text
stringlengths 245
34.4k
| id
int64 0
1.27M
|
|---|---|
By Barbara Liston
ORLANDO Fla. (Reuters) – The parents of a 12-year-old Florida girl who killed herself after being bullied by schoolmates filed a lawsuit Monday accusing the school system of negligence for failing to stop the torment.
Rebecca Sedwick jumped from a silo at an abandoned cement plant in Lakeland, Florida, last September after enduring months of bullying at school and online, even after switching schools, according to police reports.
ADVERTISEMENT
The lawsuit identifies the primary bully as G.S., whom it accuses of intentional infliction of emotional distress. It also accuses Cemex Construction Materials Florida LLC of negligent maintenance of its abandoned facility.
It said G.S. used social media to tell Sedwick to “drink bleach and die,” and to “go kill yourself.”
“Defendant G.S.’s outrageous conduct included a Facebook posting by Defendant G.S., subsequent to Plaintiff’s decedent taking her own life that stated, “Yes ik [I know] I bullied Rebecca nd [and] she killed herself but IDGAF [I don’t give a f**k],” the lawsuit said.
The lawsuit was filed in Polk County, located between Orlando and Tampa, said Matt Morgan, the parents’ lawyer.
It seeks a minimum of $15,000 from the Polk County School District for failing to protect Sedwick during the 2012-13 school year at Crystal Lake Middle School.
ADVERTISEMENT
“Defendant school board knew or should have known that its failure to adequately and expeditiously discipline G.S. for her conduct would result in a further escalating pattern of disruptive and violent behavior which, in turn, would threaten the safety of Crystal Lake students,” the lawsuit said.
Laws limiting liability for government agencies would normally cap damages to $200,000. But the lawsuit claims that its charges against the board are not covered by that cap.
G.S., 14, and a 12-year-old girl were arrested in October and charged with felony aggravated stalking in her death. The charges were later dropped.
ADVERTISEMENT
The parents of G.S. could not be reached for comment.
The sheriff’s investigation found Sedwick suffered from family troubles that contributed to her mental state, according to media reports.
ADVERTISEMENT
Representatives of the school board and Cemex USA said on Monday they have not yet been served with the lawsuit.
(Editing By Frank McGurty) | 3,800 |
Elon Musk’s SpaceX suffered a setback this week when the firms “Starhopper” small-scale spacecraft exploded into flames during a static fire test.
TechCrunch reports that SpaceX’s Starhopper small-scale test spacecraft exploded into flames after what appeared to be a fuel leak or fuel dump during a static fire test at SpaceX’s facility in Boca Chica, Texas. It is not yet fully clear why the starcraft burst into flames or how badly damaged it was as a result of the malfunction.
The Starhopper is a smaller-scale version of a larger spacecraft the firm is currently developing and is designed to test ideas for the larger version. It is expected that the Starhopper will be capable of performing short space flights called “hops.” The craft was planned to do an untethered test flight this week, hovering at around 20 meters, an improvement on the short tethered flights it has already completed.
Video footage of the event shows that the static fire started and stopped but flames from the rocket’s thrusters continued to burn. A stream of what appears to be water is fired at the craft before the entire rocket bursts into flames, which was captured in high-quality video by SpaceX fans at the event.
It has not yet been revealed what caused the sudden fireball, but some have speculated that there was a fuel dump after the thruster tests that emitted lighter-than-air vapors, which rose and surrounded the rocket, eventually igniting. Photos taken of the vehicle the next day show little damage to the exterior of the starship, but the extent of the damage has not been determined.
The Associated Press reported earlier this month that another SpaceX craft had faced safety issues, from the AP’s report:
A leaky valve caused a SpaceX crew capsule to explode during a ground test back in April, destroying the spacecraft and dealing a blow to the company’s effort to launch astronauts. The company announced the preliminary results of its accident investigation Monday. SpaceX’s crew Dragon capsule had just returned, minus astronauts, from a successful test flight to the International Space Station and was undergoing a ground test April 20 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The abort-system thrusters were 100 milliseconds away from firing, when the spacecraft exploded and was destroyed.
It appears that exploding craft is becoming a recurring theme for Elon Musk’s space exploration company.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or email him at [email protected] | 3,801 |
A new Ibec report has warned that "excessive" personal injury payouts are contributing to a "litigation culture" that will only serve to cause the cost of insurance to soar for businesses.
The business and employers group has published a new report calling for a reduction in the level of compensation awarded in Ireland.
The report found that insurance companies are often afraid to challenge compensation claims due to the cost of legal fees.
Compensation levels for a number of minor injuries are typically double those in the UK. While the Personal Injuries Assessment Board – now InjuriesBoard.ie – was established 12 years ago to speed up the process for claims, Dr Neil Walker, Ibec's Head of Infrastructure, has argued that the system is not working. In 40% of cases, the board is just a "stepping stone" to the courts and bigger payouts. Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast, Walker said:
"The claimants and their solicitors both have an interest because generally you're going to get substantially more in court, depending on which judge is sitting that day.
"The guidelines that the Injuries Board use are actually 12 years old, so you think [of] 12 years of inflation...
"The UK guidelines are only one year old. And yet we looked at a range of half a dozen different types of minor injury – the least you would expect in Ireland is more than the most you would expect in the UK.
"So there's something not right."
Walker said that the difference lies in the fact that, while the Irish guidance was set up by independent consultants, whenever the UK guidance is updating, a senior member of the judiciary has to explicitly endorse it.
"I think that's what's needed this time," he said of the Irish situation.
"The 12-year-old guidelines are going to be revised this year.
"There's an expectation that the level of guideline for minor injuries will go up. We would question whether that's actually appropriate given the comparison with the UK."
Walker also pointed to the "extraordinary increases" in payouts for minor whiplash and, subsequently, motor insurance and warned that that kind of pressure was going to be put on employer and public liability.
"The fear is that it's going to start spiralling."
The Ibec report includes a number of recommendations for solving the problem.
It wants greater transparency from insurers on personal injury settlements, solicitors to adopt a voluntary code of practice to stop court proceedings being dragged out unnecessarily and for the Injuries Board to work on its image as an impartial service. | 3,802 |
Beyonce’s shocking pregnancy announcement has left her highly-anticipated Coachella performance up in the air. However, the singer could reportedly still get paid a whopping $1 million even if she doesn’t perform at all! That’s a huge check, so why would Coachella pay her for not performing? We’ve got the answer!
Doctors could deem Beyonce’s Coachella performance in April too risky because she’s pregnant with twins. If that’s the case, Beyonce will still get paid the $1 million she was set to receive for performing due to an insurance policy, according to TMZ. The insurance company will pay the $1 million if she’s sidelined for “incapacity,” and complications from a high-risk pregnancy fall into that category.
[interaction id=”589481c2c2488d8e767cfac2″]
HollywoodLife.com learned EXCLUSIVELY that Beyonce is still planning on performing at Coachella despite being pregnant with twins. The festival is still a couple of months away, so things could change as her pregnancy progresses. The company producing Coachella this year reportedly had no idea Bey was even pregnant until she announced the news on Instagram!
Beyonce has not revealed how far along she is in her pregnancy. Even if she is only 3 or 4 months again, that would make her at least 5 or 6 months pregnant by the time Coachella rolls around. HollywoodLife.com spoke with Sherry Ross, MD, OB/GYN and Women’s Health Expert at Providence Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, California, who noted that Bey will likely have to “decrease physical activity” even earlier than she did with Blue Ivy, 5, because carrying twins is a lot harder on the body.
The singer doesn’t exactly take it easy when performing. She’s always up on her feet dancing and walking around on stage. Dr. Rose, who wrote She-ology, The Definitive Guide to Women’s Intimate Health, told us that the singer will probably be on “home-rest” by the time Coachella arrives. While we would love to see Beyonce perform at Coachella, we don’t want Queen Bey to push herself too hard!
HollywoodLifers, do you think Beyonce will still perform at Coachella? Do you think she should still get paid if she doesn’t? Let us know! | 3,803 |
of permanent state, as if you get liberated and that’s it, you get some rights and that’s it, you get some acknowledgment and that’s it, happy now? But you’re going back down into the muck of it every day; this world constricts. You know what the opposite of Latin Night at the Queer Club is? Another Day in Straight White America. So when you walk into the club, if you’re lucky, it feels expansive. “Safe space” is a cliche, overused and exhausted in our discourse, but the fact remains that a sense of safety transforms the body, transforms the spirit. So many of us walk through the world without it. So when you walk through the door and it’s a salsa beat, and brown bodies, queer bodies, all writhing in some fake smoke and strobing lights, no matter how cool, how detached, how over-it you think you are, Latin Night at the Queer Club breaks your cool. You can’t help but smile, this is for you, for us.
Outside, tomorrow, hangovers, regrets, the grind. Outside, tomorrow, the struggle to effect change. But inside, tonight, none of that matters. Inside, tonight, the only imperative is to love. Lap the bar, out for a smoke, back inside, the ammonia and sweat and the floor slightly tacky, another drink, the imperative is to get loose, get down, find religion, lose it, find your hips locked into another’s, break, dance on your own for a while — but you didn’t come here to be a nun — find your lips pressed against another’s, break, find your friends, dance. The only imperative is to be transformed, transfigured in the disco light. To lighten, loosen, see yourself reflected in the beauty of others. You didn’t come here to be a martyr, you came to live, papi. To live, mamacita. To live, hijos. To live, mariposas.
The media will spin the conversation away from homegrown homophobic terrorism to a general United States vs. Islamist narrative. Mendacious, audacious politicians — Republicans who vote against queer rights, against gun control — will seize on this massacre, twist it for support of their agendas.
But for a moment, I want to talk about the sacredness of Latin Night at the Queer Club. Amid all the noise, I want to close my eyes and see you all there, dancing, inviolable, free. | 3,804 |
favorite favorite favorite favorite favorite
I disagree with sbrew about this show and agree with Eric F. Wybenga and everybody else. This is a kick-ass performance mixed very well by Mr. Seamons.The five things I look for in a top notch collectable (besides the obvious - the overall performance of The Boyz) is:1.) How is Jerry singing? 2.) How are Jerry and Bobby's mics mixed on the board in relation to the other instruments - are they too hot? 3.) What is the ambiance like, i.e.: did the recordist capture most if not all of the crowd response at the end of each song? 4.) How well does the SBD mix with the audience capture? 5.) Lastly, where was the AUD recorded from and how high could the recordist get his mics off the crowd? For me, those qualities are in order of importance. But all five answers to those key questions are paramount in judging whether a matrix is really stellar or just masking a seriously problematic SBD recording of Jerry and everyone's mics.And I consider this a stellar mix of a stellar evening's performance.The first and most important issue is that Jerry sounds good, and his and Bobby's SBD vocals are very well mixed and seem totally natural to the AUD. In fact, if I had to guess - not knowing this was a MTX - I would have said the vocals were ALL from the AUD. That is an unusual aspect to this MTX and a wonderful addition from the board. In fact, it's such a good mix and so natural, it has me scratching my skull at just HOW well meshed the SBD vocals are with the AUD. It's unusually good!Secondly, the aforementioned notes on Mr. Rolfe's 1st row balcony location puts me at ease to whether it might be a good AUD recording, with Steve being a serious and conscientious recordist fighting, begging, borrowing, and stealing for the best possible position while getting the best from what he's given; allowing for all the crowd's response and ambiance between songs throughout the night... which automatically answers the last two questions.It's a fun listen kids - and the end of the show is a balls-ee blowout! Highly recommended five star performance and mix. Nice job Mr. Rolfe, Mr. Healy, and Mr. Seamons, et al. And - oh yeah - nice job Boyz!!!PS. I just love this show and this matrix. It's hands-down better than the officially released "Road Trips"... At least, I can imagine that it is. ;^ ) | 3,805 |
I tucked my tie in my shirt. One of the flight attendants handed us latex gloves and I leaned in to pinch the bridge of the man’s nose and ask what had happened. He remained silent but the flight attendant spoke up, “He said he hit it on a counter as he bent over to pick up his briefcase this morning.”
