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The Bangalore Development Authority is back in the news for the wrong reasons.
The agency has sold two acres and 35 guntas of land (more than 1.25 lakh sq ft) to its own employees’ welfare association for Rs. 8,60,675 in the upmarket Banashankari area. That works out to about Rs. 6.87 per sq ft; and that is cheaper than a cup of tea in this city, where land is equated to gold in terms of value.
According to estimates by some real estate developers, the actual value of the land is at least a thousand times more. “If you find land in that area that is less than Rs. 6,000 per sq ft, please inform me and I will buy it,” asserts RTI activist B.M. Shivkumar, who is behind this revelation.
Producing documents to back his claim at a press conference here on Monday, Mr. Shivkumar holds Chief Minister Siddaramaiah morally responsible for what he describes as the “biggest scam since the BJP government surrendered its brief”. He reckons that the land that was sold for a little less than Rs. 7 lakh is worth Rs. 100 crore at the very least in the open market. The sale deed that Mr. Shivkumar shares with reporters shows that the BDA sold the land to the BDA Employees’ Welfare Association on June 4. Mr. Shivkumar’s press conference has triggered media frenzy with television channels already calling for an explanation from the Chief Minister’s office, with some even suggesting a CBI probe. Speaking to the The Hindu, BDA Commissioner T. Sham Bhat and employees’ association president D.N. Bette Gowda, however, categorically deny any wrongdoing in the transaction.
Mr. Bhat says, “In 2006, the government ordered the BDA to allot 45 acres to the employees’ association. This is the fruitions of a much older deal [when land was cheaper].” Cheaper by a thousand times? “Yes,” says Mr. Bhat, without revealing the cost at which the land was acquired. He, however, points out that four parcels of land — measuring 27 acres, 7 acres, 5 acres and 2 acres — have already been sold to the association since 2007.
Although defending the sale along similar lines, Mr. Gowda claims that the plot in Banashankari was due to the association in 1997. “Back then, the land was worth less than Rs. 1 lakh an acre. In fact, we are paying eight times more than what we should,” he argues.
Mr. Shivkumar, however, holds his ground and says that the BDA has shown undue favouritism. “The BDA has sold the land for less than what it paid to purchase it,” he says. | 1,266,900 |
CHELSEA, Manhattan (WABC) -- The sister of a man who is believed responsible for two separate random slashings over the past eight days is speaking out, saying the family tried in vain to get help for the troubled suspect.And her comments come as the NYPD announced that 41-year-old Kari Bazemore is now charged in a third assault.Bazemore has 32 arrests over the years and was taken into custody after 23-year-old Amanda Morris was attacked on a Chelsea street early Wednesday. He was then linked to a similar assault on 28-year-old Nikki Pagliaro in the Port Morris section of the Bronx on New Year's Day. She required 150 stitches to close the cut on her face, while Morris needed seven stitches for gashes above and below her lip."I feel like I got hit in the head with a baseball," Morris told Eyewitness News. "I don't know what I did to deserve that. I guess I was in the wrong place at the wrong time."Dana Bazemore is the sister of the man police believe committed both assaults, along with many others, and she believes the system failed her family and the victims."This could have been prevented," she said. "This could have all been prevented."Kari Bazemore had recently grown increasingly violent, including a December 30 arrest for assault. But the judge released him."Anybody that looked at him could tell that he had a mental issue," Dana Bazemore said. "So if you locked him up on the 30th, why did the judge let him go?"Dana Bazemore said the family has tried for months to get their brother the care he needed, but that no one would help."It was a ping-pong game," she said. "They keep telling us, 'Go to Bellevue,' then Bellevue says go to the NYPD. We called Ward's Island. These are places where he's been at, so that's why we called them, because we figured they got history of him being there, so it would help. But it didn't, obviously."She said she knew what her brother was capable of violence, and she tried to prevent it."I thank God nobody didn't get killed," she said.Bazemore was being investigated in at least two more unsolved attacks, and he his now charged with felony assault and criminal possession of a weapon in one of them. Police say that just before noon on November 11 in Midtown, Bazemore approached a 43-year-old female who was walking northbound on 5th Avenue between 55th and 56th Streets. It is alleged that without provocation, the suspect struck the victim in the face with a large plastic bag containing an unknown blunt object. The victim sustained injuries to her head and face.In another incident, also in the Bronx, a woman was cut and another was punched.Bazemore is undergoing a psychiatric evaluation at Bellevue Hospital. | 1,266,901 |
�s subscription bundled into its price.
Usually, it costs £3.99 a month per child or £7.99 for up to four, although Amazon Prime members get discounted rates of £1.99 and £3.99 a month respectively.
For that, you get a good selection of apps from children’s developers like Toca Boca, StoryToys, Dr Panda and Sago Sago, as well as well-known brands like Disney, Sesame Street, Dr Seuss and Thomas & Friends.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Fire HD Kids Edition comes with a catalogue of content for children. Photograph: Stuart Dredge/The Guardian
Your children may gravitate towards the famous names at first, but there’s an impressive long-tail of independent apps to try as time goes on. The advantage of not having to pay for apps individually may encourage kids to explore the catalogue.
The books section is a similar mix of brands (SpongeBob SquarePants, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, plenty of movie tie-ins) with quirkier fare. The videos catalogue likewise mixes shows like Adventure Time, Peppa Pig and Shaun the Sheep through to videos from brands like Lego Friends.
What if your children want an app that isn’t part of the subscription? The first two apps my sons asked me to install were Minecraft and Crossy Road, which aren’t part of Fire for Kids Unlimited. This is where you switch to your profile, get them from Amazon’s Appstore, and then use the Fire for Kids app to “add” them to your children’s libraries.
Diversity in children’s apps: ‘Gender depictions tend to be very stereotyped’ Read more
This means you can let your children play “freemium” games (like Crossy Road) although the tablet will block them from buying in-app purchases. I also added the BBC’s iPlayer app, which meant I could download some TV shows for offline viewing - an option missing from Amazon’s own video catalogue.
Verdict
As a robust, affordable tablet, the Fire HD Kids Edition makes an ideal first tablet for children, with a good balance between kids taking control over their download choices, and parents being able to set limits on how they use it.
The built-in subscription has plenty of good, educational and/or entertaining content to explore, but the flexibility to install other apps and games is welcome - especially if your children are reaching peak Minecraft age.
It would be nice to be able to store some of Amazon’s video catalogue for offline viewing ahead of a long trip or holiday, and I wonder if there is scope to add music streaming or downloads in to the subscription in the future. Still, as things stand this is one of the best children’s tablets yet. | 1,266,902 |
LOMBARD, Ill. (Reuters) - A potential merger of Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd and Norfolk Southern would make it hard for No. 3 U.S. railroad CSX Corp to survive alone and ratchet up pressure for more industry consolidation, the chairman of No. 2 U.S. railroad BNSF said on Thursday.
The Canadian Pacific railyard is pictured in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia in this file photo from February 15, 2015. REUTERS/Ben Nelms/Files
“CSX would be at an enormous (competitive) disadvantage and so there would be another step towards consolidation,” Matt Rose told Reuters on the sidelines of the semiannual meeting of the Midwest Association of Rail Shippers.
Rose reiterated that this is not the right time for mergers as “our belief is that our customers do not want mergers to occur.” But he said if a merger of Canadian Pacific and Norfolk Southern appeared likely then BNSF, which is owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc, would bid for another railroad.
Canadian Pacific in mid-November disclosed its $28 billion offer to buy Norfolk Southern.
Norfolk Southern has spurned the Canadian railroad’s interest, setting the scene for a proxy battle. Some customers and legislators have written to the Surface Transportation Board, the regulator that would review any merger proposal, opposing the proposed deal.
Rose said BNSF would not likely make a competitive bid for Norfolk Southern. Canadian Pacific has said operating synergies from a merger with Norfolk Southern would lead to savings of more than $1.8 billion. Rose said that figure is very high compared with prior rail mergers.
“I don’t know if we would ever do a competitive bid for Norfolk Southern because we don’t see $1.8 billion in natural synergies. We may (do a bid), but we think the synergy numbers are enormous.”
Any deal would likely face a review from the Surface Transportation Board, which tightened guidelines for mergers following a slew of deals in the 1990s. The regulator would have to weigh whether a Canadian Pacific and Norfolk Southern merger would lead to other deals.
Rose said a deal would see the “final map redrawn” for North America’s railroads.
“You don’t have to have a lot of imagination when there’s only seven railroads to get down to two railroads,” he said. “The chairs get taken away pretty quick.”
Rose said he has discussed the merger issue with Buffett and has his support for whatever is in the long-term interests of BNSF.
“He expects me to run this company. But if I went to him and said I need $30 billion to buy a railroad, we would have more than a phone conversation.” | 1,266,903 |
In today’s cutthroat environment, every business website has to be strategic and have a focused plan of action. Your website needs to be designed by a specialist for website design in Bay Area to dominate its niche with the help of SEO. It not only draws organic traffic to the website but even enhances its overall prominence over time. Having a website designed to be SEO-friendly is the most cost-effective and the best option to consider these days.
The following are a few essentials that you need to keep in mind:
Visually pleasing
People are visual hungry and that’s why it’s necessary to create a well-planned and organized website with wonderful graphics and template that can drive the maximum number of audience. None would like to browse through a website that incorporates frustrating, unimaginative, dull, or boring images. Adding quality images and making your website visually stunning can make it more compelling. Ensure to create a website that is user-friendly and easy to navigate and the users can find information easily.
Social media
In order to enhance website’s visibility, attract more users, and establish the leadership in the niche, making use of social media is essential. If carried out with a focused approach, it can progress the overall visibility of your website in a broader sense. However, keep in mind that you can guide gain an edge and do extremely well with your website with an SEO-friendly design by an expert for website design in Bay Area. Adding social media can make your business popular in the niche.
Blogging
An ideal approach to attract more audience and enhance their knowledge as well as establish a position in the niche is blogging. Plus, it is the most cost-effective technique to progress the overall ranking of the website in search engine results. Therefore, including a blog on your website is really worth. Blogging provides you with the opportunity to make use of keywords within your website to make it SEO-friendly that will ultimately lead to improved sales and overall return on investment of your business.
Mobile optimization or responsiveness
Having a website designed to be SEO-friendly and mobile responsive is the need of an hour. Responsiveness plays a vital role when it comes to ranking higher in search engine results. Your website must be ready to be browsed using any kind of device, be it a computer, Smartphone, or a tablet. Plus, Google also gives priority to ranking the websites higher in search results that are designed to be responsive and attracts the widest range of users.
Speed
Having a website designed to be SEO-friendly by an experienced professional for web design in Bay Area makes sure that the website has good page load speed. Load speed of the website plays a crucial role in obtaining a higher ranking in search engine results. If your website fails to load within three to five seconds, the user is sure to bounce and switch over to one of your industry competitors, thus results in negatively impacted sales and revenue. | 1,266,904 |
Netflix is coming to a theater near you Friday with the release of the heady thriller “Beasts of No Nation,” starring Idris Elba, but major theater chains are closing their doors in protest. AMC, Regal, Cinemark and Carmike have followed through on threats not to screen the movie because Netflix plans to both stream it online and show it in 31 smaller theaters across the country.
The film, written and directed by Cary Fukunaga of “True Detective” fame, premiered last week at the London Film Festival to generally positive reviews from the New York Times, Washington Post, Hollywood Reporter and Variety.
But the major chains are pointing to the traditional 90-day “window” that separates theatrical and home or on-demand releases, a system increasingly under pressure with the rise of video-on-demand services like Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Video.
The independent theater chain Alamo Drafthouse told Variety in March that it would show the film, with CEO Tim League arguing there need not be friction between theaters and the streaming giant.
But why might Netflix, one of the most obvious culprits yanking moviegoers away from theaters and DVDs, be interested in a debut on the big screen?
The most likely answer is that the company wants a little gold statue. Hyping "Beasts" in a press release as “a powerful film that unfolds beautifully,” Netflix needs to push the flick in theaters in order to qualify for an Oscar.
According to the rules of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: “Films that in any version, receive their first public exhibition or distribution in any manner other than as a theatrical motion picture release will not be eligible for Academy Awards in any category.”
The guidelines note that nontheatrical releases include “Internet transmission.”
Netflix, which acquired the right to “Beasts” for $12 million, earned its first Oscar nomination for “The Square,” a 2014 documentary on the Egyptian revolution. Another documentary, “Virunga,” was nominated in 2015. Both were released “day-and-date,” where a film becomes available in theaters and on demand at the same time.
The company touted both the film’s artistic promise and its distribution model earlier this year in a press release, congratulating its partners at Red Crown Productions, which produced the film.
“To know that this harrowing and beautiful movie is going to reach the more than 50 million people within Netflix’s reach is beyond our wildest dreams,” said Daniela Taplin Lundberg, a co-founder of Red Crown. “The Netflix team is bold and has the same pioneering spirit about distribution that I like to think we had about making the film in the jungles of Ghana. We could not be happier about this partnership.” | 1,266,905 |
They hate you, too:
tell a self proclaimed male feminist that he cant be a feminist and watch him turn in to the biggest misogynist abusive s–t within 0.2 seconds. happens 100% of the time.
That 31-word post got more than 25,000 notes on Tumblr in the past year, and the same Tumblr feminist had this to say:
leftist men are just as horrifyingly and violently misogynist as all other men, including old conservative christian dudes, but they get away with so much because they dress up their misogyny in a specific “social justice” language and call themselves feminists rather than just straight up saying that they hate women, and they think women are only good for sex, having babies, and domestic labor like right wing men do, but they both hate women the same.
Insofar as “lefist men” and self-proclaimed “male feminists” describe the same group of men, the question arises whether any man can escape feminism’s general condemnation of males. Obviously, some men still believe that feminism is something other than mere man-hating, and some feminists may also encourage men to believe this. What we never see, however, is feminists who condemn the man-haters among them. It would seem that the first commandment of feminism is, “Thou shalt not speak praise of a male, nor defend any man against thy feminist sister.”
Feminism’s discourse about men is relentlessly negative, and no feminist ever criticizes these anti-male sermons, because to do so would result in her ex-communication from the cult. Therefore, if any man dares to object to a movement that seems to contemplate the annihilation of males as its ultimate goal, he can be sure that feminists will unite to denounce him for doing so: “How dare this despicable man quote our words as evidence against us? This is misogynistic harassment!”
Men must never call attention to feminism’s deliberate hatefulness, because no man has any right to defend himself against women who wish him dead. The mere fact that a man notices how feminists express malice toward him — merely because he is male — is considered proof that he is a particularly egregious oppressor. Not even the most sympathetic “progressive” man can ever be exempt from feminism’s all-encompassing hatred of males. Yet left-wing men are so eager to appease these spiteful women (whose votes are necessary to electing progressive politicians) that their allegiance requires them to absorb a constant barrage of insults from their feminist “allies” without complaint
We can only conclude that progressive men think they deserve to be hated by women, and who am I to say that they don’t?
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[by Oscar Pistorius]. The day she died she was supposed to talk to schoolgirls in Johannesburg about violence against women.
Whatever she was going through in her relationship she hid from me. I believe that’s because she didn’t want me to worry. After it happened, I missed Reeva so much and my grief became destructive but, during the trial, I went into another space in my head. I felt vulnerable in that courtroom but, after everything that had happened, I wanted to be strong – the things I had to listen to were terrible. Eventually, I freed myself from the anger inside me – and I forgave. You have to forgive, but that doesn’t mean her murderer needn’t pay for what he did.
I came to the realisation I needed to get myself together and try to help other women affected by violence. That’s how the foundation was born. It’s named after Reeva, to continue the work she started. We want to raise awareness of physical abuse, provide resources to victims and educate women on their self worth. But we also want to educate men – while they are still boys – to respect the women in their lives.
Ashley Judd
Actor and feminist activist
‘I speak from a position of empowerment’: Ashley Judd. Photograph: Kieran E Scott
My mother was pregnant with me at the time of the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr and Bobby Kennedy – those events imprinted on her and, therefore, on me. More than anything, though, what has formed the core of both my pain and my resilience is experiencing sexual abuse in early childhood.
That experience of extensive patriarchal wounding shaped my neural anatomy. I have spent a good deal of my life either unconsciously affected, or bewildered by my inability to let go of the pain. I’d been using yoga, meditation and prayer as modalities to cope with the abuse, but the power to confront what happened came through my sister. She had been seeking help for an eating disorder and, when I showed up to a family week, her treatment team took one look at me and recommended a 12-step programme. I thought they were wrong to suggest it, but I was willing to do anything to change, and I’m glad I did. Through professional help, I’ve become a general badass. It can be abusive to highlight a problem without also underscoring a solution, so I am very thankful that today, when I talk about being a survivor of adolescent and adult rape, and of all kinds of gender wounding, I do so from a position of empowerment. If I could change one thing in the world today, it would be to change the prevailing global culture of sexual exploitation and sexual entitlement.
200 Women is published by Chronicle Books at £35. To order a copy for £29.75, go to guardianbookshop.com | 1,266,907 |
It’s time for our last matchup in the Joe Morgan Memorial Elite 8. Already, one of Monday’s semifinals is set with Chris Berman facing Craig James. The winner of our final Elite 8 matchup today will face the gross Colin Cowherd in our other semifinal. Who will it be? Will it be sports broadcasting’s chosen one that has faced the ire of fans for his moribund play by play… or the sleazy reporter that still wants to take credit for The Decision. Your decision is a tough one, Joe or Jim, who deserves to be on AA’s Mount Rushmore the most?
Joe Buck vs Jim Gray
Joe Buck
Fact File: Fox’s #1 play by play man for NFL and MLB. Has announced several World Series and Super Bowls.
Why He’s Here: Joe Buck has quickly risen to the top of the most disliked sports announcers. His dry, monotone style doesn’t quite fit in with an age where Gus Johnson and Kevin Harlan are two of the more popular sports announcers in the business. Beyond that though, Joe Buck has a certain air of smugness towards his announcing duties, even admitting in the past that he isn’t that big of a sports fan. His attempted and failed late night career told sports fans that he had bigger and better things to do than announce the biggest games in sports.
Links:
Joe Buck Doesn’t Enjoy Baseball Anymore
Real Tweets From Real People – Joe Buck
It’s Time For Fox To Sit Joe Buck
The Artie Lange Interview
Round 1 Result: Defeated Chris Rose 72.53% – 27.47%
Round 2 Result: Defeated Deion Sanders 55.21% – 44.79%
Jim Gray
Fact File: Reporter and interviewer for ESPN…or the highest bidder
Why He’s Here: Two words – The Decision. Jim Gray’s involvement in The Decision led to plenty of jealousy from fellow sports media personalities and plenty of fury from sports fans. At least his pointless stalling in that interview wasn’t as contentious as his infamous interview with Pete Rose. But, there’s also many other examples of Jim Gray’s sterling career.
Links:
Jim Gray’s Awful Super Bowl Sign Off
What Happened To Jim Gray?
Jim Gray Tries To Fight Corey Pavin, Gets Dumped By Golf Channel
How Jim Gray Helped Orchestrate The Decision
Round 1 Result: Defeated Jim Nantz 78.15% – 21.85%
Round 2 Result: Defeated Thom Brennaman 77.89% – 22.11%
Results:
Joe Buck defeated Jim Gray 56.34% – 45.66%
| 1,266,908 |
GENEVA (Reuters) - The United Nations Special Envoy for Syria said after meeting representatives of the United States, Russia and other major powers on Wednesday that Syria peace talks were still planned to start in Geneva on Jan. 25.
United Nations (U.N.) Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura attends a meeting on Syria with representatives of the five permanent members of the Security Council (P5) at the United Nations European headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, January 13, 2016. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse
Staffan de Mistura told reporters they had discussed access to the government-besieged town of Madaya, where the first aid deliveries were made on Monday to starving civilians after three months.
“This meeting was essential in order to move forward on the Geneva talks, and there are issues still, and very much at stake, that’s why I needed to consult them,” he said.
Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Anne Patterson said the talks were still “on track” for Jan. 25 and she had had a “good conversation” with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov and senior officials from Britain, China and France.
“Everyone’s primary concern is humanitarian access given some of the dire situations that are taking place inside of Syria,” Patterson told reporters.
Syrian rebel groups said earlier on Wednesday they would not take part in the peace talks unless humanitarian articles in the latest U.N. resolution on the conflict were implemented.
The groups, who include the powerful Islam Army, mentioned articles 12 and 13 of a resolution passed late last year, which calls for humanitarian access to all in need and the cessation of attacks on civilians.
De Mistura’s office issued a statement saying that officials from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council had agreed to push for “sustained and unimpeded access to a number of besieged areas” in Syria’s civil war.
“The Special Envoy and his team will continue working hard to issue the invitations in order to ensure maximum inclusivity, with a view to starting the intra-Syrian Geneva Talks on 25 January,” it said.
The opposition council told de Mistura that the Damascus government would have to take goodwill steps, including a prisoner release, before they would go to negotiations.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said on Twitter that Gatilov would meet representatives of various opposition groups on Thursday. It also said the international powers needed to do more work to agree lists of groups to be regarded as terrorists.
Patterson said the United States and Russia were working “very assiduously” on the question of defining terrorist groups. They had been discussing “the terrorism issue in the whole Syria-Iraq corridor” for months, and military and intelligence contacts were continuing. | 1,266,909 |
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Rock star Bono used to be targeted by bullies for supporting the wrong football team, when he was a kid.
The U2 frontman was picked on by bullies while growing up in Dublin, revealed his best friend Guggi.
Irish artist Guggi – real name Derek Rowan – grew up on the same Dublin road - Cedarwood Road - as Bono, real name Paul Hewson.
“Myself and Bono, we weren’t like the other kids in the street and we knew we weren’t,” Guggi revealed.
“I was seen as an oddball, a freak. We didn’t know what to say when they would want us to name our favorite football players because we didn’t know any names.
"We could get beaten up for supporting the wrong team or not supporting anybody.”
As children, they bonded over a shared love of punk rock, mischief making and Jesus.
Guggi’s father was a member of the Christian Brethren faith who encouraged his son and Bono to explore religion.
“Bono came to his faith through my dad. And I came to faith through my dad,” Guggi told the told Religion News Service.
“My dad would send us to the YMCA where they had something called the ‘boys department’ where boys went — not boys and girls, just boys — and the boy’s department went on a camp every year. It was called camping, but it was more like sleeping bags on the rec room floor.
“We slept in tents maybe a couple of times, but it was mostly school halls, church halls, that kind of thing, and yeah, myself and Bono went there every summer.”
(Image: X01164)
During the recording of U2’s seminal Joshua Tree album in 1985, Bono summoned Guggi and Gavin to their local pub, known as The Gravediggers, to ask a favour.
“He said, ‘Look, I want to paint. We’re putting this album together, we’re making this record, but I need to get away from that,’” Guggi recalled. “Bono always loved painting, and we painted together as children, as teenagers.”
Bono set aside a room in the large manor house where the band was recording the famous album and asked Guggi to fill it with art supplies, which he did.
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A Wisconsin woman earned praise from police after “body slamming” a suspect who was attacking the officers as they tried to arrest a man for parole violations, reports say.
Two officers in Portage, Wisconsin, were attempting to put a suspect in custody when the suspect’s girlfriend allegedly attacked one of them. Sgt. Eric Walters got the woman to the ground and was about to cuff her, but before Officer Brian Loewenhagen could react, the man they were arresting, 21-year-old Jacob R. Hellenbrand, reportedly broke free and kicked the kneeling officer into unconsciousness.
“A female associate of the male suspect instigated the battery by punching Portage Police Officer Brian Loewenhagen numerous times while he was attempting to place the male into handcuffs,” the Portage Police reported on the department’s Facebook page.
The Facebook page description continued:
During the struggle Sgt. Eric Walters came to Officer Loewenhagen’s aid and was attempting to restrain the female on the ground. While the male was being stabilized against the wall of a building in a standing position by Officer Loewenhagen, nearby Sgt. Walters was attempting to ground cuff the female. The male was able to blade his body toward Sgt. Walters and forcefully kick Sgt. Walters on the right side of his face and head. The force of the kick caused Sgt. Walters to lose consciousness.
Upon seeing the melee, Divine Savior Hospital employee Vanessa Guerra rushed to the fallen officer to see to his condition.
Allegedly, Olivia J. Boomsma, 21, continued her assault of the officers, yelling she had a knife and intended to use it. Guerra then body slammed Boomsma and held her until the officers regained control of the situation.
The department said:
Concerned that the female was going to stab Officer Loewenhagen or the unconscious Sgt. Walters, the nurse disregarded her own safety to help protect the officers and took it upon herself to engage the female suspect by body slamming the female suspect against a wall and held her there until Sgt. Walters resumed consciousness and was able to handcuff the female.
Guerra, a certified medical assistant, told WKOW if she faced such a situation again, she would do the same thing.
“I’m in the medical profession. When you get into that mode, you’re there for your patients; you’re there for the person that you see in need. And that’s what you do,” Guerra added.
Both officers were checked out and were reported in good condition, having suffered only a few cuts and bruises. The department said Sgt. Walters also suffered a possible concussion.
The two suspects now face felony charges for the alleged battery to a law enforcement officer and resisting arrest.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston. | 1,266,911 |
anecdotes and vulgarisms. He is revealed to be a character no one could possibly dream up. McLemore is an antiquarian horologist, an antique clock repairer and a student of time, a genius who is one of the best in the world at what he does. Tucked away in rural Alabama, he has a large property on which he built a giant maze out of hedges and gates that move to create 64 different variations, one of which has no solution. In an interview with Jimmy Fallon, Reed described McLemore’s life as “metaphorically convenient.” The introduction to the podcast goes into great depth describing the intricacies and difficulties of clock restoration.
“To make the job even trickier,” Reed says “you often can’t tell what’s been done to a clock over hundreds of years. Maybe there’s damage that was never fixed or fixed badly. Sometimes entire portions of the original clockwork are missing, but you can’t tell for sure…a clock that old doesn’t come with a manual. So instead, the few people left in the world who know how to do this kind of thing rely on what are often called ‘witness marks’ to guide their way…. actual impressions and outlines and discolorations left inside the clock, of pieces that might have once been there.”
The less-than-subtle symbolism is a brilliant, despite cliched, introduction to what Reed spends the next seven episodes embarking on. A restoration of his own. Recreating the story of a life from all the scattered clues that are left behind. Some that belong, and some that don’t. A puzzle with too many pieces, of a picture we cannot deduce.
Reed continues, “I’m told that fixing an old clock can be maddening. You’re constantly wondering if you have just spent hours going down a path that will likely take you nowhere… So, at every moment along the way you have to decide if you are wasting your time, or not.”
