature?... Well, they do provide food for birds and other insects, but I think the world would be a lot better off without them."
Indeed, mosquitoes can spread diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, dengue and Zika virus. Even the ones that aren't carrying diseases are buzzing in ears and threatening everyone's outdoor fun.
Really, why don't we just kill all of them?
That solution, it turns out, is the stuff of science fiction.
Aside from the potential impacts on the ecosystem when a species disappears, "it is absolutely impossible to kill all the mosquitoes; it's just not going to happen," said Roger S. Nasci, executive director of the North Shore Mosquito Abatement District, a public mosquito control program outside Chicago. "No one in the scientific field today has any illusions of being able to eradicate the mosquito."
The reality is no matter how big of a mosquito-killing effort cities and countries unleash on the pests, "there will always be a remnant population somewhere that will repopulate," Nasci said.
It's been tried before
In the not-so-distant past, there were notions of mosquito eradication, but history quickly taught us otherwise.
Nasci points to the Herculean job that Latin America undertook in the 1950s and 1960s to eradicate Aedes aegypti, the mosquito that transmits yellow fever -- and also dengue, chikungunya and Zika. The Pan American Health Organization rolled out all the most effective measures -- spraying insecticide such as DDT and discarding standing water containers -- on a massive scale. But after efforts let up, the mosquitoes came buzzing right back, possibly hitching a ride on shipping vessels from Asia and Africa.
The United States would probably be hard-pressed to achieve the same success if it borrowed Latin America's strategy to wipe out mosquito populations. For starters, the Environmental Protection Agency banned the use of DDT, still the best pesticide to kill mosquitoes, in 1972 because of its devastating environmental effects and possible risks to human health. There is also the challenge that mosquitoes develop resistance to DDT and other agents such as pyrethrin that limit their effectiveness.
The best hope is to limit the number of mosquitoes in an area to reduce the risk of disease transmission, Nasci said. There are effective tools for doing so. Nasci and his program turn to them when surveillance data show the number of mosquitoes carrying West Nile virus -- the major mosquito-borne disease in his area, carried by the Culex mosquitoes -- is on the rise. His team gets called into action, too, when a fed-up resident can't enjoy his deck because of all the backyard biters.
The future of mosquito control
The good news is that tools used for controlling mosquito populations wreak less environmental havoc than in the days of DDT -- and at least so far have not been associated with resistance in mosquitoes. One approach is to spray a formula of bacteria around mosquito habitats. Mosquitoes eat up the bacteria, which then kill them and only them (and related insects) by destroying the lining of their guts.
Another strategy could be to develop tools that only kill the few mosquito species that transmit diseases to people and animals and spare the other 3,000 or so species that don't do any harm, said Laura Harrington, professor and chair of entomology at Cornell University.
This plan would involve using genetically modified mosquitoes. It could take several shapes, but one would be to breed male mosquitoes to contain a gene toxic to their offspring. These tweaked males would be released into the wild to mate with females, but their larval babies would quickly die off. Studies testing the effect of releases in Brazil and the Cayman Islands have found 80% drops in Aedes aegypti levels. Harrington is also developing genetically modified males that would effectively kill all the females with which they mate.
The downsides of this approach are that genetically modified mosquitoes could be expensive, and they would probably have to be released at least once a year to keep populations in check, Harrington said. It is probably still years before these genetically modified mating menaces are ready to join the armamentarium of mosquito control tools, she added.
Learning to live with mosquitoes
In the meantime, it is important to remember that "mosquitoes can play a very important role in the ecosystem," Harrington said. They are particularly key in their larval stages when, just because of their sheer mass, they are major food sources for aquatic predators. "If you removed all mosquito larvae in the Everglades, you'd probably have a huge impact," Harrington said.
For his part, Nasci said his team does not see a "wholesale ecological collapse" when it does mosquito control in the Chicago area, which he would expect to see if the insects played a clutch role in the food chain.
Just because mosquitoes don't appear to be going anywhere anytime soon does not mean that we must resign ourselves to their biting and buzzing.
There are a number of ways to keep mosquitoes at bay. At the most basic level, make sure you don't have pools of standing water, such as in plant pots or bird feeders, around your home and that your window screens are in good shape.
If you are outside and insects are really making a nuisance of themselves, you can wear bug spray and a long-sleeve shirt, Nasci said. It can also be a good idea to keep an eye any reports of increases in the level of mosquitoes in your area harboring disease, such as West Nile. Many local public health agencies have monitoring programs, Nasci said.
Even if better mosquito control measures develop -- and perhaps one day there are genetically modified mosquitoes -- it will still be important to mix up approaches, Harrington said.
Even if levels of Aedes aegypti can temporarily be brought down, people should still take personal precautions, such as wearing repellent. And experts need to work on developing anti-viral drugs and vaccines against the diseases that that handle of mosquito species carry.On Sunday ANC leaders got together to announce Thoko Didiza as the mayoral candidate for SA’s other capital city, but as has become custom at ANC political gatherings, violence soon broke out.
IOL reports that four men in a white Polo sans license plates parked outside the function venue, casually strolled over to a group of party members standing outside and opened fire. It is believed that one person was shot dead before the gunmen – one wearing an ANC t-shirt – fled to nearby flats. Two party members were also rushed to hospital after being attacked with pangas and golf clubs.
Angry ANC members were picketing outside the gathering, shouting that the ANC’s regional deputy chair Mapiti Matsena would ‘get what was coming to him’, with some members holding placards saying #MapitiMustFall and #SputlaMustRise.
Soon after the attack, other ANC members seeking retribution went on a rampage, damaging nearby property and threatening journalists, saying they’ll confiscate their equipment.
“We want no journalists. We’ll take your camera and break it,” an ANC member told Simone Heradien, deputy chair of the National Press Club and content manager at Rekord newspaper.
What’s even more worrying is that the SAPS prevented journalists from accessing the area and taking pictures – a right protected under Standing Order 156 of the South African Police Service, allowing journalists to photograph police officers and anything at a crime scene as long as it is outside the crime scene tape.ACTRESS Saoirse Ronan plans to keep her love life under wraps.
The Carlow teenager says that while she doesn't mind dealing with fame, she plans to keep her love life private once she begins dating.
Talented Saoirse is no stranger to the media spotlight thanks to the success of her movies Atonement, Hanna, and The Lovely Bones, but although she admits she likes posing with fans for pictures and speaking to the media, Saoirse says her personal life will always be kept separate to her life as a famous actress.
Speaking to the Herald, the Hollywood star said she will be keeping family issues and personal romances behind closed doors.
"My personal life is private and the thing for me is that people know me for the films that I'm in, more so than who I am. But at the same time, I'm not going to completely put up a barrier. I get that people are interested in who I am and I think it's nice to know who a person is, I can understand it.
"But I certainly wouldn't be giving away my family secrets or anything. The love life seems to be such a fascination for the media now, too. If someone has done enough interesting things then you shouldn't need to know about that. And I don't think it's that interesting, to be honest," she explained.
Meanwhile, Saoirse (17) is currently working on her next movie, a vampire flick called Byzantium, which is currently being filmed in Ireland and directed by Neil Jordan. The talented star says she is happy to be at home for Christmas after a hectic few years travelling around the world.
And the actress says she loves going shopping in Dublin because she doesn't get followed around by paparazzi. "I don't get loads of attention. People will recognise me but they will just be like, 'ah yeah'."
hnews@herald.ie@PlywoodStick I really dont think an afro is all that "racist" and i actually think the whole Frocobo thing was kinda cute ^^
I just love his character. Hes very believable and relatable.
His views on the whole situation are very natural. He first goes by what he learned from society / media, even though he learned first hand that it might not be true. On a personal note, his way of dealing with stress through witty jokes hits very close to home
As for hope, sure, he had plausible reasons for his hatred and disgust for Snows attitude. I mean, whats not to hate about that douchebag? I just couldnt stand his "chameleon" acting. This constant "Im angry, im sad, im angry, im sad" combined with "im strong, im weak" etc was just annoying.
Imo, every kid his age would have just thrown a tantrum towards snow the instant they are in ears reach and dont wait for the porpper opportunity, pondering in the meantime. But thats just my opinion.
Vanille on the other hand, i just couldnt stand in any way, shape or form. Her obsession with touching people, this overly childish behavior and the forced "playful" attitude was tiresome.
And i never understood what Fang saw in her
There were plenty other, far nicer woman in the pond to fall for.
@Darknyht Good points and good comparisons.
I think the biggest crux here is the internet. People now have the ability to compare releases. I mean, thats how people found out about 50% of FE Fates script went missing during localisation.
If you dont know about it, well, you simply dont care. But people are way more passionate about their hobby and started using the web to dig for more background info.
As for this game, the biggest issue i see is, that bad writing was fixed with bad writing.
Instead of properly fixing what was wrong: Characters acting in unison to question the players decision (so basically their own), now you have characters reacting in unison questioning nothing at all.
No one thought: "Hey, how about we implement each characters unique personality into it, so they might not question the player, but maybe each others opinions on the matter"
Comparison to Default, as i havent played Second:
(minor spoilers) In the desert town, you have a sidequest where you basically axe the corrupt king.
In a choice scenario, both, letting him rule and getting rid of him would be bad decisions for the city, no matter what.
But you could have your party discuss this matter, half of them are more concerned about the political situation, others are more concerned about the popolus. Its not a complicated system.
As for society...sadly, im not seeing this anytime soon.
We live in a time, where people get offended by the most mundane stuff and knit a narrative about how opressed and weak they are.
People forgot to believe in their own strength. When the female body becomes an object of opression, you have already lost, as personality and character have lost their meaning.Peru: an enchanting destination alive with the history of one of the greatest civilizations of all times, the Incas. It is on of the only places in the world where ruins sit atop a mountain top and one can sit in peace but also utter amazement at how these were built without modern technology. This is the story of my journey there.
Last August, I had about 80,000 United miles and was thinking of a way to use them. I talked to main travel advisor, my father, and asked him what his favorite destination on the Earth was. He remarked rather quickly that it was Machu Picchu. I decided then and there to book two round trip tickets. Albeit, the timings were not ideal to and from the final destination, Cuzco, but free is free.
The path to Lima was a two-pronged trip: first, a flight to Panama City, followed by another to Lima (my first time on Copa Airlines, and a good experience overall). There is actually a direct flight from my home base of Houston, but it arrives quite late at around midnight. With this itinerary, I was able to arrive at around 8 PM, which was not just a decent time but necessary with the 520 AM flight the next morning to Cuzco.
Upon arrival in Lima, I checked into the Costa Del Sol Wyndham airport hotel. It’s not a particularly nice hotel, but the location is unbeatable, it is a simple walk across the airport. There is actually an elevated walkway that leads to the hotel from the second floor of the airport.
The hotel itself is quite expensive, however there is a trick to lighten the load on the wallet. Simply purchase 3,000 Wyndham points for $33 and then you can book a points plus cash booking for $104.50 total. Compared to the rack rate of $229, this is an excellent deal. The hotel also gives a free drink, most people choose to taste the local specialty, the pisco sour.
For dinner, I grabbed a rotisserie chicken from the airport food court. This was actually quite tasty, probably the best airport food court food I’ve ever had. The name of the restaurant is Pardos for reference. On the return I had another Lima specialty, ceviche, in the hotel restaurant which was also good, but double the price of the chicken. I got to bed by 10, knowing that five hours later it was time to awaken for the flight to Cuzco.
The path to Cuzco is not an easy one. Cuzco does not have international flights; there are statements that an international airport will be built in the next six years, but these are nothing more than words at this moment. The current airport is in a location that gets very windy, so by the afternoon many flights are delayed or cancelled altogether. Thus, the best idea is to take the earliest flight to and from Cuzco. I took the earliest flight, 520 AM, which was not ideal but the best option to minimize possible delays.
The flight to Cuzco was an hour more or less. The crew was friendly and gave a snack and refreshments. It was my first experience on Avianca and I can not complain, a free exit row seat is about all it takes to make me happy. I arrived quite early, around 7 AM, so the hotel room was not ready yet. No worries, this gave me several hours to tour the town. Also, there is a Peru Rail office in the airport to collect tickets. This is important because when purchasing tickets online, it is simply a reservation, not the actual ticket.
Cuzco is widely considered a colonial gem. It is a pleasant city, but in my opinion the main sights can all be seen in a day. They are mostly museums in addition to a tranquil central square.
My favorite experience in Cuzco itself was actually going to the local market, Mercado San Pedro, and eating chicken soup, or caldo de pollo in Spanish, with the locals. The locals glanced at me for a moment, probably at the oddity of a foreigner daring to eat in the bustling market. This was probably the best meal of my entire trip. There were also stands that sold fresh juice. I had some mix of local fruits, and it was excellent. The lady kept refilling my cup until the juice from her blender ran out. The cost from my memory was maybe 3 soles, or 1 US dollar.
By the afternoon, the hotel was ready, and I was ready for a nap. The elevation of Cuzco is severe, 11152 feet. It definitely takes about a day to get acclimated to the elevation. It honestly did not bother me so much, I felt a bit lightheaded at worst.
The hotel I stayed at was actually a bed and breakfast named Second Home Cusco, run by Carlos Delfin, the son of the famous Peruvian artist Victor Delfin. The room is nice, it was a bedroom with a living room area and a bathroom. Also, breakfast is free and prepared daily by Carlos. My rate was approximately $300 for 3 nights, a relative bargain in Cuzco. Carlos was very helpful in arranging rides to and from the airport and train station, as well as arranging a sacred valley tour.
The next day was the trip to Machu Picchu, the day that was months in the making. Purchasing tickets to Machu Picchu isn’t particularly user-friendly, but definitely doable on the Peruvian government’s website. Tripadvisor has an excellent user guide here. Tickets for the year aren’t released until the first of the year, so I purchased my tickets January 1. The prices aren’t bad, about $38. The train tickets are quite expensive though; the ticket from Cuzco to Aguascalientes was $200 round trip. However, there isn’t really any alternative, since there is no way to arrive to Aguascalientes by road. The journey there was nice, as there were two very friendly Americans that sat across from me and kept a great conversation for the 3 hour journey.
There are two train companies: Inca Rail and Peru Rail. Peru Rail is the original company, but apparently the owner of what is now Inca Rail had a dispute in the past and thus decided to start his own company. Peru Rail was fine but I think in the future I would try Inca Rail, as its seats look nicer and more comfortable. The food on Peru Rail was forgettable as well.
To be clear, the station isn’t actually in the center of Cuzco, it’s actually a bit outside the city in Poroy municipality, 20 minutes more or less. I’m not sure of the exact reason of this, I was given various stories by various locals. One said that it was causing too many accidents in the town, another said that it was a way for taxis to make money by taking people outside the city, while most were as confused as me as to why it happened.
Upon arrival in Aguascalientes, one has to buy a bus ticket to actually go to the top of Machu Picchu, these run about $24 round trip. Honestly, on the way up, the scenery to me wasn’t that much better than other scenery I had seen around the world, particularly in Sicily and Central Mexico. I think it is the fact that the ruins themselves are on top of a mountain more than the ruins or the views themselves that make it a special place.
Upon arrival, one heads straight into the maze of ruins. As the day goes on, the crowds begin to enter; I can only imagine how bad they are in the peak season. In the afternoon, they die down again. This is the best time to be here, one can simply sit and visually meditate. There are also llamas, though not many, that provide bemusement to most visitors.
Then, it’s back to the bottom on the bus. Food in Aguascalientes is like most touristy cities, overpriced and forgettable. Anyhow, this is still better than what is offered in the train. The train back to Poroy was interesting; the workers performed a fashion show, to sell goods of course. One Alpaca jacket costed approximately $300, an outrageous price.
By the time one arrives in Cuzco, the first idea is to eat something, and then sleep. For me, this is what I did, grabbed a pizza from a local hipster restaurant of which I can’t even remember the name and then hit the sack. The next day was the sacred valley tour.
The one day tour of the sacred valley was honestly my favorite day of the three. I hired a driver for $80 for the entire day, and he basically took me on a tour of the entire valley. First, we went to Chinchero. There, he showed a market where alpaca sweaters were sold. I purchased one for $20, glad that I didn’t fall for the train peer pressure the night before. There were some ruins here, giant stair steps of sorts.
Then, it was off to Moray. This was a very interesting place. I don’t even know how to describe this place in words, so I won’t dare to do so. The picture below says everything.
After this, we headed to Salineras. This was again a visually stunning place, essentially open salt mines. The road here was extraordinarily risky, basically a one way dirt road on the side of the mountain. However, the drivers going up and down seemed as relaxed as an old man going for a walk in the park, it was simply routine for them.
After this was the last destination, Ollantaytambo. Some people stay here and catch the train from here to Aguascalientes, as it runs more frequently and is closer, as to avoid crowds. There isn’t much in the center, but there is a huge hill that one can climb. This is a good way to test one’s physical condition, many people were having issues going up and down.
After this, it was the long ride back to Cuzco. All thanks to the driver Wilbur, who spent 12 hours driving me all around the region for a very modest price. The contact info he gave me is 984744237 and wwontalvog@hotmail.com.
After this it was back to the sack and in preparation for the next day, a flight back to Lima, and then a one day stopover in Panama City!The father and grandfather of four victims in a fatal January crash near Saskatoon could not hold back his tears after a 49-year-old woman pleaded guilty to impaired driving in their deaths.
Catherine McKay, 49, pleaded guilty Wednesday in Saskatoon provincial court to four counts of impaired driving causing death in the Jan. 3 crash. McKay was trying to cross Highway 11 at Wanuskewin Road when she struck a vehicle carrying Jordan Van De Vorst, 34, his wife Chanda, 33, and their two children Kamryn, 5, and Miguire, 2.
The parents died at the scene, while the children died shortly after in hospital.
Louis Van De Vorst, Jordan’s father, was emotional as spoke outside of court following McKay’s guilty plea.
“It’s not a happy day for anyone, but we are relieved that she has accepted responsibility,” Louis Van De Vorst told reporters.
Van De Vorst said the outpouring of support for his family and the tributes from around the world have been touching. He quickly added that drinking and driving remains a serious issue in Saskatchewan that needs to be addressed.
“We have the worst record of impaired driving and impaired driving causing death in Canada. There has to be some place where society makes a statement about what this does to us, what this does to society,” he said.
McKay’s lawyer, Leslie Sullivan, said outside court that McKay wanted to plead guilty from the outset.
“Ms. McKay has always taken responsibility and I hope that the public appreciates that lawyers still need to do due diligance, review disclosure, prior to taking final instruction,” Sullivan said.
McKay is scheduled to return to court for sentencing on July 27.
— With files from Hannah Spray
cthamilton@postmedia.comAfter private telecom operators showered their users with plans which have high validity, BSNL, the government-owned telecom operator is now getting ready to introduce new offers with which it aims to disrupt the market once again.
To counter Reliance Jio’s Dhan Dhana Dhan offer and other private telco’s offers that were recently introduced, BSNL will reportedly launch three new plans, namely, Dhil Khol Ke Bol (STV349), Triple Ace (STV333), and Nehle per Dehla (STV395). The company has also modified the popular STV339 plan to offer more data, as per our sources.
Speaking of which, the modified STV339 plan, will now offer 3GB data per day as opposed to 2GB of data it used to offer earlier. Voice calling benefits, though, remain the same, i.e., unlimited on-net calling along with 25 mins off-net call per day. All of this with 28 days validity.
The Dhil Khol Ke Bol plan will cost users Rs. 349 offering unlimited local and STD calls in home circle and 2GB data for 28 days. The Triple Ace STV333 plan will offer 3GB data per day for 90 days, which is way better than any other telecom operator’s plan.
On the other hand, the Nehle per Dehla STV395 plan will offer 2GB data per day along with 3000 BSNL to BSNL free minutes. Thankfully, this time around, the telco is offering benefits for off-net calling as well. You will get 1800 minutes to other network calls. The best part of this scheme is it will be valid for 71 days (10 weeks), on-par with Airtel and Idea Cellular’s offers. After the allotted free minute’s quota, you will be charged at 20 paise/min.
All the three plans offer a speed of 80 Kbps once you exhaust the data you’ve been allocated to. All these new plans along with the revamped STV339 will be valid from April 24, claim our sources.
Yesterday, BSNL CMD Anupam Shrivastava said they are working on a new plan that provides free off-net calling, and the STV395 might be the one he tweeted about.
What do you think of these new plans from BSNL? Will you be satisfied with them? Let us know in the comments space below.Dwelling on the poor performance of the FC Goa team, everyone following the franchise would tell you that the cub was besieged with problems right from the start- problems of their own doing. It started off with ISL striking deal with Jaydev Mody and throwing out true blooded Goans-Dempo and Salgaocar- who had passion for the game.
It was apparent that Jaydev Mody knew nothing of football and that’s where part two of the whole thing started. Alleged cut money signings by FC Goa CEO Sukhwinder SIngh. An unfit Robin Singh- who is supposed to be very close to him- was signed for a huge sum, making him the highest paid Indian player at the club. Beto too ruled the roost, with several cut money signings and failures from last year like Reinaldo making their way to the team this year too. Players who don’t even feature regularly in I-League sides featured in the team while Oldies like Gregory, Luciano, Julio Caesar were signed. A goof up from the management of FC Goa resulted in them having one less player compared to the rest of the teams. The management team had a major revamp with at least four staff leaving or being asked to leave.
Pre season then was a disaster, players being made to travel half way around the continent to train at Zico’s academy in Brazil. There was only one man laughing his way to the bank, and that was the gaffer himself who must have made a fortune after renting out his academy to the team. Incompetent and shady staff like Gavin Araujo ( who was allegedly involved in fixing of a second division match in 2010) were hired. Problems started there itself with Gavin refusing to buy water and ice for the players apparently citing instructions from Sukhwinder Singh to tighten the purse. Undeserving players were given exorbitant salaries while necessities like water and ice were controlled citing budget control.
Then came Goa and more disaster was to follow. A dearth of training grounds due to the AIFF U-16 Championships meant that FC Goa were forced to shift their training to the Sesa Academy. The ground was refurbished and missed the deadline of completion forcing Zico to cancel two scheduled friendlies and shift training for a week to a Panchayat ground in south Goa. Logistics were a mess, players were made to stay in a two star hotel owned by Deltin Group causing major divisions in the team between senior players like Lucio and the management. The matter escalated so much that a month later, Lucio shifted himself at his own cost to a five star hotel and had a major falling out with Zico. As I had predicted a while back, he hasn’t played a single match in the past month even though he was fit. He has apparently skipped many training sessions and appears to have completely lost his focus. Pictures were also uploaded on a social media account of a support staff, showing players being made to stand in the bus arranged by the club to transport them from the airport to the hotel in Guwahati due to lack of seats.
Off the field too there were plenty of problems. The marketing team was a complete failure. Compared to last season where they had around five paid sponsors on their jersey, this year the amount reduced to just two. Tickets were a disaster. Prices were hiked and when the performance went down free tickets were distributed and gates were opened to fans after half time. Revenues would be at an all-time low this season and losses at an all-time high. FC Goa fans though can rejoice having won many twitter and social media battles, unfortunately football isn’t played in cyberspace.
So a major clean-up is expected. Expect a new look FC Goa in ISL-4 (subject to it being held after the merger).
(This article is written by our forum member @lokeshchandaindia and it is edited and posted by the authour @mohammed87_hassan
link to th post http://forum.indianfootballnetwork.com/discussion/1920/isl-week-7-discussion-thread/p17 )Verizon Communications Inc. is putting off the potential acquisition of two small wireless companies, a shift that may signal the U.S. carrier is cooling on the idea of entering Canada despite moves by Ottawa to entice foreign players into the market.
The New York-based communications giant had been looking at buying one or both of Wind Mobile and Mobilicity, two struggling carriers that are for sale. After tabling a $700-million preliminary offer for Wind and signing a non-disclosure agreement with Mobilicity in recent months, Verizon has now decided to delay pursuing those deals until after a government auction of wireless licences in January, said two people familiar with the situation.
Instead, Verizon will focus on deciding whether to participate in the upcoming auction of the 700 megahertz frequency, considered the most valuable airwaves that have ever come up for bidding in Canada. If Verizon enters the auction and wins the spectrum it wants, it could then look at potentially bidding for Wind and Mobilicity at some point next year, sources say.
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Such a change in strategy would give Verizon more time to decide on whether to enter Canada at all – the spectrum auction is not set to begin until Jan. 14. Carriers face a Sept. 17 deadline to apply and to put down a refundable deposit. Once that paperwork is filed, however, prospective bidders are barred from negotiating any deals with other bidders until next year.
It is not clear-cut what prompted the strategic change, and what it says about Verizon's long-term ambitions. The shift could signify that Verizon is still interested in Canada but is trying to further drive down the price of Wind and Mobilicity, is seeking regulatory concessions from Ottawa or is preserving cash for spectrum purchases. The shift could also mean Verizon is becoming less enamoured with Canada and has decided it needs time to rethink before writing any cheques.
The move is likely to be seen as a blow, though not a fatal one, to the Conservative government's ambitions to bring a major foreign wireless company into the country to fulfill a promise of ensuring a viable fourth competitor in every regional market. At recently as Tuesday evening, Industry Minister James Moore was trumpeting the government's efforts to stimulate competition and lower prices in the $19-billion wireless market, while taking a swipe at the Big Three incumbents' lobbying campaign, which is aimed at changing government policy.
The news is likely to be taken as a positive for the Canadian incumbents, which have been waging an expensive public relations battle against the prospect of Verizon entering Canada under current federal rules. Verizon's potential entry has wiped billions of dollars from the market values of BCE Inc., Telus Corp. and Rogers Communications Inc.
Verizon's new timetable also casts doubt on the long-term future of both Wind and Mobilicity, which are on the auction block after suffering years of major financial losses while trying to compete with their larger rivals.
Amsterdam-based VimpelCom Ltd. has put Wind up for sale and is said to be eager to dispose of its Canadian assets. Mobilicity has previously indicated that it is running out of cash and could pursue a recapitalization plan if it fails to find a buyer.
Both startup carriers are also being pursued by Birch Hill Equity Partners Management Inc. The Toronto private equity firm is partnering with Rogers on a deal for Wind, and potentially on another for Mobilicity. The plan would see Birch Hill take a controlling stake in Wind, while Rogers would chip in capital in exchange for the right to use Wind's spectrum to add capacity to its own high-speed network.
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Verizon, VimpelCom, Wind and Mobilicity all declined comment.
One of the risks in Verizon's new timeline is that the company would have to wait until final payments for 700 MHz spectrum are made in 2014 before it is clear to take another run at Wind and Mobilicity without running afoul of the auction's anti-collusion rules.
By the time that happens, it could be early spring, which means that Wind and Mobilicity would no longer be subject to a federal ban on selling their spectrum to the large domestic carriers. For its part, Telus has not ruled out taking another run at Mobilicity once that standstill agreement expires.Eyeball tattooing: Calls for ban as procedure regulated in New South Wales
Updated
The Baird Government has been criticised for recently regulating the practice of eyeball tattooing, as the New South Wales Opposition calls for a ban on the procedure.
The Opposition said the tattooing, also known as eyeball inking, was effectively legalised when it was included in a number of health amendments enacted last Friday.
The amendment declares that "eyeball tattooing, tongue piercing and tongue tattooing are skin penetration procedures".
The procedure involves injecting the whites of the eyes, or sclera, with coloured dye or dyes.
Health Minister Jillian Skinner said, in general, procedures involving body piercing needed to be covered by regulation, but that a ban on eyeball inking for cosmetic reasons was now on the cards.
"I've sought advice |
win or lose, aiming to motivate and reward his national audience of true believers rather than pursuing a viable electoral map. As the campaign has gone on, Trump has limited his media appearances to friendly bubbles where he knows neither reporters nor viewers will expect anything beyond confirming his established brand. The prominence of media experts from such bubbles within his campaign, such as Roger Ailes and Stephen Bannon, has prompted speculation that Trump’s post-election plan is to develop a media empire to the right of Fox News, monetizing his aggregated audience via the very medium that built him up.
Whether Trump TV happens or not, Trump has long been mobilizing this national niche for post-election action, sowing the seeds for claims that the election was rigged and stolen, fanning the flames for poll-based intimidation efforts or other modes of insurrection. While I doubt Trump himself is particularly interested in rallying a violent mob — at least beyond trying to sell them Trump-branded pitchforks — clearly the audience he has aggregated will not simply accept a traditional “peaceful transition of power” without a fight.
Sadly, the parallel to television does not offer us much solace of precedent: The rise of narrowcasting in the 1980s has all but destroyed any vestiges of broadcasting to a mass audience of Americans. Instead, we’ve been wedged into smaller and smaller niches on many different sizes of screens, never to be united. Alas, it seems like our democracy has likely now suffered a similar fate, unless the Trump niche grows so small as to be outright canceled.
Jason Mittell is a professor of film and culture and American studies at Middlebury College. His books include Television & American Culture and How to Watch Television.Hey, I was hoping I could get some advice on this picture I'm working on. I thought I'd paint the whole thing black and white so I could concentrate on value before color and that was a mistake. I didn't completely finish the black and white painting before I started experimenting with how I was going to color this as you can see. Next time I'll go straight to color but for now I was hoping to get some advice on how I can save this. The more color layers I put on top of it the more it flattens out as you can really see on the 3rd picture. I'm also really stuck on the color scheme, I tried a bunch of directions, maybe I'm going too vibrant I dunno. Any advice would really help!Veterans denied benefits face long wait times on appeal Copyright by WISH - All rights reserved (WISH Photo) [ + - ] Video
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) -- Bob Ildefonzo says his nightmares have gotten worse.
The retired Air Force mechanic and Korean War veteran says he has struggled with recurring dreams, depression and - at times - fleeting thoughts of suicide.
"I got very upset and I said to myself, 'What in the hell do I care? Why don't I just end it all here? I don't need this. I don't need this garbage.' And then for some odd reason I said, 'Okay, let's go on. Live your life the best you can,'" Ildefonzo said in a recent interview at his Peru, Indiana, home.
"I still have nightmares. I still have dreams. I still worry if somebody has my social security number, if somebody has my medical information," he added. "It's really kinda unique. (I dream) I'm falling. I'm falling, my hands are above my head, and I can't grab anything. I'm falling and there is no bottom."
Ildefonzo told I-Team 8 his nightmares grew worse last year after a VA employee took his and three other veterans' medical records outside a Cleveland federal building and left them unattended for days. In a letter sent to Ildefonzo obtained by I-Team 8, the VA acknowledged the error and offered him free credit monitoring.
Ildefonzo's records had been sent to the Cleveland VA last year in an effort to alleviate the backlog of claims and appeals at the Indiana VA. Bob was appealing a 2013 decision by the VA to deny him disability compensation for knee problems and post traumatic stress disorder.
Bob believes his struggles with nightmares, sleep impairment and depression can be traced back to an event 28 years ago - the crash of A-10 warthog fighter jet that killed his friend.
The crash happened in early January of 1987 in a remote field of Fulton County. The A-10 Warthog jet was on a routine training flight when it crashed into the ground, killing the pilot and creating a large crater, according to WISH-TV archived news reports.
Ildefonzo was assigned to help clean up debris and collect evidence for the crash investigation. While working to clear debris, Bob says he made a gruesome discovery.
"I found the pilot's helmet that contained some of his brains in it," Ildefonzo said.
Ildefonzo notes in his claim to the VA that the incident made him sick, but that he turned over the helmet and continued to work collecting debris for investigators. Ildefonzo said as he was attempting to remove another piece of debris he fell backward into the crater.
"When I fell it was like I was falling forever," Ildefonzo said.
The pilot, Daniel Williams of Memphis, Tennesse, was killed in the crash. He was engaged to be married, according to archived WISH-TV news reports.
Medical records show no record of Ildefonzo being checked out after falling that day at the crash scene. His records do, however, chronicle numerous falls that he says he sustained him working as an airplane crew chief at Grissom Air Force base near Peru, Indiana.
After filing his claim for issues related to his wrists, knees and mental health in 2011, Ildefonzo is still awaiting a final decision. He was recently granted coverage for his wrists but denied disability coverage for his knees and his claims of PTSD.
According to a copy of the VA's statement of case, which Ildefonzo shared with I-Team 8 for this report, the VA told him his PTSD symptoms were "minimal."
"The examiner evaluated your condition and reviewed the evidence in your claims file and VA treatment history. The examiner indicated you did not meet the diagnostic criteria for PTSD but for anxiety disorder (not otherwise specified). The examiner gave an opinion that your condition was less likely than not caused by an in military service. It was indicated you began treatment with anti-anxiety medication in 2010 due to family issues and were currently treated with only sleep medication," the February 2015 notice read.
An I-Team 8 analysis of more than 300 pages of Ildefonzo's medical records showed the criteria used in his 2013 PTSD evaluation (DSM-IV) may have been outdated. A month before Ildefonzo's June evaluation, a new medical standard (DSM-V) was introduced.
It included additional criteria and new symptoms for diagnosing PTSD which include persistent negative emotional states, according to the American Psychiatric Association. It's not clear if the change in criteria would have affected Ildefonzo's evaluation. Calls seeking an explanation from the VA's Northern Indiana Health Care System were not returned.
But according to the American Psychiatric Association, DSM-V criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder "differ significantly" from those in DSM-IV.
Under the new standard, PTSD is no longer considered an anxiety disorder, but rather it falls under "Trauma and Stessor-Related Disorders."
Six months after that evaluation in December of 2013, Ildefonzo submitted new evidence to the VA, indicating he had another assessment from a neuropsychologist that showed "there may be a likelihood that the veteran may have PTSD," according to his medical records. There is no other mention of that report in his file.
Dr. Sanford Pederson, a neuropsychologist with the Great Lakes Institute for Neuropsychology and Behavioral Health is not affiliated with Bob's case and would not talk specifics about it. But he did agree to talk about how difficult it is to diagnose PTSD.
"If you are examining someone and you are getting information, that clinician has to decide, does what I'm being told fit this particular criterion or not? There's where some of the subjectivity comes in," Pederson said. "We can take 100 people that have the same label and they are going to be very different. Some are going to fit diagnosis, other people are going to fit that diagnosis but be very different from typical person."
Ildefonzo is among the estimated hundreds of thousands of veterans still appealing their claims. Last year, more than a million veterans filed claims with the VA. According to the VA's own data, more than 650,000 veterans have been awarded disability coverage related to PTSD.
Sum of All Column Labels Row Labels 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Gulf War 86,933 119,799 153,879 196,760 250,744 256,413 Korean Conflict 11,606 12,452 12,781 12,790 12,585 12,577 Regular Establishment (Peacetime) 11,665 14,360 16,387 19,081 22,285 Vietnam Era 229,436 265,910 298,729 326,110 348,164 350,067 World War II 21,529 20,836 19,062 17,295 15,214 15,042 Peacetime 22,576 Grand Total 361,169 433,357 500,838 572,036 648,992 656,675
I-Team 8 brought the concerns Ildefonzo had about his case to the Veterans Benefits Administration, the agency responsible for veterans' claims and appeals. While the Indianapolis office would not discuss specifics about his diagnosis, it did acknowledge that it had reviewed Ildefonzo's transcript from a recent adjudication hearing and that Ildefonzo will be given another mental health evaluation and an exam for his joints.
Michael Schiebel, the assistant director of the Indianapolis office of the Veterans Benefits Administration, told I-Team 8 that his office has worked to pear down the case load backlog this year with an average wait time of 93 days for responses to claims.
Appeals, however, remain a lengthy process.
The average appeal takes 287 days, according to data provided by the VA. If new evidence is presented, it can take longer than 400 days.
"I do know that it's a long process. We do hear that it's a long process. And we acknowledge that's one area that this year is our focus," Schiebel said. "I'm a veteran myself. I don't like it when we sit and we wait a year for a veteran to receive a decision. We work within laws that we have. I will tell you, everyone on the floor is absolutely dedicated to make sure that next veterans' cases gets worked out. In fact, we have a core of people who are working on Veterans Day to make sure we get more claims processed."
Schiebel suggests veterans can speed up the claims process by having thorough documentation when they file their claims or appeals. Presenting new evidence during the appeals process can add additional time, he said, given that those VBA employees reviewing records must start over and re-examine the entire file.A new apartment building is taking shape on Canal Street, and good news, the meaningless word “luxury” is nowhere to be seen on the project. Nope, these are bona fide micro-lofts (fold-up beds, no parking space) aimed at students. Edge College Hill is now taking applications. According to Greater City Providence,
... this new 15-story high-rise will include 202 micro-loft style apartments and first floor commercial space. Amenities for the residential units include a top floor common room and southwest facing terrace as well as a fitness center and first floor lobby/gathering space. These modernly furnished apartments will primarily be marketed towards students. Features include over-sized windows, high-end finishes, 9′ 7″ ceilings, fully equipped kitchens and fold-down beds that tuck into contemporary cabinetry when not in use.
This is for urban, car-free living (must love WaterFire) and completion is scheduled for summer of 2018. The DBVW Architects site has a view of a typical unit. Apartments will have “fully equipped kitchens and fold-down beds that tuck into contemporary cabinetry when not in use.”
Just up and across the street is The Cove, now Johnson & Wales housing. It had originally been built as “luxury condos” until the developer found there was a shortage of luxurious buyers in the area. Instead of having it languish empty, the city allowed it to be used as student housing and it seems to have worked out fine. Still, better for the city overall to have commercial properties renting to students and those on student budgets.
I have no idea what rents are at 169 Canal Street (some students are pretty well-heeled) but it is hoped that they are moderately priced. The location is fantastic. There has been a waiting list for the micro-lofts at Arcade Providence since day one. We need more.TV Reviews All of our TV reviews in one convenient place.
Rarely does Doctor Who embrace another genre as completely as the first 30 minutes of “Knock Knock” does. For the first two thirds of its running time, tonight’s episode is a horror movie, with all the customary trappings. There’s the spooky haunted house with the still spookier landlord. There’s a bunch of thinly sketched young people who are all possibly idiots. There are loud noises and eerie music and windows and doors shutting all by themselves. If anything, it’s all a bit old-fashioned, in the best possible way.
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And to its credit, the script by Doctor Who newcomer Mike Bartlett doesn’t take this as the umpteenth opportunity to deconstruct the genre. The Doctor and Bill are dropped into this scenario, and the Doctor’s presence—as well as the fact he’s not some young doofus, at least not in this incarnation—means the story unfolds a little differently than it might in a typical horror scenario, but even then he doesn’t fundamentally alter the setup as he might in another story, at least not at first. Let’s say you remove the Doctor from this story and make Bill the same basic person, except not a companion. It’s not too hard to imagine that version of her working out enough of what’s going on to confront the landlord over the house’s prior occupants, much as the Doctor does.
It’s around that particular scene, when the Doctor starts pleading with the landlord to let him help and Harry makes his ill-fated escape attempt, that the episode transitions from horror movie to a more typical Doctor Who story. The emphasis flips from surviving to solving the latest impossible mystery, and it’s here where the Doctor’s superior knowledge and experience—not to mention his alien nature—alters what kind of story we’re watching. For the first 30 minutes, the focus is on the young people in danger, with the Doctor as honorary member of that band. Following the story “Knock Knock” sets up to its inevitable conclusion would probably mean Bill and the Doctor escaping the malevolent threat by the skin of their teeth, the former’s friends all sacrificed for the sake of building up the monster they just escaped. And sure, Doctor Who isn’t above killing all its guest characters. The aptly named Fourth Doctor story “The Horror Of The Fang Rock” is perhaps the most brutal example of this.
But “Knock Knock” chooses a different direction, as the episode asks us to switch our focus to the landlord and his wooden mother. The Doctor and Bill then move from horror movie survivors to a TARDIS team trying to understand and help. Their own experiences become subordinate to their empathy. And that’s not a bad thing! It’s just a bit weird to watch the story undergo such a shift, especially on a first viewing. The first half-hour and the final 15 minutes of “Knock Knock” are independently very good, even excellent, but the lack of cohesion between them undercuts both.
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That could be a bigger problem for an episode not anchored by three terrific performances—four, if you include Mariah Gale’s affecting work under heavy prosthetics as Eliza. I’ve already heaped plenty of praise on Peter Capaldi and Pearl Mackie, and I’ll soon do so again, but let’s first turn to David Suchet, who is magnificent as the landlord. Like Capaldi, Suchet elects to underplay his character, suggesting a man who is less evil than he is broken or even incomplete, which perfectly fits someone who never really left his tragic childhood. The temptation would be for the former Poirot star to sow hints of menace from the first moment, but it’s only when Harry asks once too often about the tower—and, without knowing it, potentially puts Eliza in jeopardy—that the landlord snaps, and even then only for a moment. The psychology of Suchet’s performance is impeccable: For much of the run, he’s a little boy doing his best impression of a grown-up, then he’s a little boy being cruel to those who must die to save his mother, and then all falls away as his mother realizes who she is and treats him like his son again for the first time in decades.
Still, tonight’s episode is only briefly about Suchet’s landlord. Most of the time, the focus remains squarely on Bill, and here’s where we see a very different horror aspect come into play: Bill faces the exquisite embarrassment of the Doctor wanting to hang out with her and her friends. While other new series companions have had love interests and family members, very few have had friends—like Bill, Rose had a friend called Shireen, while Donna had her arch-enemy Nerys—and these were generally unseen or only briefly glimpsed. It’s very rare for Doctor Who to explore a companion’s personal life in this way, and Bartlett’s script repeatedly underlines just how out of place the Doctor is in this setting, with Mackie and Capaldi wringing every ounce of comedy out of the Doctor’s repeated intrusions.
That character work also neatly complements the horror genre excursion. After all, it’s a classic horror trope that the characters involved have to act like idiots for the plot to work, and “Knock Knock” is no exception. The problem is Bill has established she’s no idiot, and nothing that happens tonight is any stranger than what she witnessed in the first three episodes. The story explains her occasional obliviousness as a character choice, an indicator of how much she wants to preserve some space of her life independent from the Doctor.
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Even then, “Knock Knock” is careful to make Bill the bravest, most intelligent member of the group, with her volunteering to investigate the spooky noise and her working out a good chunk of what’s going on here. Beyond that, some of the storytelling choices on the margins are clearly designed to ease the weirdness of placing Bill, a companion who we will see in episodes before and after that, in a narrative scenario that would normally involve the brutal murder of a bunch of her friends: first, only Shireen is someone she knew before the events of the story, and second all her housemates come back to life at the end, a necessary and wise concession given how much death affected her in “Thin Ice.”
Finally, a larger thought: An episode like “Knock Knock” underlines the difference between Bill and her predecessor in the TARDIS. In part because Clara began as a mystery instead of a character, she could never really progress beyond being the archetype of a Doctor Who companion. All her actions and motivations ultimately either traced back to her role as the Doctor’s companion or felt episode-specific, something not clearly rooted in a character that existed outside the TARDIS. She wasn’t unique in that regard: Martha was in a similar position, and Amy and Rory rode the line with this, especially after season five. The point is the stories Doctor Who eventually figured out best suited Clara were those that spoke more universally to her role as a Doctor Who companion—her addiction to adventure, growing similarity to the Doctor, and even her romance with Danny Pink were compelling because of what they said about the show and its storytelling conventions.
Bill, though, exists independently of the Doctor, even if “Knock Knock” portrays her failing to keep her life separate. In this respect, she fits into the best tradition of Rose and Donna, characters the show likewise took time to develop outside the TARDIS. Bill’s desire to find a place to live, her dealing with Paul’s unwanted advances, her friendship with Shireen, even her showing her mother’s photo where she ended up—all these are aspects of a character that could exist and be compelling even if she had never fallen into the Doctor’s orbit. And that makes it all the richer when Bill makes the companion’s contribution to the resolution of the story, as she points out the impossibility of the landlord being old enough to be a middle-aged father in the mid-20th century and the improbability of such a father just randomly sharing a box of insects with his sick daughter. These are practical objections that may not be directly informed by any of the traits and motivations that I just mentioned—though notice how Bill also pauses when the landlord challenges the Doctor to say he would not do anything to save his own mother—yet there’s a sense of connectivity and coherence in Bill’s actions that you find in the best new series companions. Doctor Who has something special in Pearl Mackie and Bill, as her presence has elevated every episode she’s appeared in. When she’s accompanied by Peter Capaldi and David Suchet at the height of their powers, it’s easy to forgive “Knock Knock” a bit of narrative wonkiness.
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Stray observations
For the record, none of what I said above should be read as a condemnation of Clara. She was fun in specific episodes of series seven, very good in series eight, and often great in series nine. Plus, Jenna Coleman generally elevated the shortcomings of the writing for her character. I think series nine is the best of new Doctor Who (though series 10 already looks like it’s in with a shot), so I’m not dismissive of Clara’s contributions to the show. It’s just that everything just feels easier this year with Bill around, as the storytelling is organic and character-driven in a way the show hasn’t tapped into this readily since probably series four or five.
I do enjoy the little stray bits of characterization Mike Bartlett gives to the generally thinly sketched housemates. In particular, Shireen is very obviously crushing on Paul long before Bill calls her out on it, as she consistently teases him about being expendable or Scottish or whatever else in the way someone figuring out if they are attracted to someone would.
The scene in which Bill and the Doctor discuss how he’s a Time Lord is another brilliant interaction between them. I’d say the show should give them a two-hander together, but then I remembered that’s what all the best bits of “Smile” already were. Also, I do hope Bill sticks around long enough to learn about regeneration firsthand after that deft bit of foreshadowing.
At this point, I’m not sure there’s any logical identity for who’s in the vault that isn’t the Master. Only real question is whether the Master in there looks like John Simm or Michelle Gomez.Students Learn Two-way Science in Remote Western Australian Desert
By David Broun
Getting 52 people in eleven four-wheel drives to the edge of the Gibson Desert in Western Australia for a four day school trip to conduct a wildlife survey with scientists and Aboriginal Elders was a bit of a logistical nightmare, but we made it in the end!
Twenty students from Wiluna and Leonora Schools participated in the Science Pathways program at Matuwa Kurrara Kurrara Indigenous Protected Area (IPA). The Science Pathways program builds on the strengths of Aboriginal desert communities by using a two-way approach to align traditional ecological knowledge with Western science.
“The amount of information that the kids found out; talking with the old ladies, language and science. They didn’t even know they were doing school work,” said Fifi Harris, an Aboriginal and Islander Education Officer who works at Leonora High School.
Students learned tracking skills from Wiluna Rangers and applied these in the collection of data for a project looking at the abundance of native marsupials and feral animals in different areas of the Indigenous Protected Area. They found populations of the threatened Ninu (Bilby) with evidence of burrows, tracks and scats, all confirmed by camera trap pictures.
In the first ever biological survey held on Kurrara Kurrara, students learned from Department for Parks and Wildlife scientists about the special adaptations of desert marsupials and reptiles. The also learned how to weigh, measure and identify different species including the Dunnart, Spinifex mouse and the spiky Gidgee Skink.
“We learnt that you measure a lizard from the nose to the bum hole!” said Aeishah Muir, a Year 6 student.
Traditional Owners took everyone to Nyimbin (Sydney Head) and told stories of Pujiman days in Martu language.
“We learnt about the land and how you look after it. If you look after the land, the land looks after you,” said Romarno Jackson, a high school student.
You can find out more about our programs here.
Science Pathways for Indigenous Communities is one element of the Indigenous STEM Education Project which is delivered by CSIRO and funded by the BHP Billiton Foundation. In Western Australia, Science Pathways operates in six Western Desert communities to facilitate schools, Traditional Owners and scientists to develop a Two-way science curriculum based around Learning on Country activities. Science Pathways aims to increase the engagement of Indigenous students with science education and careers.Bloody-Disgusting is excited to bring you the exclusive music video premiere for Colorado thrash metal band Havok‘s “Point Of No Return”, which comes from their EP of the same name (iTunes). The Roy Warner-directed video mixes performance footage of the band with real news clippings, many of which are graphic and violent in nature. Therefore, I feel it’s best to say that this video is NSFW (don’t want anyone to lose their jobs, y’know?)
Vocalist/guitarist Dave Sanchez says, “The lyrics of ‘Point of No Return’ are highly interpretable, but the message of the video pretty simple… The world as we know it is a delicate place and we have never had such a high capacity to destroy the human race as we do now. At some point, our self-made concoction of nuclear/biological weaponry, ancient superstitious beliefs, nationalism, corruption, ignorance, and conflicting ideologies is going to become lethal: on a global scale. We live in a time like no other and it’s obvious that if we don’t change our behavior, it’s only a matter of time before the world is extinguished at the hand of fanatics. It’s literally within everyone’s power to leave the world a little nicer than we found it. Don’t believe everything you’re told: Think for yourself.”