The man took over: “It had stopped bleeding before I got on the plane but it wasn’t coming from the inside until a few minutes ago.” I asked him the usual questions about being on aspirin or other blood thinners. Was he a free bleeder or had any problems with bleeding in the past? No, no and no.
Classic first aid teaching says to pinch the cartilage of the bridge of the nose to stop a nosebleed. I did this, but nothing happened. The blood continued to pour out of his nose. I looked to Susan and said, “This may not be so easy.” She nodded and began to rifle through her purse.
“He did just have vodka right before it started,” the flight attendant volunteered, pointing to the small empty bottle lying on the seat next to him. Susan and I looked at one another knowingly. Alcohol can raise the blood pressure acutely in some people, particularly those with high blood pressure already.
“Do you take blood pressure medicine?” I asked him. “Do you have any on the plane?”
“Yes,” he answered, “and no.” He turned away, the blood still flowing. Suddenly, I began to piece it all together as a severe disruption of the plexus of blood vessels in the mucosa underneath the bridge of the nose, possibly worsened by elevated blood pressure. I had neurosurgery partners at home who would treat intractable nosebleeds by snaking a tiny microcatheter up from the groin into the arteries of the nose to inject a type of glue directly into the vessels. Invariably, that would stop this type of hemorrhage.
None of that and none of them, however, were with us at 15,000 feet.
“Anyone have any nasal spray?” I asked. “Afrin specifically?” Afrin is basically neosynephrine, a potent vasoconstrictor, and would be ideal to put on a tissue stuffed deeply in the nose.
“And a tampon?” Susan added, holding up a tampon from her purse and smiling. Multiple eyes turned toward her. | 3,806 |
Animal rights activists have accused a blind man of being ‘cruel’ simply for having a guide dog.
Jonathan Attenborough, 30, said that he has been subjected to accusations of animal cruelty on two separate occasions while out with his three-year-old Labrador, Sam.
Mr. Attenborough spoke of a ‘very aggressive’ incident that occurred while he and Sam were in a hotel bar in Portsmouth.
According to The Sun, Mr. Attenborough recalled: ‘A woman approached me and my friend, another guide dog owner, to tell us she was an animal rights activist and we were cruel.
‘She was very in our faces and made us feel very uncomfortable.’
Mr. Attenborough added: ‘I was so taken aback. I tried to have a conversation with her but she didn’t listen. She just seemed to be in a rage.’
Mr. Attenborough, from Fife in Scotland, relayed a similar experience he had in a cafe in Edinburgh.
Mr. Attenborough described his exchange with an irate man claiming to be an animal rights activist, saying: ‘He told me I shouldn’t have a guide dog. He said dogs should be running free in the fields. I thought he was joking at first.’
Mr. Attenborough is a technology expert and innovator as well as a disability rights and inclusion activist, and is an ambassador for Euan’s Guide, a review forum designed for those with disabilities and access issues.
Another blind man, 23-year-old Robert Meikle from Glasgow, told The Times that he had also come in for similar accusations when in the company of his three-year-old black Labrador, Winnie.
Mr. Meikle said: ‘It’s completely inappropriate. There’s so much I rely on Winnie for.’
It has been argued by some hardline animal rights activists that breeding dogs to benefit humans represents exploitative behaviour.
Other activists campaign to introduce tougher measures to regulate the breeding of dogs, and encourage pet owners to adopt abandoned animals rather than buying from breeders.
However, most animal rights activists do not argue against the need for guide dogs and other assistance dogs for those with disabilities.
In January 2019, Irish organisation Dogs Trust presented the Dail with a petition signed by 28,000 people to strengthen the Dog Breeding Establishment Act of 2010 as a matter of urgency to tackle the cruelty inflicted on dogs by certain unscrupulous breeders. | 3,807 |
Square Enix announced at the Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival 2016 event in Tokyo on Saturday that the previously announced Stormblood expansion for the Final Fantasy XIV MMORPG will launch in Japan, North America, and Europe on June 20. Pre-orders start on January 24. Stormblood is the game's second expansion.
The event also revealed that the expansion will offer the new Red Mage job, and the ability to swim and dive. Additionally, Final Fantasy franchise composer Nobuo Uematsu is composing the theme song for the new expansion.
A collector's edition of the expansion will include a Syldra Mount, a wind-up Bartz minion, and a Red Mage Main Arm: Chicken Knife weapon.
The event also revealed a new high-level raid titled "The Bend of Time - Omega" for the game, and a new alliance raid titled "Return to Ivalice" (Ivalice is the name of the setting where the Final Fantasy Tactics, Final Fantasy XII, and Vagrant Story games take place).
Additionally, the "Letter from the Producer" livestream during the event revealed on Saturday that Final Fantasy XIV is getting a collaboration with the GARO franchise.
Square Enix also revealed that the game's Patch 3.5 will release in two parts on January 17 and in March.
Stormblood will feature Ala Mhigo as its backdrop, and the storyline will center on the city's liberation. XIIth Legion Legatus Zenos yae Galvus (pictured below), who is the ruler of the occupied city, serves as one of the enemies players will face.
The expansion will raise the level cap from 60 to 70, and will also add new jobs, new dungeons, new high-level raids, new alliance raids, and new gear. The expansion will also increase players' inventory size.
When Stormblood launches, Sony and Square Enix will stop support for the game for the PlayStation 3. The companies plan to launch an upgrade campaign that "will allow PS3 players to seamlessly join in the battle for Ala Mhigo at launch."
Square Enix released Final Fantasy XIV Online for personal computers in September 2010. After criticism from fans, the company revealed an updated version of the game titled Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn that added a new world and story. Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn launched on Windows PC and PS3 in August 2013, and then on PS4 in April 2014. Square Enix released the first expansion for Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, titled Heavensward, in June 2015.
The game currently has more than 6 million players.
Source: Square Enix USA on Twitter | 3,808 |
Accoding to a new poll, the Conservatives appear to have weathered most of the Senate scandal storm and put a halt to their declining popularity, although most of the Canadians surveyed believe it’s time for a change in government.
A CTV News Ipsos Reid poll found that 30 per cent feel the Harper government has done a good job and deserves to be re-elected, while 70 per cent feel it’s time for a different party to take over.
The results could be troubling for the Conservatives ahead of the 2015 election.
Heading into the 2011 election, which saw the Conservatives win a majority government, 44 per cent of those polled indicated that the government under Harper deserved re-election.
While the majority of Canadians don’t believe the Conservatives deserve a fourth mandate, the poll also showed that the party and Harper seem to have weathered the Senate scandal storm.
The government’s approval rating is at 41 per cent – a three-point increase from May, when news of the expense scandal in the upper chamber first broke.
Meanwhile, 57 per cent say they "disapprove" of the government's performance.
Majority don't think Canada is on right track
Forty-four per cent of Canadians say the country is heading in the right direction under the Conservatives -- which is a lower approval rating compared to the last two federal elections.
In 2008, 55 per cent thought that Canada was on the right track, but the Conservatives only returned with a minority government.
In early 2011, 51 per cent of Canadians thought the country was on the right track. Harper and the Conservatives returned to Ottawa with a majority government.
Party personalities
Canadians were asked how the Conservatives, Liberals and NDP stacked up against a series of personality attributes. The Tories were seen are the most “tired” party (49 per cent), but also the most “competent” (35 per cent) and “well-rounded” (35 per cent).
The Liberals topped other parties in the “shares my values” category (32 per cent), and tied with the NDP as the party that’s “for all Canadians” (34 per cent). However, 37 per cent of poll respondents said the Liberal Party is “of the past” (37 per cent).
The NDP ranked highest in the “honest” (41 per cent) and “inspired” (36 per cent) categories, but was also deemed most “risky” (33 per cent). | 3,809 |
ATLANTA Jimmy Carter says the United States is experiencing a “resurgence of racism” and he’s calling on Baptist faith leaders to foster change in their churches and communities.
The former U.S. president spoke Thursday at a summit hosted by the New Baptist Covenant, which he convened in 2007 to unite Baptists of different races, ethnicities and theologies. Carter’s keynote address came during a three-day meeting in Atlanta aimed at creating partnerships between black and white churches to work together on pressing issues in their community.
Before Carter spoke, leaders of two Baptist churches in Macon, Georgia, located less than a block apart but split by race, discussed their congregations’ partnership. Carter called such relationships “a very powerful potential weapon to set an example not just among Baptists, not just among churches, but in communities.”
Get Breaking News Delivered to Your Inbox
Carter said some white Americans stay quiet when they see discrimination or segregation, fearful of losing a “privileged” position in society. He said that amounts to acceptance of “discrimination and animosity and hatred and division.”
Carter, a lifelong Baptist, often spoke about his faith during his political career. Now 91, he continues to teach Sunday school several times a month at a church in his hometown of Plains, Georgia.
Carter said he wanted the event to stay nonpolitical, but described “some degree of embarrassment” about the ongoing presidential campaign between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. He said Americans’ multiple races, ethnicities and religions form “a beautiful mosaic” and said the country has been “resilient” following other periods of deep division, including the Civil War.
“I think there will be a positive reaction after this election,” Carter said. “I pray it will come out a certain way, but I think there will be a lot of lessons learned. And I think the average person in America now will be looking at how to do better things, how to have a superb American policy on peace and human rights and other aspects of life. I think we’ll raise our standards as a public and I believe our next president will accommodate that inclination.”
Carter said 22 members of his family are registered to vote, adding: “We’ll all vote the same way.”
“They have inherited some genes or something that causes them to look with favor on the New Baptist Covenant and on one of the parties,” Carter said with a smile, drawing laughter from the audience. | 3,810 |
CINCINNATI -- Mayor John Cranley will introduce legislation that would require city employees, including police officers, to go through “implicit and explicit bias” training.
Cranley announced the legislation in a Friday morning press conference, just days after the Cincinnati Police Department released body camera footage of two police officers using a racial slur.
“Let me be clear … explicit bias is using the N-word, and it’s totally unacceptable,” Cranley said. “And obviously, in light of recent events, we need a refresher on that.”
Officers Donte Hill, who used the word while responding to a domestic dispute Sept. 26, and Dennis Barnette, who used the word while arresting a woman at the Brownstone Nightclub Dec. 23, were both restricted to desk duty after the incidents came to light.
Officials recently revised Administrative Regulation 25 so the city’s nondiscrimination policy would be more clear and so it would include “strong but fair” discipline requirements, City Manager Patrick Duhaney said.
City employees who use a racial slur will be suspended without pay for 40 hours, and they will have to go through a retraining program. If an employee violates the policy a second time, they will face “punishment which may possibly be termination,” Duhaney said.
Isaac has launched an internal investigation into both of the incidents, and he said findings will be released in the “near future.” Pending a sustained finding, the police officers will face a pre-disciplinary hearing. After the hearing, if the findings are upheld, the officers will be subject to a 40 hour suspension and retraining, Isaac said.
“I personally, as the leader of this organization, I apologize that that word was ever used,” Isaac said. “Again, I know the significance of it. I’ve felt that sting both personally and professionally. I take it personally. It won’t be tolerated. I will do everything I can to ensure it won’t be utilized by anyone that wears this uniform.
“I don’t want the work of the other (over 1,000) officers that are out here on a daily basis doing an exceptional job to be judged by the mistakes of a few … our folks do nothing less than exceptional work. Don’t forget the great work. Don’t let that be lost because we’ve had this occur.”
Cranley will present the legislation to Cincinnati City Council next week. | 3,811 |
speak on a panel. Nonetheless, an ADL spokesperson told JNS that the organization applauded the DOJ for being “focused on the important issue of rising anti-Semitism in the U.S. and around the world.”
“Nationally respected thought leaders, professors, commentators and attorneys were selected to lend their expertise to this important topic,” said DOJ spokesperson Kerri Kupec. “The Department of Justice is grateful for the participation of all our partners in attendance today, including ADL.”
As part of his remarks, Mnuchin said that “we must never forget about the rallying cry of ‘Never again’ ” and fight against anti-Semitism “every single day,” as it can take “the form of violence,” as has been seen in the synagogue shootings.