Brian Reed spent 3 years of his life exploring the mysteries of ‘S-Town’ and John B. McLemore, and it is clear from his own asides he wondered whether it was worth all the time he put into it. What was he finding? What story was he telling? Who would care to listen? With over 40 million downloads in the first month, the answer was clear. Though it is no antique clock, the story told is beautiful and timeless, and listening to it was an experience I will never forget.
‘S-Town’ is a seven-part series available to listen to or read at stownpodcast.org. You can also listen to it via Apple podcasts, or on Stitcher or Radiopublic if you have an android device. | 1,266,912 |
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It’s election season, and three things are inevitable: death, taxes and provincial political parties helping their federal counterparts.
Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil said he’s more than happy to go out and “do some work” for some of the federal Liberal candidates who want him, while Nova Scotia NDP Leader Gary Burrill told Global News he will use “every spare nanosecond” to campaign with prospective NDP MPs.
“In the NDP, the provincial and federal parties work very closely together,” Burrill said. “I am so excited about the stature and the quality of the slate that our party is bringing forward in our province and I’m looking forward to going door to door with them.”
But for at least one party in Nova Scotia, there appears to be a conscious decision to distance its members from the leader of its federal counterpart.
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READ MORE: Here’s where Canada’s party leaders will be on Day 3 of the election campaign
Despite the success of the Conservative Party of Canada this federal term — in which New Brunswick, P.E.I., Ontario, Quebec and B.C. opted out of giving their Liberal governments another term — Nova Scotia PC Leader Tim Houston would not commit to going to bat for Andrew Scheer.
A statement from the provincial party said Houston is “totally focused” on the provincial legislature, his riding of Pictou East, and winning an upcoming provincial byelection, leaving him limited availability to campaign on the federal stage.
NS NDP Leader Gary Burrill on NB NDP members leaving party in favour of the federal Green Party: “Elizabeth May can have them.” Says those candidates ran from racism, NDP Party tackles racists head on. pic.twitter.com/cFaUvDz85S — Jeremy Keefe (@Jeremy_Keefe) September 12, 2019
But Houston says he’s committed to attending community events with federal candidates George Canyon and Scott Armstrong, both of whom are friends he supports.
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It’s a stark contrast to the sentiments expressed by other provincial leaders.
“I believe our relationship with the prime minister has been positive. We have signed a number of positive deals with them,” McNeil said.
“I continue to provide that working relationship and I will continue to do what I can.” Tweet This
It’s unclear when federal leaders will arrive in Nova Scotia, but with all parties in full campaign mode, it’s safe to say they will visit at some point.
WATCH: ‘Fringe parties’ preparing for upcoming election
1:55 “Fringe parties” preparing for upcoming election “Fringe parties” preparing for upcoming election | 1,266,913 |
�s history known as los doce años. These 12 years of a new de facto dictatorship systematically decimated resistance movements. Balaguer went to great lengths to wipe out all voices challenging his regime, eliminating more than 3,000 opposition leaders in his first four years in office. He sent agents as far as Brussels to assassinate the MPD’s Maximiliano Gómez in exile in 1971.
A new generation of resistance
Today, though most texts on Latin American social movements hardly mention the Dominican Republic, the flame of resistance against injustice burns bright there. Leaders who came of age during the revolution, in the struggles against Balaguer’s terror of the 1970s or in the fight against structural adjustment in the 1980s are encouraging a new generation of young people to speak out against violations of human rights, political cronyism and corruption.
In recent weeks, mass protests and strikes throughout the country have denounced the Supreme Court’s decision not to investigate the approximately US$900 million recently found in the possession of Dominican senator Félix Bautista. Bautista has been a close adviser to presidents and has held public posts for the last two decades, and was accused by the Attorney General’s office of illicit accumulation of wealth, fraud and money laundering.
In addition, Dominican popular movements have successfully halted potential mining operations in Los Haitises National Park and most recently at Loma Miranda, a peak in the central mountains.
A strong voice for justice for Dominicans of Haitian ancestry stripped of citizenship rights has emerged from many sectors, including the Jesuit community, the Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo and the disenfranchised youth themselves.
As part of our 50th anniversary year, CUSLAR members continue to educate ourselves and others about structural inequality and the political repression that can result from trying to maintain unlivable situations. Since the 2008 global economic crisis, it has become more clear that inequality is not only a North-South problem, but also an issue of an extreme concentration of wealth and expanding poverty in the Global North. Past and present struggles in the Dominican Republic, just as the demands of teachers, immigrants or fast-food workers in the United States, point to the necessity to “globalize the struggle, globalize hope,” as Brazil’s Movimento Sem Terra says. May we lay to rest a past of inequality and violence and together build a movement based on the right of all people to life with dignity.
—
Tim Shenk is the Coordinator of the Ithaca, New York-based Committee on U.S.-Latin American Relations (CUSLAR). CUSLAR is a Cornell University-based organization, founded in 1965, which seeks to promote justice and mutual understanding among the people of the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean. CUSLAR is part of the New Poor People’s Campaign. | 1,266,914 |
Everyone who has seriously worked in politics and journalism agrees that this has been the strangest and least predictable presidential campaign we’ve ever seen. This is largely because of Donald Trump’s angry elephantine presence. Though not solely: Bernie Sanders’s fund-raising prowess and skill at campaigning have rattled all Democratic assumptions. And then comes an event like the death of Antonin Scalia, which will reverberate throughout the length of the campaign.
None of us has experienced anything quite like it. And yet with the benefit of hindsight, we can see that what is happening in this campaign, for all its crazy-sounding dogmatism, isn’t so crazy at all. The developments within both parties reflect the long-standing anxieties that liberals and conservatives feel about the country, anxieties that have only grown sharper as time has passed. For liberals, the chief concern for thirty-five years now has been about the unfairness of the economy—virtual wage stagnation for most workers, huge gains for the top 1 percent, and the lax regulatory and enforcement regimes that have permitted those outcomes, along with slow recovery from the most recent recession.
For conservatives, for about the same period of time, the main worry has been what is broadly called “culture,” by which we really mean the anger and resentment felt by older white Americans about the fact that the country is no longer “theirs” and that their former status and authority no longer seem what they once were. This rubric takes in a number of issues—immigration, especially illegal immigration; same-sex marriage; a black president in the White House; all the things that conservatives bundle under the reviled label “political correctness.” In their minds it is some sort of taint that has infected every institution in this once-great nation and is destroying it daily before their eyes.
It is no wonder, then, that a man who possesses a sharp instinct for identifying and simplistically fulminating against all these evils should have emerged to define the shape of the Republican race. Donald Trump’s rise has taught us a few things about him, chiefly his instinct for dominating the daily news; but mostly it has taught us what the central voting issue of conservatives in the Obama era really is. It’s not taxes or terrorism or even abortion rights. It is that we have been letting in too many undesirables who reject conservatives’ values, compete for jobs, and are changing the country radically and irreparably for the worse.
Trump has committed many apostasies, such as his increasingly aggressive condemnation of the Iraq War. (In the February 13 debate, he went so far as to accuse George W. Bush of intentionally lying about Iraq’s alleged weapons. This diverges sharply from the standard Republican line that it’s simply a pity that the intelligence was so wrong.) Trump’s record of statements and positions, which include past support… | 1,266,915 |
Marius is illustrated in sacked Carthage
Dr Quinn said: 'People have tried to argue that these archaeological sites are cemeteries for children who were stillborn or died young, but quite apart from the fact that a weak, sick or dead child would be a pretty poor offering to a god and that animal remains are found in the same sites treated in exactly the same way, it's hard to imagine how the death of a child could count as the answer to a prayer.
'It's very difficult for us to recapture people's motivations for carrying out this practice or why parents would agree to it, but it's worth trying.
'Perhaps it was out of profound religious piety, or a sense that the good the sacrifice could bring the family or community as a whole outweighed the life of the child.
'We have to remember the high level of mortality among children – it would have been sensible for parents not to get too attached to a child that might well not make its first birthday.'
Dr Quinn said that we think of human sacrifice as a terrible practice because we view it in modern terms, but people looked at it differently 2,500 years ago.
'Indeed, contemporary Greek and Roman writers tended to describe the practice as more of an eccentricity or historical oddity – they're not actually very critical,’ she said.
'We should not imagine that ancient people thought like us and were horrified by the same things.'
The backlash against the notion of Carthaginian child sacrifice began in the second half of the 20th century and was led by scholars from Tunisia and Italy - the very countries in which tophets have also been found.
Dr Quinn said: 'Carthage was far bigger than Athens and for many centuries much more important than Rome, but it is something of a forgotten city today.
Babies were sacrificed by the Carthaginians at tophets. Dedications from the children's parents to the gods are inscribed on slabs of stone above their cremated remains, ending with the explanation that the god or gods concerned had 'heard my voice and blessed me' A tophet in Marsala, Sicily is pictured
'If we accept that child sacrifice happened on some scale, it begins to explain why the colony was founded in the first place.
'Perhaps the reason the people who established Carthage and its neighbours left their original home of Phoenicia – modern-day Lebanon – was because others there disapproved of their unusual religious practice.
She explained that child abandonment was common in the ancient world and human sacrifice is found in many historical societies, but child sacrifice is relatively uncommon.
‘Perhaps the future Carthaginians were like the Pilgrim Fathers leaving from Plymouth – they were so fervent in their devotion to the gods that they weren't welcome at home any more, Dr Quinn said.
| 1,266,916 |
like a car without fuel. We’ve split the source code of the AI engine and the ontology database to make sure the ownership of our technology is not centralized. The ontologies will be crowdsourced and stored into a distributed storage system utilizing blockchain, and the contributors of the ontologies will be the owners of the data. The community has control of the data, gets rewarded when their data is used, and has a voice in how his or her data is used.”
He also shared with Cointelegraph the challenges that may be faced when developing and managing such complex platforms:
“One of the main challenges with designing such a system is adapting to the constantly and quickly changing technologies in the blockchain space. There are a few promising technologies we’d like to utilize, but many are only at a conceptual stage. For example, we’re constantly looking for the best distributed storage system that can provide the adequate speed, security, and the amount of data we need. A centralized, local storage is going to be, overall, much faster and much more robust than a distributed storage at this point of time. Currently available blockchain platforms might not have the adequate TPS (transaction per second) [...].”
SingularityNet rewards users with tokens every time someone uses its proposed AI model, thus allowing anyone to monetize AI algorithms, and letting companies and developers buy and sell AI at scale.
In an interview with Cointelegraph, Ben Goertzel, CEO of SingularityNet and chairman of the Artificial General Intelligence Society, explained how both technologies can be used to socialize the AI industry:
“If you had a global decentralized network and you can put your AI there and anyone can access it and then use it in a way that connects it with other AI tools that are out there, that can provide a way for people to monetize what they’ve done, without having to go the currently standard route of creating a startup and selling the startup to Google or Amazon or something.”
In the run-up to changes
A revolution, as the term implies, is a complete turn of events around a focal point, thus leading to a new stage or phase. With technologies, revolutions involve a variety of changes in everyday lives. But the uniting factor of all revolutions is a strive for improvement and efficiency.
Experts predict that by 2021, the blockchain technology market will grow to $2.3 billion and investments in AI will grow to $52.2 billion. As the investments in both AI and blockchain grow, more and more global companies — including Microsoft, Dell, and Porsche — are spending money on their research and testing. Fred Ehrsam, the co-founder of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, predicted it could take some time for these systems to prove themselves and show the results in practice, but that once it happens, they will boost the industry’s democratization. | 1,266,917 |
Today, about 30,000 people live in the town of Dodge City, Kansas, the one-time outlaw gunfightin' capital of the world whose name is universal shorthand for the imperative to leave a dangerous place quickly. Most of those residents—about 60 percent—are Hispanic, and in what is almost surely a wild coincidence, the county clerk has moved the town's lone polling place to a site that is both outside city limits and about a mile from the nearest bus stop. In order to participate in democracy in 2018, Dodge City residents will literally have to get the hell out of Dodge.
The proffered reason for this shift is road construction that apparently blocks access to the most recently-used location, which has been in use since 2002. That is the year in which officials, citing to requirements imposed by the Americans with Disabilities Act of 2002, closed all but one of the town's polling places; as the Wichita Eagle notes, that location is nestled comfortably in the whiter, wealthier part of this majority-minority town, "just blocks from the local country club." In 2014, according to data collected by the Democratic Party, white voter turnout in Ford County was around 61 percent; Hispanic turnout was 17 percent. Again, these are wild coincidences. From the Eagle:
Kansas is not the only state that has closed polling sites. Polling places across the country have also been shuttered since the U.S. Supreme Court in 2013 struck down parts of the Voting Rights Act. A 2016 research report from the civil rights coalition Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights found local officials had shuttered 868 polling places in the three years after the court’s ruling.
A decade ago—even five years ago—stunts like this one might have gone unaddressed. But this year, activists got creative. Voto Latino, an organization that sprang from a 2004 public service announcement campaign headlined by actress Rosario Dawson, began reaching out to its corporate partners upon hearing the news. Now, on Election Day, it will be offering free rides to the polls, courtesy of the unlikely coalition of Lyft, Steve Madden, Johnnie Walker, and donors like you. The state Democratic party has also launched a special volunteer and fundraising drive to ensure that no one in Dodge City doesn't vote because they don't have a way to get there.
The notion that self-determination in this country depends in any part on the largesse of a ridesharing app, a shoe company, and an alcoholic beverages manufacturer is, admittedly, a grim one. (This is especially true when elected officials and Supreme Court justices, the people who should be upholding voting rights, have demonstrated little interest in doing so.) And the frustrating reality that progressives keep having to spend their time and money and energy fighting this bullshit is exactly why the Republican Party has adopted minority voter suppression as a semi-official plank of its platform: As a political strategy, it is as savvy as it is despicable. | 1,266,918 |
Though Jackson’s certainly made positive strides this season as a passer—his completion percentage is up nearly seven percentage points from last season, at 65.1—there are times when Baltimore’s offense is stalling and Jackson the runner becomes their best option. This was the case last week, when Jackson became the first quarterback in regular season history to throw for 200+ yards and rush for 150+. After the game, John Harbaugh spoke on the importance of Jackson’s rushing ability, saying it was “What it took to win the game. We needed him to run the ball like that to win the game. That was a necessity in the game, the way they played us.”
Jackson is a rushing threat like never before seen in the NFL, and is on pace to break Michael Vick’s single-season record for carries by a quarterback by almost 40 rushes. As NFL.com’s Gregg Rosenthal astutely put it during the offseason, “the easiest play in the NFL last year was Jackson beating the defense to the sideline for a 7-yard gain.” That remains the case in 2019, and on Sunday, it’ll be up to Bobby Wagner to stop Jackson from getting to the corner on Seattle’s defense.
Against the Cardinals in Week 4, Wagner would often drop into his zone over the middle of the field, but serve as a spy on Arizona’s Kyler Murray, as well. Murray rushed just four times on that day, but Wagner was tasked with containing Murray, just as he will with Jackson on Sunday—the only difference being, Jackson will rush a helluva lot more often that Murray’s four. To meet Jackson on the outside, and stop him from being able to turn the corner, a defender cannot take any false steps in their read and pursuit. Wagner is ideally suited for this role; the best linebacker in the game sees the field as well as any defender, and when he has to open up and run, he can do so with anyone.
If Wagner’s able to contain Jackson’s day on the ground, he will severely limit the impact Baltimore’s quarterback can make on the game. With the vertical-stretching Marquise Brown looking unlikely to play, Jackson’s excellent downfield passing ability will be hampered, too. The Seahawks will be well positioned to win on Sunday, as long as Wagner remains well positioned against Jackson.
In his first full season as a starter, Jackson is doing things no quarterback has done before, however, he’s still able to be contained if a defense can takeaway certain aspects of his game. Russell Wilson, meanwhile, is playing like the league’s MVP, and heads into Week 7 against a depleted secondary and toothless pass rush. The matchups across positions are favorable for Seattle, and they should be in good position to move to 6-1 on the season. | 1,266,919 |
To wit, an American fighter shot down a Syrian warplane on Sunday, “the first time the American military has downed a Syrian aircraft since the start of the civil war in 2011.” Observers immediately called the incident a marked escalation in the conflict.
And their view was quickly vindicated: “Russia on Monday condemned the American military’s downing of a Syrian warplane, suspending the use of a military hotline that Washington and Moscow have used to avoid collisions in Syrian airspace and threatening to target aircraft flown by the United States and its allies over Syria.”
Those skeptical of U.S. intervention in the Syrian civil war have long warned that it could escalate into a civilization-warping conflict between nuclear powers. But neither Vietnam nor Afghanistan nor Iraq nor Libya has persuaded today’s hawks to sufficiently weight the unintended consequences that plague all complex military interventions. And there are so many varieties of hawks that are urging action.
The complexity of the civil war in Syria is underscored by the fact that the ascendant pro-war faction inside the Trump administration is composed of Iran hawks. According to reporters Kate Brannen, Dan De Luce and Paul McLeary at Just Security, antagonism toward Iran is causing two officials in the Trump White House to push for broadening the conflict, against the advice of officials at the Pentagon:
Ezra Cohen-Watnick, the senior director for intelligence on the National Security Council, and Derek Harvey, the NSC’s top Middle East advisor, want the United States to start going on the offensive in southern Syria … Their plans are making even traditional Iran hawks nervous, including Defense Secretary James Mattis, who has personally shot down their proposals more than once, the two sources said … Despite the more aggressive stance pushed by some White House officials, Mattis, military commanders and top U.S. diplomats all oppose opening up a broader front against Iran and its proxies in southeastern Syria, viewing it as a risky move that could draw the United States into a dangerous confrontation with Iran, defense officials said. Such a clash could trigger retaliation against U.S. troops deployed in Iraq and Syria, where Tehran has armed thousands of Shiite militia fighters and deployed hundreds of Revolutionary Guard officers.
Put another way, Iran hawks in the Trump White House want to broaden the conflict there in a manner that pits the U.S. against another country that also seeks the defeat of ISIS, the ostensible reason the U.S. is involved in Syria in the first place.
Meanwhile, hawks in Iran are escalating that country’s role in Syria: “Iran announced Sunday the Iran Revolutionary Guards had launched ballistic missile strikes on Saturday against ISIS targets in Syria, dramatically escalating the country’s role in the Syrian conflict. The mid-range ground-to-ground missiles targeted militants in eastern Syria in retaliation for the deadly terrorist attacks in Tehran earlier this month.” | 1,266,920 |
-allah-in-prayer/
Is Praying in Arabic Difficult for You?
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/living-islam/is-praying-in-arabic-difficult-for-you/
How I Came to Love Prayer as a Muslim
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/finding-peace/remembering-allah/how-i-came-to-love-the-prayer-as-a-muslim/
3- Learn the Importance of Knowledge in Islam
Converts: Seeking Knowledge is Power
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/understanding-islam/converts-seeking-knowledge-is-power/
Reverts: 4 Steps Will Help in Your Path of Knowledge
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/living-islam/reverts-4-steps-will-help-in-your-path-of-knowledge/
Baby Steps in Your Journey to Islam
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/living-islam/baby-steps-in-your-journey-to-islam/
Take Knowledge from the Knowledgeable
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/understanding-islam/take-knowledge-from-the-knowledgeable/
4- Send us your questions on this series to: [email protected]
_______________
Series Background
As this is a special series for new converts to learn about Islam in a comprehensive way through learning the Seerah (Biography of Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him) in a gradual chronological way, we will add a few more resources of other areas of Islamic knowledge related to each part of the Seerah at the end of each article as extra learning resources.
We will add new videos for this series as we progress from Year 1 to Year 23, in sha’ Allah.
The references used in each article are given for further details, so please feel free to send us any questions you may have to this e-mail: [email protected]
You may also wish to join our Facebook Group, Islam 101, for further learning and also to interact with fellow new converts and those who are new to Islam here.
_________________
Article References:
The Sealed Nectar by Sheikh Safi-ur-Rahman al-Mubarkpuri
Seerah of Prophet Muhammad – 12: Declaration of Prophethood (video by Dr. Yasir Qadhi)
Prophet Muhammad: The World’s Best Teacher
https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/prophet-muhammad-the-worlds-best. | 1,266,921 |
This article originally appeared in In These Times.
Ever since the earth-shaking election of Donald Trump, there have been innumerable articles arguing that Democrats brought this upon themselves by losing white, working-class voters in the Midwest. These articles have been met with a torrent of essays urging Democrats to focus on becoming the party of diversity. And, coming back from the dead like a bloated zombie corpse is Mark Penn and Andrew Stein’s New York Times piece calling for a return to Clintonian centrism.
All of these discussions imply that progressives can either fight for voters from the working class or communities of color — but not both at once. This line of thinking demonstrates a profound lack of faith in democracy and the electorate’s ability to smell bullshit.
As a seasoned union organizer, I often ask myself whether the pundits offering the aforementioned opinions have ever actually spent time talking to working-class people. By this, I mean all working-class people. Contrary to the narrative put forth in the mainstream — and even some left—media, some of the most significant work confronting homophobia, sexism and racism has been done by working-class people of all ethnicities through collective struggle in the labor movement.
My first substantive labor movement work was as a union organizer with California’s SEIU Local 250 — a healthcare workers’ industrial union, theoretically representing all non-management personnel in hospitals and nursing homes. In practice, the union mostly represented those classifications except registered nurses, who were generally represented by the widely-respected California Nurses Association. Local 250’s membership was racially diverse, with strong representation from African-American, Latino, Filipino and white workers. Standards were generally good for a union workplace: free healthcare, pensions, time off and competitive wages.
My first instructions at Local 250 were pretty simple: Go recruit 10 percent of the membership at the hospital to serve on the negotiating team, and get them ready to lead the entire hospital out on strike in two months. These were strong directives delivered with about as much subtlety. At the time, the union was engaged in a massive, coordinated contract campaign to achieve minimum staffing standards. This meant that as many as 30 hospitals would be bargaining and perhaps striking in coordination.
As a union staffer, one of my myriad job duties was to have meetings with members and member leaders, guided by a small pamphlet titled, “What is a Union?” This pamphlet emphasized that a union is “an organization of workers who all work for the same employer and act collectively to keep the boss from doing things that the workers do not want and to get the boss to do things that the workers do want.”
My job was to explicitly talk about racism, sexism, ethnocentrism, homophobia and religious intolerance as specific barriers to a strong union. A good union member can’t complain about Mexicans ‘taking jobs’ while also asking Latino colleagues to make common cause with him. | 1,266,922 |
COMPANY AND THE PROJECT
We are an indie game studio consisted of professional and friendly people. Additionally, we are a team of skilled artists and dedicated indie enthusiasts. Our current project is INT, developed on Unity Engine 5 for platforms Windows, Linux, and Mac.
INT is a 3D Sci-fi RPG with a strong emphasis on story, role playing, and innovative RPG features such as randomized companions. The focus is on the journey through a war-torn world with fast-paced combat against hordes of enemies. The player must accomplish quests like a traditional RPG, complete objectives, and meet lively crew members who will aid in the player's survival. Throughout the game you can side and complete missions through criminal cartels, and the two major combatants, the UCE and ACP, of the Interstellar Civil War.
For more information about us, follow the links listed below.
INT Official website
Steam Greenlight
IndieDB page
Also follow social media platforms for the latest news regarding our projects.
Facebook
Twitter
TALENT NEEDED
We are seeking an UI Artist to design and develop HUD and UI for our project. The UI Artist will follow instructions from the Art Lead and the Project Lead in creation of assets. Open evaluation to and from other team members would also be expected.
Your duties will include:
1. Create UI elements for various in-game systems.
2. Collaborate with the coding team to implement UI elements.
3. Make adjustments to created UI elements where required.
REQUIREMENTS
Essential:
1. Familiar with image creation software such as Adobe Photoshop and GIMP.
2. Able to adapt to pre-existing themes and styles.
3. Have knowledge of creating digital 2D images of specific sizes.
4. Able to create intuitive UI & HUD for interactive games.
5. Willing to follow direction and make adjustments when needed.
Preferred:
1. Be an avid gamer, have played a wide collection of games from various genres.
BENEFITS
Revenue-sharing from crowd-funding is offered to team members who contribute 15-20 hours per week to company projects, as well as maintain constant communication and adhere to deadlines. Currently the crowd-funding campaign is scheduled for the first half of year 2018. We are unable to offer wages or per-item payments at this time. Your understanding is dearly appreciated.
TO APPLY
Please send your Cover Letter, CV, Portfolio (if applicable), and other relevant documents/information to this email: [email protected]
Thank you for your time! We look forward to hearing from you!
John Shen
HR Lead
Starboard Games LLC
Edited by: INTgame | 1,266,923 |
dignitas defeated CLG 16-9 on Mirage following a solid Counter-Terrorist side in the last match of the 1-1 pool.
Dignitas got off to the better start against CLG despite losing the pistol round, as they exploited the duels in their forcebuy to go up 3-1. Stephen "reltuC" Cutler was the man of the hour then due to his four kills on short, which gave CLG a 4-3 lead.
The Danish side then found a way past the North American defenses, winning five out of the next six rounds with James "hazed" Cobb's team having to eco three times. The remaining two rounds went the way of CLG, which made the half 8-7 in favor of Dignitas.
After a close first half, dignitas put up a fantastic defense on Mirage
René "cajunb" Borg's two opening kills secured the pistol round, which started a great defense for his team. Dignitas only dropped one round on the CT side before reaching match point at 15-8.
CLG delayed for one round with reltuC and Ethan "Ethan" Arnold turning around a 2v5 situation, but the Danes shook it off and advanced to the 2-1 pool with a 16-9 victory.
ELEAGUE Major Main Qualifier Best of 1 Dignitas Matchpage 16 9 CLG 16 Mirage 9
Dignitas K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Emil 'Magisk' ReifMagisk 29 - 10 +19 116.1 1.87 Kristian 'k0nfig' Wieneckek0nfig 24 - 14 +10 96.7 1.53 Ruben 'RUBINO' VillarroelRUBINO 17 - 14 +3 84.5 1.21 René 'cajunb' Borgcajunb 15 - 13 +2 63.7 1.09 Mathias 'MSL' LauridsenMSL 13 - 19 -6 61.0 1.01 CLG K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Stephen'reltuC' CutlerreltuC 15 - 18 -3 71.2 0.87 Ethan 'Ethan' ArnoldEthan 17 - 20 -3 70.9 0.85 James 'hazed' Cobbhazed 18 - 22 -4 74.5 0.83 Kenneth 'koosta' Suenkoosta 11 - 19 -8 59.0 0.71 Yassine 'Subroza' TaoufikSubroza 9 - 19 -10 49.9 0.58
Only two matches of the Swiss format's third round are remaining:
Another team will exit the qualifier with a 0-3 record after the next match which will see Spirit in an uphill battle against Envy. | 1,266,924 |
When Dan O’Dowd was hired as the Rockies’ general manager at the end of the 1999 season, he announced, “Our goal, very simply, is to put a championship-contending club on the field each and every year.”