Check out the video below!
Director Roy Warner notes, “Working with the guys from Havok was great. They had awesome ideas to start out with and build from; wanting to showcase real life as the concept. It really illustrates the depths of human depravity in the past, present and what we can expect from the future if attitudes don’t change.”
Havok on-line:
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Got any thoughts/questions/concerns for Jonathan Barkan? Shoot him a message on Twitter or on Bloody-Disgusting!President Obama on Friday offered a rebuttal to what he called “doomsday rhetoric” from the Republican Party, declaring that “America is pretty darn great right now.”
In brief remarks from the White House, Obama touted impressive new figures that showed the U.S. economy added 242,000 jobs last month, beating expectations amid global turbulence.
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Flanked by Vice President Biden and a half-dozen economic advisers, Obama gave a glimpse of his strategy to counter the pessimistic tone struck by the Republican presidential field, particularly front-runner 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.
“I’m looking forward to very forcefully making clear that what we have done has made a difference, and that there is a huge gap between the rhetoric that’s going on out there and the reality of the success that we’re seeing in America’s economy,” Obama said.
Without naming Trump or any other GOP candidates, Obama criticized their focus on “how terrible America is.”
He said Republicans should end the “name-calling” and “trying to talk down the American economy” as it climbs out of the recession.
“There seems to be an alternative reality out there, from some of the political folks, that America’s down in the dumps,” Obama said. “It’s not. America is pretty darn great right now and making strides right now.”
Rattling off statistics about job growth, Obama made the case for his own economic policies, which he suggested have been hindered by Republican lawmakers.
“The fact of the matter is the plans that we have put in place to grow the economy,” he said. "They would work even faster if we did not have the kind of obstruction that we’ve seen in this town.”JAKARTA, INDONESIA - APRIL 27: An aerial view of Jakarta's new seawall and land which has been sinking below sea level on April 27, 2017. Jakarta, one of the world's most densely populated cities, is also one of the fastest-sinking cities in the world under the weight of development and rising sea levels caused by global warming.(Photo by Ed Wray/Getty Images) (Ed Wray/Getty Images)
On Thursday, a group of scientists, including three working for the U.S. Geological Survey, published a paper that highlighted the link between sea-level rise and global climate change, arguing that previously studies may have underestimated the risk flooding poses to coastal communities.
However, three of the study’s authors say the Department of Interior, under which USGS is housed, deleted a line from the news release on the study that discussed the role climate change played in raising Earth’s oceans.
“While we were approving the news release, they had an issue with one or two of the lines,” said Sean Vitousek, a research assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. “It had to do with climate change and sea-level rise.”
“We did end up removing a line,” he added.
[Want stories like this delivered to your in-box? Read The Energy 202, starting tomorrow]
Vitousek and five co-authors wrote the study, which was published in the journal Nature Scientific Reports. Three of the authors worked for USGS and the other three worked for universities.
That deleted line, they said, read: “Global climate change drives sea-level rise, increasing the frequency of coastal flooding.”
Instead, the USGS news release leaves the cause unmentioned. It begins: “The frequency and severity of coastal flooding throughout the world will increase rapidly and eventually double in frequency over the coming decades even with only moderate amounts of sea level rise.”
“It’s a crime against the American people,” Neil Frazer, a geophysics professor at University of Hawaii at Manoa and one of the study’s co-authors, said of the line’s removal and of other efforts to limit scientific communication from federal agencies. “Because scientists have known for at least 50 years that anthropogenic climate change is a reality.”
He added: “The suppression of this information is a scandal.”
The paper’s authors acknowledge the deletion did not make the news release wrong. But, they say, it made it incomplete.
“It did not cause any direct inaccuracy, but it did eliminate an important connection to be made by the reader — that global warming is causing sea-level rise,” Chip Fletcher, a University of Hawaii professor and study co-author, said. “I disagree with the decision from the upper administration to delete it, not with the scientists who deleted it at the administration’s request.”
A.D. Wade, top press officer for USGS, said that the deleted line “didn’t add anything to the overall findings.” She explained that because climate change causes sea levels to rise is not a new finding, it did not warrant inclusion in the news release.
Wade also noted that the line appeared in the very top of the academic paper.
“It is business as usual for USGS science,” she said.
Normally, USGS has one political appointment, its director, though the White House has yet to fill that position. The decision to change the news release came from officials at the Interior Department itself.
Since President Trump, who has said he is not a “not a big believer in man-made climate change,” took office, the federal government has curtailed some of its communication on climate change to the public.
During the first days of the Trump administration, federal agencies halted scientists from publishing news releases and doing other communication with the public. Later, the Environmental Protection Agency and Departments of Interior and Energy scrubbed portions of their websites that discussed the science and risks of climate change.
[EPA removes climate science site from public view after two decades]
There is scientific consensus among climate scientists that sea levels will rise over the next century due to the heat-trapping effect of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases released from the burning of fossil fuels.
Those gasses will have a one-two punch: The additional heat in Earth’s atmosphere melts glaciers, which adds water to the oceans, and heats the oceans themselves, causing them to expand and rise.
In their study, Vitousek and his team wrote that previous research on the risks of coastal flooding from sea-level rises ignored another factor: the effect waves played in amplifying sea-level rise and causing floods.
The study found that only 10 to 20 centimeters of sea-level rise will double the risk of coastal flooding in the Tropics, which Vitousek said is the “the most vulnerable area” for coastal flooding.
The only mention of the climate system that appeared in the news release came at the very bottom — and only through a quote from one of the non-USGS authors of the study.
The news release quotes Fletcher, a study co-author, as saying: “These important findings will inform our climate adaptation efforts at all levels of government in Hawaii and other U.S. affiliated Pacific islands.”
Read more at PowerPostIn 2013 the J. Paul Getty Museum acquired a magnificent copy of the Romance of Gillion de Trazegnies, now Ms. 111 in the Getty’s collection. In the Manuscripts Department, we’ve long been interested in experiments to engage diverse audiences with our collection. As senior curator of the collection and a specialist in Flemish illumination of that era (Elizabeth), I was particularly eager to share the Romance of Gillion with our many audiences—fellow scholars, enthusiasts of art and the Middle Ages, visitors to the Getty—in efforts ranging from a print publication to a delightfully fun YouTube video. Here’s what we did and why.
About the Romance of Gillion Manuscript
Part travelogue, part romance, and part epic, the text of the Romance of Gillion de Trazegnies traces the exciting exploits of a knight named Gillion as he journeys to Jerusalem on pilgrimage, is imprisoned in Egypt and rises to the command of the Sultan’s armies, mistakenly becomes a bigamist when he marries a Muslim wife while still married to his Christian spouse, and dies in battle as a glorious hero. The tale encompasses the most thrilling elements of the Western romance genre—love, war, treason, and loyalty—set against the backdrop of the East. The accompanying illuminations, created by Lieven van Lathem, one of the greatest artists active in Flanders in the fifteenth century, vividly interpret the text, serving as a visual gloss that heightens the reader’s experience of the manuscript.
Since its acquisition, the book has been on view three separate times in exhibitions at the Getty Center, allowing us to share with visitors five examples of its lavish illuminations. (In two of the exhibitions, we turned pages midway through to reveal new parts of the story.) Earlier this year it was on view in Traversing the Globe through Illuminated Manuscripts, appropriate given Gillion’s travels between Europe and the Middle East.
Gillion’s Journey to Print
Almost immediately after the acquisition, I conceived of the idea to write a book about the text and its illustrations to make them accessible in detail not only to scholars, but also to anyone interested in art, manuscripts, or the Middle Ages. I was delighted to be able to engage the perfect co-author for the book, professor Zrinka Stahuljak of UCLA’s French and Comparative Literature Departments. Just as I have spent many years in the study of the art of the fifteenth century in Flanders, professor Stahuljak is equally well-versed in the language and literature of the period.
It was an ideal collaboration that stretched almost three years while we researched, wrote, and saw the book through to publication. Along the way, our excitement for the project was only exceeded by our passion for the manuscript itself. We became more and more absorbed by the problems and questions posed by the manuscript’s text and illumination, much to our mutual enjoyment. In our monthly meetings, we exchanged ideas, endlessly discussed the thorny aspects of dating, attribution, and textual development. We also traveled together multiple times to see related manuscripts and consider the place of this masterpiece within the greater context of productions of the period. We studied manuscripts across Europe, from Berlin and Paris to London and Brussels. Along the way, we often felt that we were vicariously sharing in the sense of adventure and humor integral to Gillion’s story as we forged ahead on the project. The result, happily, is a book that reflects our interests and the great knowledge we gained from each other.
The Manuscript’s Digital Life
While we were writing the book, Gillion was also busy making multiple appearances on the Getty’s digital media to further engage scholars and art enthusiasts alike. My colleagues and I blogged multiple times about the manuscript and its illuminations here on The Iris, and Zrinka read elegantly from the original Middle French for our Medieval Manuscripts Alive audio series, evoking how the story would have originally sounded when read aloud.
We told the knight’s story in cliffhanger mode over the course of a week on Facebook—and later did it again, this time in greater depth on Tumblr, inspired by the podcast Serial. Images from the manuscript likewise made an occasional appearance in our series #ThyCaptionBe, also on Tumblr, in which we asked you to come up with creative captions for a detail selected from a manuscript in the collection, revealing later what was really happening.
We were delighted with the response to these posts, as well as to the published book. Combining scholarship and play, we wanted to continue to share with you both the excitement of Gillion’s story and the fun we had together while discovering more about it by writing the book. Enter the idea for “Tipsy Medievalists.”
Gillion on YouTube—Tipsy Medievalists
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��𗂧 "The Great Xia State of the White and the Lofty" (白高大夏國), or called "mjɨ-njaa" or "khjɨ-dwuu-lhjij" (萬祕國). The region was known to the Tanguts and the Tibetans as Minyak.[3][9]
"Western Xia" is the literal translation of the state's Chinese name. It is derived from its location on the western side of the Yellow River, in contrast to the Liao (916–1125) and Jin (1115–1234) dynasties on its east and the Song in the southeast. The English term "Tangut" comes from the Mongolian name for the country, Tangghut (Tangɣud), believed to reflect the same word as "Dangxiang" (traditional Chinese: 党項) found in Chinese literature.
History [ edit ]
Foundations [ edit ]
The Tanguts originally came from the Tibet-Qinghai region, but migrated eastward in the 650s under pressure from the Tibetans. By the time of the An Lushan Rebellion in the 750s they had become the primary local power in the Ordos region in northern Shaanxi. The Tanguts sometimes fell under direct administration by the Tang dynasty. As a result, the Tanguts often cooperated with external powers such as the Uyghurs in opposing the Tang. The situation lasted until the 840s when the Tanguts rose in open revolt against the Tang, but the rebellion was suppressed. Eventually the Tang court was able to mollify the Tanguts by admonishing their frontier generals and replacing them with more disciplined ones.
In 881 the Tangut general Li Sigong was granted control of the Dingnan Jiedushi, also known as Xiasui, in modern Yulin, Shaanxi for assisting the Tang in suppressing the Huang Chao Rebellion (874–884). Li Sigong died in 886 and was succeeded by his brother Li Sijian. After the fall of Tang in 907, the rulers of Dingnan were granted honorary titles by the Later Liang. Li Sijian died in 908 and was succeeded by his son Li Yichang, who was murdered by his officer Gao Zongyi in 909. Gao Zongyi was himself murdered by soldiers of Dingnan and was replaced by a relative of Li Yichang, Li Renfu. Dingnan was attacked by Qi and Jin in 910, but was able to repel the invaders with the aid of Later Liang. Li Renfu died in 933 and was succeeded by his son Li Yichao. Under Li Yichao Dingnan successfully repelled an invasion by the Later Tang. Li Yichao died in 935 and was succeeded by his brother Li Yixing.
In 944 Li Yixing attacked the Liao dynasty on behalf of the Later Jin. In 948 Li Yixing attacked a neighboring circuit under encouragement from the rebel Li Shouzhen but retreated after Li Shouzhen was defeated. Honorary titles were given out by the Later Han to appease local commanders, including Li Yixing. In 960 Dingnan came under attack by Northern Han and successfully repelled invading forces. In 962 Li Yixing offered tribute to the Song dynasty. Li Yixing died in 967 and was succeeded by his son Li Kerui.
Li Kerui died in 978 and was succeeded by Li Jiyun, who died in 980 and was succeeded by Li Jipeng, who died in 982 and was succeeded by Li Jiqian.
Li Jiqian rebelled against the Song dynasty in 984, after which Dingnan was recognized as the independent state of Xia. Li Jiqian died in battle in 1004 and was succeeded by his son Li Deming.
Under Li Deming, the Xia state defeated the Ganzhou Uyghur Kingdom in 1028 and forced the ruler of the Guiyi Circuit to surrender. Li Deming died in 1032 and was succeeded by his son Li Yuanhao.
In 1036 the Xia annexed the Guiyi and Ganzhou Uyghur states. In 1038 Li Yuanhao declared himself the first emperor of the Great Xia with his capital at Xingqing in modern Yinchuan. What ensued was a prolonged war with the Song dynasty which resulted in several victories. However the victories came at a great cost and the Xia found itself short of manpower and supplies. In 1044 the Xia and Song came to a truce with the Xia recognizing the Song ruler as emperor in return for annual gifts from the Song as recognition of the Tangut state's power. Aside from founding the Western Xia, Li Yuanhao also ordered the creation of a Tangut script as well as translations of Chinese classics into Tangut.
Middle period [ edit ]
After Emperor Jingzong of Western Xia died in 1048, his son Li Liangzuo became Emperor Yizong of Western Xia at the age of two and his mother became the regent. In 1049 the Liao dynasty launched an invasion of Western Xia and vassalized it. Yizong died in 1067 and his son Li Bingchang became Emperor Huizong of Western Xia at the age of six.
Huizong's mother became regent and she invaded the Song dynasty. The invasion ended in failure, and Huizong took back power from his mother. However he died soon after in 1086 and was succeeded by his son Li Qianshun who became Emperor Chongzong of Western Xia at the age of two.
After Chongzong became emperor, his grandmother (Huizong's mother) became regent again and launched invasions of the Liao dynasty and the Song dynasty. Both campaigns ended in defeat and Chongzong took direct control of Western Xia. He ended wars with both Liao and Song and focused on domestic reform.
In 1115, the Jürchen Jin dynasty defeated the Liao. The Liao emperor fled to Western Xia in 1123. Chongzong submitted to the Jin demand for the Liao emperor and Western Xia became a vassal state of Jin. After the Jin dynasty attacked the Song and took parts of the northern territories from them, initiating the Southern Song period, Western Xia also attacked and took several thousands square miles of land.
Chongzong died in 1139 and was succeeded by his son Li Renxiao who became Emperor Renzong of Western Xia. Immediately following Renzong's coronation, many natural disasters occurred and Renzong worked to stabilize the economy.
Destruction by the Mongols [ edit ]
Renzong died in 1193 and his son Li Chunyou became Emperor Huanzong of Western Xia.
In the late 1190s and early 1200s, Temujin, soon to be Genghis Khan, began consolidating his power in Mongolia. Between the death of Tooril Khan, leader of the Keraites, until Temujin's Mongol Empire in 1203, the Keraite leader Nilqa Senggum led a small band of followers into Western Xia.[11] However, after his adherents took to plundering the locals, Nilqa Senggum was expelled from Western Xia territory.[11]
Using his rival Nilga Senggum's temporary refuge in Western Xia as a pretext, Temujin launched a raid against the Western Xia in 1205 in the Edsin region.[11][12][13] The Mongols plundered border settlements and one local Western Xia noble accepted Mongol authority.[14] In 1206, Temujin was formally proclaimed Genghis Khan, ruler of all Mongols, marking the official start of the Mongol Empire. In the same year, Huanzong was killed in a coup by his cousin Li Anquan, who installed himself as Emperor Xiangzong of Western Xia. In 1207, Genghis led another raid into Western Xia, invading the Ordos Loop and sacking Wulahai, the main garrison along the Yellow River, before withdrawing in 1208.[13][15]
In 1209 Genghis undertook a larger campaign to secure the submission of Western Xia. After defeating a force led by Gao Lianghui outside Wulahai, Genghis captured the city and pushed up along the Yellow River, defeated several cities, and besieged the capital, Yinchuan, which held a well-fortified garrison of 150,000.[16] The Mongols attempted to flood the city by diverting the Yellow River, but the dike they built to accomplish this broke and flooded the Mongol camp.[11] Nevertheless, Xiangzong agreed to submit to Mongol rule, and demonstrated his loyalty by giving a daughter, Chaka, in marriage to Genghis and paying a tribute of camels, falcons, and textiles.[17]
After their defeat in 1210, Western Xia attacked the Jin dynasty in response to their refusal to aid them against the Mongols.[18] The following year, the Mongols joined Western Xia and began a 23-year-long campaign against Jin. In the same year Xiangzong's nephew Li Zunxu seized power in a coup and became Emperor Shenzong of Western Xia. Xiangzong died a month later.
In 1219, Genghis Khan launched his invasion of Khwarezmia and Eastern Iran and requested military aid from Western Xia. However, the emperor and his military commander Asha refused to take part in the campaign, stating that if Genghis had too few troops to attack Khwarazm, then he had no claim to supreme power.[19][20] Infuriated, Genghis swore vengeance and left to invade Khwarazm while Western Xia attempted to create alliances with the Jin and Song against the Mongols.[21]
After defeating Khwarazm in 1221, Genghis prepared his armies to punish Western Xia for their betrayal. Meanwhile, Shenzong abdicated in 1223 in favor of his son Li Dewang, who became Emperor Xianzong of Western Xia. In 1225, Genghis attacked with a force of approximately 180,000.[22] After taking Khara-Khoto, the Mongols began a steady advance southward. Asha, commander of the Western Xia troops, could not afford to meet the Mongols as it would involve an exhausting westward march from the capital Yinchuan through 500 kilometers of desert, and so the Mongols steadily advanced from city to city.[23] Enraged by Western Xia's fierce resistance, Genghis ordered his generals to systematically destroy cities and garrisons as they went.[19][21][24] Genghis divided his army and sent general Subutai to take care of the westernmost cities, while the main force under Genghis moved east into the heart of the Western Xia and took Gan Prefecture, which was spared destruction upon its capture due to it being the hometown of Genghis's commander Chagaan.[25]
In August 1226, Mongol troops approached Wuwei, the second-largest city of the Western Xia empire, which surrendered without resistance in order to escape destruction.[26] At this point, Emperor Xianzong died, leaving his relative Emperor Mozhu of Western Xia to deal with the Mongol invasion.[27] In Autumn 1226, Genghis took Liang Prefecture, crossed the Helan Mountains, and in November lay siege to Lingwu, a mere 30 kilometers from Yinchuan.[27][28] Here, at the Battle of the Yellow River, the Mongols destroyed a force of 300,000 Western Xia that launched a counter-attack against them.[27][29]
Genghis reached Yinchuan in 1227, laid siege to the city, and launched several offensives into Jin to prevent them from sending reinforcements to Western Xia, with one force reaching as a far as Kaifeng, the Jin capital.[30] Yinchuan lay besieged for about six months, after which Genghis opened up peace negotiations while secretly intending to kill the emperor.[31] During the peace negotiations, Genghis continued his military operations around the Liupan mountains near Guyuan, rejected a peace offer from the Jin, and prepared to invade them near their border with the Song.[32][33] However, in August 1227, Genghis died of a historically uncertain cause, and, in order not to jeopardize the ongoing campaign, his death was kept a secret.[34][35] In September 1227, Emperor Mozhu surrendered to the Mongols and was promptly executed.[33][36] The Mongols then pillaged Yinchuan, slaughtered the city's population, plundered the imperial tombs west of the city, and completed the effective annihilation of the Western Xia state.[21][33][37][38]
The destruction of Western Xia during the second campaign was near total. According to John Man, Western Xia is little known to anyone other than experts in the field precisely because of Genghis Khan's policy calling for their complete eradication. He states that "There is a case to be made that this was the first ever recorded example of attempted genocide. It was certainly very successful ethnocide."[39] However, some members of the Western Xia royal clan emigrated to western Sichuan, northern Tibet, even possibly Northeast India, in some instances becoming local rulers.[40] A small Western Xia state was established in Tibet along the upper reaches of the Yalong River while other Western Xia populations settled in what are now the modern provinces of Henan and Hebei.[41] In China, remnants of the Western Xia persisted into the middle of the Ming dynasty.[42][43]
Culture [ edit ]
The kingdom developed a Tangut script to write its own Tibeto-Burman language.[3][44]
Tibetans, Uyghurs, Han Chinese, and Tanguts served as officials in Western Xia.[45]
The practice of Tantric Buddhism in Western Xia led to the spread of some sexually related customs. Before they could get married to men of their own ethnicity when they reached 30 years old, Uighur women in Shaanxi in the 12th century had children after having relations with multiple Han Chinese men, with her desirability as a wife enhancing if she had been with a large number of men.[46][47][48]
Rulers [ edit ]
450 years after the destruction of the Tangut empire, the "Kingdom of Tenduc or Tangut" was still shown on some European maps as China's northwestern neighbor
Temple Name Posthumous Name Personal Name Reign Dates Jǐngzōng 景宗 Wǔlièdì 武烈帝 Lǐ Yuánhào 李元昊 1038–1048 Yìzōng 毅宗 Zhāoyīngdì 昭英帝 Lǐ Liàngzuò 李諒祚 1048–1067 Huìzōng 惠宗 Kāngjìngdì 康靖帝 Lǐ Bǐngcháng 李秉常 [49][50] 1067–1086 Chóngzōng 崇宗 Shèngwéndì 聖文帝 Lǐ Qiánshùn 李乾順 [51][52] 1086–1139 Rénzōng 仁宗 Shèngdédì 聖德帝 Lǐ Rénxiào 李仁孝 [53] 1139–1193 Huánzōng 桓宗 Zhāojiǎndì 昭簡帝 Lǐ Chúnyòu 李純佑 1193–1206 Xiāngzōng 襄宗 Jìngmùdì 敬慕帝 Lǐ Ānquán 李安全 1206–1211 Shénzōng 神宗 Yīngwéndì 英文帝 Lǐ Zūnxū 李遵頊 1211–1223 Xiànzōng 獻宗 none Lǐ Déwàng 李德旺 [54][55][56] 1223–1226 Mòdì 末帝 none Lǐ Xiàn 李晛 1226–1227
Gallery [ edit ]
A clay head of the Buddha, Western Xia dynasty, 12th century
A winged kalavinka made of grey pottery, Western Xia dynasty
A painting of the Buddhist manjusri, from the Yulin Caves of Gansu, China, from the Tangut-led Western Xia dynasty
Tomb No. 3 of the Western Xia imperial tombs in Ningxia
Tangut officials
Tangut printing block
Tangut movable type print
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Citations [ edit ]An artist's concept of Spaceport America, a suborbital spaceport under construction in New Mexico.
Leaders in the burgeoning private space industry are gathering in the New Mexico desert this week for the seventh annual International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight.
Officials from commercial space firms including SpaceX, Sierra Nevada, Bigelow Aerospace, XCOR and others will join representatives from NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to discuss the growing field of for-profit spaceflight. The meeting will run Oct. 19 – 20 at the New Mexico Farm and Ranch Heritage Museum in Las Cruces, N.M.
Many of these companies are in the process of building and test-flying spacecraft intended to carry paying passengers to suborbital and orbital space.
Topics under discussion at the two-day symposium will include how to keep the United States competitive in the global space marketplace, protecting intellectual property, the challenges of lowering the cost of launching people and cargo to orbit and building relationships for international collaboration in space.
The conference will wrap up with a trip to the world's first commercial spaceport, Spaceport America, which is being built near Truth or Consequences, N.M.
Mojave, Calif.-based firm Virgin Galactic, a frontrunner in the race to launch the first tourists aboard commercial spaceships, is the anchor tenant at Spaceport America. Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle aims to launch customers from the spaceport in the next few years. [Photos: Spaceport America Blooms in New Mexico Desert]
The spaceport's modern hangar terminal was dedicated in a ceremony on Monday (Oct. 17).
You can follow SPACE.com senior writer Clara Moskowitz on Twitter @ClaraMoskowitz. Follow SPACE.com for the latest in space science and exploration news on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.Learning About Node Streams
4 minute read
The purpose of this blog post is to explain what a stream is in the simplest way possible. There are already many articles and videos online about this topic; however, I wanted to explain it in the simplest way that I could. This is how I would explain Node streams to a five year old.
ELI5: In essence, a stream connects programs together. Streams can be read and written to. These programs are small and specialized to do a single thing.
Recently, I was working on my Give Me The Time project and ran into an error when working on my Gulp file. The error looked something like this:
stream.js:94 throw er; // Unhandled stream error in pipe. ^
I have to admit, when I first ran into this error. I had no idea what a “stream” was. I did what any developer should do, turn to Google.
My favorite search pattern of all time:
ELI5 <insert topic here>
This time it was:
ELI5 node streams
ELI5 = Explain Like I’m 5
The first result was a Reddit thread suggesting to install the nodeschool program and complete the exercises in the stream-adventure series.
Before installing the Stream Adventure, I started to read the Node.js documentation which states:
A stream is an abstract interface implemented by various objects in Node.js. For example a request to an HTTP server is a stream, as is stdout. Streams are readable, writable, or both. All streams are instances of EventEmitter.
What does this even mean? In essence, a stream is something that allows you to connect other objects, or programs, together. You take some input and then stream it, or pass it into another program. I like the plumber analogy that has been around for a long time. Connect a bunch of tiny pipes (programs) that do a specific thing really well to achieve a specific end goal.
The piping system has been around since the UNIX days; you read this article for more information: Unix Pipelines
Streams can be: readable, writable and duplex.
Readable: Read a file (Input)
Writable: Write a file (Output)
Duplex: Read and write a file (Input/Output)
Max Ogden goes into more detail in his blog post, which you can find below.
For now, let’s make a file that takes input and prints it out into the terminal.
// The process object will take any input that it gets and print it out as an Output // This code was stolen from Hack Reactor's video which can be found below. // Oh and also taken from nodeschool's Stream Adventure exercise. // (also linked below) process.stdin.pipe(process.stdout);
This is what it looks like when the file is running (via the node command):
Let’s get even more advanced and take a look at the fs, or File System, module. The fs module allows you to read, write or even change permission levels of file(s) and directories. Very nice!
fs.createReadStream(path[, options])
We are going to write a program that read the content of a hello.txt file which contains the following word:
hello
Here’s a Node program that reads the file and, when executed, spits it out into the terminal.
//get node's file system module var fs = require('fs'); // Next, let's assign the reading stream, which will read the hello.txt file. // The first arguement takes a string, a file. // We are going to pass an option, which is an object, and set the encoding // to UTF-8, just in case. var file = fs.createReadStream('hello.txt', {encoding:'utf8'}) // Since a stream is an EventEmitter, we can attach an event listener // to listen and run when the file is opened. The 'open' event can also // be accessed by calling the.open() method on the fs object. file.on('open', function() { // We are going to pipe, or connect to the process object and dump // the file's content into the terminal. Process is a global object // in Node that is also an EventEmitter this.pipe(process.stdout); });
Just a simple program but hope that it makes sense now. As you can see, we used the pipe() method take the input from the file system module (fs) and passed it into the process object. The process object then just prints it out into the terminal.
After going through some of the exercises via nodeschool’s Stream Adventure, I will write another blog post and see if I can explain a little bit more about how streams work. I recommend doing some of the exercises, they are fun and you can learn a lot about streams. Remember, practice makes perfect!
Disclaimer: If you find any errors in this blog post, feel free to send me an email at kevin@tokyoincode.com. Questions? Send them as well!
##References
Hack Reactor’s Video About Node Streams
Stream (Node.js)
File System (Node.js)
Node Streams Article by Max OgdenIf you've ever wondered how you'd act in a real-life zombie apocalypse, Zero Latency will let you — happily or unhappily — find out.
The Melbourne-based company have developed a system they're calling "multiplayer free-roam" virtual reality gaming. I tried it Saturday during the gaming convention PAX Australia, and the results were just what you'd want them to be: Shaky arms, an accelerated heart rate and adrenaline levels that didn't go down for hours.
See also: Earthlight VR is the closest you can get to outer space without leaving Earth
"For want of a better way to put it, you're walking around inside a video game," Tim Ruse, Zero Latency's co-director, told me. "It's a completely new form of entertainment. It's a physical experience, almost like a theme park ride, but it's a video game. It's an interactive experience, but you're also not using any controller, you're using your entire body."
Alienware backpacks. Image: George Voulgaropoulos
Getting started
Five of us showed up to fight zombies on Saturday — the rain pounding on the tin roof of Zero Latency's warehouse not doing much to lessen any nerves we might have had about the coming situation.
Scott Vandonkelaar, Zero Latency's fellow co-director and the coder behind it all, walked us through the set up. We were kitted out with an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, headphones and a mic to let us communicate, a backpack containing an Alienware Alpha computer, and a weighty gun with sensors the team have built from scratch.
The weapons, which are able to change between assault, shot gun and sniper mode with a few simple buttons, were being held in real life, but would also appear virtually during the game.
The Oculus Rift headset. Image: George Voulgaropoulos
The five of us would be playing in a space about the size of a basketball court, while 128 cameras and computers above tracked our every movement thanks to small balls of light on our headsets and guns. Of course, the virtual world would be much larger.
With the headset on, you're blind to the real world. Vandonkelaar has worked for years developing the processing power to ensure players' movements are instantly replicated in the game space and on our personal screens.
To keep you spatially-aware during the game, red crosses appear on your headset when you near a wall, and circles if you come too close to other players. Vandonkelaar also emphasised that you cannot run in this game for your own safety — despite the strong urge to do so.
During our 30 minute experience, we would be fighting off zombies in an abandoned building, with the goal of reaching a spaceship that would allow us to escape. Finding green circles would help us progress to new levels, while yellow circles would help players perform an action such as pulling a lever.
A camera rig. Image: George Voulgaropoulos
Survive the zombies
Standing in a wide circle, we put on our headsets as Vandonkelaar loaded the game. Appearing as male avatars dressed in military fatigues, we had a moment of target practice before we headed into a virtual lift to start facing down zombies.
When the first undead creature comes at you, they feel shockingly close — if you've ever wanted to hear grown men squeal, this is your chance. It took us a moment to get organised, but then we set off, traversing well-rendered carparks, dark tunnels and abandoned offices, all with a steady stream of staggering zombies to fight through.
Although the walls and burnt out cars aren't really there, you step around them — you can't help it, it's that immersive. I even gingerly stepped over dead zombies as if they were real. The fact you could hide behind doors and duck down behind pylons just added to the reality of the game's world.
The first-person view of each player. Image: George Voulgaropoulos
Vandonkelaar warned us that all players die at least once, but dying became the least of our concerns. At one point, to escape the zombies, every player had to cross a rickety bridge, high up between two skyscrapers. The sense of depth as you looked down was spot on, and Zero Latency even turned on fans in place of wind for an extra sense of terrifying verisimilitude.
You get a kill score at the end, but it almost didn't matter — I was just glad to have escaped alive. Later, Vandonkelaar told us that at least three people have thrown up from the intensity of the game. While none of us had such an extreme reaction, it did generate sufficient screams and yelps from the group to make it clear the game was hitting home.
There were a few hiccups — my gun got out of sync with the game briefly at the beginning, but Vandonkelaar was able to fix the problem. In general, the motion tracking is spot on. The graphics aren't incredibly sophisticated either, but when a zombie is clawing you from behind, trust me, you don't notice.
Notably, people who have gamed all their lives have little advantage. It's not about button mashing, but about reflexes and how you move around the space. While you won't find me playing Left 4 Dead, I'd run around Zero Latency's warehouse again in a heartbeat.
Fighting zombies.
What's next for Zero Latency?
Zero Latency is incredibly compelling, but you can't imagine experiencing it in a home setting in its current form. Having the space to roam is too important.
The company seems to recognise this, and in the long term, their aim is to sell the technology to people who want to operate venues similar to laser tag in shopping centres or theme parks, Ruse said. Currently built for six players, it can scale much larger, he added. A complete experience lasts around 45 minutes.
Their model certainly seems promising: The North Melbourne space was intended for research and development, Ruse said, but there was so much interest the company thought they might as well sell tickets. At A$88 (US$63) a session, it’s now booked until February.
"We thought we might try and roll out four or five systems in different venues in Australia, but we’re getting such overwhelming demand from overseas," he explained. "We could have sold 50 since we opened."
Zero Latency guns.
So far, Zero Latency has built their own gaming content but they're also hoping to open it up to other developers. Vandonkelaar said they'd be interested in partnering on content with a known game developer, someone like Electronic Arts or Rockstar. "Imagine a proper Call of Duty branded game," he said. "You could play your game at home and bring all your statistics into the experience. I'm surprised no one else has done it."
Vandonkelaar also said they're looking to develop games that might pit player against player, or puzzle and adventure games. The only cause for concern with competitive games is the desire to run is hard to fight, and running in the headset is a no-go due to lack of vision. While a game where you undertake a quest, something similar to the series of tests Harry Potter goes through in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, would be a great use of the technology.
Final verdict? Zero Latency will even make non-gamers want to suit up.PostgreSQL database driver for Dart #
Basic usage #
Obtaining a connection #
var uri = 'postgres://username:password@localhost:5432/database'; connect(uri).then((conn) { //... });
SSL connections #
Set the sslmode to require by appending this to the connection uri. This driver only supports sslmode=require, if sslmode is ommitted the driver will always connect without using SSL.
var uri = 'postgres://username:password@localhost:5432/database?sslmode=require'; connect(uri).then((conn) { //... });
conn.query('select color from crayons').toList().then((rows) { for (var row in rows) { print(row.color); // Refer to columns by name, print(row[0]); // Or by column index. } });
conn.execute("update crayons set color = 'pink'").then((rowsAffected) { print(rowsAffected); });
Query Parameters #
Query parameters can be provided using a map. Strings will be escaped to prevent SQL injection vulnerabilities.
conn.query('select color from crayons where id = @id', {'id': 5}).toList().then((result) { print(result); }); conn.execute('insert into crayons values (@id, @color)', {'id': 1, 'color': 'pink'}).then((_) { print('done.'); });
Closing the connection #
You must remember to call Connection.close() when you're done. This won't be done automatically for you.
Conversion of Postgresql datatypes. #
Below is the mapping from Postgresql types to Dart types. All types which do not have an explicit mapping will be returned as a String in Postgresql's standard text format. This means that it is still possible to handle all types, as you can parse the string yourself.
Postgresql type Dart type boolean bool int2, int4, int8 int float4, float8 double numeric String timestamp, timestamptz, date Datetime json, jsonb Map/List All other types String
Mapping the results of a query to an object #
class Crayon { String color; int length; } conn.query('select color, length from crayons').map((row) => new Crayon()..color = row.color..length = row.length).toList().then((List<Crayon> crayons) { for (var c in crayons) { print(c is Crayon); print(c.color); print(c.length); } });
Or for an immutable object:
class ImmutableCrayon { ImmutableCrayon(this.color, this.length); final String color; final int length; } conn.query('select color, length from crayons').map((row) => new ImmutableCrayon(row.color, row.length)).toList().then((List<ImmutableCrayon> crayons) { for (var c in crayons) { print(c is ImmutableCrayon); print(c.color); print(c.length); } });
Query queueing #
Queries are queued and executed in the order in which they were queued.
So if you're not concerned about handling errors, you can write code like this:
conn.execute("create table crayons (color text, length int)"); conn.execute("insert into crayons values ('pink', 5)"); conn.query("select color from crayons").single.then((crayon) { print(crayon.color); // prints 'pink' });
Query streaming #
Connection.query() returns a Stream of results. You can use each row as soon as it is received, or you can wait till they all arrive by calling Stream.toList().
Connection pooling #
In server applications, a connection pool can be used to avoid the overhead of obtaining a connection for each request.
import 'package:postgresql/pool.dart'; main() { var uri = 'postgres://username:password@localhost:5432/database'; var pool = new Pool(uri, minConnections: 2, maxConnections: 5); pool.messages.listen(print); pool.start().then((_) { print('Min connections established.'); pool.connect().then((conn) { // Obtain connection from pool conn.query("select 'oi';").toList().then(print).then((_) => conn.close()) // Return connection to pool.catchError((err) => print('Query error: $err')); }); }); }
Example program #
Add postgresql to your pubspec.yaml file, and run pub install.
name: postgresql_example dependencies: postgresql: any
import 'package:postgresql/postgresql.dart'; void main() { var uri = 'postgres://testdb:password@localhost:5432/testdb'; var sql = "select 'oi'"; connect(uri).then((conn) { conn.query(sql).toList().then((result) { print('result: $result'); }).whenComplete(() { conn.close(); }); }); }
To run the unit tests you will need to create a database, and edit 'test/config.yaml' accordingly.
Creating a database for testing #
Change to the postgres user and run the administration commands.
sudo su postgres createuser --pwprompt testdb Enter password for new role: password Enter it again: password Shall the new role be a superuser? (y/n) n Shall the new role be allowed to create databases? (y/n) n Shall the new role be allowed to create more new roles? (y/n) n createdb --owner testdb testdb exit
Check that it worked by logging in.
psql -h localhost -U testdb -W
Enter "\q" to quit from the psql console.
BSD
http://www.postgresql.org/docs/9.2/static/index.html http://www.dartlang.org/On 18 April 2007 Poland and Ukraine won the bid to host the 2012 UEFA European Championship. Of course, matches would be held in the capital of Poland and a new stadium was needed. It was built on the site of the 10th-Anniversary Stadium demolished in 2008.
By the time of its demolition, the latter looked quite depressing and was used as a bazaar, which was one of the largest in the world.
The National Stadium was built on the ground of the demolished stadium. First construction work began on 15 May 2008 — 3.5 months after the consortium of architects from three different companies presented a conceptual design of the project. The construction of the stadium began on the 7th October of the same year.
European companies from different countries (Poland, Germany, Austria and others) participated in the project. The opening of the stadium was scheduled for 27 August 2011 during an official ceremony, but the stadium was not done by that date.
The construction was completed on the 29th of November and the opening ceremony was held on 29 January next year. Exactly a month later on 29 February, the first friendly match between Poland and Portugal was held.
For my taste, the stadium turned out to be a bit too colorful and the Wroclaw or Gdańsk stadiums seem to be more elegant but this is nit-picking and a matter of taste. The National Stadium is the main stadium of the country and has already become one of the symbols of Warsaw and therefore its flashy look doesn’t cause any harm.
Some figures: its capacity is equal to 58 thousand people (56.8 according to the UEFA assessment); construction years — 2008 to 2011; construction cost was nearly 2 billion złoty.
The stadium is actively used for a variety of events and activities. Besides football matches the stadium hosts concerts (already visited by Madonna, Coldplay, Depeche Mode and others) and the annual “Science Picnic”. There is also karting, a viewing point, a miniature of the city and much more. We can definitely say that the stadium has become part of the city and is actively in use.
The stadium in Warsaw, of course, had its difficulties — the opening ceremony was postponed for five months (almost half a year), but besides that nothing unusual happened. To not get bored let’s now move on to Russia.
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entire frameworks that start to look like DSLs instead (Witchcraft).
But even smartest macro can’t solve everything without surpassing the biggest meta-programmer’s limitation: syntax. So that’s what we changed.
Arguably one of the loudest religion choices is typing. Private jokes like “Strong typing is for weak minds” and “If you shoot yourself in the foot, it’s easier to solve the problem by being careful not to aim the gun at your foot than it is to make guns that don’t point down” roam around the community. Whether types are hot or not, is out of this article’s scope.
I like strong types. And I like Elixir.
And that’s why Elchemy was made.
What does strong typing give us anyway?
Generally strong typing pays attention so you don’t have to.
You put a typo in function params?
Compiler will tell
Your arguments are in wrong order.
Compiler will tell
You wrongly treat a list of {:ok, value} tuples as if they were just value ’s.
Compiler will tell.
So whether your application works on complex nested structures, you like extra safety, or you just suffer from short attention span, static typing probably will serve you well.
Elchemy to the rescue!
With all of those values in mind, we came out with Elchemy:
Without further and unnecessary descriptions. Elchemy is entirely about turning this:
Into this:
Does it work? Check by yourself.
“But wait. I just typed
a : String
a = 1
And it totally went through. Where is the entire type safety in that? You suck!”
Worry not. The type safety’s there. Just not in the browser, but living safely in the depths of the entire toolkit to integrate Elchemy with your existing Elixir project.
And to prove and learn the basics of it, below we’ll write a simple example program from scratch.It took nearly 10 years for a federal judge to look at Jersey Boys, the Broadway story of the 1960s pop group The Four Seasons, and declare the theatrical production to be a fair use of an unpublished biography. Now comes a new lawsuit involving the same plaintiff over Clint Eastwood's film adaptation.
In late June, Donna Corbello sued Warner Bros., Eastwood, GK Films and members of The Four Seasons including Frankie Valli over the movie. Her complaint was filed in California federal court just days after she suffered a stunning loss when a Nevada judge overturned a jury verdict in her favor.
Corbello is the widow of Rex Woodard, who once assisted Four Seasons member Tommy DeVito in an autobiography. She asserts that producers of the theatrical version used her late husband's materials. After a decade in court, she convinced a jury in November, but then on June 14, U.S. District Court judge Robert Jones bypassed an assessment of damages by coming to the conclusion that Woodard's biography was fairly used. The judge determined that only a small portion had wound up in the musical and that what was incorporated was significantly transformative.
The decision is headed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeal for review, but in the meantime, Corbello is now targeting Eastwood's 2014 movie, too.
According to the complaint (read here), GK Films was put on notice about the theatrical litigation in 2010. In response, Corbello's lawyer was told that negotiations for a film deal had ceased.
"Plaintiff had no reason to doubt this representation in 2010, and accordingly, assumed there would be no cinematic version of Jersey Boys, unless and until the Theatrical Litigation was resolved," states the complaint. "However, upon information and belief, while perhaps technically true, the representation from Defendant GK Films... was misleading..."
Corbello alleges that another company led by King had entered into an agreement with the writers of Jersey Boys and that rights were subsequently assigned to Warner Bros. A purchase agreement was signed in 2013.
"Upon information and belief, the Purchase Agreement for the Jersey Boys Movie also establishes that Defendants Warner Bros. Pictures, WB Studio Enterprises, Warner Bros. Entertainment, and their affiliates, were on notice, and were aware of, Plaintiff’s copyright claims when the agreement was executed," continues the complaint. "For example, Sections 5(a) and 5(b) of the Purchase Agreement, which consist of representations and warranties from Defendants Brickman, Elice, Valli, and Gaudio, that the materials conveyed are original, and do not infringe copyrights of others, each prominently include the following qualifier: 'excluding the Corbello v. DeVito et al., pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit [“Corbello Litigation”].' Thus, the conveying Defendants, the receiving Warner Bros. Defendants, and Defendant WAGW, willfully and intentionally decided to proceed with the film at their risk."
Eastwood's film was hardly a hit. With a $40 million budget, it made about $47 million at the box office domestically.
Nevertheless, Corbello claims she's due damages from the alleged misappropriation of Woodard's work.
"The Jersey Boys Movie, as released, still contains protectable expression from the Work, and material viewed as infringing same by a unanimous jury in the Theatrical Litigation," states the complaint. "Most significantly, it retains, with only minor modification, the studio dialogue for the scene in which The Four Seasons record their third hit, 'Walk Like a Man.' This dialogue, which appears on page 124 of the Work, is entirely the product of Woodard’s literary imagination, and was not a'real conversation' among the band members."Michele Elliott Guilford Press, May 2, 1994 - Psychology - 244 pages 1 Review This courageous and powerful book is a first step in addressing the secrecy, distress, anger, and fear surrounding female sexual abuse of children. Refuting the rationales for our lack of attention to the problem and contradicting some commonly held beliefs about sexual abuse, it combines accounts from survivors with input from professionals working with both survivors and abusers.
Part I presents contributions from professionals who discuss aspects of female sexual abuse ranging from impact and treatment issues for victims of childhood sexual abuse by female perpetrators to the paradox of women who sexually abuse children. The second part is devoted to survivors--it presents stories from both men and women, then provides self-help guidelines for both. The book concludes with a valuable section on resources which includes a review of the existing literature on female child molestation as well as a listing of pertinent books and help organizations.
FEMALE SEXUAL ABUSE OF CHILDREN also addresses the controversial issue of current statistics that show that female sexual abuse is very rare and the question of whether it is being underreported due to fear from survivors that they will not be believed or supported. Regardless of the true magnitude of this problem, secrecy or denial about any aspect of child abuse must be avoided. Whatever future studies may show about this problem, it will not diminish this book's importance in taking the step of exploring this issue.
Preview this book »(Last Updated On: September 4, 2018)
You should know who the 25 year old Hafthor Bjornsson is by now. He’s Europe’s strongest man and he famously took the role of The Mountain in the TV series Game Of Thrones.
In Jakaból (hardcore gym in his home country, Iceland) they have a small boxing arena, but it’s not every day that the beast himself goes into the ring. It is safe to say that I would never dare to step in the ring with the 190kg (418lbs) and 2.06 m (6 feet and 7 inches) beast, but his Icelandic mate, Skuli Armansson, just did exactly that.
Watch this incredible event below and then share it with your friends…… it’s not every day you see guys his size in a boxing fight.Jordan Spieth has told us several times how much Riviera Country Club means to him.
Last year he tweeted that it’s one of his top-five favorite courses he’s ever played, and during his press conference before last year’s Northern Trust Open (now the Genesis Open), he said “it’s one of my favorites in the entire world.”
In fact, the storied course almost changed where he played collegiate golf.
“I was 12 I think, and I was equally considering USC and Texas,” Spieth said before the 2016 event. “So people from — my Texas Longhorn family probably won’t like me saying that. But at the time I was looking into visiting both schools on unofficial visits once I was really a sophomore in high school.”
Asked why a Texan would consider USC, especially at 12, Spieth said it was because of Riviera.
“In all honesty a huge thing for me, USC was, I heard, that they had four playing memberships at Riviera,” Spieth said. “So when I came on my visit, I was offered one of the memberships at Riviera for the time you’re at USC, and that’s a pretty awesome perk.”
Spieth said he was also considering UCLA, Stanford, Oklahoma State and Texas, as well as USC. As the story goes, he eventually stayed in Texas but turned pro during the middle of his sophomore year.
Spieth missed the cut last year, but he’ll tee it up again this week.minnihowl you literally just made something click in my head when you reblogged one of my posts and added something about how Mona hated Ali the most.
YOU ARE SO FREAKIN’ RIGHT.
So now I’m more confused than ever.
If Charlotte’s main motive for torturing the Liars was because they were “happy” Ali was gone, then why, just whyyyyyyyy, would she work together with Mona as a team, when she is the one that hated Ali most of all?
No one was happier to see Alison disappear from Rosewood more than Mona Vanderwaal herself. No one. (Except maybe Lucas & Jenna). She even helped Alison fake her death & leave town so she could be rid of her, but only after attempting to murder her in cold blood that same night (yet hit Bethany instead). You mean to tell me that CeCe, in all of her A-ness, never figured those details out?
A has always pegged Mona as her favorite, mainly because she tortured Ali’s friends for an entire year when she was acting as Original A.
But that does not cancel out the fact that Mona tried to murder A’s own sister, then continued to hate Ali even more once she returned to Rosewood in season 5. (Remember the assembly of Mona’s Army? It was for anti-Alison members only & Mona was the leader.)
So if CeCe’s motive was to go after anyone who was glad to see Alison gone, then shouldn’t Mona have been her #1 victim?
Sure, CeCe ended up torturing Mona eventually, but not nearly as much as she tortured the Liars. Mona STILL remained A’s favorite, even while they were in the dollhouse. Which doesn’t add up at all since none of the Liars even did anything bad to Ali like Mona did.
Plus, throughout the entirety of season 3, CeCe & Mona were working together. How could A work with someone to hurt other people who literally shared the same thoughts about Alison that Mona did? Actually, Mona’s feelings about Ali were even worse!
It makes no sense! Mona hated Ali more than anyone. So I can’t even fathom why she was A’s favorite, when she should have been the one A targeted the most.
This may be the worst plot hole yet!
And I hate A’s motive even more than I did the first time around.
I really hoped that I was going to appreciate the finale more and more as time went on, but I should have known better. The story is irredeemable at this point (unless every single thing that CeCe said in 6x10 was a lie). But that’s doubtful.
Damn you Marlene! Damn you to hell."A single gene mutation may be all it takes to determine if a person is prone to becoming obese," the Mail Online reports.