He touted getting Germany to increase its funding for the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (also known as the Claims Conference), which currently funds social-welfare services for approximately 132,000 Jewish Nazi victims globally.
The Claims Conference announced earlier this month that the most recent negotiations resulted in an increase of around $50 million from last year in funding for social-welfare services for Holocaust survivors, bringing the total worldwide allocation for 2020 for social-welfare services funded by Germany to more than $587 million.
Wray talked about fighting hate crimes, including against Jews, and illustrated the FBI’s role in doing so.
Among religious groups, Jews are the leading target of hate crimes annually.
While he said that America cherishes freedom of speech, words can turn into violence, and violence can turn into hate crimes. Wray cited James Alex Fields, who rammed his car into a crowd of counter-protesters during the white-nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017, killing a 32-year-old woman, Heather Heyer, and injuring dozens of people.
On Monday, Fields was sentenced to life, plus 419 years, behind bars, in a state case, while he was sentenced last month to life in prison on federal hate crime charges.
The FBI head said that most hate-crime investigations are “reactive,” but working with civil rights and other groups is crucial to fostering trust and understanding between them and law enforcement.
As such, he mentioned the FBI’s requirement for new agents to visit the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., as part of a joint program between the ADL and the museum called “Law Enforcement and Society: Lessons of the Holocaust.” | 3,812 |
Microsoft’s next HoloLens headset is still in the works but according to leaks, it could feature some significant internal changes — including a new processor from an Intel competitor. According to Windows Central the new headset could sport some new hardware under the hood, as Microsoft contemplates replacing the HoloLens’ Intel processor with an ARM processor.
That’s interesting for a couple reasons, first because it means the HoloLens 2 — or whatever it ends up being called — could be built on Microsoft’s Always Connected PC platform, and could feature LTE connectivity. If you’re unfamiliar, Microsoft’s Always Connected PCs are Qualcomm-powered laptops designed for unparalleled battery life and mobile connectivity. That means the HoloLens’ new processor could be more powerful but consume less power overall. Which leads to another important development.
“HoloLens contains a custom multiprocessor called the Holographic Processing Unit, or HPU. It is responsible for processing the information coming from all of the on-board sensors, including Microsoft’s custom time-of-flight depth sensor, head-tracking cameras, the inertial measurement unit, and the infrared camera. The HPU is part of what makes HoloLens the world’s first – and still only – fully self-contained holographic computer,” said Microsoft’s Marc Pollefeys in a blog post describing the next-gen HPU.
So the next-gen HPU that lives in the HoloLens 2 will have the horsepower — and battery power thanks to that low-power ARM chip — to perform complex computing onboard without having to outsource compute-intensive tasks like voice recognition to cloud services.
“In addition to the new [holographic processing unit], we hear that the next HoloLens will be powered by an ARM processor and include LTE support for true-mobile holographic computing,” Windows Central reports. “Our sources suggest that the next HoloLens will be more mobile than ever, with longer battery life and an always-connected state. It is likely the HoloLens 2 will also include a wider field of view, something the original HoloLens caught a lot of flack for.”
Not only will these changes make the HoloLens 2 a much more capable device, but they have some far-reaching consequences as well. If Microsoft is going to replace the Intel chip currently in the original HoloLens with an ARM chip in the HoloLens 2, this would be the second high-profile company to reportedly plan for a jump to non-Intel processors for a flagship device.
Editors' Recommendations | 3,813 |
BINGHAMTON, NY- Analysis of giant stone hats found on Rapa Nui, Chile (Easter Island) provides evidence contrary to the widely held belief that the ancient civilization had a warrior culture. According to a new study conducted by a team of researchers, including a professor at Binghamton University, State University of New York, these stone hats suggest that the people of Rapa Nui were part of a supportive and inclusive community.
Carl Lipo, anthropology professor and director of the Environmental Studies Program at Binghamton University, and a team of researchers studied the monumental statues (moai) on Rapa Nui, and the previously unacknowledged giant stone hats (pukao) that were placed atop them. Pukao are large, cylindrical stones made from a volcanic rock known as ‘red scoria.’ Weighing multiple tons, they were placed on the heads of the moai during prehistoric times, consistent with the Polynesian traditions of honoring their ancestors.
The researchers produced the first study analyzing the pukao and their significance, examining the 70 multi-ton giant hats scattered around the island that have gradually eroded over time. Using photography to produce 3-D computer models, the researchers were able to study the pukao in greater detail and discovered that there are far more drawings carved into the hats than was previously thought.
“With the building mitigating any sense of conflict, the moai construction and pukao placement were key parts to the success of the island,” said Lipo. “In our analysis of the archaeological records, we see evidence that demonstrates the prehistoric communities repeatedly worked together to build monuments. The action of cooperation had a benefit to the community by enabling sharing of information and resources.”
While Easter Island is famous, the archaeological record of the island is not well-documented, said Lipo. He believes that scientists can learn a great deal from the pukao by examining this new information.
“Every time we look at the archaeological record of the island, we are surprised by what we find. There is much more to be learned from this remarkable place — important answers that shed light on the abilities of our ancestors, as well as potential ideas for contemporary society about what it takes to survive on a tiny and remote island,” said Lipo.
The paper “Using Structure from Motion Mapping to Record and Analyze Details of the Colossal Hats (Pukao) of Monumental Statues on Rapa Nui (Easter Island),” was published in the October issue of Advances in Archaeological Practice. | 3,814 |
STANSBURY PARK, Utah - There’s only one spot on earth you can see 7 billion light-years into space with the naked eye, and it’s in Stansbury Park.
“I think there’s going to be a lot of jaws that drop when they look through this,” said Rodger Fry, Stansbury Park Observatory Director.
This weekend, the observatory is opening its doors and the skies to allow the public in to use the largest amateur telescope in the world.
“It’s huge,” a smiling Fry added.
The telescope was built by a Utah truck driver and astronomy enthusiast, who purchased the mirror himself. Though he’s never disclosed how much he paid for the mirror, Fry said that it was originally auctioned off in the 1980’s for $1.5 million.
“It was for a spy satellite, but there was a small defect in it, a chip in the mirror on the side,” explains Fry. “It doesn’t effect the performance, but it couldn’t go into space.”
Space’s loss is Utah’s gain. Fry says the mirror is the heart of the telescope.
The trucker allows the observatory and the community to use the telescope for a number of reasons.
“Stansbury Park recognizes the importance to minimize light pollution,” Fry said of the township. “So, they have strict ordinances to regulate outside lighting to make sure it doesn’t inhibit the darkness of the sky, which is really good for us.”
Fry said that was part of the reason why the observatory decided to move to Stansbury Park in the 1970s.
“Our mission with this observatory was to bring astronomy to the public," Fry said. "We felt that the public really couldn’t be motivated to travel more than 30 minutes from their home for a casual trip. So, we looked at a location 30 minutes from Salt Lake that had a reasonably dark sky, and Stansbury fit the bill.”
The observatory will have a ribbon cutting ceremony on Saturday at 4 p.m. followed by access to their smaller telescopes. However, the main attraction won’t be open to the public until dusk, when it will remain open until midnight.
Fry said after Saturday the telescope will be available twice a month during Star Watch Party days.
You can find the observatory’s schedule on their website. | 3,815 |
The Labour Party has gained support and National has dropped in the latest 1 NEWS Colmar Brunton poll, despite optimism for the country’s economic outlook taking a dive.
Your playlist will load after this ad
The results show Labour is up three per cent to 45 per cent, and National is down two to 43 per cent compared to the last poll nearly three months ago.
Party Support:
Labour Party – 45% (up 3%)
National Party – 43% (down 2%)
Green Party – 7% (up 1%)
New Zealand First – 5% (steady)
Maori Party – 1% (steady)
National Party leader Simon Bridges said it was a reflection of the “toughest, worst week in living memory for National and I think for any leader”.
“We know we’ve got to move back very quick to holding the Government to account. We’ve got to get back to talking about what matters for New Zealanders,” he told 1 NEWS.
It comes after the dramatic political events of last week in National, with MP Jami-Lee Ross quitting the party after making a series of allegations against leader Simon Bridges.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told 1 NEWS she was “never complacent but really heartened” by the results of Labour’s increase.
The Green Party have also risen by 1 per cent, up to seven per cent, with NZ First steady on five per cent.
The latest poll also showed Simon Bridges decreasing by three per cent down to seven per cent as preferred Prime Minister, with Jacinda Ardern rising two per cent to her highest rating of 42 per cent.
Economic Outlook
Optimistic – 33% (down 6%)
Pessimistic – 41% (up 6%)
Optimism over New Zealand’s economic outlook has decreased, dropping down to 33 per cent from 39 per cent in the last poll.
Pessimism grew by six per cent, up to 41 per cent.
National leader Simon Bridges said the economy “was in downturn”, and said the Government is letting people down.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the economic outlook results reflected the international environment.
“We have seen a down-grading over global growth numbers, predominantly because of the trade war we’re seeing between China and the United States,” she says.
“Domestically, we’re in good shape.” | 3,816 |
eBay may soon offer online banking. It would seem.
This afternoon, while fielding questions about PayPal at Santa Clara University conference obsessed with "trust online," chief information security officer Dave Cullinane seemed to indicate eBay is interested in extending the popular online payment system to its logical conclusion.
"What we're trying to do is provide a trusted payment system that's within the community that constitutes eBay Inc., trying to be all things, but we aren't the bank yet," he said, before adding "Did I say yet?"
Cue audience laughter. But you have to wonder. Before joining eBay, Cullinane was the CISO at Washington Mutual, one of the largest banks in the US.
Or maybe we're just having fun.
During his hour-long keynote, Cullinane stuck mostly to generalizations when discussing eBay's security practices, but he had a few interesting things to say about his time with Washington Mutual.
At one point, he said, the bank spent a month as the largest phishing target in the country, and in fighting this ongoing problem, it has shutdown countless phishing sites surreptitiously installed on countless machines across the net.
"These things are incredibly sophisticated, and when they take over a computer, most [users] don't know it," he said. "With every single phishing site [Washington Mutual has] shutdown, not one person was aware been aware that their machine was compromised and used for phishing. That includes university servers and company servers and personal PCs and all sorts of things."
More interesting is that most of the compromised machines were not Windows machines. "The vast majority of [the phishing sites] we saw were on rootkit-ed Linux boxes, which was rather startling. We expected a predominance of Microsoft boxes and that wasn't the case."
This pleased Microsoft's head of Silicon Valley PR, who served as a conference sponsor.
Botnets are obviously a big problem for eBay as well, but Cullinane wouldn't quite say how big. "We see botnet attacks that are massive in their size and scope. We did a preliminary analysis and found over - I guess I'm not supposed to say that, what the number is - but we found a huge number of bots aimed specifically at eBay, trying to do things specifically to us."
The problem has become so bad that eBay operates under the assumption that every personal PC is infected, he says. "With the desktop, we're starting to run on the assumption that anyone who's trying to contact us from their own personal desktop is probably coming from a compromised computer." ® | 3,817 |
This is the last night of Saturn in Scorpio for this Saturn cycle. Each cycle lasts around 29 years, and Saturn is in each sign for over two years.
Saturn is the stern teacher archetype, associated with hard lessons, structure, challenges, age and death, among other things. Scorpio is the deep dark zodiac sign of power, fear, transformation, penetrating depth, life and death… the two together bring us face to face with our fears, our power-struggles and our own mortality.
I felt Saturn enter scorpio a few years ago. I was largely oblivious to astrological occurrences at that point. I only knew the basics, but I knew my Saturn return was coming up in Scorpio, so I had a vague idea that Saturn would be going there within the year. I was visiting a community as part of my PhD research and I found myself reading a random book, confronted with fears of intimacy and vulnerability. The thought occurred to me: Saturn must be getting into scorpio. A few days later, upon returning home, I looked it up and sure enough, it had gotten there just at the time of my revelations.