But the Rockies have missed the playoffs in 10 of O’Dowd’s 12 seasons as GM, and in eight of those the team wasn’t even competitive.
In Denver, where fans have grown accustomed to winning — the Broncos have won two Super Bowls, the Avalanche have won the Stanley Cup twice, the Nuggets have made the playoffs nine straight seasons — fielding a perennial loser doesn’t cut it.
O’Dowd has failed. He needs to go.
Such a move would demonstrate to Rockies fans who continue to pour into Coors Field that the team is indeed serious about building a perennial contender and not simply operating Wrigley Field West.
The problem is, the team’s ownership seems blindly loyal to O’Dowd, who has the fourth-longest tenure among baseball GMs. (Full disclosure: The Denver Post is a limited partner in the team. There is, of course, nothing more limited than a limited partner in baseball.)
“I can’t think of a general manager in baseball that’s as good as him,” said Dick Monfort, the Rockies’ chief executive, earlier this year.
What in the name of purple mountains’ majesty? Has Monfort lost his mind? Here’s what O’Dowd has done wrong, Mr. Monfort:
First off, he squandered a good team by abandoning the Blake Street Bombers and building the Rockies around pitchers Mike Hampton and Denny Neagle, who ultimately failed miserably after signing huge contracts. Strike one.
Then, after recovering from that debacle, he squandered another good team, the one that reached the 2007 World Series. (Rocktober, we hardly knew ye.) Strike two.
And this season has shown he clearly doesn’t know where to take the team. Giving Jim Tracy — a good man but an uninspiring manager — a handshake agreement to keep him “indefinitely” makes no sense. And O’Dowd’s bizarre “paired pitching system,” which seems like a desperate move by someone who has run out of real ideas, has resulted in more of the same: losing. Strike three.
With the All-Star break starting after today’s game against Washington, now is the perfect time to make a change.
In baseball, it’s one, two, three strikes, you’re out. Dan O’Dowd has had at least that many. He clearly should be out. | 1,266,925 |
members of Congress particularly angry, because it would be the military construction projects in their districts that would be directly losing money to the wall.”
As William C. Banks, a Syracuse University law professor pointed out in the New York Times last year, there are two other laws give Trump some wiggle room to move money around: the Economy Act of 1932, which could authorizes federal agencies to exchange supplies or services, and the Feed and Forage Act, a 1799 law which allowed the military to buy essential supplies like clothing or medicine. But according to the New York Times, “such an accounting trick has never been used to go around Congress on such a large scale, Mr. Banks said.”
In all, the options available to the Department of Defense and Trump are extremely limited in scope. And they all run the risk of going against Congress specifically for a project Republicans haven’t prioritized.
The spending bill largely ignored Trump’s immigration agenda, mostly because Republicans have an entirely different one
There’s no question that Congress’s spending bill does not reflect the hardline immigration agenda President Trump and his White House have long espoused.
As Vox’s Dara Lind writes, not only did Trump get very little of what he asked for, but “Congress is actually making an effort to rein in the Trump administration’s overspending on immigration detention instead of expanding it.”
Instead, in every spending fight since Trump took office, Republicans have repeatedly made clear that the wall and restrictionist immigration policy aren’t among their spending priorities.
This time the border wall did get some funding — $1.6 billion worth — which is much less than the $25 billion the White House asked for and came with a lot of strings attached; most of the funding will have to go toward repairing existing fencing or toward double fencing where barriers already exist.
On enforcement, Republicans, who went into spending fight wanting more funding for the Department of Homeland Security to increase the number of beds for immigrant detainees and to expand the enforcement force, settled for more modest spending measures.
The final compromise included funding for only an additional 328 Customs and Border Protection officers, and ICE will actually have to reduce the number of detention beds. Needless to say, this isn’t the kind of deportation force Trump’s administration was envisioning. The bill also does not defund so-called “sanctuary cities,” something the White House specifically called on Congress to do.
Trump was so unhappy with the final spending package, he threatened to veto the bill altogether and shut down the government, but was walked off the ledge in the final hours.
Now, he seems to recognize that Congress won’t help him get the border wall and going around the legislative branch isn’t so easy.
His other option seems to be a GoFundMe campaign. | 1,266,926 |
Plan to build Ottoman barracks on Istanbul’s Gezi Park approved in new court ruling
ISTANBUL
This picture shows a general view of Gezi Park in Istanbul on May 31, 2015 as Turkish police officers cordon off the park. AFP Photo
Turkey’s Council of State reversed its previous decision to cancel the controversial pedestrianization project around Istanbul's iconic Taksim Square, expressing support for the construction of the replica of an Ottoman artillery barracks over Gezi Park, daily Cumhuriyet reported July 15.Istanbul’s 1st Regional Court canceled both the Taksim pedestrianization project and the Artillery Barracks project on June 6, 2013, in the midst of the Gezi protests which spread across the nation and the resulted in the deaths of eight protesters.Almost a year later, in April 2014, the Council of State re-evaluated and approved its cancellation decision in response to an appeal by the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality.Nonetheless, the municipality made a rare request for a revision of the decision – an unusual motion that only succeeds in the event the decision was made in error.However, a report by Cumhuriyet on July 15 revealed the Council of State voted in favor of the municipality’s request for a revision on March 31.In its decision, the council demanded the formation of a new panel of experts for a second expert examination and demanded the finalization of the Istanbul 6th Regional Court’s February 2014 decision for a stay of execution.The newspaper noted the decision came after 33 new members were appointed to the Council of State in 2014, shifting its balance in favor of the then-ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).It is alleged that the decision also extended veiled support for the construction of the Artillery Barracks by defining the “historical barracks” as a piece of immovable cultural property that requires conservation.The news of the Council of State decision immediately stirred public outcry on July 15, with the hashtag "we will not allow you to demolish Gezi" (#SanaGeziyiYıktırmayacağız in Turkish) becoming a worldwide trending topic on Twitter.The project to construct a reproduction of the historic Artillery Barracks was one of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s “crazy” projects in Istanbul, alongside a new airport, a third bridge and a man-made canal.On July 13, Erdoğan cited the major projects as his redline for the ongoing talks to form a coalition government, after the AKP lost its parliamentary majority with the June 7 general election. “Any coalition talks that start with a debate about suspending the major projects of Turkey will be challenged by me before anyone else,” Erdoğan said.The reproduction would have been built over Gezi Park in central Istanbul and serve as a shopping mall and residence with social facilities, but nationwide protests which continued throughout the summer of 2013 prevented the demolition of the park. | 1,266,927 |
�not fine not fine!”)
• screen caps of those animatronics from fuzzy dice with the caption “is this five nights at freddy’s”
• when the post card was announced and all the writers were like “it’s a hi five ghost episode! no, really!”
• “you really have to blow, you’re not blowing hard enough, BLOW HARDER!”
• this was in season 7 so not exactly old but sam spina’s bad art contests
• the swift rise and fall of the cloudygret ship at one point in the love triangle i think it was after eileen flat screen aired
• everybody making their own theories about skips and his “mystery lost love” and then there were tears when skips’ story aired
• muscle man getting beaten up to holly jolly christmas and we all laughed because he deserved it
• benson’s girlfriend veronica
• “i can’t believe evangelion copied regular show”
• you’ve witnessed the introduction, filling, and re-digging of the crash pit
• the eileen flat screen fake out where jg quintel hyped the episode and said it was gonna be big and people immediately thought “RIGLEEN” but it was like nope margaret’s back
• MUD WAIFU
• “still think i’m a momma’s boy?”
• people making thomas memorial videos or “rip thomas” text posts after the real thomas aired
• how a lot of people left the fandom after the two great controversies™, meteor moves (“FRIEND ZONE! FRIEND ZONE FRIEND ZONE FRIEND ZONE!”) and the season 6 love triangle, also the real thomas but to a lesser extent, but most of them still went “but tell me when rigleen becomes canon yo”
• is it just me or will my favorite scene always be the season 4 ending where rigby joined mordecai on the park house roof and they watched the sunset together
• “you take margaret to the airport?” “yeah” “you want to talk about it?” “no” seriously if this is not your favorite moment then why not
• how they sTILL HAVEN’T RESOLVED THE WHOLE “RIGBY GOES BACK IN TIME TO STOP MORDECAI FROM KISSING CJ” PLOT FROM NEW YEAR’S KISS I MEAN ARE WE EVER GOING TO SEE WHY RIGBY WANTED TO PREVENT IT SO BAD | 1,266,928 |
President Donald Trump has said that “nothing changes,” following Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s public statement on the ‘Russiagate’ investigation. The president declared that “the case is closed.”
“Nothing changes from the Mueller Report,” Trump tweeted on Wednesday. “There was insufficient evidence and therefore, in our Country, a person is innocent. The case is closed! Thank you.”
Nothing changes from the Mueller Report. There was insufficient evidence and therefore, in our Country, a person is innocent. The case is closed! Thank you. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 29, 2019
Trump’s tweet came after Mueller made his first public statement since releasing his final report almost two months ago. The Special Counsel formally closed his office, and announced he would make no further statements on the investigation. The written report, he said, “speaks for itself.”
Mueller’s final report found no evidence that Trump colluded with Russia in the runup to the 2016 election, and insufficient evidence that the president then obstructed his investigation. Mueller did, however, state that he had not determined that obstruction did not take place, but declined to charge the president with a crime, as that move would be “unconstitutional.”
Also on rt.com Charging Trump with obstruction of justice ‘was not an option,’ says Mueller in 1st public statement
Congressional Democrats have accused Attorney General William Barr of making unnecessary redactions to the 400-page report in an effort to protect Trump. Mueller dismissed these accusations on Wednesday, saying Barr has already “made the report on our investigation largely public."
Mueller also said that he would give no testimony to Congress “beyond that which is already public.”
Previously, House Judiciary Committee chair Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-New York) had expressed a desire to question Mueller about the report, saying last week that the special counsel would “probably” testify in private to the committee, and earlier threatening to subpoena Mueller if necessary.
Trump has accused Nadler and the 23 other Democrats on the committee of trying to hold a “do over” of the Mueller investigation, and has repeatedly stated that the report found “no collusion” and “no obstruction.”
.....The Dems want a second shot at Bob Mueller, are very unhappy with the No Collusion Report. They should not be allowed to play this game any longer - no second chances - must get back to work. So bad for our Country! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 24, 2019
Meanwhile, some Democrats have taken Mueller’s insistence on not prosecuting Trump as a cue to bring their own charges, including impeachment proceedings, against the president.
Think your friends would be interested? Share this story! | 1,266,929 |
On 6 February, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria released a statement saying that it was investigating multiple reports that bombs allegedly containing weaponised chlorine had been used in the town of Saraqeb in Idlib and in Douma in eastern Ghouta.
The pro-Kremlin disinformation campaign prepared its usual answer: a week later, Russia Today and Sputnik claimed that the Syrian civilian rescue group White Helmets together with Al-Nusra Front terrorists were “preparing to stage a provocation involving chemical weapons’ use, in Syria’s Idlib province in order to blame Damascus.”
Disinformation was based on a call by a “local resident” and was comprehensively debunked by the DFRLab. It continues the pattern of years, in which the White Helmets have been discredited and framed as collaborating with terrorists by pro-Kremlin disinformation. The overall aim remains to sow distrust in the work of this volunteer organisation.
See a video for examples of disinformation this week.
Creative misuse of “sources”
The disinformation article on the White Helmets had only one anonymous source to back up its claim. In the past two weeks we witnessed several other examples of unsubstantiated sources.
State-controlled TV channel Rossiya 24 referred to unnamed “local news agencies” in claiming that the quality of Latvia’s school education had dropped to the level of the Dominican Republic. In fact, in the PISA survey from 2015, Latvia scored 31st out of 72 countries, and well above the Dominican Republic.
Another type of fabrication of sources was used in reports on Fancy Bear hackers “revealing a Canadian conspiracy against Russian sports”. The documents available on the website of the hacker group do not provide evidence for the conspiracy theory – only the announcement by the hackers themselves claims so. Cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike has stated that both Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear are Russian intelligence affiliated adversaries that targeted the US election in 2016.
…Or no source at all
Sometimes the disinformation campaign doesn’t identify the source at all, but presents disinformation as facts. This method is repeatedly used when Russian-language media refer to the tragedy of the MH17 flight. Tsargrad informed us that “Dutch and Russian foreign ministers planned to discuss, among other things, the investigation into the Malaysian Boeing-777 that was shot down by a Ukrainian Buk 17 July 2014” and Regnum wrote “Normalisation of the relations between Russia and the Netherlands is possible only in one condition: if the Netherlands is ready to tell the world the truth about Malaysian plane that was shot down by the air force of Ukraine.”
The Dutch-led Joint Investigation Team has concluded that the plane was shot down from an area controlled by pro-Russian fighters, and the Buk missile system was brought there from Russia and later taken back to Russia.
Disinformation cases reported in the previous two weeks: | 1,266,930 |
AfroCyberPunk has now moved to a permanent home at http://www.afrocyberpunk.com.
For a while, it seemed that cyberpunk was dead.
The Internet counterculture of the West went mainstream faster than anyone could have predicted and the grim forecast of the cyberpunk movement became a self-defeating prophecy. Many dark realities were prevented from coming to be. Far from the sinister age of corporate dominance many envisioned, the digital era has liberated an entire world of individuals from obscurity, empowering them beyond their wildest dreams.
However, this power didn’t come without regulation. The surveillance capabilities of the West have been well orchestrated to secure a significant degree of control over its citizens’ virtual lives. Its law enforcement continually strives to gain jurisdiction over the ever-expanding boundaries of Net, making it a far stretch from the lawless frontier cyberpunk predicted.
But here in Africa, development has been dangerously asymmetrical. By the time any product hits our soil it’s already fully-developed and ready to be abused by the imagination. Technology designed for vastly different societies invariably trickles down to our streets, re-sprayed, re-labeled, and hacked to fit whatever market will take it. Regulation? You can forget about regulation.
Whatever rules the creators imagined fly out of the window as freighters are crammed to bursting with the second-hand remains of their creations, damn wherever they’re heading as long as they can be cleared from port. Similarly, the Net’s architecture fails to reflect the reality on our continent as the expansion of cyberspace exceeds the reach of our road networks. How do you track someone who doesn’t have a social security number or a physical address? Someone who never really made it onto the Grid?
It’s no surprise then that lawlessness is the rule on our end of the networks, ‘do what thou wilt’ the full extent of cyber-regulation. This will remain the case as long as Africa continues to wear hand-me-down systems; until she acquires her own truly tailor-made networks. With the huge logistical frameworks that need to be implemented, spanning vast swathes of geographical terrain, political regimes, and language barriers, a cyberpunk future for Africa seems all but inevitable.
And even if we manage to overcome these hurdles, cyberpunk can never really die. There’s just too much human nature embedded within its code – it thrives on uncertainty and unpredictability, on severe human limitations juxtaposed with the radical and unlimited power of our own technology. It will always find a home somewhere on this planet until we collectively reach Utopia – if we ever do – whenever society grapples with brave new technology. We have not seen it’s last.
Cyberpunk will be reborn.
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,000 tests a day and NPHET wanted to have a situation where 100,000 tests a week were processed, he said.
On reports that the HSE had raised concerns about its capacity to achieve this level of testing and the process by which the decision to increase capacity had come about, Mr Harris said he had never seen such a level of collaboration between those working in health.
He pointed out that senior representatives from the HSE are on NPHET.
He said NPHET was making decisions transparently but decisions had to be made in real time. There was no time to dilly dally he said, or to "ponder, debate or send papers back and forth".
Time costs lives and NPHET was making recommendations on the best advice available.
The minister said 127,319 tests for Covid-19 had been processed to date.
He said there would be a point in time when people should rightly look back and scrutinise decisions that had been made.
When NPHET came up with recommendations, the minister said, those recommendations could be really challenging and sometimes took time to put into effect.
He said everyone was working really hard in a tense situation.
He said notes of meetings and letters from NPHET should and would be published.
Restaurant owners call for supports
Meanwhile, restaurant owners are putting forward a recovery plan suggesting a reduction in rents and rates be linked to sales as a way to prevent widespread job losses and closures in the sector.
The Save Our Restaurants Coalition aims to present their step-down plan to the Government for consideration in the coming days.
Brody Sweeney, CEO of Camille restaurants and takeaway group, said that without supports there could be 80,000 employees facing the prospect of being on social welfare long term.
Mr Sweeney said a pro-rata reduction in rates and rents - in agreement with landlords and councils - would, for example, see a business which sees a return to half of its sales, pay half the existing cost of rates and rents.
Likewise, those earning less would pay less in rates and rent.
Mr Sweeney said the proposal would not be as costly as it may seem as without a functioning sector there will be a loss in VAT and taxes to Government and an increase in welfare costs for employees who become unemployed.
He said the step-down plan could work over two years, meaning that it is stepped down as revenues in those businesses recover, while those businesses that do not need supports would not get it.
He said under the plan, the Government would help them to support landlords.
Mr Sweeney said it is not a list of demands as industry professionals know the Government has a huge battle and it wants to "put on the green jersey" and come up with solutions.
Reporting George Lee, Orla O'Donnell, Sinéad Ní Neachtain | 1,266,932 |
Malvertising is now a billion-dollar business Watch Now
A US senator has blasted the Federal Trade Commission for failing to crack down on Google's lack of effort in reducing ad fraud on its advertising network.
Virginia Democrat Senator Mark Warner says Google is directly profiting by letting ad fraud run rampant at the expense of the companies who buy or sell ads on its platform.
However, Warner is just as mad about the FTC as he is about Google, claiming the FTC has failed to take action against the Mountain View-based company for more than two years since he and New York Democrat Senator Chuck Schumer first wrote the agency about Google's ad fraud problem.
"The FTC's failure to act has had the effect of allowing Google to structure its own market," said Sen. Warner in a letter sent to the FTC yesterday.
"Through a series of transactions, the company has accomplished a level of vertical integration that allows it in effect to act as the equivalent of market-maker, commodities broker, and commodities exchange for digital advertising -- in the process creating a range of conflicts of interest," he said.
"While the company controls each link in the supply chain and therefore maintains the power to monitor activity in the digital advertising market from start to finish, it has continued to be caught flat-footed in identifying and addressing digital ad fraud."
Sen. Warner also called out Google for proving unwilling to address misuse of its advertising platform for the "rampant proliferation of online disinformation" --referring to how various foreign entities have used Google ads to push political agendas, both in the US and other countries of the world.
"As long as Google stands to profit from the sale of additional advertisements, the financial incentive for it to voluntarily root out and address fraud remains minimal," Sen. Warner added.
Both Google and the FTC have not replied to requests for comments for this article. Google did publish a blog post after our inquiry entitled "Tackling ads abuse in apps and SDKs" that described the company's latest efforts in addressing Android and Google Play Store ad fraud, which has been a serious problem for the company in the last few months.
This is the third letter Sen. Warner has sent the FTC about Google's ad fraud problem. He sent a first in 2016, another one in October, and a third yesterday.
In yesterday's letter, Sen. Warner also criticized the FTC's reply to the second letter. In its answer, available here, the FTC told Sen. Warner that they don't have the authority to go after Google for its practices, but instead opted to tackle online ad fraud through "workshops and education campaigns."
Sen. Warner disagreed and reminded the FTC that they themselves lobbied Congress for additional authority related to online businesses and the digital age, which they received.
"Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act was written in broad terms precisely for this purpose," Sen. Warner said.
More US news: | 1,266,933 |
A satirical website has launched that will help you push through your grief over the loss of the anti-establishment hero, Gawker.
This week, Gawken appeared on the internet, and the people cheered. It claims it is based on a text-generating algorithm — the Gawken News Algorithm — and promises to "open your mind to the future." It does this through a bunch of Gawker-esque posts that are written by bylines from the likes of Elon Musk, Elon Musk's Tesla, Peter Theil (sic), Peter Thiel's Fridge and even Tim Cook's Toaster.
SEE ALSO: Univision executives delete 6 Gawker Media posts
PayPal founder Peter Thiel does not actually appear to be involved, one must be careful to note. Thiel, the Facebook board member and most definitely not the founder of Gawken, bankrolled Hulk Hogan's $140 million court case against Gawker for the publication of a clip of the wrestler's sex tape, which led to the site shutting down on Aug. 22.
Gawker, and most notably its now-shuttered vertical Valleywawg, published some of the most skeptical and brazenly negative writing about Silicon Valley, its companies and major figures.
Gawken now provides the counterpunch to that work.
Peter Theil, the Gawken writer, is definitely not Peter Thiel. The spelling is entirely different, you see, and according to Theil, the two have not even met each other.
Theil, the Gawken founder not the PayPal founder, told Mashable in an email that he was the sole founder of the site, and that it was not associated with Gawker.
"No, Gawken has nothing to do with Gawker. I have never even heard of Gawker," he wrote. "If people continue to suggest that Gawken is tied to Gawker in any way I am prepared to pursue legal action."
We have been warned.
Gawken is being run, according to Theil, in the depths of Silicon Valley. "I am currently running the site out of my office at home, and plan on moving into a larger dedicated office space in Palo Alto once they finish installing the indoor drainage system," he wrote.
On the website, you will also find Gawken's first foray into native advertising, with a piece by Brian White who is the Inventor of the Standing Couch™. This site is going places.
It is currently unclear who is actually behind the site, but the creator shared via email a link to a free copy of philosopher Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. An apparent favorite of Peter Thiel, the PayPal founder, and Peter Theil, the Gawken founder, but widely panned by Gawker.
Is it a clue or a way to a Gawken-inspired future? We may never know for sure.
A quick domain search showed that Gawken.com had been registered privately. | 1,266,934 |
what he looked like until he did a “face reveal.”
(that wasn’t actually it)
You’d learn a lot from watching the first few videos of popular YouTubers. For instance, you’ll find most people don’t start out very well-liked and loved. However, as their channel grew, so did their “YouTube skills.”
Everyone had to start somewhere, the important thing is to start.
Find Your Motivation
Why do you want to be on YouTube? Do you just want to have fun, build your own brand, or be famous and successful? Do you want to be on YouTube to make serious money? Or maybe you want an outlet where you can express yourself?
Whatever it is you want to do on YouTube, ask yourself how important it is to you. Will you let other people’s opinions stop you from achieving what you want in life? Will you let your own concerns about your appearance or current ability sabotage your chance at success?
As Steve Jobs once said, our time, here on earth is limited. Don’t wait for tomorrow to try your luck on YouTube.
Grow your own YouTube channel today, if that’s really what you want to do. Kickstart your success and buy YouTube Views, which will attract real organic news. A high view count will encourage people to watch, attracting everyone who wants to see the new hot thing.
Do everything you can to succeed and do it now. Tomorrow will not wait for you.
Don’t Overthink It
Stop overthinking and just start doing! You already know you want to start a YouTube channel, especially if you’ve read this far, so just start one already.
You won’t accomplish anything by thinking of everything that could go wrong. Sure, the possibility of failure is real but failure is not permanent, and what if you succeed? What if people like you? What if you become popular? What if you become rich?
Focus on the positives and make the decision to start your own YouTube channel today.
Get Out of Your Comfort Zone!
It takes a different kind of courage to start a YouTube channel, but mastery of that fear will only come from standing in front of a camera and creating your own channel. So step out of your comfort zone and confidently go where you haven’t gone before.
Broadcasting yourself on YouTube will become easier the more you do it. The more you do it, the more you’ll expose yourself to criticisms and the more you’ll realize it’s not the end of the world.
So take the plunge and step out of your comfort zone. It’s where real growth happens.
Date: September 28, 2017 / Categories: Tips, / Author: Chell | 1,266,935 |
Senate Republicans are working to fast-track a health care bill in utmost secrecy before the July 4 recess. It’s clear that the bill—which is shaping up to be as disastrous as the House-passed American Health Care Act—won’t be let out of the dungeon until the very last second to avoid scrutiny. Republicans aren’t planning to hold any hearings and they won’t publicly release a draft of their bill because, as one senior GOP Senate aide told Axios, “We aren’t stupid.”
If Mitch McConnell and the Republican majority want to pass a bill taking away health insurance from some 20 million Americans, there isn’t much that Democrats can do about it in the end. But they can delay the process—and activists are pushing them to do just that. Groups like Indivisible and Move On want Democrats to withhold consent—a parliamentary maneuver that slows down Senate business—to trip up McConnell. According to Jeff Stein at Vox, Senate Democrats don’t have any current plans to do so. They argue that “going nuclear” would only unify Republicans in their resolve and would, at most, stall the inevitable by a few weeks:
Senate Dems believe escalating by using 'nuclear option' over AHCA would unify GOP, make AHCA _more_ likely
From an aide on background: pic.twitter.com/nVyCUH7T67 — Jeff Stein (@JStein_Vox) June 12, 2017
Activists see it differently. They think 1-2 weeks may make huge difference, & want maximum pressure on GOP, not olive branch. @ezralevin: pic.twitter.com/crJQPWFtRB — Jeff Stein (@JStein_Vox) June 12, 2017
But those few weeks can be vital. When the House passed the AHCA in May, speed was of the essence: Activists were caught flat-footed and were unable to put pressure on House members in full force. The political theater of Senate Democrats making a last stand to delay the bill would help garner more publicity for that effort. More importantly, it would shine a light on what Republicans are doing: They are jamming through a massive overhaul of the health care system in secret, one that will likely kick millions of Americans off their health insurance, literally leaving some people to die by 2018.
Trumpcare is extremely unpopular and people don’t want cuts to programs like Medicaid. People also want affordable health care! This is a no-brainer fight for Democrats to pick. Right now, the news cycle is (rightfully) completely bonkers about Trump and Russia, with James Comey’s testimony last week and Jeff Sessions’s scheduled for later this afternoon. It’s easy for the Republican health care bill to get lost in the shuffle. Senate Democrats can’t let that happen. | 1,266,936 |
UPDATE: Unfortunately, Chabot Gun Club’s lease was not renewed by the East Bay Regional Park District and the marksmanship range is now permanently closed. We thank all of our tens of thousands of patrons for your support for more than fifty years at this important facility. There are no plans to open up at another location at this time, although we still are open to suggestions. Sincerely, John M. Maunder, Senior Rangemaster
We would like to welcome you to the home page for Chabot Gun Club. This site will help you find our facility and give you some information about the many activities that we host. Chabot Gun Club is the finest public marksmanship range in Northern California, and perhaps in all the west. We are located in the East Bay hills, above San Francisco Bay, in the heart of the beautiful Anthony Chabot Regional Park. The Park has camping, showers and hook-ups. Their website is: http://www.ebparks.org/activities/camping. We invite you visit their comprehensive home page at: http://www.ebparks.org
It’s about time, we are on Facebook now!!! https://www.facebook.com/ChabotGunClub
At Chabot Gun Club, we feature public lines for rifle, pistol and shotgun shooting and public trap fields. Several other ranges in our 65 acre facility are available for match activities and training rentals. Every weekend we have several matches of various types that are open to the public. Look up the activities you are interested in in the index to the left and contact us if you have further questions. One thing we do not do is rent firearms. We do have.22 rifles for loan to our Light Rifle, Junior and SmallBore shooters. We also loan Garands to High Power participants who need them. We have handguns available for our lessons. We do not, however, rent or loan firearms for use on the public lines. We emphasize safety on our range. Rules are published on this site and available at the Range office. Rangemasters and Range Safety Officers monitor all activities. If you are new to shooting, you will find the controls we use will guide you into safe gun handling habits. If you are an old hand, but new to our range, you will be able to relax and enjoy yourself, knowing that we are keeping an eye on the newer shooters. Memberships are available, with certain privileges such as voting for our directors, prepaid fees and a very occasional newsletter.