A particular genetic variant may disrupt the normal workings of a protein – brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) – that helps regulate appetite after eating.
Researchers have examined brain tissue samples to see whether variations in the DNA sequence of the gene that "codes" for the BDNF protein influenced how much of the protein was produced.
It then followed up the findings in cohorts of adults and children to see whether this sequence was linked to people's body mass index (BMI).
The findings suggested that one particular variation in the DNA sequence of the gene was associated with lower levels of this protein. Those inheriting two copies of the BDNF gene with this variation were more prone to obesity.
The suggestion is that lower levels of BDNF protein may mean that a person is still hungry even if they have eaten enough food to satisfy the body's energy requirements, leading to weight gain.
The researchers suggest that increasing BDNF protein levels may be a possible therapeutic target to treat obesity. However, it is difficult to say at this stage whether such a treatment could be developed or be effective.
It is thought that the current obesity epidemic is being, in the main, driven by environmental, not genetic, factors. Read more about the causes of obesity and what you can do to tackle it.
Where did the story come from?
The study was carried out by researchers from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), Bethesda, Maryland, and several other institutions in the US and Belgium, and was published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Cell Reports.
Funding was provided by the Intramural Research Program of NICHD and NIMH, the National Institute of Health, and the National Institute of Minority Health and Health Disparities.
The article is open-access, so it is freely available online.
The Mail Online's headline "Being obese IS in your genes!" is misleading; it seems to suggest that being obese definitely is all in the genes, and that one precise "mutation" provides the whole answer to obesity, which is not the case. Even in this study, some people who did not carry this genetic variation were overweight or obese.
Also, the main body of the article is contradictory, saying first that the variant in question is rare and then saying that it was common.
What kind of research was this?
This was laboratory research that aimed to look into the possible genetic determinants of obesity. The research centres on a particular protein called BDNF, which is thought to play a role in energy balance, influencing our body weight and how much we eat.
The researchers say how population-based studies have linked obesity to single "letter" changes in the DNA sequence (single nucleotide polymorphisms or SNPs) of the BDNF gene, which carry the instructions (codes) for making the protein.
This study aimed to look at a variety of SNPs in the BDNF gene to see what influence they had on activity of the BDNF protein in a brain region that has a role in telling us that we feel full (the ventromedial hypothalamus).
What did the research involve?
The laboratory study involved donated human brain tissue obtained at autopsy and data collected from people participating in different cohort studies.
The researchers examined the ventromedial hypothalamus in the autopsy samples from 84 people, looking at 44 target SNPs in the BDNF gene.
The SNP that was found to be most significantly associated with BDNF gene activity in the ventromedial hypothalamus was then further investigated in the data from the cohort studies. The ventromedial hypothalamus is an area of the brain associated with some of the most primal human emotions, such as sexual attraction, fear and appetite.
Four cohorts were subsequently examined: two cohorts of African-Americans (almost 30,000 people), and two cohorts of healthy children and adolescents (almost 2,000) – one of which included only Hispanic individuals. In these populations they examined the association of the SNP with body composition.
What were the basic results?
Of the 44 SNPs examined in the BDNF gene, one called rs12291063 was significantly associated with BDNF protein production and activity in the ventromedial hypothalamus, and with BMI.
The four "letters" called bases, which make up our DNA, are called A, C, T and G. The researchers found that having a T base at this rs12291063 location on both copies of the BDNF gene (called having a TT genotype) was required for normal BDNF gene activity.
Instead, inheriting two gene copies with a C base at this location was associated with reduced gene activity of the protein. Children and adults with a CC genotype had a higher BMI than those with either TT or CT genotypes.
How did the researchers interpret the results?
The researchers conclude that their findings "provide a rationale for [increasing BDNF levels] as a targeted treatment for obesity in individuals who have the rs12291063 CC genotype."
Conclusion
This research aimed to look into possible genetic influences on obesity – an area that has been frequently studied in the past.
This study focused on the brain protein BDNF, which is known to play a role in controlling energy balance and how much we eat, and the gene coding for it.
The findings suggested that a particular base letter in the DNA sequence of the gene was associated with levels of this protein and with BMI. It appears that those with two copies of the BDNF gene carrying a C base in one particular location were more prone to obesity.
The researchers suggest that increasing levels of BDNF may be a possible therapeutic target in people who carry two C variants. However, it is difficult to say at this stage whether such a treatment could be developed or be effective.
What it is possible to say is that even if this single substitution on the BDNF gene is one genetic factor that has an influence on our appetite, satiety and BMI, it is does not provide the whole answer to the obesity epidemic. To show this, even some people with no C variants in this study were overweight or obese.
Though including a large overall sample size in the cohorts, it was predominantly African-American and Hispanic populations that were studied. The same observations may not have held true in other population samples. There are likely to be other genes which affect a person's predisposition to being overweight or obese.
Regardless of any genetic influence there may be on BMI – and whether or not treatments could be developed to target our genetics – one way that will tackle overweight and obesity is to follow a healthy, balanced diet combined with regular exercise.
The NHS Weight Loss plan uses both to help you achieve sustainable weight loss.(This post has spoilers. Not for the ending of BioShock Infinite, but for things that happen near the end. Proceed with high caution.) The first time you meet him is before you even see him. It’s the shrill call that grabs your attention, a striking pitch that you know can only mean imminent danger.
The first time you meet him, you know that this is an enemy. Your brain files this big, red-eyed mechanical bird as something to run away from. But as sure as you are that Songbird must be taken down given the chance, your more compassionate, human side might recognize an important distinction. Songbird is a lot more complex than your typical villain.
For what is basically a machine, Songbird carries a lot of emotions in his two-tone eyes. They are either red, meaning that he is on alert and prepared to attack, or a yellow/green, meaning that he is calm. Loving, even.
Songbird responds to music as command cues. He was built by inventor Fink—who manufactures a ton of other things the city Columbia relies on—to keep an imprisoned young woman named Elizabeth under harsh security, locked up in her tower. The inspiration for Songbird's design comes from the world of Rapture, an underwater world that Fink gained access to thanks to tears that step into alternate universes. Songbird shares more than just mechanical similarities to Rapture's Big Daddies—the brutish but also loving protectors who guarded the Little Sisters in the original games. The Big Daddies presided over the young girls' security, but in a protective, fatherly way (hence the name). Songbird's desire to protect Elizabeth comes from similar motivations.
As far as Songbird (and a Big Daddy) is concerned, he was built to protect a delicate, young girl. She is at danger, in need of protection. What Elizabeth comes to determine as her prison, Songbird sees as her home. What Elizabeth sees as a rescue, Songbird sees as kidnapping.
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For you, playing as Booker DeWitt, Songbird is the enemy. He’ll kill you to get Elizabeth back. He's aggressive and asks no questions, shows no signs of backing down. That's what Songbird looks like to us, from the outside. But let's take a moment to consider Songbird's side of the fight. Stepping into his big, mechanical, clawed shoes—if you played as Songbird—you’d recognize Booker as the enemy, too.
Songbird doesn’t understand the context behind Elizabeth’s imprisonment in the tower. He only understands that he must care for her and protect her at all times. Songbird’s purpose, in Songbird’s eyes, is the equivalent of a parent or at least a guardian. And so like any wild animal would do for their child, Songbird protects Elizabeth at all costs. Or at least protects her in a way that he understands that obligation to mean. He sees intrusions on their territory as threats, and he does not hesitate to expel them.
Elizabeth mentioned something about halfway through the game that stuck with me. She noted that even she used to consider Songbird a close companion and protector. She said that his chirps were something that would excite her. Songbird is indeed a powerful enemy, but when he wasn't bursting into buildings somewhat more menacingly than the Kool-Aid man, he offered Elizabeth company. He cared for her. For a child, that basically equates to a loving relationship.
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Eventually Elizabeth grew up and realized that Songbird was her warden, not her caretaker. But through that, I think Songbird maintained the perspective of a parent. Songbird isn’t capable of maturing like Elizabeth did. He may not understand that guarding Elizabeth and keeping her in the tower was actually hurting her, but he never guarded her out of malicious intent. To his knowledge, Elizabeth is only safe in the tower. He was programmed to think this way. But he also feels compassion, not just loyalty, to Elizabeth.
That’s why he responds to her cry to leave Booker alone. In this scene, she says she wants to go back home. That she never should have left. Songbird’s eyes soften to a yellowish hue. All he wants is his family back where they belong.
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But Songbird is difficult to control if you don’t know the proper songs to summon him as your ally and not your enemy. And so Elizabeth is eventually forced to kill him.
But even as she does, she reaches out to him to console him. His panicked frustrations subside, the red glow brightens to a green, and he reaches back out for her. To the end Songbird’s loyalties are with Elizabeth. And whether or not he understood that she sent him to drown, he loves her unconditionally.
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Image by Reddit user SgtMuchacho.
This was an awful scene to experience. I couldn't help but empathize with Songbird. His entire life, and his entire existence was dedicated to keeping Elizabeth safe. And his last moments are spent looking at her from behind an unbreakable glass wall while his brain shatters from the inside out. He looks across at her with love in his eyes for as long as they can handle the water pressure before the green shatters into broken pieces. And then he dies.
I definitely choked up while watching this happen.
Is Songbird really such a villain? A misinterpreted one, maybe. As far as Booker DeWitt, the player, and video game tropes go, Songbird can effectively be categorized as a villain for most of the game. But the (virtual) reality of it is so much more complicated than that. Because Songbird is perhaps one of the more caring creatures in BioShock Infinite, and can someone who fights out of love and a desire to protect really be considered an evil character?
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And in case you wanted a recap, here are all of Songbird's scenes in BioShock Infinite:WASHINGTON — In an extraordinary attack, the White House on Wednesday slammed Sen. Charles Schumer for criticizing the administration’s proposed cuts to homeland security funding — labeling Schumer “wrong” and even calling his “credibility” on homeland security into question by digging up a sore point in his voting record.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest delivered the unusual broadside at the man presumed to be the next Senate Democratic leader, just hours after Schumer, Mayor Bill de Blasio and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton denounced federal cuts to urban security funds.
While it’s not uncommon for the White House to go after the president’s harshest Republican critics, taking on any Democratic standard bearer — let alone the powerhouse Schumer — is rare.
“I will also just say that at some point, Senator Schumer’s credibility in talking about national security issues — particularly when the facts are as they are when it relates to homeland security — have to be affected by the position that he’s taken on other issues,” Earnest said.
Earnest continued by venting about Schumer’s opposition to the White House-negotiated Iran deal that survived the Senate without his backing.
“Senator Schumer is somebody that came out and opposed the international agreement to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. He was wrong about that position. And most Democrats agreed — disagreed with him in taking that position,” Earnest added.
“And when people look at the facts here when it comes to funding for homeland security, they’ll recognize that he’s wrong this time, too,” he concluded, to audible astonishment from reporters.
The president’s budget includes cuts to the Urban Area Security Initiative that New York has relied on to protect against terrorism.
The funding is one way to steer anti-terror funding to cities on the top of the threat list, while other programs spread federal largesse all around the country.
The White House argues that New York is getting its fair share and then some.
“I would point out that the amount of funding that is devoted to protecting New York and making sure that law enforcement officials in New York have the resources that
they need is higher than the amount of money that’s provided to local communities across the country,” said Earnest.
“We understand that New York is the largest city in the country. We understand that New York is — certainly is a high-profile target of terrorists. That would explain precisely the kind of commitment that this administration has made to homeland security in New York.”
Schumer blasted the cuts at a press conference with the mayor and police commissioner inside Police Headquarters on Wednesday.
“These proposed cuts are ill-advised and ill-timed and they must be reversed, end of story,” Schumer said. “In light of recent attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, and the vow by our extremist enemies to launch more attacks on our shores, it makes no sense to propose cuts to vital terror prevention programs like” the urban security grants.
Bratton called the cuts “unconscionable” and “indefensible.”
The administration is proposing $330 million for urban security funding in the next fiscal year, a drop from $600 million in the current year.
Asked about Earnest’s comments, a Schumer aide responded: “We had conversations with high-ranking administration officials and didn’t receive any satisfactory responses regarding the funds.”According to reports from the Sunday Mirror, a USB device was found lying on the street in West London having sensitive data belonging to Heathrow security. An unnamed individual discovered the USB stick from Ilbert Street in Queens Park.
This USB had highly sensitive data that could easily be termed as a treasure trove for threat actors. The storage device contained nearly 2.5GB of classified but unencrypted data; there were 74 files and in total 176 documents, which include maps, photographs, and video files.
The information stored in the device is highly confidential as it contains details about security measures adopted by the security at Heathrow for ensuring the protection of high profile personalities including the Queen, foreign VIPs, and cabinet members. Not only this, but the USB also contains data related to CCTV camera locations, various types of IDs used to access prohibited areas, security patrols schedules, etc. It must be noted that some files are marked as confidential in the storage device.
How this device ended up on the streets of London city yet remains a mystery, and it is also unclear why this sort of classified data was stored on a storage device in unencrypted form. When contacted, Heathrow’s spokesperson stated that they have already reviewed their security plans and are certain that security of Heathrow remains secure.
Furthermore, the spokesperson noted that an internal investigation had been launched to analyze why and how this happened to implement preventive measures so that this kind of incidents never happen again. The spokesperson also added that security and safety of passengers and colleagues have been and remains the “top priority” of Heathrow.
“The UK and Heathrow have some of the most robust aviation security measures in the world, and we remain vigilant to evolving threats by updating our procedures on a daily basis. We have reviewed all of our security plans and are confident that Heathrow remains secure. We have also launched an internal investigation to understand how this happened and are taking steps to prevent a similar occurrence in future,” Heathrow spokesperson told The Guardian.
[fullsquaread][/fullsquaread]The Dean ML is an electric guitar made by Dean Guitars in 1977 along with its counterparts, the Dean V, Dean Cadillac and Dean Z. It has an unusual design, with a V-shaped headstock and V-shaped tailpiece. It was popularised by the guitarist Dimebag Darrell of Pantera.
The neck had a slight "v" shape to it, which for some guitarists allowed for faster playing. The shape was designed to fit into some players' hands more comfortably. The mass of the guitar is spread out over a wider area than most guitars, in order to maximize sustain. The "V"-shaped headstock and "string-through-body" design are also designed to increase sustain and improve tone. The Dean ML's body shape resembles that of a Gibson Flying V combined with the upper half of an Explorer.
History [ edit ]
The ML was created by Dean Zelinsky in 1977 for improved sustain and tone. It was created with the Dean concept of spreading the mass of the body over a large area. Higher string angles and string length, due to the size of the headstock, contribute to the overall resonance. Dean has made the ML available to other manufacturers[which?] by licensing arrangement.
The ML was named posthumously for the initials of Zelinsky's friend Matthew Lynn, who had died of cancer.[1]
The ML shape is also available as part of the Baby Series as a scaled down version.[2] The Dean "Metalman" line of bass guitars has a Metalman ML model.[3]
A guitar body shape similar to that of the ML is featured in the "create-an-instrument" mode in the video game Guitar Hero: World Tour.[citation needed]
Dean From Hell [ edit ]
The "Dean From Hell" was an ML used by the late Dimebag Darrell Abbott, shown on the cover of Pantera's album Cowboys from Hell. It has a custom lightning bolt paint job, routed for a Floyd Rose and has a Bill Lawrence L-500XL pickup in the bridge, two traction volume knobs, one master tone knob and a rosewood fretboard. The original has an old Kiss sticker on the bottom left spike and multiple abrasions including burn marks on the tips of the headstock from Abbott shooting bottle rockets from them. The words "THE DEAN FROM HELL" are written on the top in black magic marker.
Six-String Masterpieces [ edit ]
"Six-String Masterpieces[4]" is an ongoing charitable art tribute for Dimebag Darrell. Musicians, tattooists and contemporary artists painted, sculpted, or drew original art on a Dean ML guitar. Over 70 artists participated including Jerry Cantrell, James Hetfield, Kirk Hammett, Dave Grohl, Ozzy Osbourne, Kerry King, Joe Satriani, Marilyn Manson, Zakk Wylde and Rob Zombie. They were on display at the NAMM Show and on the Ozzfest 2006 tour, MTV's Headbangers Ball and in 2011 at the Mesa Contemporary Arts Center. The exhibit was curated by Curse Mackey of the band Pigface.
30th Anniversary ML [ edit ]
In 2007, for the 30th anniversary of the ML and V, Dean Guitars produced 100 of the ML with a "Dean 30th Anniversary" logo printed on the headstock and the pickup covers. They were signed by Dean Zelinsky, and had a transparent black finish and hardcase.[5]
Players [ edit ]
Notable players of the Dean ML includes Eric Peterson, Dimebag Darrell,[6] Michael Angelo Batio,[7] Corey Beaulieu,[8] Matt Heafy[9] Mike Terry, Wayne Static,[10] and Michael Schenker.Friday 17th February 2012 my son Casey decided to join the world, I was overjoyed. Close to 9 months I had been looking forward to meeting my first child and here he finally was. It wasn’t an easy birth, at least that’s what I’ve been told. You see I wasn’t there. Whilst my wife was probably the most scared she had ever been due to the pain relief she had been given which caused our sons heart rate to plummet, I was sat in the hospital canteen eating chocolate pudding with my mum!
The nurse, who administered, said to me that the pethidine would help relieve my wifes pain, she had been in labour since about 4am that morning and it was nearly 4pm now and that she would probably be drowsy and fall asleep. So after a conversation with my wife I left to go and find some food in the hospital canteen. I just so happened to come across my mum who had been with us all day and I thought had left to go home and rest herself. So I ate with my mum and went back to the maternity only to be greeted by 2 nurses waiting for me to tell the news about the emergency caesarean my wife went through in my absence and that my son had arrived. And I had missed it; something that still bothers me today.
But I put my feelings aside, as at this point I was scared, I wanted to see both of them and check with my own eyes they were ok.
I got taken straight to Casey and held him so tight I was worried I was going to hurt him, my wife was still coming round and I saw her about an hour later, by this point I had introduced Casey to his Momar as the nurses saw me in a frenetic state and let her in to calm me down. So I thought “OK one night in hospital for the two of them I can do that, and then we can go home and start family life.”
The next morning my wife was more conscious and we both were in awe of Casey when she said that she was going to be kept in, she had suffered from Thyroid issues during the pregnancy and the doctors wanted to check Casey over to see if his was performing normally, this was done by heel prick tests and every little wail he gave when they pricked him to draw blood me hit me but worse was to come. I left that night and felt low, really low. When in reality I should have been on top of the world. I felt lonely, isolated and useless, I know common sense and hindsight says there was nothing I could do to help any medical issues but it didn’t help then.
I went home and cried for probably half an hour, our house was all set for mummy & son to come home yet it was just me walking through the door and I couldn’t handle that. I wanted them there; I needed them there, maybe to prove to myself that the last 9 months hadn’t been some crazy dream. Cynics would say I should have enjoyed the undisturbed sleep but that didn’t matter, myself and sleep have always had something of a strained relationship but I just wanted them both there with me. They were both kept in hospital until the 21st and every night I went through the same emotions, fine in the day when I was with them and low at night when I wasn’t.
I think that the whole experience has left a huge emotional imprint deep in my mind, as even though it’s been 4 years I still remember everything as clear as day and I certainly haven’t mentally recovered, sometimes I use it as a stick to beat myself with when I get into a negative mind space and it’s something that seemed to kick open a door in my mind I had been trying to keep locked for a long time.
The stigma of male post natal depression is one that needs to end, men have a hard time during the first period of a new child’s life as well as the mum but are expected to be tough as a rock and not show their feelings and frustrations like some sort of robot, it’s wrong. Depression isn’t a sign of weakness it’s a sign of strength. I hope by reading this someone who is or was in a similar situation can relate and not feel lonely or isolated.
Throughout my experience and even to date I have never sought any type of treatment either therapeutic or medicinal instead I chose to isolate key parts of my environment and amplify them. Wether it be screaming my heart out in private to a song that means something to me or losing myself in the gym, Anything I could to not have to feel as bad as I felt. But I urge anyone that needs help and is finding it harder and harder to try and break the cycle to seek out what’s available to them. You aren’t alone, you aren’t abnormal or wrong & you certainly aren’t weak, it gets better. Something I’ve learnt and try to keep reminding myself is “Don’t let a bad day become a bad week and don’t let a bad week become a bad month”
If you want to join the network of thousands of dads to seek support and encouragement, click hereJosh Homme and Jesse Hughes talk to Gigwise about Zipper Down
"Have you ever heard of the porn star John Holmes?," Eagles Of Death Metal frontman Jesse 'Boots Electric' Hughes boldy asks Gigwise. We don't believe we've had the pleasure. "He was the biggest dick in pornography - he had like a 12 inch dick. The feel of this album is like John Holmes but with a bigger dick."
Watch our full interview with Josh Homme and Jesse Hughes below
And that's the spirit of Eagles Of Death Metal - cut the crap, drop your pants and let the good times roll. It comes as no surprise that their long-awaited new album is called Zipper Down. The Queens Of The Stone Age frontman and one half of Eagles Of Death Metal Josh 'Baby Duck' Homme chips in: "I think |
razor blades, duct tape, wire)
Items that may be disruptive (e.g. laser pointers, slingshots, stink bombs, air horns)
Cremated remains (e.g., urns, vases, boxes)
Miscellaneous other items (tools, fire extinguishers, musical instruments, megaphones, pots and pans)
Wrapped gifts (all gifts must be able to be unwrapped for inspection)
Items with spikes (e.g. purses, bracelets, etc.)
Selfie sticks (hand-held extension poles for cameras and mobile devices)
Folding tripod stands or monopod stands that can fit inside a standard backpack are permitted.
Equipment used for unauthorized photography, videotaping, recording, broadcast or transmission of any kind for commercial purposes is not allowed. Professional photographers with professional cameras or recording equipment, who are visiting the Disneyland Resort with the intent to take photographs or recordings of people, Disneyland Resort properties, or icons for professional purposes must request permission and make prior arrangements with appropriate Disneyland Resort representatives. Permission for any recordings or broadcasts on the premises are within the sole discretion of Disney.
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We ask that you review our Disneyland Resort park rules before your visit to avoid any delays or disruptions. We regularly update our park rules to ensure you have a safe and enjoyable experience at the Disneyland Resort.Saved by the Bell is an American television sitcom that aired on NBC from 1989 to 1993. A retooling of the Disney Channel series Good Morning, Miss Bliss, the show follows a group of high school friends and their principal. Primarily focusing on lighthearted comedic situations, it occasionally touches on serious social issues, such as drug use, driving under the influence, homelessness, remarriage, death, women's rights, and environmental issues. The series starred Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Dustin Diamond, Lark Voorhies, Dennis Haskins, Tiffani-Amber Thiessen, Elizabeth Berkley, and Mario Lopez.
The show spawned two spin-off series: Saved by the Bell: The College Years (1993–1994), a primetime series that follows several of the characters to college, and Saved by the Bell: The New Class (1993–2000), a Saturday morning series that follows a new group of students at Bayside High School.[1] The series also spawned two TV movies, Saved by the Bell: Hawaiian Style in 1992 and Saved by the Bell: Wedding in Las Vegas in 1994.
In recent years, Saved by the Bell has been classified as educational and informational.[2] The show was named one of the "20 Best School Shows of all Time" by AOL TV.[3]
Characters [ edit ]
In casting Good Morning, Miss Bliss, Peter Engel knew the success of the show would not hinge on Miss Bliss herself, but on her students. Engel particularly envisioned one character, Zack Morris, who "would be that incorrigible kid who could lie to your face, letting you know very well that he's lying, and make you love him for it all the same."[4] Engel insisted that the show could not go on without Zack Morris, but he turned out to be one of the most difficult characters to cast. Engel's casting director, Shana Landsburg, finally happened across fourteen-year old Mark-Paul Gosselaar and was immediately struck by the teen's charisma, charm, and good looks. After a quick read-through, Gosselaar was immediately given the role.[4]
After casting Zack Morris, the next character sought after was Morris's nerdy friend, Samuel "Screech" Powers. Gosselaar was asked to read through the script with a number of kids, and a second audition was scheduled for finalists. It was Gosselaar himself who insisted that Dustin Diamond was right for the part as he believed Diamond was Screech in real life. After reading through the script, Diamond was given the part, although Engel later found out that he had misread his head shot and Diamond was considerably younger than the rest of the cast—a fact that, had he been aware, might have prevented Engel from casting him.[5]
Lisa Turtle was originally conceived as a rich Jewish princess from Long Island, spoiled, materialistic, and obsessed with shopping. While still casting from the role, African-American actress Lark Voorhies was brought into Engel's office, and he immediately knew she was perfect for the role despite the fact that it meant rewriting the character.[6][7]
The school principal, Mr. Gerald Belding, as originally conceived on Good Morning, Miss Bliss, was an older, humorless man, and was played in the 1987 pilot by character actor Oliver Clark.[7][8] After the show was retooled for Disney Channel, the character's first name was changed to Richard and he was recast, with Dennis Haskins ultimately winning the role. Mr. Belding was rewritten to be significantly younger and to have a much different sense of humor[7]
When Good Morning, Miss Bliss was retooled as Saved by the Bell, four actors and their respective characters from the original series were brought over to the new series: Gosselaar, Diamond, Voorhies, and Haskins. The rest of the cast was fired, and Engel sought to replace them with new characters who would complement the old ones.[9]
Saved by the Bell, clockwise from left: Screech, Slater, Lisa, Mr. Belding, Jessie, Zack, and Kelly The cast of, clockwise from left: Screech, Slater, Lisa, Mr. Belding, Jessie, Zack, and Kelly
The first of the new characters, A.C. Slater, was conceived as a young John Travolta type who would be an army brat and wear a leather jacket. He was originally conceived of as Italian-American. However, when all efforts to cast the character were unsuccessful, Engel asked that the part be opened up to other ethnicities. Two days later, Mario Lopez, a dancer and drummer of Latino descent from Kids Incorporated auditioned for the role. Lopez was, by far, the best actor who auditioned, and was cast.[9]
For Kelly Kapowski, the love interest of both Zack and Slater, producers were able to narrow the field down to three actresses: Tiffani-Amber Thiessen, Elizabeth Berkley, and Jennie Garth. Engel had originally met Thiessen in 1988 while casting for Good Morning, Miss Bliss and was impressed with how much her acting had improved. He wanted her for the role, believing she had the perfect all-American girl appeal for the role, while others felt that Berkley, as the more experienced actress, would be a more reliable choice. Ultimately, Engel convinced the others after a read-through with Lopez, and Thiessen received the role.[9][7]
Engel and the other producers did not want to lose Berkley, however, as she was the strongest actress they'd seen during casting. Berkley originally auditioned for the role of Karen, a love-interest of Zack's on Good Morning, Miss Bliss, but lost the role because she was so much taller than Gosselaar at the time. Engel believed that, now that her height was more even with the rest of the cast, she could be perfect. They were not having much luck in casting the third new character, Jessie Spano, who was conceived as a strong, feminist activist and a straight-A student, so Engel suggested offering the role to Berkley, who gladly accepted it.[9][7]
Rounding out the new cast was real-life magician Ed Alonzo as Max, the owner of the gang's frequent cafe hangout, The Max, who frequently performed magic tricks.[10] Alonzo's role, however, would ultimately only last through the end of the first season, and he left after a single guest appearance during season two.[11]
In 1992, Saved by the Bell unexpectedly received an order for an additional eleven episodes to be shot after the graduation episode. However, Thiessen and Berkley had already decided to leave the show. Though producers knew they couldn't replace Kelly and Jessie, they also knew they couldn't leave Lisa as the only girl on the show. A new character, Tori Scott, was created as a cool but pretty biker girl who would also serve as a love interest for Zack and also act as a nemesis for him initially. Leanna Creel was cast for the part. Rather than develop a second new character, the producers decided to rely more on minor recurring characters such as Ginger, Ox, and Big Pete.[12]
Production [ edit ]
Good Morning, Miss Bliss [ edit ]
In 1986, Brandon Tartikoff, then-president of NBC, asked Peter Engel to develop the pilot for a new prime time series, Good Morning, Miss Bliss Tartikoff had been inspired by his sixth grade teacher, Miss Bliss, and had long wanted to make a show about someone like her. The series would focus on Miss Carrie Bliss, a recently married sixth grade teacher at the fictional John F. Kennedy Junior High School in Indianapolis. Though Sandy Duncan was originally considered for the titular role, the series ultimately became a vehicle for former British child star Hayley Mills. Veteran writer Sam Bobrick was brought on to write the episode and the cast included future stars Jonathan Brandis, Brian Austin Green, and Jaleel White.[13][7]
The pilot aired on June 11, 1987, but NBC had decided not to pick up the series even before it was shown. Tartikoff didn't want to give up on the show, though, and made a deal with the Disney Channel to air thirteen episodes of the series in prime time. If the initial order did well, Disney was prepared to order an additional seven-seven.[13] The show was completely retooled, with Mills the sole remaining cast member from the pilot. Miss Bliss's class was changed from the sixth grade to the eighth grade, and the kids would be more central to the story.[4]
Good Morning, Miss Bliss aired from 1988 to 1989. However, the show failed to pick up a following and did poorly in the ratings. By the time the last episode aired, Disney had already decided against ordering more.[14][7]
Saved by the Bell [ edit ]
Tartikoff felt there had been strong elements to Good Morning, Miss Bliss and wanted to try the show again with a different time slot and a different approach. The elements featuring the kids had been well-received, so Tartikoff wanted to drop Miss Bliss from the show altogether and focus entirely on the teens. NBC had been losing the high end of their animated audience, kids from ten to twelve, so the idea was to create a live action comedy to air on Saturday mornings, a new idea at the time.[14][7][15]
Engel was skeptical of the new format at first, and did not want to make children's programming. However, his wife convinced him that making the show would be a worthwhile endeavor, and he soon told Tartikoff he would do the show.[14] Engel felt, however, that Indianapolis was not exciting as a location, and moved the show to a semi-fictional part of Los Angeles, "the Palisades." The main locations of the show would be the teenager's school, Bayside High, and The Max, a fictional eatery they frequent. In addition, they would film before a live studio audience.[7][16]
The majority of the cast was replaced, and Tartikoff gave a seven episode commitment for the show. In a meeting with Engel and Tartikoff, senior producer Tom Tenowich suggested the name Saved by the Bell. Though Engel hated the name, Tartikoff loved it. The name stuck, and filming commenced, with the first episode, "Dancing to the Max," airing in prime time on August 20, 1989.[16][17]
Episodes [ edit ]
Films [ edit ]
Saved by the Bell: Hawaiian Style [ edit ]
In 1992, NBC approved the production of a feature-length made-for-television Saved by the Bell film to air in prime time. Titled Saved by the Bell: Hawaiian Style, the film followed the six teenagers from the show as they vacationed in Hawaii with Kelly's grandfather, Harry Bannister (Dean Jones). They soon discover Mr. Belding also happens to be there, and the seven are caught up in a plan to save Harry's resort from a greedy developer.[7][18]
The film was written by Bennet Tramer and directed by Don Barnhart. Due to budget constraints, much of the film was shot in Santa Monica, with only location shots that could not easily be faked shot in Hawaii. The shooting schedule in Hawaii turned out to be massive, even after Engel and Barnhart scouted the location. Real-life lifeguards were hired as extras during beach scenes to ensure the safety of the cast.[7][18]
Saved by the Bell: Hawaiian Style was ultimately successful in the ratings, and ultimately paved the way for Saved by the Bell: The College Years airing in prime time.[18]
Saved by the Bell: Wedding in Las Vegas [ edit ]
Following the cancellation of Saved by the Bell: The College Years on a cliffhanger in 1994, NBC President Warren Littlefield commissioned a second Saved by the Bell film to both conclude the story started in the final episode of Saved by the Bell: The College Years in which Zack and Kelly become engaged, and acts as a series finale for the original Saved by the Bell. The story features Zack, Kelly, Slater, Screech, and Lisa travelling to Las Vegas so Zack and Kelly can elope after their parents disapprove of their impending marriage.[7][19]
The show was popular enough to justify two spin-offs, both of which premiered in 1993.
Saved by the Bell: The College Years [ edit ]
Following the conclusion of Saved by the Bell, an idea came out of a focus group for Saved by the Bell: The New Class, in addition to creating a new cast of characters, to continue the story of the original Saved by the Bell cast. The new show aired in prime time and feature only Zack, Slater, and Screech from the original cast attending the fictional California University and living in a suite with a new cast of girls. Kelly later joined the cast after the pilot.[7][20]
Although ratings started out promising, they quickly plateaued against the competition of Full House and Rescue 911, two well-established, popular shows in prime time. Saved by the Bell: The College Years was ultimately cancelled after only one season of nineteen episodes. The events of the final episode would lead directly into the second Saved by the Bell film: Saved by the Bell: Wedding in Las Vegas.[7][20]
Saved by the Bell: The New Class [ edit ]
In 1993, NBC decided it wanted to extend the Saved by the Bell franchise with a new show, Saved by the Bell: The New Class. Also set at Bayside, the show would follow a new cast of characters as they navigate their high school years. Reprising his role from the original series was Dennis Haskins, once again as their principal, Mr. Belding. Following the cancellation of Saved by the Bell: The College Years in 1994, Peter Engel asked Dustin Diamond to reprise his role as Samuel "Screech" Powers, who was returning to Bayside on a work-study program as Mr. Belding's administrative assistant.[7][20][21]
Saved by the Bell: The New Class ran for seven seasons and 143 episodes, from 1993 to 2000. The cast was constantly revolving, with Haskins as the only constant throughout all seven seasons. The show was not generally well-received, and some believe that it failed to recapture the charm of the original series.[7][20][21][22]
Reunions [ edit ]
On April 9, 2006, Cartoon Network's Adult Swim announced that Saved by the Bell would air at midnight as a two-week special starting April 17. On April 19, 2006, Adult Swim also posted on their website that Saved by the Bell was back in production. A week later, the announcement was exposed as a joke.[23]
On March 27, 2009, NBC's Late Night with Jimmy Fallon launched a campaign to get the cast on board for a Saved by the Bell reunion. Fans signed an online petition and pledged their support for the cast to reunite on the show. Dennis Haskins, Lark Voorhies, Mario Lopez, Elizabeth Berkley, and Mark-Paul Gosselaar agreed to a reunion.[24][25] Gosselaar reprised his role as Zack Morris in a skit on Late Night on June 8, 2009, while promoting his then current TNT drama, Raising the Bar. The spoof interview closed with a performance of "Friends Forever," originally by Zack Attack, where Zack played guitar and sang with backing from Fallon's house band, The Roots. Tiffani Thiessen posted a parody video to the website Funny or Die, where she claimed she was too busy to join the reunion.[26]
The cast reunited in August 2009 for a photo shoot in People Magazine. Diamond was not invited to participate in the photo shoot because of poor relationships with the rest of the cast. Diamond's image was also edited out of the 1989 cast photo that was used on the cover inset of an issue of People Magazine to show how the cast looked 20 years later.[27]
The cast convened again when Haskins, Diamond, Gosselaar, Voorhies, and Lopez did their own voices in a Saved by the Bell Saw parody, called "Sawed by the Bell", on "Boo Cocky", a season three episode of Robot Chicken. Gosselaar also provided audio commentary for the episode on the DVD.
On February 4, 2015, the cast appeared on a skit on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon while episodes of the program were taped in Los Angeles. Haskins, Gosselaar, Lopez, Berkley and Thiessen all participated, though Voorhies and Diamond did not, with Thiessen's real-life pregnancy, Lopez's involvement with Dancing with the Stars and Berkley's film Showgirls the targets of some of the humor.[28]
Theme song [ edit ]
The theme song for Saved by the Bell was written by composer Scott Gayle against the implicit instructions of Engel. Though Engel had not been able to keep the show from being named Saved by the Bell, he was determined to prevent the phrase from showing up in the theme. He gave explicit orders to his team of composers that he would not accept any theme that referenced the title, and the group agreed to leave out the phrase.[7][16]
A week later, Engel listened to the first four composers and, though they followed his instructions, the songs were flat and nothing special. Gayle played his song next and, though he explicitly violated Engel's instructions, Engel couldn't help but admit it was the best and perfect for the show. Engel would later comment that he was glad Gayle had not followed his instructions.[7][16]
Merchandise [ edit ]
Home media [ edit ]
Lionsgate Home Entertainment released all four seasons of Saved By The Bell, broken into five seasons (season 4 split in two) on DVD in Region 1. However, the episodes on these and all subsequent releases are the edited versions as used in syndication, with scenes cut for time. Lionsgate released the two feature-length TV movies on DVD, in Region 1, on August 7, 2007.[29] On March 13, 2012, Lionsgate (distributed by Alliance Films) released Saved By The Bell: The Complete Collection on DVD in Canada.[30] The 13-disc set features all 86 episodes of the series as well as the two reunion tele-films.
On November 5, 2013, Lionsgate released a complete-series set in the United States.[31] It does not contain the reunion movies but does include some bonus commentaries.
In Region 2, Fabulous Films has released all 5 seasons on DVD in the UK.[32][33][34][35]
Contender Entertainment Group released the 2 reunion tele-films on DVD in the UK in 2004.[36][37]
In Region 4, Shock Entertainment released Season One on DVD in Australia on February 10, 2010.[38]
DVD name Ep # Region 1 Special Features Saved By The Bell: Seasons One & Two 33 September 2, 2003 ( ) None Saved By The Bell: Seasons Three & Four 29 April 27, 2004 ( ) Selected episodes commentaries Saved By The Bell: Season Five 24 July 19, 2005 ( ) In-depth documentary focusing on the series phenomenon Saved By The Bell: Hawaiian Style / Wedding In Las Vegas 2 August 7, 2007 ( ) None Saved By The Bell: The Complete Collection (Canada) 88 March 13, 2012 ( ) Selected episodes commentaries
In-depth documentary focusing on the series phenomenon
The two Saved By The Bell movies Saved By The Bell: The Complete Series (U.S.) 86 November 5, 2013 ( ) Saturday Morning: from toons to teens
It's Alright: Back To The Bell
Selected episodes commentaries
In-depth documentary focusing on the series phenomenon
DVD name Ep # Region 2 (UK) Special Features Hawaiian Style Film May 17, 2004 Behind The Scenes Wedding In Las Vegas Film May 17, 2004 Behind The Scenes Season One 16 March 20, 2010 Season Two 18 October 1, 2012 Season Three 26 October 1, 2012 Season Four 26 October 1, 2012 Complete Series 86 July 2, 2012
Soundtrack [ edit ]
Saved by the Bell: Soundtrack to the Original Hit TV Series Saved by the Bell soundtrack cover. Soundtrack album by Various artists Released April 11, 1995 ( ) Recorded 1989–1992 Genre Rock/Pop
A CD and cassette tape soundtrack was released on April 11, 1995.[39] It contained songs used throughout the series. The track listing is as follows:
"Saved by the Bell" "Don't Leave With Your Love" "Go for It!" "Love Me Now" "Make My Day" "Friends Forever" "Did We Ever Have a Chance?" "Deep Within My Heart" "Surfer Dude" "Gone Hawaiian" "School Song" "Saved by the Bell" with Michael Damian
List of Saved By the Bell Novels [ edit ]
There have been 21 novelizations based on the show, released by the publisher Boxtree Ltd, all written by Beth Cruise. The books all feature the main cast and have the same storylines that relate to the main-plots in the TV shows.
Title ISBN Number Release Date (s) Zack Strikes Back (ISBN 0020427778) 1 Jul 1992 Class Trip Chaos ( ISBN 0020427654) 1 Oct 1992 Bayside Madness ( ISBN 0020427751) 15 Mar 1993 California Scheming ( ISBN 002042776X) 15 Mar 1993 Zack's Last Scam ( ISBN 0020427670) 15 Mar 1993 Girl's Night Out ( ISBN 0020427662) 15 Apr 1993 Impeach Screech ( ISBN 002042762X) 1 May 1993 One Wild Weekend ( ISBN 0020427638) 1 May 1993 Kelly's Hero ( ISBN 0020427697) 1 Oct 1993 Computer Confusion ( ISBN 0020427840) 31 May 1994 Best Friend's Girl ( ISBN 0020427867) 30 Aug 1994 Zack in Action ( ISBN 0020419775) 31 Oct 1994 Operation Clean Sweep ( ISBN 002042793X) 2 Dec 1994 That Old Zack Magic ( ISBN 0752206133) 30 Mar 1995 Surf's Up! ( ISBN 0689802099) 1 Aug 1995 Fireside Manners ( ISBN 0689800924) 31 Dec 1995 Picture Perfect ( ISBN 0689800932) 31 Dec 1995 Screech in Love ( ISBN 0689802102) 31 Dec 1995 Ex-Zack-Ly ( ISBN 0689802102) 31 Dec 1995 Silver Spurs ( ISBN 0752201867) 15 Apr 1996 Don't Tell a Soul ( ISBN 0752201913) 15 Apr 1996
Several unofficial books relating to the show have also been published.
Title Writer ISBN Number Publisher Release Date (s) "Behind the Scenes at 'Saved by the Bell': An inside Look at TV's Hottest Teen Show" Beth Cruise ( ISBN 0020427786) Prentice Hall & IBD 15 Feb 1993 "Super Saved by the Bell Scrapbook" Beth Goodman ( ISBN 0590471686) Scholastic Trade 1 May 1993 "Saved by the Bell: Ring Out the Old, Ring in the New Scrapbook" Nancy E. Krulik ( ISBN 0590480863) Scholastic Paperbacks 1 May 1994 "Saved by the Bell: Guide to Life" Alan Sepinwall ( ISBN 076244326X) Running Press, U.S. 9 Aug 2011 "Saved by the Bell: 30 Years of Miss Bliss, Belding, Bayside, The Max and More" Kirk Cunningham ( ISBN 1543270239) CreateSpace Paperback 21 Feb 2017
Comic books [ edit ]
In 1992, Harvey Comics published a short-lived Saved by the Bell Comic series. Seven issues were released, including a Christmas and a Summer special. The comic was generally not well-received, with comic book critic Matt D. Wilson saying "its character likenesses for the show's starts were rough at best."[40]
In 2014, Lion Forge Comics announced that its new all-ages imprint, ROAR Comics, would publish a new Saved by the Bell comic. Set initially during the gang's freshman year of high school, the comic serves as a modern update to the classic series. It premiered in March 2014 alongside ROAR's adaptation of Punky Brewster.[40][41]
Behind the Bell [ edit ]
In 2009, Dustin Diamond published an inside story of the show's cast and crew from his point of view, entitled Behind the Bell.[42] The book paints an unflattering portrait of many of Diamond's colleagues and their alleged backstage behavior. Some of Diamond's claims have been refuted by colleagues and questioned by critics.[43] Diamond also alleges in the book that he had sex with 2,000 women, one of them being NBC's Vice President of children's programming, Linda Mancuso, who was 18 years his senior.[44][45] Diamond later disclaimed responsibility for much of the book's content, blaming his ghostwriter for fabricating salacious stories.[46]
The Unauthorized Saved by the Bell Story aired on Lifetime on September 1, 2014.[47]
Bayside! The Musical! [ edit ]
In September 2013, Bayside! The Musical! an unauthorized parody of Saved by the Bell, opened at NYC's Theatre 80. Bayside! The Musical! was named a New York Times Critics' Pick.[48] Bayside! The Musical! was written and directed by Bob and Tobly McSmith, the same creative team behind Showgirls! The Musical! In contrast to the wholesome nature of Saved by the Bell, Bayside! The Musical! contains strong language and adult situations throughout. The show's run has been extended 6 times.
Bayside! originally debuted in 2005 under the title Bayside! The UnMusical![49] The following year a sequel was produced called Bayside 2! Electric Screechio[50] The show then took several years off, reopening in 2012 at NYC's Kraine Theatre with a revamped script and new cast[51] Following the success of Showgirls! The Musical! the show's creators Bob and Tobly McSmith revisited their script and reworked it from the ground up.
The show has had appearances from original Saved by the Bell cast members such as Dustin Diamond[52] and Dennis Haskins.[53]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
General references [ edit ]As younger generations of television viewership grow up and out of their parents' houses, many have turned to a 'cord-never' buying philosophy, where things like cable television subscriptions just simply don't fit into the monthly budget.
And as more services like Netflix, Hulu, Sling, and more crop up, it seems likely that cable subscriptions will continue to decline. Most users can get at least 70% of their entertainment by subscribing to 1-3 streaming services, at a fraction of the cost of cable.
But the fact of the matter is, there are still millions of people out there that have traditional cable, and many who simply state they're likely never to cancel and are pretty set in their ways. A survey on Exstreamist.com asked 785 people why they still have cable, and the responses were interesting, especially when based off of specific demographic criteria.
It appears it's more common for men to stay subscribed to cable in order to have easy access to live sports, while women prefer cable subscriptions for the wider array of TV show options. Convenience was of course a popular choice among everyone, and it's hard to disagree with the fact that having all television choices in one place with cable is still a major benefit, even despite the cost.
Live sports is difficult to replace with streaming services as broadcast television have tight grips on contracts with most major sports leagues, but as digital streaming continues to grow a bigger audience, there's no doubt that leagues like the NFL, MLB, and NBA will likely follow the eyeballs. Once streaming services capable of handling live broadcasts of major sports, there's no doubt that the advertising dollars will start to exponentially increase.
Interestingly, there were still plenty of people who responded to the survey by saying they still weren't sure what they would replace their cable subscriptions with, which means despite how ubiquitous "Netflix" might be in some crowds, there are plenty unaware that it can act as a cable television replacement.WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The GOP presidential field, already 16 candidates strong and brimming with controversy, features a large number of contenders who are familiar to Republicans nationwide. Donald Trump leads the pack as the best-known candidate, at 92%.
However, the best-known candidates, Trump and Jeb Bush, are not the best-liked. That distinction goes to Marco Rubio and Ben Carson, who enjoy the highest advantage in their net favorable ratings.
These data are based on two weeks of interviewing conducted on Gallup Daily tracking, spanning July 8-21, with a total of 1,028 Republicans and Republican-leaning independents. This was an eventful time on the campaign trail. On July 18, Trump said that longtime GOP senator and 2008 presidential nominee John McCain, a prisoner of war in Vietnam for five years, was not a war hero. Despite nearly universal condemnation of Trump's remarks from other presidential candidates, Trump did not budge from his views.
While Trump is probably the most heavily covered GOP candidate at the moment and is certainly the most well-known, he is hardly running against a cast of anonymous or unknown rivals. Besides Trump, three other candidates are familiar to at least 70% of self-identified Republicans, meaning Republicans know enough about the candidate to give him or her a "favorable" or "unfavorable" rating: Bush (81%), Mike Huckabee (73%) and Chris Christie (72%). Another seven candidates enjoy familiarity ratings above bare-majority levels among self-identified Republicans, but below a supermajority of 70%. These candidates include Rand Paul (68%), Rick Perry (67%), Ted Cruz (66%), Rubio (64%), Rick Santorum (57%), Lindsey Graham (55%), Scott Walker (52%) and Bobby Jindal (51%).
Carson, whom half of Republicans are familiar with, nonetheless enjoys a net favorability -- the difference between a candidate's favorable and unfavorable ratings -- of +40, among the highest of all the candidates, meaning Carson is exceptionally well-liked among the smaller subset of Republicans who know him. Other lesser-known candidates, especially Ohio Gov. John Kasich (35% familiarity), are more recent entrants into the field, so their low name recognition may not be a problem for them just yet.
Growing Number of Candidates Well-Known and Well-Liked
A growing number of candidates are in the "sweet spot" of public opinion, meaning they are comparatively well-known among the GOP base as well as comparatively well-liked. Rubio has a +42 net favorability, slightly better than Carson's, and 64% of Republicans are familiar with him. Huckabee and Perry also occupy this advantageous space -- each is slightly better-known than Rubio but is slightly less well-liked. Finally, these findings are a reminder of the importance of campaigning; the best-known, best-liked Republican candidates also happen to be, in many instances, the ones who have been campaigning the longest. Cruz was the first candidate out of the gate, with Paul and Rubio close behind. Bush, meanwhile, officially announced only recently, but his candidacy was far from a secret, and he was engaging in activities that resembled a campaign well before his announcement.
Several Candidates Well-Liked but Not Well-Known
Three candidates are comparatively well-regarded in the GOP field but are not well-known. Carson, Walker and Jindal all have essentially the same familiarity rating of about 50%, but each man has a higher-than-average net favorable score. Carson, in particular, has one of the highest net favorable scores of all candidates, at +40.