I was expecting Saturn in Scorpio to be hard, but nothing would prepare me for how hard it was. Every major I’ve feared was stirred up in a massive way, in uncanny synchronicity with exact transits. Some of the details are too personal to share, but let’s just say it has been agonising. It has also been astoundingly rewarding. I have confronted patterns and aspects of myself that I had never been able to face or even recognise before in this long journey through the dark.
If you look at where saturn has been (where Scorpio is in your natal chart), over the past few years you may notice that this area has been under rampant transformation and restructuring. Saturday has been going through my 5th house, home of creativity, pleasure friendship, parenting and play. The 5th is often light hearted and gin but with natal Saturn there it lends a seriousness to my character. Incidentally, all of my Scorpio nice fear-facing challenges have occurred through these types of things. IT HAS NOT BEEN FUN. Saturn also squared my Leo Sun and is still in fairly close conjunction with my Mars at the end of Scorpio, giving me plenty of chances to release my power issues, inhibitions and helping me learn to stand in my own power.
Compared with the last few years, Saturn in Sagittarius (philosophy, nature, expansion) sounds a lot more fun… but we’ll see about that! | 3,818 |
Photo Courtesy of Faridodin Lajvardi - CHHS Students from Carl Hayden High School work on a robot for competition. Photo Courtesy of Faridodin Lajvardi - CHHS Students from Carl Hayden High School work on a robot for competition. Photo Courtesy of Faridodin Lajvardi - CHHS Students from Carl Hayden High School work on a robot for competition.
A popular after-school activity is now being recognized as a sport in Arizona. While students may not break a sweat, state and national competitions can be fierce, if there is money to support it.
The Arizona Interscholastic Association, has made Arizona the second state to recognize robotics as an official high school sport, second only to Minnesota. So, what does this now mean for the thousands of Arizona students in robotics clubs?
“You’ll be able to get a letter, like you do in sports, you’ll be able to get a letter for doing robotics,” said Faridodin Lajvardi, the Robotics Team Lead Mentor for Carl Hayden High School.
“We’ve always had to be kinda operating underneath the radar" Lajvardi said. "Now we don’t have to operate underneath the radar. It’s officially sanctioned. So, it raises the profile up more so maybe kids that might want to do sports or do sports and robotics now might pay a little more attention to robotics because they’re going to get the same kind of attention that they would in the sporting program.”
Much like other sports, life skills like teamwork and collaboration are present, but activities like robotics offer other tangible skills.
“But also there’s the hard skills of computer programming that is fast becoming recognized as an essential skill," said Dr. John Kriekard of the Science Foundation Arizona, who worked with the AIA to make the recognition take place.
However, in keeping with robotics competition traditions, admission won’t charged for attending state championships, for at least the first few years. This leaves AIA to solicit sponsorships to support new teams and championships.
“To find sponsors for the state tournament, the AIA has put in the amount of money from donations to the startup of new clubs" Kriekard said. "There is a start-up cost because of the first robot and the transportation and entrance fees, tournaments and so forth. That’s been somewhat prohibitive to some schools.”
It is unknown how they will determine who makes varsity and JV. | 3,819 |
Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren has been slipping in the polls and struggling to gain much momentum so far in the primaries.
FIGHT THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA! Download Our FREE Pro-Trump App Today
sponsor
During a quick visit to a local New Hampshire diner, things could not have gone any worse for Warren in her cringeworthy attempt to woo voters.
In a video clip of the awkward encounter, Warren was seen walking around tables while people were eating, waving, and trying to strike up conversations.
But it appears that literally everyone ignored Warren and just wanted to eat their food.
In the clip below, it's more than obvious that no one wanted to engage with Warren.
WATCH:
Several Twitter users torched Warren for the awkward exchange, with a majority using adjectives like “embarrassing,” “cringe,” or “awkward” to describe the incident.
“She’s that weird aunt that smells like garlic and urine,” one individual said of Warren jokingly.
Another poked fun at her controversial DNA test results that show she’s 1/1024 Native American, saying, “Wow, that was embarrassing. And about 1/1024 effective use of time during a campaign.”
Warren's bizarre encounter came a week after she came under fire for stopping just short of calling President Donald Trump's judicial nominees "deplorable."
Warren said Trump has nominated judges who stand for racist, sexist, homophobic, and anti-voter sentiments and urged voters to “look at their written records.”
“I think what’s at the heart of it is who you ask to be a judge,” Warren said at the “We the People 2020” forum in Des Moines, which featured the top 2020 Democrats.
“And I’ll tell you what the answer has been for Donald Trump, cause I’ve seen these guys. Homophobic, that’s in. Racist, that’s in. Sexist, oh yeah, most definitely. And anti-voter. That’s been a big qualification. He has named one person after another,” Warren continued.
***BRAND NEW Space Force Commemorative Bundle***
Democrats refuse to learn their lesson.
According to Warren -- and many other Democrats -- anyone who is Christian, believes in God, and supports the U.S. Constitution and the way our Founders wrote it is apparently a racist, sexist, homophobic. | 3,820 |
Oscar Meyer has stepped in the blockchain biz only to find themselves in hot water, as they will be served with a cease and desist for their rollout of “bacoin.” The cease and desist was posted on Twitter and can be seen here…
The supposed original creator of Bacoin posted the cease and desist he sent in the following tweet. It is unknown as of press time what claim he actually has to Bacoin.
Said claimant later wrote out the following tweet, claiming that he had indeed sent the cease and desist letter.
Going to the Oscar Meyer Bacoin website, one can enter to “win” bacoin, but I had no luck. The video however, is funny, if not a bit condescending.
Here’s an inside look at the Bacoin Website:
If the author of this cease and desist can bring the real bacoin to fruition in which I can actually buy bacon, this will be one happy blogger.
Cryptotradersguide.org has reached out to @simplexletalis for comment.
UPDATE: THE CREATOR OF BACOIN RELEASES THE FILES!
@simlexletalis has shown proof of concept with the following response to my inquiry.
His response is linked below:
@Simplexletalis https://t.co/WEpcyYWYOT
Just wrote up your story…anything you want me to add? — Cryptotrader’s Guide (@crypto__guide) May 2, 2018
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
You can include the various links to my work from Github and Bitcointalk if you’d like. While my project was far from complete, they have the exact same premise.https://t.co/SgwQhJUjIJhttps://t.co/PITSitj9Zzhttps://t.co/Ky8UnLoOOUhttps://t.co/toJrSTpXHi — Simplexletalis (@Simplexletalis) May 2, 2018
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
My latest project was based around a rewards program and an ERC20 token airdrop. Live net test contract for the token: https://t.co/0xq4xGFDhL — Simplexletalis (@Simplexletalis) May 2, 2018
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js | 3,821 |
all get angry at other people for various perceived offenses, deep down doesn’t it sound appetizing to believe those people are going to Hell, regardless of how much they suffer in life? No one would ever admit to it, of course, but it’s a primitive passion innate in every human, and precisely the heart of the Crusades.
In 1099, the 1st Crusade ended in “Christian” victory, when knights and soldiers from France, England, Germany, and Apulia (southern Italy) successfully besieged Jerusalem from 7 June to 15 July. They were opposed by the Islamic Fatimid Caliphate of Egypt, under Iftikhar ad-Dawla, who had 400 cavalrymen and a garrison of Muslim and Nubian troops comparable in size to the invaders, about 13,000 for each side. Inside the city there lived over 60,000 unarmed civilians, mostly Muslims and Jews.
Once the city fell, the invaders stormed in, ransacked every building and murdered every single man, woman, and child within the walls. 70,000 people were hacked to pieces “in the name of Christ.” The horses waded in blood up to their knees. Probably half the women were raped, and most of everyone was tortured by varying methods. It was unbridled, bacchanalian sadism. About 500 Jews fought alongside the Muslims, then took refuge in a synagogue. The French burned the synagogue to the ground, with everyone in it.
88 years later, Salah ad-Din successfully took Jerusalem back for Islam and allowed all those inside to return unharmed to their homelands provided they paid a ransom. Those who could not afford it were sold into slavery. Two years later, Richard I of England (the Lionheart) arrived with Phillip II of France and Frederick I of Germany. Richard was not the chivalrous hero he is frequently depicted as in films. He spent barely 6 months of his 10-year regency in England. He lived in France, spoke only Langues d’Oil and Langues d’Oc, two dialects of Old French, did not speak any form of English, and used England as a money machine to finance his conquests. He loved the sport and glory of overpowering other nations. His Crusade, the 3rd, ended in an uneasy stalemate.
There would be 6 more Crusades, with the Holy Land changing hands several times, costing hundreds of thousands of lives, all in the name of one god or another. All the while, both bibles stated, “Love your enemies.” | 3,822 |
uates for whatever reason, adoption for use in commerce will still suffer. What we’d need in that case is a coin backed by a perfect, continuously-adjusted combination of deflationary and inflationary cryptocurrencies that evens out to 0 inflation in total.
Even with general cryptocurrency baskets, the DApps will have to operate on fractional basket reserves to a small extent, investing with some of the funds saved for basket coin holders in order to recoup costs like data storage and trade fees. Programming DApps to intentionally invest in less profitable coins to maintain 0 inflation will force them to run on even flimsier fractional reserves, which could lead to the equivalent of a bank run if the conditions were just wrong.
In Math We Trust
All of these complications arise because we cannot find just one currency that can maintain stability without inflation. Without some manipulation of the Bitcoin supply, market forces will always cause it to fluctuate wildly in value. History has shown that humans cannot be trusted to manipulate a money supply responsibly, but maybe using the principles of decentralization and the blockchain, we can engineer a smart currency capable of regulating itself autonomously.
The primary means by which we can do this is by adjusting the mining difficulty or reward. Dollars dilute in value because they can be arbitrarily printed; if a currency is diminishing in value, a logical solution would be to reduce the number of coins generated with each block mined. Conversely, increasing the reward could help limit an unstable surge in value, helping to reduce the momentum and reach of price swings.
A major limitation comes to mind: what if the block reward hits 0, and the coins are still inflating in value? This scheme might work better in a proof-of-stake system, where control of the money supply is relative to how many coins one has on reserve. If the reward hits 0, those minting coins will have to rely on transaction fees, which twice-incentivizes hoarding by giving coins to those who stockpile them while taxing those who conduct transactions.
Like any currency, insufficient market demand could render such a system unstable. If enough people want to sell, the price will have to fall. It might be ideal to program the currency to maintain slight deflation, to make for a safer alternative investment to other cryptocurrencies.
No matter what, it will always be a better alternative to fiat in the bank. The executive power governing the currency would be a non-profit decentralized autonomous organization, and the blockchain will never need to raise money for anything from public education to wars abroad. Programmed correctly, it will simply do its job, quite unlike the central banks we have to deal with today. | 3,823 |
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- There will be "ample security" at the funeral for six of the eight people shot and killed in rural southern Ohio in what authorities call a planned attack targeting one family, Ohio's attorney general said.
The service Tuesday at a West Portsmouth church is the last of three funerals for the victims.
Seven adults and a 16-year-old boy from the Rhoden family were found dead April 22 at four properties scattered across a few miles of countryside near Piketon, about 80 miles east of Cincinnati. All eight were shot in the head, some had other gunshot wounds and bruising, and none of the deaths appeared self-inflicted, authorities said. Three young children were unharmed.
Get Breaking News Delivered to Your Inbox
One family member told CBS Columbus affiliate WBNS-TV, "Nobody should ever have to bury a whole family.... It's just really sad. It's something that shouldn't ever happen to anybody."
Still trying to determine who killed the victims and why, authorities have conducted nearly 130 interviews and are reviewing about 450 tips and more than 100 pieces of evidence, Attorney General Mike DeWine said Monday. They said they found a large-scale illegal marijuana growing operation at one of the crime scenes and said pot was being cultivated at some of the other homes, too - something not uncommon in this corner of Appalachia - but they haven't said whether they believe that to be connected to a motive.
DeWine said he wouldn't speculate as to whether a threat to the family remains.
"We have no new information that would indicate that there is a threat to any of the members of the family," he said. "We don't have any information on that. And we did not when we initially said it other than the fact we had eight people killed."