For more information, give us a call at 510-569-0213 during the day on Friday, Saturday, Sunday or Monday or just come up and talk to us at the main range office at the rifle/pistol line.
You can also email me at [email protected]. See you soon! John M. Maunder, Senior Rangemaster | 1,266,937 |
When paired with his balancing of the wrecked budget left by his Republican predecessor, Bobby Jindal, and his moves to protect working families, like his expansion of Medicaid or pay raises for teachers, Mr. Edwards is a heterodox mix that makes him ideologically and culturally palatable enough to attract substantial support from the sort of Louisianans whose support for Bill Clinton won him the state during his presidential runs in 1992 and 1996, but who have since been swayed by Republican positions on wedge issues.
The lingering influence of the state’s more malicious 1990s coalition, however, equally influenced the turnout of liberal whites and people of color. They voted this weekend with vivid memories of the dark pull of former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, David Duke, who won about 60 percent of the white vote in the 1991 gubernatorial race.
He didn’t lose to a rising star in the Democratic Party nor a trusted veteran. He lost to the womanizing, infamously corrupt Gov. Edwin Edwards. “Vote for the crook. It’s important,” pro-Edwards bumper stickers read at the time.
John Bel Edwards is no crook. But he’s never been the avant-garde progressive who many in the national party base have come to not just hope for in candidates, but to expect. With the high stakes set in this race of Mr. Rispone — who was endorsed by Mr. Duke — serving as the alternative to Mr. Edwards, activists, everyday voters and political consultants alike weren’t shy about making the recent historical connections.
A radio ad paid for by BOLD, the Black Organization for Leadership Development, and voiced by a New Orleans councilman, Jay H. Banks, asked, “What’s the difference between David Duke, Eddie Rispone and Donald Trump?” Mr. Banks then answers: “The only difference is that Rispone will be governor if you don’t stop him. These people are telling you every day that they do not care about you or anyone who looks like you.”
(Mr. Edwards, for his part, said his campaign wasn’t involved and he called BOLD asking them to stop running the ads.)
Nonetheless, in the days leading up to the election, Mr. Duke himself appeared on the radio to reiterate his allegiance to Mr. Rispone, to Mr. Trump — who infamously struggled to forthrightly denounce Mr. Duke as a presidential candidate — and to defend his own legacy. “People say, ‘He’s irrelevant and he has no impact and all of these other things’,” he said, reminding listeners of the “landslide of white voters” who cast ballots for him. “There’s no question that I made an impact on politics” and, “I’m proud of that.” | 1,266,938 |
I grew up in the mid-aughts and thrived on the blend of pop-punk and emo that was prevalent throughout the decade. At the time, both genres were starting to feel a little like a dirty word, but that didn’t stop bands like Armor For Sleep from releasing their magnum opus, the grand and cinematic What To Do When You’re Dead. It’s been a minute since a record of the caliber has made its way through my headphones, and while it may not be as cinematic as Armor For Sleep’s underappreciated classic, Head Spell‘s debut five-song EP, Take What You Can Get, matches the heart and prowess of it in spades.
“I’ve Been Better” is a rip-roaring album opener; starting out a bit of a slow-burner before collapsing to the weight of everything and turning into a crashing and cathartic moment of release for every single pent-up emotion and memory, and their knack for incredible expressive song-writing doesn’t stop there. Songs like the previously released “Shut In” are bouncy and reminiscent of the early days of fellow Pennsylvania natives, Title Fight.
The real cherry on top comes from the closer, “Playing Pretend.” The track is sprawling and the most experimental that Head Spell have gotten on this record. There’s an ambiance to the track that makes you feel at home in every note before collapsing into the wormhole of a chorus. It sucks you right in, leaving you both mesmerized and out of breath. It’s a stunning way to close out an already phenomenal record.
When asked about the record, vocalist Jon Arocho said: With “Take What You Can Get” I’ve attempted to get a little more personal when it comes to the lyrical aspect of the album. I️ dove into recent/past memories to create a more vivid and in-depth look at my life and the situations I’ve lived through. One of the main inspirations for this record was the birth of my first son. From the moment he was born my life took a complete 180 and changed the way I️ viewed the world. It allowed me to make major changes in the way I carried myself and therefore many songs on the album were derived from that.”
The continue that with “Every aspect of writing this record from the early days of writing to finalizing everything has been a terrific experience. We put so much effort into this record and it’s honestly my favorite project I’ve worked on so far when in comes to music.”
You can stream Take What You Can Get in full below.
Take What You Can Get is out November 17th with cassette releases from Honest Face Records and Ok Sweet Records. Pre-orders can be found here and here. | 1,266,939 |
At A Glance: Georgia state representative Richard Smith, a republican from Columbus has introduced a bill that could put an end to unexpected medical bills patients receive after hospital procedures.
The Problem: Imagine you recently had surgery. You have decent insurance, and you’re aware there will be some cost to you for the procedure, but you met your deductible three months ago, so you have an idea of what the costs are and have planned accordingly. The bill comes and you owe about what you expected. A week later, while you’re still recovering, you get another bill from a doctor you’ve never heard of for $3,000. Now, instead of focusing on your recovery, you are panicking over a bill you didn’t expect that you’re not sure how you will pay.
How It Happens: Unexpected medical bills like this happen when an out-of-network doctor is involved in a patient’s care even though the hospital is in-network. The patient’s insurance company doesn’t have a relationship with that doctor and will not pay for the doctor’s services, despite the fact that they approved the procedure. This is commonly seen with anesthesiologists, but it can happen with any specialist.
The Bill: Smith’s Bill, House Bill 678, would require hospitals, at the request of the patient, to give notification prior to surgery of every doctor they will be seeing, how much they will be charged and how much insurance will cover. The bill also requires out-of-network charges to be billed within 90 days after the procedure and for any disputes to be settled within 90 days. The House Insurance Committee recommended passage of the bill Thursday.
Why It Matters: About 22 percent of Georgians have medical debt that has been turned over to collections agencies.
Loopholes: According to Georgia Watch, while the bill is a step in the right direction, it does not protect patients in emergency situations and patients who dispute out-of-network charges still have to handle the dispute themselves instead of having the hospital, the out-of-network provider and the insurance company work it out while the patient recovers. Also, it appears patients have to request the notification prior to the procedure.
History: Smith filed a similar bill last year, but that bill would have required all doctor’s working at a hospital or medical facilities to be certified under that facility’s insurance network plans. That bill also passed in the committee, but didn’t make it to the house floor by crossover day.
Does It Have A Chance?: The insurance industry is a powerful lobby and that often slows down meaningful health care changes. However, since this year’s version of the bill doesn’t require every doctor to be certified on a facility’s network plan, it may have a better chance.
Read The Bill:
| 1,266,940 |
The new CEO of Puerto Rico's power company announced Monday that the public agency will immediately adopt a U.S. national standard to design and rebuild the island's power grid following Hurricane Maria.
That measure will make it easier for the Electric Power Authority to maintain power lines and replace them after a storm, and crews will be able to obtain materials more quickly, CEO Walter Higgins said.
"It's a great step forward for faster restoration from storms and improving technology of the grid," he said in a statement. "It ensures that all of our future construction and activities in the grid will be done to a standard that is widely adopted and widely used in the United States."
It was not immediately clear why Puerto Rico had not previously adopted such a standard and whether the government has already started to rebuild and design a stronger power grid. Higgins was not available for comment, and power company spokesman Carlos Monroig said he did not have details.
More than 29,000 customers remain without power nearly eight months after the Category 4 storm destroyed up to 75 percent of the U.S. territory's distribution lines. Officials have said a lack of materials and rough terrain have in part delayed power restoration efforts as anger grows over the lack of electricity in dozens of communities.
Higgins said emergency measures taken so far to restore power must be upgraded or replaced to permanent standards.
In April, federal officials told a congressional hearing that they expected to have a plan by June on how to strengthen and stabilize Puerto Rico's electrical grid. Many worry the plan comes too late: The Atlantic hurricane season starts June 1, and power outages remain common across Puerto Rico.
Just hours before Higgins' announcement, Puerto Rico legislators said they would investigate an island-wide power outage that occurred April 18 and scrutinize what kind of steps the power company took to restore electricity and ensure it would not happen again. It was the second such outage in less than two years.
Puerto Rico's power company is $14 billion in debt and operating with infrastructure nearly three times older than the industry average. The governor announced in January that he aims to privatize the company as local and federal officials continue to restore power, with up to $2 billion of $18.5 billion in disaster recovery grants slated to help rebuild the grid.
Also on Monday, Gov. Ricardo Rossello released details on how his administration plans to use an additional $1.5 billion in federal funds to help the U.S. territory recover from Hurricanes Irma and Maria. At least $817 million will go to rebuilding single-family homes and $45 million will help with mortgage payments.
In addition, the plan earmarks $36 million for developing renewable energy projects for homes, $12.5 million for building housing for the homeless and domestic violence victims and $15 million for promoting the island as a tourism destination to help revive the economy.
The funds were awarded through the Community Development Block Grant program. | 1,266,941 |
LOS ANGELES (REUTERS) – Australian model and actress Miranda Kerr has handed over millions of dollars worth of jewellery that US authorities say was given to her as part of a Malaysian money laundering scheme, her spokesman said on Tuesday (June 27).
Kerr, a former Victoria’s Secret model, was given diamond pendants, earrings and other jewellery worth about US$8 million (S$11 million) in 2014 by Malaysian financier Jho Low, according to a June 15 US Department of Justice civil lawsuit.
Kerr is not accused of any wrongdoing and her spokesman said she has co-operated fully with US authorities from the start of the inquiry.
“The transfer of the jewellery gifts from Ms Kerr’s safe deposit box in Los Angeles to government agents was completed on last Friday afternoon,” the spokesman said in a statement.
The gifts of jewellery were detailed in the Justice Department’s lawsuit, in a long-running case over an alleged conspiracy to launder money misappropriated from the 1Malaysia Development Berhad fund, known as 1MDB, which was set up by Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in 2009 to promote economic development.
The Justice Department alleges that more than US$4.5 billion was taken from 1MDB by high-level fund officials and their associates.
Related Story Leonardo DiCaprio turns over Marlon Brando Oscar, other gifts allegedly bought with 1MDB funds
Kerr, who was in between marriages to actor Orlando Bloom and Snapchat co-founder Evan Spiegel at the time, was given a heart-shaped diamond necklace worth US$1.8 million, with her initials inscribed on the back, as a 2014 Valentine’s Day gift from Low, according to the lawsuit.
Later in 2014, investigators said, Low gave Kerr a second, pink diamond, pendant worth US$4.8 million, followed by matching earrings, a bracelet and a ring worth almost US$2 million.
The lawsuit said the funds for the jewellery were misappropriated from the 1MDB account.
Low, whose whereabouts are unknown, could not be reached for comment.
Actor Leonardo DiCaprio also is tied up in the scandal after accepting artwork by Picasso and Basquiat worth more than US$12 million from financiers connected with the 1MDB case, along with an Oscar once owned by actor Marlon Brando.
DiCaprio is cooperating with authorities and has initiated the return of the items, his spokesman has said.
DiCaprio’s involvement stems from his 2013 film The Wolf Of Wall Street, which investigators allege was financed through Hollywood production company Red Granite with US$100 million diverted from the 1MDB fund.
Red Granite has denied any wrongdoing and has said it is fully co-operating with the Justice Department. | 1,266,942 |
When Stephen Curry, the newly minted MVP, was asked about his Golden State Warriors’ upcoming matchup with the Houston Rockets and James Harden, who finished as the runner-up in MVP voting, Curry responded:
“All those story lines kind of end once the game starts for us because we understand it’s a team game and neither one of us is going to go out and win four games by ourselves.”
We’re inclined to agree with Curry. The series is about the teams, not specific players — especially because Curry leads a historically dominant Warriors team. Golden State has a 91 percent chance to beat Houston, according to our Real Plus-Minus projections.
Although …
Since 1985, the top two players in MVP voting have gone on to meet in the playoffs seven times. (Curry vs. Harden will be the eighth.) In those matchups, the MVP winner led his team to victory five times. The two exceptions took place in the NBA Finals: In 1985, MVP runner-up Magic Johnson’s Los Angeles Lakers unseated award winner Larry Bird’s Boston Celtics. And in 1997, Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls beat MVP Karl Malone’s Utah Jazz.
So the MVP is five-for-seven. And in those matchups, the “most likely better player” (at least, according to our long-term talent estimates) is also five-for-seven. The exceptions there came in 1998 — when Jordan’s Bulls won even though Malone was likely the more valuable player during the regular season — and, again, in 1985.
This year, those two trends will collide as Harden was most likely the best player, while Curry took home MVP honors.
Whether it’s the darling of the player ratings or the MVP voters who prevails in this matchup, though, one truth has held up across all these series: The team whose star has played better has won.
In every matchup of MVP and runner-up, the player with the better stats in the series (as measured by leveraged points above replacement) led his team to victory.
For example, look at the battles between Jordan and Malone in the 1997 and 1998 NBA Finals. In both cases, the player who won the MVP (Malone in 1997, Jordan the next year) rated second in the “most likely best player” derby. But in both instances, Jordan had the superior series statistically — and the Bulls cruised to back-to-back championships against the Jazz.
It’s a tiny sample size, of course, and each MVP candidate’s team has talented sidekicks who could conceivably carry the load if things were to go awry for the stars. But at the same time, don’t be stunned if the pattern holds and the relative play of Harden and Curry aligns with the overall result of the series. | 1,266,943 |
of the THAAD missile-defence system in South Korea. North Korea has long decried the 28,500 U.S. troops stationed in South Korea, and Beijing would see a South Korean deployment of THAAD, which is one of the world's most advanced missile-defence systems, as a threat to its interests in the region.
In a statement, North Korea's National Aerospace Development Administration, in typical propaganda-laden language, praised "the fascinating vapour of Juche satellite trailing in the clear and blue sky in spring of February on the threshold of the Day of the Shining Star."
Juche is a North Korean philosophy focusing on self-reliance; the Day of the Shining Star refers to the Feb. 16 birthday of Kim Jong Un's father, former dictator Kim Jong Il. North Korea has previously staged rocket launches to mark important anniversaries.
The global condemnation began almost immediately.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye called the launch an "intolerable provocation," saying the North's efforts to advance its missile capabilities were "all about maintaining the regime" in Pyongyang and ignored the hardships of ordinary North Koreans.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called the foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan and reaffirmed the United States' "ironclad commitment to the security and defence" of its allies, the State Department said.
The Foreign Ministry in China expressed "regret that, disregarding the opposition from the international community, the (North) side obstinately insisted in carrying out a launch by using ballistic missile technologies."
Noting China's pivotal role in negotiating a new Security Council resolution, Britain's deputy U.N. ambassador, Peter Wilson, said: "Today is Chinese New Year's eve and if I was a senior Chinese official, I would be pretty annoyed at what's been happening here. I know what I feel like when I'm dragged out of bed on a major national holiday."
Kim Jong Un has overseen two of the North's four nuclear tests and three long-range rocket launches since taking over after the death of his father in late 2011. The U.N. Security Council prohibits North Korea from nuclear and ballistic missile activity. Experts say that ballistic missiles and rockets in satellite launches share similar bodies, engines and other technology.
"If North Korea has only nuclear weapons, that's not that intimidating. If they have only rockets, that's not that intimidating, either. But if they have both of them, that means they can attack any target on Earth. So it becomes a global issue," said Kwon Sejin, a professor at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.
Lederer reported from the United Nations. Associated Press writers Hyung-jin Kim and Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul; Yuri Kageyama and Eric Talmadge in Tokyo; Lolita Baldor in Washington and Louise Watt in Beijing contributed to this report. | 1,266,944 |
Drake and Future are having incredible success this year, and they’ve just released a joint album that’s going to be talked about until 2015 is over.
Drake and Future’s What a Time To Be Alive comes after weeks of rumors and speculations that the pair were working together on a project. Some of us thought that Drizzy, Future Hendrix, and all their affiliates were trolling fans. Others believed the hype. Just by looking at their previous track record this year, it would make sense for them to collaborate on music. With all the anticipation finally behind us, the album is here.
Every Drake and Future fan is currently dissecting What a Time To Be Alive, as OVO Sound Radio ran back the album twice for listeners who might of missed it. At 11 tracks, the LP is executive produced by Metro Boomin and mixed by Gadget & Noah "40" Shebib. While all of this sounds great on paper, it's important to note what label this project is released on. According to iTunes, the album is released under Cash Money Records with Epic Records, which was hinted on Saturday (Sept. 19) when Epic's official Twitter account retweeted Future's "WHAT A TIME TO B ALIVE" tweet.
For Drake, he’s already dropped If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late—a surprise release in February on iTunes under Cash Money / OVO Sound / Republic Records. The same went for the physical copies that were announced later in April. Despite debate over whether it was an album or mixtape, this counts as Drake’s fourth studio album under his contract with YMCMB.
For Future, he recently released Dirty Sprite 2 in July, which was the first album to have the highest sales week in his career with 126,000 copies sold. Since signing to Epic in December 2012, he’s released three albums (Pluto, Honest and DS2). Unlike Drake, who has voiced his displeasure about Cash Money on IYRTITL and fueled more talks about him getting out of his contract when he didn't thank Birdman and them in the liner notes, Future is seemingly happy with Epic Records. However, the label might not be happy with him, as rumors circulated that they didn’t like the idea of a free mixtape while they’re still in mid-cycle of DS2.
Just for reference, Jay Z and Kanye West’s Watch the Throne, released in 2011, was through Roc-A Fella, Roc Nation and Def Jam. Big Boi and Phantogram’s upcoming EP Big Grams, due out Sept. 25, is via Epic Records and Republic Records. Whatever What a Time To Be Alive will count towards for Drake and Future, just know that these two just brought us that “champion sound” and we can’t wait to see what will come of it. | 1,266,945 |
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Breaking: Mother Nature has just possessed a bunch of scientists and delivered this urgent message: “If you keep burning all the fossil fuels, I will eliminate the Antarctic ice sheet, drowning most of what you’ve built and causing mass chaos in the process. Oh, and save the damn red pandas, you monsters.”
Mother Nature then dropped the proverbial mic and left the scientists to write this paper, published today in the journal Science Advances. Researchers warn that burning through the currently available fossil fuels will produce enough heat to melt not only the entire Antarctic ice sheet, but all of Earth’s land ice. To get a sense for what that means, here’s The New York Times:
A sea level rise of 200 feet would put almost all of Florida, much of Louisiana and Texas, the entire East Coast of the United States, large parts of Britain, much of the European Plain, and huge parts of coastal Asia under water. The cities lost would include Miami, New Orleans, Houston, Washington, New York, Amsterdam, Stockholm, London, Paris, Berlin, Venice, Buenos Aires, Beijing, Shanghai, Sydney, Rome and Tokyo.
It would take about a century for serious melting to get underway, but once it does, The New York Times reports, half of the Antarctic ice sheet could disappear in just a thousand years. That might seem like a long time, but it was a surprise to the scientists. Ken Caldeira, a researcher at Stanford and one of the study’s coauthors told the Times: “I didn’t expect it would go so fast … To melt all of Antarctica, I thought it would take something like 10,000 years.”
Besides melting all the world’s land ice, the roughly 20 degree F rise in the average global temperature would wreak havoc on health, food security, and basic living conditions. That, in turn, would drive large swaths of remaining life on Earth to extinction.
Of course, an easy way to avoid such devastation would be to not burn all of the oil, coal, and natural gas at our fingertips. Unfortunately, idiot politicians and greedy energy companies are making that extremely hard to do. In the mean time, coastal cities can (and are) preparing for the early stages of sea level rise. But if this worst-case scenario plays out, then, well … I know nobody likes to talk about this, but if the most important hubs of civilization go under, then all those grizzled off-grid survivalists lurking in the woods will inherit the Earth. And on that point, I’m getting one more message from Mother Nature:
“Please, don’t let the survivalists inherit the Earth.”
See: Climate Study Predicts Huge Sea Level Rise if All Fossil Fuels Are Burned,
The New York Times | 1,266,946 |
Image copyright Thinkstock
Scientists have figured out how to brew morphine using the same kit used to make beer at home.
They have genetically modified yeast to perform the complicated chemistry needed to convert sugar to morphine.
The findings, published in Nature Chemical Biology, raise promise for medicine but also concerns about "home-brewed" illegal drugs.
Experts have called for tight control of organisms genetically modified to produce narcotics.
Brewing bad
If you brew beer at home, then you are relying on microscopic yeast that turns sugars into alcohol.
But by borrowing DNA from plants, scientists have been genetically engineering yeasts that can perform each of the steps needed to convert sugar into morphine.
One stage of the process - the production of an intermediary chemical called reticuline - had been a stumbling block.
That has been solved by a team at the University of California, Berkeley, and the scientists say it should now be possible to put all the steps together and "brew" morphine.
Dr John Dueber, a bioengineer at the university, said: "What you really want to do from a fermentation perspective is to be able to feed the yeast glucose, which is a cheap sugar source, and have the yeast do all the chemical steps required downstream to make your target therapeutic drug.
"With our study, all the steps have been described, and it's now a matter of linking them together and scaling up the process.
"It's not a trivial challenge, but it's doable."
High hopes
Image copyright Thinkstock Image caption Until now morphine has been obtained from poppies
Morphine plays a vital role in pain relief in many hospitals, but it requires a poppy harvest to manufacture.
Brewed morphine could, eventually, be easier to produce. It could also allow scientists to tweak each of the steps to develop new types of painkiller.
The broad concept of using microscopic organisms to make drugs is not new in medicine.
Insulin for people with diabetes has been made in genetically modified bacteria for decades.
But there are concerns these latest advances could allow a DIY drug lord to brew illegal narcotics in their home.
'Basic skills'
"In principle, anyone with access to the yeast strain and basic skills in fermentation would be able to grow morphine producing yeast using a a home-brew kit for beer-making," reads a comment piece in Nature journal.
It calls for tight controls on such genetically modified yeasts.
Prof Paul Freemont, one of the directors of the Centre for Synthetic Biology and Innovation at Imperial College London, said: "Making opioids that can be used in an illegal sense makes this an important story.
"It's technically demanding to make these strains, but in the future who is to know?
"That is why this is such an important time - how do we regulate these strains?" | 1,266,947 |
Latin America-watchers agree that the trial could be a complete paradigm shift for Guatemala, and a potentially history-setting precedent for the region. While there are no statutes of limitations on genocide crimes in most national and international courts, political will has been lacking when it comes to prosecuting grand-scale human rights abuses in Latin America. Many involved in the abuses are still in power. Laura Carlsen, the Mexico City-based director of the Americas Program at the Center for International Policy in Washington, explains that there is a running debate about historical memory in the southern cone. Is it healthier to bring crimes to justice, to face them head on as a nation, or instead move forward, not reopening wounds? The region might be settling on a direction.
"In the last couple of years, there's really been major movement throughout Latin America to come to terms with history, as in Argentina," Carlsen said.
The indictment has generated unprecedented hope for justice in a country where many people still live with the pain of the disappearances and memories of the massacre of family members, lovers, and friends.
"Just the fact that they've opened the prosecution against him is important," said Patricia Ardón, director of a Guatemalan feminist organization called Sinergia No'j. Ardón lost both her husband-to-be in 1979 and her first boyfriend, from when she was 15. "For justice just to recognize that this really happened is important."
Ardón said it's not about vindication, nor is it about that for the other survivors I spoke to -- it's about a public reckoning with the men in power. It's about the realization that these men can no longer terrorize them. And, luckily for those who survived the loss of loved ones, the indictment of Ríos Montt holds real potential for justice, according to the people closest to the case.
"We feel it's a very, very strong case," Guatemala's pioneering attorney general, Claudia Paz y Paz, told a delegation from the Nobel Women's Initiative and Washington-based Just Associates in Guatemala City on January 30. Though many people I spoke to said they expect her to lose her job any minute because of her willingness to take on the powers-that-be (and were), she's still hanging on. She added that the charge of rape as a war crime is crucial to delivering justice to Guatemala's women: "For the first time, a judge said these rapes occurred. For these women it's like saying they have a real voice. It becomes finally clear that this is something that is not allowed, specifically."
Paz y Paz, with her steadfast, soft-spoken fearlessness, is part of the phalanx of women and men bringing justice to Guatemala, in spite of threats and endless resistance, legal and otherwise. "I have been 'advised' that if I continue to work there will be consequences," said Paz y Paz. | 1,266,948 |
FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. -- Atlanta Falcons offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan knew what type of dynamic playmaker he inherited in Julio Jones.
Watching Jones perform this offseason and through six training camp practices simply made Shanahan develop even more respect for Jones' explosive ability.
Julio Jones has wowed his new offensive coordinator with his toughness and explosiveness. Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images
"Just physically... I mean, I loved Julio coming out of college [and] I've always known how talented he is,'' Shanahan said. "Just to be around a guy who is as explosive as he is but who can still break down and cut and attack the football and see the ball... and his toughness. The guy doesn't take a play off. He's physically tough and mentally tough. He's very fun to coach. And he makes you a better coach.''
Jones, who set a franchise record with 1,593 receiving yards last season despite missing one game, vowed to be even better this season. So far in training camp, he has made dynamic catches look routine while improving the play of cornerbacks Desmond Trufant and Robert Alford.
Jones and veteran Roddy White made up a fierce dynamic duo a few seasons back. Injuries and age have caught up to White, who turns 34 in November. But White insists he can have an impact on offense, if he remains healthy.
Shanahan was asked about White's role.
"I've been really excited about Roddy and how he's shown up to training camp,'' Shanahan said. "I've been a fan of Roddy's my whole career. He really came to this camp ready to go. I could tell he worked real hard throughout July. He's in great shape. He's running hard. He's put himself in a position to have a good year and to stay healthy. I'm excited to work with him and see how it ends up for him.''