Pataki Struggling by Wide Margin in Familiarity and Favorability
Five candidates occupy the "no-man's land" of below-average name recognition and below-average favorability. By these metrics, no GOP candidate seems as challenged as former New York Gov. George Pataki. Despite running one of the largest states in the country during a trying time that included the 9/11 attacks, Pataki is familiar to about half of Republicans nationwide (49%). Complicating his chances further, Pataki is more disliked (28%) than liked (21%) among Republicans. He is currently the only candidate in the GOP field to receive a negative "net favorable" score, an unenviable feat. Meanwhile, 2012 runner-up Santorum again finds himself beginning a race in a difficult place in terms of recognition (57%) and likability (+19). Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina is dogged more by low name recognition (39%) than low likability (+23).
For Trump and Christie, Name ID Outpacing Likability
Two candidates known for their "better to be feared than loved" style of interacting, Trump and Christie, find themselves in the unwelcome position of being well-known, but comparatively less well-liked. Trump's name recognition is nearly universal, but his net favorability is below average (+20). Given the state of affairs of his contentious campaign, it is hard to foresee his favorable rating rising by a substantial share. For Christie's part, the two-term governor has about as many Republican admirers (39%) as detractors (33%).
Bottom Line
With one of the largest presidential fields in recent history, the Republicans have a number of well-known candidates from whom to choose when the primary campaign gears up. The group of familiar candidates poses clear challenges for candidates who currently have a much lower national profile. In the long run, both types of candidates, the well-known and the less so, are aiming to promote their likability as an influential factor in determining GOP voters' decisions.
Survey Methods
Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted July 8-21, 2015, on the Gallup U.S. Daily survey, with a random sample of 2,374 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is ±2 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.
For results based on the total sample of 1,028 U.S. adults who identify or lean with the Republican Party, the margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.
Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 50% cellphone respondents and 50% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods.
Learn more about how Gallup Daily tracking works.munch Profile Joined July 2014 Mute City 2334 Posts Last Edited: 2016-09-22 14:12:21 #1
Interview with Neeb
TL.net: Congratulations on qualifying for KeSPA Cup! How tough was the qualifier grind, going through the lower bracket?
Neeb: The qualifiers were surprisingly difficult for me. I expected it to be a lot easier since I was playing in good conditions, the ping was like 120 and I slept fine the night before. The only thing is that I was super tilted after losing to Scarlett in the winners semis so I didn’t care about my losers’ bracket games. It might have helped though since I wasn’t nervous when playing.
Did you play from Korea or were you back home in America?
I was in Korea for these matches, I got back from WCS Mexico a few days before the qualifiers.
How much do you think that training in Korea this year has helped your play?
I think I’d honestly improve at a similar rate if I had stayed home since I don’t have the connections to get a wide variety of practice partners. I think the ladder here is similar if not a bit worse than EU ladder, but playing customs with Byun/Solar/a few other Koreans is definitely helpful.
How do you think the best foreigners match up against the best Koreans?
The skill gap between foreigners and Koreans is a lot smaller this year than previous years, so the best foreigners are probably as good as mid-tier Koreans and can take games off of anyone they have the chance to play.
Moving onto the competition itself then, who would you most like to play, and who do you want to avoid?
I obviously want to avoid ByuN because he’s really really good and I want to avoid playing Nerchio / MarineLord / TRUE because I play them all the time already so I feel like it’s a missed opportunity. I hope to play top Koreans (that aren’t ByuN) since I’ve never played any in a live tournament setting and I’m working on my mindset a lot so I could play better here. [E/N: Note: this interview was conducted yesterday prior to the group announcements]
Who do you think will win?
ByuN.
KeSPA Cup will be the first Global Event of 2016 |
considering the darkness Turkey is drifting into,” he added.
The interior ministry said on Thursday it had suspended 1,218 gendarmerie personnel, including more than 1,000 officers, on suspicion of links to the Gulen movement.
In a sign of how broad and at times confused the crackdown has become, one of Cumhuriyet’s lawyers said on Wednesday that a prosecutor handling the case against the paper, Murat Inam, was himself a defendant in a case against suspected Gulenists.
Asked about the allegation by an opposition lawmaker in parliament on Wednesday, Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Simsek said the prosecutor was indeed a defendant in that case but had not been suspended or expelled from the profession.
On Wednesday, Turkish media broadcast video footage of what they said were the two putsch ringleaders arriving at Istanbul’s main airport two days before the coup after one of several visits to the United States.
Chief Ankara prosecutor Harun Kodalak told state-run Anadolu Agency that the two, Adil Oksuz and Kemal Batmaz, were judged to be key figures in the plot. He said court cases against coup suspects would begin to be opened at the start of 2017.
Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in the United States since 1999, has denied involvement in the coup.Remember, back in October, when we were all confident that Hillary Clinton would continue and add to Barack Obama's legacy once 11pm EST hit on the East Coast? How innocent we were. How foolish.
A confluence of forces, internal and external, led to what actually happened: an unstable, narcissistic fascist claiming the mantle of President-elect.
The useful idiots on the Left—partisans of Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein—were sure that Donald Trump would be far to the left of "warmonger, neoliberal" Clinton. Of course, the evidence of the past twelve days hasn't prompted soul-searching among them. They're getting erections or wet at the thought of blowing it all up and ushering in their Glorious Revolution.
For the rest of us, those of us who are sane and bewildered and frightened, we have woken up to the fact that we are in a generational struggle.
The struggle is against the rabid Right, which sees its hold on the country slipping day by day, and will do anything to keep it.
The struggle is against the rabid left, those dilettantes, those limousine revolutionaries who spout theory and rhetoric and have no idea how to enact any political agenda aside from drumming in a circle.
The struggle is against those who are apathetic, who don't see any difference between the parties, who are unconcerned with political things, who will go any way the wind blows as long as they have their toys.
This long, twilight struggle has been fought in this country since before its founding; it's been fought between those who believe in an ideal of liberty, equality, and humanity, and those who cleave to tribe and blood. We fooled ourselves into thinking that Barack Obama's election and re-election had settled the contest in our favor. The contest will likely never be over. The best we can hope for is to win more battles than we lose, and to make the periods of peace longer and more secure.
But. Look at what this latest round of the struggle has engendered.
Millions took to the streets after the illegitimate president's inaugural, to make it clear to the nation and the world that his diktat would not be submitted to.
After Trump signed the Muslim travel ban, causing untold pain and distress—and even death—thousands marched to say this is not who we are.
Read the text which prefaces this column. And read it again. That is what the world is looking for. It's not looking to what Trump will do; it already knows that. It's looking to what we will do, this commonwealth of disparate people, united by one idea: America. United by the notion that out of many we are one. United by the notion that we are only as strong as our weakest member. United by the notion that no one of goodwill is an alien to our shores. They are looking for us to shine as a million candles in the darkness which is Trump.
As one of our greatest Americans said: It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness. Millions of candles are being lit. Torches are being lit. Bonfires of defiance are being lit. This generation has been called and will be tested; and so far it has met the call, it has undergone the test.
This is not a sprint. This is a marathon of the soul. For our opponents, power and privilege are at stake. For us, our very lives. I would not care to wager on them winning.Britain's farmers - not Mayfair property speculators - were the big financial winners of the last decade with new research showing the value of their land almost quadrupling.
Rising global food demand, climate change and foreign investment attracted by liberal British land ownership laws have helped to make a hectare of British farmland bought in 2002 one of the best performing investments in the country, according to new research from Savills.
Up to 2012, good agricultural land in the UK had grown 270pc in value from 10 years earlier to $25,575 (£15,415), outstripping gains in prime central London, which rose by 135pc over the same period, according to Savills.
“The general view is that growth is going to continue in the UK, though values are very high and how long it can be sustained is unclear," said James Cairns, from Savills international land markets.
Britain's green pastures are worth three times the price of a hectare of farmland in the US and more than 15 times the cost of an equivalent paddock in Australia, two of the world's largest food producers.
The high retained value of farmland in the UK has also attracted the interest of large sovereign wealth funds seeking a secure investment in which to park their capital, according to Savills.
“The UK is seen as a stronghold of capital preservation and if they can put their wealth into a UK farm, that’s very interesting to them”, said Mr Cairns.
However, British farmland - which has delivered an annual 14pc growth rate - is still behind the average global trend. International farmland values - based on 15 key markets - have increased by an average 20pc, according to Savills.
Demand overseas is being driven by climate change and rising demand for food from Asia's rapidly growing emerging economies.
“If climate change is having an impact on production in places like Australia and America and harvests are affected by flooding or drought, then worldwide supplies are affected, which means it’s more important to develop farming activity in new areas like the emerging markets”, said Mr Cairns.
The highest growth rates are in countries such as Romania, Hungary, Poland, Zambia, Mozambique and Brazil. Romanian farmland values grew by 40pc per year over the decade to 2012, double the global average and the fastest growth of any country since its accession to the EU.
“As a general rule, the emerging markets like Romania and Zambia are growing very quickly and looking at the next ten years, they’re going to be the countries I would expect to have the most growth, both in terms of income and capital”, said Mr Cairns.
<noframes>Interactive chart: Annual change in price of farmland 2012</noframes>
Overseas investment in UK arable land fell from 9pc in 2003 to 2pc in 2012, as overseas investors seek better value per acre on home soil.
But the UK is still seen as attractive to international buyers, as the UK and Ireland are the only entirely free markets for farmland out of those surveyed by Savills. Nearly every other country restricts foreign ownership of land.
Overseas buyers of British farmland enjoy liberal land ownership laws and business property relief, with the ability to pass down holdings to the next generation without incurring inheritance tax.
“Sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia are looking to acquire large funds and arable areas to grow food for their own food security. There’s investment interest from America, Europe, Australia," said Mr Cairn.
Hugh Coghill, director of land markets at Savills, said that although investment in global farmland markets was increasingly popular, predictions are uncertain as there’s little long term data on the area.
“Investment in global agriculture, and to a degree in global forestry, has only been on the agenda since about 2005. The markets of the world are immature”, he said.
Last year it was revealed that the cost of UK prime arable land rose by 10.7pc to £7,594 an acre in 2012, with growth of 40pc to £10,631 forecast by 2018.Ambassador Ron Dermer says that by sending American recipients a holiday basket that includes wine, olive oil and other goods produced in Israeli settlements, he is also delivering a message against those seeking to boycott the Jewish state.
Dermer said Wednesday the gift was meant to "combat the latest effort by Israel's enemies to destroy the one and only Jewish state."
Israel has been jarred by efforts of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, or BDS, which Israel considers to be anti-Semitic.
Ambassador slams BDS
The BDS movement is sponsored by pro-Palestinian intellectuals and bloggers, which campaigns for a boycott of all Israeli goods and questions Israel's legitimacy.
Dermer said in the letter, which he posted on Twitter on Monday, that the group was supported by "fanatics and fools" who are "promoting a new anti-Semitism." The movement is a frequent target of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
An accompanying photograph showed packages in blue, silver and white wrapping with a seal of the Embassy of Israel, Washington, D.C.
Israel's ambassador to the US Ron Dermer
Dermer complained that Israel was being unfairly held to a different standard than other countries and cited a recent European Union decision to label products made in Judea and Samaria, the Hebrew names for the West Bank, differently than those made in Israel.
Jewish settlements in the West Bank were born after Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Mideast war.
EU labels infuriate Israel
Under EU guidelines issued in November, products made in settlements on Israeli-occupied lands must be labeled as such, rather than carry a "Made in Israel" label. The EU considers settlements illegal under international law.
"Of the over 200 unresolved territorial disputes around the world, Europe decided that only these Jewish-made products deserved to be labeled," he wrote.
He said Israel alone among its Middle East neighbors upholds high Democratic standards in its treatment of women, gays and Christians.
"In response to this effort to cast a beacon of freedom, tolerance and decency as a pariah state, I have decided this holiday season to send you products that were made in Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights," Dermer wrote.
The US opposes the BDS movement.
bik/jil (AP, Reuters)KUALA LUMPUR: "Nasi Lemak Pondan" - which translates to "Transgender's Nasi Lemak" - has become well known across Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in just over a month since it opened. The stall's name and owner have raised eyebrows, but Jojie Kamaruddin's take on Malaysia's national dish has earned her just as much attention too.
“I love her sambal,” one customer told me, referring to the rich sweet but spicy condiment that comes with the rice dish.
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Nasi lemak (it literally translates to “fatty rice”) is simply rice cooked with coconut milk, served with fried anchovies (ikan bilis), fried peanuts, slices of cucumber and hard-boiled egg. You can get this dish everywhere in Malaysia.
Jojie Kamaruddin doesn't advertise the location of her roadside stall. Still, most days people know where to queue up, even before she opens for the day. Her colourful banners are a clear giveaway. (Photo: Sumisha Naidu)
Jojie decied to sell nasi lemak in March this year to supplement her income, using her mother's tried-and-tested recipes. At Nasi Lemak Pondan, you can get the classic iteration for around RM2, and for a few more ringgit you can also get fried chicken, chicken with tomato sambal and a variety of other curries. If you’re feeling adventurous, try her signature sambal sotong (squid curry) and clam curry.
The nasi lemak at Nasi Lemak Pondan are made from Jojie's mother's tried-and-tested recipes. (Photo: Sumisha Naidu)
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Always looking immaculate (she is also a fashion designer and wedding planner), Jojie treats her customers like old friends, greeting everyone with a smile.
“We don’t have that today, darling,” she tells a customer who swung by on his motorbike asking for kuih - local cakes she sells at her stall too.
Her warmth is usually reciprocated. But not everyone is kind. Jojie received a lot of attention online for reclaiming the term "pondan" often used derogatorily in Malaysia and for unashamedly embracing her identity to sell her food.
“I’m not using the name Nasi Lemak Pondan as a marketing ploy,” she tells me. “A lot of people already call me pondan, so even if I call my stall Nasi Lemak Jojie, they will still ask for the pondan selling nasi lemak on the side of the road.”
Besides, other stalls are already using unique names such as Nasi Lemak Anak Dara (Virgin Nasi Lemak, named so after the stall’s young, single owner), Nasi Lemak Bujang (Bachelor Nasi Lemak, because why not) and Nasi Lemak Spiderman (where the stall owner dresses up like Spiderman) to stand out from the crowd.
Jojie (right) decied to sell nasi lemak in March this year to supplement her income. (Photo: Sumisha Naidu)
“I also want to open up people’s eyes and show them that transgender people don’t just do sex work,” she says. “We have dreams of working like normal people, because we are normal.”
Jojie’s customers come from all walks of life, ranging from middle-aged homemakers to young men and they’re generally unfazed by the “pondan” stamp (and I mean this literally too - she has a stamp for her nasi lemak packets). “They’re really good to me,” she says. “They give good feedback and come back again.”
Very unglamorously eating my Nasi Lemak Pondan order. Wasn't adventurous enough to try her signature squid sambal 😅https://t.co/v3uSyqcJep pic.twitter.com/PWNs0Eo0vh — Sumisha Naidu (@SumishaCNA) April 23, 2017
Nasi Lemak Pondan is open daily, between 12pm to 7pm in Cheras. Contact Jojie at +6016 272 2272 or +6011 2613 6219 for her exact location.
HAVE YOUR CAKE AND EAT IT
Nasi lemak cake from Tiana Kitchen (Photo: Sumisha Naidu)
While Jojie stands out for the unusual name for her nasi lemak stall, Jennifer Yap is reinventing the traditional dish into something else.
It all started with Yap’s mother Tatiana. Yap had the idea to turn her mom’s much-loved nasi lemak into a cake for her son’s birthday last year. The idea took off and soon evolved into a business – Tiana Kitchen. Today, Tiana Kitchen takes a maximum order of 15 cakes a day across the Klang Valley.
A basic cake that serves about seven people starts at RM58 and the price goes up if you want different toppings such as prawn, squid, abalone and more.
“People say it's expensive at RM58 but when you see the effort put in and the premium ingredients used, you’ll understand why,” says Yap. “Also, it takes two hours just to make the sambal.” Yap adds that the cakes has no artificial colouring or preservatives.
The rice for the body is cooked with extra water so that it can be moulded into a cake. (Photo: Sumisha Naidu)
So what does a nasi lemak cake taste like? Exactly like nasi lemak. Although the rice is cooked with extra water so that it can be moulded into a cake, once you dig into a slice, it disintegrates and the experience is just like eating it in its traditional form.
A lot of people have been asking how you eat a nasi lemak cake... well it's just like eating nasi lemak, really. https://t.co/5OhA0DGyHe pic.twitter.com/heqvtRaAWn — Sumisha Naidu (@sumishanaidu) April 23, 2017
Tiana Kitchen’s sambal, however, is different. Inspired by Mrs Yap’s Surabayan roots, it is salty but not as sweet with just the right hint of spice to suit every taste bud.
Tiana's Kitchen is a home-based caterer which serves Indo-Malay food. More details can be found on their Facebook page.A foundation in Sacramento, Calif., is claiming that it is the first bitcoin-based charity to be granted 501(c)(3) status by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
The BitGive Foundation has been operating as a volunteer organization since it was founded a year ago, supporting various public health and environmental causes and exclusively using bitcoins, a digital currency. The announcement of its nonprofit status came with the start of the foundation’s initial fundraising campaign, which will be used to build their long-term fund for charitable giving.
The Foundation does accept non-bitcoin donations, but converts those funds into bitcoins, said Executive Director Connie Gallippi, who also said the foundation will distribute money to nonprofits in non-bitcoin currencies if that is preferred.
“Our stance is that we don’t require the funds we give to be in bitcoin,” she explained. “We generate our donations in bitcoin and we operate in bitcoin but we aren’t forcing it on organizations.”
The IRS would not confirm the foundation’s claim that it was the first charity that only uses bitcoins. According to Gallippi, the claim was based on knowing the other bitcoin organizations that are currently operating. “We know that there are others out there doing work with bitcoins, but they either haven’t applied for status or haven’t received it yet,” she said. While there is another bitcoin-based nonprofit — The Bitcoin Foundation in Seattle — that organization is a 501(c)(6) which means it does lobbying and education work. The Bitcoin Foundation was the first 501(c)(6) digital currency trade organization.
Gallippi said that getting nonprofit status would help attract new donors, as it will allow them to get tax write-offs for their donations.
The organization’s initial fundraising campaign has a goal of $150,000 and is broken down into two categories: Founding Donors and Membership Program. The Founding Donors campaign is designed primarily for companies or high-level donors, with required donations depending on which level you choose (the highest, Platinum, at 40 bitcoins which is equivalent to $20,000). The Membership Program, meanwhile requires just half 0.5 bitcoins ($257.43) and is designed for individuals. The amount raised at this writing is $40,000, and there might be a significant addition once they hear back from one donor, she said.
There are eight companies listed as Founding Donors including BitPay, Roger Ver, and LibraTax.
BitGive Foundation has already been involved with a number of fundraising campaigns during its first year. This includes a current $10,000 campaign, started in February, to raise money for The Water Project. At press time, the campaign has generated $8,201.89 in bitcoins which Peter Chasse, president/CEO of The Water Project, said will be converted into dollars to help bring clean water to developing countries.
“BitGive has done a fantastic job of raising awareness of the issue we are working on,” said Chasse. “They’ve been relentless about telling our story.”
This is not the first time the Concord, N.H.-based organization has dabbled in alternative currencies. Back in January, a number of users of digital currencies contacted the organization asking if they could donate using these currencies. While Chasse said there was a self-serving element to some of these requests – to bring awareness to these new currencies – he stressed that the majority of interested parties did not want a press release announcing the donation.
“It was interesting to see that there was a really strong interest in philanthropy from this community,” said Chasse.
All these donations were eventually accepted, though he asked all parties to consolidate their donations to bitcoins, the form of currency The Water Project was comfortable using. Because of the perceived volatility of the currency, Chasse opted to work with bitcoin processor Coinbase to convert the donations into dollars.
Gallippi’s organization has no such concerns regarding holding onto bitcoins. Explaining that the organization was founded on its belief in the digital currency, she said that she believes the value of bitcoins will only increase. “We 100 percent believe in its success,” she said. Based on this belief, they pay as many expenses as they can in bitcoins though there are some expenses (such as government fees).
You can find out more information about the BitGive Foundation at http://bitgivefoundation.org/Kopiera denna text sprid den via epost, facebook etc! Se till att få med referenserna nedan!
Demografibomben: Extrem könsobalans & 16-åriga svenska pojkar i minoritet redan 2016I denna tråd diskuterar vi hur man politiskt först skall erkänna och sedan hantera den demografiska bomb, demografibomben, som är på gång i Sverige. Ja, många ensamkommande fuskar med sin ålder, men i denna tråd är själva fusket och att det svenska samhället blundar för fusket sekundärt, vi diskuterar snarare konsekvenserna av fusket, än att de fuskar.Det har skrivits mycket om när svenskar kommer att bli en minoritet i Sverige. Faktum är att för 16-åringa pojkar, så kommer detta att vara ett faktum inom ett år, redan 2016, givet nuvarande invandringsvolym. Därtill skapas en oerhörd obalans mellan könen. Detta kan man räkna ut med mycket enkel matematik. Se här:Av de "ensamkommande barnen" som kommit 2015 är 91% pojkar [1].2164 st "ensamkommande barn" har kommit de senaste 7 dagarna [2], vilket innebär en dagstakt på 309 st. Det ger 281 st pojkar och 28 st flickor.32% av de "ensamkommande flyktingbarnen" har tidigare år varit 16 år gamla (och 20% 17 år) [4]. Det ger 90 st "ensamkommande pojkar" och 9 "ensamkommande flickor", som är 16 år, per dag.År 2014 fanns det av 16 år gamla i Sverige: 52 562 pojkar och 48 627 flickor [6]. Per dag blir det 144 pojkar och 133 flickor.Sammanfattning årskull 16 år gamla, per dagPojkar: 144 icke ensamkommande, 90 ensamkommandeFlickor: 133 icke ensamkommande, 9 ensamkommandeDet innebär alltså att 38% av 16-åringa pojkar kommer att vara "ensamkommande barn", redan inom ett år med invandring på dagens nivåer.Vidare, då redan nu 30% av barnen 13-17 år har invandrarbakgrund i Sverige [5] (utläst ur figur) fås följande:Dvs bland pojkar som är 16 år gamla kommer invandrare att vara klar i majoritet redan innan slutet av 2016. Till detta kommer ju även övriga invandrande barn som är 16 år gamla, som kommer just nu ihop med sin familj, eller som kommer komma senare via återförening; det kommer att göra att det hela går ännu snabbare!Kommer ens Kina eller Indien upp i de siffrorna vad gäller könsobalans? Nej, detta är ännu värre än de länderna. I Indien föds det 115 pojkar per 100 flickor, och i Kina är siffran 119 pojkar per 100 flickor. Det är väl känt att könsobalans bidrar till ökade oroligheter i samhället [7], alltså att läggas till de integrationsproblem vi redan har i Sverige.____________[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]In a recent media interaction, finance minister Arun Jaitley urged the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to cut the interest rates. A lower rate would help fuel growth in India’s realty sector, which is suffering from a severe demand slowdown.
And he’s not wrong. There are 750,000 unsold apartments in seven cities alone, including those in Mumbai, the National Capital Region (NCR) and Bengaluru. RBI governor Raghuram Rajan obliged the finance minister with a 50 basis points (bps) rate cut.
Will that be enough to revive India’s housing demand? Will it save the realty sector from crashing? Why is India’s housing sector staring at an imminent crash?
A majority of demand for homes in India is in the affordable segment. However, most developers are coming out with high priced premium and luxury apartments that most buyers can’t afford. Over 69% of the unsold homes in Mumbai are priced above Rs1 crore or more. The result is huge unsold inventories.
If homes prices continue to remain flat for long, investors will start losing interest.
The inventory pile-up is so huge that it would take at least five years in the NCR and three years in Mumbai to sell them off, according to a report by Knight Frank India, a property consultancy. Rajan is right when he says the salaried class can’t afford to buy flats in India’s top cities. Obviously, builders will face shortage of buyers.
Secondly, India’s home market is driven by investors rather than end users. Thus, if homes prices continue to remain flat for long, investors will start losing interest, as they are in the market for a good return on the money invested.
Return comes in two ways—capital gains from the appreciation in the home prices or rental income. At present, apartment prices are either stagnant or witnessing a mild correction in most parts of India, and more so in the NCR.
When it comes to rental income, a typical two-bedroom, 1,000 square feet apartment in the Mumbai suburbs of Andheri East or Malad with a quoted price of anything between Rs1.5 crore and Rs2.5 crore will generate an annual rental income of anything between Rs3 lakh and Rs6 lakh. That is 2% to 2.4% of the capital value of the apartment.
Expenses on account of property taxes, society maintenance charges and the normal wear and tear of the apartment devour around 20% to 30% of the rental income depending upon the age and location of apartment building. Then, you also have to consider capital gains taxes in case you decide to sell.
Critics will say that I’m not accounting for the role of black money. That’s true.
Investors have already started to desert some realty markets like Noida.
However, even people with black money who’ve invested in the property market do look for positive returns. If rent is insignificant compared to the property price, and capital appreciation is not happening—which is the reality whether builders accept it or not—investors will soon lose interest.
Investors have already started to desert some realty markets like Noida. As a result, prices are lower by almost 30% from the peak of December 2012. (The best way to verify price correction is check prices in the resale market.)
Can the RBI rate cut of 50 bps revive sentiment in the housing sector and bring back buyers as EMIs (equated monthly instalments) would now be lower?
I don’t think so.
It’s important to realise that buyers have to pay both the principal (apartment price) and interest. A 50 bps rate cut on a Rs50 lakh loan with an interest rate of 10% for 20 years means that the EMI will drop from Rs48,251 to Rs46,607.
Will you buy something that cost you Rs50 lakh just because your EMI is now down by Rs1,644 a month? Most people will not, especially when you can rent that Rs50 lakh apartment for just Rs10,000 or Rs12,000 a month.
It doesn’t make sense to buy a two-bedroom apartment for Rs2 crore and enslave yourself for life in a bad job or with a bad boss. Why buy when you can rent it out for just Rs50,000 a month at the most. I stay in a house that is priced at Rs1.5 crore, but I pay only Rs32,000 a month as rent when home loan interest rate is 10%. Why can’t you?
There are so many unoccupied apartments to choose from irrespective of what your local brokers say about availability.
Even if you want to buy your dream home, what’s the hurry? Prices are not moving up so it makes sense to wait till then, stay in a rented accommodation of your choice, at least till the housing regulator becomes a reality. There are so many unoccupied apartments to choose from irrespective of what your local brokers say about availability.
My advice: please don’t go for under-construction apartments, even if you think that the payment plan offered by builders is too good to refuse. For instance, pay 20% now and the balance 80% on possession. Well, 20% of Rs2 crore is Rs40 lakh. And at 10% per year, your interest outgo would be Rs4 lakh annually, which is more than sufficient to rent a decent 2 BHK apartment.
Plus your money remains safe that you can use to buy a ready to move in apartment when prices are reasonable.
If you still want to fall into the 20:80 trap, here’s the fact: builders are delaying handing over the possession by two to six years. If that’s the case, you may have to pay both the rent and EMIs.
Besides, what’s the guarantee that your under-construction project will ever be completed, given the over-leveraged conditions of real estate companies, the nexus between builders, babus and politicians, and no housing regulator to police the errant builders.
Can you fight a builder who doesn’t intend to keep his words? You can’t. But why should you when you have the option of staying in a rented accommodation?
A version of this post first appeared on LinkedIn. We welcome your comments at ideas.india@qz.com.The son of the late three-time heavyweight champion and humanitarian Muhammad Ali said he was a target of religious profiling when he was stopped and questioned by U.S. immigration agents earlier this month while traveling from Jamaica with his mother.
Appearing on “CBS This Morning” Monday, Muhammad Ali Jr. and his mother, Khalilah Camacho Ali, said that they had just arrived at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on February 7, and were headed toward baggage claim when they were stopped. Both were in wheelchairs, because of their knees.
Muhammad Ali Jr. and his mother, Khalilah Camacho Ali, on “CBS This Morning.” CBS News
“Immigration came up to me and pulled me aside and asked me my name first and I said ‘Muhammad Ali.’ And he said, ‘What religion are you?’ And I said, ‘Muslim.’ He said, ‘Come with me.’
“At first, you know, we were traveling together,” Khalilah said. “And when I saw they were having a problem with him, I said, ‘That’s my son over there. We’re traveling together.’
“They rolled him away. I said, ‘Where’s he going?’ They said, ‘He’ll meet you on the other side.’”
Muhammad continued, “So he took me to another room - it’s like he didn’t believe me or whatever, but he asked me again, ‘What is your name and what is your religion?’ And again I answered.
He was questioned for about an hour and 45 minutes.
“They asked me about my birthday. They asked me where was I traveling to, what route I come from. And I was like, ‘What difference does it make? I’m a U.S. citizen. You see my ID, you see my passport. I offered my social security card, so why are you stopping me?’”
In the end, when he was released, Ali said he was given neither an explanation for why he was stopped, nor an apology.
Khalilah said they had had no problems coming from Jamaica.
“I was scared!” she said.
Muhammad, who was born in Philadelphia, said he had never been questioned or stopped before. Nor does he have a criminal record.
“I was wondering why he was asking about my religion,” he said. “I thought, what does that matter?”
In a statement, Customs and Border Protection told CBS News that, while it’s against their privacy policy to comment specifically about the Ali’s case, “CBP does not discriminate based on religion, race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.”
Anthony Mason asked, “What’s your response to that?”
“Then why would you ask me?” Ali replied. “I wouldn’t ask you, ‘What religion are you? Christian?’ Like there’s a problem with it? I know Islam and Christianity is peace.”
When asked about how he feels from his experience, Muhammad said, “I don’t know. That situation made me feel like I was at my father’s funeral -- I didn’t know what to think.”
Gayle King asked, “Did they know you were Muhammad Ali’s son?”
“Yes.”
“Did they believe you?”
“I don’t think so.”
An Ali family lawyer has suggested that his detention was related to President Donald Trump’s recent executive order banning travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from all countries. The travel ban has been blocked by a federal court. But Ali suggested that, while the travel ban was not in effect, it may be connected to his experience.
“There’s always a problem in history; it’s since gotten a lot worse,” he said. “Racial profiling -- not just racial profiling, but, you know, religious profiling.”
Khalilah said her wish was to present Mr. Trump with a Quran. Though she said she did not blame him, she wanted him to read the Islamic holy book. “The president should know we are a people of peace, and the Quran should be read to know that.”
She also hoped the Trump administration would “take Muslim and Islamic off the terrorism agenda. That’s what they should do.”
Muhammad Ali died last June at age 74 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease.Dozens of business leaders have signed a letter asking Tennessee lawmakers to kill a piece of legislation known as the transgender bathroom bill.
The CEOs of Williams-Sonoma, Airbnb, Alcoa, T-Mobile and Dow Chemical were among the 60 business leaders who signed the letter and said the proposal has no place in Tennessee.
A group of advocates for lesbians, gays, bisexual and transgender people dropped off a letter to House Speaker Beth Harwell and Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, both Republicans.
Under the measure, students at public schools and universities would be required to use bathrooms and locker rooms assigned to their gender at birth. Supporters say it protects the privacy of students and the rights of everyone. Opponents call it discriminatory.
© 2016, Associated Press, All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
This Story Filed UnderExample of a Birch bark scroll piece
Wiigwaasabak (Ojibwe language, plural: wiigwaasabakoon) are birch bark scrolls, on which the Ojibwa (Anishinaabe) people of North America wrote complex geometrical patterns and shapes. When used specifically for Midewiwin ceremonial use, these scrolls are called mide-wiigwaas. These enabled the memorization of complex ideas, and passing along history and stories to succeeding generations. Several such scrolls are in museums, including one on display at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, DC [1]. In addition to birchbark, copper and slate may have also been used, along with hides, pottery, and other artifacts. Some archaeologists are presently trying to determine the exact origins, dates, and locations of their use. Many scrolls were hidden away in caves and man-made pits.
Construct [ edit ]
The bark of the paper birch tree provides an excellent writing material. Usually, a stylus of either bone, metal or wood is used to inscribe these ideographs on the soft inner bark. Black charcoal is often used to fill the scratches to make them easier to see. To form a scroll, pieces of inscribed bark are stitched together using wadab (cedar or spruce roots). To prevent unrolling, the scroll is lashed, then placed in a cylindrically-shaped wiigwaasi-makak (birch bark box) for safe-keeping. Scrolls were recopied after so many years, and stored in dry locations, often underground in special containers, or in caves.[citation needed] Elders recopied the scrolls over time, and some were hidden away in remote areas for safekeeping.[citation needed] Scrolls were often kept hidden to avoid improper interpretations and to avoid ridicule or disrespect of the teachings.[citation needed]
Purpose [ edit ]
Some scrolls are songs and details of Midewiwin rituals and medicine lodges [1]. Some of the oldest maps of North America were made by natives, who wrote on birch bark for explorers and traders to follow[citation needed].
Some scrolls give the history of the Ojibway migration from Eastern North America to further west[citation needed]. They indicate the discovery of |
for you, because as far as I know, you have to select the files one by one so they are marked as read.
There is also another minor and tedious task to be undertaken. Each time you import an mbox file into the KMail folder, it does NOT go immediately into the folder itself, but instead the emails are copied into a subfolder of the folder you are working with. What you then do is open that subfolder, select all the emails in it and "drag and drop move" them into the designated folder and delete the subfolder. Okay, messy, but once again, it does work.
Last But Not Least.
As I indicated above, there seems to be no way you can drop a Unix based copy of the entire set of KMail files into the present version of KMail using the standard file managers. I'd be enormously happy to be corrected if I am wrong in this matter. As I presently see it, there are two methods available to the KMail user if some sort of backup system is to be applied - there may be others. The first is to use the "mbox" export method and keep that set of files as an "unreadable but savable" copy. The second is to use KMail's archive process and make a standard archive.
I'd also stress that this article contains my perceptions of the situation as it unfolded. There are probably other ways of doing what I wanted, but I found a way to effectively solve a problem and tedious or not, I'm very content with the results. It is very possible that some of my assumptions are incorrect and readers should recall that I am just a user who has fought his way through a problem and seen it from a particular perspective. I'm very happy to be told of any errors I've made in this text, just as long as I also get the real answer.
At the moment, KMail 4.11.5 seems to be running perfectly. I have altered no settings which concern the Akonadi system. I cordially detest the fact that KMail is wholly dependent on Akonadi, but I don't dare touch any of its default settings for fear of rendering KMail inoperable. I have no objections to Akonadi itself, I simply believe that users should have the choice/option of operating KMail completely independently from Akonadi and preferably with Akonadi wholly disabled.
I have gone through some "convoluted process" which seems to have stored the server password in KMail rather than the wallet, but if you ask me how I did it, I simply don't quite know. Just luck that I pushed the right buttons, I think. I do recall that when the Wallet kept on asking me if I wanted to Keep the password in the system, I selected Keep each time, and I think the Wallet got sick of asking. What I do know, is that when I just looked at my account, the password is clearly shown as having been registered in the KMail software itself. If that is the case, then I congratulate the KMail team for restoring that user option - I repeat, my only problem is that I don't know precisely how I did it. I have always argued that a user should have the option of either keeping the password either in the system or in the Wallet, and the option should be very clearly displayed.
Assuming that the option to use or not use the Wallet has now been restored, KMail's absolute dependence on Akonadi to store its files remains the sole major problem as far as I personally am concerned. But for the rest, KMail remains a superb piece of software, settings complexity or not - I can live with that. And one last thing is that the 4-core 64bit laptop runs both KDE 4 and KMail very fast indeed and at least some of the problems noted in the earlier articles are now un-noticeable.
So there we are.......I think I have managed to "bash" KMail 4.11.5 into a form that I can use comfortably. It's been a very steep learning curve and I wasn't sure I was going to win. To be honest, I think the KMail team would be perfectly justified in saying that I should have expected some sort of difficulty in trying to migrate emails from such an old/antique version into one of the latest versions. And I cannot help but agree - but in mitigation KMail team, I believe I used an "antique method" to get my files across (sorry, but that strikes me as funny). I have noted that the Accounts section in the setting up window has a "Local Mail" line......I'm not sure what it does, but it's of no use to me, and so I have left it strictly alone. Like other parts of KMail now, I am reluctant to try to modify or delete areas about which I lack information and whose change might disturb the smooth running of the software in some way.......What an absolute pain. But, thankyou once again KMail team for the Password/Wallet option alteration and the difficulties that were laid in my path (and I strongly emphasise that I am not being sarcastic at this point). Without those problems, I would not have explored and learned about the mbox concept - and best of all, it worked.
Links to the Earlier Articles on openSUSE 13.1, KDE and KMail
Here is a link to my earlier article discussing problems with KMail in these latest versions. I'd add here, that later events have "killed" the Patience option described here. The latest versions of KDE4 have been modified to the extent that the old version of Patience will no longer run. Sad. The new swinging and dancing version of KDE 4 KPat does NOT have the crispness and quality of the card decks available in the old KDE3.5 KPat. Well, that's my opinion.
"KMail Complexity - and a Little Patience": http://lxer.com/module/newswire/lf/view/197664/
Readers might also like this other series on openSUSE, KDE and the semantic desktop. The links to both Part 1 and Part 2 are supplied.
Removing/Disabling The Semantic Deskop in KDE4 (and firing up Thunderbird) Part 1
http://lxer.com/module/newswire/view/198081/index.html
"Removing/Disabling The Semantic Deskop in KDE4 Running on openSUSE 13.1 Part 2"
http://lxer.com/module/newswire/lf/view/198639/Dogs' ability to communicate and interact with humans is one the most astonishing differences between them and their wild cousins, wolves. A new study published today in the journal Science Advances identifies genetic changes that are linked to dogs' human-directed social behaviors and suggests there is a common underlying genetic basis for hyper-social behavior in both dogs and humans.
An interdisciplinary team of researchers, including those from Princeton University, sequenced a region of chromosome 6 in dogs and found multiple sections of canine DNA that were associated with differences in social behavior. In many cases, unique genetic insertions called transposons on the Williams-Beuren syndrome critical region (WBSCR) were strongly associated with the tendency to seek out humans for physical contact, assistance and information.
In contrast, in humans, it is the deletion of genes from the counterpart of this region on the human genome, rather than insertions, that causes Williams-Beuren syndrome, a congenital disorder characterized by hyper-social traits such as exceptional gregariousness.
"It was the remarkable similarity between the behavioral presentation of Williams-Beuren syndrome and the friendliness of domesticated dogs that suggested to us that there may be similarities in the genetic architecture of the two phenotypes," said Bridgett vonHoldt, an assistant professor in ecology and evolutionary biology at Princeton and the study's lead co-author.
Dogs’ ability to communicate and interact with humans is one of the most astonishing differences between them and their wild cousins, wolves. Shown here, Lauren Brubaker, a graduate research assistant in the Department of Animal and Rangeland Sciences at Oregon State University and one of the study’s authors, interacts with a gray wolf.
VonHoldt had identified the canine analog of the WBSCR in her publication in Nature in 2010. But it was Emily Shuldiner, a 2016 Princeton alumna and the study's other lead co-author, who, as part of her senior thesis, pinpointed the commonalities in the genetic architecture of Williams-Beuren syndrome and canine tameness.
By analyzing behavioral and genetic data from dogs and gray wolves, vonHoldt, Shuldiner and their colleagues reported a strong genetic aspect to human-directed social behavior by dogs. Monique Udell, an assistant professor of animal and rangeland sciences at Oregon State University and the paper's senior author, collected and analyzed the behavioral data for 18 domesticated dogs and 10 captive human-socialized wolves, as well as the biological samples used to sequence their genomes.
First, Udell quantified human-directed sociability traits in canines, such as to what extent they turned to a human in the room to seek assistance in trying to lift a puzzle box lid in order to get a sausage treat below or the degree to which they sought out social interactions with familiar and unfamiliar humans. Then, vonHoldt and Shuldiner sequenced the genome in vonHoldt's lab and correlated their findings.
Consistent with their hypothesis, the researchers confirmed that the domesticated dogs displayed more human-directed behavior and spent more time in proximity to humans than the wolves. The also discovered that some of these transposons on the WBSCR were only found in domestic dogs, and not in wolves at all.
VonHoldt's findings suggest that only a few transposons on this region likely govern a complex set of social behaviors. "We haven't found a'social gene,' but rather an important [genetic] component that shapes animal personality and assisted the process of domesticating a wild wolf into a tame dog," she said.
Anna Kukekova, an assistant professor in the Department of Animal Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who is familiar with the research but had no role in it, said that the paper points to these genes as being evolutionarily conserved, or essentially unchanged throughout evolution. "The research provides evidence that there exist certain evolutionary conservative mechanisms that contribute to sociability across species," she said. "That they have found that this region contributes to sociability in dogs is exciting."
By analyzing behavioral and genetic data from dogs and gray wolves, vonHoldt, Shuldiner and their colleagues reported a strong genetic aspect to human-directed social behavior by dogs. Shown here, Shelby Wanser, an undergraduate research assistant in the Department of Animal and Rangeland Sciences at Oregon State University and one of the study’s authors, participates in an exercise to determine the degree to which canines seek out social interactions with familiar and unfamiliar humans.
Survival of the friendliest
The researchers' evidence also calls into question the role of domestication in the evolution of canine behavior. Most experts agree that the first domesticated dogs were wolves that ventured into early human settlements. These proto-dogs evolved not only in their looks, but also their behavior, a process likely influenced by the species' cohabitation, according to vonHoldt.
However, unlike previous research which suggests that, during the process of domestication, dogs were selected for a set of cognitive abilities, particularly an ability to discern gesture and voice, vonHoldt and Shuldiner's research posits that dogs were instead selected for their tendency to seek human companionship.
"If early humans came into contact with a wolf that had a personality of being interested in them, and only lived with and bred those 'primitive dogs,' they would have exaggerated the trait of being social," vonHoldt said.
Other authors on the paper were Ilana Janowitz Koch and Rebecca Kartzinel of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton; Andrew Hogan and Elaine Ostrander of the Cancer Genetics Branch, National Human Genome Research Institute the National Institutes of Health; Lauren Brubaker and Shelby Wanser of the Department of Animal and Rangeland Sciences at Oregon State University; Daniel Stahler of Yellowstone Center for Resources, National Park Service at Yellowstone National Park; Clive Wynne of the Department of Psychology at Arizona State University and the Cancer Genetics Branch, National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institutes of Health; and Janet Sinsheimer of the Departments of Human Genetics and Biomathematics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California-Los Angeles.
The study, "Structural variants in genes associated with human Williams-Beuren Syndrome underlie stereotypical hyper-sociability in domestic dogs," was published July 19 by Science Advances. The research was funded in part by Princeton's Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Office of the Dean of the College, and Council on Science and Technology, as well as the National Science Foundation (NSF DEB-1245373, NSF DMS 1264153) and National Institutes of Health (NIH GM086887).By Tom Philpott
As it came to a close, 2013 seemed to leave a kind of high-water mark on the wall of more than a decade of steady, impressive gains to military and veterans’ pays and benefits.
Will those gains now begin to recede?
The military this month is getting its smallest annual pay raise in 50 years, 1 percent versus 1.8 percent needed to match private sector wages. No big deal, pay officials contend.
Military pay still exceeds earnings for 90 percent of civilians of like age and education level, thanks to the string of raises that, starting in 2001, exceeded private sector wage growth. Also, recruiting is strong and average housing allowances rose 5 percent Jan. 1.
Military careerists and younger retirees got a harder hit in December when the first “bipartisan” budget in years included a cap on annual cost-of-living adjustments for retirees below age 62, starting in January 2016.
Projected savings — $6.3 billion over just the first decade — helped Congress to ease automatic defense spending cuts set for 2014 and 2015.
But advocates for military folks worry the COLA cap signals that lawmakers, who continue to oppose tax increases or cuts in more popular entitlement programs, no longer view military compensation promises as sacrosanct.
“The COLA (cap) is huge,” said retired Army Col. Robert F. Norton of Military Officers Association of America. “Because contrary to public assertions from the president, the chairman of the joint chiefs, (Defense Secretary Chuck) Hagel and leaders on Capitol Hill, this retirement cut is a hit on currently serving career members.”
That includes, he said, a Marine gunnery sergeant or Army platoon sergeant “on a third or fourth tour in Afghanistan” who expects to retire soon.
Initially praised for shaping a modest budget deal on deadline, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the budget committee chairmen, saw their package swiftly enacted, before most lawmakers realized that the military COLA cap would spark a firestorm of protests.
Worried lawmakers immediately held news conferences, sponsored rollback bills or issued news releases promising to replace the COLA cap with an alternative budget saving idea.
Even Ryan and Murray agreed the cap at least should be modified before it takes effect in 2016 to spare 100,000 veterans who have been medically retired by their branch of service.
Ryan, however, defends the COLA cap in general, saying the idea came from the Department of Defense and only modestly trims a generous retirement plan that provides, on average, 40 years worth of inflation-protected annuities in return for
20 years of service.
Send comments to Military Update, P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, VA, 20120, or e-mail milupdate@aol.com or twitter: Tom Philpott @Military_Update
On mobile or desktop:
• Like Times of Trenton on Facebook
• Follow @TimesofTrenton on TwitterUntil recently, most macroeconomic forecasters, assisted by mathematical models, were predicting economic recovery and rising stock indices. But the market has reminded us that reality doesn't always correspond to the predictions of those who claim the mantle of "science." As is so often the case, those economists who were more humble in their pretensions to knowledge avoided such embarrassment.
The Methodological Divide
The Austrian School of economics is known for its aversion to mathematical modeling of human behavior. The neoclassical mainstream, on the other hand, is quite fond of this approach, and uses the mathematical method for just about any problem. I think it is fair to say that most mainstream economists would prefer the precision of a false formal model, versus the generality of a true verbal proposition.
This misplaced reliance on the power of mathematical tools for economic analysis is epitomized in the field of econometrics, which employs statistical techniques in the study of empirical data concerning economic phenomena. Unlike their mainstream colleagues in game theory—who are notorious for criticizing human "players" when their actions fail to correspond to the strategies employed in a particular game's equilibrium state—the econometricians believe they are exempt from the biases of a priori theorizing. The true believer in econometrics takes no particular stand on doctrinal questions, and rather thinks that the facts will "speak for themselves."
Ludwig von Mises exposed the fallacy in this supposedly atheoretical method:
It is true the empiricists reject [a priori] theory; they pretend that they aim to learn only from historical experience. However, they contradict their own principles as soon as they pass beyond the unadulterated recording of individual single prices and begin to construct series and to compute averages. A datum of experience and a statistical fact is only a price paid at a definite time and a definite place for a definite quantity of a certain commodity. The arrangement of various price data in groups and the computation of averages are guided by theoretical deliberations which are logically and temporally antecedent. The extent to which certain attending features and circumstantial contingencies of the price data concerned are taken or not taken into consideration depends on theoretical reasoning of the same kind. Nobody is so bold as to maintain that a rise of a per cent in the supply of any commodity must always—in every country and at any time—result in a fall of b per cent in its price. But as no quantitative economist ever ventured to define precisely on the ground of statistical experience the special conditions producing a definite deviation from the ratio a : b, the futility of his endeavors is manifest. (Human Action p. 351)
Although the student of Austrian economics may share Mises's opinions about the dubiousness of econometrics, the fact is that he or she must take classes and exams in this field in order to receive a degree from most programs in the United States. In an attempt to help such students "keep hope alive," I will now share my impressions and an anecdote gleaned from my experience in a mandatory course in macroeconometrics.
Market Process?
Austrian economists, especially those of a Hayekian bent, stress that the market is a process. Ironically, econometricians use the same term, but they mean by it something completely different.
For example, when he wishes to model the price of a particular stock, the econometrician may say, "Assume p(t) follows a random walk process." What he means is that the price at any time t equals the price at time t - 1, plus a completely random "shock." The shock is modeled as a random variable with mean zero and a certain variance.
Notice already that this approach has given up on trying to explain how real-world prices are actually formed. In reality, today's prices have no causal connection with tomorrow's prices. Every day, the price of a stock is formed afresh by decisions on the part of investors to buy or sell. The stock price today seems to be partially "dependent" on the stock price yesterday only because the underlying factors that caused yesterday's price are largely the same today. The case of a stock price is completely different from, say, the balance of one's bank account, which does remain constant from day to day, except for "autoregressive" changes due to interest compounding, or "shocks" due to deposits and withdrawals.