The last funeral honors 40-year-old Christopher Rhoden; his ex-wife, 37-year-old Dana Rhoden; their three children, 20-year-old Clarence "Frankie" Rhoden, 16-year-old Christopher Jr., and 19-year-old Hanna; and Christopher Rhoden Sr.'s brother, 44-year-old Kenneth Rhoden.
The funeral home titled their online obituary simply "The Rhoden Family," with a section listing how each of those victims was linked to the others and their survivors.
Services for a cousin, Gary Rhoden, 38, were held Thursday in South Shore, Kentucky. Mourners remembered Frankie Rhoden's fiancée, 20-year-old Hannah Gilley, at a funeral Saturday in Otway. | 3,824 |
of information.” After the war, when he worked at the Board of Trade, he was reported to have taken part in secret meetings of Communist civil servants. However, MI5 was unable to establish any evidence that his Communist contacts continued after 1952, when he left the civil service.
There was a sad story to the end of Bernard Floud’s life, partly revealed by the now declassified MI5 files on him. In 1966 and 1967, he was questioned as part of a broad MI5 investigation into Soviet recruitment at British universities in the pre-war years. Over a series of interviews in January 1967, MI5 presented Floud with the account given by Fischer Williams about her pre-war contacts with him at Oxford, at which point Floud apparently became very agitated. A few days later, Floud was told that, because of his lack of frankness about his past Communist associations, he was regarded as a security risk and could not be given a security clearance.
The issue was not that MI5 thought Floud was a Soviet agent—there was, and is, no evidence of this—but that he had not been forthcoming when asked about his pre-war communism and was thus unreliable for holding a security clearance. Rejection of his security clearance seems to have dashed his dream of one day becoming a minister. Suffering from undisclosed depression and despair brought on by the death of his wife, a Communist whom he had met at Oxford, and believing his political career over, six months after his last meeting with MI5, Floud killed himself. His is a tragic tale of the human cost surrounding espionage and counter-espionage investigations.
At present, then, it is impossible to say whether there was a successful Soviet spy network in Oxford like there was in Cambridge. We know the KGB attempted to establish one at Oxford, but not whether it was successful. As far as producing traitorous university graduates goes, for now Cambridge still stands in a league of its own. The successes of KGB recruitment at Cambridge led to some truly perverse results. Before the Second World War, there were just a few graduates of British universities working for MI5 and MI6, which were staffed overwhelmingly by ex-military and ex-colonial officers who had not been to university. One senior pre-war MI6 officer said that he was proud never to recruit a university graduate. This meant that, thanks to the five Cambridge spies, in the pre-war years the KGB had more graduates of British universities working for it than Britain’s own intelligence services, MI5 and MI6.
As is so often the case with intelligence history, the truth is even stranger than fiction. | 3,825 |
Chester Zoo elephant calf's EEHV survival'momentous' Published duration 12 June 2019
image copyright Chester Zoo image caption Prof Steinbach said Indali Hi Way's recovery was "wonderful news"
An Asian elephant's rare recovery from a "lethal" virus has been hailed as a "momentous step" for the species.
Two-year-old Indali Hi Way is believed to have made a full recovery from elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus (EEHV), a Chester Zoo spokesman said.
He said groundbreaking work by the zoo, the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) and University of Surrey (UoS), had aided the calf's recovery.
UoS's Prof Falko Steinbach said it would help "find answers" to the virus.
Almost all Asian elephants carry the virus, but it only develops into an illness for some and there is no vaccination against it.
image copyright Chester Zoo image caption The calf underwent two weeks of intensive treatment
Prof Steinbach, from the university's School of Veterinary Medicine, said a lot "remains unknown about EEHV [but] with fewer than 50,000 Asian elephants left in the wild, it is important that we find answers".
"Indali's recovery is wonderful news, and we will use what we have learnt from her case to help us find solutions against this deadly virus," he added.
Vets at the zoo diagnosed the calf with the active virus in March and set about a programme of intensive treatment.
Across a two-week period, Indali had nine anaesthetic procedures, blood plasma transfusions, interferon therapy, anti-viral medications and immune boosting treatments, as well as very large amounts of intravenous fluids.
image copyright Chester Zoo image caption The calf underwent numerous treatments as it battled against the virus
The zoo's chief executive Dr Mark Pilgrim said the two-year-old's recovery was a "major milestone for conservation".
"Only two years ago, the global search for a solution to the EEHV crisis looked unlikely to bear fruit," he said, adding: "There is light at the end of the tunnel."
Dr Akbar Dastjerdi, the head of APHA's Mammalian Virus Investigation Unit, said the treatment was the first step towards a cure.
"With the help of many devoted scholars, we have been able to develop a way to tackle EEHV," he said.
"Our efforts are now focused on designing and testing a vaccine to save this irreplaceable species from further suffering." | 3,826 |
Leaving Afghanistan would've been heresy to Republicans in 2008. Today, it may sound like common sense -- especially after bin Laden was killed in Pakistan, where America is not formally at war, and where he successfully hid for at least five years.
With the debt and deficit several times larger now than they were in 2008, mainstream Republicans may come around to Paul's positions on Iraq (leave), Libya (shouldn't have gone in), foreign aid (end it), and the defense budget (cut it).
"Maybe we could take care of people back here at home if we weren't spending $1.5 trillion dollars per year on our militarism," Paul said at the debate.
None of this means that Paul has any better shot at winning the Republican nomination in 2012 than he did in 2008 -- especially after saying if wouldn't have ordered the raid on bin Laden.
"I think things could have been done somewhat differently," Paul said Thursday. "I would suggest the way they got Khalid [Sheikh] Mohammed. We went and cooperated with Pakistan. They arrested him, actually, and turned him over to us, and he's been in prison. Why can't we work with the government?"
But it seems increasingly likely Paul will nonetheless sway enough voters that at least one of his presidential rivals will seek to woo over his highly-vocal supporters, who already appear better organized than during Paul's last bid.
That could make him a significant influence in the campaign. In 2008, Paul won almost 10 percent of the caucus vote in Iowa and 8 percent of the vote in New Hampshire. His influence on the 2012 contests will likely be much bigger: he's better known now, more popular, and may raise more money. Most importantly, early Republican contests in 2012 will award delegates on a proportional, not winner-take-all, basis.
Last time a candidate just needed to finish first to take all of the delegates from a state. Now, a solid second- or third-place will be money in the bank toward the nomination. Paul's rivals won't want to ignore his voters; they'll want to siphon some of them off to win more delegates.
Paul lost the battle for the nomination 2008 and all signs point to another loss in 2012. But, to everyone's surprise, he's been setting the pace for the Republican Party on domestic issues. As improbable as it seems, he just might do the same on foreign policy.
Image credit: Brian Frank (Reuters)
We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to [email protected]. | 3,827 |
This page may contain affiliate links. Please read my This page may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
THIS GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED!
Happy New Year, everyone! Since many of you have new year’s resolutions that revolve around healthier cooking, reducing stress, saving time, and/or having fun in the kitchen…here’s a giveaway just for you! And the ultimate prize is a Fagor LUX Electric Multi-cooker pressure cooker, which is BETTER than an Instant Pot (as I detail in my review here).
About the Prize
The Fagor LUX Electric Multi-Cooker is a top quality, state-of-the-art appliance that offers four cooking tools plus a variety of assist functions all in one single device.
Cooking Programs Pressure Cooking. Cooking speed is reduced by up to 70% with the pressure cooking program. Cook on high or low for up to 99 minutes. Slow Cooking. Add ingredients in the morning, choose high or low, set the timer up to 10 hours, be on your way, and come home to dinner ready to go. Rice Cooking. Featuring White Rice, Brown Rice, and Risotto settings, you can achieve perfect rice fast. Yogurt Maker. Pasteurize and incubate yogurt all in just this one device. You can even make Greek yogurt! Assist Cooking Functions Brown & Sauté. Brown or sauté your food directly in the pot. Hello, fewer dishes! Simmer. Again, hello, fewer dishes! Steam. Preserve nutrients when prepping veggies and fish. Keep Warm. Not eating right away? It automatically pops into the Keep Warm setting for up to 12 hours once cooking is done so it stays hot. Time Delay. Delay the start of cooking by up to 6 hours.
See My Full Review
Enter to Win
Enter to win a Fagor LUX Electric Multi-cooker (winner’s choice of color and size) below. This giveaway is open to Canadian and United States residents who are at least 18 years old. Odds of winning based on number of entries. Please enter a valid email in the form below so I can contact you if you win and make sure your email accepts messages from the tjstaste.com domain (so the email doesn’t land in the spam box). This giveaway ends at 11:59 PM Eastern time on January 31, 2018. Good luck!
THIS GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED!
Fagor LUX Multi-cooker Pressure Cooker
| 3,828 |
New York Rep. Anthony Weiner is trying to weather an online sex scandal. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
The behind-the-scenes heat comes as the New York Times reports that Weiner’s wife, Huma Abedin, 35, is pregnant with the couple’s first child. The Times reported late Wednesday that Abedin, a senior State Department aide who is very close to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, was in the early stages of pregnancy when the Weiner scandal broke. Abedin left Wednesday for a trip with Clinton to North Africa. A person close to the Clinton family confirmed the development to The Post.
Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Allyson Schwartz said Wednesday that “having the respect of your constituents is fundamental for a Member of Congress,” adding: “In light of Anthony Weiner’s offensive behavior online, he should resign.”
Such a strong statement by Schwartz, who handles recrutiment as well as member services for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, is widely regarded as a sign that the party leadership has decided it’s time for Weiner to leave the House.
Schwartz joins Arkansas Sen. Mark Pryor and Maine Rep. Mike Michaud as well as former Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine in calling on Weiner to step aside.
Weiner, according those close to him, remains insistent that he has broken no laws and has no plans to leave the House. It remains to be seen whether Schwartz’s statement will open a floodgate of public condemnation that will alter Weiner’s political calculus.
Democratic leaders have largely stayed silent about Weiner’s political fate since he revealed in a press conference on Monday that he had lied about sending a lewd image via Twitter to a college student in Seattle.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) as well as DCCC Chairman Steve Israel (N.Y.) called for the House ethics committee to investigate the matter.
But, the steady stream of new news about Weiner and his online liaisons has made the situation increasingly untenable for a party trying to reclaim control of the House majority in 2012. Weiner is also a rapidly emerging target for Empire State redistricters who must shrink the congressional delegation by two members before next November.
The problem for Democrats is that Weiner has shown little inclination to step aside and, barring a full House vote to expel him, likely could hang on to his seat at least until the election next year.
Such a drawn-out ordeal is a nightmare for Democratic strategists who would like the Weiner story out of the news as soon as possible.
Paul Kane contributed to this report. | 3,829 |
Given PETA’s radical positions — and actions — the organization’s absolute opposition to animal acting in filmed media comes as no surprise. A PETA spokesperson reportedly told The New York Times that the “organization believe[s] that live animals should be removed entirely from movies and television.” This loss would be a shame: There is a rich cinematic tradition of animal acting in film production, bringing us poignant narratives that foster empathy and respect for animals among audiences around the world. The examples are countless, from the sweet human-bond celebrated in “Old Yeller” (1957) to the unconditional love portrayed in the classic family-favorite “Lassie” (1994).
In an op-ed in the New York Daily News, Newkirk suggested that “with all the cutting-edge technology now used by innovative filmmakers” the days of animal acting “are finally coming to an end.” That’s simply not the case. For one thing, while impressive, modern techniques, such as computer-generated imagery (CGI) cannot possibly replicate the depth and emotional range of real dogs and other animals. Financial expenses are also an issue: As Polone explained in the op-ed, using technology to replace live animals in movies like “A Dog’s Purpose” is “impossible,” due to “astronomical” costs that would render most projects “economically unviable” before they would even get off the ground. Polone estimates that making “A Dog’s Purpose” with CGI, instead of real dogs, would be four to five times more expensive, requiring a budget of upwards of $110 million. In other words: Without animal actors, our favorite furry, feathered, and finned movie stars might disappear from Silver Screen altogether.