Shanahan also has a familiar face at receiver in Leonard Hankerson, a player he coached in the same role with the Washington Redskins. Hankerson has stood out throughout the offseason and training camp, obviously using his knowledge of Shanahan's scheme to his advantage.
"'Hank' is a real good player,'' Shanahan said. "Anytime you've played in this system -- especially I was with Hank two years before I came here -- you have an advantage because you've done this stuff. You know the coaching points. Nick Williams the same way. He was with us in Washington.
"They had a little bit of an advantage in OTAs. The other guys are starting to catch up, though. Everyone has had the reps. It starts to even out. It definitely should by the season. And then, you're hoping the next man up: Everyone's playing. You don't really care who the starter is; who's out there. It's the Golden State Warriors.''' | 1,266,949 |
Volvo Trucks, friends of Jean-Claude Van Damme and all truckies, are pretty good at setting world records.
Back in 2007, their 1600 horsepower 'The Wild Viking' beat the world record for the standing-start 0-1000 m (0.62 mile) distance, with an average speed of 158.8 km/h (98.67mph). Three years later, they went further, reaching an average speed of 103.5mph with their 'NH D16' prototype, only to set a new record with a hybrid the next time around. That truck—called the 'Mean Green'—packed a 1800 horsepower diesel, plus a 300 electric motor, good enough combined for an average speed of 147 miles per hour.
Now, they came up with 'The Iron Knight', their latest and greatest custom truck featuring a heavily turbocharged series engine and a standard I-Shift Dual Clutch transmission with a reinforced clutch.
Sufficient cooling. Volvo Trucks
Simply put, Iron Knight is the world's fastest truck. It has an upgraded D13 diesel with a water-cooled intercooler and four turbochargers, producing 2400 horsepower and 4425 pound feet of torque. At 10,080 pounds, it weighs 2204 pounds less than the hybrid 'Mean Green' did, putting its a power-to-weight ratio above 0.5hp/kg, which is roughly half as good as a Koenigsegg One:1's.
With a fiberglass cab and 1994 European Truck Racing Champion Boije Ovebrink in it, The Iron Knight set two FIA world records at a former airfield outside Skellefteå in northern Sweden. Reaching a top speed of 276 km/h (171mph), the Volvo covered 500 meters in 13.71 seconds from a standing start at 131.29 km/h, and 1000m in 21.29 seconds at 169km/h.
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Of course Volvo Trucks did this whole thing to promote the hell out of their I-Shift Dual Clutch transmission, which was put in the recorder truck straight from a series Volvo FH with the addition of sintered discs and pressure plates. Volvo is very proud of how this unit can shift without dropping the torque, which can improve efficiency greatly when hauling stuff. And that's what trucks are all about.
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The Trump administration has failed to staff key positions in vital federal agencies. It isn’t clear who is responsible for what, and the White House’s relationship with the federal bureaucracy is rocky.
All of this screws up the US government in ways that are often hard to notice from the outside. But sometimes that dysfunction goes public in really revealing ways. Thursday’s State Department briefing was one of those examples.
Mexico’s foreign minister, Luis Videgaray, was in Washington. The Los Angeles Times’s Tracy Wilkinson asked State spokesperson Mark Toner what the plans were for his visit. Toner, a highly regarded career foreign service officer, apparently had no idea that a key foreign dignitary was even in the city:
Wowwowwow. State Dep't Acting Spox Mark Toner had zero idea the Mexican foreign minister was in Washington. DoS totally cut out. (!!!) pic.twitter.com/zYclfJIq6q — Ankit Panda (@nktpnd) March 10, 2017
Wilkinson did some follow-up reporting, and found out that Videgaray had called Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to tell him he was visiting. However, the visit had been planned entirely through the White House, and Videgary did not schedule any meetings with Tillerson personally. This, as Wilkinson notes, is highly unusual.
“It is customary for foreign secretaries from all nations to be received by their US counterpart when in Washington,” she writes. “But Videgaray said the thrust of his mission meant he needed to speak directly to the White House.”
As my colleague Yochi Dreazen has written, Tillerson doesn’t seem to be much of a player on key foreign policy decisions, even though the job of the secretary of state is to help make them. The former Exxon Mobil CEO has also been slapped down by the White House on personnel choices and given virtually no opportunities to make public appearances with President Trump.
Now this is the latest black eye for the embattled department, already reeling from a proposed 37 percent budget cut.
There are two major takeaways:
Tillerson’s State Department is so poorly staffed (he doesn’t yet have a deputy or a permanent spokesperson) and out of the loop on high-level decision-making that its press secretary wasn’t even informed of a visit by the top diplomat from one of Washington’s most important strategic partners. Foreign governments appear to be recognizing State’s weakness in the Trump administration and are bypassing America’s trained diplomatic corps. Instead, they’re speaking directly with White House aides whom they see as wielding real influence over the president. That includes ones like Jared Kushner — Trump’s son-in-law, who has no experience in international affairs or diplomacy.
This is what a dysfunctional government looks like. | 1,266,951 |
Presidential candidate Donald Trump wants to "Make America Great Again!" Before he can do that, he has to answer to allegations that his now-defunct Trump University was a scam.
Trump is involved in two lawsuits brought by former students and one by the New York Attorney General.
The Donald is expected to be questioned under oath next month in a class action lawsuit brought by Art Cohen, who spent more than $36,000 on the Trump programs. Cohen's suit alleges that Trump University failed to deliver on its promises to provide a premier education.
Related: What we know - and don't know - about Donald Trump's wealth
Trump University, launched in 2005, promised to teach students the mogul's investing techniques to get rich on real estate. But the suit claims the teachers were not professors hand-picked by Trump as advertised, but rather independent contractors paid commissions for sales of the seminars and products.
The suit also alleges that the University would "upsell" students in its initial free seminar to buy a $1,495 "one year apprenticeship" -- which was effectively a three-day seminar. Then if they bought that, the teachers would upsell them again to buy "mentorships" at a cost of $10,000 and up. The most expensive, the Gold Elite program, cost $35,000.
"Even then, after investing nearly $36,500, students still do not receive Defendant Trump's'secrets' they were promised, but are constantly subjected to upsell of additional Live Events, products and books," the Cohen suit said.
Trump's camp rejects the allegations. "Mr. Cohen's claims are completely baseless," said Alan Garten, the executive vice president and general counsel of The Trump Organization.
Jason Forge, an attorney representing Cohen, said "We'd rather try this case in court."
Related: Donald Trump: I'm worth $10 billion
In addition to Trump's upcoming deposition, more information about his financial stake in the school may be revealed.
U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel in California ordered that the plaintiff may reopen depositions of various Trump witnesses where they were asked but didn't answer questions about the money Trump put into -- and received from -- Trump University.
Cohen's Trump University suit isn't the first. Another class action suit representing students in California, Florida and New York made similar claims and is still pending.
And in a suit brought by the State of New York, a trial court found Trump was personally liable for running an unlicensed school and must pay restitution to approximately 800 consumers nationwide who took courses after May 31, 2010 from the Trump Entrepreneur Initiative (formerly known as Trump University).
In addition, the court authorized Trump's attorneys to take the deposition of more than 5,000 consumers who took courses before that date and for whom New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is seeking restitution under claims of fraud. | 1,266,952 |
A coal mine in India, the fifth largest producer of coal in the world. Image: Environmental Change and Security Program/Flickr
Coal India—a government-back coal company–is reportedly closing 37 of its "unviable" mines in the next year to cut back on losses.
India is primed for an energy revolution. The country's ongoing economic growth has been powered by fossil fuels in the past, making it one of the top five largest energy consumers in the world. But it has also invested heavily in renewables, and the cost of solar power is now cheaper than ever. In some instances, villages in India have avoided coal-powered electricity altogether, and "leapfrogged" straight to solar power.
Partly because of this shift, Coal India, which produced 554.13 million tonnes of coal in the 2016-2017 fiscal year (for comparison, the largest company in the US produced about 175 million in 2015) saw demand dip in recent months. This is not the first sign that coal is no longer the most economic option for emerging economies like India and China. Earlier this year, the heavily industrial state of Gujarat cancelled its proposed coal power plants. And a few weeks ago The Hindu reported that Coal India had identified another 65 mines in losses.
India's energy situation is changing so fast that even expert predictions about its switch to renewables are wildly off: A study from last year claimed India would be building more than 300 coal plants in the next 10 years, but experts said the data was already outdated by the time the report was published, and that India would be moving toward renewables instead.
We are collectively moving away from fossil fuels
"For the first time, solar is cheaper than coal in India and the implications this has for transforming global energy markets are profound," said Tim Buckley, Director of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) in a statement.
The decline of Coal India, which produces 80 percent of the country's domestic coal output, is more evidence that we are collectively moving away from fossil fuels as cleaner, renewable technologies become more widely available. This reality is important to grasp in every country where coal used to be king. Even as Donald Trump promises coal jobs, let's remember that those jobs don't are unlikely to come back. "One of the most popular mines today employs [a couple hundred people] who are doing the work that used to be done by thousands," Jerome Scott, a left-leaning activist with the League of Revolutionaries for a New America, said at the Left Forum earlier this month in Manhattan. "That's the fundamental contradiction within capitalism—it's being disrupted because they're able to hire fewer and fewer workers."
And for countries like India, where companies like Coal India employ more than 300,000 people, training people to work in more viable energy markets will be increasingly important to provide sustainable livelihoods. Luckily, it looks like the solar industry will have some job openings. | 1,266,953 |
I guess Mitt Romney hasn't gotten the word from his billionaires yet on what he should say in response to the immigration issue, and particularly the Supreme Court ruling on SB 1070. Instead of having a strong policy statement of his own, he chose the cowardly and overused attack on the President's leadership, which is ironic considering that it was the Obama administration who brought forward the challenge put in front of the court.
Politico has a report of how the Romney campaign is responding when pressed for actual answers to the issues at hand, which is to say, how they are not responding. Where is his immigration billionaire with the pen and the answers? Poor Mittens had to just bob and weave his way through it:
GORKA: "The governor supports the states' rights to craft immigration laws when the federal government has failed to do so. This president promised as a candidate to address immigration in his first year and hasn’t, and waited actually ‘til four and a half months before the election to put in place a stopgap measure." QUESTION: So does he think it's wrongly decided? GORKA: "The governor supports the states' rights to do this. It's a 10th amendment issue." QUESTION: So he thinks it's constitutional? GORKA: "The governor believes the states have the rights to craft their own immigration laws, especially when the federal government has failed to do so." QUESTION: And what does he think about parts invalidated? GORKA: "What Arizona has done and other states have done is a direct result of the failure of this president to address illegal immigration. It's within their rights to craft those laws and this debate, and the Supreme Court ruling is a direct response of the president failing to address this issue." QUESTION: Does (Romney) support the law as it was drafted in Arizona? GORKA: "The governor supports the right of states, that's all we're going to say on this issue." QUESTION: Does he have a position on the law, or no position? GORKA: "The governor has his own immigration policy that he laid out in Orlando and in the primary, which he would implement as president which would address this issue. Whereas Obama has had four years in the office and has yet to address it in a meaningful way."
And on and on it goes. No Romney policy. No opinion on whether or not the Arizona law was valid or not valid. Just the usual blah, blah, blah-de-blah argle-bargle Obama blah, blah immigration, blah, blah states' rights, blah blah, leadership.
It's absurd and insulting. Every American has an opinion on this, for better or worse. Mitt Romney could possibly be the only candidate running for President who has managed to either have no opinions, reverse them on a near-daily basis, or wait for his billionaires to pony up the biggest check in exchange for one. | 1,266,954 |
KARS, Turkey — “WE have enemies.”
The old Kurdish woman said this by way of running me off. I had trekked into her mountain hamlet at dusk, hoping to camp nearby. She waved a hand at the stone homes around us. Most were empty. There had been a killing between neighbors. The house of the perpetrator had been leveled. Fearing retribution, his relatives had run for their lives. Armed members of the victim’s family were now guarding the place against their return. The watchmen’s lonesome campfire seesawed in the wind high up on a cliff.
“It’s not safe here,” the woman apologized. So I walked on. I slept five miles away in a field.
We have enemies. Over the past three months, while plodding some 350 miles along the steppe trails, rural back roads and modern highways of Turkey’s Kurdish heartland, I’ve heard this bleak refrain dozens of times. I am crossing the world on foot as part of a project called the “Out of Eden Walk.” The idea involves retracing the first human migration out of Africa during the Stone Age, and reporting current events at the micro level along the ancestral route to South America. Turkey, the eighth country on my itinerary since leaving Ethiopia in early 2013, was supposed to be easy. But while plodding into eastern Anatolia this summer, I have been shooed out of Kurdish villages, interrogated by Kurdish vigilantes and nearly shot twice by frightened Kurds. None of this is personal, of course.
Friendlessness — having enemies — is synonymous with Kurdishness.
The world’s 30 million Kurds, a tough and independent mountain people who mostly practice a moderate brand of Sunni Islam, are scattered among Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran — states that for generations have perfected the tools of marginalization, counterinsurgency and manipulation to keep their unruly Kurdish minorities in check. Lately, American military support for Kurds battling the Islamic State in Syria has revived a modest dream of pan-Kurdish unity: greater cooperation among the region’s rival Kurdish movements, if not the dawn of a Greater Kurdistan.
Yet my boot-level view of Kurdish fractiousness suggests how steep that slope may be. To be clear: I have been overwhelmed by a stunning brand of Kurdish hospitality that places nearly every private home and barn at my disposal. (I am walking with a cargo mule.) But this kindness frequently comes entangled in a painful thicket of grievance and suspicion — not just among individual Kurds, but entire villages and families. Walking through a still-mythic Kurdistan must resemble, I imagine, a foot journey through 19th-century Appalachia: Kurds appear to share the same violent honor culture and clannish tensions as the frontier Scotch-Irish. Any ramble in the woods can be fraught. | 1,266,955 |
minority role in a coalition with Fatah, Israel and the US rejected this. They demanded Hamas abandon its three core tenets and renounce the use of arms, recognise Israel and sign up to the Oslo Accords in return for international recognition of a Hamas-controlled PA, or face an international boycott. The other members of the Quartet, the UN, European Union and Russia, soon fell in line with Washington’s demands, and the EU too cut its aid to the PA.
The US and Israel were determined to prevent any attempts by Fatah and Hamas to reach an agreement, deepening the split between the two factions in order to divide and rule, while increasing Hamas’ economic dependence on Qatar and Iran.
In June 2006, Israel launched an attack on Gaza, knocking out its power station, making Gaza increasingly dependent on Israel for its electricity and precipitating daily power cuts lasting for hours at a time. Israel tightened its blockade on Gaza after Hamas forestalled and defeated an attempted coup by Fatah in a brief but brutal civil war in June 2007. Three military assaults on Gaza in 2008-09, 2012 and 2014 killed 1,417, 147 and 2,250 Palestinians respectively, and destroyed much of Gaza’s basic infrastructure together with tens of thousands of homes. Around 90,000 of the 500,000 people displaced by the 2014 assault remain displaced or homeless.
The blockade worsened after the military coup in Egypt that toppled the Muslim Brotherhood-led government of Mohammed Morsi and the clampdown on the Brotherhood and Hamas—a Brotherhood affiliate—by the military junta of Abdul Fattah el-Sisi.
El-Sisi closed Egypt’s border crossing at Rafah and forced Hamas to close the tunnels between Gaza and Egypt that had provided a means of circumventing Israel’s blockade and a source of income, by taxing the goods brought in, for Hamas.
Last year, Abbas imposed further hardship on Gaza. He stopped paying Israel for fuel for Gaza’s power station and electrical transmission into the Gaza Strip and ended or cut salary payments to thousands of public sector workers. This was to force Hamas into “reconciliation” talks with Fatah that culminated in a Cairo-brokered agreement in October. But the talks have stalled and the promised relief has failed to materialise.
In October, the World Food Programme announced a cutback in its food voucher programme in Gaza due to a budget shortfall.
Earlier this year, the Trump administration withheld $65 million in funding for the United Nations Relief and Work Agency (UNRWA), which supports some 1.2 million in Gaza, as well as $45 million in food aid in the West Bank and Gaza that it had promised for an emergency UNRWA appeal.
UNRWA has for decades provided key social services as well as a vital lifeline for the poorest Palestinians. Now that too has gone and the viability of the agency itself is in question. | 1,266,956 |
When Gene Roddenberry wrote the line “Live long and prosper,” which debuted in the Season 2 opener of his iconic 1960’s TV series “Star Trek,” little did he know that it would be a self-fulfilling prophecy. The series may have run from only 1967 to 1969, but its legacy lives on, spawning a movie franchise and several TV spin-offs. Generations of “Trekkies” all over the world scramble to snag collectibles, and one of the best may be the house where a Season 3 episode of “Star Trek: The Next Generation” was filmed.
The Malibu, Calif., home is on the market for $5,695,000, according to TopTenRealEstateDeals.com.
The series, set in the 24th century, aired from 1987 to 1994. One of the stars in Season 3 was this playfully eclectic, European-style contemporary, which was where Commander William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and a rescue party from the USS Enterprise answer a distress call coming from a seemingly deserted planet. In “The Survivors” episode, they find two people who appear to have miraculously survived a disaster that claimed the lives of the rest of the population. The house and grounds appear much like they do today, but the magic of film showed a vast wasteland surrounding the property.
Designed by futuristic architect/artist and furniture designer Ellis David Gelman, the eye-popping wedge-shaped house features circular and triangular windows, as well as dramatic angles. Sited on two acres on the Pacific Coast Highway, the four-bedroom, four-bath home features an open floor plan, including a living area with spectacular views and a high wood-clad ceiling, according to the listing. The home has a media/family room with a kitchenette, a loft, a 440-square-foot terrace with a glass railing that doesn’t disrupt the ocean view, two fireplaces, slate and bamboo flooring, a sound system, a two-car garage, built-ins, and a kitchen with a breakfast bar and stone counters. The property also offers parking for 10 vehicles, a guest house, lavender and rose gardens, and an enclosed patio for dogs. The listing does not give the home’s square footage.
The listing agent is Ani Dermenjian of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Malibu. You can see a video of the property and a clip from the episode on her website: www.come2malibu.com.
View additional photos of the home:
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rest of my education and went to college. I graduated from college in 1971 and went through the whole anti-war, environmental thing and became kind of a social activist.
DB: Were you a hippie Dave?
DP: I absolutely was a hippie. You know. I wasn’t a leader. I was a follower, I’ll admit that but I did believe in a lot of those things and I think that’s what really kind of set me up for the whole solar thing when I finally discovered it and I was out of work and I had moved from Oregon to Ohio and I was looking for a job. Actually I was trying to see if I could get unemployment for a while and take a vacation. But they told me at the unemployment office I had to get two job interviews every two weeks I think and the first place I walked into was this engineering firm called SunPower, which I could never quite figure out how this other company has that name. And they were doing research on stirling engines, a free piston stirling engine. And the guy who ran the place hired me, even though I was an architect, because he was an engineer, in spite of being an architect. He said he had this thing he wanted me to work on and he was interested in solar thermal and he wanted to come up with a better mousetrap so he set me up in a lab and I was studying inefficiencies and how one designs a flat plate solar collector. And I bought a bunch. I raced them against things I would design and build and try to find out how one maximizes the efficiency in a flat plate solar collector. So I was kind of in the solar industry before I discovered the passive part of it. And I was an architect and when I came back from that conference I was really stoked and I said to him, “Wow, you won’t believe what I just saw.” And he and I went together and applied for a grant to build a test facility, sort of a passive test building. He needed a place for his mother-in-law, who lived in Maine, to stay when she came to southern Ohio. And so we did an all-weather, plywood, subterranean, passive-solar, rock storage, mother-in-law house for her. And I remember the first January after it was completed I went out to see how it was doing and it was about a 10 degree high that day and I walked in the mother-in-law house and it was 80 degrees in the living room but it worked.
For the rest of the interview please listen to the audio clip by clicking the player at the top of this podcast. Please subscribe to the show in iTunes or Stitcher and if you like it please give the show a review. That will help other people find it. I would love to get your feedback too. Please email david at cleanpowerplanet.com. | 1,266,958 |
Saraf has raised nearly $18,000 within 4 days.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: An eight-year-old boy from Laurel, Maryland, has raised nearly $18,000 dollars within three days to aid victims of the earthquake in Nepal that that claimed more than 7,000 lives and left thousands more injured and destitute.
Related story: 8-year-old Neev Saraf from Maryland raises $25,000 for victims of Nepal earthquake
According to Neev Saraf’s father, Prakash, who spoke with The American Bazaar over the phone, Neev has always been an altruistic soul. He described the boy as one who felt compelled to visit homeless shelters from an early age, always bringing groceries along with treats and snacks to liven the spirits of the men and women he encountered there.
Neev has always eschewed gifs and presents, instead asking that his parents place money in a piggy bank, said Prakash. Every year on his birthday there would be a few hundred dollars accumulated, and Neev would go and hand the piggy bank over to either a homeless shelter or the Salvation Army.
After learning of the 7.9 magnitude earthquake that hit Nepal last week, Neev asked if he could send the $384 from his piggy bank there.
His father agreed it was an excellent idea, but it wasn’t long before Neev enhanced his ambitions even further and set out to contact his friends and family to see if they would donate as well. Within one day, he had raised $4,000, according to his father.
At that point, Neev’s father decided the scope of Neev’s mission might require structuring on a larger scale, and they reached out to the American Nepal Medical Foundation, with whom a crowdfunding page was set up to expand Neev’s philanthropic reach to unprecedented levels.
With his crowdfunding website running on all cylinders, Neev’s new goal is to raise $25,000 by his birthday on May 24.
“I’m really glad to do this fundraiser because it’s helping my culture. I’m really depressed because a lot of people in Nepal have died and about 8 million have no shelter. I’m trying my best to raise up to $25,000 to save Nepal and save those with no shelter,” Neev commented via telephone.
Neev’s parents Prakash and Majila immigrated to the U.S. from Nepal 15 and 25 years ago, respectively, before settling in Laurel. Prakash Saraf described the family as having Indian roots, and noted that Neev, an only child, was born and raised stateside.
(Updated on May 2, 2015) | 1,266,959 |
Yet another disagreement between Washington and Kabul over the handover of prisoners held at U.S.-run facilities comes at a crucial moment in negotiations over legal immunity for U.S. troops.
The U.S. military has suspended transfer of prisoners to some Afghan prisons over concern about torture and other human rights abuses, The New York Times reported Thursday. The decision comes six weeks after the British government made a similar decision, also citing the risk of torture in Afghan prisons.
The issue has been a particularly prickly one for Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who has demanded all detainees be transferred to Afghan authority out of respect for the country’s sovereignty. Transfer of prisoners was a major topic of discussion between Karzai and President Barack Obama at their meeting in Washington last week.
Obama is pressing for an agreement that would grant legal immunity to U.S. troops after combat units leave at the end of 2014, and Afghan control of prisoners is seen by many as a major bargaining chip for Karzai.
In 2011 the U.S. made a similar decision to halt prisoner transfers in Afghanistan in response to a United Nations report that found torture to be rampant in Afghan prisons. The latest halt in transfers was made ahead of a new U.N. report expected to make similar allegations, the Times reported.
Afghan officials cited by The New York Times denied all allegations of torture in the country’s prisons, a claim human rights expert Kate Clark said “isn’t credible.”
“It looks like something has gone wrong with the ISAF program to stop these abuses,” said Clark, who has tracked prisoner issues in the country for the Afghanistan Analysts Network. “They haven’t done enough in the past and, from what’s being reported, they still aren’t.”
Clark said the issue goes beyond questions of human rights and that ISAF, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, should be concerned also with the effects abuses can have on the battlefield.
“One of the factors that’s contributing to the insurgency is maltreatment of prisoners,” she said.
Despite this latest disagreement over prison handovers, the relationship between Karzai and the U.S. is slowly thawing, said Michael O’Hanlon, a security expert and author of the Brookings Institution’s “Afghanistan Index,” which tracks security trends.
“My impression is that the basic situation is in fact gradually improving despite various temporary setbacks,” he said. “Clearly, we need for the transfer to occur eventually since it’s their country and since we can’t be responsible for jails if we only have a few thousand troops (after 2014).”
[email protected]
Twitter: Druzin_Stripes | 1,266,960 |
A massive database has been discovered containing information for millions of Instagram influencers, celebrities, and brand accounts. Hosted on Amazon Web Services, the database is growing by the hour and was not even password protected.
Security researcher Anurag Sen has discovered a ‘secret’ database containing compiled information on millions of accounts. Even worse, the database is still rapidly expanding. Upon investigation, the database has been linked to a Mumbai-based social media marketing firm called Chtrbox.
In total, the database has some 49M entries and was hosted on Amazon Web Services, password free and accessible to all. Every recorded account in the database is assigned a worth based on various metrics including number of followers, engagement, reach, likes, and shares. According to TechCrunch, several high-profile influencers were in the database.
Private contact information including phone numbers and email addresses were also included in the database. According to various individuals contacted by TechCrunch, it seems that nobody in the database consented to have their information compiled and made public.
Is Instagram Safe?
You might remember a similar story that broke in 2017 when Instagram said that a security bug had allowed hackers to obtain phone numbers and emails. Six million accounts were compromised which were later sold for Bitcoin (BTC).
Facebook, which owns Instagram, has said that it is now investigating the Chtrbox situation and are in direct communication with the marketing firm. It’s still unclear how Chtrbox was even able to compile such a vast collection of information.
The newly-discovered database raises questions about Instagram’s security. Instagram and Facebook have commonly been subject to criticism for data-mining and violating user privacy. However, it seems that information on Instagram is even less secure from third-parties than expected.
In fact, Facebook was in hot water just a few years ago when it was revealed that many third-parties were using its games and apps to access private information on users. The scandal escalated when it was further unveiled that Cambridge Analytica had used this info to target political ads for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. Facebook has since patched that issue but suspicions remain.
The Problem Lies with Centralization
Ultimately, the main issue is that Facebook and Instagram are both highly-centralized entities. We trust them to our own detriment, and we are naive to expect them to do any better. When it comes to privacy, Facebook ultimately sees this consideration as optional until told otherwise.
Decentralized, blockchain-based social media networks provide us with an alternative to both Facebook and Instagram. In today’s highly-surveilled world, where ads target our most intimate details, the least we can ask for is basic privacy. However, that won’t happen until we transcend centralization.
Do you believe Instagram is safe? Can we trust the platform to secure our data? Let us know your thoughts below. | 1,266,961 |
Hundreds of thousands of people in Scotland could miss the opportunity to vote if there is a snap general election because they are not registered, campaigners have warned.
The Electoral Commission estimates that between 630,000 and 890,000 people in Scotland were missing from the local government electoral roll in December.