The econometric approach to stock price movements is analogous to a meteorologist who looks for correlations between various measurements of atmospheric conditions. For example, he might find that the temperature on any given day is a very good predictor of the temperature on the following day. But no meteorologist would believe that the reading on the thermometer one day somehow caused the reading the next day; he knows that the correlation is due to the fact that the true causal factors—such as the angle of the earth relative to its orbital plane around the sun—do not change much from one day to the next.
Unfortunately, this distinction between causation and correlation is not stressed in econometrics. Indeed, for economists truly committed to the positive method, there can be no such distinction. Although the econometric pioneers may understand why certain assumptions are made and can offer a priori justifications such as "rational expectations" for the details of a particular model, the students of such pioneers are often caught up in the mathematical technicalities and lose sight of the true causes of economic phenomena.
A Case in Point
Lest the reader feel I am speaking in broad generalities, let me offer as an example a question that was on one of my exams. The question epitomizes the problems with the econometric approach of stipulating a particular "process" that generates the observed levels of some variable:
Suppose we have T observations on the time series x(t), which has mean μ. Suppose also that d(t), the deviation of x(t) from its sample average s, which is defined as d(t) ≡ x(t) – s, follows an AR(1) process, that is, d(t) = ρd(t - 1) + e(t). What is the variance of the sample average, s?
As I sat staring at this question, I was absolutely befuddled, since I believe it makes no sense. My problem was not that such a question was of little use in understanding the business cycle or the stock market; my problem was that I believe its propositions are contradictory.
The question assumes that there is some variable x(t), the true mean of which is μ. That is, if we took the mean of all realizations of x(t) from t = 1 to t = ∞, the result would be μ. In practice, however, we never have an infinite number of realizations to analyze, but only a finite number T of sample observations. Although we can't know the true mean μ, we can calculate s, which is the sample average, or mean of the observations from x(1) to x(T).
Now, the exam question above wasn't intended to be "deep"; I suspect that talking about an autoregressive (AR) process concerning the variable d(t) was an indirect way to get the student to assume that x(t) itself followed an AR(1) process, and to then apply a standard formula to "compute the sample variance of the mean of T realizations from an autocorrelated time series process" (quoted from the solution later given by my professor).
An autoregressive process is one in which the value t is dependent on some fraction of the value at t - 1, plus a random "error" term of mean zero. For example, we might have x(t) =.5 * x(t - 1) + e(t), which means that the value of x at time t is equal to one-half its value at time t - 1, plus some random error term e(t) that on average will equal zero.
It makes sense to say that x(t) in the above question follows such an AR(1) process. However, the question said that the deviation of x(t) from its sample average s follows an AR(1) process, and this I believe is nonsensical. This is because, unlike the infinitely long x(t) process—in which the deviations of x(t) from its mean μ can in principle sum to any number (though we expect in the long run this sum to be zero)—for a finite sample of size T, the deviations d(t) by definition must sum to zero. So when my professor—following the standard econometric practice—stipulated that the series d(t) followed a particular process, he stipulated the impossible.
Let's illustrate the problem with a sample of size T=3. Suppose that the observed values of x are 1, 2, and 3. The sample average s is thus 2. The value of d(1) is -1; that is, x(1) – s = -1. The value of d(2) is 0, and the value of d(3) is 1. As must be the case, the sum of the deviations of x(t) from the sample mean are zero; i.e., -1 + 0 + 1 = 0.
Now notice that this makes it impossible for the variable d(t) to follow an AR process. This is because the value of d(1) and d(2) completely determine the value of d(3). Given that d(1) is -1 and d(2) is 0, d(3) must be 1 to render the entire sum zero.
But if this is the case, then the stipulated formula for d(t)—that is, d(t) = ρd(t - 1) + e(t)—cannot be true. For we know that d(3) is not some function of d(2) plus a completely random error term e(3), which in principle can take any value. So to reiterate, it's not merely that the question is irrelevant to a true understanding of economics; it's rather that even on purely mathematical terms, the question makes no sense.
The Econometrician's Response
I emailed my concerns to my professor and his teaching assistant. They told me that I was reading too much into the question, and that my problem was of a very "philosophical" nature. Rather than pondering what the question "meant," I should have realized the relevant formula from the information given, and applied it to get the answer.
I believe their stance is typical of the mainstream approach. It would be one thing if all of the formal rigor of modeling were followed through to the deepest foundations of economic science. But unfortunately, I believe that in day-to-day practice, the mainstream economist relies on certain assumptions and techniques to address a particular problem, since he knows "how to solve" the question when it is asked in this way.
But surely there is something fundamentally wrong when he persists in this method, even when the "question" so posed is internally contradictory.Op-ed: Dear Media and Fellow Trans Men, We Are More Than Our Bodies
The U.S. Army’s first out trans soldier argues that media obsession with trans men’s medical histories and traditional masculinity detracts from what we need to discuss most.
As the nation's media continues tracking down stories to satiate the current cultural curiosity about transgender Americans, we only rarely see trans men invited into the discussion. And when we do, we're most often invited to do one thing first: take off our shirts.
Currently, the media is only publishing and discussing “fluff” pieces about trans men — articles about conventionally attractive men or pieces with titles like “Look at This Trans Man, He’s So Hot!” or “Gorgeous Men That You Would Never Know Are Trans.”
These kinds of articles project unrealistic expectations of trans men’s bodies and promote stereotypes, like the false ideas that all men can grow facial hair, have binary, male-appearing chests without breasts, are muscle-bound, dress in stereotypically “masculine” clothing, or must be attractive by straight, cisgender (nontrans) standards to be deemed “desirable.”
These articles are shallow — all surface, with little depth. And when that’s all the world sees of trans men, we become, in the eyes of others, less than the deep, multifaceted human beings we are.
The limited, “acceptable” topics the media will cover about trans men negate our ability to focus on the deeper, intersectional issues — ones around race, color, class, ability, employment, and more — that affect our everyday lives. Trans men given space in the media have a responsibility to actively address this lack.
Particularly troubling to me is the media’s obsession with the ideal of hypermasculinity and traditional gender roles. Typically, the trans men we see portrayed are white and heteronormative. We often don’t see men of color, queer men, or people who are nonbinary. Yet the world needs to know: these kinds of trans-masculine people also exist.
The few trans men given space in media have a duty to acknowledge this. When offered a platform from which to speak, trans men should actively address all of our community, rather than draw attention to the top percentage that’s currently popular.
Because what we do does affect others. When given our minute in the spotlight, trans men need to approach it with a social justice education, focusing on the intersectional issues that affect the many kinds of men, women, and nonbinary people in our communities. Otherwise, we're only talking about our perspective of society. It’s a lost opportunity to open doors for those around us that we cannot afford to lose.
When handed the mike, we need to be careful to not let the media steer the conversation, because it’s going to turn quickly away from the community and back to the minute details of one single transition. It devolves into sexualization and objectification of trans bodies quickly — and away from our rights, away from the struggles we face just to be ourselves. Right now, it seems to me, we’re largely allowing media to ask about our surgeries, to ask about our hormones. We need to push beyond that in our responses, even if it’s not exactly answering the question asked.
And when we specifically, as trans men, say we represent the community — which is inevitably what happens when one is given a media platform — we need to recognize the privileges of our social class.
This means acknowledging that we’re men living in a patriarchal American society that still considers being male more important than being a member of any other gender. I, for one, know what it feels like to be instantaneously valued and considered knowledgeable simply because I’m a man. I also know what it feels like to be considered “middle class,” after having worked in the military for many years — to be socio-economically better off than at least one-third of Americans. I’m able-bodied and physically fit. I’m employed in the military — one of our nation’s most profoundly trusted, diverse, and equal-paying industries.
Few other trans men, trans women, or nonbinary people inhabit the positions I do. It’s the same for any trans man in the media, who most likely possesses privileged statuses beyond simply being male. The media focuses on us in part because we are “exceptions” rather than the “rule.” So when we’re trying to be spokespeople — when we’re standing up and talking about our personal experiences — we also need to always be talking about the lack of access to such experiences across the board.
If you have a seat at the table and you’re not pulling the seat next to you back for someone else, what is the purpose of showing up? If you’re not there to change the system of how things are usually being done, what's the point?
Because when we trans men simply accept what the media gives us — the questions about our bodies and transitions, the unchallenged inclusion of only a few kinds of men — we’re saying that we’re OK with eating scraps. That we’re OK with whatever is given to us, and that we won’t push for change or ask for more.
That complicity tells the media that we’re so used to being ostracized, marginalized, and oppressed that we’ll take any little bit of acceptance we're offered. We're sending the message that it’s OK to continue portraying trans men as stereotypes, as one-dimensional “fluff.”
Personally, I came to these conclusions because I don’t accept mediocrity as my own truth — so if I don’t accept it in my professional life in the military, why should I accept it in my public life when I’m speaking out for trans people?
All humans are undeniably entitled to dignity and respect, and we can’t expect anything less. When handed a tool to help with this, we must hold the media — but also, just as importantly, ourselves — accountable.
Sgt. SHANE ORTEGA currently serves as a U.S. Army helicopter crew chief in Oahu, Hawaii. He is considered the first openly transgender soldier in the U.S. military. He can be reached at @OnlyShaneOrtega.
This piece originally appeared in an earlier version as a talk on the author’s YouTube channel.by Dr. Carl Benn
Chair, Department of History, Ryerson University
The founding of urban Toronto was a military event that occurred when John Graves Simcoe ordered the construction of a garrison on the present site of Fort York in 1793. Simcoe wanted to establish a naval base at Toronto in order to control Lake Ontario because of a war scare with the United States resulting from Britain's alliance to the native people of the Ohio Country, who were engaged in a brutal conflict with the Americans to preserve their territories. In his capacity as lieutenant-governor of the British province of Upper Canada, Simcoe also moved the provincial capital to Toronto from the vulnerable border town of Niagara during that tense period. Toronto was renamed 'York,' civilian settlement followed the government, and the settlement began to grow. During those early years, Fort York played a significant role in the economic and social development of the small backwoods community.
Simcoe, nevertheless, did not construct the strong defences he had planned for York. Anglo-American tensions eased by 1794, and his superiors decided that the Lake Ontario squadron should be stationed in Kingston, 250 kilometres to the east. Simcoe's original log buildings deteriorated quickly. His successors built new barracks, one hundred metres east of the present site in the late 1790s for the small garrison assigned to the provincial capital. In 1800, a residence for the lieutenant-governor, 'Government House,' was built on the present fort site.
In 1807, Anglo-American relations began to deteriorate again. In anticipation of hostilities, Major-General Isaac Brock strengthened Fort York in 1811. Today's west wall and circular battery date from that time. In 1812, the United States declared war and invaded Canada. On 27 April 1813, the U.S. Army and Navy attacked York with 2700 men on fourteen ships and schooners, armed with eighty-five cannon. The defending force of 750 British, Canadians, Mississaugas, and Ojibways had twelve cannon.
The Americans stormed ashore west of the fort under the cover of their naval guns. The defenders put up a strong fight, but fell back to Fort York from the landing site in the face of overwhelming odds. The British commander, Major-General Sir Roger Sheaffe, then retreated eastward and blew up the fort's gunpowder magazine (located near today's Memorial Area). The explosion was devastating: 250 Americans fell dead or wounded from its blast, including their field commander, Brigadier-General Zebulon Pike. Total losses in the six-hour battle were 157 British and 320 Americans.
The Mississaugas and Ojibways withdrew into the forest, Sheaffe's professional troops retreated to Kingston, and the local militia surrendered the town. The Americans occupied York for six days. They looted homes, took or destroyed supplies, and burned Government House and the Parliament Buildings (near today's Front and Parliament streets). In 1814, the British retaliated when they captured Washington and burned the White House, Capitol, and other public buildings.
The Americans returned to a defenceless York in July 1813 to burn barracks and other buildings that they missed in April. Shortly afterwards, the British rebuilt Fort York on what is both today's and Simcoe's original site. In August 1814, Fort York was strong enough to repel the U.S. squadron when it again tried to enter Toronto Bay. In February 1815, word reached York that the War of 1812 had ended the previous December. It was good news: peace had returned, and the defence of Canada against American invasion had been successful.
The British continued to garrison Fort York after the war, although most soldiers moved to new barracks one kilometre west of the fort in 1841. (The officers' barracks of that 'New Fort' or 'Stanley Barracks' survives today.) During times of peace, Fort York's defences were allowed to deteriorate, only to be strengthened in periods of crisis, such as the Rebellion Crisis of 1837–41, or when war with the United States seemed imminent, such as in 1861–62.
In 1870, the Canadian government assumed responsibility for most of the country's defences, including Fort York. Canadian troops maintained the harbour defences at the fort until its guns and earthworks became obsolete in the 1880s. The army, however, did not abandon the site at that time, but used it for training, barracks, offices, and storage until the 1930s. Some military activity even took place at Fort York during World War II.
Between 1932 and 1934, the City of Toronto restored Fort York to celebrate the centennial of the incorporation of the city in 1834. On Victoria Day 1934, Fort York opened as a historic site museum. Today, its defensive walls surround Canada's largest collection of original War of 1812 buildings. Even the older part of the one reconstructed building on the site, the Blue Barracks, contains a significant amount of 1814-period material and is an interesting example of the efforts made during the Great Depression to create employment by restoring and rebuilding historic sites. The grounds of the fort and the surrounding land encompass part of the 1813 battlefield, remnants of Toronto's late eighteenth-century landscape, and at least two military cemeteries. Below the soil of the fort lies a vast archaeological resource, capable of significantly expanding our understanding of life in the earliest years of Toronto's settlement.
Today, the City of Toronto, supported by The Friends of Fort York and other members of the community, operates Fort York as a historic site museum. The fort houses various exhibits, such as restored period rooms and traditional museum galleries, as well as other displays that explore the story of Ontario's turbulent military past. Staff and volunteers engage in the essential tasks common to operating any such institution of significant importance: enhancing the collection through acquiring artefacts, conserving the collection for the benefit of future generations, developing the site to meet the public's interests in the past, studying Fort York's history through archival, material culture, and archaeological research, and sharing that history through public programmes, tours, and special events.SPIEGEL: Mr. Klingholz, in your study "New Potential," which was presented on Tuesday, you point to a paradox |
aircraft use in regions that were previously impractical.
“Often one of the greatest military logistics burdens is fuel transport,” said Hodkin. “If we can reduce or eliminate the need to ship specialized fuels, we’ve then reduced the associated cost and risk.”
The first step in turning this innovative design into reality was proof-of-concept testing, beginning with the recent ground tests conducted at the Arnold Engineering Development Complex. Here, the development team performed simulated flights at altitude in the facility’s Propulsion Development T-11 Test Cell, which was reopened for this test effort after not being used for a decade. The T-11 test cell simulates airflow at a variety of altitudes.
During the ground testing, the EPS Graflight engine was taken through a range of operational flight conditions, from sea-level to 30,000 feet and back, successfully meeting performance expectations and generating valuable data on performance factors such as fuel consumption, calibration, vibration and power output.
AFRL researchers will use this data to prepare for future flight testing, confirm the engine’s efficiency and validate the engine’s performance characteristics for future Air Force users.
Once the proof-of-concept is fully demonstrated, it will be considered for use in several Air Force manned platforms. Designers will also work to scale the engine down to a smaller variant, better sized for current Air Force unmanned aircraft.
(Source: Holly Jordan/Air Force Research Laboratory Materials and Manufacturing Directorate)Baseball sources say Angels special assistant Tim Bogar is a favorite to get the job. McClendon’s replacement will be the Mariners’ ninth overall manager since they last made the playoffs in 2001.
The offseason of change continues for the Mariners.
Lloyd McClendon won’t return as manager for the 2016 season.
The Mariners, based on the decision of new general manager Jerry Dipoto, announced Friday they have decided to part ways with McClendon after two seasons. A large portion of McClendon’s coaching staff was let go or reassigned.
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“I just felt in the end, that I owed it to Lloyd and I owed it to the staff, to the players, to the Mariners organization and to myself to be honest in my assessment of where the Mariners were and where we needed to be,” Dipoto said Friday in a conference call with reporters. “I think this is the right decision to make. I believe in a vision moving forward, and I’m excited about starting 2016 now. In the end, I didn’t feel like it was a very good match between Lloyd and I. I respect his baseball. I admire his professionalism for having the players play hard through the final day, and I told him so.”
Bench coach Trent Jewett, third-base coach Rich Donnelly, outfield coach Andy Van Slyke and bullpen coach Mike Rojas were let go. Pitching coach Rick Waits and quality-control coach Chris Prieto have been invited to remain in the organization and will be reassigned.
Hitting coach Edgar Martinez and infield coach Chris Woodward were invited to return to the big-league staff in 2016.
McClendon, 56, moves on after compiling records of 87-75 in 2014 and 76-86 in 2015. His initial year as manager produced the Mariners’ first winning season since 2009. But 2015 began with lofty playoff expectations, and the Mariners did not meet them, struggling to play with any consistency. McClendon’s future became tenuous when the man who hired him, general manager Jack Zduriencik, was fired Aug. 28.
[New GM Jerry Dipoto says Mariners’ foundation is ‘fantastic’]
McClendon is under contract for 2016 and will be paid just over $1 million next season, but Dipoto was given the autonomy by team president Kevin Mather and CEO Howard Lincoln to determine whether to keep McClendon or move on with his own manager.
Dipoto had been meeting with McClendon since being hired as Zduriencik’s replacement Sept. 28. The two met this week with the coaches and baseball-operations staff to discuss the organization’s future.
[Mariners never recovered from 2-9 homestand]
Both men labeled the early talks productive. But in the end Dipoto decided to go with his own hire. It wasn’t unexpected considering Dipoto’s tenure with the Angels where he had a series of issues with manager Mike Scioscia. The disagreements over the implementation of analytics and ensuing power struggle led to Dipoto’s departure (owner Arte Moreno sided with Scioscia).
Dipoto downplayed the experience as a factor in this decision.
“Very little,” he said. “Obviously, we are all formed by our past experiences, and I’m no different from anyone else in that regard. But the fact that we are sitting here the Friday after the season ended and we are announcing this decision, it’s because I thought through all the different angles. The way the clubhouse would be affected, the way the organization would be affected, I incorporated many people in making the decision I felt comfortable with.”
McClendon’s replacement will be the Mariners’ seventh full-time manager and ninth overall manager since they most recently made the playoffs in 2001.
Dipoto said he has a short list of candidates. But what is he seeking from them?
“Energy, positive interaction with players, a good baseball background, a teacher — someone who can create a plan and lead people,” he said. “In many ways in today’s game, the manager’s position has become as much about creating an environment as it is about Xs and Os. I think too much is made of the metrics and how it will affect the game through analytics. It’s a little bit overblown.
“A lot of it is about the environment that you build and the people you surround yourself with. Leadership will be an important element to me, and energy will be an important element to me. Players need to be energized, to be inspired to do something. I’m not here to criticize the group that was here before. I don’t know them as well as I know others around the league. That’s something I will hold in high value as we go through this process.”
Though Dipoto must follow the hiring rules of Major League Baseball, including interviewing a minority candidate, baseball sources have said Angels special assistant Tim Bogar is a favorite to get the job.
Bogar was hired to be a special assistant to Dipoto when he was general manager with the Angels. Bogar is under contract for that job until Oct. 31. Before that, Bogar served as bench coach for the Rangers for the 2014 season. He was promoted to interim manager on Sept. 5, 2014 when Rangers manager Ron Washington resigned.
The Rangers went 14-8 with Bogar as manager. Bogar spent four years managing in the minors before gaining big-league coaching experience with the Rays in 2008 under Joe Maddon and then three seasons with the Red Sox staff. He served as manager of the Angels’ affiliate in Class AA in 2013, leading the Arkansas Travelers to 73-66 record. For his five years of managing in the minors, he compiled a 362-266 record.
Longtime Padres manager Bud Black, who attended high school in Longview, will likely be mentioned as a candidate. Former Mariners outfielder Raul Ibanez is another possible candidate. He was a finalist for the managerial job with the Rays this past offseason and has some familiarity with Dipoto.
As for the return of Martinez and Woodward to the big-league staff, that has yet to be finalized.
“Any part of any invitation is discussing contracts, and we have not done that yet, but will get to that point,” Dipoto said. “I think both guys would like to return.”
Martinez was brought in midseason to replace Howard Johnson as hitting coach. The Mariners offense did improve with his attention to detail and daily hitters’ meetings. With a street named for him outside Safeco Field and an impeccable playing resume, it would have been hard for him not to come back.
“Sitting with him this week and listening to him talk about the players and listening to him break down hitting, clearly how invested he was about making the players better, really excited me,” Dipoto said. “I’m very excited the opportunity to bring him back. I think this is where he wants to be. That’s a good thing.”
Woodward, 39, is considered one of the better young coaches in baseball. He worked with Kyle Seager, who credits Woodward’s instruction for him helping him a Gold Glove in 2014.
“I felt like with Chris Woodward we were watching a real impact coach,” Dipoto said. “It’s hard in the big leagues to step in and make an impact early in your coaching career as a young guy like Chris did. I admire it. He’s made an impact on both young and veteran players. I really liked his energy. I felt like he was a very good fit moving forward.”
The McClendon move was the latest in a series of expected personnel changes for the Mariners with more likely to follow. On Thursday, Chris Gwynn, the director of player development, resigned. Earlier in the week, three special assistants to Zduriencik — Pete Vuckovich, Ted Simmons and Joe McIlvaine — and two people from the pro scouting — Duane Shaffer and Joe Nigro — were let go.
Recent Mariners managersThe attack on the Central Reserve Police Force on Monday was undertaken because of the soldiers’ sexually abusing tribal women in conflict areas, Maoists said on Thursday, according to The Hindu. The outlawed Dand Karanya Special Zonal Committee of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) claimed the incident that killed 25 personnel. They were also responsible for another attack in March.
The DKSZC spokesperson “Vikalp” in an audio clip, said, “These attacks are retaliatory, defensive, to defeat anti-people policies and to take forward the pro people struggle… Bhejji and Chintagufa-Burkapal attacks should be seen as (retaliatory) attacks for the dignity and respect of tribal women. These attacks are being carried out to liberate the tribal people in conflict areas from the inhuman atrocities they facing from the security forces.”
He also added that his outfit was against the roads being constructed in conflict areas, and that while they were being done under the guise of “providing relief” to people, it was actually being undertaken “to loot natural resources, to exploit common masses and to make sure easy transport of security forces”.
“Vikalp” said that the attacks were also planned because of the attempt to create an “undemocratic and fascist atmosphere” in the country. “These attacks are in opposition to the exploitation of the Dalits, the Tribals and the minorities and the attacks on their culture and economic lifestyle by the Brahmanic, Hindutva, Fascist, Sanghi, and the BJP governments and the direct involvement and active protection of the police and security forces.”
In the voice clip, “Vikalp” added that soldiers were not enemies of the Maoists, “least of all our class enemies”. “But they are coming in the way of public welfare by being a part of the government’s exploitative and anti-people machinery.” He appealed to soldiers not to lose their lives while protecting “such people and their property”.
Chhattisgarh’s Special Director-General of Police DM Awasthi said security forces commit no such atrocities and that “the human rights commission is dealing with some cases which were reported.” He said veracity of the audio clip released would be investigated.
The government had described Monday’s attack in Chhattisgarh as “cowardly” and condemned it. The Bharatiya Janata Party had also refused to celebrate its win in Delhi’s civic body polls, dedicating its victory to the soldiers who had been killed. Home Minister Rajnath Singh has asked the CRPF chief and his top advisers to revise their strategies against the Maoists. He called the attack an “act of desperation”.One debate ended in St. Louis on Sunday night, while another debate shows no signs of slowing down in Texas.
The 4-1 Cowboys are one of the most surprising teams in football, and at the center of their success is rookie fourth-round pick Dak Prescott, who has surpassed even the lofty expectations augured by his promising preseason. Given how previous preseason sensations looked when the gloves came off, I was skeptical that Prescott would be able to live up to his level of play from August. I was wrong.
Adam Schefter reported Sunday morning that the Bengals, Prescott's opponent in Week 5, broke the rookie down on tape and did not believe he had thrown a single bad pass all season. I would argue that there is probably a pass or two in there which might fit the description, but that's beside the point: Prescott has been incredibly effective. Outside of some aggressive decisions in the red zone, Prescott also didn't do much on Sunday to prove the Bengals wrong. He was phenomenal during Dallas' 28-14 win, going 18-of-24 for 227 yards with a passing touchdown and a rushing score on a read-option keeper. Prescott fumbled in the red zone and took an unnecessary shot from Vontaze Burfict late in the game when he neglected to slide, but he finished with an 87.5 QBR, the fifth-best figure of the week.
Prescott is now second in the league in opponent-adjusted QBR at 84.1, behind league leader Matt Ryan, and he might be losing his job in a few weeks. Even after this hot start, owner Jerry Jones has insisted that Tony Romo is still the team's No. 1 quarterback. Romo is recovering from a broken back, and while the Cowboys obviously don't need to rush him back into the lineup, the preseason timeframe for Romo suggests that he'll be back after Dallas' Week 7 bye for what now looms as a crucial divisional matchup against the Eagles on Oct. 30.
Should the Cowboys insert Romo back into the lineup? Or should they keep Prescott -- who is eight passes away from breaking Tom Brady's record for most pass attempts to start a career without an interception -- in the job for the foreseeable future? I think you can make a case for each side, so let's do that and see if one seems stronger than the other. Starting with the incumbent:
The case for starting Tony Romo
Romo has been a better passer than Prescott. As good as Prescott has been this year, when Romo has been healthy over the past couple of seasons, he has actually been a tiny bit better. Here's a table comparing their numbers since the beginning of 2014, when Romo was gifted with Zack Martin to complete Dallas' devastating offensive line:
Tony Romo vs. Dak Prescott Player Cmp Att Cmp% Yds Y/Att AirYds/Att TD INT Rating QBR Dak Prescott 107 155 69.0% 1,239 8.0 7.5 4 0 101.5 86.7 Tony Romo 387 556 69.6% 4,589 8.3 8.5 39 16 105.9 75.9
Prescott's QBR is better because he has added significant value as a runner, which counts, but might not be sustainable over the long haul. Prescott has three rushing touchdowns in five games, for one. He also won't manage to go his entire career without throwing an interception, and even while we give him credit for having done so up to this point, Prescott's passing numbers are slightly worse than Romo's on a rate basis. The biggest difference is that Romo throws downfield far more frequently than Prescott, as noted in the air yards column; 11.2 percent of Romo's passes traveled 20 or more yards in the air, compared to just 5.2 percent of Prescott's passes.
There are pretty huge error bars on both sides of those numbers: Romo is 36 and missed most of the past year with injuries, while Prescott is five games into his NFL career. Given what we've seen most recently, though, Romo has been the slightly better passer. Given how Romo spreads the field more frequently, he also seems to be the quarterback with the higher short-term upside for the Cowboys.
Romo is more experienced. If the Cowboys are trying to win now and value experience as an asset, Romo obviously has that over Prescott in spades. The old arguments that Romo would turn to dust in December were always foolish and mysteriously never came up in 2014, when the Cowboys went 4-0 and Romo threw 12 touchdowns against one interception with a 133.7 passer rating. Romo's playoff record is an underwhelming 2-4, but he has been relatively effective within those games, throwing eight touchdowns against two picks and posting a passer rating of 93.0. His sack rate in those games is a staggering 10.6 percent, nearly double his career rate of 5.4 percent, which might tell you what has gone wrong in those contests.
Jerry Jones has made it clear that Tony Romo will get his job back. Robert Deutsch/USA TODAY Sports
The argument against rushing Prescott into a key postseason role before he's ready for the moment, ironically, is Tony Romo. It was Romo who had critics bestowing him with the "it factor" during the red-hot start to his own career before a pair of brutal postseason blows. Romo famously fumbled the snap on a chip-shot field goal attempt which would have sealed a playoff win over the Seahawks during his debut season in 2006, and he lost to the Super Bowl-bound Giants at home the following year, which cemented his unfair reputation as a passer who couldn't win when it really mattered.
Prescott may very well win those games when he gets the opportunity, or he might fail if the Cowboys give him the shot two or three years down the line. It also helps that Prescott looks about as cool and comfortable on the field as any young quarterback in recent memory. If experience matters, though, Romo obviously has that point in his favor.
Romo is probably sticking around for 2017 either way. I wrote about Romo's contract situation before the season, and while the Cowboys have locked up center Travis Frederick to a long-term deal, not much has changed. Dallas already has nearly $173 million in salaries tied up on its 2017 cap, and that's without considering deals for Barry Church, J.J. Wilcox, Brandon Carr, Terrance Williams or even Morris Claiborne, who has shown flashes of competence this year. (Even if the Cowboys don't want to re-sign any of those guys, they still need somebody to start in the secondary.) Dallas will create cap room by restructuring Tyron Smith's deal for another year, but they're still going to be working with limited salary-cap space for yet another season.
After restructuring Romo's deal twice since re-signing their star quarterback in March 2013, the Cowboys couldn't make a clean break even if they were so inclined. His cap hold on the roster next year is $24.7 million. If the Cowboys cut Romo, they could designate him as a post-June 1 release and eat $12.7 million in dead money in 2017 with $6.9 million in additional funds hitting their 2018 cap. More plausibly, if the Cowboys trade Romo or encourage the oft-injured passer to retire, Dallas would be responsible for $19.6 million in dead money for Romo on its 2017 cap.
Could the Cowboys afford that sort of cap hold? It's not out of the question. The Cowboys have Prescott locked up for the next three seasons after this one with cap hits between $635,848 and $815,849. If Dallas doesn't need to find a starting quarterback, it could absorb the massive hit from a Romo trade next year, use the $5.1 million in savings to sign a backup quarterback to replace Romo, and then enjoy all the benefits of a bargain-basement quarterback in 2018 before locking Prescott up to an extension in 2019.
Given that Romo will be 37 and coming off two injury-marred seasons, though, will there be an enormous trade market for his services (and contract)? It won't help that the Cowboys will have little leverage, since teams will know Dallas will be trying to offload its star passer. It'll also be in a market where organizations could be considering veteran options such as Sam Bradford, Jay Cutler and Colin Kaepernick in trade or as cap casualties. Somebody will be interested in Romo, but if all the Cowboys can get is a midround pick (a la the Brett Favre trade from Green Bay to the Jets), wouldn't it be better to keep Romo on the roster and have two viable quarterbacks on hand at all times?
The case for starting Dak Prescott
Prescott hasn't done anything to lose his job. There's no simple, concrete answer to the question of whether a player such as Romo should lose his job if he gets hurt and the replacement does well, as you can see from this article. Some players who have been on the injured side of that situation and fearful for their futures would surely tell you they deserve a crack at the gig once they're healthy, while athletes who lurked on the bench and desperately waited for their opportunity would likely say the opposite. It's a matter of preference and context.
With that being said, there's a certain level of credibility a coach gains -- with fans and inside the locker room -- by self-evaluating and putting his best players on the field. Jason Garrett's job isn't in danger, but he has pulled all the right strings during Dallas' 4-1 start. If you watched the Cowboys blow out the Bengals on Sunday, you saw an unfamiliar scene among the guys wearing blue and white: smiles all around. Even the injured players on the bench like Romo and Dez Bryant were beaming. I'm not saying the Cowboys will lose those smiles or see their chemistry dissipate if they make the move back to Romo, but if they do, and it turns out Prescott was the better option, it will cost Garrett a serious chunk of credibility.
Romo's margin for error will be razor-thin. I mention this a lot when we talk about teams promoting high-profile rookie quarterbacks into the starting role, but it applies here. The Cowboys don't need the fans on their side to win, but if Prescott plays at this level for half a season and is dropped to the bench for Romo regardless, it's going to dramatically up the tension at Cowboys games. A not-insignificant percentage of the Dallas fan base already holds some level of contempt for Romo. Everyone loves Prescott.
Dak Prescott isn't running a lot, but his mobility does allow Dallas to do some different things. He scored on a run Sunday. Ronald Martinez/Getty Images
Let's say Prescott continues at this level of play for three more games and then the Cowboys go back to Romo. The first time Romo screws up -- he misses an open receiver, he throws an interception, even pieces together a few consecutive scoreless drives -- what do you think will be the first thing Dallas fans chant? "We Want Dak," of course. Very few fans would insist on Romo if Prescott plays at this level and suddenly has a bad start in Week 8. The one thing the Cowboys can't afford to do is go back and forth and erode each quarterback's confidence. Once Garrett makes a switch, he has to stick with it for a while. That alone may be enough of an argument to keep Prescott in the lineup until he has proved he can't handle the job.
Prescott is Dallas' quarterback of the future, and once you find that guy, you build everything around him. Even if Romo might narrowly be the best option for the next season-plus -- and that is very debatable -- Prescott's clearly the guy whom the Cowboys are about to build their next 10 seasons around. He may not end up rising to that level, but Prescott is the first passer to come around since Romo whom the Cowboys view as a franchise-caliber asset.
Given how important quarterbacks are, a properly incentivized Cowboys team might find its most important short-term tasks after winning a Super Bowl will be figuring out whether Prescott's the guy and giving him as many reps as possible to improve. Obviously, Prescott is far more likely to learn and improve in the starting lineup than he would be watching Romo while holding a clipboard on the sidelines.
Leaving Romo on the bench might actually increase his trade value. If the Cowboys have decided that Prescott's their guy and they don't want to threaten him with Romo's presence on the roster, the smartest thing to do is trade Romo for a draft pick and clear up his dead cap holds as much as possible to free up space for 2018. And given that Romo may not be the same player he was even two years ago, before these injuries, the Cowboys might prefer that other teams' most recent professional tape on Romo comes from the 2014 and '15 seasons as opposed to the games featuring the man with the fractured back. If Romo has slipped and the Cowboys see it in physical therapy or practice, the presence of Prescott allows Dallas to retain plausible deniability if it wants to deal Romo. Being able to hide Romo from view may be the difference between getting a fourth-round pick as opposed to a conditional seventh-round pick. There's value in that.
I can see bits and pieces of both sides here. Each side has a case. The more I think about it, in fact, a third possibility came to mind. (No, it's not Mark Sanchez.) It might be the least satisfying answer of all, but it's also the most accurate one from my perspective:
The case for it not really mattering who the Cowboys start at quarterback
They're both good. While there are still question marks around Romo's health and Prescott's relative lack of professional experience, everything we know suggests that Romo and Prescott will continue to play at a high level when in the Dallas lineup. The table I included in the Romo section says that he might be the better passer, but the numbers are close enough and at a high enough level that there's not really a wrong choice between the two. It's not as if the Cowboys are picking between a hot young quarterback and a league-average veteran, as the 49ers did when they chose Kaepernick over Alex Smith after the latter missed a couple of games with a concussion and Kaepernick excelled in his absence. These are two quarterbacks who can play in reasonably similar offensive styles and produce passer ratings in excess of 100.
This team is built around the running game regardless of its quarterback. Dallas' run-first identity isn't some new game plan the team installed to make things easier for Prescott. Ever since using high picks on Frederick and Martin, the Cowboys have gone with a run-heavy offense and built their team around that dominant rushing attack. During Dallas' 8-8 seasons from 2011 to 2013, Romo averaged 36.3 passes per start. In 2014, when the Cowboys were defending more leads late and turning the ball over to superstar DeMarco Murray, Romo averaged 29 pass attempts per game.
Ezekiel Elliot is leading the NFL in rushing through five weeks and popped this 60-yard TD run on Sunday. Matthew Emmons/USA TODAY Sports
This year, with the Cowboys giving the ball to the phenomenal Ezekiel Elliott, Prescott has averaged only 31 throws per start. After a slow beginning to his professional career, Elliott has kicked into another gear. He has now produced three consecutive games with 130 yards or more, and unlike Week 3, when the Cowboys needlessly ran him into the ground for 30 carries in a blowout victory over the Bears, Dallas gave Elliott only 15 carries on Sunday before letting Alfred Morris carry the rest of the load. I'm still not sure Elliott was worth the fourth overall pick given how good this line looks -- you can imagine the Cowboys might be very happy if they had chosen Jalen Ramsey with the fourth overall pick and spent a fourth-round pick on Jordan Howard -- but with the draft capital a sunk cost, Elliott looks great.
If the defense doesn't hold up, the quarterback won't matter. This Cowboys team is capable of winning a shootout with just about anybody when its main assets are healthy, although it's perpetually trying to keep those stars active. Just as Tyron Smith was gone for a couple of weeks before returning to the Cowboys this week, Dallas has lost Bryant to a knee injury which could hold the Pro-Bowl wide receiver out until the bye week just like Romo.
What has really changed for the Cowboys this year, in addition to improved quarterback play over the Matt Cassel-driven disaster of 2015, is the presence of a much-improved defense. The much-maligned Cowboys pass rush doesn't have any stars, but Dallas is still managing to pressure opposing quarterbacks 23.6 percent of the time, which is a respectable 22nd in the league. Even more notable is that the Cowboys are finally creating takeaways again. In 2014, the Cowboys ended 16.8 percent of opposing possessions with a takeaway, the highest rate in the league. In 2015, that figure fell to 5.6 percent, the lowest in the league. This year, their takeaway rate is 10.4 percent, which is a respectable 18th.
If this team can run the football and play average defense, it can begin to approximate a winning football organization without even being concerned about picking a passer. And if the Cowboys can't run the ball or play defense, Prescott and Romo will each end up in a lot of third-and-long situations with no help at all, which doesn't play to their strengths whatsoever. This speaks to the value of building an infrastructure around a quarterback to make everything else work. Passers such as Prescott and Carson Wentz are off to remarkably quick starts, and the effectiveness of their offenses has much to do with quality offensive lines and well-schemed game plans. Jared Goff and Andrew Luck would kill for that sort of help.
Knowing that the Cowboys will need to make a choice one way or another, I'm inclined to lean toward keeping Prescott at quarterback for now, if only because it's a lot easier to go from Dak to Romo if the former struggles than it would be to go from Dak to Romo and then back to Dak a few weeks later. As I suggested in writing about Jimmy Garoppolo a few weeks ago, though, it's a problem the Cowboys are blessed to face.Sufficiently admired in the UK that they were able to pack out London's Royal Albert Hall in April 2010, Opeth have long been a potent antidote to the notion that prog rock and metal are genres bereft of substance. The Swedes' 10th album, Heritage, is a brave, melancholic and often beautiful heavy rock record that revels in the warm, analogue tones and shimmering mellotrons of the pre-punk 70s while still exuding a sense of wonder at new ideas. Band leader Mikael Åkerfeldt has confessed to a peevish rejection of the modern metal scene, but there is still plenty of rugged oomph amid the labyrinthine riffing of The Devil's Orchard and the Rainbow-like clatter of Slither. Although proudly mired in indulgence – Famine is a bewildering squall of crescendos, calms and rasping flutes; Folklore ends with an outrageous Gilmouresque guitar solo – this is both tasteful and timeless enough to lure in the prog-averse, too.
TopicsThe Left’s goal, as it was during and after the bitter 36-day Florida recount in 2000, is to delegitimize the incoming president because he is a Republican. Democracy isn’t working properly if it puts non-leftists in power, left-wingers reason, so all GOP chief executives must be vigorously opposed.
[…]
But after eight years of President Obama’s Saul Alinsky-inspired tactics, including the near-constant vilification of opponents and the dangerous racial polarization the 44th president has cultivated, tensions are much, much rawer now than they were in 2000.
Protests aimed at undermining the president-elect’s legitimacy began springing up in the wee hours of Wednesday, Nov.9, after TV networks called the race for Trump. Soon after that, this writer saw and spoke to a handful of protesters who showed up at the new Trump International Hotel a few blocks away from the White House just after 4 a.m. On Oct. 1, “Black Lives Matter” and “No Justice, [No] Peace” with the second “no” expressed using a red circle with a slash, were spray-painted at the hotel’s entrance. On Nov. 12, a photo circulated of a protester holding a sign reading “Rape Melania,” a reference to the incoming first lady, at a large demonstration outside that hotel.
[…]
Black Lives Matter released a statement this week denouncing Trump and urging resistance to his presidency.
“Our mandate has not changed: organize and end all state-sanctioned violence until all Black Lives Matter,” the mini-manifesto begins. It refers to Trump’s victory as “the election of a white supremacist to the highest office in American government.”| by Craig White |
After three years of work, Queens Quay will be officially reopened tomorrow. The kilometre-long project, designed by Rotterdam's West 8 and Toronto's DTAH after winning a design competition held by Waterfront Toronto, has moved all traffic to the north side of the roadway, rebuilt the streetcar tracks, significantly improved the Martin Goodman cycling trail through the Harbourfront area, added hundreds of new trees, and replaced narrower concrete sidewalks with vast areas of new granite walkways.
The last bits of Queens Quay are being readied for tomorrow's opening, image by Camil Rosiak
In the lead-up to the celebration, work crews have been scurrying to complete the last touches on the various components, above at Rees Street, and below on the Peter Street slip bridge.
The Peter Slip Bridge with the last fences on it, image by UT Forum contributor Megaton327
Street furniture including inviting new benches, wooden lampposts, and plenty of bike rings add both the aesthetic enhancements and practical equipment that this people place has long needed, but it's the feeling of generous space that now pervades the pedestrian realm here which makes the street so much more inviting.
Completed Martin Goodman Trail beside the York Quay Centre, image by UT Forum contributor Megaton327
A great way to come and see what has been accomplished is to participate in the opening celebration! Waterfront Toronto is still looking for volunteers to participate in the grand opening on Friday evening. If you are available and want to take part in this milestone ribbon cutting, show up wearing blue at the Simcoe Wave Deck between 3 PM and 5:30 PM. You will be needed until about 7 PM, but celebrations will continue long past then.
Martin Goodman Trail separated on the west end of Queens Quay, image by Craig White
Want to see the renderings that the Queens Quay plan has been working towards? Click on our dataBase file for the project, Linked below. Want to get in on the discussion? Choose the associated Forum thread link, or leave a comment in the space provided on this page.WATCH: A WestJet flight from Edmonton to Toronto was forced to make a frightening stopover Monday night. It had to land in Winnipeg because a threat was made to the plane. It was the third threat involving a flight in the last week. Jennifer Tryon reports.
WINNIPEG — Fire and emergency crews were on the tarmac after the emergency landing of a commercial plane at Winnipeg James Richardson International Airport.
Winnipeg fire crews and RCMP were dispatched at roughly 8:30 p.m. Monday for the report of an aircraft with a bomb threat. The RCMP explosives canine unit was also called in, RCMP said Tuesday morning.
WestJet tweeted from their account just before 9 p.m. confirming that flight WS442 from Edmonton to Toronto was diverted to Winnipeg after receiving a threat. The aircraft landed safely and was evacuated, with guests and crew using emergency chutes deployed from the doors.
There were 54 passengers and five crew members on board at the time.
We can confirm that #WS442 (Edmonton to Toronto) has diverted to @YWGairport due to a threat. Guests & crew will disembark soon. — WestJet (@WestJet) June 30, 2015
Guests and crew have evacuated flight #WS442 at @YWGairport. Emergency crews are assisting on site. — WestJet (@WestJet) June 30, 2015
Those who have been evacuated were sheltered in city buses nearby then driven away.
In a tweet WestJet said six of the passengers had to be taken to hospital for injuries sustained during evacuation.
Six guests from #WS442 sustained injuries during the emergency evacuation. Those transported to hospital are being escorted by WestJetters. — WestJet (@WestJet) June 30, 2015
Guests diverted to @YWGairport on #WS442 will be accommodated overnight in local hotels, and will continue their journey tomorrow morning. — WestJet (@WestJet) June 30, 2015
The #WS442 aircraft has been cleared by police. Following routine maintenance, safety and security checks, it will re-enter service soon. — WestJet (@WestJet) June 30, 2015
WestJet tweeted out that everyone on board the diverted plane will spend the night in a hotel before continuing their travels Tuesday morning with passengers expected to arrive in Toronto around 2 p.m.
00:34 – Winnipeg Airports Authority releases statement on #WS442: http://t.co/qNdx5afsoX — Winnipeg Airport (@YWGairport) June 30, 2015
As of 11 p.m. CST there were seven delayed arrivals and one delayed departure at the airport. It is unclear if the delays were a direct impact of the diverted plane. Other flights were still on schedule.
WATCH: For the second time in three days a WestJet flight was forced to make an emergency landing due to a threat. Jessica Kent has the details.
The airline would not provide any information on the nature of the threat.
This is the second time a WestJet flight was forced to make an emergency landing due to a threat in recent days. A similar situation led to a WestJet flight being diverted and landing in Saskatoon over the weekend.
READ MORE: WestJet bomb threat call made to Ontario airport
WATCH: The recent bomb threats might have passengers thinking about flight security, but for the most part people would rather personnel are cautious of every threat. Lisa MacGregor reports.
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Donald Trump has proposed a trillion-dollar infrastructure spending program, and conservative voters seem to have no problem with this. Conservative elites purport to be puzzled. Why did tea partiers go nuts over Obama’s stimulus, but seem fine with Trump’s? That is indeed a chin scratcher, isn’t it? Jonathan Chait wastes some gray cells pondering this:
The entire Republican Party treated Obama’s |
in so doing found himself bringing new harmonies into existence that led to his adoption of a twelve-tone scale capable of all sorts of new harmonic combinations, but he never became an atonalist. Bartok came to the United States for the first time in December, 1927. He made his American debut, Dec. 22, 1927, with the Philharmonic Orchestra, under Willem Mengelberg, in Carnegie Hall, when he was heard as soloist in his own "Rhapsodie," Op. 1, instead of his First piano concerto originally scheduled. The latter work received its American premiere with the composer as soloist at a concert of the Cincinnati Symphony, under Fritz Reiner, in the same hall in February, 1928, and that same month Bartok was heard with his compatriot Joseph Szigeti, the violinist, in a concert devoted largely to his own compositions presented by the Pro-Musica Society at the Gallo Theatre. Later that year he returned to Hungary. Appeared Here With Wife A concerto for violin and clarinet, written in Hungary by Bartok for Mr. Szigeti and Benny Goodman, was heard for the first time with those two artists as soloists in 1939 in Carnegie Hall. The next year Bartok returned to this country and made his first appearance in Washington, D.C., at a concert in the Congressional Library featuring the American premiere of his "Rhapsody," No. 1, for violin and piano. He participated in a program given in his honor by the League of Composers at the Museum of Modern Art, April 24, 1940. Shortly thereafter he went to Europe, returning to New York in October, 1940, with his wife Ditta Pasztory Bartok, with whom he was heard in the world premiere of his "Music for Two Pianos and Percussion," in Town Hall on Nov. 3 of that year. Later in the month the two artists gave a two-piano recital in the same auditorium. It was also in November, 1940, that Columbia University conferred the degree of Doctor of Music upon the composer and commissioned him to transcribe the vast Millman Parry collection of Yugoslav folk music recordings. Bartok was a prolific composer. His stage works, which suffered from unfortunate librettos, but contain some of his finest music, comprised the one-act opera, "Prince Bluebeard's Castle," and two mime-ballets, "The Wooden Prince" and "The Miraculous Mandarin." For orchestra he wrote two Suites, a "Dance Suite," two sets of "Hungarian Folk Songs," "Two Portraits," "Two Pictures" and other works, as well as the "Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta," for small orchestra. His chamber music comprised six string quartets and several unpublished works. He also composed a large amount of piano music and wrote a large number of songs, many based on Hungarian folk melodies, and choral works. Some 450 songs from his collections were published, as well as his two books. From 1940 until his death Bartok lived in New York. He added several extensive works to his long list of compositions, including a violin sonata composed last winter for Yehudi Menuhin and not yet played. Bartok made his last appearance before the public Jan. 21 and 22, 1943, when he and his wife were the soloists in a new orchestral arrangement of the "Music for Two Pianos and Percussion" as a concerto. According to As Ember, New York Hungarian newspaper, the American Control Commission in Hungary recently notified the Foreign Minister that it had given permission to Bartok to return to Budapest. Bartok recently was elected a member of the Hungarian Parliament. Besides his widow, he leaves two sons, Bela and Peter. A funeral service will be held tomorrow at 2 P.M. at Universal Chapel, Lexington Avenue and Fifty-second Street. Burial will be in Ferncliff Cemetery, Hartsdale, N.Y.Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Oil industry consultant Dana Nuccitelli, writing for the Guardian, has launched yet another green attack on democracy, by suggesting that older people who voted for Brexit, or who vote against green policies, are committing “intergenerational theft”.
The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
Youth will bear the brunt of the poor decisions being made by today’s older generations
In last week’s Brexit vote results, there was a tremendous divide between age groups. 73% of voters under the age of 25 voted to remain in the EU, while about 58% over the age of 45 voted to leave.