Of course, featuring animal actors on screen should never come at the expense of their welfare behind the scenes. The mistreatment of animals in media productions—or any other environment—is always unacceptable, which is why American Humane is dedicated in our work to ensure that “No Animals Were Harmed” in the making of film and television. This is and has been our mission for more than 75 years and we will continue our efforts to build a more humane Hollywood—something necessary to protect not only animal actors on sets, but also the future of the beloved films that remind us all to love and respect all the creatures of our world.
Dr. Robin Ganzert is president and CEO of American Humane, the country’s first national humane organization. | 3,830 |
(CNN) The Trump administration has tapped Marshall Billingslea, the current undersecretary for terrorism financing at the Treasury Department, as special envoy for nuclear talks, according to two sources familiar.
The decision comes nearly one month after US national security adviser Robert O'Brien said the US was preparing to begin negotiating a new nuclear arms agreement with Russia.
The National Security Council declined to comment and Billingslea hasn't responded to CNN's inquiry.
Billingslea had previously been nominated to be under secretary for civilian security, democracy and human rights at the State Department but his confirmation process stalled after Democrats and advocacy groups raised concerns about his views on torture while working for President George W. Bush's administration. As of Wednesday evening, a Democratic Senate aide told CNN that the nomination had not yet been formally withdrawn.
"There has been ample evidence that Mr. Billingslea encouraged the use of interrogation methods that amount to torture or other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment while he served in the Bush Administration," Daphne Eviatar, director of security with Human Rights at Amnesty International USA, wrote last September. "This makes a mockery of that important position."
During his confirmation hearing last year, Billingslea told lawmakers that he would "advocate for and respect" Congress' 2015 decision to ban torture.
Daryl Kimball, the director of the Arms Control Association, noted Billingslea's history as an aide to former Sen. Jesse Helms, a North Carolina Republican who was a vocal opponent of arms control deals. Kimball told CNN that Billingslea was "an odd choice" for the role of special negotiator
Last month, O'Brien said that the US was going to "confront the Russians... but at the same time I think we'll negotiate," while speaking at the Meridian International Center in Washington to ambassadors from around the world.
O'Brien gave that speech as the US and Russia hit the one-year deadline to extend the New START Treaty, the last legally binding agreement limiting their nuclear arsenals -- the world's largest.
President Donald Trump has previously criticized new START as a "bad deal" and the administration has demonstrated a pattern of rejecting international agreements, including two other nuclear pacts, the Intermediate Range Forces Treaty and the Iran nuclear deal.
Kimball said it may be a "suicide mission" if Trump wants Billingslea to deliver progress on a trilateral arms agreement, especially given that the Chinese have said multiple times that they're not interested in negotiations while there's such a disparity in the arsenal sizes between them and the US and Russia. | 3,831 |
Elwell were “all in agreement.”
AD
Daniel Wells, who sits on the board of the Coalition of Airline Pilots Associations, said Trump should not have been the person making the announcement.
“The president isn’t the right person to do it. Elwell or Chao should have made the announcement,” said Wells, whose 30,000-member group did not call for the planes to be grounded. “But it was Trump who said it. That tells you everything you need to know.”
AD
Boeing, which as late as Tuesday said publicly it saw no reason to ground the planes, announced soon after Trump made his move that it had recommended the grounding.
“We are supporting this proactive step out of an abundance of caution,” Muilenburg said in a statement. “We are doing everything we can to understand the cause of the accidents in partnership with the investigators, deploy safety enhancements and help ensure this does not happen again.”
AD
Boeing has a long history of developing close relationships with U.S. presidents. In 2015, President Obama told Seattle TV station KING-TV that he was probably the second-biggest global salesman for Boeing, which he called “an iconic company.”
The company donated $1 million each to the inaugural funds of Trump and Obama.
Boeing has an especially close relationship with the Trump administration, which has recruited several company executives for senior posts, including acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan.
AD
Muilenburg has courted Trump at the White House, at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J., and at Trump Tower in New York. Trump has twice visited Boeing facilities and praised the company’s aircraft.
“God bless Boeing,” Trump said after touring a company facility in Charleston, S.C., in February 2017.
“Great planes,” he told reporters while visiting a St. Louis facility in March 2018. “Incredible. Great company.”
He has also personally pitched the company’s planes in meetings with world leaders from Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore and other countries.
“Greatest commercial aircraft in the world,” he said in November 2017 while meeting with Japanese business leaders. He noted that after the United States, Japan is the largest owner of Boeing aircraft.
Trump also offered a dose of praise for the company as he made his announcement grounding its plane. | 3,832 |
Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Flipboard (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
The second season of Formula One on NBC Sports kicks off with the Rolex Australian Grand Prix.
NBCSN will feature live coverage of both practice sessions and race qualifying. The race itself is 1:30 a.m. ET on March 16. A full listing is below.
Practices, qualifying and the race are also streamed online, via NBC Sports Live Extra.
A special half-hour season preview show, Countdown to F1, will occur immediately before FP1, at 9 p.m. ET on Thursday, March 13.
Further programming is also planned around the Australian Grand Prix weekend, including a re-air of “Road to Ferrari” at 11 p.m. ET, and other bumper programming at 8:30 p.m. Thursday and 1 a.m. Friday.
Leigh Diffey returns to anchor the coverage with analysts David Hobbs and Steve Matchett, with Will Buxton live from Australia on the ground as pit reporter and insider.
Breakdown
Countdown to F1 – Thursday, March 13, 9 p.m. ET (NBCSN)
Practice 1 – Thursday, March 13, 9:30 p.m. ET (Live on NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra)
Road to Ferrari – Thursday, March 13, 11 p.m. ET (NBCSN)
Practice 2 – Friday, March 14, 1:30 a.m. ET (Live on NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra)
Qualifying – Saturday, March 15, 2 a.m. ET (Live on NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra)
Qualifying Encore – Saturday, March 15, 6 a.m. ET (NBCSN)
Grand Prix – Sunday, March 16, 1:30 a.m. ET (Live on NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra)
F1 Extra – Sunday, March 16, 4 a.m. ET (Live on NBCSN and NBC Sports Live Extra)
Grand Prix Encore – Sunday, March 16, 6:30 a.m. ET (NBCSN)
The remainder of the entire 2014 F1 on NBC Sports schedule will be released soon.
Follow @TonyDiZinno | 3,833 |
The common bed bug, once considered rare in developed countries, has been proliferating on every continent but Antarctica for the last two decades, making it a growing concern for travelers and others. With an eye toward eradicating the parasite, which feeds on the blood of humans and other animals, an international research team has successfully mapped the genome of Cimex lectularius to get a better understanding of its genetic makeup.
The findings -- by researchers from 36 institutions -- have been published in the journal Nature Communications.
"There's an explosion of insect genome sequencing right now," said Jack Werren, a professor of biology at the University of Rochester and a member of the research team. "But the bed bug is particularly interesting because it's a human parasite, a major pest, and has a unique biology."
In his part of the sequencing project, Werren discovered 805 possible instances of genes being transferred from bacteria within the bed bug to the insect's chromosomes -- a process called lateral gene transfer (LGT).
Chromosomes routinely break and are then repaired in organisms. The most common repair mechanism is called homologous recombination in which similar genetic material is used as a template in piecing the broken chromosome back together. But, periodically, the repairs go badly and foreign DNA is incorporated into the chromosomes -- in the case of C. lectularius, that DNA includes genetic material from bacteria.
"Usually, genes that are transferred from other organisms never become functional or are harmful to the host organism," said Werren. "In those cases, the transferred material is often lost by random processes -- such as mutation and deletion -- or removed during genetic selection."
One exception involves the transfer of a patatin-like gene from the Wolbachia bacteria. Patatin genes help organisms to store and cleave starch and lipid molecules. The gene, transferred from the intracellular bacterium Wolbachia to C. lectularius, appears to be functional in the male bed bug, but not the female.
"Because the inserted genes create unique genetic profiles in bed bugs, they have the potential of becoming effective targets for pest control," said Werren.
A great deal more work needs to be done before any eradication steps can be taken based on these results. While 805 candidate sites for LGT have been identified in the common bed bug, Werren says only six have been confirmed, so far, as actually having received genetic material from bacteria.
Of those 805 candidate sites, 459 have been attributed to the Arsenophonus bacteria, and 87 from Wolbachia, both of which are common bacterial associates of insects. | 3,834 |
Watch above: Saskatchewan Huskies women’s basketball team coach Lisa Thomaidis talks with Jack Haskins about her golden summer as bench boss of national team.
SASKATOON – It has been quite the summer for Lisa Thomaidis. The head coach of the Saskatchewan Huskies women’s basketball team is also the bench boss of Canada’s women’s national team, and the ladies took care of business this summer.
First they won gold on July 20 at the PanAm Games in Toronto, defeating the U.S. 81-73.
READ MORE: Canadian women beat the U.S. 81-73 to collect 1st-ever Pan Am basketball gold
Four weeks later, they took top spot at the FIBA America’s women’s basketball championship, downing Cuba 82-66 and going unbeaten in the tournament. The win earned Thomaidis and her squad a spot at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
Story continues below advertisement
READ MORE: Nurse scores 20 points as Canada beats Cuba 82-66 to earn berth at Rio Olympics
It was the perfect way to cap off what was a historic summer for the national team and Thomaidis was quick to credit her players and their character for capturing two major championships weeks apart.
“This national team is the best team that I have ever been a part of because of the buy-in, because of the character, because of the athletes and the people we were able to work with,” explained Thomaidis.
“We had the potential to do something great this summer and as it turns out, they were able to do something remarkable and amazing and history making.”
Leadership also played a role for her squad.
“I think the messaging from (the veteran players) saying how special it is and how hard it is to get to an Olympics really hit home with some of the younger players.”
READ MORE: Who is Team Canada basketball star Kia Nurse?
Securing the Olympic berth gives Thomaidis breathing room in preparing for the Olympics.
“To be able to secure this berth one year out is just such a great feeling for them … we can tailor our training so that we are peaking at the Olympics as opposed to having to peak for the Olympic qualifying tournament.”
Story continues below advertisement
Before that, she has a university team to coach this upcoming season and said the championships this summer will only help with exposure and recruiting.
Jack Haskins contributed to this story | 3,835 |
Simon Cowell has reportedly signed America's Got Talent finalist Courtney Hadwin to his Syco record label.
According to the Daily Star, the 58-year-old music mogul will meet with the 14-year-old rock singer to discuss a big money deal, after she missed out on the NBC talent show's top prize.
Courtney was tipped as the favourite to be crowned America's Got Talent champion during Wednesday night's final, but ended up finishing sixth with magician Shin Lim crowned champion.
Exciting: Simon Cowell has reportedly signed America's Got Talent finalist Courtney Hadwin to his Syco record label
After wowing the judges during the AGT final, Simon had nothing but kind words for her, gushing that if she didn't win the show he would sign her to his label.
He said: 'Every time you perform, you inspire people. You are more than a great singer, you are a trendsetter.'
Meanwhile PR guru Hayley Smith also told the publication the with the right platform, Courtney could earn a staggering'six-figure' salary.
MailOnline has contacted representatives for Simon Cowell and Syco for comment.
Protégé: According to The Daily Star, the 14-year-old teen rock singer will meet with the music mogul to discuss a big money record deal
This revelation comes after it was confirmed by AGT bosses on Thursday that Courtney will join series winner Shin Lim at his residency in Las Vegas.
The County Durham teen is already known to British viewers after she made it to the live finals of The Voice Kids last year.
She was tipped as the favourite to be crowned AGT winner ahead of the final on Wednesday, after judge Howie Mandel used his Golden Buzzer during auditions to advance her in the competition.
She performed with fellow English rockers The Struts on Wednesday during the live results show from the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood.
Sensational: Courtney wowed viewers in the States with her incredible rock vocals, and despite being favourite to win ended up finishing in sixth place
And despite the grand stage Courtney more than held her own while joining in on the group's first single Could Have Been Me as she sang along with front-man Luke Spiller.