Figures for the parliamentary register are not available, however campaign group the Electoral Reform Society (ERS) said that as the Parliamentary register and local register "completeness" levels are almost the same, it fears that hundreds of thousands of people are also missing from it.
READ MORE: Former TV news anchor Mike Edwards says families affected by dementia face 'unimaginable hurdles'
The ERS is now calling for automatic registration to be introduced across the UK to ensure people do not lose out on the right to vote.
Dr Jess Garland, director of policy and research for the ERS, said: "These figures should sound the alarm for anyone who cares about democracy.
"Hundreds of thousands of potential voters in Scotland are effectively missing from the electoral roll, representing a major barrier to political equality and democratic engagement.
"That means any snap election will be on the basis of an flawed franchise.
"You shouldn't have to opt in to your right to vote.
"As the Electoral Commission says, we need to move towards automatic registration now, starting with being able to check you are registered online, and being able to register whenever you engage with government bodies or services.
"There's widespread consensus on this - now it just needs to be done."
READ MORE: Dementia carers say loved ones should be entitled to free health care like others with a terminal illness
Electoral Commission analysis found that in December 2018, parliamentary registers in Scotland were 84% complete and 87% accurate while local government registers were 83% complete and 86% accurate.
It found there were between 400,000 and 745,000 inaccurate entries on the local government registers that month.
The ERS is also concerned that the number of people registered to vote in Scotland has dropped despite the population rising, and an increase in the number eligible to be on the register through the adoption of votes at 16 and 17.
READ MORE: Is Twitter down? Tweetdeck and DMs impacted by service outage
Alice Kinghorn-Gray, campaigns officer for Electoral Reform Society Scotland, said: "That voter registration numbers are actually going down is deeply concerning.
"We urge the Scottish government to explore how it can use its powers to ensure everyone has a stake in our democracy.
"The gaps in registration are creating major inequalities in our elections, with young people and renters particularly affected.
"Parties must respond with action, and start to bring in the'missing millions'.
"Let's ensure the next election does not exclude huge swathes of our country and instead represents the gold standard for participation." | 1,266,962 |
A Fortress of God’s Army testifying to the Eternal Truth of the Gospel
About Us
Glory Landmark Baptist Church is a new church plant in Portland, Oregon, led by Pastor Jonseph Cheung. We are fundamental, separated, KJV 1611, old-time Baptist community established for the sole purposes of preaching the Gospel to “one of the most anti-Christian cities in America” and of glorifying the Lord Jesus Christ.
Unlike many so-called “churches” today, we steadfastly refuse our church to be co-opted by the secular humanist State and by the anti-Christian ecumenism. We have nothing to do with them. We are a Free Church, not a 501(c)(3) State-established Corporation. Our Sole Obedience is to Christ and and the Word of God alone.
Our Beliefs
We believe in the 100 percent literal inerrancy of the Holy Bible, in the God-ordained language of the KING JAMES VERSION (AUTHORIZED VERSION 1611 A.D.). The Bible is our only creed. We reject secular humanism, liberal “theology,” and any other compromises to the Integrity of the Perfect Word of God.
As a landmark Baptist, we are a true heir to the authentic Apostolic Christianity of the Twelve Disciples. Our tradition dates back, in its unbroken form, to Jesus Christ our Lord of Lords.
Where we are
Unlike most other “churches,” we are not here to be “seeker-friendly” or to market ourselves to attract non-believers and those with questionable commitments to faith. Our worship services and meetings are open ONLY to baptized Members of this Church in good standing. To join Glory Landmark Baptist Church, your first step is to keep in touch with one of our Soulwinners, who will instruct you on your next step, including extensive Bible lessons, Discipleship process, and interview before the Congregation. All prospective Members must be nominated by Pastor Jonseph Cheung and receive an unanimous vote of the full Congregation.
We do not disclose our meeting location so as to prevent non-believers (including atheists and socialists, witches, ANTIFA’s, homosexuals and transvestites), apostates (liberal fake “Christians”), heretics (such as Catholics and holy rollers) from defiling our Holy Assembly before the LORD. Again, our Worship is ONLY for Baptized Believers!
Any sincerely interested souls should complete the prospective member application form and send it to our Pastor Jonseph Cheung. You will then be instructed regarding the initial interview.
More about our Worship Services
Copyright GLORY LANDMARK BAPTIST CHURCH, PORTLAND, OREGON, USA – All rights reserved
| 1,266,963 |
. In both of these games his play was instrumental to the Wolves’ victories and while it’s too early for him to be the new Froggen, the young Dane definitely has the raw potential and skills to achieve that.While there were a couple of highly unexpected results till now, probably the one that surprised most people wasin Week 4, Day 2. Considering the fact that the European powerhouse came into the match as the leader of the scoreboard while the Danish team was at the bottom and had only just secured their first win the previous day, no one expected this game to be much of a challenge for Fnatic. With this said though they made some unusual mistakes and the Wolves, lead by Bjergsen’s quadra kill Kassadin, didn’t hesitate to snatch the victory away. Besides ending in an unexpected fashion the game was also very entertaining to watch and many people refer to it as the best yet in LCS due to all the teleport and backdoor action that took place in it.While EG started the league pretty convincingly going 5-1 by Week 2 and showing the dominant performance we are used to seeing from them during a lot of Season 2 in these 5 wins, things didn’t look so well for them in the next two weeks. The way they play doesn’t seem to work anymore and a lot of that falls onand his support junglers who don’t fit the current aggressive meta. He did have a good performance on Kayle with which he has 3 wins out of 3 games but that made EG’s opponents constantly ban her against them thus forcing him to play the likes of Volibear and Vi and those attempts weren’t very successful. Since the team has a very big fanbase and their expectations are never low, it will be up to him to quickly find new champions that he’s comfortable on and change his playstyle to a more aggressive one.While this is a very subjective topic as some focus on the wins a player has, others on his KDA, third on the big plays he did and fourth on how consistent he is in his performance, the SK editorial team did a little poll in order to determine the player that most impressed us during the first month of LCS EU. Of course it was really hard to pick just one out of all the star players there are in the league so we went for top 3 and based on a point system here are the results:1., Gambit Gaming2., SK Gaming2., Fnatic*Note: Both Kev1n and xPeke had equal amount of points.We can probably all agree that these 3 players have been instrumental for their teams’ victories and showcased insane amount of skill in almost if not all of their matches. If they will be able to maintain their strong performances is something we’ll be able to find out in only a day as Saturday and Week 5 are approaching fast and things are going to get even more heated up as the playoffs draw closer. | 1,266,964 |
President Trump said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was making a racist statement when she accused him of making a xenophobic statement.
"Speaker Pelosi said, 'Make America White Again,'" Trump said Monday. "Let me tell you, that's a very racist statement. I'm surprised she would say that."
Trump's comment was during a "Made in America" event where he defended controversial comments regarding several prominent progressive congresswomen.
"So interesting to see 'Progressive' Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run," Trump said Sunday on Twitter. "Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how it is done. These places need your help badly, you can’t leave fast enough. I’m sure that Nancy Pelosi would be very happy to quickly work out free travel arrangements!"
So interesting to see “Progressive” Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly...... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 14, 2019
....it is done. These places need your help badly, you can’t leave fast enough. I’m sure that Nancy Pelosi would be very happy to quickly work out free travel arrangements! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 14, 2019
Pelosi accused Trump Sunday of making "xenophobic comments" which were "meant to divide our nation."
"When @realDonaldTrump tells four American Congresswomen to go back to their countries, he reaffirms his plan to “Make America Great Again” has always been about making America white again," Pelosi said on Twitter.
I reject @realDonaldTrump’s xenophobic comments meant to divide our nation. Rather than attack Members of Congress, he should work with us for humane immigration policy that reflects American values. Stop the raids - #FamiliesBelongTogether! — Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) July 14, 2019
Trump's tweets were directed at Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. The "squad" of the four progressive congresswomen are all freshmen in Congress and have teamed up in pushing legislation in an attempt to move the Democratic Party to the Left.
The "squad" has been critical of Trump and have repeatedly called for his impeachment. | 1,266,965 |
see deal Company of Heroes 2 - PC $39.99 on Gamestop
For the Russian soldiers in World War II’s Eastern Front, the melting snows must have been an amazing sight. Fighting for your country, watching countless thousands of your countrymen die to both Nazi aggression and environmental exposure was doubtless brutal for morale. But in Company of Heroes 2
Less interesting doesn’t mean uninteresting, mind you. W hen compared to the winter maps we’ve seen there simply seems to be a lot less going in spring. You don’t have to worry about the fury of what Eastern Front soldiers came to refer to as General Winter; the weather isn’t out to kill you. You still have to worry about the rest of what’s made the series so popular, though, such as intricately detailed mortar explosions that turn your soldiers into hamburger, bullets that’ll knock them off their feet, and armored tanks that can roll over them as if they were simply debris on the road.Weather conditions have never really affected how you played Company of Heroes in the past, but in CoH 2 it essentially gives Relic double the multiplayer maps. The map I played on took place in spring, but it was easy to see how things would change if it was colder. For instance my soldiers could cross the river at specific points, slowly plodding through the knee high water during spring. In winter, however, there’d be more potential crossing points, most of which wouldn’t really slow my soldiers down, but would present the added risk of having the ice shot out from underneath them. Likewise in springtime my soldiers could veer off the road and run through low grasses and brush, whereas in winter they’d have to contend with heavy snow falls, moving laboriously slow and leaving tracks the enemy could follow. Springtime understandably forgoes these weather consequences, enabling you to focus on the traditional minutia of combat more than the panic and unpredictability of winter matches allow.It’s too bad that what we’ve seen of CoH 2 at this point still feels like the work in progress it is. As a fan, I can’t help but wonder about the systems they’re changing, such as the still unshown commander skill trees. There’s obviously a lot of thought being put into changing things they were unsatisfied with from the first games (such as how machine gun nests can only be built by capture points now, or that veterancy can net additional abilities for units), but by and large Relic’s keeping much of it under their hat for now.
Anthony Gallegos is an Editor on IGN's PC team. He enjoys scaring the crap out of himself with horror games and then releasing some steam in shooters like Blacklight and Tribes. You can follow him at @Chufmoney on Twitter or at Ant-IGN on IGN. | 1,266,966 |
Five men who have spent years on death row will soon be executed in Indiana.
On Thursday, Attorney General William P. Barr has directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to adopt a proposed addendum to the Federal Execution Protocol that allows the United States government to resume capital punishment.
The last federal execution was carried out in 2003.
There is also a new execution protocol that mirrors those used in states like Texas, Georgia and Missouri. This replaces the three-drug cocktail used in past federal executions with a single drug called pentobarbital.
According to a news release from the Department of Justice, 14 states have used pentobarbital in over 200 executions since 2010.
Debra Denise Brown was Indiana's last woman on death row. She will no longer be executed.
“Congress has expressly authorized the death penalty through legislation adopted by the people’s representatives in both houses of Congress and signed by the President,” Barr said in a statement. “Under Administrations of both parties, the Department of Justice has sought the death penalty against the worst criminals, including these five murderers, each of whom was convicted by a jury of his peers after a full and fair proceeding."
Here are the inmates set for execution at U.S. Penitentiary Terre Haute and their crimes, according to the Department of Justice press release:
Daniel Lewis Lee
Lee, a member of a white supremacist group, murdered an Arkansas family of three, including an eight-year-old girl. Lee’s execution is scheduled to occur on Dec. 9, 2019.
Lezmond Mitchell
Mitchell stabbed to death a 63-year-old grandmother and her 9-year-old granddaughter from Arizona. Mitchell’s execution is scheduled to occur on Dec. 11, 2019.
Wesley Ira Purkey
Purkey raped, murdered and dismembered a 16-year-old girl in Missouri. He also was convicted in state court for using a claw hammer to kill an 80-year-old woman. Purkey’s execution is scheduled to occur on Dec. 13, 2019.
Alfred Bourgeois
Bourgeois, of Texas, tortured, sexually molested and then beat to death his 2-year-old daughter. Bourgeois’ execution is scheduled to occur on Jan. 13, 2020.
Dustin Lee Honken
Honken shot and killed two men who planned to testify against him in Iowa. He also killed a single mother, her 10-year-old daughter and her 6-year-old daughter. Honken’s execution is scheduled to occur on Jan. 15, 2020.
The Department of Justice said additional executions will be scheduled at a later date.
Call IndyStar reporter Justin L. Mack at 317-444-6138. Follow him on Twitter: @justinlmack. | 1,266,967 |
the game retains the series’ signature style while adapting and strengthening its offerings through the formation of the STORY OF SEASONS IP. Newcomers can experience the satisfaction of a successful harvest more quickly with the Seedling mode, characters and farms can be fully customized, and longtime fans can enjoy an enhanced variety of seeds, pets, and other ways to make their farms truly their own.
Developed in Japan by Marvelous Inc., STORY OF SEASONS is published in North America by XSEED Games, exclusively for Nintendo 3DS. The game is now available for $29.99. This game is rated “E10+ for Everyone ages 10 and up” by the ESRB.
About Rune Factory 4
[Platform: Nintendo 3DS] – Rune Factory 4 is the latest installment in the critically acclaimed Bokujo Monogatari spin-off series, Rune Factory, which revolves around the same addictive life simulation and farming activities that its father franchise, now known as STORY OF SEASONS, is famous for. The Rune Factory series, however, also incorporates classic action-RPG elements into the mix, all framed in a stunning fantasy setting. Taking place in the Kingdom of Norad, players must fill the shoes of a Prince or Princess and aid the people of a small, picturesque town named Selphia in achieving lasting peace and prosperity. Boasting countless items, crops, weapons and other pieces of equipment to find and grow, as well as a substantial story with richly developed characters, innumerable hours of enjoyment await within the game’s humble confines.
Rune Factory 4 is published in North America by XSEED Games exclusively for Nintendo 3DS and now available for $29.99. This game has been rated “E10+ for Everyone ages 10 and up” by the ESRB with the descriptors Fantasy Violence, Language, Mild Suggestive Themes, Use of Alcohol.
More information on STORY OF SEASONS can be found at www.storyofseasons.com, and more information on Rune Factory 4 can be found at www.runefactory4.com. For more information on XSEED Games products, including STORY OF SEASONS: Trio of Towns, please visit www.xseedgames.com.
Fans can also follow XSEED Games on Facebook at www.facebook.com/XSEEDGames and on Twitter at www.twitter.com/XSEEDGames.
About Crystal Colwell What's up everyone? Crystal here! I spend my time writing up the news for you all and keeping us all up to date with incoming game info from Japan. I do a little bit of everything else around here, too. 🙂 Happy Reading!
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A little over 48 hours ago BBC 2 Newsnight presenter Kirsty Wark spoke the first words of heresy about Anthropogenic Global Warming, and gave a warming alarmist a very nasty surprise as well. Instead of the fawning easy ride of last week, Ms Wark let rip doing a passable impression of a parakeet from Edinburgh. So rough was the ride that the Guardian attacked the BBC for being AGW deniers.
One of the ways of spreading propaganda of any sort, is to disguise it as popular entertainment. This can be seen freuqently in the story lines in soap operas where after the program you are told that if you have effected by any of the scenes in real life you can call so and so. At the beginning of the year the BBC did a fairly lacklustre rehash of Day of the Triffids where AGW was blamed for the Triffids, to cut a long story short Aardvark complained to the BBC and got this response via email 4 days later.
Just one month later and things have changed at the Beeb, they have actually managed a U turn on AGW faster than Gordon Brown on yet another failed policy.
In the popular comedy show “Mock The Week” tonight there was a section where the panel were given the answer and had to guess the question.
The answer was 2035.
2035 is a number to be feared by warming alarmists, it has become the equivalent of 666, the Church of Climatology’s Beast.
The correct answer was given about the Himalayan Glaciers allegedly melting, they then described in the detail how Glaciergate came about. For a moment Aardvark thought they were reading the script from a denier’s blog.
The BBC were done yet denying AGW, skip forward 1 hour to Newsnight where sadly the brightly coloured Kirsty Wark was not presenting tonight, to a story about how the Climate Change scam is likely to bring down the Kevin Rudd and Penny Wong warmist regime in Australia. They even repeated Tony Abbot’s Climate Change is crap remark.
The BBC even showed a long clip on Lord Monckton ridiculing Al Gore!
The prominence of Australia in the implosion of AGW cannot be under estimated, the defeat of Rudd’s Green lunacy on the eve of Copenhagen and Climategate’s first political scalp have led the way in the unravelling of the Climate Change scam.
The abrupt change of policy at BBC about AGW is good news as it helps stop the spread of warming alarmist propaganda, but the real reasons are more likely to be self interest and based on past performance of the BBC, paying lip service until this Climate Denial thing blows over, then dust off the icons of Al Gore and resume worship at the Church of Climatology.
For all Climategate posts click here | 1,266,969 |
Turkish defence minister says 362 DAESH terrorists killed and 123 others wounded in Turkish artillery strikes in northern Syria in last three months
Turkish soldiers in a tank and an armored vehicle patrol on the road to the town of Beytussebab in the southeastern Sirnak Province, Turkey, on September 28, 2015. (TRT World and Agencies)
The Turkish army killed 362 DAESH terrorists and injured 123 others in its artillery strikes on northwestern Syria in 2016, which it carried out in retaliation to attacks on its border areas, Turkish defence minister said on Wednesday.
Addressing a press conference at the regional governor's office in south-central Kilis Province, Ismet Yilmaz told reporters that the Turkish army had carried out 1,117 artillery strikes to achieve 146 objectives in northwestern Syria between Jan. 9 and April 12.
Kilis province has been hit by a number of rockets fired from Syria in recent days and months. Rocket projectiles fired from Al-Bab, a Syrian region under DAESH control near the Turkish border, on Monday and Tuesday injured 20 people, two of whom later succumbed to their wounds.
More rockets were fired from the same region on Wednesday, but there were no reports of any casualties.
He said that two people were injured this week from rockets fired from Syria remained in critical condition, while the health condition of five others was improving.
Also, four people were killed in January and March when rockets fired from the Al-Bab region hit a school and a residential area.
Turkish Defence Minister Ismet Yilmaz during a press conference, on April 13, 2016. (AA)
Speaking about material damages caused by the rockets, Yilmaz said: "All losses will be covered by the state."
The minister said the Turkish army also destroyed 36 Katyusha (name of Russian multi-rocket launcher vehicles) positions, 15 sniper positions, 40 headquarter buildings, 19 mortar positions, seven ammunition dumps, a tank and a cannon, 17 improvised explosives and 10 car bombs within the same time period in northwestern Syria.
He also mentioned that Turkey was working towards improving security in its border areas.
Turkey recently completed 300 kilometres (186.4 miles) out of the 911-kilometre (559.2-mile) long planned rocket-resistant concrete wall along its border with Syria.
Turkish Interior Ministry gave nearly 250 million Turkish liras ($87,5 million) to governorates of its border provinces of Sirnak, Mardin, Sanliurfa, Kilis, Gaziantep and Hatay for the construction of the wall.
Yilmaz also said that security forces had caught 701 people trying to approach the Turkish-Syrian border within the same time period; 262 of them were remanded in custody, 97 were released on condition of judicial control, while others were deported.
Source: TRT World | 1,266,970 |
President Donald Trump has said that “nothing changes,” following Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s public statement on the ‘Russiagate’ investigation. The president declared that “the case is closed.”
“Nothing changes from the Mueller Report,” Trump tweeted on Wednesday. “There was insufficient evidence and therefore, in our Country, a person is innocent. The case is closed! Thank you.”
Nothing changes from the Mueller Report. There was insufficient evidence and therefore, in our Country, a person is innocent. The case is closed! Thank you. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 29, 2019
Trump’s tweet came after Mueller made his first public statement since releasing his final report almost two months ago. The Special Counsel formally closed his office, and announced he would make no further statements on the investigation. The written report, he said, “speaks for itself.”
Mueller’s final report found no evidence that Trump colluded with Russia in the runup to the 2016 election, and insufficient evidence that the president then obstructed his investigation. Mueller did, however, state that he had not determined that obstruction did not take place, but declined to charge the president with a crime, as that move would be “unconstitutional.”
Also on rt.com Charging Trump with obstruction of justice ‘was not an option,’ says Mueller in 1st public statement
Congressional Democrats have accused Attorney General William Barr of making unnecessary redactions to the 400-page report in an effort to protect Trump. Mueller dismissed these accusations on Wednesday, saying Barr has already “made the report on our investigation largely public."
Mueller also said that he would give no testimony to Congress “beyond that which is already public.”
Previously, House Judiciary Committee chair Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-New York) had expressed a desire to question Mueller about the report, saying last week that the special counsel would “probably” testify in private to the committee, and earlier threatening to subpoena Mueller if necessary.
Trump has accused Nadler and the 23 other Democrats on the committee of trying to hold a “do over” of the Mueller investigation, and has repeatedly stated that the report found “no collusion” and “no obstruction.”
.....The Dems want a second shot at Bob Mueller, are very unhappy with the No Collusion Report. They should not be allowed to play this game any longer - no second chances - must get back to work. So bad for our Country! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 24, 2019
Meanwhile, some Democrats have taken Mueller’s insistence on not prosecuting Trump as a cue to bring their own charges, including impeachment proceedings, against the president.
Think your friends would be interested? Share this story! | 1,266,971 |
Wolverine. It was a close call to keep its rating kid-friendly. When discussing why the movie almost lost its intended PG-13 rating, producer Ralph Winter said, “...in the fight, that happens in the augmentation room. From the origin of it we have two characters that have claws. At some point they're gonna fight. At some point [they’re] gonna go at it. So for us it was about the intensity of that. It was about the blood, which we tried to hold back on, because that's what really pushes it over the edge and makes it unnecessarily gory. So we made changes in that fight sequence to minimize that for the ratings board, but I don't think that diminishes anything from the fun of that."is an edgy movie about an alcoholic, foul mouthed superhero. It walked a line, and crossed over it when the MPAA sent it back twice with an R rating. In the version of the movie we all know, Hancock goes to jail because of all the damage he’s done to the city. In the original cut, it was a different crime that sent him to the big house. Director Peter Berg explained in an interview shortly before the film's release, "We had statutory rape up until three weeks ago." In a deleted scene, Hancock got drunk and had sex with a seventeen year old. Funny how the MPAA had a problem with that. But it’s better than the scene in the original script, where the girl was twelve.This movie has been the whipping boy of superhero movies for years, which I never felt was deserved. However, much of the problems with the movie lie with the studio’s attempts to get a PG-13 rating. The original cut ofwas far bloodier and more violent in the combat scenes, especially in the final fight between Daredevil and the Kingpin. The MPAA made them cut the edges off all the fight scenes to make the movie more kid friendly, but the director’s cut restored the movie to its original glory. Do yourself a favor and give it another chance with the director's cut.The studio had a lot riding on this movie when it was released. It was the first Bond movie to set after the fall of the Soviet Empire, and the Cold War had been a driving force for Bond throughout his history.needed to prove Bond could still be successful and reach the widest audience possible, which is why they fought for a PG-13 rating. It seems like villainous Xenia Onatopp was the main problem with the movie, since cuts were made to her scenes, including removing some of the deaths when Onatopp gunned down the workers at the Severnaya station, Bond giving Onatopp a rabbit punch in the car, and shortening the scene of Onatopp being crushed to death in a tree.If you enjoyed this, then please use the buttons below to tell your friends about this post! Follow us! Email | 1,266,972 |
gins were supposed to remain celibate during their time of service.
Miracles and Martyrdom
According to legend, the plan to distract Chrysanthus from Christianity backfires. He converts Daria to his religion, and the two marry but take a vow of celibacy and devotion to God.
"That people should live together as if they're married but not actually have sex and produce children goes against everything that Roman society stood for," Candida Moss, an expert in early Christian martyrdom at the University of Notre Dame, said in the documentary.
What's worse—in the eyes of the Roman Empire—is that the pair successfully converted many to Christianity. (See computer reconstructions of ancient Rome.)
For their crimes, Chrysanthus and Daria are arrested and tortured.
The typical punishment for a vestal virgin who'd broken her vow of celibacy was death by starvation. The punishment for conversion to Christianity, though, would have been a life of prostitution—the worst possible fate for a priestess of Vesta, Sage College's Takács explained.
The Romans would have believed Daria's conversion to Christianity endangered their entire city, Takács explained. For one thing, there were only six vestal virgins at any one time, so the loss of even one priestess would have been a serious setback for Rome.
"What's important about the vestals is that they were intimately connected with Rome," Takács said.
"When they did everything correct and properly, Rome thrived. And if they made mistakes, then Romans suffered problems."
According to the story, Chrysanthus is sent to prison, while Daria is condemned to prostitution. Both are said to have been saved from their fates by miracles—his prison turns into a garden; she is protected from would-be johns by a lioness.
Despite supposedly divine intervention, Chrysanthus and Daria are eventually sentenced to death, the story goes. According to the most popular version of the legend, the pair is buried alive in Rome.
"No Evidence in Contrast"
It's said that a Christian shrine was erected at Chrysanthus and Daria's burial site. Later their venerated bones were transferred several times before eventually arriving, around the year 1000, in Reggio Emilia, hundreds of miles north of Rome—a story the new analysis appears to corroborate, scientists say.
"I think there is no evidence in contrast of this hypothesis," study leader Fulcheri told National Geographic News.
The University of Turin's Cinti added in the documentary, "These results confirmed two fundamental facts for us.
"They confirmed their antiquity and the fact that they were both from the same time period. We were able to relax, let out a sigh of relief and say okay, maybe it's actually them." | 1,266,973 |
【9月22日 AFP】インド南部ハイデラバード（Hyderabad）の警察当局は21日、18歳未満の少女と性交渉を行うため、お金を払って短期間の「婚姻」を偽装したとして、60代後半のアラブ人の男8人を逮捕したと発表した。詐欺、レイプなどの容疑が掛けられている。
逮捕されたのはオマーン国籍の5人とカタール国籍の3人。警察当局によると、ハイデラバードの市内各所にある宿泊施設にいた未成年の少女8人が保護された。事件に関与したとみられるブローカー5人、聖職者3人、宿泊施設の所有者4人も逮捕された。
当局がAFPに明らかにしたところによると、アラブ人の容疑者らは短期間の「婚姻相手」となる少女を手配するブローカーに4500～1万5500ドル（約50万～173万円）を支払っていた。
容疑者らは先月ハイデラバードに到着。イスラム教の聖職者の同席のもとで婚姻の儀式を行い、既に少女たちとは婚姻状態になっていた。
インドでは、未成年との性交渉や結婚は性犯罪として扱われている。(c)AFP | 1,266,974 |
Several hundred pro-regional independence activists have marched through the streets of Nantes, calling for reunification with the Brittany region of France and greater autonomy from the central government in Paris.
While the city of Nantes is officially part of the Pays de la Loire region, the district is historically and culturally tied to Brittany, one of 18 French regions.