This generational gap is among the many parallels between Brexit and climate change. A 2014 poll found that 74% of Americans under the age of 30 support government policies to cut carbon pollution, as compared to just 58% of respondents over the age of 40, and 52% over the age of 65.
Inter-generational theft
The problem is of course that younger generations will have to live with the consequences of the decisions we make today for much longer than older generations. Older generations in developed countries prospered as a result of the burning of fossil fuels for seemingly cheap energy.
However, we’ve already reached the point where even contrarian economists agree, any further global warming we experience will be detrimental for the global economy. For poorer countries, we passed that point decades ago. A new paper examining climate costs and fossil fuel industry profits for the years 2008–2012 found:
“For all companies and all years, the economic cost to society of their CO2 emissions was greater than their after‐tax profit, with the single exception of Exxon Mobil in 2008”
…
It now falls to the US to do better than the UK. Risk management and the well-being of future generations must trump ideology and fear in the November elections. We simply can’t afford two of the world’s superpowers being dictated by populism and xenophobia at the expense of our youth’s future.190 BC and the heirs of Alexander face a grave threat. Over the past nine years, a new power has thrust itself onto the Greek World intent on wrestling control. That power is Rome, home of the Senate and ‘City of Seven Hills.’
Achieving great success the Romans now find themselves within touching distance of toppling Hellenistic supremacy in the Eastern Mediterranean. Yet one powerful Kingdom still remains, its ruler determined to protect his hard-won primacy. Legion vs phalanx, this inevitable battle is to decide which culture will reign supreme.
Background: Rome in 200 BC
By this time, Rome was in the process of becoming the dominant power in the Mediterranean. From small beginnings in Central Italy, over the past 200 years, the ‘City of Seven Hills’ had transformed into the epicentre of one of the most powerful nations in the West. The rewards duly followed.
The Illyrians, Insubres, Syracusans and Carthaginians – all once-great powers that by 200 BC, had fallen under the yoke of the Roman war machine. Rome’s supremacy in the Western Mediterranean was now undisputed. Yet this was only the beginning. Another conquest was soon to occur.
The 2nd Macedonian War: 200 BC – 197 BC
To the East across the Ionian Sea lay the Kingdom of Macedon – home of Alexander the Great and epicentre of the prominent Hellenistic World. By 200 BC Macedonia’s rulers were some of the most powerful in the Mediterranean, priding themselves as the rightful heirs to the famed Argeads. They had gathered a formidable reputation; Rome would now put it to the test.
Seizing the chance to put their mark on the beating heart of the infamous Greek World and gain the gratitude of the libertarian Greek cities – who were desperate to be free from Macedonian rule – Rome rapidly prevailed over the Macedonians. Alexander’s Hellenistic descendants in Europe had finally met their match. Their dominance in Macedonia and Greece – two of the greatest pillars of past Greek power – was at an end.
Yet although their victory over the Macedonians marked a remarkable achievement, in reality the Romans had only scratched the surface of Greek military power. Alexander’s Successors did not reside purely in Macedon and Greece. Further east, one other Hellenistic Kingdom still outshone the Romans with both its size and strength.
The Seleucid Empire
At the time of Rome’s victory against the Macedonians, the Seleucid Empire was the most powerful Kingdom in Ancient Asia. Yet this supremacy had not always been the case.
223 BC: Struggle
For much of the 3rd century BC, following the death of their founder Seleucus, this Kingdom had been in almost-constant decline. Inheriting a vastly over-extended empire, Seleucus’ successors had faced a nigh-impossible task, proving incapable of managing such a diverse population (Greeks, Persians, Indians, Bactrians etc). Its result was turmoil.
The Galatians, Ptolemies, Attalids and Greco-Bactrians – just a few hostile neighbouring powers that by 223 BC had made the most of this struggle, seizing land where they could. The Seleucid Kingdom’s complete demise looked only a matter of time. One man, however, had other ideas.
Antiochus III
Ascending the throne in 223 BC, Antiochus aimed to reverse his Kingdom’s current plight and restore Seleucid supremacy in the Near-East. It would be no easy task. To achieve this goal, he would have to re-unite lands stretching from the borders of India in the East to Macedonia in the West under his rule. Yet Antiochus remained undeterred.
Rebuilding the empire
For the next 26 years, the Seleucid ruler would conduct numerous military campaigns. From fighting in Asia Minor (Anatolia), Egypt and Bactria (Afghanistan) to successful diplomacy with various neighbouring kings – including an Indian local ruler called Sophagasenus – gradually Antiochus’ persistence began to reap rewards.
Looking west
By 197 BC, Antiochus’ dedication had met with exceptional success. Having restored his Kingdom’s primacy in Ancient Asia, he had achieved one of the greatest ‘Empire revivals’ in antiquity. Yet Antiochus had no intention of halting his Kingdom’s expansion just yet. One more conquest still had to be made; his ancestors’ former lands in Europe remained outside his control. They would be next.
Crossing over the Hellespont (now the Dardanelles) into Europe, Antiochus quickly reaffirmed his Kingdom’s control on Thrace and the vital Chersonese – lands spear-won by Seleucus over 85 years before. Antiochus now had a solid foothold on European soil, heralding a simple message: He was here to stay.
Uneasy news
For the Romans, hearing of this new presence in Europe was most unwelcome. Only recently had they emerged victorious over the powerful Macedonians; now, to their horror, an even stronger Hellenistic Kingdom was attempting to cement its authority on the Greek World. Suspicious of the true extent of Antiochus’ European ambitions, Rome made its position known:
So long as both Macedonia and any remaining independent Greek cities remained unharmed, Rome – although uneasy at Antiochus’ presence in Europe and the fact that Hannibal, their greatest enemy, was residing in his court – would not pursue war with this powerful Greco-Asian king. All, however, was about to change.
One step too far
In 192 BC, following four years of uneasy relations, Antiochus finally breached the line of Roman patience.
Sailing from Asia Minor with a relatively small force of 10,000 men the Seleucid King landed in Greece and seized control of several cities. The Romans had always been suspicious of Antiochus’ true intentions; now they had been proved right.
192 BC: the Romano-Seleucid War erupts
In this act, Antiochus had crossed the line of no return. The Romans – viewing themselves as the new champions of Greek liberty in the Aegean – knew war was now inevitable.
To many, this would have seemed a daunting prospect. Not only was Antiochus’ Empire massive, but Antiochus’ previous military successes had been so formidable that he was already being hailed by some as the next great Greek general – the next Alexander.
Everything therefore looked set on this war being one of the hardest Rome had ever fought. Yet this Italian power had thwarted such esteemed Hellenistic generals before; now they aimed to do it again. Gathering their armies once more, they prepared for war.
Thermopylae
What followed would surprise even the Romans. Antiochus, seeing his supposed Greek support abandoning him, soon suffered a crushing defeat to Rome at Thermopylae.
Hastily retreating to Asia Minor, Antiochus’ campaigning in Greece had quickly turned into a catastrophe, unnecessarily losing face among many of his subjects – his expedition had proved reckless and ill-prepared. Yet Antiochus remained undeterred.
Although a personal blow, Antiochus’ failure in Greece was only a minor setback. His lands in both Thrace and around the Hellespont – the doorway to Europe – still remained firmly in Seleucid control. He was intent on keeping it that way.
Quickly restrengthening, Antiochus’ forces once again crossed the Hellespont and entrenched themselves inside Lysimacheia, their most formidable stronghold in Europe. On their arrival, Antiochus ordered his men to gather supplies, sharpen the fortifications and prepare to weather the coming storm; the Roman armies were on their way.
In Thrace therefore, did Antiochus’ men aim to make up for their King’s recent failure in Thessaly. Fate, however had other ideas.
Problems at sea
Sadly for Antiochus, things would once again not go according to plan. Not all the fighting was currently happening on land. At sea, thanks mainly to having an alliance with Rhodes, one of the greatest maritime powers of the time, Rome continued to defy expectation.
Following two crushing victories over their opponents – including one in which Hannibal himself was the opposing commander – the Romans succeeded in wrestling control of the Mediterranean from their enemy; a crushing blow for Antiochus’ European ambitions. Its effect on the Seleucid King would be significant.
The mistake
Panicking on hearing of his navy’s defeats, Appian recalls Antiochus’ next blunder,
Everything unnerved him, and the deity took away his reasoning powers, so that he abandoned the Chersoneses without cause … leaving all these sinews of war in good condition for the enemy.
{App. Syr. 6.28}
Antiochus, distressed by his recent defeats, therefore abandoned his final holdings in Europe. Lysimacheia, a city he had re-built from ruin into one of the most formidable fortresses in Europe, was simply left without a fight. The Romans could not believe their luck. Yet the war was still far from over.
Antiochus had already revealed once before his expansionist desires to the Romans; how could they trust such a man to refrain from conducting another, more formidable campaign against them in the future? They could not allow him to remain in command of a powerful kingdom right on Europe’s doorstep. Further action had to be taken.
Crossing the divide
To solve this, Rome decided on a radical plan of action, agreeing – for the first time in their history – to send an army across the Hellespont into Asia. Reaching that land, they aimed to confront Antiochus in his own territory and remove the threat he posed indefinitely. Under the overall command of the consul Lucius Scipio – who was seconded by his famed older brother Scipio ‘Africanus’ – this army therefore set off to become the first Roman army in Asia.
Crossing the Hellespont completely unhindered, the Scipios quickly achieved this milestone. From now on, Rome would be the invaders.
A reversal of fortune
Within six years of his crossing into Europe, Antiochus found himself back at step one. His expeditionary force into Greece had been routed, his fleets severely weakened and all his well-stocked and fortified defences in Thrace had fallen uncontested into the hands of his enemy.
Now finding himself fighting a war in his own territory, Antiochus could not afford any more blunders; the future of his kingdom as a superpower depended on it. Determined to expel the Roman invaders, he once again prepared to fight.
Ever since his retreat from Lysimacheia, Antiochus had been gathering a vast army from across his large Eastern Domain – the best the Seleucid Empire could offer. Now Antiochus aimed to show the Romans the true power of his extensive Kingdom.
Preparing for battle
Following a brief period of manoeuvring, counter-manoeuvring and failed negotiations, the two sides made camp near the town of Magnesia in Lydia. Battle was imminent.
Scipio’s army
Triumphing the strength of their own people, Scipio’s army centred around its powerful Roman infantry and its flexible Manipular formation. Although aided with an equal number of Italian allies, it was these Roman citizens and their style of fighting that had been key to Rome’s past successes. Only recently had they defeated a Hellenistic army with this formation; now they hoped to do it again.
The Roman army did not consist solely of Italian forces however. Among Scipio’s ranks were some formidable Greek allies.
Achaean aid
Ever thankful for Rome’s recent intervention against the Macedonians, one such ally was the Achaean League. Sending a small force under the command of Diophanes – a disciple of their most famous commander Philopoemen – these Achaeans had already proven their formidable skill in the preceding fighting.
For Scipio, these men were undoubtedly a great addition. Yet Diophanes and his Achaeans were not the only Greeks siding with the Romans. One other had staked everything on a Roman victory.
Eumenes II
That man was Eumenes II, ruler of the Attalid dynasty, a small Hellenistic kingdom in Western Anatolia. Bringing his army to Magnesia, that man was determined to expel Antiochus from Asia Minor and the ever-present threat the Seleucid expansion had posed to his kingdom. His role in the upcoming battle would be critical.
The Seleucid army
Boasting one of the most diverse Hellenistic armies ever seen, Antiochus’ army could not have been more different to that of his Roman counterpart. From Syrian scythed chariots and Gallic cavalry from Asia Minor to Arabian camel riders and swift horse archers from Turkmenistan, his army had come from all four corners of his vast empire.
Yet despite this diversity, Antiochus’ force still focused around the most iconic unit of the entire Hellenistic period.
The phalanx
From fighting in the hill fortresses of Thrace to the plains of Southern Italy and the fast-flowing Hydaspes River in India, the Macedonian phalanx had formed the backbone of Hellenistic armies across the Ancient World for the past 130 years. Antiochus’ force was no different.
Having 16, 000 of these troops – including an elite force of Argyraspides – at Magnesia, Antiochus knew their role in the upcoming battle would be crucial, pinning their Roman opponents in place with multiple rows of deadly pikes. Yet albeit critical, the phalanx could not win the battle alone.
Elephants
To aid his powerful infantry, Antiochus positioned nearby one of his most deadly weapons: A small force of Indian War Elephants, the tanks of ancient warfare.
Having maintained good relations with the powerful Mauryan Empire ever since Seleucus I’s treaty with the famed Chandragupta over a century before, Indian elephants had become a frequent part of Seleucid armies. Yet using these beasts also had its risks. If managed effectively, then their impact on a battle’s outcome could easily decide the engagement. If not, calamity could be just as likely.
Deployment
Drawing up his forces, Antiochus deployed his powerful war elephants at regular intervals between each section of his phalanx. Appian, writing over 350 years later, claims the sight from the Roman camp,
The appearance of the phalanx was like that of a wall, of which the elephants were the towers. Such was the arrangement of the infantry of Antiochus.
{App. Syr. 6.32}
Imagine you are facing one of the most powerful armies of our time. Not only is their infantry highly-trained in a tested form of fighting and equipped with the best weapons available, but divided regularly among these soldiers are some of the most feared tanks in warfare, both stronger and more terrifying than any you or your army have faced before.
For a Roman soldier at Magnesia, viewing Antiochus’ phalanx intermingled with the formidable Indian elephants would have been the ancient equivalent of such a sight. The prospect of having to combat such a formation would have looked daunting from a distance. Yet looks, as will be proven, could be deceiving.
The time for admiration was over. Wanting no more delay, battle quickly commenced.
The Battle of Magnesia 190 BC
At first, all seemed to be going well for Antiochus. Commanding the right side of his army himself, he successfully managed to drive back the opposing Romans. So far so good. Yet elsewhere, things were not going as smoothly.
On Antiochus’ left, things quickly turned to disaster. There, intending to put the opposing Roman forces into complete disarray, Antiochus had deployed many of his deadly scythed chariots to lead the charge. Their shock impact, Antiochus and his commanders likely envisaged, would allow their forces to swiftly cut down any remaining resistance at leisure. In practice, the strategy was sound enough. Yet things did not go according to plan.
Chariot calamity
Eumenes, commanding the opposing Roman flank and seeing this impending chariot attack, acted decisively. Gathering his missile-troops the Attalid King rained stones, lead and arrows on the bladed carts, hailing down death and destruction from a distance. The result would prove devastating.
Suffering heavily and refusing to continue being slaughtered from this barrage of missiles, the Seleucid chariots soon became uncontrollable. Turning away from their assailants, they sought safety by any means and charged manically back towards the rest of Antiochus’ flank. Calamity was about to ensue.
Running amok, these bladed wagons of destruction carved devastating gaps through Antiochus’ heavily-armoured mounted troops – the cavalry’s armour making it almost impossible for them to avoid the deadly scythes. Antiochus’ weapon had backfired completely; rather than the Romans, it was his army that now felt the full force of these brutal war machines. In complete confusion and disarray, the Seleucid left was in turmoil.
The critical moment
From this confusion, one man saw an opportunity that would decide the encounter. Appian recalls,
Eumenes, having succeeded (in pushing back the chariots)… led his own horse and those of the Romans and Italians… against the Galatians, the Cappadocians, and the other collection of mercenaries opposed to him… They… made so heavy a charge that they put to flight not only those, but the adjoining squadrons and the mail-clad horse.
{App. Syr. 6.34}
In this one swift, deadly charge, Antiochus’ vast array of powerful cavalry on his right flank evaporated. Eumenes had seen the opportunity; he had been swift to take it.
Exposed
Defeat would follow quickly for Antiochus and his army.
The man himself – caught up in the thrill of a cavalry chase – was blissfully unaware of the calamity. His powerful elephants too, unable to move away from the Seleucid phalanx without causing great disruption, were rendered all-but useless.
As both flanks crumbled around them, Antiochus’ formidable pikemen found themselves completely exposed. Under attack from all sides, their worst nightmare had come true. No longer were these men fighting for Antiochus; now they were battling purely for their own survival.
Encircled, Antiochus’ formidable phalanx prepared a valiant last stand. Forming a square, they protruded their pikes in every direction – presenting any attacking Roman with a wall of death.
Finally, however, succumbing to Roman missiles and the panicking of their own elephants nearby, the resistance crumbled. Rome had won.
Antiochus, expecting to return to a victorious Seleucid army, was shocked. Arriving back at the battlefield to see his great army either routed or slain, the King quickly fled. He had played his last card and lost.
The result
With the destruction of his great force at Magnesia, so too did Antiochus’ hopes of extending his empire into Europe. He could not complain. That King’s war against the Romans had been plagued by tactical errors from start to finish. Magnesia was simply a culmination of such mistakes.
Abandoning his dreams to reform Seleucus’ great Empire, Antiochus admitted defeat and sued for peace.
The Treaty of Apamea: 188 BC
Bathing in the glory of victory at Magnesia, the Scipios would be sure to impose harsh terms on their defeated enemy; never again would they allow Antiochus or his empire to expand westwards. Determined to reduce his power in the Mediterranean, they forced Antiochus to give up almost all his holdings in Anatolia. Yet that was not all.
Having now witnessed first-hand the extent of Antiochus’ available manpower at Magnesia, Rome desired to reduce his military strength even further.
Not only did they strip Antiochus almost completely of his navy, but they also forced him to disband every contingent of his Indian War Elephants. One of the most iconic units of Seleucid armouries for the past century was no more.
Never again would Antiochus or his empire be a threat to Rome; this treaty had mercilessly seen to that. At the outbreak of war, there had been two great superpowers in the Mediterranean. Now, there was only one.
Mare Nostrum
Having implemented these terms on the defeated Antiochus, Roman confidence went through the roof. They had emerged victorious over a general who had styled his previous conquests on those of the famed Alexander; who could now seriously challenge Roman dominance throughout the Mediterranean? From then onward, Rome had every right to call that sea Mare Nostrum (‘Our Sea’).
Yet Rome was not the only power to benefit from victory at Magnesia. Throughout the campaign their Greek allies had proved invaluable. Their aid would not be forgotten.
Rewards
Philip V of Macedon, the Rhodians and the Greek Cities in Asia Minor that had sided with Rome at Magnesia; all were rewarded for their loyalty and assistance against Antiochus. One man and his dynasty however, benefited more than any other from this Roman generosity.
Attalid supremacy
That was Eumenes, the Attalid dynast and hero of Magnesia. Not wanting to control these far-flung lands themselves, Rome granted Eumenes all Antiochus’ former territories in Asia Minor north of the River Maeander.
In one battle, a formerly small Hellenistic power in Western Asia Minor had been transformed into the most powerful force in that entire region. The Golden Age of Attalid rule had begun.
The fate of the Seleucids
As for Antiochus, his fate would be less fortunate. Within a year of Apamea, that Seleucid King met his inevitable end. Desperate for more money to fund a new campaign, he was killed in Susa whilst raiding a temple – a somewhat anticlimactic end to the story of this great king.
In his lifetime, he had restored the Seleucid Kingdom into the most powerful nation in Asia; sadly however, his war with Rome had proven one step too far.
Although one other king would temporarily succeed in reversing its demise, within 23 years of Antiochus’ passing Seleucid power had descended into internal turmoil; a turmoil that it never managed to completely emerge from again.
Eventually – and perhaps fittingly – it would be Rome that put the final nail in that nation’s coffin, annexing their few remaining lands in Ancient Syria into their Empire in 63 BC. One of Alexander’s greatest legacies had finally come to an end.
What if
As with many battles of the time, Magnesia was decided by the initiative of one man seizing an opportunity; it was the quick-thinking of Eumenes that ultimately paved the way for the Roman victory.
Imagine therefore how different antiquity would look if Antiochus’ army had managed to fend off that Greek king’s devastating charge? One unit more than any other in Antiochus’ vast force would have been well-suited for completing this task.
Elephants & horses
Although a fearsome task for any enemy to deal with, these tanks of ancient warfare were especially deadly against cavalry. Not only did their smell panic nearby horses, but their size and power ensured that just a single beast could rip straight through even the most disciplined of mounted formations.
Indeed, Antiochus above all others should have known this fact – his forefather Seleucus had adopted a very similar tactic against one of his greatest foes over a century before.
Rather than deploying the elephants among his infantry – where they ended up just as much of a hazard for Antiochus’ army than the Romans – imagine if Antiochus and his commanders had placed them in reserve?
Deployed there, they would have been easily manoeuvrable and ready to deal with any unforeseen threat; in such a position, these animals would have been ideally situated to counter Eumenes’ devastating attack on the left. If so, then the battle’s outcome may have looked very different.
Repulsing Eumenes
Instead of being the architect of the critical blow, in such a world Eumenes would have found his cavalry charge completely rebuffed – his troops finding their mounts unwilling to run straight into the terrifying Indian elephants.
Eumenes’ intent to seize the initiative would have backfired completely. Rather than fleeing, Antiochus’ left flank therefore, would have remained intact, emerging victorious.
The impact of this would have been far-reaching. Antiochus’ phalanx, safe in the knowledge that both their flanks had successfully repulsed their opponent, would have had no need to form their desperate last stand.
Although no-one can say for sure what would happen next, perhaps the Roman army, finding itself defeated on both wings and held by the phalanx in the centre, would have been the ones to become surrounded instead?
It’s destruction could have easily followed in such a scenario; the consequences of which are fascinating to consider.
Rome in retreat
Rather than instantly fleeing, Antiochus would have returned to cheering troops and a victorious army; his Roman counterparts either lying dead or fleeing back towards Europe.
From fighting at Thermopylae to allowing the Romans to cross unhindered in Asia, Antiochus’ campaign against Rome up to that point had been one of several great military blunders. Victory at Magnesia, however, could have easily turned it all around.
In such a world, despite multiple early successes against Antiochus, Rome’s first ever campaign into Asia would have therefore ended in disaster – hardly the best of omens for future eastern expansion.
To many Romans, perhaps this would have affirmed their fears that Asia was a step too far for their fledgling empire… for now. Crossing back into Europe, for one of their allies more than most would this have been catastrophic news.
Attalid decline
For Eumenes and his kingdom, both would likely have met their end soon after suffering defeat at Magnesia. Cementing his rule on Asia Minor, no longer would Antiochus have allowed Pergamum to remain a beacon for Seleucid resistance in that region.
The Great Altar of Zeus and the Library of Pergamum; two brilliant pieces of monumental architecture that turned Pergamum into one of the greatest Greek cities in the East. Their constructions, however, were entwined with Eumenes and the Attalid ‘Golden Age’ that followed victory at Magnesia.
If not for that victory, then these two iconic creations in the subsequent Attalid supremacy would never have occurred. There would have been no Attalid ‘Golden Age,’ no Attalid supremacy in Asia Minor. A victorious Antiochus would have ruthlessly seen to that.
Rather than Antiochus and his Seleucid Empire, it would have been Eumenes and his Attalid rule that quickly fell into obscurity after the battle.
A bi-polar Mediterranean
Re-affirming his control on Asia Minor, Antiochus’ great empire would have remained powerful on the doorstep of Europe. Rome’s nightmare outcome of the war would have come true.
Such co-existence between these two expansionist powers, however, would never have lasted. As proven with previous bi-polar scenarios – such as that of Sparta and Athens back in 431 BC – war between them would have again erupted soon enough. Its outcome, however, would be anyone’s guess. All possible in a world where Magnesia had not marked the end for Seleucid primacy in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Conclusion
The Roman victory at Magnesia marked its first ever foray into Asia. From then on, the Hellenistic Kingdoms were no longer the clear top power in the Mediterranean; now that title would belong to Rome.
Yet if it had not been for Antiochus’ poor deployment of his elephants – unable to prevent the crushing charge of Eumenes – then it seems very likely that the outcome of Magnesia would have been very different. The repercussions of such are fascinating to consider.
For how long would the Seleucid Empire and Rome co-exist in such a bi-polar Mediterranean World? Would Rome have halted their Eastern expansion indefinitely or would defeat at Magnesia have simply been a minor setback? And of course, what of Hannibal?
Would his hand in the Roman defeat at Magnesia have emboldened him and other past enemies to rise-up and defy Rome once more? All fascinating questions in a world where Antiochus’ formidable elephants had saved his army from ruin.
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Huge thanks to Johnny Shumate for letting us use some of his brilliant images. You can also view his page here.
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Further Reading
Appian’s Syrian Wars here.
Livy’s account of the Roman War against Antiochus (Book 37) here.
Baronowski, D. W. 1991. ‘The Status of the Greek Cities in Asia Minor after 190 B.C,’ Hermes 119 (4), 450-463.
Callaghan, P. J. 1981, ‘On the Date of the Great Altar of Zeus at Pergamon.’ Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 28, 115-121
Errington, R. M. 1989, ‘Rome against Philip and Antiochus,’ The Cambridge Ancient History 8, 244-298.
Habicht, C. 1989, ‘The Seleucids and their Rivals,’ The Cambridge Ancient History 8, 324-387
Tarn, W. W. 1966. The Greeks in Bactria and India, Cambridge University Press.
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EmailIsraeli hardline economy minister Naftali Bennett has indirectly accused John Kerry of Jew-blaming and encouraging global terror for his comments linking the Islamic State (Isis) crisis in Syria and Iraq to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The US Secretary of State had suggested that reaching a peaceful solution to the 'Mother of all conflicts' - as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is called - should be put against the bigger picture of the struggle against Islamic extremism in the Middle East.
In the course of discussions with leaders in the region about the Islamic State emergency, Kerry said that the topic of the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks always came up spontaneously "because it was a cause of recruitment and of street anger and agitation".
"And people need to understand the connection of that... It has something to do with humiliation and denial and absence of dignity, and Eid celebrates the opposite of all of that," he said, referring to the Islamic festivity of Eid.
However, Bennett, who is a Israeli far-right figurehead with a clear pro-settler agenda and youthful image that appeals to both young Israelis and ultra-Orthodox Jews, criticized Kerry's remarks saying that "there is no justifying terror, only fighting it", according to Haaretz.
"It turns out as well that when a British Muslim decapitates a British Christian, there will always be someone to blame the Jew," he said. "To say that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is strengthening the Islamic State is encouraging global terror."
"These are terrorists who want to control the entire Middle East from Syria to Jordan and Lebanon, and to re-establish an Islamic caliphate," he said. "You can either fight this or explain this. The choice is in the world's hands, and it will bear the consequences."
Bennett, who served in one of the Israel Defense Force's elite fighting units before founding a software company, is popular for his outspoken and radical remarks. The settlement champion was criticized for saying in 2013 that he "killed lots of Arabs in my life - and there's no problem with that".In the new Total Film magazine feature on Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice, Ben Affleck and Henry Cavill open up a bit about the motivations for the fight.
"One of the interesting things about Batman is he functions in some ways as an antagonist," Affleck said. "You have to remember, this is Batman versus Superman." The characters don't get along from the start, thanks to Affleck's Bruce Wayne witnessing the destruction in Metropolis during Man of Steel.
"He's found himself in a place of harbouring a tremendous amount of rage for Superman. So it's how he got there, and what that's done to him, and what that's done to people around him," Affleck continued. That |
difference six years can make.ESA set to announce their partnership with the global Asteroid Day initiative, and detail a new mission to study potentially hazardous asteroids
The European Space Agency will host a press conference today to announce that they are a partner on Asteroid Day 2016. Taking place on 30 June 2016, this is a global initiative to raise awareness of the threat from near-Earth objects.
Asteroids are the left-over remnants from the formation of the planets 4.6 billion years ago. We know that they have hit our planet in the past, causing mass devastation, and will continue to do so in the future.
However, it is a natural disaster that can be predicted by monitoring space to find these faint objects. The European Space Agency runs the Near Earth Object Coordination Centre that continually assesses the risk from nearby asteroids.
We also know of several ways that could deflect any asteroids found on collision course, though no techniques have ever been tried in practise. ESA is working to help change this.
It is studying the Asteroid Impact Mission. If approved later this year and awarded funding, AIM would launch in October 2020 and travel to the binary asteroid system Didymos, which consists of an 800m-diameter main asteroid and a 170 m moon, nick-named ‘Didymoon’.
NASA may also contribute to the mission by launching the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART). This would smash into Didymoon in an attempt to alter its orbit slightly. As yet, NASA has not partnered with Asteroid Day.
I am chairing today’s press event, having been asked by Grig Richters, the co-founder of Asteroid Day. I chaired a science panel at the Science Museum for last year’s inaugural event.
You can watch today’s press conference live at 1400 GMT (1500 CET) in the viewer below.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest The press conference will be broadcast live at 1400GMT (1500CET).
Asteroid Day takes place on 30 June because this is the anniversary of the Tunguska impact in Siberia 1908. The resulting explosion flattened 2000 square kilometres of forest in the scarcely populated region.
There were no known casualties but the devastation covered an area the size of a large city.
Richters started Asteroid Day with Queen guitarist and astrophysicist Brian May last year, having worked on the film 51° North, which details the days leading up to a devastating asteroid strike.
Stuart Clark is the author of The Unknown Universe (Head of Zeus), and co-host of the podcast The Stuniverse (Bingo Productions).Bill Moyers talks to Steven Harper, author of our new interactive feature, about what he's learned researching the connections between Trump, his team and Russia going back nearly four decades.
If you’re having trouble finding your way through the blizzard of facts, leaks, rumors and lies howling around the Trump/Russia connection, we have just the guide for you.
Steven Harper is a trained and tenacious tiger for the truth. An outstanding career litigator, he’s also an accomplished writer. His book Crossing Hoffa told the compelling story of his father’s bitter feud with Jimmy Hoffa — he was twice targeted by hit squads. Harper’s also the author of Straddling Worlds, a biography of his old college professor, diplomatic historian Richard Leopold; The Lawyer Bubble – A Profession in Crisis and a roman à clef about life in a “fictional” big law firm. He’s a fellow of the College of American Trial Lawyers and teaches at the Northwestern University School of Law.
Steve and I connected early this year (we’d never met) after he mentioned to a mutual friend that he wanted to dig into the Trump/Russian Connection — the bizarre and entangled ties of Trump’s empire to the murky underworld of Russian billionaires, state officials, hackers and spies.
We struck up a relationship and Steve started digging, using a timeline, the tool he had honed in years of preparing courtroom cases, to create a chronological “map” of events that now threaten to bring down the Trump presidency.
Take a look and you’ll see that a lot has happened.
Today, we are launching a new version of the Trump/Russia Timeline, one that we think is the most comprehensive available online, and one a former assistant Watergate prosecutor says is “the most enlightening… and best source” for tracing the Trump/Russia connection.
With more than 450 separate events, our redesigned timeline gives readers the chance to see everything we know so far about the Trump Russia story, and provides the ability to drill down by specific names to view each player’s personal connections.
Late last week, I talked with Harper about why he embarked on this project, what he’s learned and what we should pay attention to in the Trump Russia investigation.
Bill Moyers: You created this timeline back in February. I think it’s been like Jack and the beanstalk; it just keeps growing. And you’ve been working on it for almost six months, and I have to say, it’s quite an impressive project. But you had to come out of retirement to do it after a long and successful career as a litigator. Why? What was it? It was your idea — you came up with it and you committed with passion to it. Why?
Steven Harper: Fear. I started writing about Donald Trump and what he might do to the rule of law back in early June 2016 when he had his first outburst against the so-called Mexican judge, born in Indiana, who was presiding over his [Trump University] case. And I continued writing about concerns as it related to the rule of law and Trump from my professional vantage point as a litigator of over 30 years. What worried me as I moved into early 2017 is that it just seemed to me that the Trump-Russia issue wasn’t getting as much headline attention as I feared that it might deserve.
So I started this really as a part of a post that I did for your site that just tried to focus people on paying attention to the Trump-Russia story, because of course none of us knew really where it would lead and we still don’t know where it’s going to lead. But as you learn more and more, it becomes — at least to me — more and more troubling. So I began the thing and continued it as an effort to try to synthesize the most important events relating to Trump and Russia, just focus like a laser on that issue — because I do believe it’s central to the survival of democracy in America, and I still think it goes to the core question of Trump’s legitimacy as president.
Moyers: You used the word fear. What is there, not in just the Russian connection, but what is there about Trump that makes you fear for the, quote, “rule of law”?
Harper: Well, there’s been a steady erosion — I’ve called it a dangerous normalization of Donald Trump — in terms of his actions. We’ve now gotten ourselves to the point — and it was well underway during the campaign season and it’s continued in spades since then — of no longer asking whether Trump is going to do something outrageous that in any prior time that I’ve been living, over 60 years, people would say, “Wait a minute, what’s going on here?” We’ve now gone from asking whether to allow him to normalize himself and desensitize us, to just asking when it will happen again. And if you couple it with the fundamental lack of transparency with respect to his financial affairs, the sort of ongoing bromance that he still maintains with Vladimir Putin, all of this stuff is just very troubling in terms of what it means for not just America today, but for the America of my children and my grandchildren. Whatever he’s doing now could matter a lot more to them.
The question is: Are Americans going to vote for their candidates based on [false] information — because ultimately, that’s what democracy requires, an informed electorate, or are we going to allow that to disappear?
Moyers: What is unique about the Russian connection, potentially, that is different from other abnormal deviations that concern you? What is it that calls you to look at this story as opposed to his business empire or his campaign?
Harper: I think it does go to the question of the fundamental legitimacy of the man who sits in the Oval Office. If you’re worried at all about whether your vote matters as an American, then something like Russian interference with a presidential election with a specific aim to determine the outcome, and with a specific aim to determine the outcome in favor of someone who already has some connections [to Russia] of some kind, full story to be determined, that ought to be upsetting to anyone who thinks that what we do in America is vote for leaders who are then responsible to and responsive to us as our elected officials.
Russia is in my view the big deal in American political history for the last 200 years. This is it.
Moyers: Why?
Harper: Because if we no longer have the sanctity of the vote because a foreign power can interfere in ways — whether it’s through a fake news bombardment of the populace through bots or whether it’s changing electoral totals on machines — the effect is just as insidious, it’s just as dramatic and it’s just as bad. And the question is: Are Americans going to vote for their candidates based on [false] information — because ultimately, that’s what democracy requires, an informed electorate, or are we going to allow that to disappear? Because if we do, then what’s left?
Moyers: So there’s no doubt in your mind that the Russian government tried to influence American public opinion in favor of Trump over Clinton?
Harper: Correct. Yes, I stand with all of the US intelligence agencies on that one.
Moyers: Well, both had motives, obviously, Trump to win the election, Putin to punish Clinton for criticizing a previous Russian election as corrupt, as you know, and for opposing his foreign policy toward Ukraine and Eastern Europe. Was there something else? You mention, if I may be journalistic for a moment and ask you — we journalists follow the money trail. Do you think there’s a money trail here that led to what happened last fall?
Harper: To me, that’s an evolving theme of this story. It also, at least to me, becomes increasingly clear that there is. And I think there are a number of different themes that converge, but follow the money is I think the right way to view much of what Trump says and does. And how you follow the money, where the money leads and who gets what and who gains what out of that is I think going to turn out to be a central part of this story.
Time will tell ultimately, but I have my own suspicions about it for sure. Trial lawyers will tell you — which is the kind of law I practiced — there are two types of evidence. There’s direct evidence and there’s also circumstantial evidence. And the circumstantial evidence with respect to the flow of Russian money, the desire of Russians in the ’90s and thereafter to launder money out of the country and into various Western countries, particularly through the expedient of real estate, with New York being an especially favorable place to do that — you know, I think all of these things are going to converge in a way that when you start to look at everything that’s happening through that lens, you can crystallize things.
But it’s very difficult for someone just trying to pick up the story and say, “Well, tell me what’s going on” and all you hear about is, well, today The Washington Post said that he was involved in drafting his son’s response to a meeting in June of 2016. Unfortunately, I think a lot of Americans just sort of shrug and say, “Well gee, so what?”
Moyers: What do you make of the fact that, although the Trump administration repeatedly lobbied Republicans in Congress to weaken the sanctions against Russia, the House and the Senate both passed a very strong sanctions bill with bipartisan support? And apparently reluctantly but nonetheless with finality, Trump signed it this week. Can you interpret that for us?
Harper: Yes — two things are interesting. One, the signing statement is about as close as I think you could get to apologizing to Putin for having to sign it. And two, it does seem to me that the strong bipartisan support for the bill does suggest that somewhere along the line the GOP is willing to say, “OK, that’s enough.” The problem is, I think ultimately still, that in pursuit of their other agenda items, they’re willing to, at least to this point, to let him go way too far in eroding the central norms of democracy that make America what it is.
Moyers: How have you kept from being overwhelmed by — you know, there are over 440 separate events on your timeline. How do you decide what’s the most important item/event to include?
Little did I imagine that it would grow to, as you say, over 400. And the only way to keep track of it has been to be on it weekly.
Harper: I started with what I thought was going to be a much more modest task because the original timeline, which appeared in that post back in early February, only had about two dozen entries.
Little did I imagine that it would grow to, as you say, over 400. And the only way to keep track of it has been to be on it weekly. I have the luxury of not having to go to work every day other than work on this and it’s become a full-time job in many ways. But what better way to use my hours of retirement than trying to keep track of a story that I think will be a central story in the definition of America for a long time to come? It would be very hard to pick up the thread now, I think, and try to say, OK, well, how do I begin to get my arms around this thing? If I hadn’t been doing it all along, I probably wouldn’t even have the desire to try to start it—
Moyers: Well, let me ask you one question. If you were to bill us on an hourly basis for what you’ve done on this timeline, I’d have to have my own Russian connection to pay for it. [laughter]
Harper: I’d give you a special rate, Bill.
Moyers: So how do you decide what to include? I mean, the faucet is never turned off.
Harper: No, it never does turn off. It’s a challenging process, and I tackle this the same way I would have tackled a complex piece of litigation when I was trying cases to juries. Because ultimately what you’re trying to do is sort the relevant from the irrelevant and then figure out what the relevant facts mean.
So the first step is focus. While I’m aware of a lot of other things that are going on in Trump’s world, and occasionally write about those as well, for the purposes of this timeline I’m really trying not to get lost in the media culture of sound bites and the Trump culture of lies, diversions, deflections and distractions. And the focus for me is, all right, let me just look at this and see, does this in some way relate to the ongoing unfolding Trump/Russia story? So that’s the first cut.
And then the next cut is facts. How do I make sure that the timeline is not simply, dare I use the phrase, fake news?
And frankly for me, that’s where the trial lawyer’s training comes in. That’s why with every entry, we have embedded links that allow the reader to check me out. I encourage fact-checking. I’m delighted if someone — it doesn’t happen too often, but if someone says, “Say, I checked on this and this link doesn’t quite line up with this,” I want to know that. But I also put my sources right in there where people can look and see for themselves. So what matters ultimately are the conclusions that thoughtful readers draw from the facts, not what I tell them to believe.
The tough part of the exercise, I will tell you — and again, this is a derivative of my training as a trial lawyer — is the limited capacity — it’s pretty big but it’s limited — capacity of the human mind to retain information. There’s an analogy that one of my mentors used to use to presenting evidence to a jury. He would say it’s sort of like pouring coffee into a cup and saucer. You can keep pouring facts in and they may all be facts and they may all be proven and everything else, but if you pour in too much, eventually the coffee’s going to spill onto the saucer and the trial lawyer never knows what remains in the cup of that juror’s mind. So that’s the challenge and that’s why I think our next phase with the timeline is going to be to continue to develop themes that allow people to access separate strands more readily as well as to identify events related to particular people and they can do searches that way and so forth.
In terms of the sources that I use, every morning I start my day with The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and a number of the magazines that come out weekly. I check but try not to dwell on what the television news outlets have to say because they’re mostly summarizing and repeating things, although occasionally there’s breaking news. I try to watch most of the press conferences when they’re televised. And I pay attention to what’s happening on Twitter, including Donald Trump’s, because he has a way of revealing himself sometimes and sometimes in very important ways.
Moyers: Let me double back to the previous point you made that you want to look ahead to themes. You want to anticipate themes as they come. But have you seen at least the beginning of a theme that ties all of these 456 separate events together?
Harper: I don’t know that it’ll tie every single one of them, because despite my best efforts it could very well turn out to be that a number of them won’t fit into the larger puzzle, but [I think] there’ll be enough of them that fit into certain puzzles that all of a sudden there’s a story that makes sense here and is proven with facts — and provable with facts, I should say. I think one theme will continue to be important will be the money trail. I think another theme will be just noticing or being aware of how events throughout the summer campaign of 2016 are awfully difficult to explain as coincidences, whether you call them hacking, Trump advisers interacting with Russians, Trump’s refusal to disengage from his Putin bromance. I think all of those things are going to be of a piece.
A third theme that has become prominent since I started the original timeline is what I would call the erosion of Trump’s sequential defenses, and unfortunately, the willingness of the GOP to let him get away with it. Just to illustrate the point, you know this all started with Trump and his team assuring everybody there had been no contacts between the campaign and Russians. That was defense No. 1. Defense No. 2 was, well, if there were contacts, there was no collusion. And then that has disappeared. Defense No. 3, particularly in light of the June 9, 2016 meeting among Trump’s senior advisers and the Russians, is, look, anyone would do it; it’s oppo research. Well, that isn’t really selling very well. So defense No. 4 has become, well, the Russians didn’t provide anything that was helpful anyway, so no harm, no foul. And now we’re up to [Nos.] 5 and 6, which I would summarize as whatever happened didn’t affect the election outcome, and No. 6, the newest one, is no matter what happened, Trump is still a legitimate president. And I think that No. 6 is a big one because I think that’s very much in question based on the failure of defenses 1 through 5.
Moyers: About that meeting in the summer of 2016, what about the revelation last week that Donald Trump himself dictated his son’s statement describing the meeting? He dictated it demanding that Don Jr. include the lie in it that it was really about adoption. Seems to me the father was demanding that the son potentially perjure himself. Does that make any sense to you?
Harper: Well, very little of what happens coming out of Air Force One makes much sense to me.
But in terms of perjury, nobody’s under oath. So you’re away from the technical requirements of perjury. I actually was sort of amused when the story came out for two reasons. I mean, not amused in a funny way, but maybe bemused is a better way to put it. No. 1, if you’re a lawyer, coming at it purely from the standpoint of an attorney, you have to wonder about a client who will so disregard what’s happening around him that he’ll do something that every lawyer worth his salt would never allow to have happen, which is have direct communications with another potential witness, namely Don Jr., about what he’s going to say about an issue and an event that is clearly going to become central to the ongoing saga. That was the part that was at least as stunning to me as the substance.
And on the substance, I thought it was amusing that when asked about it, Sarah Huckabee Sanders dismissed it, saying, “Well, this is just the president weighing in”—
Moyers: Yes [laughs].
Harper: As any father would for a son. Well, we all know who carries more weight in that situation. So I find the whole thing quite remarkable.
The other remarkable thing too is that it just keeps on going. We went from statement No. 1, which didn’t sell because The New York Times was still digging and found more. He went to statement No. 2, which didn’t sell because The New York Times said, “Hey, guess what, we’ve seen the emails.” And now we’ve gone to the release of the emails and then we had a period of several days where we had a dribbling out of, well, who were the Russians that were actually in that meeting, by the way? And of course, that has exploded into an entirely new story, I think, that, again, if we follow the threads of that, it’s going to lead to some interesting places.
Moyers: How so?
Harper: William Browder’s testimony of July 26 got lost in the chaos of the Trump tweet about the transgender ban on military service, the health care debacle for the GOP in the Senate, and of course the infamous Mooch interview for The New Yorker. But in his testimony before Congress, Bill Browder put some flesh on the bones of a number of issues relating ironically enough even to Russian adoptions.
Moyers: And who is Browder?
Harper: Bill Browder was an American financier who hired a lawyer in Russia named Sergei Magnitsky, because he was concerned that there were some shenanigans happening with respect to tax payments that he’d made to Russia. And to make a long story short, Magnitsky discovered through his investigation that in fact $230 million of Browder’s money had been misdirected into the pockets of Russian officials. And Magnitsky then wound up testifying against those officials.
Shortly thereafter, he was arrested, put in prison and for almost a year subjected to physical abuse until he died in 2009 at the age of 37. What came of that ultimately was Browder’s determination not to have let Magnitsky’s death be in vain, so he made it his personal mission to try to seek justice on behalf of his former lawyer. And what resulted from all of that was something called the Magnitsky Act—
Moyers: Passed by Congress?
Harper: Correct. Signed by President Obama in December of 2012. In response, Putin — according to Browder’s testimony — was furious and made it one of his primary objectives to reverse those sanctions because — again, according to Browder — they could very well reach Putin personally because he has a lot of assets in Western countries. So the next thing that happens is, as retaliation for the Magnitsky Act, Putin imposes a ban on Americans’ adoption of Russian children.
The discussion about the Magnitsky Act and the discussion about the adoption of Russian children actually does become in the end a discussion about Russian sanctions, which of course is the ultimate irony of Trump’s crafting — if that’s what he did — of Don Jr.’s statement, because in the effort to make it seem innocuous, if you scratch just two or three inches below the surface, you’re right back in the thick of it in terms of Putin and sanctions and the Trump campaign.
Moyers: And the congressional sanctions passed by Congress, which Obama signed, as you said, were a threat to Putin’s own wealth, much of which he has outside the Russian border, right?
Harper: That’s right.
Moyers: Well, that brings me back to what journalistically is the meta-narrative that I see emerging, from your work actually, which is that — you may have read the very powerful and well-detailed piece in The New Republic recently by the investigative reporter Craig Unger about how the use of Trump Tower and other luxury high rises to launder dirty money ran into an international syndicate and, as he says, “propelled a failed real estate developer into the White House.”
So my meta-narrative, Steve, would be suggestively — not convincingly, but suggestively this: that the Trump empire would have gone under 15 to 20 years ago if rich Russians hadn’t bought his apartments here in New York. Donald Trump Jr. is on the record as saying the money poured in around that time from Russia. And my hunch is they were all counting on using the presidency and Putin to mutual benefit so the money would keep pouring in once Trump leaves the White House, if not before. Does that make sense to you?
Harper: It’s certainly possible. It’s certainly possible. You’re raising the right question I think, because one of the challenges of a follow-the-money narrative is determining into whose pockets do you want to go? Because there are a lot of different pockets to choose from, some on the American side, some on the Russian side. And that alone, again, becomes a series of daunting tasks. We can follow Paul Manafort’s money into his pockets, we can follow Mike Flynn’s money into his pockets, we can follow the Trump Organization and see what money flows into their pockets. And that’s just the American side of the equation. What you raise may very well turn out to be true. Probably the difficult part of the Russian side of this is going to be tracing through a lot of this.
Moyers: Is that Mueller’s challenge? Is that Robert Mueller’s task?
Harper: I suspect it is and I suspect he’s well onto it. I don’t know if this is going to turn out to have been relevant or not, but the same lawyer who was in attendance at the June 9 meeting in 2016 with the top Trump campaign people was also representing the defendant in a case that Preet Bharara had brought as US attorney in the southern district of New York that was going to involve a trial and evidence relating to Russian money laundering. And in fact, it was a trial that grew out of, in some ways, the very fraud that Sergei Magnitsky had uncovered. And that case settled two days before it was supposed to go to trial in May of 2017, and not surprisingly, some Democrats in Congress would like to hear some answers from Attorney General Sessions about how that settlement came about.
Moyers: Do you think that Trump’s refusal to disclose his tax returns in 2016, a departure from what presidents for 40 years at least have done, is perhaps tied to the Russian connection, to all of this that we’ve been discussing and people have been reporting?
Harper: Let’s put it this way, it won’t surprise me if that turns out to be true. And the tax returns may not even be the more important pieces of financial evidence relating to all of this. It may well be that what you really need to do is get into the bowels of the documents relating to the various Trump Organization projects and their various partnerships, limited-liability corporations and so forth.
Real estate developers can have very complex structures relating to their deals and you’re not necessarily going to get all that in a tax return. I suspect that one of the things that might be of concern or have been of concern to Trump was that the tax returns could begin to pull the thread on a financial disclosure sweater that could lead to some, let’s just say interesting, questions about who some of the business partners are that he’s had over the many years of his projects in New York and in Florida and elsewhere. We know a little bit about some of them, but I think there’s a reason that goes beyond, “This is private and I don’t want anyone to know about it” for not releasing his tax returns. And I think there may be a reason that goes even beyond greed.
Moyers: Can you say a word about that?
Harper: Well, again, I’m not sure where the evidence will ultimately lead but another powerful motivator besides greed is fear. And it wouldn’t surprise me if Putin knows things about Trump and his business arrangements that the American public does not and it could very well be that the prospect of having the American public learn some of those things is not a pleasant prospect for Trump.