She then unleashed her powerful vocals while joining the group in a duet of Take Another Little Piece Of My Heart.
But when it came down to announcing the top five, Courtney was pipped against fellow singer and father-of-six Michael Ketterer, but lost out on the viewer vote to finish in sixth place. | 3,836 |
.- In the wake of recent sexual abuse scandals throughout the U.S., the Diocese of Richmond has announced that it will no longer name buildings and institutions after clergymen and religious founders.
The new policy went into effect on Thursday, as six names were added to the diocese’s list of clergy with credible sexual abuse accusations against them. The diocese said the additional names reflect new information recently brought forward.
“Overcoming the tragedy of abuse is not just about holding accountable those who have committed abuses, it is also about seriously examining the role and complex legacies of individuals who should have done more to address the crisis in real time,” said Bishop Barry Knestout of Richmond.
“The continued honorific recognition of those individuals provides a barrier to healing for our survivors, and we want survivors to know that we welcome and support them in our diocese,” he said in a June 27 statement form the Diocese of Richmond.
Schools, institutions, and parish buildings will from now on only be named after saints, titles of Jesus and Mary, mysteries of the faith, and the locations where the ministries were founded.
Buildings and institutions may no longer be named after bishops, pastors, or the founders of organizations. Rooms and parts of buildings that are already named are exempt from the policy. The archdiocese clarified that the new rules do not prohibit the placement of plaques which recognize historical figures or donors.
The only building that will require a name changes is Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School in Virginia Beach, which will return to its former name: Catholic High School.
“While the name of the school is changing, our mission remains the same, based firmly on Catholic teaching,” said Kelly Lazarra, superintendent of the Diocesan Office of Catholic Schools. “Catholic High School is dedicated to nurturing intellect, shaping character and forming Christian values.”
This move follows a nearly 10-year campaign by resident Thomas Lee, who says he was abused by a priest in the diocese and that Bishop Walter Sullivan covered up the abuse and allowed the priest to continue in ministry.
“This will go a long way in the healing process,” said Lee, according to WTKR.
Bishop Knestout issued a renewed apology to all those affected by clerical sexual abuse.
“It is my hope and prayer that the policy change is another way to continue to assist survivors of abuse in their healing, especially those who have, in any way, experienced the failure of Church leadership to adequately address their needs and concerns,” he said. | 3,837 |
Federal records show that Wesley David Gilreath, 29, is only charged with possession of child pornography as of Thursday afternoon, but officials detailed other allegations against him. The FBI was investigating information that the defendant posted a “Montana Hunting Guide,” authorities said. They had received a tip that someone was posting “hunting guides” regarding Jewish and Muslim people, as well as a refugee center, facilities for the Bureau of Land Management, and the Montana National Guard, according to the complaint (h/t KDVR).
The investigation stemmed on an iPhone left forgotten on a bus, authorities said. The Boulder Police Department responded to a call on June 1st and found out that the phone contained images featuring the sexual abuse of children. Federal investigators turned up thousands of images featuring male and female victims as young as infants, according to the complaint.
Authorities determined this belonged to Gilreath by tracing down an associated phone number, and the email linked to the Apple account. In the course of this investigation, they determined that this suspect was interviewed by the FBI in Colorado last January regarding the aforementioned “hunting guide.”
Not only that, the ATF told the FBI that Gilreath was denied his attempted May 24 purchase of a firearm from a Boulder gun store.
“You’ve permanently ruined my ability to buy a gun in CO and other states,” Gilreath wrote his father on May 24, according to the complaint.
Magistrate Judge Scott T. Varholak decided on Tuesday to keep Gilreath detained. In so ruling, the court emphasized the amount of illicit images Gilreath allegedly possessed, that he had “numerous white supremacist documents and paraphernalia,” that his “hunters’ guide” contained information regarding mosques and synagogues, that he possessed other lists included the addresses of local mosques and synagogues, that he recently tried to buy a gun, that he had multiple failures to appear, that he had a contempt of court conviction, and that he had searched “for a book that is a guide to gaining children’s trust.”
Gilreath’s current attorney of record, federal public defender Laura Hayes Suelau, declined to comment when Law&Crime reached out for a statement. According to the website for Office of the Federal Public Defender in Colorado and Wyoming, the office has a policy of not commenting on cases.
Federal records show that a status conference is scheduled for August 30.
[Screengrab of Gilreath’s apartment complex via KDVR.]
Have a tip we should know? [email protected] | 3,838 |
That may be true of the National Geographic channel, Disney movies and children’s fairytales, but it is no longer true of the real world. The world contains 40,000 lions but, by way of contrast, there are around 1 billion domesticated pigs; 500,000 elephants and 1.5 billion domesticated cows; 50 million penguins and 20 billion chickens.
In 2009, there were 1.6 billion wild birds in Europe, counting all species together. That same year, the European meat and egg industry raised 1.9 billion chickens. Altogether, the domesticated animals of the world weigh about 700m tonnes, compared with 300m tonnes for humans, and fewer than 100m tonnes for large wild animals.
This is why the fate of farm animals is not an ethical side issue. It concerns the majority of Earth’s large creatures: tens of billions of sentient beings, each with a complex world of sensations and emotions, but which live and die on an industrial production line. Forty years ago, the moral philosopher Peter Singer published his canonical book Animal Liberation, which has done much to change people’s minds on this issue. Singer claimed that industrial farming is responsible for more pain and misery than all the wars of history put together.
The scientific study of animals has played a dismal role in this tragedy. The scientific community has used its growing knowledge of animals mainly to manipulate their lives more efficiently in the service of human industry. Yet this same knowledge has demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that farm animals are sentient beings, with intricate social relations and sophisticated psychological patterns. They may not be as intelligent as us, but they certainly know pain, fear and loneliness. They too can suffer, and they too can be happy.
It is high time we take these scientific findings to heart, because as human power keeps growing, our ability to harm or benefit other animals grows with it. For 4bn years, life on Earth was governed by natural selection. Now it is governed increasingly by human intelligent design. Biotechnology, nanotechnology and artificial intelligence will soon enable humans to reshape living beings in radical new ways, which will redefine the very meaning of life. When we come to design this brave new world, we should take into account the welfare of all sentient beings, and not just of Homo sapiens.
• Buy Animal Liberation by Peter Singer (Bodley Head) or Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (Vintage) now from bookshop.theguardian.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £10, online orders only. Phone orders min. p&p of £1.99. | 3,839 |
Jordan Graham has been superb for Wolves this season.
Wolverhampton Wanderers winger Jordan Graham has told the Football League Paper that he understood why he didn’t get a chance at Aston Villa.
Graham, 20, was born in Coventry and was snapped up by Aston Villa at the age of just seven, making his way up through the ranks like many other players.
The likes of Gareth Barry, Gary Cahill, Marc Albrighton, Boaz Myhill, Craig Gardner, Gabriel Agbonlahor and Daniel Sturridge all passed through the Aston Villa academy, with Villa developing young players well during the 2000’s.
In recent years, the conveyor belt appears to have slowed down somewhat, but some young players have left Villa and enjoyed success elsewhere.
Midfielder Samir Carruthers helped MK Dons win promotion to the Championship last season with some impressive displays, whilst Daniel Johnson has been sensational for Preston since leaving Villa for Deepdale almost a year ago.
However, the biggest talent to have slipped through Villa’s net appears to be winger Jordan Graham, who has been one of Wolverhampton Wanderers’ star players this season.
The 20-year-old wide man, who signed for Wolves in January 2015, has hit one goal and five assists last season, producing a number of outstanding displays on the flanks for Kenny Jackett’s men.
Now, Graham has been asked about just why he left Villa, and told The Football League Paper that after doing everything he could to earn a first-team place, he simply decided it was time to go – but given Villa’s recent struggles, understands why they didn’t throw him into Premier League action.
“When me and Sammy and DJ were there, I don’t think they believed in us enough to throw us in the deep end,” said Graham. “It’s not been easy for them. For the last five years or so, Villa have been down there at the bottom of the table, so putting young kids in isn’t what the fans really want and not the first thing on the manager’s mind.”
“We got to the stage where we realised we couldn’t do any more than we had been doing and that the best thing for all of us was to move on – and we’ve all reaped the benefits,” he added.
Have Villa made a mistake over Jordan Graham?
In other news, Mourinho suggests one Tottenham player simply wasn't doing enough against Everton | 3,840 |
In the aftermath of the Euro 2016 fan violence between supporters of the Russian and English teams, moments ago UEFA announced that it has given Russia a suspended disqualification from the tournament, which means the Russian team will be expelled from the tournament in case of repeated violence. The Russian soccer federation will also be fined €150,000.
#BREAKING Football: Russia given'suspended disqualification' from Euro 2016 over crowd trouble — AFP news agency (@AFP) June 14, 2016
Oddly enough, as the NYT's Sam Borden reports, England, whose fans were also involved in the altrecation, is not punished and was not investigated because "UEFA saw English fans as victims in the in-stadium violence." In other words, this may be the first time in soccer hooliganism history when English fans were on the receiving end. This punishment came from UEFA Disciplinary Comm. UEFA Executive Committee, a different body, can still punish further.
The silver lining for Russian fans: the threat of DQ is related to any more incidents "inside the stadium." Fighting on streets doesn't count.
As Borden notes, "the acid test is this: If one flare goes off in the Russian section tomorrow v Slovakia, is Russia bounced?" The answer: most likely yes, as UEFA clearly wants to send a message to not just football holligans, but also to Russia.
More importantly, at this point, these incidents, and even an ejection, have no bearing on Russia hosting the World Cup in 2018 as UEFA isn't FIFA, which may also explain the bias in favor of UK fans.
* * *
Meanwhile, in what may be an extreme sign of keeping up with self-incriminating technology, the Talking Baws blog reports that a Russian hooligan wore a GoPro camera as he went on a rampage around Marseille and went on to publish footage of violent attacks on English fans. The video was published on YouTube earlier today and gives further insight into the unsavoury scenes which marred the first few days of Euro 2016.
It appears that the camera is strapped to his chest and drops down to face his feet for the majority of the recording while he runs around the streets of Marseille with hundreds of fellow Russian hooligans looking for English supporters. At several points the man can be seen attacking men on the ground and regularly throws objects at those he’s attacking.
What makes it particularly surprising is the way the hooligans run their way through several battles looking for their next target and at no point throughout the six-minute video do they run into French police.
| 3,841 |
claimed by both China and Japan—Diaoyu to the Chinese, Senkaku to the Japanese—frequently leads to scrambled fighter jets. At a time when over half of Chinese believe that military conflict with Japan is nearing, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe are taking small but important steps to cool down the conflict over the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands and the two nations’ bloody history.
Even though China is still years behind the US and Russia in terms of aerospace engineering, should the US be worried about the coming years of technological development for the Chinese military? Are the US and China partners or competitors?
The answer is a bit of both. In June, China participated in the world’s largest naval exercises, which were hosted by Washington. Subsequently, China joined the US and Australia for joint military exercises in October. At the same time, the 2014 National Intelligence Strategy, which is issued by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, states that “China has an interest in a stable East Asia,” which coincides with American interests, but it “remains opaque about its strategic intentions and is of concern due to its military modernization.”
The J-31 is just one manifestation of China’s ambitions. The People’s Republic is already an economic powerhouse, so it is increasing its geopolitical reach by extending its influence in Africa, as well as East and Southeast Asia. The Chinese government says it doesn’t meddle in the affairs of other nations, but when it sells weapons—warplanes, small arms, missiles—to Pakistan, South Sudan, Iran, and many others, they are doing exactly that. The Obama administration’s as yet ineffectual “Pacific pivot” has only spurred the Chinese desire to develop new military technology, and has given rhetorical fuel to the more bellicose faction within the People’s Liberation Army to justify massive resources poured into the development of new firepower.