On Saturday, a rally attended by some 300 native Bretons demanded the city be incorporated into the region of Brittany, which they argued should subsequently declare its independence from the central government in Paris.
The rally was timed ahead of Sunday’s scheduled referendum in the Catalonia region of Spain. Waving Catalan and regional Brittany flags, activists marched peacefully through the streets of Nantes chanting 'Separation for Brittany' as police officers watched on.
“We are organizing a demo to show that this part of Brittany is in Brittany which is not officially recognized by France and we want to show solidarity with the Catalan movement in favor of independence and we ask to fight more here in Brittany for the right for the sovereignty of nation for all of the Brittany. From Nantes to Brest," activist Goel Roblin told RT's Ruptly video agency.
The Bretons are a Celtic people who have roots in Brittany, bordering the Normandy and Pays de la Loire regions. Their ancestors migrated from the southwest of England to France between the 4th and 6th centuries. About half a million people in Brittany and beyond consider Breton to be their native tongue.
Breton nationalism combines both political and cultural aspects. The political aspirations of Breton nationalists include the right to self-rule and to gain more power in the European Union, the United Nations, and other international institutions.
The independence call in Brittany follows similar aspirations by Catalans and Basques in Spain and the Scots in the UK.
“We have to fight to go for word and to organize a condition to exercise on yourself the right of self-determination,” Roblin said. We want “to be able to manage our things on our own. We have the right like every small nation to be a republic and to organize a better way of life here in Brittany like the Catalans want to do,” the independence activist added.
On September 6, Catalonia’s Parliament passed a bill paving the way for an independence referendum to be held on October 1. The Spanish government, however, insists the proposed referendum is illegal, and to prevent the vote from going ahead, the central government has, among other measures, deployed police to shut voting stations and intimidate those who want to take part in the plebiscite.
LIVE UPDATES: Catalonia pushes ahead with independence referendum
Despite the Spanish government’s moves, Catalan authorities are determined to hold the referendum on Sunday. Activists have occupied dozens of schools intended to be used as polling stations to stop police from shutting it down. | 1,266,975 |
I’m sure you’ve all noticed it at some point, but Siri is pretty dang cool. She’s not quite as good at listening as, say, Apple’s Friend Bar, but she’s good at it.
There are times, however, when she’s not so good at it. The other day, walking out of Home Depot, I wanted to find the number for Graybar, a wire and electrical equipment vendor, so I asked her. I should have been more conscious of how she’d take this, but what she ended up searching for:
Yeah. Not helpful.
Now, I’m the kind of guy that likes to contribute to the cause. I let Apple take my diagnostics and usage data. When my Google Voice transcriptions come back all garbled and stuff, I often take the time to donate the recording to improve the service.
Now, we’ll come back to this in a second. Let’s get sidetracked and talk for a minute about Siri and her seductive blue underwear underline.
I’ve read numerous posts guessing what it’s for. The primary nouns in your sentence, the important action words in your sentence, or whatever, but none of them seemed right to me, or to appear with any sort of consistency. Then I noticed this…
So, when I touch the blue underline in a text, I get options on a word Siri wasn’t sure about. That means if I touch it in a search, or some other command…
SWEET STEVE’S TURTLENECK! I CAN EDIT IT!
Go ahead, type to your heart’s content. Once you’ve got what you meant in there, hit Done on the keyboard, and she’ll try to work her magic on the new phrase. Note that I do not recommend this during the time that I use Siri most: driving. So, if you’re not behind the wheel, go on, try it! I’ll wait here.
Pretty sweet, huh? Not only does it do that, but she LEARNS from the input. I didn’t think to screenshot the gay bar thing, so I had to REALLY try to reproduce it for this article… She learned quite well that I don’t frequent gay bars, but I’m quite interested in buying wire and stuff.
So, next time you’re frustrated that Siri didn’t quite understand what you said, correct her. Not only will it be easier than stopping and starting her up again, but she’ll remember that for next time, and get better at her favorite game, listening to your monotonous voice ask her “Who’s on First?” over and over again. | 1,266,976 |
Image copyright AP Image caption Mr Holder said the justice department needed to be a better "backstop" against discrimination
Attorney General Eric Holder says he will try to change the standard needed to bring federal civil rights cases in his last few weeks in the job.
In an interview with Politico, Mr Holder said "if we adjust those standards, we can make the federal government a better backstop".
His comments come after his department said it would not bring such charges in the Trayvon Martin case.
Mr Holder is set to leave after his successor, Loretta Lynch, is confirmed.
Ms Lynch, a US prosecutor in New York, was approved by a Senate committee panel on Thursday and must be confirmed by the wider Senate in the coming weeks.
Mr Holder, who has spoken out strongly about minorities communities relations with law enforcement, said he would use his last days as the US' top lawyer to talk about how the justice department decides to bring civil rights cases.
Image copyright Reuters Image caption Nationwide protests followed the death of Mike Brown, an unarmed black teenager
"I think some serious consideration needs to be given to the standard of proof that has to be met before federal involvement is appropriate, and that's something that I am going to be talking about before I leave office," he told Politico.
The US justice department's civil rights division often opens up investigations separate from local law enforcement when they believe a person has been killed specifically because of their race, but bringing charges requires a high legal standard involving intent of the suspect.
Earlier in the week, the justice department announced it had finished its investigation into the death of Martin, an unarmed black teenager killed by a volunteer neighbourhood watchman, George Zimmerman in 2012.
Mr Zimmerman was found not guilty of murder charges in 2013. The justice department said its investigation into Martin's death did not meet the "high standard" needed for federal civil rights charges against the Florida man.
A similar investigation into another high-profile case, the killing of Michael Brown by a Ferguson, Missouri, police officer is expected to be completed soon.
When asked if the legal standard should be lower in such cases, Mr Holder told Politico there needed to be an adjustment.
Image copyright AP Image caption George Zimmerman was cleared of murder charges in the death of Trayvon Martin
"I think that if we adjust those standards, we can make the federal government a better backstop - make us more a part of the process in an appropriate way to reassure the American people that decisions are made by people who are really disinterested," he said.
"I think that if we make those adjustments, we will have that capacity."
It is unclear if Mr Holder will be successful in making any changes with a short time left in office, but he told the website he was proud of what he was able to accomplish during his tenure as attorney general, including civil rights charges against police departments as a whole for discriminatory practices. | 1,266,977 |
rather are hidden deep within people. By spending many moons in such an isolated place, their purity is refined, and they gradually transform into strange enigmas…’ (Episode 6 voice-over)
The series background director, Osamu Masuyama, champions background and ambient design as the most invaluable asset in crafting a rich cinematic experience. The value of informed and deliberate design for the backgrounds of Made in Abyss can only be truly savoured, once the show takes its main characters deeper into the Abyss.
With his expertise in the creation of background concepts rich with diverse species of flora, Masuyama’s vision for the otherworldly lower levels of the Abyss is wholeheartedly complementary of the show’s constant tone of unsettling danger and mystery. The atmosphere generated by the second layer, for instance, is a reality-bending trip. Trees growing upside down, and forests thickly covered with purple haze, offers a vivid contrast to the upper layers’ dominance of natural sunlight and bright greenery, even to the extent of showcasing the differing ecosystems and dependent fauna that live in these habitats.
Speaking of fauna…what I consider to be the other defining achievement of Made in Abyss in world-building, can be said to be an extension of the show’s ‘background’ design: the terrifying characterisation of the creatures.
The backgrounds of a show do not just encompass the painted static picture above which everything happens. Creature design, object design and the aforementioned architectural design are all creative sectors of the umbrella term.
Death is a triviality in Made in Abyss’ world. Living with such hostile predators as their neighbours, the human settlers in the land are depicted as having normalised experiences with the loss of human lives. Of course, this aspect of world-building is competently put into perspective by the gruesome characterisation by the show’s main creature designer and animator, Kou Yoshinari. With everything from giant serpents to oversized spiders, the unkind natural world of Made in Abyss is a constant juxtaposition of hyper-reality and organic dread, as these imagined creatures have such developed…preying strategies and unique movements, that they feel all too real to be dismissed as mere fantasy, even when they are indeed, just imagined abominations.
Not unlike the stuff of nightmares, one such creature that the main characters encounter in the first layer of the Abyss is the corpse-weeper. With a tortured eagle-like angular design, the corpse-weeper mimics the cries for help of its victim, to draw out more stragglers for their flock to prey on.
Such is the extent of terror in Made in Abyss’ more sadistic aspects of world-building.
Made in Abyss is an exercise of abundant creativity and anticipation. Its level of ingenuity and layered ambient background design allows the foregrounded action and story to be well-optimised for an immersive viewing experience. | 1,266,978 |
Last week, the Deadpool movie was revealed to be in production under the production title “WHAM!” Casting 247 has put out a casting call for “WHAM!” which perhaps gives us our first hint at what other characters we can expect to see in Deadpool.
Here's what they have listed:
[RIDGE] Any ethnicity, early 30s to early 50s. Big, muscular, dangerous, violent, vain, insecure and more than a bit of a dick…. but with a sense of humor. He is not a psychopath, he’s practical but morally neutral—he doesn’t enjoy torturing people, he just doesn’t care. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SEQUEL OPTIONS. [LINDSAY] Any ethnicity, 20s, attractive and worldly. Smart, tough, beautiful but a little bit broken. Nothing has ever been easy for her and she’s developed a thick skin and cynical outlook. But she’s not a victim—she may not have a great life but she’s holding it together and does what she needs to get by. She’s got a great sense of humor but it leans heavily towards irony and sarcasm. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SEQUEL OPTIONS. [SIMON] Any ethnicity, late 20s to early 40s. Quirky, great sense of humor. Smart, funny, but more than a little bit slippery. Fast talker, always looking to make a buck. He looks out for himself first and foremost, but reveals loyalty at the end of the day. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SEQUEL OPTIONS. [SHIRLIE] African American, late 60s to early 80s. Worldly, great sense of comedic timing, sarcastic, dry, funny. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS. [KATHY] Any ethnicity, early to mid teens. World weary, great sense of comedic timing, sarcastic, droll sense of humor. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS. [KEREN] Any ethnicity, early 20s to late 30s. Serious, big, tough. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS [ALBERT] Any ethnicity, early 30s to early 50s. Big, muscular, dangerous. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS
Keren's description fits Gina Carano pretty well, and she was announced on Friday as playing Angel Dust. The age range of Shirlie suggets Wade's old friend Blind Al, but the rest are a little tougher to pin down.
Also worth noting is that several of the roles require a three film deal, suggesting that these character will appear again in the X-Men movie universe, perhaps in a Deadpool sequel if the film does well enough on its own.
Deadpool opens February 12, 2016. | 1,266,979 |
Along with almost every rider on the premier-class grid, Vinales is a free agent for 2021 after the expiration of his current factory Yamaha deal.
With Marc Marquez already in early talks to remain at Honda beyond the end of 2020, and star rookie Fabio Quartararo thought likely to remain in the Yamaha orbit, six-time MotoGP race winner Vinales could be among the hottest properties on the rider market.
One potential destination for Vinales could be Ducati, which currently fields Andrea Dovizioso and Danilo Petrucci in its factory team, and relations between Dovizioso and Dall'Igna are thought to have become strained amid Ducati's continued difficulties this season.
Speaking to Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport, Dall'Igna admitted Vinales could be an attractive option for 2021 if it decides to reshuffle its rider line-up.
"He is one of the riders who has managed to beat Marquez," said Dall'Igna of Vinales. "We are evaluating what could be the best solution. But it does not depend only on us."
Speaking after the Thailand Grand Prix earlier this month, Vinales suggested he is open to the idea of a change of scenery in 2021 after his existing Yamaha deal ends.
“I do not know," he said when asked if his future lies at Yamaha. "That is hard to know.
"In the end I am here, I am adapting to the motorcycle, it is totally against my style and I am against my nature, but the bike works well, that is clear. I do a lot of podiums, maybe we don't start the races in the best way, but we are scoring a lot of points."
However, at Motegi two weeks later, Vinales rowed back on those statements, saying he is committed to trying to win with Yamaha in 2020.
“What I wanted to say, above all, is that I am very focused on trying to get the most out of this Yamaha," he said. "In 2020 we will see, it is far away.
"You never know, maybe I start like in 2017 [when he won three of the first five races] and it changes the whole mentality, I have no idea.
"The important thing is to finish this year as well as possible and start next year with the belief of going to win."
Earlier this season, during his four-race injury layoff, Jorge Lorenzo sounded out Ducati about a potential return to the Italian manufacturer's fold as early as 2020 before ultimately electing to stay committed to Honda.
However, Dall'Igna made it clear that he no longer sees Lorenzo as an option for the future, saying only: "No, enough."
Additional reporting by Oriol Puigdemont | 1,266,980 |
Suicide and homicide rates show strikingly different trends in the United States.
The suicide rate has been increasing. It has been led by a rise in suicides in rural America, which are up 40% in 16 years. The homicide rate, on the other hand, has been decreasing over the same time period, though there has been a slight uptick in recent years.
Racial differences in homicide and suicide rates are particularly eye-catching. Over the past week, the CDC has released data, first on suicides:
As shown, the overall, age-adjusted suicide rate in the U.S. is 13.5 per 100,000. The suicide rate (per 100,000) among whites (17.1) is more than 2.5 times the rate among blacks (6.3) and Hispanics (6.7).
To put those numbers into perspective, the death rate in 2016 from car accidents in the U.S. was 11.6 per 100,000. That means that the average white person was more likely to die by suicide than in a car accident, while the average black or Hispanic person was likelier to die in a car accident than by suicide.
The data for homicide rates are shown below:
Overall, the age-adjusted homicide rate was 6.2 per 100,000, a slight increase from 2015. In 2016, the homicide rate (per 100,000) for whites was 2.9, blacks 22.8, and Hispanics 5.3. Put another way, compared to whites, Hispanics were roughly twice as likely and blacks eight times as likely to be murdered.
Comparing Suicides to Homicides by Race
The contrast between races is further underscored by creating a "suicide-to-homicide" rate ratio (or vice versa). For whites, there are roughly 6 suicides for every 1 homicide; among blacks, there are about 3.5 homicides for each suicide; and the rate ratio among Hispanics is roughly 1:1, with suicide slightly edging out homicide.
When we discuss our "gun violence" and "suicide" epidemics in this country, these statistics should help clarify where public health and safety resources are best spent. Suicide disproportionately affects whites, while homicide disproportionately affects blacks.
Source #1: "QuickStats: Age-Adjusted Suicide Rates,by Race/Ethnicity — National Vital Statistics System, United States, 2015–2016." MMWR 67(14): 433. Published: 13-Apr-2018. DOI: 10.15585/mmwr.mm6714a6.
Source #2: QuickStats: Age-Adjusted Homicide Rates, by Race/Ethnicity — National Vital Statistics System, United States, 2015–2016. MMWR 67(15): 462. Published online: 20-Apr-2018. DOI: 10.15585/mmwr.mm6715a8. | 1,266,981 |
ITALIAN police were slammed as "dictators" after sharing drone video of officers swooping to catch a man sunbathing alone on a deserted beach.
The man, who was spotted by the drone, was stunned when cops rode up on two quad bikes and issued him with a fine.
⚠️ Read our coronavirus live blog for the latest news & updates
The sunbather was confronted by police on quad-bikes Credit: Comune di Rimini/Facebook
The drone footage shows the famous seaside resort Rimini completely deserted Credit: Comune di Rimini/Facebook
Police have been using drones to search for people breaking lockdown rules on beaches and in parks Credit: Comune di Rimini/Facebook
In the video, the cops can be seen flying the drone to survey the beach from above before finding the unaware sunbather and the closing in on him while riding quad-bikes.
The unidentified man was visibly surprised to see the two police officers standing above him in the east coast resort Rimini.
Shared by the town's pubic relations office, the footage was intended to demonstrate how the police were enforcing nationwide lockdown rules and how they are covering large areas such as parks and beaches using drones and all-terrain vehicles.
However, the footage caused a backlash against the police's heavy-handed approach.
Comments online complain that the police were going "too far" and that the man was already practising social distancing by being on his own.
One said they were acting like "dictators".
According to the Italian Interior Ministry, 17,500 people were reported over the weekend for failing to comply with social distancing rules.
On Sunday alone, 8,641 people were sanctioned for illegitimate travel, 74 or false declarations and nine for violating quarantine rules.
Meanwhile, the Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte confirmed on Tuesday that country would begin to ease some lockdown measures on May 4, but this would be done by a regional basis.
Italy has been under some of the strictest lockdown measures in Europe since the nationwide quarantine was imposed on March 9, restricting all but necessary movement.
By the end of the week, Conte hopes to reveal the steps that the country will take to loosen restrictions.
In a Facebook post, he said: "We have to reopen on the basis of policy that takes into consideration all the details and cuts across all the data. A serious policy, scientific.
"A reasonable expectation is that we will apply it from May 4."
Italy reported its first drop on Monday in the number of people currently testing positive for the virus since recording its first infection in February.
Since then, Italy became the epicentre of the virus in Europe with more than 24,000 recorded deaths.
The police fined the man for breaking lockdown measures Credit: Comune di Rimini/Facebook | 1,266,982 |
” All Things Considered, National Public Radio, June 6, 2009.
“Popular Research Topics: Ford Rubber Plantations in Brazil,” The Henry Ford (accessed April 5, 2020).
Listener mail:
“Hundreds of Billions of Locusts Swarm in East Africa,” BBC News, March 10, 2020.
Antoaneta Roussi, “Why Gigantic Locust Swarms Are Challenging Governments and Researchers,” Nature, March 12, 2020.
Kaamil Ahmed, “Locust Crisis Poses a Danger to Millions, Forecasters Warn,” Guardian, March 20, 2020.
Rodney Muhumuza, “New, Larger Wave of Locusts Threatens Millions in Africa,” Associated Press, April 10, 2020.
“China Will Not Send Ducks to Tackle Locusts in Pakistan, Says Expert,” Guardian, Feb. 27, 2020.
Kate Ng, “Army of 100,000 Ducks Deployed to Combat Locust Infestation,” Independent, Feb. 27, 2020.
“China May Send Ducks to Battle Pakistan’s Locust Swarms,” BBC News, Feb. 27, 2020.
Katherine J. Wu, “Is a Duck Army Coming for Pakistan’s Locusts? Not So Fast,” Smithsonian, Feb. 28, 2020.
Wikipedia, “Seagull Monument” (accessed April 6, 2020).
Wikipedia, “Miracle of the Gulls” (accessed April 6, 2020).
Ryan Cunningham, “A Seagull Story,” Salt Lake City Weekly, Feb. 15, 2017.
Trent Toone, “Was the ‘Miracle of the Gulls’ Exaggerated? LDS Historians Explain,” LDS Living, July 23, 2018.
This week’s lateral thinking puzzle was contributed by listener Florian, who sent these corroborating links (warning — these spoil the puzzle).
You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on Google Podcasts, on Apple Podcasts, or via the RSS feed at https://futilitycloset.libsyn.com/rss.
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Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode.
If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at [email protected]. Thanks for listening! | 1,266,983 |
Last updated on.From the section Football
Brockenhurst and Andover score record-breaking 29 consecutive penalties
Players from Brockenhurst and Andover Town set a new record as they scored 29 consecutive penalties in a shoot-out.
The Hampshire Senior Cup match finished 0-0 after extra time, so went to spot-kicks.
quote I was excited but nervous - I never thought I'd have to take the 30th penalty in a shoot-out Claudio Herbert
And after 29 successful attempts - a total confirmed by the Football Association as an English record - Andover's Claudio Herbert missed.
"I didn't realise the magnitude, it was a bit of a blur, the keeper pulled off a great save," Herbert told BBC Sport.
The sequence of successful attempts is also thought to be a world record.
The previous English record for the most consecutive penalties scored in a shoot-out was set when Dagenham & Redbridge defeated Leyton Orient in a Johnstone's Paint Trophy Tie in 2011 after 27 consecutive successful kicks.
The record for the longest penalty shoot-out came in 2005 when the Namibian Cup had to be settled by a record-breaking 48 spot-kicks, with KK Palace holding their nerve to defeat the Civics 17-16 following a 2-2 draw in normal time.
Herbert, 20, who is a full-time student, says he never dreamed he would need to take two penalties in the shoot-out but would have no hesitation stepping up and doing it all again.
"I was excited but nervous," he said. "I never thought I'd have to take the 30th penalty in a shoot-out.
"I've been involved in penalty shoot-outs before, but nothing like this. There was not so much pressure.
"I would definitely take another one. I'd never shy away from taking a penalty."
He says despite the miss his team-mates attached no blame to him, adding: "I was just thinking 'oh no, it's going to be on TV - I'm going to miss a penalty on TV'."
His manager at Andover, Neil Benson, said the defeat was hard to accept at the end of a game which began at 19.40 BST and ended at 23:00 BST.
"It was a tough one to take," Benson told BBC Sport. "It was with some disbelief after the first set of penalties that we had to do it all over again. Every credit to the 11 players from both sides."
Herbert had the unfortunate task of trying to level at 15-15, but the keeper pulled off an astonishing save.
"He is an excellent player and will continue to be confident with everything he does on the pitch," added Benson. "It won't affect him and given the opportunity he will step up and do it again." | 1,266,984 |
North Korea nukes SF in birthday party video
For the grand finale to its founder's 105th birthday party this weekend, North Korea celebrated with rousing military music punctuated by a not-so-subtle warning for the United States and San Francisco in particular.
The martial music concert was part of the "Day of the Sun" festivities honoring late founding father Kim Il Sung. As the uniformed brass band and choir played performed enthusiastically to an audience of clapping soldiers, a propaganda video showing missiles being launched was shown on a large overhead screen.
Eventually the nukes found their target, San Francisco, and exploded in massive fiery eruptions, engulfing the city in flames. The audience appeared to applaud San Francisco's destruction, primitive CGI production values notwithstanding.
Click through this slideshow to see a look back at North Korea.
1950: A United Nations soldier in uniform helps a wounded Canadian rifleman to an aid station behind the front lines during the Korean War. Click through this slideshow to see a look back at North Korea.
1950: A United Nations soldier in uniform helps a wounded Canadian rifleman to an aid station behind the front lines during the Korean War. Photo: Hulton Archive, Getty Images Photo: Hulton Archive, Getty Images Image 1 of / 55 Caption Close North Korea nukes SF in birthday party video 1 / 55 Back to Gallery
The image of flickering flames overlaid shots of an American flag and a military cemetery.
While the concert took over an hour to finish, San Francisco was wiped out in about 15 seconds.
On Saturday, North Korea tried to test a real missile, but it blew up almost immediately.
Four days earlier, President Donald Trump told Fox News, "We're sending an armada" into the Sea of Japan as a formidable deterrent signal to the North's increasingly belligerent behavior.
But the New York Times reported Tuesday that the carrier and three other warships he was referring to were at that time sailing in the opposite direction, to take part in joint exercises with the Australian Navy in the Indian Ocean.
While laying waste to cities in video simulations is nothing new for North Korea, its armament is plenty real. Most observers believe that Pyongyang does not yet possess the technology to deliver a nuclear warhead intercontinentally. But Vox reported that Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia nonproliferation program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, estimated that North Korea will be able to reach U.S. territory at Guam or Hawaii within five years.
Regionally North Korea's nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles do present a clear and present danger to U.S. allies, with Tokyo and Seoul topping the list of targets.
Seoul is especially vulnerable. Thousands of pieces of artillery — part of the world's largest artillery force — are pointing at the South's capital from across the border. The North is also believed to have stockpiled chemical weapons. | 1,266,985 |
The decision of the city of Arad to darken the soccer fields in the city at night (Almog Ben Zikri, Haaretz, September 9) is another of the infuriating decisions of Mayor Nissan Ben Hamo to “protect” residents from the entry of outsiders.
About two weeks ago Ben Hamo ordered roadblocks at the entrance to the city, for fear of an “invasion” by African migrants who were released from the Holot detention center. The latest order targets is aimed against Bedouin children and teens who come to play in the city’s sports facilities, and who according to residents, cause a disturbance. “To my great regret, it wasn’t our young people who came to the fields, and therefore, we decided we’d turn on the lights only upon request,” Ben Hamo said by way of explaining his decision.
The sensitivity of Arad’s residents to the noise coming from the playing fields is understandable. In no city would the residents be willing to tolerate noise in the wee hours of the night. But the municipality’s decision does not stem from the nuisance itself, since had “our young people” come to them, they could have benefited from illuminated fields. We can also assume that had teens from other Jewish communities come to the playing fields that would not have disturbed the mayor.
The decision is aimed at those creating the noise, Bedouin and asylum seekers, who are considered not only a nuisance, but even a threat to the social fabric of the city. By his actions the mayor of Arad is joining several other mayors, who encouraged their residents not to rent out apartments to Arabs or to give shelter to asylum seekers.
Arad decides for itself on the policy of absorption and inclusion of nonresidents, as though it were an independent government that is above the law. It’s hard to come with complaints to the mayor, at a time when the government itself has yet to formulate a clear policy in relation both to the released asylum seekers and to the Bedouin, who are asking for services identical to those provided in Jewish cities.
It is doubtful whether Bedouin children would insist on playing in Arad’s athletic fields if the government were to invest in infrastructure for public recreation in the recognized and unrecognized Bedouin villages and if it were to consider the Bedouin citizens with equal rights. Nor are the asylum seekers happy about living in Arad, of all places, and they would probably prefer cities where they could work.
Relinquishing responsibility for Bedouin and asylum seekers and imposing it on the cities and on charitable organizations is not policy. The failure must be redressed immediately. The mayor of Arad must allow everyone to use the city’s public facilities, and at the same time the government must adopt a policy that will prevent unilateral decisions with no moral foundation. | 1,266,986 |
his economic plan, and let me bespecific. The Democratic nominee for president supports plans toraise income taxes … raise payroll taxes … raise investment incometaxes … raise the death tax … raise business taxes … and increase thetax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions ofdollars.”