Moyers: Earlier you identified some of the highly qualified, highly respected sources you have used, as all of us have, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post. I mean, it may be the last great newspaper war between The Post and The Times in particular — it’s very invigorating for us journalists. During the life of this timeline, have you listened to the counterarguments? Have you watched Fox or read Breitbart or gone to those sources that are positing a defense of Trump or a refutation or discrediting of what we’ve been talking about?
Harper: Sure. There is some honest reporting, I believe, that comes out of Fox News. But there’s also some deflection, diversion and distraction that comes out of a number of those far-right media outlets. But I pay attention to it.
Moyers: Right. You are a litigator, a trial lawyer, a successful one. You were before you retired. How would you take all of this and frame Trump’s defense if you were his lawyer?
Harper: The first thing I would want to know, and I’m not sure any of his lawyers know this, is tell me what the facts actually are. Because you can’t really frame a defense unless you know where the vulnerabilities are in the facts. And if the facts are going to trip you up, you’re going to get into trouble pretty quickly. Ultimately as a trial lawyer, at least in front of a jury, the only thing you have is your credibility in front of the jury for whatever it is you’re going to ask them to believe the evidence shows.
I guess the most recent case of a lawyer being trumped up, I’m sorry, tripped up [laughter] — maybe trumped up too, maybe that’s a new way to look at this — is the way one of Trump’s lawyers, Jay Sekulow, went all over the news outlets after the story broke about Don Jr.’s statement and said, “Well, the president had nothing to do with that statement.” There are three or four different Sunday talk shows that he appeared on.
Moyers: Oh yes, I saw that.
Harper: And guess what? It turned out to be not true. And of course we’re used to that world, but I think as a lawyer at least, I would be awfully concerned if I had a client lying to me like that. When your answer to the question “How do you know?” is “Because the president told me,” that gets pretty tricky for a lawyer, I think.
Moyers: Did you use timelines like this in your own courtroom cases?
Harper: Yes. And in fact I also created one for the first book that I wrote, which was about my dad and his tangle with Jimmy Hoffa in the late ’50s and early ’60s. And I think that’s sort of a standard trial lawyer approach to the thing. Again, I’m thinking in terms of the jury’s receptivity or a reader’s receptivity to what it is you’re going to expose them to. I think most people in the reception of information think in a linear fashion, so it’s easier to follow if the first words out of your mouth to a jury are, “The story of this case begins” and then you take them through.
That’s as opposed to the way many lawyers think, which is based on issues, so is there obstruction of justice, is there witness tampering, is there something worse? But if you think about the factual presentation as really being driven by a linear narrative, it becomes easier to do two things. No. 1, to keep the facts straight yourself, and then No. 2, if you start with a basic linear narrative, as I did back in early February with 24 entries, you can then sort of drop new things in as you find them. In a case like this, unlike a case that I would have for a jury, the facts are still evolving.
Moyers: Do you find yourself slipping here into your old mode? Do you find yourself, as you work on this timeline, making a case or preparing an argument?
Harper: I’m trying very much not to do that. [laughter] I went through this exercise a little bit — again, going back to my very first book. When you’re writing a book about your father and a challenge that he faces in his life, the struggle there is to try to do everything you can to maintain a sense of objectivity about what you’re doing, because you don’t want to get lost in the world of hyperbole or bias. So I’ve tried very, very hard — I’ll take positions, and I have taken lots of positions in my substantive essays for your site and for others. But when it comes to this timeline, I’ve tried to keep that in what I would call a pristine state.
I’m hopeful that if someone reads through the timeline, they’ll see the effort is really no editorializing at all on my part, simply a straightforward “Here is what happened.” Because ultimately, what is most persuasive to people is what they come to believe on their own, not what someone tells them they should believe. So I’ve tried very hard. I don’t know how successful I’ve been but I know that your team has also been very useful for me in trying to maintain that kind of objectivity in the presentation.
Moyers: Well, it’s been a marvelous partnership, from which I have learned much and for which I’m grateful.
Harper: Thank you, Bill, have a good day.
Moyers: You too. Bye.Cancer studies pass reproducibility test
A high-profile project aiming to test reproducibility in cancer biology has released a second batch of results, and this time the news is good: Most of the experiments from two key cancer papers could be repeated.
The latest replication studies, which appear today in eLife, come on top of five published in January that delivered a mixed message about whether high-impact cancer research can be reproduced. Taken together, however, results from the completed studies are “encouraging,” says Sean Morrison of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, an eLife editor. Overall, he adds, independent labs have now “reproduced substantial aspects” of the original experiments in four of five replication efforts that have produced clear results.
In the two new replication efforts, however, one key mouse experiment could not be repeated, suggesting ongoing problems with the reproducibility of animal studies, says one leader of the Reproducibility Project: Cancer Biology.
The unusual initiative was inspired by reports from two drugs companies that up to 89% of preclinical biomedical studies didn’t hold up in their labs. The project is having contract labs repeat key experiments from about 30 high-impact cancer papers published between 2010 and 2012. Whereas some researchers laud the effort, others have worried that contract labs lack the expertise to perform certain experiments as well as cutting-edge academic research labs and that any failures will unfairly tarnish the field.
In January, critics’ fears were realized when the first five replications came out. Only two studies could be reproduced; one result was negative, and two studies were ruled inconclusive because of problems with mouse tumor models. The findings have led some experts to conclude that biomedicine suffers from a replication crisis.
Now, scientists’ track records seem to be improving. In one of the new studies, a contract lab confirmed a 2010 report in Cancer Cell that mutations in genes called IDH1 and IDH2, found in some leukemias and brain cancers, cause cells to produce a metabolite that spurs cancer growth. The replicators also verified that levels of the metabolite in leukemia cells indicate whether a cancer patient has the IDH mutations. (The original paper’s lead author, Craig Thompson of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, who co-founded a company that is testing IDH drugs in clinical trials, was traveling and unable to comment.)
The second replication study looked at a 2011 Nature paper reporting that a compound called a BET inhibitor, which controls whether genes are activated—can stop a type of leukemia. As in the original study, the compound, I-BET151, killed human leukemia cells in a dish and reduced their numbers in mice that had been injected with the cells. However, unlike in the original paper, these mice did not survive any longer than untreated mice with leukemia.
Several scientists say that result doesn’t invalidate the overall conclusions that I-BET151 works against leukemia. The replication team did the mouse experiment differently, using a lower dose of I-BET151, for example. Given such differences, “I think we should be careful not to make too much of the absence of statistically significant differences in survival as an endpoint,” says Harvard University molecular biologist Karen Adelman, an eLife editor who oversaw reviews of the replication paper.
And cancer biologist Tony Kouzarides of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, who led the original Nature study, says this one negative result “highlights the pitfalls of biological research, namely thatdifferent labs may vary conditions that affect the outcome of a given experiment.”
But Tim Errington of the Center for Open Science in Charlottesville, Virginia, which is co-sponsoring the reproducibility project, counters that the fact that the mouse survival experiment worked only under certain conditions raises questions about whether the paper’s overall findings are “robust.” He adds, “You want this to be generalizable.”
The cancer biology project hopes to finish experiments for another 22 replications by the end of this year, when the grant funding the effort runs out, Errington says.When I was in third grade, I happened upon a conversation between two male classmates of mine. Pokemon had just started airing as part of the weekday afternoon block and was quickly growing into the mega-franchise it |
identify novel mechanisms or disease targets are of particular interest. The assays should be amenable to medium- to high-throughput screening, ideally in 96-well or 364-well format.
The cell-based phenotypic screens should be based upon a physiologically relevant cellular assay, ideally using patient-derived primary cells. The preferred assays should demonstrate disease-relevant assay stimuli (e.g. cytokines for inflammatory disorder) with readouts that are closely linked to and predictive of clinical endpoints.
This is an Ideation Challenge, which has the following unique features:
There is a guaranteed award. The awards will be paid to the best submission(s) as solely determined by the Seeker. The total payout will be $15,000, with at least one award being no smaller than $7,500 and no award being smaller than $2,500.
. The awards will be paid to the best submission(s). The total payout will be $15,000, with at least one award being no smaller than $7,500 and no award being smaller than $2,500. The Solvers are not required to transfer exclusive intellectual property rights to the Seeker. Rather, by submitting a proposal, each Solver grants to the Seeker a fee-free, royalty-free, perpetual, worldwide, and non-exclusive license to use any information included in the proposal for all purposes. Each proposal is submitted by the Solver on a non-confidential basis.
Submissions to this Challenge must be received by 11:59 PM (US Eastern Time) on January 17, 2016. Late submissions will not be considered.Red Dead Redemption was undoubtedly one of the best games to come out of the last generation of consoles but unfortunately, it never quite made it to PC. However, the rumour mill this week is claiming that PC gamers may finally get their chance, as Rockstar is apparently planning a Red Dead Redemption re-release, which would come to PC, Xbox One and PS4.
This is according to a source speaking with the Korean site, Game Focus. According to their source, a remastered version of the game is currently being localised for Asia, and may even be announced at the PlayStation Meeting on the 7th of September this week.
There isn’t much more information beyond that, but if this proves to be true, then we may end up with some official information in just two days time.
This isn’t the first time we have heard of Red Dead Redemption returning, earlier this year various sources claimed that a sequel is on the way, the game’s map even leaked (allegedly). Unfortunately, a sequel hasn’t been announced just yet but a re-release of the first game could tide people over while work on the sequel wraps up. That, and it would also give PC players a chance to experience it.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru Says: I missed out on Red Dead Redemption last generation but if the game were to come to PC finally, I would pick it up. Hopefully this rumour doesn’t turn out to be false, after all, a lot of people would probably play through Red Dead again if given the chance on new platforms.Thank you all so much! We're so thrilled at the amazing support everyone has shown! Our final stats were -
Total funds: $147,512 (1475% funded)
Backers: 1,619
That's just incredible! And as a special bonus thank-you, we have decided to still count the final stretch goal if we can reach $150,000 with our BackerKit totals, which means it is almost guaranteed.
What Happens Next
The first thing that's going to happen is that tomorrow (June 3rd), you will receive the Kickstarter survey. This is not the full survey, but it does include one very important question: What is your DriveThruRPG account email?
Make sure you have that account ready to go and answer that survey question right away! We're asking for that before we even send out the BackerKit survey because we want to get the Core Rules PDF to you as soon as possible. We'll probably send the first batch early next week.
By that time, we should have the BackerKit surveys going out as well. The BackerKit survey period will stay open for much longer, because we'll need to do a lot of resolving of addresses, shipping amounts, add-ons, and so forth. We will also be opening a pre-order page for those who were not able to participate in the Kickstarter. Keep an eye out for that!
If you have any other questions, feel free to ask them. We will make sure to keep all our communication channels open. We know that many of you had individual needs and requests, and we will definitely be addressing those in the coming days and weeks. We won't forget you!
In the meantime, raise a glass with us and celebrate this wonderful beginning for The Dark Eye's English-speaking community! You did it!Image caption The victim was shot after burglars broke into the house in Sible Hedingham - they fled empty-handed
A householder suffered "life-changing injuries" when he was shot by burglars through a bedroom door.
The victim, aged in his 40s, was hit in the leg after two men forced their way into his home in Sible Hedingham, Essex, in the early hours of Saturday.
They threatened their victim before shooting him through a door after he locked himself in the bedroom, said police.
The men then fled the house without taking anything.
Police found the wounded man after being called just before 04:40 GMT.
"He locked himself in a bedroom and it is believed a gun was then fired through the door injuring him," said Det Sgt Mark Cadd, of Essex Police.
"This was an extremely distressing incident for the victim and he has suffered life-changing injuries which have left him in great pain.
"I urgently need to find the men responsible."
Any witnesses who spotted anything suspicious in the village should contact police, he said.
The two suspects are white, in their 20s, of slim build and wore dark clothing. One is described as bald.
Officers are carrying out a forensic search at the scene and house-to-house inquiries are under way.Update: For a well-reasoned rebuttal to at least my views on design, check out Leigh’s counter-post once you’re done reading here.
I’ve been alluding to this for a few months now, but let me repeat: The Mac is poised for innovation over the next few years on a scale that we haven’t experienced since the initial move to OS X in the previous decade. After five years of focusing on new categories like the iPod and the iPhone while gradually improving its Mac product line, the company has now freed up the resources to strengthen its core and highest-revenue business: Macs. And at the same time, new technologies are emerging to take the Mac to the next level. To read why, click through.
When Apple released the first iPod in October 2001, the company’s future was very much in doubt. Despite years of cool Mac designs and the roll-out of Mac OS X, Apple’s market share was worse than ever, and the PowerPC roadmap was already starting to show signs of trouble. Initially seen as a desperate, niche product, the iPod went on to save Apple, establishing it as a media powerhouse. But Apple didn’t sleep on its success, immediately beginning work on what became the iPhone, and in the process creating a new platform for its portable media devices. With the iPhone 3G just more than a week from release, this platform is stable and just starting to take off. Multi-touch works great, the processor is plenty fast, and storage is getting cheaper and cheaper. Most of the complaints that remain about the iPhone and iPod touch are software related. Apple can easily get another two years out of both devices doing little more than increasing capacity and developing new software. They need maintenance, not innovation. At most, an iPhone nano or touch nano might come, but these devices won’t require nearly the development effort that the original iPhone did.
Implication: Apple’s best hardware and software teams have time to work on Mac stuff. Really interesting Mac stuff.
The Architecture of Computing is Changing Dramatically
As you might have noticed, the era of the megahertz myth died a long, long time ago. Four years ago, the fastest chip that Intel made for desktop computers ran at 3.8 Ghz (Never quite got to 4 Ghz.). Today? The high end is just 3.2 Ghz. While, I would gladly take a Core 2 Extreme over a Pentium 4 any day of the week, it’s clear that the way to greater performance these days is not through clock speed but in more efficient use of lots of processors. Intel has led the way with its Core Duo and Quad lines of chips, but things are about to get really weird. First of all, NVIDIA, the graphics chip leader, now claims that the CPU has become irrelevant, and future performance advances will come through optimizing the GPU. Intel, for its part, is introducing Larrabee, an integrated graphics platform that can natively execute CPU x86 code. That means that when note rendering 3-D graphics, it can also add a few dozen processing cores to pump up performance in all regards. Even more amazingly, Intel will, in late 2009 or early 2010, introduce the Sandy Bridge platform, which is expected to integrate Larrabee onto a single die with Core 4 (or whatever Intel calls them) processors, leading to lightning-fast performance.
While that might all sound like electrical engineering inside baseball, it’s actually revolutionary. The move to hybrid CPU/GPUs is a computing architecture change bigger than any we’ve witnessed since Floating Point Units became standard on-die equipment instead of a nice-to-have add-on. Once hardware truly becomes standard, software becomes optimized for it. In this case, software will become optimized for incredibly high-bandwidth applications that barely function on today’s gear. And Apple has already made it clear in the release notes for OS X Snow Leopard that it will be ready for the advent of GPUs that act like an extension of the main processor before they even ship:
Fully 64-Bit – If you’re going to be tossing around extremely data-intensive applications, you need a ton of RAM available. Snow Leopard will.
– If you’re going to be tossing around extremely data-intensive applications, you need a ton of RAM available. Snow Leopard will. Grand Central – Having two, four, eight, or, as Intel says Larabee will offer, THOUSANDS of processing cores is nice, but having an OS smart enough to efficiently use all of them is even better. That’s what Snow Leopard’s Grand Central technologies are designed for. It’s a taskmaster, routing jobs to multiple processors and cores in the most optimal way. Better, it allows application developers to do the same.
– Having two, four, eight, or, as Intel says Larabee will offer, THOUSANDS of processing cores is nice, but having an OS smart enough to efficiently use all of them is even better. That’s what Snow Leopard’s Grand Central technologies are designed for. It’s a taskmaster, routing jobs to multiple processors and cores in the most optimal way. Better, it allows application developers to do the same. OpenCL – Open Computing Language is designed to allow developers to take advantage of all that untapped GPU power to pump up application performance, so even graphics architectures that can’t natively execute x86 code like Larrabee can pump up general processing tasks.
Then, there’s also all kinds of cool new tech, from WiMax and LTE to USB 3.0, eSATA, aGPS, and SSD. It’s time to showcase some great ideas that are ready for prime-time.
Implication: Powerful new hardware coupled with an operating system that’s prepped for it. Start your engines!
The Entire Mac Line is Due For a Face Lift
There is much to be said for a genuinely classic design. Lovers of the ThinkPad still get misty thinking about how today’s models look like ones from 16 years ago. I, and most Mac people, are not like that. We cherish each Mac as a unique icon of its era, and then we move on to the next era. But that’s been hard to do over the last few years. Apple’s computer designs are pretty much where they were three years ago, before the move to Intel processors happened. Today’s 17″ MacBook Pro looks virtually identical to the 17″ Powerbook introduced in January of 2003. Seriously. The main difference between the last generation of iBooks and today’s MacBooks are its latch mechanism and the keyboard. The Mac Pro is literally identical to the original Power Mac G5. The iMac has seen the greatest change, and that was just to put an aluminum finish on an existing design. The MacBook Air is really different, but it isn’t a core product, nor does it signal a new design direction for the rest of the line. Heck, the MacBook that’s available in black is downright revolutionary in this light.
All of which is to say, it’s time for Apple to make a new statement with the design of its computers. The time couldn’t be better. All the kinks and problems that came along with the move to Intel chips have been worked out. People know that Macs are still Macs, and they’re all safe to use, so the designs can get more wild and divergent again. I can’t wait until they take that leap.
Implication: Jonathan Ive, I hope you’re really turning up the heat on the design of the next generation of Macs!
The iPod and the iPhone Have Put the Mac Back in the Spotlight
For years, most experts were skeptical of Apple’s so-called “Halo Effect.” That is to say, the idea that just by hooking people on iTunes and iPods, Apple could convince people to trade in their PCs for Macs. It took a long time, but it’s now clear that this theory was correct (though the switch to Intel chips made a huge difference, too). According to research firm Net Applications, 8 percent of all computers on the Internet now in use are Macs. That’s up 32 percent in just 14 months. In sales of new computers, Apple is doing even better. As of May, NPD estimates Apple sells almost 14 percent of all new personal computers in the U.S., which is the kind of market share the company hasn’t seen since the early 1990s. Apple is actually gaining on the PC guys.
Implication: We’ve got the demand; Apple needs to make with the supply.
Sing it with me: We want new Macs!
The public is ready for Apple to really tear it up with a killer line of new computers. The iPod and iPhone lines don’t need as much attention as they have for the last seven years. Incredible new hardware and emerging standards will push the limits of what we thought Macs could do. The existing designs have been around for what seems like forever. The company’s computer market share is way up. For all these reasons and more, Macs are about to get really interesting really soon. And it’s about time — innovation in new markets is fun, but innovation at the core of the company is even better.Soil samples are dug up and delivered to the onboard labs for analysis The US space agency (Nasa) has quashed any idea that it is hiding information related to discoveries made on Mars. Nasa has acknowledged that its Phoenix probe has detected perchlorate salts in the Martian soil but says the analysis is incomplete. Scientists said they had not discussed the issue publicly earlier because they were unsure of the data's significance. They said the discovery - if confirmed - was fascinating but made "life on Mars" neither more nor less likely. Peter Smith, the Phoenix principal investigator from University of Arizona, stressed that his team would be completely open about its investigations. "Our policy from the beginning has been to show all our pictures as they come in and to try to involve the world, along with us, in exploring Mars for a habitable zone," he told reporters. "We really feel it's time to let everybody know what we're finding and get that window into our project." The fuss had kicked off over the weekend when rumours swept the web that major findings from Phoenix were being held back. The source of this internet storm was an Aviation Week article that claimed the "White House has been alerted by Nasa about plans to make an announcement soon on major new Phoenix lander discoveries concerning the 'potential for life' on Mars". The respected magazine further claimed that scientists working on one of the Phoenix instrument suites had even been kept out of a press conference last week to avoid the risk they might have to answer questions on the subject. That subject - Nasa has now confirmed - is the detection in the Martian soil of a strong perchlorate signal. Water story Perchlorate (an ion containing chlorine and oxygen) is an oxidant; that is, it can release oxygen, but it is not a powerful one. It is often seen in arid soils on Earth, such as in the Atacama desert in Chile. Although the super-dry Atacama was often regarded as being hostile to life, the same assumption should not be made about the presence of perchlorates, the Phoenix team said. "[On Earth] there are a large number of plants that concentrate perchlorate and grow in perchlorate at certain levels; there are a variety of species of bacteria that utilise perchlorate as a substrate in their metabolism," explained mission scientist Sam Kounaves, from Tufts University. The apparent perchlorate signal was seen by the probe's Microscopy, Electrochemistry, and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA), but Nasa stresses that complementary analysis is needed to confirm the data and finesse the details. On Earth, perchlorates are created in the atmosphere by the interaction of aerosols or dust particles in sunlight, and are dry-deposited onto the surface. In a desert setting, they stay at the surface; but in wet regions, they will quickly move through the soil. "Perchlorates will tell us quite a bit about the history of water, not just at the Phoenix landing site but in other parts of Mars as we continue our exploration," explained Richard Quinn, a Phoenix researcher from Nasa's Ames centre. "Currently, we've seen the perchlorates at the surface and a future line of research will be to look at where else they are on the planet and whether or not water and salt mobility was involved in that transport." Phoenix scientists have more time to work up their findings. The US space agency recently agreed to add another five weeks to the original 90 days of the prime mission. Phoenix carries seven science instruments
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StumbleUpon What are these?Courtesy of Olivia Ragni Olivia Ragni, 19, scrubs an elephant in Thailand. During her gap year, Ragni also volunteered at a hospital in India and studied Spanish in Guatemala.
This summer, Monika Lutz's life took an unusual turn. Instead of heading off to college, the high school graduate packed her bags for a Bengali jungle. Lutz, like a growing number of other young Americans, is taking a year off. Gap years are quite common in Britain and Australia, but they are just beginning to catch on in the U.S. Lutz, who grew up in Boulder, Colo., has put together a 14-month schedule that includes helping deliver solar power to impoverished communities in India and interning for a fashion designer in Shanghai experiences that are worlds away from the stuffy lecture halls and beer-stained frat houses that await many of her peers. "I could not be happier," she says.
No one tracks the number of U.S. students who decide to take gap years, but many high school guidance counselors and college admissions officers say the option is becoming more popular. Harvard, which has long encouraged its incoming first-years to defer matriculation, has seen a 33% jump in the past decade in the number of students taking gap years. MIT's deferments have doubled in the past year. And Princeton formalized the trend in 2009 by funding gap-year adventures for 20 incoming first-years annually. The school's goal is to extend this offer to about 100 students per class. (See pictures of the college dorm's evolution.)
Meanwhile, a cottage industry of gap-year programs and consultants has sprouted in the U.S. Tom Griffiths, founder of GapYear.com a site that serves as a clearinghouse for gap-year programs, says that five years ago, perhaps 1% of his Web traffic originated in the U.S. Now, that figure is 10%. The number of Americans taking gap years through Projects Abroad, a U.K. company that coordinates volunteer programs around the world, has nearly quadrupled since 2005. The organization just launched Global Gap, its first effort marketed specifically to Americans; the 27-week curriculum features service projects in South Africa, Peru, India and Thailand.
Like a year of college, these adventures can be expensive. The price tag for Global Gap is $30,000. Thinking Beyond Borders, a highly respected, eight-month program that parachutes students into third-world communities, costs $39,000. Yes, it's certainly possible for students to pursue meaningful volunteer work on a smaller budget. But unless kids stay at home and get a paying job nearby, families will likely incur significant expense. The increase in interest suggests that at least some families are willing. "There are now more structured opportunities for students to take gap years," says David Hawkins, the director of public policy and research for the National Association for College Admission Counseling. "That doesn't happen unless there's a market to sustain it." (See TIME's special report on paying for college.)
Why are students attracted to the gap-year concept? According to new survey data from Karl Haigler and Rae Nelson, education-policy experts and co-authors of The Gap-Year Advantage, the most common reason cited for deferring college is to avoid burnout. "I felt like I was focused on college as a means to an end," says Kelsi Morgan, an incoming Middlebury College freshman who spent last year feeding llamas at a North Dakota monastery, interning for a judge in Tulsa, Okla., and teaching English at an orphanage in the Dominican Republic. The hope is that after a year out of the classroom, students will enter college more energized, focused and mature. That can be an advantage for colleges too. Robert Clagett, dean of admissions at Middlebury, did some number-crunching a few years ago and found that a single gap semester was the strongest predictor of academic success at his school.
Most experts recommend securing a spot in college before taking a gap year and warn against using the time off to pad your résumé. "Most admissions folks can see right through that," says Jim Jump, the academic dean of St. Christopher's School in Richmond, Va. But for students like Lutz, who, after getting rejected from five Ivies, decided to take time off, a gap year can help reprioritize and focus interests. Lutz now plans to apply mostly to non-Ivies that have strong marketing programs. "This experience has really opened my eyes to the opportunities the world has to offer," she says. (See the 10 best college presidents.)
But at least one education expert doesn't want schools spreading the gap-year message as if it were gospel. In a study that followed 11,000 members of the high school class of 1992 for eight years after graduation, Stefanie DeLuca, a sociology professor at Johns Hopkins University, found that, all things being equal, those who delayed college by a year were 64% less likely to complete a bachelor's degree than those who enrolled immediately after high school. DeLuca did not pinpoint whether these students voluntarily started college late, but at the very least, her work indicates that taking a gap year doesn't guarantee success. "I'm not going to say that time off does not have benefits," says DeLuca. "But I think we should be tempered in our enthusiasm." (Comment on this story.)
No one's gap-year enthusiasm was more tempered than Olivia Ragni's. In the spring of 2009, the high schooler from Arkadelphia, Ark., inadvertently missed the deadline to secure her spot at Rice University that fall and was told she would have to wait a year to enroll. "I was really down," says Ragni, who still cries when recalling the embarrassment of informing her classmates of the unintended deferment. But through two experiential-learning organizations, she spent the year volunteering in a hospital in India, taking intensive Spanish while hiking volcanoes in Guatemala and working at an elephant camp in Thailand. "I gained confidence and independence," says Ragni, who has just arrived in Houston to start her first term at Rice. "It was the best experience of my life." The tears have dried up. Consider it a lucky break.
See the 20 best back-to-school gadgets.WASHINGTON (Reuters) - National Zoo staff are helping giant panda Mei Xiang adjust to life with her newborn twins by occasionally switching out one cub and keeping it in an incubator, zoo officials said on Sunday.
Mei Xiang, a star tourist draw, took staff by surprise on Saturday by giving birth to twins about four-and-a-half hours apart. Giant pandas are among the world’s most endangered species and she had been artificially inseminated.
Laurie Thompson, a giant panda biologist, said she and other staff had monitored Mei Xiang to see if she was strong enough to pick up the second cub on her own.
“She was really struggling. She was trying but she wasn’t able to pick up both of the cubs... At the right moment, we were able to go in and grab one of the cubs and take it out safely when Mei Xiang was not really close to it,” Thompson told reporters.
One cub was placed in an incubator in line with protocol when twins are born.
Dr. Don Neiffer, the zoo’s chief veterinarian, said the first few hours after birth were critical for the panda cubs, especially since they have almost no fur.
“They are not able to thermo-regulate very well and they need to constantly be receiving some calories and fuel for the furnace,” he said.
To track each cub’s progress, officials are measuring and weighing each cub as they switch them out.
Slideshow (5 Images)
Mei Xiang was artificially inseminated on April 26 and 27 with frozen sperm from Hui Hui, a panda in China, and fresh sperm from the National Zoo’s Tian Tian. Zoo veterinarians first detected evidence of a fetus on an ultrasound on Aug. 19.
Mei Xiang previously has given birth to two surviving cubs, Tai Shan in 2005 and Bao Bao in 2013. Bao Bao marked her second birthday on Sunday.
Giant pandas have a very low reproductive rate, particularly in captivity. Their natural home is in a few mountain ranges in central China. There are about 1,600 giant pandas known to be living in the wild and some 300 in captivity.The family attended church service every Sunday and most Mondays and Wednesdays. Fox said they regularly spoke in tongues. They believed they could heal through prayer and “cure” lesbians and gays. Sometimes, Fox borrowed clothes from her mother’s and sister’s closets when no one was around.
Art gave Fox an avenue through which to explore the larger world, beyond Ohio, away from church. She spent hours in her room, drawing and painting and studying comic books and anime. Jim Lee was her favorite artist, his work for Marvel Comics crisp and detailed. She appreciated the new worlds he created.
Fox often pictured herself in New York City, in a loft downtown, an easel in the corner, her artist apron on. When she told her parents of her plans, they told her she would find the devil there.
She first heard the word “transgender” when she was 17, on daytime television, and realized that there was a term for what she had been feeling inside. As Boyd Burton, she took a year off after high school, married and had a daughter. She said she married because of the pregnancy. She did not divorce her wife until 2007, according to public records, after she had become Fallon Fox. She served four years in the Navy. She went to technical college and enrolled at the University of Toledo.
All the while, she felt trapped, confined, and she started to research gender dysphoria. She read about other transsexuals who waited years, even decades, to transition, about how it became harder over time. Then her hair started to fall out.
“Looking in the mirror, it was destroying me,” Fox said, before pausing to compose herself.
To tell this part of her story was difficult because it is not easily understood and would inevitably be translated into the cookie-cutter version of her life. She took a deep breath and dived back into her tale: to the two years she drove an 18-wheeler across the country, saving money and researching transitions and taking hormones in “this in-between stage”; to the gender reassignment surgery in Thailand in 2006.
Upon her return, the odyssey continued, the search for meaning, for her place in the larger world, more heightened than before. She drove a school bus and worked as a diesel truck mechanic. She lifted weights and studied jujitsu and stumbled across a video on the Internet of Megumi Fujii, a female mixed martial artist. She consumed videos of Fujii and her opponents for days on end.This article is from the archive of our partner.
Texas Governor Rick Perry has some bad news for Texas women. On Friday afternoon, the one-time presidential hopeful notified legislators that Texas would not join the federal government and 42 other states that have addressed gender-based wage discrimination. Their bill, which installs state-level legal protections similar to those enacted by the federal Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, had a lot of momentum before reaching Perry's desk. Last month the legislation, along with two separate amendements, cleared both of the state's chambers, and it would have made Texas the 43rd state in the Union to have passed such legislation.
Perry's rationale for vetoing the first bill is a bit fuzzy. The Houston Chronicle points out that the governor's staff members have argued that the legislation is unnecessary due to the the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, but have refused to speak to reporters when evidence to the contrary is presented. According to The Huffington Post, HB 950 allows litigants alleging wage discrimination to use a state court instead of a federal court (which tends to be a lot more convenient for plaintiffs) and plugs certain holes left open by the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act at the state level. Perry has yet to announce his reasoning behind the veto, which he confirmed to the staff members of two state representatives who sponsored the bill.The committee could also refer the matter to the General Assembly. Whether Iran would win a majority of votes among the membership would remain to be seen. Even if a majority sided with Iran, there is no expectation that the United States would rescind the decision.
Image Hamid Aboutalebi Credit Mohammad Berno/Office of the Iranian President, via Associated Press
“What would they expect the U.S. government to do — say, ‘O.K., we were kidding’?” said Alireza Nader, an Iran expert at the Washington offices of the RAND Corporation. He said Iran would be better off to “just let it drop quietly.”
Mr. Ban’s spokesman, Stéphane Dujarric, declined to speculate on what might happen next. “We’ll have to wait and see what the committee does and what the committee decides,” he told reporters.
Iran’s basic argument is that the United States has violated the Headquarters Agreement signed when it agreed to host the world body in New York. The 1947 agreement obliges the host to allow access to foreign diplomatic representatives, even from countries the United States dislikes. But the United States also enacted a law that year to carry out the agreement, in which the host reserved the right to “safeguard its own security” by denying visas to foreign visitors to the United Nations deemed to be a threat.
Larry D. Johnson, an adjunct professor at Columbia Law School who was the United Nations deputy legal counsel from 2006 to 2008, said numerous clashes ensued over the years between the organization and host over the visa issue. Eventually, he said, the United States and United Nations came to an understanding that if the United States objected to a diplomat’s visa application, the United Nations would inform officials of that diplomat’s government, and “it’s up to them to decide to make a fuss or challenge or not.”
Mr. Johnson said that “supposedly many times the other country doesn’t insist and it goes away quietly — none of this is publicized. And sometimes the U.S. delays issuing the visa until it’s too late.”
In a 1988 case, when the United States denied a visa to Yasir Arafat, leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization at the time, the United Nations meeting was moved from New York to Geneva.
Legal experts said Mr. Aboutalebi’s case was highly unusual.
John B. Bellinger III, a partner at the Washington office of Arnold & Porter and a former legal adviser to the State Department and National Security Council in the administration of George W. Bush, said Iran runs a risk of embarrassment by pressing the issue, because sympathy with the American side in the 1979 hostage crisis remains potent.Boston-area radio host Howie Carr reacted to news of an illegal immigrant being accused of murdering a teacher's aide in nearby Worcester, Mass.
Senate's 'Institution Is At Stake': Manchin Pressing Dems to Allow Gorsuch Vote
Bolling: Media in 'Frenzy' Because Trump Doesn't Care What They Think
Trump Applauds NYT Report Showing ObamaCare in Trouble
Jose Melendez, 55, is accused of killing Sandra Hehir, 49, and ICE has placed a detainer on the suspect, WBZ reported.
Carr said the incident proves that the real "fake news" is the mainstream media's failure to cover cases such as this latest incident.
He said the media's silence in the face of several similar incidents "gives cover" to State Rep. Michelle DuBois (D-Brockton) who is accused of tipping-off illegal immigrants to a reported ICE raid.
"The media doesn't report crimes by illegal aliens," Carr said, adding that he called the district attorney in Worcester and was unable to find out whether Melendez had a detainer.
When 23 heroin and fentanyl dealers were rounded up by authorities, Carr said he had to call U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions' office in Washington because Massachusetts authorities wouldn't tell him how many were illegal immigrants.
Sessions' office told him ten of the 23 were in the country illegally, he said.
Roger Stone Gives Bill Maher 'Marijuana Cake', Spars Over Trump-Russia Claims
DNC Chair: Trump 'Didn't Win Election', GOP 'Doesn't Give a S--t About People'
Podesta: Trump 'On a Rampage to Endanger the Planet'I finished it! 8DDBasically, I drew this in case people who have no idea who any of the characters are would like to understand the fanart in their inboxes and on their dash's a little better. Granted this is probably a little late for something like this but you never know.I have no idea if anyone would find this at all useful for the reasons I drew it... but whatever. It was a lot of fun drawing all the main characters! And at least you guys can look at more drawings of the gang.The hardest character to draw was Toriel. I have realised I need to do a lot of practice with female characters who are really really big. Not only in heigh but also in their hips. I'm still not a 100% satisfied with her but she's ok.I eventually decided to give Papyrus his black colours on his arms and legs. At first I didn't want to because I have no idea what the material for the outfit is suppose to be and I didn't want to cover up the gabs between his bones. But really that's the least bit of realism I should be worrying about I guess. Maybe its not even clothing but he just painted himself.Alphys was the easiest to draw for some reason. She has cute little legs but they ended up being covered by her coat a lot.I'm super happy with how Mettaton turned out 8'D I could've probably drawn him in his box form but most fanart around is of him in his... whatever this is called form. So chances are anyone who might actually need this reference would see him like this the most.I think the rest all speaks for itself, in all honesty.I don't know if I'll do one for the minor characters too or not. Because if I include characters like the Monster Kid and the Nice Cream Salesman I need to ask myself; who do I exclude? Do I include Bratty and Catty too? Do I include the Dog Marriage? Do I include the guard bros? I love Monster Kid and the Nice Cream salesman but I dunno if I'd do a full sheet of EVERYONE. It would go on forever and some of the minor characters I like more than others.If you've played the game you may notice I left 2 of the main characters. That's because there is nothing I can draw or write about them that wouldn't be a spoiler of some kind. Even their existence is spoiling some things. So unfortunately they don't get to be on the sheet.Anyway that's it.Please don't use my art for your own stuff, ok? I normally don't say stuff like that but with individual easy pictures like this I just know someone is gonna find it tempting >.>DON'T. ok? Just don't.Orthodox Church Leaders Blame Conchita Wurst for Balkan Floods
'God sent the rains as a reminder that people should not join the wild side,' says the patriarch of Montenegro, in attributing the disaster to the drag performer's Eurovision win.
LGBT people are being blamed for yet another natural disaster: The leaders of the Orthodox Church in Serbia and Montenegro this week said flooding in their region is a punishment for the victory of gay drag performer Conchita Wurst in the Eurovision song contest.
After floods left more than 50 people dead in the Balkan region of Eastern Europe, Patriarch Amfilohije, who heads the Orthodox Church of Montenegro, commented, “This is not a coincidence, but a warning,” according to the London Telegraph’s translation of a Serbian website. “God sent the rains as a reminder that people should not join the wild side.” The bearded drag queen, he said, appears as a “Jesus-like figure” but should be rejected, notes another U.K. source, Pink News.
Patriarch Irinej, who leads the church in Serbia, reportedly said the floods were “divine punishment for [LGBT people’s] vices” and that “God is thus washing Serbia of its sins,” reports the Telegraph.
The Orthodox Church, also known as Eastern Orthodox, is a |
they are scheduled to play one another in 2012 at the 2nd Crossroads Classic (which all four schools should continue to participate in beyond the next two years, IMHO).
Brennan: Ooh, that's a good one. I couldn't think of any that currently exist that aren't on the schedule, but if you start getting creative with proximity, there are probably five more of these we could dream up. Leave yours in the comments or the mailbag, friends.U.S. President Barack Obama gave a strong message to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the pro-Israel group that has been strongly opposing the Iran nuclear deal, in his meeting this week at the White House with the two executives of AIPAC.
President Obama invited two directors of AIPAC to the White House this week and gave strong messages regarding AIPAC's cold stance on the nuclear deal. The president accused AIPAC of "spending millions of dollars against the nuke deal and spreading delusive claims regarding the agreement."
According to a report by the New York Times, the president said that he will strongly oppose the AIPAC leader's attitude regarding the deal.
Obama described the ones against the nuke deal as, "Lobbyists spending millions of dollars for the liberal hawk rhetoric that got the US involved in the Iraq war," in a speech he gave in the American University after his meeting with the AIPAC directors.
It is reported that AIPAC has spent 20 million dollars and has put aside some 25 million dollars more to advertise against the nuke deal. While hundreds of AIPAC activists are lobbying against the deal in Congress where it will be put to vote, 700 AIPAC members are working to persuade Congress members against the deal. The Republicans are expected to oppose the nuclear agreement.
AIPAC is also trying to persuade Obama's party, the Democrats against the deal. It is also important that one of the most prominent Democratic leaders, Chuck Schumer declared that he was against the deal just after his meeting with 60 AIPAC volunteers, which struck Obama.
It is said that Obama is very angry at the posters in which he is likened to the British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain who signed the Munchen Agreement with Adolf Hitler in 1938. AIPAC denies that it is behind the posters.
The New York Times also reminded in the story that Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush also had some minor issues with AIPAC but never dared to oppose the lobby that is the second most effective after the gun lobby. According to the New York Times, some democrats think that Obama "has gone too far" with his remarks against the AIPAC and they are concerned about a possible permanent damage in relations between the government and the Jewish lobby in a time when the 2016 presidential elections are near.
AIPAC is considered the most powerful lobby after the gun lobby in the United States. Former president George H.W. Bush once said "I'm just a little, alone man opposing thousands of lobbyists in Capitol Hill" regarding a disagreement with AIPAC on mortgage loan guarantees to be given to Israel.Manchester United might not be part of this year's competition, but Jose Mourinho spoke to the Daily Mail about some of his favorite ever Champions League memories. He's won the trophy twice, once with Porto in 2004, but his most treasured memory? In 2010, with Inter Milan.
“My best memory? The victory with Inter, that final [against Bayern Munich]. With Porto it was a team of young people, a team of people with many years in front of them.
“If I didn't win that year then we probably would not have left. After that victory I was leaving — everybody was leaving — but if we did not win that Champions League we would have stayed at Porto a couple more years.
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“And we would have then won it because we were a very good young team.
“Inter was an old team, a team of people who wanted to do it for their whole career. There had been frustration after frustration.
“That final was the last chance for [Marco] Materazzi, [Francesco] Toldo, [Javier] Zanetti, [Ivan] Cordoba, [Esteban] Cambiasso. It was an old team. It was now or never. That really was a crazy journey.
“Everything put things into context. It was a dream that everyone was chasing. Probably not me because I won it before. But for all of them… it was a last chance to reach their dream.
“It was just the end of a generation. I think the club would chase and chase and chase until they got it because it was everyone's dream. But for this group that was it.”
Nobody represented that generation and that wait more than captain Javier Zanetti. He had been at Inter Milan for 15 years before their win, and the Champions League Final against Bayern Munich marked his 700th match for the club. All of that, and many trophies, without being crowned champion of Europe. So it's no surprised that Zanetti named Mourinho, the man who got him that elusive title, his favorite ever manager.
“Mourinho was a winner who took care of every detail and his two years will remain in the hearts of all Inter fans … when I carried the Champions League trophy and put it next to my locker, I spoke to it. I told the trophy that I’d been chasing it for a long time and finally it was in my arms.”
Mourinho won't be able to make any memories in the competition this year, but it's interesting to hear his thoughts on why the Inter win was his favorite.
Also: “It was a dream that everyone was chasing. Probably not me because I won it before” is an ALL TIME great line. It's one of those quietly unabashedly arrogant statements that doesn't quite resonate in the beginning, but makes you chuckle to yourself at the pure audacity of it.
Never change, Mourinho.
MORE FROM FOX SOCCER:No Enemies, No Hatred: Selected Essays and Poems by Liu Xiaobo, edited by Perry Link, Tienchi Martin-Liao, and Liu Xia, and with a foreword by Václav Havel Belknap Press/Harvard University Press, 366 pp., $29.95
Better than the assent of the crowd: The dissent of one brave man!
—Sima Qian (145–90 BC)
Records of the Grand Historian
Truth will set you free.
—Gospel according to John
The economic rise of China now dominates the entire landscape of international affairs. In the eyes of political analysts and statesmen, China is seen as potentially “the world’s largest economic power by 2019.” Experts from financial institutions suggest an even earlier date for such a prognosis: “China,” one has said, “will become the largest economy in the world by 2016.” This fast transformation is rightly called “the Chinese miracle.” The general consensus, in China as well as abroad, is that the twenty-first century will be “China’s century.” International statesmen fly to Peking, while businessmen from all parts of the developed world are rushing to Shanghai and other provincial metropolises in the hope of securing deals. Europe is begging China to come to the rescue of its ailing currency.
All thinking people wish now to obtain at least some basic understanding of the deeper dynamics that underlie this sudden and stupendous metamorphosis: What are its true nature and significance? To what extent is it viable and real? Where is it heading? Bookshops are now submerged by a tidal wave of new publications attempting to provide information about China, and yet there is (it seems to me) one new book whose reading should be of urgent and essential importance, both for the specialist and for the general reader alike—the new collection of essays by Liu Xiaobo, judiciously selected, translated, and presented by very competent scholars, whose work greatly benefited from their personal acquaintance with the author.1
The award of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 brought the name of Liu Xiaobo to the attention of the entire world. Yet well before that, he had already achieved considerable fame within China, as a fearless and clearsighted public intellectual and the author of some seventeen books, including collections of poetry and literary criticism as well as political essays.2 The Communist authorities unwittingly vouched for the uncompromising accuracy of his comments. They kept arresting him for his views—four times since the Tiananmen massacre in June 1989. Now he is again in jail, since December 2008; though in poor health, he is subjected to an especially severe regime. As Pascal…The District Weekly - November 25th, 2017
News and updates from the district0x Network
Alexander Khoriaty Blocked Unblock Follow Following Nov 25, 2017
Given the Thanksgiving holiday, a rather short work week has come and pass. In light of this, I thought I’d instead take some time to write and reflect a bit more freely in place of a regularly scheduled update.
I’ve been working in the cryptocurrency space for three years now, and have been interested in the space for nearly twice as long. Naturally, the topic comes up with family and old friends at various get-togethers. Holidays are a unique opportunity for me to interface with older and younger generations at length. Seeing the proliferation of familiarity and interest in cryptocurrencies across the spectrum each successive year serves as a personal watermark for the industry’s progress.
2017 has been a historic year in the growth of cryptocurrency, and that’s reflected in the types of interactions that I’ve had this holiday weekend. The same basic analogies I’d use to explain bitcoin a year or two ago are no longer sufficient to answer the complex questions being asked. It’s no longer that some in the room have heard of bitcoin, but most. Some have even heard of Ethereum, and can name a token or two. The baseline understanding of what a digital currency is and how a decentralized network might maintain one is beginning to sink in. It’s no longer just “that bitcoin thing”.
And yet, at the very same time, when interfacing with my peers from grade school and university, it’s the exact opposite result that I find surprising. The general understanding of digital currency is not any more common or further along than the rest of the people in my life. Even among those with technical background in computer science, mathematics, or economics, cryptocurrency is still a very small niche that require zero effort to avoid.
This recalls what I’m confronted of time and time again, that the new world we’re working towards won’t be built overnight, but over the course of an entire generation. We are still in the very early days of the development of this ecosystem, and though we’ve added a countless number of new community members this year, we’ve grown to just a tiny fraction of the potential this new technology holds.
The district0x team has come together across borders as a group of individuals all sharing the conviction of this potential. We’ve known from the beginning that the road ahead is a long one. Having a dedicated community of thinkers and dreamers walking this journey alongside us has been incredible, and offers constant motivation to keep working towards a more equitable world we want to be a part of.
From the entire team, we are thankful for your support. Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate!Even in Silicon Valley, the home of the ever-present origin story, Chamath Palihapitiya has a pretty incredible narrative. The Sri Lankan immigrant escaped a civil war in his homeland before eventually landing a job at a new company called Facebook. Then he started a venture-capital firm that is now among the most formidable in the Valley. He is also an owner of the Golden State Warriors, the defending N.B.A. champions, who are on pace to the achieve the greatest season in league history.
Palihapitiya’s firm, Social Capital, has backed numerous tech companies with valuations in the billions, such as Slack, Box, and SurveyMonkey. But that doesn’t mean that he is bullish on unicorn culture. Here, Palihapitiya speaks about Mark Zuckerberg’s secret sauce, which start-ups are going to make it, and the saga between Apple and the F.B.I., among other topics.
Vanity Fair: You were at Facebook early on in the company’s history. What’s the best advice you learned from Mark Zuckerberg?
Chamath Palihapitiya: The most amazing thing about working with him is how even-keeled he is. He’s very happy to just be the last person to talk in a room. So he’ll just sit there, and you’ll tell he’s actually actively listening and thinking about everything people are saying. He had this amazing ability to unpack what was anecdote and what was fact.
Back then there was a very turbulent phase in our company. We had a lot of ups and downs. We had a lot of scrutiny. One day we’d be getting sued by the F.T.C., the other day we were celebrated for being the next great company. In all of that tumult, it was really important to stay as calm as possible and think as far out as possible. I think that’s what allowed him to ultimately turn down the acquisition offer from Yahoo. It’s what allowed us to negotiate really important financing from Microsoft. It’s what allowed us to invest and take a bunch of shots on some random things, like our online advertising, that has turned out to be a huge business.
Funding is slowing down, both in seed rounds and mega-rounds. There have been fewer tech I.P.O.s recently, more companies are raising down rounds. Are we in a downturn?
I think we’re in a phase where we’re realizing that the people who have been allocating capital thus far have done a horrendous job. Most people’s inherent reaction is to make sure they never lose their job, and so they become risk-averse. I think what we’ve had is a handful of investors who have extreme vision who make great investments in things that are amazing businesses: Facebook, Google, Uber. And then everybody else reacts to that success by trying to do the thing that most approximates the thing that’s working. As a result, most of those businesses are fundamentally not good, they’re poorly run, and they never should have been invested in in the first place. But the capital came in because the person who had control of the capital was able to justify it intellectually to themselves versus something else that could have become the next Facebook or Google.
The reality is, great companies can go public in any market. When we talk about the I.P.O. slowdowns what we’re really saying is that there really just aren’t that many good companies being built. We need to divorce ourselves from venture capital as an occupation and focus on using capital as a way to take really big bets on things that just seem totally audacious. Right now we haven’t done enough of that, and the result is that most of the things we’ve funded are mostly crap and largely worthless.