REALITY: OBAMA TAX PROPOSAL WILL NOT RAISE TAXES AND WILLPROVIDE A BIGGER BREAK FOR MIDDLE CLASS FAMILIES THAN MCCAIN’S PLAN
Annenberg Political Fact Check: McCain’s Ad Attacking Obama’s PlansThat Would Increase Taxes And Bring On “Years Of Deficits” And“Billions In New Government Spending” “Puts Another Stitch In WhatWe’ve Call His Pattern Of Deceit On Obama’s Tax Plan.” “McCain's newad puts another stitch in what we've called his pattern of deceit onObama's tax plan. This one claims Obama and congressional Democratsplan to push forward ‘painful tax increases on working Americanfamilies’ and that they will bring about ‘years of deficits,’ ‘nobalanced budgets’ and ‘billions in new government spending.’ The ad isplain wrong about higher taxes on working families. In fact, Obama'seconomic plan would produce a tax cut for the majority of Americanhouseholds, with middle-income earners benefiting most. As for ‘yearsof deficits,’ exactly the same claim could be made about McCain'sprogram. It's unlikely either Obama or McCain would balance thebudget, and both are projected to increase the debt bytrillions.” [FactCheck.org, 9/2/08]
Washington Post Editorial: “McCain Campaign Insists on CompletelyMisrepresenting Mr. Obama’s Plan” on Taxes – Under McCain’s Plan,“Wealthiest Taxpayers Make Out Terrifically.” “Instead, the McCaincampaign insists on completely misrepresenting Mr. Obama's plan. Thead opens with the Obama-as-celebrity theme – ‘Celebrities don't haveto worry about family budgets, but we sure do,’ says the femaleannouncer. ‘We're paying more for food and gas, making it harder tosave for college, retirement.’ Then she sticks it to him: ‘Obama'ssolution? Higher taxes, called 'a recipe for economic disaster.' He'sready to raise your taxes but not ready to lead.’ The facts? Thenonpartisan Tax Policy Center found that the Obama plan would givehouseholds in the bottom fifth of the income distribution an averagetax cut of 5.5 percent of income ($567) in 2009, while those in themiddle fifth would get an average cut
| 1,266,987 |
To meet climate change targets in B.C., researchers are suggesting companies convert commercial trucks to electrical power.
The study, published by the Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions, found that electrifying the provincial commercial trucking industry could cut emissions by over 60 per cent.
The idea might not be as far-fetched as it seems, according to the lead researcher of a study on the subject, Walter Merida, director of the Clean Energy Research Centre at the University of British Columbia.
He said that the province has a very "green electricity mix" because the majority of our energy comes from hydropower. That energy could be put toward reducing the amount of emissions our transportation system produces.
About 40 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions in the province come from the transportation sector, and roughly half of that is produced by heavy-duty vehicles, according to Merida.
"These vehicles are much larger and they consume much more fuel than normal vehicles, so with a much smaller number of vehicles, they can have a much larger impact," he told All Points West's Jason D'Souza.
Bus-sized batteries
But the challenge of powering an 18-wheeler designed to transport goods long distances is significant, he said, and would require large batteries or hydrogen fuel cells.
"Electric vehicles are fantastic for urban mobility solutions, but if you need to move ships, trains, airplanes or trucks, you need much higher-energy density."
A B.C. company that makes bus-sized batteries to power ferries is also working to provide solutions to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
Corvus Energy has been in operation for about a decade. Vice president Sean Puchalski says the company has grown to be a world leader in marine battery technology.
Corvus's Orca batteries have been used in ships and ferries around the world. (Corvus)
While businesses try their best to make innovative solutions, Merida said governments need to take more action to create the infrastructure to support new green technology, like charging and refuelling stations.
"That's definitely one of the areas where government needs to take the leadership to ensure that car makers and other stakeholders can actually bring the vehicles to the province," he said.
Among the most underutilized assets in urban centres are parking garages which could, with the right technology, be turned into "a smart system that basically becomes a city-scale battery" to charge electric vehicles, according to Merida.
The research team is currently in the second phase of study on the subject, which will examine the economic requirements to make the idea of electric-powered trucks a reality.
Merida is encouraged by the number of organizations that are taking the issue of climate change beyond the political arena into the business and innovation sectors.
To hear the full interview listen to media below:
With files from All Points West | 1,266,988 |
Naresh Agarwal Naresh Agarwal
Modi adds flavour to Agarwal's storm in a tea cup
Talking to India Today, Bihari Lal, a tea-seller who makes his livelihood selling tea at the BSNL stadium in the cantonment, asked if Naresh Agarwal believes that tea-sellers aren't human? He said that if a person works hard and reaches a high position in society, people are bound to get jealous of him and Naresh Agarwal is jealous of Modi, nothing more. Praising Modi, he said that Modi has not forgotten his days of poverty and nobody can stop him from becoming the prime minister now.
Mileage of grime: Modi scores on 'tea-seller', fails on'sahebzada'
Talking to India Today, Bihari Lal, a tea-seller who makes his livelihood selling tea at the BSNL stadium in the cantonment, asked if Naresh Agarwal believes that tea-sellers aren't human? He said that if a person works hard and reaches a high position in society, people are bound to get jealous of him and Naresh Agarwal is jealous of Modi, nothing more. Praising Modi, he said that Modi has not forgotten his days of poverty and nobody can stop him from becoming the prime minister now.
The tea-sellers of Agra have united against Samajwadi Party leader Naresh Agarwal's statement that tea-sellers cannot run the nation. The credit for this goes to the BJP workers, who have taken a cue from Naresh Agarwal's statement and brought the tea-sellers of the town together just before BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi's Agra rally on November 21.Jeetu, a tea-seller who works out of a wooden stall in the loha mandi area of the town said, "Since I heard that Narendra Modi used to sell tea and is now going to become the Prime Minister of India, it has given me so much pride that I am now charging a rupee less on a cup of tea till Modi wins the elections."Kamal, a tea-seller from Delhi Gate, has even named his tea stall as 'NaMo Tea Stall' and is selling tea on discount to his patrons, asking them to help Modi win the elections. He said that the tea-sellers of Agra will soon meet and form a strategy to help Modi win the elections.BJP leader Keshav Dixit told India Today that Modi's November 21 Agra rally will be historic and never before will UP have seen such a huge turnout. He said that the tea-sellers of Agra should be commended for taking a firm stand against Naresh Agarwal's statement and opposing the Samajwadi party. He said that no amount of criticism can stop Modi from becoming the prime minister now. | 1,266,989 |
is stronger than ever before.”
Trump says the more America achieves, the “more hateful and enraged these crazy Democrats become.”
“They’re crazy,” Trump says. He says “at stake” in this fight is “the survival of American democracy itself.”
Trump again accuses Democrats of trying to overthrow the results of the perhaps the greatest election in the history of the country. He says Democrats will not win at the ballot box. “They’re not going to come close,” Trump says. Trump says he doesn’t believe anymore that Democrats love our country and the crowd chants “four more years!”
8:45 PM: Trump now taking the stage. “Latinos for Trump” and “Cops for Trump” signs behind him.
8:05 PM: Trump about to take the stage:
7:35 PM: Packed crowd getting ready for the main event.
Dallas, Texas crowd is getting ready for @realDonaldTrump with a little YMCA ‼️ pic.twitter.com/9muhNZqGvZ — Sarah Matthews (@SarahAMatthews1) October 17, 2019
See you soon Dallas, Texas! pic.twitter.com/Sg6xtp1vqQ — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 17, 2019
Trump v. Beto:
President Trump and Beto O'Rourke held dueling rallies in Texas earlier this year (El Paso in February). Tonight, round two in Dallas. Trump intro speaker already poking fun at the former congressman: "We have more people in the porta potties than he will have at his rally" — Monica Alba (@albamonica) October 17, 2019
San Marcos resident, Kim Thomson in a inflatable costume of President Donald Trump holding whistles.
This is Thomson’s 4th Beto rally. pic.twitter.com/2ImTjbBHm0 — Megan Cardona (@megancardona_) October 17, 2019
Huge crowds as always for a Trump event:
HAPPENING NOW: Large crowd outside American Airlines Center in Dallas in anticipation the President Trump's rally tonight: https://t.co/5GAOvltMlg pic.twitter.com/qJUxsKc9o4 — CBSDFW (@CBSDFW) October 17, 2019
The excited crowd waiting for @realDonaldTrump at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Texas- Trump base is very strong here but may be shaping up to become a battleground in #Election2020 as some Democrats generating heat outside #TrumpRallyDallas pic.twitter.com/3BzMMpZ6KN — Saqib Ul Islam (@SaqibIslam) October 17, 2019 | 1,266,990 |
kind of retaliatory action which years of frustration would bring out. I imagine the republic. would be seen as the threat, the ones who are pushing the constitutional claim, and you're not too far away either, so people would say 'If we're suffering, you'll suffer'. How it all ends I wouldn't even want to start dreaming about.
"I would no longer be a politician in that kind of situaation. People would have to opt as to whether they just wanted to drop out of everything or whether they wanted to maintain some degree of input and control. I myself would look for a role in whatever extra-parliamentary acctions were available. I wouldn't be a very good general, so I would hardly imagine that they would sign me up for that, but I'm sure there would be something I could do in a situation like that. I wouldn't relish it, but I would imagine there are other people and that's their forte. I can imagine that there are people from the border areas, political reppresentatives who have been going to a funeral a week at times, who might not be as restrained as I would be."
One man from the border is Ivan Foster. As a minister, his theology does not prevent him from wielding a gun. "Modernism has equated Christianity with pacifism, which is a load of rubbish. It is useful to throw in here that title which is given to the Lord in the bible where it says of him that he is a man of war. These Anglo-Irish talks are enterring a phase where it is very possible that the state will beecome a tyrant and say to me as a British citizen that I am. going to lose a part of my citizenship because a foreign state is going to be given a role in the running of a part of the United Kingdom. It is a Presbyterian doctrine, ground out in the hard mill of the days of persecution in Scotland, that when the government, or the king as it then was, forrsakes his lawful role and begins to enforce his will on the people contrary to the contract that exists between him and the people, then the king is no longer the lawful head of state, he has become a tyrant. And it is a Christian's duty to resist a tyrant.
"I would have no hesitation. I wouldn't be joining the army of Ulster as a chaplain. I would be joining it as Joe Bloggs, an ordinary foot soldier. I would not be infringing my conscience or the word of God, but acting in complete obedience to both. I would have no compunction, not in the least. I know how to use a gun. There's no good carryying a gun if you don't know how to use it. There's no good carrying a gun if you don't intend to use it. And if! am ammbushed, I have one prayer: 'Lord, let him miss the first time!'" _ | 1,266,991 |
Despite the ubiquity of patrol rifles, shotguns still have an important role to play in law enforcement. The Virginia State Police evidently agrees. The agency just announced it has picked the Benelli SuperNova as its new, standard-issue patrol shotgun.
RELATED STORY 8 Reliable Pump-Action Shotguns for Law Enforcement & Security
Virginia State Police’s New Scattergun
A press release says that Virginia State Police troopers have been training with the Benelli SuperNova platform since the start of the year. The scatterguns are being phased into department starting in the fall of 2019.
Up until now, VSP troopers were equipped with the Remington Model 870 Police Magnum shotgun. It was decided, however, that the SuperNova better suited the agency’s needs.
“The SuperNova offers configurations that meet the needs of departments plus a proven track record of reliability making it a popular choice with departments of all sizes nationwide,” Benelli USA Law Enforcement Sales Manager Jeff Sterner said in a statement. “To be deployed throughout the entire department of this size speaks volumes about the shotgun and we are proud to help play a role in the future success of the Virginia State Police.”
Benelli SuperNova
The Benelli SuperNova is 12-gauge, pump-action shotgun available in a standard and tactical setup. The standard version is chambered for 2-3/4-inch, 3-inch and 3-1/2-inch shells. The barrel length ranges from 24 inches to 28 inches. The OAL goes from 45.5 inches to 49.5 inches. In addition, the weight starts at 7.8 pounds and tops out at eight pounds. Most models in the standard lineup feature a ComforTech stock which reduces recoil for the shooter. One model sports a SteadyGrip stock. There’s also a model with a rifled slug barrel. All the guns have a forend shell-stop button; enlarged trigger guard; and steel skeletal framework overmolded with polymer. MSRP starts at $559 and goes up to $839.
The tactical version of the Benelli SuperNova, meanwhile, includes four models. Two of those models come with a pistol grip, while two sport the ComforTech stock. All four models feature an 18-inch barrel and are chambered for 2-3/4-inch, 3-inch and 3-1/2-inch shells. In addition, each tactical gun has an OAL of 40 inches and weighs in at 7.6 pounds. These guns can be had with ghost-ring or open-rifle sights. The forend shell-stop button; enlarged trigger guard; and steel skeletal framework overmolded with polymer are included on this lineup as well. The MSRP on two models is $499, while the other two go for $559 and $549. | 1,266,992 |
SAO PEDRO, Brazil -- For generations the residents of Sao Pedro, Brazil and neighboring Candido Godoi have known their isolated hamlet in southern Brazil was special.
Twins Lenardo and Edwardo, six, are just one of the 40 pairs of twins in the hamlet of Sao Pedro, Brazil. more photos »
They say about a decade ago the rest of the world figured it out too. Since then, despite the remoteness, they've been visited by researchers, authors, journalists and even a few tourists.
We saw the print articles, we knew the story; 40 pairs of twins in just a four kilometer stretch of land. But it sounded too good to pass up. It was something we had to see for ourselves.
So when we landed in Rio de Janeiro, it was the first story we set out to cover. A second flight to the southern city of Porto Alegre and then what turned out to be a ten hour drive and we finally found ourselves in "the Land of Twins."
On a foggy, misty, winter morning we set out to find the residence of Paulo Sauthier, who like many here can trace his roots to the area's first European settlers. And like many, is a twin. Watch the Vital Signs' team report on the twins phenomenon »
The area around Sauthier's home is unassuming, rural farmland. And at the time we arrived, there really wasn't much to see, just Paulo in his front yard, ready to greet us. But then through the mist they came, car after car, twin after twin. There was Cladis and Clovis, John and Javan, Lenardo and Edwardo.
Vital Signs Each month CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta brings viewers health stories from around the world.
See more from the show »
Over Sunday brunch they talked about the mystery surrounding the twins. They told us, it was an attitude. Women here just sort of expect to have pairs. They say even the cows are twins.
The explanations for the phenomenon are numerous. Healthy lifestyle and healthy food are popular. Even more popular, they say, is the existence of a magical mineral in the town's water.
They seem in no hurry to crack the mystery, content in their uniqueness.
Geneticist Ursula Matte, has been studying the twins of Sao Pedro and Candido Godoi off and on for over a decade.
"You have what in genetics is called a founders effect," Matte told CNN.
"Propagated because there aren't too many people coming from the outside to this community."
Matte says the answer almost certainly lies in genetics. She is currently studying blood samples in hopes of isolating the gene responsible.
But until then, the mystery remains, which seems to be just alright, with residents in "the Land of Twins." | 1,266,993 |
a unified group, a club, an undefeated nation facing an existential threat from its enemies. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton People set up posts outside the train station, asking the town’s new arrivals for various things: religious missionaries seek attention and commitment; a person sleeping rough asks for food and spare change. I’m interested in how this affects the visual experience of arriving in Luton and what the religious and the homeless look like when viewed in the same frame. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Cambridge A concoction of interests outside King’s College: a tourist desperately hailing lost members of the group; a shopper takes a break from the high street; a man sits to read; a woman meditates with her identity concealed. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton A family emerges from the colours of Leagrave High Street. Twins sit and stare, identically, scrutinising me, like their father, perhaps. They are framed by rails of clothes. Mannequins exaggerate their life. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton A pop-up employment workshop opens for business in the town centre. The sign is heavily loaded with the values of modern Britain: one must aspire to achieve, earn, and live; acquiring skills is akin to personal development; the prioritisation of the ‘local’. A lady carrying water on a scooter - unconventionally, comically, skilfully - appears as a strange detail of everyday life passing such lofty visions. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Great Yarmouth The Britannia Monument celebrates Horatio Nelson’s life. An acrobat fell from the top and died in 1863. It remains a mystery, a travesty for some, that Britannia - the monument’s embodiment of the nation - has her back to the sea. These days she turns her back on a single one-man tent too, a home, a shelter erected on the shore. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Great Yarmouth This was the last scene I saw in the town. I was leaving. I thought of how child’s play, in its innocence and vitality, continues amidst our hunched, phone-tapping adolescence and adulthood. Richard Morgan/The Independent
The figure has been comprehensively debunked, including by the UK's statistics watchdog.
Lord Sugar also revealed he had turned down an invitation from then prime minister David Cameron to argue for the Remain side in a televised debate prior to the referendum – a decision he said he continues to "kick" himself for rejecting.
During the Lords debate, peers from across the House spoke out in support for a Final Say referendum on whatever deal Theresa May negotiates with Brussels.
Tory peer Baroness Wheatcroft said another public vote was needed. | 1,266,994 |
Railway Station Buildings
Wellingborough Station Victorian Goods Shed on Platform 1
Photo: Charles Moorhen
Time Capsule at Wellingborough Railway Station
Amid the stark modernity that is becoming more glaringly obvious on Britain's railway stations today, it is somewhat heart-warming to see that not everything has completely vanished from an age that has past into history. And the former UK goods shed adjacent to platform 1 at Wellingborough station, on the former Midland Railway, is one such example.
Although in a small way it has been a target for vandals, the evidence for this in two broken lattice windows, the overall structure is in remarkably good condition for a Victorian station building.
Wellingborough Station Goods Shed Platform 1
But, what is even more remarkable is that the interior, (unfortunately blocked from public access), far from being stripped or damaged, looks much as it did during its working life.
The solid wooden-planked unloading platform is still in place, as are the two original hand-operated loading cranes, once used for unloading the open wagons that were commonplace for decades.
Wellingborough Goods Shed Interior Showing Wooden Platform and Two Cranes
The large disc near the base of the upright is an electric motor, a relatively modern (possibly 1950s or 1960s) addition to make the manual work of loading/unloading wagons easier.
Wellingborough Goods Shed is a Grade II listed building.
A few historical facts about Wellingborough station:
The station was built by the Midland Railway in 1857. It was known then as Wellingborough Midland Road.
The station and buildings were designed by C.H.Driver
Wellingborough station once had a large locomotive depot with two roundhouses
On the 2nd September 1898, the station was the scene of a serious rail accident when a luggage trolley ran off a platform into the path of a Manchester express train. The crew and six passengers were killed and 65 people were injured.
The once-busy station originally had five platforms but only two now remain open to passengers.
In 2005 Wellingborough station was featured in the film'Kinky Boots ', but renamed temporarily as Northampton.
Great Days of Steam, can also be seen here Another interesting artefact, a railway water tower from the, can also be seen
'Along These Tracks' - blog update:
Previous photos posts are now easier to find.
All blog posts are now listed alphabetically on the right side of your screen; under the heading, 'Previous Photo Posts UK Trains'.
" I hope this makes your search easier ". | 1,266,995 |
the perspective of the Christian right, that doesn’t really matter. When people are looking for evidence to support their deeply held views, the science suggests that people engage in “motivated reasoning.” Their deep emotional convictions guide the retrieval of self-supporting information that they then use to argue with, and to prop themselves up. It isn’t about truth, it’s about feeling that you’re right -- righteous, even.
And where, in turn, do these emotions come from? Well, there’s the crux. A growing body of research shows that liberals and conservatives, on average, have different moral intuitions, impulses that bias us in different directions before we’re even consciously thinking about situations or issues. Indeed, this research suggests that liberals and conservatives even have different bodily responses to stimuli, of a sort that they cannot control. And one of the strongest areas of difference involves one’s sensitivity to the feeling of disgust.
A recent study, for instance, found that “individuals with marked involuntary physiological responses to disgusting images, such as of a man eating a large mouthful of writhing worms, are more likely to self-identify as conservative and, especially, to oppose gay marriage than are individuals with more muted physiological responses to the same images.” In other words, there’s now data to back up what we’ve always kind of known: The average conservative, much more than the average liberal, is having visceral feelings of disgust toward same-sex marriage. And then, when these conservatives try to consciously reason about the matter, they seize on any information to support or justify their deep-seated and uncontrolled response -- which pushes them in the direction of believing and embracing information that appears to justify and ratify the emotional impulse.
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And voila. Suddenly same-sex marriages and civil unions are bad for kids. How’s that for the power of human reason?
All people engage in emotion-guided or -motivated reasoning, to be sure. But mounting evidence suggests that the Left and Right may do so differently. And they definitely do so for different reasons -- as the present case so strongly demonstrates.
Does this mean we should be more tolerant of the intolerant, or less disgusted by those who may consider us disgusting? Maybe. After all, people may not have much control over these impulses. They may not even be aware of them. At the very least, such knowledge should increase our level of understanding of those who disagree with us.
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In the end, however, facts are facts -- and emotions and gut instincts are an utterly unreliable way of identifying them. We can try to be understanding of people different from us -- even when they’re manifestly failing at the same task. But the latest research makes it more untenable than ever to base public policy on gut-driven misinformation. | 1,266,996 |
responsibility in the central Mediterranean Sea.
Carrier Strike Group 12
Aircraft carrier
USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72), homeported in Norfolk, Va. (shifting to San Diego, Calif., upon completion of deployment)
Carrier Air Wing 7
CVW 7, based at Naval Air Station Oceana, Va., is embarked aboard Lincoln and includes a total of nine squadrons and detachments:
The “Fist of the Fleet” of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 25 from Naval Air Station Lemoore, Calif.
The “Sidewinders” of VFA-86 from Naval Air Station Lemoore, Calif.
The “Jolly Rogers” of VFA-103 from Naval Air Station Oceana, Va.
The “Pukin’ Dogs” of VFA-143 from Naval Air Station Oceana, Va.
The “Patriots” of Electronic Attack Squadron (VAQ) 140 from Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, Wash.
The “Bluetails” of Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron (VAW) 121 from Naval Station Norfolk, Va.
The “Rawhides” of Fleet Logistics Support Squadron (VRC) 40 from Naval Station Norfolk, Va.
The “Night Dippers” of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron (HSC) 5 from Naval Station Norfolk, Va.
The “Griffins” of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 79 from Naval Air Station North Island, Calif.
Destroyer Squadron 2
The leadership of DESRON 2 is embarked aboard Lincoln and commands the guided-missile destroyers that are operating as part of the CSG.
USS Bainbridge (DDG-96), homeported in Norfolk, Va.
USS Mason (DDG-87), homeported in Norfolk, Va.
USS Nitze (DDG-94), homeported in Norfolk, Va.
ESPS Méndez Núñez (F 104), Ferrol Naval Base, Spain.
Guided-missile Cruiser
USS Leyte Gulf (CG-55), homeported in Norfolk, Va.
In Norfolk, Va.
USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) completed sustainment training and returned to Norfolk, Va. on April 11.
In the Virginia Capes
USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69) got underway on April 8 for Flight Deck Certification.
In addition to these major formations, not shown are thousands of others serving in submarines, individual surface ships, aircraft squadrons, SEALs, Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Forces, Seabees, Coast Guard cutters, EOD Mobile Units, and more serving throughout the globe. | 1,266,997 |
OECD
Poorer countries have tried to raise revenues by charging fees to foreign phone companies calling in, but a new report finds the approach a really bad idea for all parties involved.
The so-called termination fees, increasingly common among African nations, are geared to fund countries' telecommunications infrastructure or increase government revenue, according to an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report released Friday.
The actual effect of the more expensive phone rates, it said, is dramatically curtailed inbound calling, corresponding decreases in revenue, and retaliatory rate increases from other countries that hurt citizens.
And because wealthy people and businesses have access to Internet calling, the burden falls disproportionately on a country's poorer citizens, the OECD concluded, calling for elimination of government rules requiring minimum termination fees.
There was no increase in revenue but rather a massive loss in consumer welfare
"When Pakistan raised its rates from $0.02 to $0.088 in 2012, traffic fell from more than 2 billion minutes per month to 500 million according to government officials. There was no increase in revenue but rather a massive loss in consumer welfare," said report authors Alexia Gonzalez-Fanfalone, Sam Paltridge, and Rudolf van der Berg in a blog post about the report.
Many in the US and Europe are accustomed to steadily dropping rates for phone calls with improving networks, competition, and new technologies such as voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). The OECD report, though, shows that for a significant population, rates are actually increasing.
The report, based on data the US Federal Communications Commission gathers from US telcos, also said the termination fees hurt the countries' telecommunications companies rather than provide them with revenue to expand their infrastructure.
"Communication network operators are also disadvantaged," the report's authors said. "Between 2009-2011, African countries that did not raise termination rates received 36 percent more termination revenue per line than those that did."
The remedy, the OECD concludes, is to bring the economic liberalization present within countries to international calling, too. That's served to dramatically increase phone usage in the countries such as India.
That advice fits with the general outlook of the OECD, an economic research and policy organization funded by 34 economically developed, free-market countries. It isn't entirely anti-regulatory and pro-business, though; it also focuses on social priorities such as improving people's living conditions.
The report says the argument that the termination fees are progressive -- helping transfer wealth from richer countries to help citizens in poorer ones -- is bogus.
"Customers with the financial and technical means may use broadband and VoIP to bypass the system," the OECD said. "In many cases, therefore, the people most affected at both ends of the call are likely to be those least able to afford increased prices. Unfortunately, the number of countries that have raised termination rates in recent years, by eliminating competition, is expanding." | 1,266,998 |
Last week, the Deadpool movie was revealed to be in production under the production title “WHAM!” Casting 247 has put out a casting call for “WHAM!” which perhaps gives us our first hint at what other characters we can expect to see in Deadpool.
Here's what they have listed:
[RIDGE] Any ethnicity, early 30s to early 50s. Big, muscular, dangerous, violent, vain, insecure and more than a bit of a dick…. but with a sense of humor. He is not a psychopath, he’s practical but morally neutral—he doesn’t enjoy torturing people, he just doesn’t care. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SEQUEL OPTIONS. [LINDSAY] Any ethnicity, 20s, attractive and worldly. Smart, tough, beautiful but a little bit broken. Nothing has ever been easy for her and she’s developed a thick skin and cynical outlook. But she’s not a victim—she may not have a great life but she’s holding it together and does what she needs to get by. She’s got a great sense of humor but it leans heavily towards irony and sarcasm. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SEQUEL OPTIONS. [SIMON] Any ethnicity, late 20s to early 40s. Quirky, great sense of humor. Smart, funny, but more than a little bit slippery. Fast talker, always looking to make a buck. He looks out for himself first and foremost, but reveals loyalty at the end of the day. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SEQUEL OPTIONS. [SHIRLIE] African American, late 60s to early 80s. Worldly, great sense of comedic timing, sarcastic, dry, funny. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS. [KATHY] Any ethnicity, early to mid teens. World weary, great sense of comedic timing, sarcastic, droll sense of humor. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS. [KEREN] Any ethnicity, early 20s to late 30s. Serious, big, tough. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS [ALBERT] Any ethnicity, early 30s to early 50s. Big, muscular, dangerous. ROLE REQUIRES THREE SERIES OPTIONS
Keren's description fits Gina Carano pretty well, and she was announced on Friday as playing Angel Dust. The age range of Shirlie suggets Wade's old friend Blind Al, but the rest are a little tougher to pin down.
Also worth noting is that several of the roles require a three film deal, suggesting that these character will appear again in the X-Men movie universe, perhaps in a Deadpool sequel if the film does well enough on its own.
Deadpool opens February 12, 2016. | 1,266,999 |
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