What advice are you giving Social Capital’s portfolio companies in the event of a tech bubble burst or correction?
There's a tension between investing in visionary companies versus investing in beauty pageants, and we have always erred on the side of the former. When nobody else is funding cancer research, we were funding cancer research. When nobody else was funding diabetes, we funded diabetes. When nobody else was touching asthma, we were spending enormous amounts of money on asthma—all of these things that frankly take lots of time to build. Around the early part of 2015 we came together as a partnership and said that the most important thing that we can do is get every single one of our companies well financed, and make sure they really understand that they need to make this money last for two to three years.
We’re trying to coach our C.E.O.s that the window dressing is both expensive from a cash perspective and tremendously expensive from a culture perspective. It distracts the team from building what they need to build. Don’t waste money on things that get away from your mission, which confuse employees about why they’re actually there. Meaning, the quality of the office and the quality of the food are all part and parcel of a lack of discipline, which speaks to the fact that the mission isn’t compelling enough. Because I can tell you what it was like at early Facebook: the food was terrible; we’d ship in lunch and probably two to three times a week the lunch had maggots in it. But we were there because we believed, and it didn’t matter.
What are the characteristics of the companies you see surviving a downturn?
If you look back, historically, companies like Microsoft or Apple have taken 25 to 35 years to get to the kinds of valuations that Facebook got to in 10 years. And the reaction to this in Silicon Valley is to try to find things that work really quickly. Over the last seven or eight years, Silicon Valley has really fallen in love with fast growth. Part of this is the risk aversion of the financiers, who themselves want to have short-term wins and want to fund things that look like they’re working in the short term.
But the problem with things that work really quickly is that they can stop working equally as quickly. Valuable companies take decades to build. We try to find businesses that are technologically ambitious, that are difficult, that will require tremendous intellectual horsepower, but can basically solve these huge human needs in ways that advance humanity forward. Those things don’t necessarily take lots of money, but they generally do take lots of time. And they require really mission-driven people. But when you build those companies, my gosh, they are so enormously valuable.
The businesses that, in my opinion, are worthless are many of these negative-gross-margin businesses that grow really quickly. Because the growth doesn’t indicate any long-term business value.
What kinds of companies are you talking about, specifically?
Most companies in e-commerce right now are negative-gross-margin businesses. Amazon has such enormous scale, and they’re at about 13 or 14 percent gross margins, but on a huge number. In order to compete with Amazon, these businesses have to sell goods for less than what they cost. These companies are in the delivery businesses (Postmates, DoorDash, Instacart) and in the food business (SpoonRocket, Munchery). Basically, a lot of these new-generation, remote-control-type businesses—where the phone acts like a remote control to replace an offline experience—are generally, to date, highly, highly, highly unprofitable.
There’s a lot of what I call “venture philanthropy” to prop these businesses up. Time will tell whether any of those can become a real business. If a shoe costs $20, Nike doesn’t sell it for $14. They sell it for $400. We have to get back to this world of having pretty reasonable discipline on business models and understanding that many of these gross-margin businesses will never, never break even or become profitable.
A number of V.C.s have been calling on mature, late-stage companies to go public. There’s even been somewhat of a quiet rally in the public tech stocks recently. Is now the time for big, late-stage companies to go public, or does it make sense for companies to stay private longer?
Any company that is making its decision based on external timing is probably not in control of their own destiny and should probably not go public. Facebook could have gone public whenever it wanted. We decided the right time was 2012. It could have easily been 2010 or 2014. When you hear the call for these companies to go public and there’s pushback and they don’t, what’s really happening is the realization that the structural strength of their business is not yet in place. So they’re worried about how the public market will react once they have to transparently demonstrate what their business will look like. The great companies can always go public whenever they want; every other company is trying for some window of time where there’s essentially some combination of intellectual laziness and greed in the public markets that will allow them to exploit a window.
You’ve voiced your support for immigration reform. Can you talk about why that’s important to you, and why it’s important for the country?
I’m a living testament to the value of immigration. I escaped a civil war, and I came to Canada as a refugee, and they gave my family protection. I did my best to pay that country back, and I think I did that. I emigrated as a knowledge worker to the U.S. The U.S. gave me a shot, and I think I’ve repaid the U.S. in enormous ways.
I’m also fortunate enough to be a co-owner of a basketball team. What you see is that when you try to recruit the best people, you can win. In the case of the Warriors, they recruited based on skill and culture. It’s another way of reinforcing to me that America is this shining beacon where the best of the best want to be there.
A number of tech companies have aligned themselves with Apple in its legal entanglement with law enforcement over the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone. A few others, including President Obama and Bill Gates, have taken a middle-of-the-road approach. Where do you stand?
I’m more on the side of the government on this one. I think we’re almost lying to ourselves in pretending that Apple can’t do something that they do every day. Instead, what I think has happened is we’ve started to fall on our sword on some weird marketing thing. They want to seem like they’re on the side of the consumer. But there’s nothing stopping an Apple engineer today from rooting your phone and taking whatever they want. It’s a bit of a red-herring conversation right now.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.That's all Lundqvist needed to say when asked for his thoughts on his season to date. Three words that mean so much he said them again, and then again.
[RELATED: Canadiens-Rangers coverage | Fast is Rangers' X-factor | Weber, Habs dynamic | Why Rangers will win Cup]
"Obviously I want more," Lundqvist said. "The work I put in, the preparation I put in to each game and practice, I want more."
He didn't get enough this season. It bothers him.
"There have just been [inconsistent] stretches throughout the year," he said.
He has a chance to change that starting with the Eastern Conference First Round series against the Montreal Canadiens beginning at Bell Centre on Wednesday (7 p.m. ET; CBC, TVA Sports, NBCSN). That's what the Stanley Cup Playoffs represent to Lundqvist in this emotional and somewhat disappointing season.
It's a chance to be great again.
"It motivates you to come to practice here and work even harder and work on everything you can possible to improve your game," Lundqvist said.
Though far from perfect, this season was far from bad for Lundqvist. He won more than 30 games for the 11th time in the past 12 seasons and helped the Rangers get to the playoffs for a seventh consecutive season.
Lundqvist fondly talks about the good moments, like the 31 games that he allowed two or fewer goals. He won 25 of them.
He remembers how he came out of slumps in December and January.
Lundqvist was benched for four straight games from Dec. 8-13 and allowed three goals in winning his next three starts. He allowed 16 goals in a three-game losing streak from Jan. 13-17, but responded by winning eight of the next 10 games with a.939 save percentage.
He broke Dominik Hasek's record for most wins by a European-born goalie (389) on Dec. 31, won his 400th NHL game on Feb. 11, and moved past John Vanbiesbrouck, Mike Vernon, Hasek, Chris Osgood and Grant Fuhr into 10th place on the League's all-time wins list with 405.
"I feel like I've done a lot of good things," Lundqvist said.
You could sense the "but" coming as he spoke.
"But the blowouts," he said. "That kind of ticks off some of the good feeling."
There were many.
He allowed four or more goals in 14 of his 55 starts, including five or more five times. He allowed seven once. He finished the season with a.910 save percentage and 2.74 goals-against average.
His save percentage never has been as low in a single season, his GAA never as high.
Lundqvist allowed four or more goals 15 times last season, but he also started 64 games, and had a.920 save percentage and 2.48 GAA. The odd rough game was easier to take with those numbers next to his name.
"I had a lot of good games [this season] that I'm really happy about to help the team to win, but then there have been games when you've been hurt pretty bad with a lot of goals, more than recent years," Lundqvist said. "Obviously that affects the overall feeling about the season."
Lundqvist has to put it behind him. He has a new opportunity to put on hold the growing perception that he's an aging goalie, now 35, who is showing the wear of 12 NHL seasons, who isn't the same as he used to be, who isn't elite anymore, who can't win the Stanley Cup.
Some of that might be nonsense. The Stanley Cup part, that's undeniable.
Video: NYR@WSH: Lundqvist turns away Oshie with pad stop
Lundqvist has had it hanging over his head for quite some time, and especially since losing in the Stanley Cup Final in 2014. At first he was a good goalie on an up-and-coming team. Then he was an elite goalie on a contending team.
What he is today still has to be determined.
Lundqvist even plays differently than he used to, further out of his crease to get to deflections quicker and see through traffic better. It's a change he made in December, when he sat for those four straight games.
"You try to adjust your game to what's going on in front of you," he said. "When you look at the 12 years I've been here the game hasn't been played exactly the same way so there is always something you need to correct and adjust."
It's been a learning experience.
"If everything stayed the same it would be easier and probably boring too, but that's just the way it is," he said. "The game changes."
The feeling inside the Rangers dressing room has not.
"Since I've been here in our room there hasn't been a concern for our goalie," defenseman Marc Staal said.
Said Rangers coach Alain Vigneault, "I know he's going to be fine. He's proved it in the past. It's just a matter of him finding his groove and finding his rhythm."
Lundqvist appears to have found it again. He missed eight games because of a muscle strain in his hip, allowed 10 goals in his first two games back but 11 in his past four for a.905 save percentage.
And that's with the Rangers leaving holes in front of him to allow for Grade-A scoring chances.
"The key for me is try not to do too much, let the game come to me instead of chasing it," Lundqvist said. "I've been moving well and feeling the puck pretty good out there, it's just been some good opportunities for teams to get some goals on us."
Staal said that falls on himself and the rest of the skaters.
"He takes care of his own business and what he does and our team feeds off him," Staal said. "It's our job as players to give him the best opportunity to be the difference.
"He can be."
He better be.Join WWE Superstars and Divas by sharing your personal and inspirational stories of heroism by using the hashtag #MyHeroIs.
NBCUniversal and WWE unveiled a comprehensive brand campaign, “For The Hero In All of Us."
In addition, advertisers can work with NBCUniversal and WWE in new ways to tap into the scale and reach of WWE’s multimedia platforms, which all deliver a TV-PG family-centric, multigenerational and multicultural audience. As part of the suite of NBCUniversal and WWE assets offered together for the first time, the companies have created bigger, more immersive opportunities than ever before for advertisers, including multiplatform, customized and turnkey initiatives around marquee tentpole events. Advertisers will also have unprecedented access to WWE Superstars and Divas for the creation of custom on-air campaigns, in-show integrations and social campaigns.
"WWE is one of the biggest, family-friendly, year-round programming opportunities on TV,” said Dan Lovinger, Executive Vice President, Advertising Sales, NBCUniversal. “We wanted to bring all of WWE’s brands, properties and platforms together so advertisers can more easily benefit from the massive and passionate audiences its live entertainment attracts. Our teams are excited to develop unique marketing campaigns for our partners in conjunction with the WWE.”
“Our new campaign illustrates all that is great about the WWE brand from our charismatic and athletic Superstars to our multigenerational and multicultural audience, and our commitment to giving back,” said Michelle Wilson, WWE Chief Revenue & Marketing Officer. “In partnership with NBCUniversal, we now have unprecedented opportunities for advertisers to engage our fans and Superstars while leveraging all of our platforms, including television, live events, digital and social media.”
Four key, tentpole marketing opportunities have been created for advertisers to take advantage of by utilizing WWE’s powerful engagement at scale:South Padre Island named second most popular spring break destination in the world, study says
By the late 1980s, Texas hot spots for spring break, from Matamoros to Galveston were in full swing. These archived photos take a look back to how students indulged in this annual blowout nearly 30 years ago. By the late 1980s, Texas hot spots for spring break, from Matamoros to Galveston were in full swing. These archived photos take a look back to how students indulged in this annual blowout nearly 30 years ago. Image 1 of / 60 Caption Close South Padre Island named second most popular spring break destination in the world, study says 1 / 60 Back to Gallery
Spring break revelers who researched their South Padre Island trips using Google helped land the Texas party spot as the second most popular destination in the world for the annual college blowout, according to a recent study.
RELATED: TABC agents will go undercover to catch underage drinkers during Spring Break
TravelMag, a website obviously dedicated to traveling, conducted research using the search engine’s “keyword planner tool” to map out the prime party places in a ranking of 20 that are all the rage. The feature is a scion of Google AdWords, which helps researchers generate analytics on specific queries.
RELATED: Port Aransas bans visible drinking of alcohol on beaches after 6 p.m. during Spring Break
“South Padre Island Spring Break” and relative terms like “SPI Spring Break” garnered a total of 64,000 searches, 160,000 less instances than No. 1, Panama City Beach, Fla.
RELATED: Top 25 cities in Texas for spring breakers
The site developed their list based off February and March 2015 analytics, since spring break 2016 hasn’t kicked off yet.
Other Texas beaches such as Port Aransas, Galveston and Corpus Christi landed in the 15th, 16th and 18th spots respectively.
mmendoza@mysa.com
Twitter: @MaddySkye(CNN) In a post-race interview, Chinese swimmer Fu Yuanhui clutched her side with an expression of agony on her face.
She had just finished in fourth place in the women's 4x100 meter medley relay on Sunday, and the interviewer asked if she was ok.
"I feel that I didn't swim well today," said Fu, speaking in Mandarin. "I let my teammates down."
"Yes (my belly hurts) because my period came yesterday. I'm feeling a bit weak and exhausted, but this is not an excuse. Anyway, I didn't do well."
Online praise
Fu might not have won the relay -- but her candid comments won countless admirers online.
Fu Yuanhui dismantles female stereotypes too. She's talking about her menstrual cycle at the Olympics. Wow. Remove shame, stigma & silence. — Aimee (@metaphor_muse) August 16, 2016
Many Twitter users praised her honesty, describing the Chinese swimmer as the real hero of the Games.
Fu Yuanhui talking about her period is the Olympic hero I can relate to — Tali Aualiitia (@taliaualiitia) August 16, 2016
China's tampon taboo?
The swimmer's frank comments are particularly striking given Chinese women's general reticence surrounding tampons.
Tampons are difficult to find in many Chinese pharmacies, explained CNN Beijing journalist Serena Dong, 26, adding that she had no idea what a tampon was before traveling to the US for college in 2010.
"When I mentioned tampons to some of my friends who have not been abroad yet, the first thing they said was 'ah, is that what American girls use during their period? Does it hurt?'"
Vivian Kam, a 28-year-old CNN journalist living in Hong Kong, said many women in mainland China don't usually talk about periods and sanitary products publicly, though online discussion was very common.
"So the fact that Fu Yuanhui did bring it up, is like opening the door for discussion in public," she added.
Fu Yuanhui (left) won equal bronze in the 100 meter backstroke, but missed out on a medal in the 4x100 meter relay.
What's the origin of this cultural reticence? Seventy-year-old Lien Duang, who grew up in Guangzhou, told CNN: "Maybe not so much in the younger generation nowadays, but 30 years ago or more most women in China would frown to use tampons. They compare it to the equivalent of losing your virginity.
"The mentality of this derived from the days when China had emperors where you had to be a virgin to marry the king. And one method for proving you were a virgin was by bleeding after having sexual intercourse for the first time."
Breaking the cycle
Does this mean Fu's comments will herald a new era openness for female athletes?
When British tennis player Heather Watson said in a post-match interview in January 2015 that she lost her Australian Open round due to "girl things," the 22-year-old sparked a debate about menstruation that quickly spread across the world.
"Has sport's last taboo been broken?" wondered commentators, after Watson described feeling "light-headed" and "low on energy," putting it down to her period.
Heather Watson crouches during the Australian Open match which she says was affected by her period.
But Watson's and Fu's frankness could also be seen as a double-edged sword for female athletes, said Karen Houppert, author of "The Curse: Confronting the Last Unmentionable Taboo, Menstruation."
"It's potentially problematic for women because our periods can get used against us," she explained.
"It's easy to dismiss a woman as, 'Oh she's on her rags' if someone is angry or emotional. It's a way of discounting the validity of what a woman is saying."
Either way, Fu might not be leaving Brazil with an extra medal -- but she has gained many more admirers.Kristoffer Lewandowski doesn't exactly fit the profile of a pot baron. A veteran of three tours of duty with the U.S. Marines, including stints in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Laguna Niguel resident divides his time between architecture classes at Saddleback College and helping his wife, Whitney, raise their three young sons. But thanks to a 2-year-old episode of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that occurred in Oklahoma and led to a guilty plea for growing six marijuana plants, Lewandowski now faces an Oct. 19 sentencing hearing that could land him in state prison for five years.
If that sounds like a heavy sentence for half a dozen scraggly plants, consider this: Thanks to the Sooner State's notoriously retrograde policy on cannabis—it's one of a dwindling number nationwide that offer no protections for medical use of marijuana—Lewandowski at one point was actually facing life in prison for the plants. (The local media even hyped his arrest as a "major pot bust.")
Lewandowski's problems began in Geronimo, Oklahoma, just outside Fort Sill, where he had been teaching field artillery classes until chronic pain from a back injury finally took him off active duty. The sudden transition from several years in Middle Eastern combat zones to a sedentary life in rural Oklahoma simultaneously triggered an onset of PTSD. As an artillery operations chief, Lewandowski had fired off countless shells in support of combat troops, and the psychic weight of the carnage he knew he'd wrought was coming back to haunt him. "In Afghanistan, what gets me more than anything was the acceptance of death and of taking life," he recently explained over pizza at a Lake Forest Chuck E. Cheese. He sat next to Whitney, who carried their baby, while their two older children played nearby. "It was completely acceptable. It almost would have been unacceptable not to celebrate a successful firing operation, but now to think about every one of those rounds and what they did, I have a big issue living with that."
Lewandowski signed himself up for psychological counseling, but talking about his problems didn't seem to help. One night, a friend sleeping on Lewandowski's couch watched his sleepwalking host clearing the house of imaginary intruders. Then, on June 1, 2014, he got into an argument with Whitney about the marijuana plants he was attempting to grow in the house. After she destroyed one of the plants, Lewandowski grabbed a knife and Whitney fled to a neighbor's house with her kids.
A brief standoff with police followed, and upon the discovery of the plants, sheriff's deputies charged Lewandowski with cultivating marijuana. According to Whitney, deputies told her that if she didn't press domestic-abuse charges against her husband, they'd send her to jail for the plants, too. To keep from losing custody of their children, Whitney followed their advice, but after 11 days, when child-welfare workers determined Lewandowski didn't pose a threat to his family, the couple reunited and haven't had an issue since. (Whitney says her husband has never laid a hand on her or the kids.)
Still, deputies weren't quite done with Lewandowski. "The original incident led to a couple of other incidents where I feel I was unjustly harassed," he says. Deputies arrested him for driving without a license, and later, they stopped and searched him while he was on foot, busting him for the less than a gram of cannabis in his pocket. While the family tried to raise money for a defense attorney, they received permission from the judge in his case to move to her parents |
hunters, silencer manufacturers and the National Rifle Association, say a suppressor can protect a hunter's hearing and allow sportsmen to shoot near residential areas without disturbing people.
Opponents think silencing guns near homes is a bad idea and will endanger lives.
"This is not a hunting issue, and this is not a gun-rights issue. This is a safety issue," said Patricia Brigham, who heads the gun-safety committee for the League of Women Voters in Florida. "If neighbors don't hear gunshots in the area, how are they going to know to stay out of the way?"
At an FWC hearing on the issue in Kissimmee in September, Katherine McGill, a gun owner and a founding member of the National Urban Wildlife Coalition, urged the state commission to explore the issue more thoroughly, saying she had not yet heard "good enough reasons for changing the rule."
"If somebody's target shooting near my property, I'd be glad they were using them," she said of silencers. "But I don't want to be riding my horse in the woods and not hear that hunter out there."
Florida rules currently allow hunters to use silencers — which usually screw on to the barrel of a gun — when hunting armadillos, feral hogs and other varmints on private lands.
The change would permit hunters to use "silencer-equipped rifles and pistols" to hunt more valuable game animals such as deer, wild turkey and quail.
Banned by California, Illinois, New York and 15 other states, suppressors are allowed for all hunting in 32 states.
Diane Eggeman, director of FWC's division of hunting and game management, recommended Florida lift its ban as neighboring Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana recently did. Georgia's new law went into effect July 1. Louisiana, until this year, restricted silencers to hunters taking coyotes and other "outlaw quadrupeds."
Eggeman said states that permit silencers haven't reported an increase in poaching or hunting accidents.
"There's a common misconception that suppressors make the gun completely silent, and that's really far from the truth," she said.
Eggeman said a deer-hunting rifle with a suppressor is still louder when fired than a jackhammer, a garbage disposal or live rock music.
In a letter to the wildlife commissioners, NRA lobbyist Marion Hammer said Florida enacted its suppressor restrictions in August 1957 "with no legitimate justification, except that, at the time, Hollywood movies made suppressors... synonymous with machine guns, assassins and alcohol prohibition days."
She called the devices "an appropriate use of technology" to protect hunters' ear health.
"Increased use of suppressors will help to eliminate noise complaints, which have been used more frequently as an excuse to close shooting ranges, informal shooting areas and hunting lands throughout the country," she also wrote.
Silencers, like machine guns, are strictly regulated under the federal National Firearms Act, passed by Congress in 1934 in the wake of Prohibition-era gangland crimes, including the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in Chicago in 1929.
The law requires a buyer to pass a federal background check, pay a $200 fee and register the device with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Ownership cannot be transferred as easily as ownership of a firearm.
Suppressors are not common among Florida hunters because of the state's restrictions and because each costs $500 to $2,000. About 40,000 are owned by Floridians, said Knox Williams, president of the American Suppressor Association, a trade group for manufacturers. He said they are primarily a hearing safety device.
He said a silencer also tends to improve a shooter's accuracy because the device contains the explosion at the muzzle and reduces recoil.
But Ladd Everitt, a spokesman for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, said the push for silencers is about money, not aim and safety.
"You want to hear the report of gunfire for the same reason you would wear a bright-orange neon vest: because you want to alert others in that area to your presence, particularly when weapons are being fired," he said.
"What this is really about... this is about allowing the gun industry to sell more accessories."
shudak@orlandosentinel.com or 407-650-6361Adrian Yalland, a former Tory candidate and fixer for various Tory MPs has been arrested for assault after apparently biting two men during a brawl in Hampshire. The video below is alleged to show Yalland, formerly a spinner for spin shop Chelgate, attacking a man on a quiet street in Stockbridge:
Hampshire Police confirmed in a statement to Guido: “Police were called at 4.10 p.m. on Thursday, February 20 following a report of a dispute outside an address on Stockbridge High Street. A 56-year-old man and a 46-year-old man both from Stockbridge suffered minor injuries. A 44-year-old man from Marchwood was arrested on suspicion of assault. He has been bailed pending further enquiries until March 27.”
Yalland handled the press for Nigel Evans when he was charged and has worked with various MPs including Andrew Bridgen and Nadine Dorries.
A Tory spokesperson says: “This is a matter for the police.”
Nigel Evans’ office says: “I don’t think we can make any comment.”
Adrian Yalland was not answering his phone today.
Not the best PR spin strategy…
UPDATE: April 26: Yalland says the police are not pressing charges against him.NEW DELHI: Ansar-ut Tawhid fi Bilad al-Hind (AuT), an India-specific jihadi outfit that pledged allegiance to Islamic State (ISIS) in September 2014, has started online propaganda for ISIS in Bengali, after posting ISIS messages in the past with Urdu, Hindi, Tamil, Gujarat and English subtitles. Indian intelligence agencies say this has expanded the geographical reach of ISIS propaganda, leading to radicalization of some Indian youth.AuT propagates acts of violence against the Indian government and encourages Indian Muslims to participate in jihad within the country, along with encouraging other jihadis to attack Indian government interests and economic centres.Another key cause of concern for the Indian agencies, as they review the ISIS threat here in the wake of Paris attacks and India’s backing to France’s retaliatory air-strikes on ISIS territory, is the Wilayat Khorasan (WK), an ISIS affiliate operating out of Af-Pak region. WK, according to intelligence sources, is at present a threat in Nangarhar province of Eastern Afghanistan and may target Indian interests there.Incidentally, Afghanistan is the only country in South Asia where ISIS activity goes beyond recruitment.While ISIS and its leaders had mentioned India along with other “Muslim areas” of the world during their inaugural announcements, there has been no mention or focus on India in the threats that regularly surface online. Agencies, however, warn that this does not make India immune to threats from ISIS or its ideology of violent extremism.The announcement of the “Caliphate” by ISIS in June 2014 has attracted a flood of foreign fighters to the outfit, including from India. According to intelligence estimates, about 25,000 foreign fighters from more than 100 countries have come out in support of IS. There are “hundreds of fighters” from South Asian countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Maldives and some from India as well. The growing concern is that these fighters, after getting active combat experience and exposure to extreme radicalization influences of sectarianism, would pose a threat to their homelands as and when they return from the jihadi theatres.Also, the call for ‘lone wolf’ attacks by ISIS spokeman Al Adnani has increased the planning of strikes in Australia, UK, Canada, France and the US. Agencies fear any individual inspired by ISIS ideology may resort to such attacks.ISIS and Al Nusra Front-led rebels together control two-thirds of Syrian territory. In Iraq, ISIS controls the west and north-west, while north-east is with Peshmarga and the south with Iraq government.Last month Marco Foco and I facilitated a workshop on refactoring legacy C++ code. It was an improved version of the same workshop we presented at the Italian Agile Day in November, with Gianluca Padovani as well.
To give you a bit of context, some days before the attendees cloned a certain Git repository we indicated and they compiled the code (by using CMake to generate the projects in their environment) on their machines. The workshop was divided in 4 parts, each one focusing on a C++ theme. They were: productivity, memory management, algorithms and generic programming. During each part, we first spent 10 minutes explaining a few C++11/14 concepts and then we gave 25 minutes to work on some refactoring exercises. At the end of each part, a brief retrospective.
In this post I’m going to describe three pitfalls attendees fell into, related to initializer_list – at least at first sight.
The workshop code was a simple version of Yahtzee, the famous dice game. It was test-driven and, among others, we wrote a test suite covering the score calculation. For instance, suppose a player rolls the dice getting:
2 2 3 3 3
She gets a full house, or 25 points. A class is responsible for recognizing and calculating this kind of stuff. To roll the dice, another class is involved, a sort of “IDiceRoller”. It is an interface that provides only one function:
virtual void Roll(int(&dice)[5]) = 0;
In the test suite, we implemented a simple fake object (not a mock – that could be an exercise) to manipulate and control the dice. Imagine:
class FakeDiceRoller : public IDiceRoller { public: FakeDiceRoller() {... set _dice[i] = 1... } void AssignDiceValues(int values[5]) {... copy values to _dice... } void Roll(int(&dice)[5]) {... copy _dice to dice... } private: int _dice[5]; }; // in a test fixture // FakeDiceRoller _roller is a member variable int dice[5] = {1,1,2,3,4}; _roller.AssignDiceValues(dice);
FakeDiceRoller had intentionally a poor interface and design. The point was: how could you improve it? Suppose you couldn’t change the interface of the domain interface IDiceRoller, as – likely – in the real life. The first series of exercises was about productivity. Sure, AssignDiceValues was one of the point we wanted participants to think about, At some point they gave a try:
_roller.AssignDiceValue({1,2,3,4,5});
They compiled and…they failed.
“Cannot convert initializer list argument to ‘int*'”.
People started trying to figure out why initializer_list was not covertible to int[]…
“This has nothing to do with initializer_list”. I stated. “This is the language and it’s saying the function parameter int values[5] is just int* dice, you cannot initialize int* from {1,2,3,4,5}”.
Then a gentleman took the floor and shouted “use the same signature as Roll, accepting a const reference to array instead of a non-const reference”. That was:
void AssignDiceValues(const int(&values)[5]) // usage _roller.AssignDiceValue({1,2,3,4,5});
It was fine.
But we were more subtle. Now the attendees started merging two lines in one, getting code like the following:
_roller.AssignDiceValue({1,1,1,1});
Do you spot any problem here?
Now FakeDiceRoller‘s _dice is:
[1, 1, 1, 1, 0]
This is because the language zero initializes missing ints.
It happended the test at issue checked a poker of ones. And ok, we had four ones. It happended also the test was a bit wrong, because it didn’t check the 5th value of the dice (say it was a 3, the test had to check we scored a poker AND a 3). Who wrote the test made a mistake. C’est la vie.
Can our test environment prevent us doing this kind of imprudence? Now this simple requirement can be translated to a C++ exercise: we want to inline-initialize an array of strictly N elements. In short, this should fail under our conditions:
void AssignDiceValues(const int(&values)[5]); _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4}); // missing last die
How can this be done? I give you 3 attempts. Other solutions are possible, here I want the simplest approaches possible. The good news was that many people at the workshop suggested the last, that I think is the best.
Attempt #1: initializer_list
Since initializer_list contents is sculpted in the code – at compile-time – its.size() function should be constexpr, shouldn’t it? Yes, but from C++14:
void AssignDiceValue(initializer_list<int> values) { static_assert(values.size() == 5, "Please provide exactly 5 values"); // only from C++14 copy(values.begin(), values.end(), _dice); }
Actually this doesn’t work yet, as a reader commented.
Attempt #2: strict_array
template<typename T, size_t N> struct strict_array : array<T, N> { template<typename... V> strict_array(V... vals) // no &&/forward to simplify : array<T, N>( {vals...} ) { static_assert(sizeof...(vals) == N, "Please provide exactly 5 values"); } }; void AssignDiceValues(const strict_array<int, 5>& values); _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4,5}); // ok _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4}); // static_assert fires _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4,5,6}); // static_assert fires and array<int, 5> constructor complains
Attempt #3: just the language
We don’t want to add complexity to my framework. We don’t need static_assert nor new bizarre array types. We can use the language and bring my requirement out by design. Just needing to add a tiny level of abstraction:
class Die { int value; public: Die(int val) : value(val) {} // mandatory // operator int() { return value; } // if really needed } void AssignDiceValues(const array<Die, 5>& values); _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4,5}); // ok _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4}); // ko _roller.AssignDiceValues({1,2,3,4,5,6}); // ko
This is the solution I like the most. It’s a design decision.
Two main points about initializer_list to remember when you refactor legacy “initialization” code:
int arr[] is int*. Don’t expect the language to magically deduce an initializer_list
is. Don’t expect the language to magically deduce an initializer_list‘s size() is constexpr only from C++14.
Next. Another task where initialization was involved regarded the game configuration: a game could be configured with a few options. Since the codebase was an hybrid of old C++ and modern C++, a tuple was employed.
YathzeeGame game ( make_tuple(5, 6, 2) ); // 5 dice, [1..6] values, 2 players
A gentleman spotted the following in the dark corners of the codebase:
vector<YahtzeeGame> games; games.push_back(make_tuple(5, 6, 2)); games.push_back(make_tuple(5, 6, 3)); games.push_back(make_tuple(5, 6, 4)); // other stuff
Excited about C++11, he tried to refactor:
vector<YahtzeeGame> games = { {5, 6, 2}, {5, 6, 3}, {5, 6, 4} };
And does it compile?
Yes!
No.
I’m kidding you!
I rephrase: do the following statements compile?
YahtzeeGame game { 5, 6, 2 }; or YahtzeeGame game { {5, 6, 2} };
No, they don’t neither. Some participants asked “why is not initializer_list supported here?”.
“initializer_list is not guilty”, I replied. First: how can one expect an initializer_list to be used to contstruct a tuple? initializer_list is – by-definition – homogeneous! Just the opposite of tuple. tuple should have a constructor taking…initializer_list<?>. Some people started likening tuple to pair: “I can do it with pair”.
Yes, you can do with pair because the real reason is tuple’s constructor, that is explicit, and – as you know – copy initialization considers only non-explicit constructors. That is, you can do:
tuple<int, string, foo> t {10, "hello", {fooArg1, fooArg2}};
But not:
tuple<int, string, foo> t = {10, "hello", {fooArg1, fooArg2}};
Nor:
tuple<int, string, foo> make_my_tuple() { return {10, "hello", {fooArg1, fooArg2}}; }
So you may refactor the initial code by adding make_tuple:
vector<YahtzeeGame> games = { make_tuple(5, 6, 2), make_tuple(5, 6, 3), make_tuple(5, 6, 4) };
Also here initializer_list was in the clear. When something is wrong with initialization, since curly braces initialization (aka uniform initialization) and initializer_list share the same syntax, and since almost all the standard containers support initializer_list construction, someone could jab at this type. As a reader commented, N4387 proposes (among other stuff) getting rid of this limitation.
The third and last example is another story.
To calculate the scores, a class with a CalculateScores function was provided. This function was monolithic, imagine a big if cascade:
if (...single dice...) {... } if (...pair dice...) {... } if (...tris dice...) {... } if (...poker...) {... } etc.
We proposed to decouple this function and make it modular. This way one can create several versions of the game, for example one with no special points (e.g. no full, poker, straight), another with extra points, etc. People designed a simple IRule interface, providing a function:
virtual void Apply(const GameState& state, ScoreTable& scores) = 0;
ScoreTable was already in the code and it just stored the results of the calculation. The idea was to apply rules in chain. Straightforward.
A funny anecdote: at some point I asked “how can you improve this if cascade?”. One person replied “we can use a switch-case”. I responded: “yes but…it’s pretty much the same. What can we do from a design point of view to make this code more modular?” Another guy said “we can design an interface and several concrete classes”. And suddenly the person who proposed the switch-case got up and left the room! Ouch…is an interface so bad?!
No more chatting! People coded this interface, created the rules and…they had to store them somewhere. They opted for a vector of unique_ptrs:
vector<unique_ptr<IRule>> rules;
And they serenely wrote:
vector<unique_ptr<IRule>> rules = { make_unique<Single>(), make_unique<Double>(), make_unique<Tris>(), make_unique<Full>(),... };
And they got impatient for testing their code, having unit tests from their side – contrary to what they have at work 🙂
I felt a tremor in the force…
“Noooo. Another compiler error” 😦
Said desperate programmers whining from the trenches.
“call to deleted constructor of ‘std::unique_ptr<Single, std::default_delete<Single> >”
“What the fuck?” Some of them kindly complained!
This time, they really made initializer_list fell guilty. And this time they were right. initializer_list doesn’t support move-only types. The main reason is that its begin() and end() return const pointers. There is a proposal to address this issue and several smart guys advanced their idioms – for example here.
As before, I wanted a simple solution for my modern C++ novices, to let them play and experience with C++11/14. I seized the moment: “guys, let’s do a simple exercise with variadics “:
auto rules = CreateVector<unique_ptr<IRule>>( make_unique<Single>, make_unique<Double>(),... );
The idea was very simple and so was the implementation:
template<typename T, typename H> void CreateVectorImpl(vector<T>& v, H&& single) { v.emplace_back(forward<H>(single)); } template<typename T, typename H, typename... Tail> void CreateVectorImpl(vector<T>& v, H&& head, Tail&&... tail) { v.emplace_back(forward<H>(head)); CreateVectorImpl(v, forward<Tail>(tail)...); } template<typename T, typename... Tail> vector<T> CreateVector(Tail&&... tail) { vector<T> v; CreateVectorImpl(v, forward<Tail>(tail)...); return v; }
Alessandro Vergani (who were there to help us) sent me this (specific – but slick) solution:
template <typename Type> void setup_rules(vector<unique_ptr<IRule>>& v) { v.emplace_back(make_unique<Type>()); } template <typename Type, typename Type2, typename... OtherTypes> void setup_rules(vector<unique_ptr<IRule>>& v) { v.emplace_back(make_unique<Type>()); setup_rules<Type2, OtherTypes...>(v); } template<typename... Types> vector<unique_ptr<IRule>> CreateRules() { vector<unique_ptr<IRule>> rules; setup_rules<Types...>(rules); return rules; } // usage: auto rules = CreateRules<Single, Double, Poker>();
Wrapping up the story, I believe people at the workshop tried to burden initializer_list too much. They got errors on something related to initialization with curly braces and they accused initializer_list. In the first case, the main misunderstanding was related to the language itself: int[] is just int*, in C++11 as in C++98. Rectifying was quite simple, by using a const reference to an array. initializer_list doesn’t have to do with that, not even here. It’s the language. And just by using the language we addressed the other requirement about prohibiting “uninitialized” dice. Here, some people thought they could just static_assert initializer_list’s size. I deem it’s not worth.
At first sight, the second case is even more related to initializer_list, because every container is constructible from initializer_list. Why tuple differs? If people don’t think about the mathematical difference between initializer_list (aka: homogeneous) and tuple (aka: heterogeneous) they can fall into a trap. Pair is the same story, but curly braces are because of uniform initialization. And pair’s constructor is not explicit, thus copy initialzation is possible and the trap is just veiled.
In the last example, initializer_list tried to escape through the window, but this time it couldn’t. Imagine initializer_list as arrays, globally stored somewhere. Even if they are (maybe) used only once (in the line you perform the initialization), the compiler is solely responsible for their state. We know there are many workarounds but I’d really like having an official feature in the standard to address this issue (e.g. N4166).
AdvertisementsLondon Drugs is gearing up to move forward with its development on the 2500 Block of East Hastings in Hastings-Sunrise.
The company owns land from Penticton Street west to the end of the lot that’s currently home to the Hastings North Temporary Community Garden. A London Drugs store is located along the block at 2585 East Hastings.
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Hastings North Temporary Community Garden. Photo Dan Toulgoet
The company had intended to build a four-storey condominium development called Alba, which included retail uses on the ground level, but it put the project on hold in May of 2013 because “the market was not conducive to starting a real estate project.”
London Drugs said it would re-evaluate the situation after two years.
In the meantime, it allowed Shifting Growth, a registered charity, to install the community garden on part of its property where some buildings had been knocked down. Shifting Growth was given a two-year deal with a 30-day removal clause. Companies like London Drugs get tax breaks for allowing vacant property to be used as gardens.
A spokesperson for Shifting Growth told the Courier recently that London Drugs had not communicated any future plans for the site yet.
But the company posted a message on its blog Nov. 19 providing some details.
The post states that there would soon be a change-of-use sign at 2696 East Hastings, at the corner of Hastings and Slocan where the old Rogers Video used to be located. The sign will reveal that London Drugs plans to open a small-scale store there “to ensure there is no disruption for our customers and pharmacy patients once development commences at the current 2585 London Drugs site.”
Former Rogers Video location. Photo Dan Toulgoet
It’s unclear when that will happen. The company says plans are being finalized and an announcement will be made in late 2016 or early 2017.
“We will be updating the community as these details are finalized and the timeline is determined,” the message states.
In an email to the Courier late last week, London Drugs said once the timeline is determined, “The Hastings North Temporary Garden will be transplanted to another site as determined by Shifting Growth who currently maintains and manages the garden. We will be giving as much notice as possible to Shifting Growth and will be sensitive to minimize disruption as much as possible during the growing season.”
A vacant building, which used to house a McDonald’s restaurant at the corner of Penticton and East Hastings, was recently torn down. The company says it wanted to get the site cleaned up and safe for the public.
A McDonald’s restaurant used to be at the corner of Penticton and East Hastings. Photo Dan Toulgoet
The Alba development was going to feature ground-floor retail space, including a new London Drugs store and a restaurant where the McDonald's used to sit. A new development may look different, according to London Drugs. And the new name is still to be determined.
“The real estate market and economic conditions did not time well for a new development at this location in 2013. Any plans moving forward will reflect current economic conditions and the current real estate landscape in Vancouver. As soon as we have a confirmed plan for the redevelopment, we will advise our staff and customers and the greater Hastings-Sunrise East Village community. Likely end of this year or early 2017,” the emailed stated.
noconnor@vancourier.com
@naoibhI know what you’re thinking. Shave with cold water? WTF? Yes, cold water. It sounds extremely uncomfortable, but it isn’t. This particular method of shaving dates back to the Victorian Era, when getting hot water was a chore. Benjamin Franklin once wrote that: “The act of shaving with cold water is much easier; it allows the whiskers to be stiff; the razor to slice the hair; and obtaining hot water much less of a bother.”
Now, yes, back in those days you had to chop the wood, start a fire, gather water, and boil it for some time (as an avid camper, I’ve done this from time to time). And now, all we have to do is turn a knob, which can still take a little bit of time for the water to heat up. But what if you don’t have time to let the water get warm? Shave cold. It actually has some very good benefits, such as less irritation, pores staying closed, whiskers being stiff. From a young age, let’s say puberty, our father’s typically teach us to use hot water whilst shaving. The reasons for this is that the hot water makes your beard soft, allowing it to be cut. I was taught this method as well.
The reason I switched to cold water was because of the extreme skin irritation I would have after a hot water shave. I have sensitive skin, so cold water was a much better alternative. Now, since several of us are proponents of the Traditional Wet Shave, we typically use that water, combined with a brush and soap, to whip up a lather. And you may be thinking, It lathers because we use hot water. It also lathers with cold water just as easily. For a cold water shave, just do your normal prep, but when you wet your face to ready it for the lather, use cold water.
This method has several benefits, not just for you, but for your gear as well. Take your razor. Nice, shiny, sturdy piece of metal. Feels nice when it’s warm. So does the blade. But get this. The hot water used to rinse the blade causes the tiny metal molecules in the blade to expand, making the razor dull after only five shaves. Cold water, on the other hand, causes the molecules to contract, giving the blade a better edge and longer life. Just by using cold water, my current Wilkinson Sword blade is on it’s eighth shave.
Your brush benefits too. While it will make the bristles a tad stiffer than normal, you don’t have to worry about any bristles slipping out of the handle and sticking to your face mid-lather. But, if you’re using a badger brush this should be no problem, as the badger hair remains soft regardless.
Now, for your face. With cold water, your beard will stiffen as opposed to being soft. When you make your first cut, there will be a slight tug, but is to be expected. Instead of the razor gliding over your whiskers, this tugging motion is the razor cutting the whisker at it’s closest. Your face will thank you, as you won’t have razor burn or bumps, your equipment will last longer, and you’ll stay quite the cool customer during the summer months.
For more on this, check out the article on cold water shaving at www.artofmanliness.com
P.S. There is also a chap in England who has a video on YouTube where he is shaving with ice water. You can check this out as well, although I would rather drink the ice water:Pump prices fell in California and across the rest of the U.S., and the trend was likely to continue as crude oil tumbled to its lowest levels in four months. The oil collapse came amid new concerns about the European debt crisis and a sense that the global economic recovery was slowing.
In California, the average retail price of a gallon of gasoline fell another 3.8 cents over the last week to $3.903, according to the AAA Fuel Gauge Report. AAA uses daily gas sales transactions from more than 100,000 retail outlets across the U.S., compiled by the Oil Price Information Service and by Wright Express.
Nationally, the average price of a gallon of regular gasoline fell 3.7 cents to $3.646.
Meanwhile, crude futures for July delivery dropped another 45 cents to $92.56 a barrel during trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil prices have fallen more than 20% since since they closed at $113.93 a barrel on April 29. The slide continued as the European Union again failed to agree on a loan payout to help Greece avoid default on its debts.
Brent crude oil fell dropped 92 cents to $112.29 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange.
Gasoline price analyst Bob van der Valk said that concern about European debt was the main reason.
"Fear of the 'PIIGS' virus [Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, Spain] has infected the oil markets, and those fears have nothing to do with another 'bird flu' type of virus but with the debt contagion" facing those countries, Van der Valk said. "With each of these countries carrying high debt-to-GDP ratios, financial markets are growing increasingly skeptical that Greece's debt crisis will be successfully resolved."
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Graphic: AAA's 12-month rolling average for retail gasoline prices.Smokers and vapers on Denver’s 16th Street Mall are now on notice: Starting Dec. 1, they will need to walk at least 50 feet down a side street before lighting up or puffing.
Denver 2017 election guide $937 million bond package and the Green Roof Initiative are on the ballot
The Denver City Council approved the public smoking ban 9-0 on Monday night, ending a weeks-long debate about how best to ensure that police don’t use the new restrictions to single out the homeless or service workers on their smoke breaks.
Councilman Paul Kashmann put forth an amendment requiring the Denver Police Department to collect information about who receives tickets, with regular reports to the council.
Even if all it takes to comply with the ban is to venture far enough off the mall, he said, “I just want to be absolutely sure that those who decide to not take that stroll, due either to obstinance or ignorance,” aren’t unfairly targeted.
His colleagues embraced that idea unanimously, but six of the nine present rejected another change proposed by Kashmann — to slap a two-year sunset on the ordinance. That would have required a council review of the measure by 2019 it to remain in effect, as a check to make sure it truly was about public health and “not just for public relations” to improve mall’s image, as Kashmann put it.
“We might as well not do it (at all),” responded council president Albus Brooks, the ban’s sponsor, expressing worry that a time limit would undercut the health campaign that’s behind the measure. “We might as well not take the step to address second-hand smoke. … I think it actually hurts the overall proposal.”
Called “Breathe Easy,” the campaign has been spearheaded by the Downtown Denver Partnership, property owners and public health advocates. Initially, Brooks says, the effort will focus on new signage and public education rather than issuing fines.
Here is what to expect when the new ban takes effect in a month:
Banned: All kinds of cigarette and tobacco smoking, as well as the use of vaporizers and e-cigarettes, within 50 feet northeast and southwest of 16th Street. The ban covers the mall from Broadway to Chestnut Place, near Union Station.
All kinds of cigarette and tobacco smoking, as well as the use of vaporizers and e-cigarettes, within 50 feet northeast and southwest of 16th Street. The ban covers the mall from Broadway to Chestnut Place, near Union Station. Marijuana use: This is already banned in public spaces in Denver, but supporters of the new ordinance argue it will help police, who sometimes have struggled to distinguish between tobacco and pot smoking or vaping.
This is already banned in public spaces in Denver, but supporters of the new ordinance argue it will help police, who sometimes have struggled to distinguish between tobacco and pot smoking or vaping. Penalty: Violations are a civil infraction, not a crime, with a potential $100 fine. But a police official said officers likely would give an offender information about the new restrictions, and then a warning, before issuing a ticket.If in its final hours Syria's crumbling government unleashes a chemical barrage – and some analysts certainly think that's possible – the regime will probably rely on an arsenal of gas- or nerve agent-tipped ballistic missiles purchased from Iran and North Korea.
But precisely how many and what mix of missiles President Bashar Al Assad controls, and therefore how deadly a chemical strike might be, both remain unclear. Equally unclear is how far the world should go to defend against such a strike.
Chances are, Syria possesses at least three types of ballistic missile that can be fitted with chemical warheads, according to Dr. Jeffrey Lewis from the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in California. These include Scuds and SS-21s acquired from North Korea and, less clearly, Fateh 110s transferred from Iran.
The Fateh 110s and SS-21s, both around 20 feet long, can reach just 50 and 120 miles, respectively. The Scuds, at 35 feet long, have a longer range: up to 400 miles. All the missiles are mobile – that is, they're carried and launched by wheeled or tracked vehicles. The Scud's so-called Transporter Erector Launcher is a heavy-duty offroad truck the size of a tractor trailer.
They're all also unguided, with abysmal accuracy – 200 feet at best, in the Scud's case. That means it can takes a lot of missiles to hit one target. According to various sources, Syria's stockpile could include between 100 and 300 Scuds, maybe 200 SS-21s and probably no more than 50 Fatehs.
The Scuds and SS-21s have been widely reported and even glimpsed in recent satellite imagery and in the video above, shot in June by the Free Syrian Army. These two missile types have guest-starred in scores of conflicts since the Cold War. Most recently, Iraq lobbed Scuds at coalition troops in 1991 and 2003. Russia fired SS-21s at Georgian forces in 2009.
But the Fatehs are "something no one talks about," Lewis, who also blogs at Arms Control Wonk, tells Danger Room. "That boggles my mind." The Fatehs are just part of a growing portfolio of Iranian-designed missiles and rockets meant mostly for domestic use in Iran's escalating standoff with most of the rest of the world and, to a lesser extent, for export.
One reason could be that the Fatehs arrived in Syria in just the last couple years, when Tehran took what Lewis calls the "unprecedented" step of transferring the missiles to Damascus – a move confirmed in a 2009 U.S. diplomatic cable released last year by Wikileaks. There were reports that Damascus passed the Fatehs on to Hezbollah, although Lewis says he's skeptical this has happened.
By contrast, Assad's regime has possessed Scuds and SS-21s for decades. The older missiles, originally Soviet in design, were practically staples of Third World dictatorships during the Cold War.
Though the oldest, the long-range Scuds "are clearly the big thing," Lewis says. Not only could these missiles strike rebel targets inside Syria, they've got the legs to target Syria's neighbors, including all of Israel. Saddam Hussein fired more than 40 Scuds with conventional warheads at Israel and Kuwait in 1991, killing one Israeli, one Saudi and 28 Americans from a Pennsylvania Army National Guard unit.
But a Syrian barrage is contingent on the missiles |
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