It’s impossible to gauge essential qualities that determine the success of a fighter jet, like pilot training and deployment capabilities from air shows. But since China’s J-31 and America’s F-35 are the only stealth jets that can be carrier-based, there is a sense of prestige in Zhuhai. Pride shone through the eyes of the air show’s visitors and children toted models of the PLA’s aircraft. As five female pilots of the PLA Air Force took to the sky, a little girl in the crowd said, “That’s what I want to be when I grow up.” | 3,842 |
Just a week before paying $2 billion to buy Oculus VR--maker of the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset--Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg tried out Sony's own virtual reality headset, Project Morpheus, it has been revealed.
PlayStation marketing executive Guy Longworth said today during a Games Marketing Summit 2014 session that he remembers Zuckerberg asking, "Can I have a tech demo?" for Project Morpheus. Longworth said he wondered why, at the time, Zuckerberg might want to see Sony's headset.
Now, it appears Zuckerberg wanted to check in on the rival to Oculus Rift to make sure he was making the right decision in buying Oculus VR.
"I wish he bought ours," Longworth said with a smile, referencing Facebook's surprise purchase of Oculus VR, which was approved today by the Federal Trade Commission, according to a Reuters report. "All the folks at Oculus have got big smiles on today."
Just because Facebook chose Oculus Rift over Project Morpheus, it doesn't mean that Sony has become soured on the prospects for virtual reality. Not at all, according to Longworth.
"If you think about VR, not just in terms of gaming, I think wearable technology is a huge trend that's going to continue," he said. "I think that being able to have experiences that are truly deep and immersive...that it somehow makes you feel you are there...is something that people want. If you could really deliver that in the future, that would be huge."
Ubisoft senior vice president of sales and marketing, Tony Key, also spoke during the panel. He said virtual reality technology like Oculus Rift or Project Morpheus represents a "breakthrough, technologically speaking," but explained that he believes it won't take off unless the content is there.
"How many people are willing to put this thing on their head? It all depends on the content," Key said. "It's going to be content-driven in the end whether these things are successful or not." Key went on to say that he tried Oculus Rift and it made him sick.
Finally, head of product planning for Xbox, Albert Penello, offered some quick thoughts on virtual reality before the panel came to an abrupt end. He said "I think [VR is] great," going on to note that he gets the same feeling using VR today that he did when he first tried Kinect in 2008. In short, he said he's excited about the future for VR, but said there are still hurdles to overcome. Microsoft is reportedly working on its own VR/AR technology, and even paid as much as $150 million to acquire assets related to wearable technology earlier this year. | 3,843 |
This one takes a little explaining—but, if you work through it, it’s pretty ridiculous:
Bill Browder is a U.S.-born British citizen whose Moscow-based investment company was robbed of $230 million over a decade ago by well-connected Russians via a scheme that involved intimidation and tax fraud.
Sergei Magnitsky was a lawyer who worked for Browder and helped publicize the fraud/theft. He died in a Russian jail in 2008 under very suspicious circumstances.
The Magnitsky Act is a U.S. law passed in 2012 that sanctions Russian individuals believed to be involved in Magnitsky’s death and other human rights crimes. Browder is the most prominent public advocate of the law, which prohibits sanctioned individuals from using the U.S. banking system.
The government of Russia retaliated against the Magnitsky Act by forbidding U.S. parents from adopting Russian orphans. This adoption ban was the ostensible subject of the infamous July 2016 meeting between Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner, and several Russian and Russia-affiliated individuals who have been closely involved in the country’s efforts to smear Browder’s reputation and overturn the Magnitsky Act.
That brings us to last week, when Canada passed its own version of the Magnitsky Act. Russia, in an apparent act of retaliation, formally notified Interpol that Browder is wanted for Magnitsky’s murder—an accusation that seems ridiculous on its face and is indeed premised on what the New York Times describes as almost farcically suspect evidence. More concerningly, the U.S. has also apparently revoked Browder’s visa—a fact first reported by National Review and confirmed on Twitter by Browder himself:
Not only did Putin add me to the Interpol list, but the US simultaneously revoked my visa. @jaynordlinger explains https://t.co/d8KskJ5CTK — Bill Browder (@Billbrowder) October 22, 2017
Yes. My US Global Entry was revoked on the same day and United wouldn’t let me board a flight to US b/c of visa problems https://t.co/RwcOAUtmdL — Bill Browder (@Billbrowder) October 23, 2017
The State Department doesn’t appear to have yet commented on the situation; I’ve put in a request for more information and will update this post when and if they respond. (Update, Oct. 24: Browder’s visa status has been returned to normal.) | 3,844 |
U.S. citizen, and I was worried about the implications for the U.S. government’s support of Ukraine. [2] I realized that if Ukraine pursued an investigation into the Bidens and Burisma, it would likely be interpreted as a partisan play which would undoubtedly result in Ukraine losing the bipartisan support it has thus far maintained. This would all undermine U.S. national security. Following the call, I again reported my concerns to NSC’s lead counsel.” [snip] It is correct that Vindman has “firsthand knowledge” of the call. However, his personal knowledge of that call is not important. Why not? Because the president released the transcript and we know what was said. In fact, Vindman’s prepared statement indicates he believes that the released transcript is accurate… claimed. Although some left-leaning media outlets now claim the transcript has omissions and is not accurate, Vindman did not make that claim or dispute the accuracy of the transcript. If he later changes course and claims, contrary to his prepared statement, that the transcript is not accurate, then such a shift would raise obvious credibility issues. But that discussion is for another day, if it happens.
I leave to others the question of the propriety of a military officer testifying against the president whose opinion contradicts his own.
Tim Morrison
Finally, there was witness Tim Morrison, an NSC official who actually was on the call, affirms the transcript of it released by the White House is accurate, and who does not confuse having an office in the White House with his being the President. He testified that there was nothing in the call that was illegal or corrupt.
So here we are, an inquiry based on hearsay by a person who’s a longtime Democratic operative, who clearly was a Brennan stooge on the NSC and who confected this with buddies on Schiff’s staff. Two other people who worked in the White House’s NSC – Vindman and Morrison -- were on the call. Both agree that the transcript released by the White house was accurate. The call transcript, of course, substantially undercuts the Schiff parody and Ciaramella’s creative version of it. One man’s view that it was improper -- contrary to what surely had been the advice given the president by his better-informed legal counsel -- contradicts Morrison’s view that there was nothing illegal or improper about it.
To be blunt about it, the “evidence” Schiff has elicited is as weak as his party’s candidates to replace Trump. | 3,845 |
CAPE CORAL, Fla. – Gov. Ron DeSantis has announced that he will issue an executive order eliminating Common Core education standards from Florida schools.
DeSantis wants to streamline standardized testing, as well as increase the rate of literacy in schools.
"One of the things we would constantly hear about on the campaign trail is frustration from parents with Common Core and the testing," DeSantis said.
The Common Core standards cover mathematics and arts & literacy. The standards cover what students should know at the end of each grade level.
Parents have long argued against Common Core, complaining guidelines were too rigid with too much testing for students.
"When you complained about Common Core, I hear you. I told you I would do something about it, and today we're acting to bring those promises into reality," DeSantis said.
Broward County Public Schools Superintendent Robert Runcie said he welcomes the change.
"I welcome the opportunity to work with the governor and the commissioner of Education on revising standards and regulations to give local districts greater flexibility on curriculum and testing," Runcie said in a statement. "We need fundamental reforms in public education that will give our teachers the freedom they need to better engage students. It is time to reduce our reliance on a testing culture that is more about ranking students on their potential, when our focus should be more on developing their potential."
Meanwhile, at about the time of the announcement, Miami-Dade County Public Schools leaders at a meeting gave a collective if tempered "Hallelujah."
"There's balance between appropriate standards and appropriate assessment of tests. When you over-test, you are doing harm to both teachers and students," Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said.
"Teachers don't want to teach to a test. Teachers want to make sure they instill the knowledge in the students to get them ready for the real world," said Karla Hernandez, of United Teachers of Dade.
One School Board member said rising school grades touted under Common Core may be window dressing.
"Even some of our A schools will not show you that our children are proficient," Dorothy Bendross-Mindingall said.
Once Florida's new education commissioner and department comes up with a new roadmap, the order goes to the legislature.
"It's very easy to say, 'We're going to come in and reduce testing.' But when you start looking into the intricate parts of the state system -- the third largest state in the union -- it's complicated," State Sen. Manny Diaz Jr. R-Hialeah Gardens, said. | 3,846 |
evident in Karachi, where Bahria Town has illegally appropriated land on a massive scale, bulldozing villages and agricultural lands to make way for the new city — to the extent that, in 2018, Pakistan’s Supreme Court ordered a halt on all further construction until landowners were properly compensated. Lavasa has also been accused of acquiring land through coercion, and of causing environmental damage through quarrying.
Essentially, this is about a lack of accountability — and it applies just as much to the residents of these new cities and neighborhoods as it does to those who were displaced to make room for them. In a 2013 article for Open Democracy about Lavasa, Persis Taraporevala, a researcher at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi, warned: “The company has sweeping rights over nearly all aspects of the life of the residents. It has the right to evict, to tax, to determine the use and design of land, to change the governing body, and to change the rules while controlling the rights of people to object to these processes.”
This came sharply into view for the first wave of Bahria Town residents when Pakistan’s Supreme Court issued its construction halt order in November 2018, which led to the company taking a big financial hit. Suddenly, those reliable electricity and water supplies were switched off. Then, this month, the Supreme Court announced it would accept Malik Riaz’s offer of 406 billion Pakistani rupees ($2.89 billion) to “settle the case” and allow construction to resume. Depending on your viewpoint, this is either a shocking example of crony capitalism in which an extraordinarily rich man could essentially pay to circumvent the law — or a fair decision to safeguard the investment of the thousands of ordinary people who had already spent huge amounts of money to purchase properties in Bahria Town.
When the company hits hard times, the residents do too, but there’s no way to vote to un-privatize Bahria Town. When urban planning becomes the preserve of corporate interests, the usual rules go out of the window.
This article by Samira Shackle was originally published on How We Get To Next, a non-profit project interested in exploring the intersections between science, technology and culture, and how those things are changing the future. Follow them on Twitter like them on Facebook, and subscribe to their newsletter.
TNW Conference 2019 is coming! Check out our glorious new location, inspiring line-up of speakers and activities, and how to be a part of this annual tech bonanza by clicking here.
Read next: Learn to use Adobe's flagship design programs for less than $40 | 3,847 |
The head of Cape Breton's Medical Staff Association is warning of an "extraordinary" number of emergency department closures next month at the hospital in Glace Bay, N.S.
Dr. Margaret Fraser said the ER will be closed every night in May and during 10 day shifts as well. There aren't enough doctors to cover the shifts.
Fraser said recently the department has been closed in the evening more than normal.
"But usually we've been able to keep Glace Bay open more consistently than this," she said. "So this represents an extraordinary number of closures for this area."
Fraser said the emergency department at the Northside General Hospital in North Sydney, which is not open at night, will be closed for 15 of the 31 days in May.
Fewer doctors available to work
Greg Boone, a spokesperson with the Nova Scotia Health Authority, said the schedules are preliminary, and more shifts will likely be filled by next month.
Fraser, though, said it's becoming increasingly difficult to find doctors willing to take on the ER shifts.
"We've lost several family physicians who were doing part-time emergency medicine and part-time family medicine. They found it difficult to balance their family practice and their home life," she said.
Dr. Margaret Fraser, president of the Cape Breton Medical Staff Association. (Nic Meloney/CBC)
Fraser added another doctor has recently retired, and one resigned.
The emergency department closures are tough on people in the outlying communities who don't have transportation to get to the regional emergency department in Sydney, and must rely on family or call an ambulance, Fraser said.
She said the closures also result in a larger volume of patients at the regional ER, and can stretch that facility "past its limits".
'It was awful'
Fraser said, during one shift recently, the Sydney emergency department was so crowded there were people "in every conceivable hallway space.
"We even had one person parked under the handout sheets that we give to patients. In order to get to all of those, you had to reach across this poor woman and disturb her. It was awful."
Fraser said the province must do more to attract more physicians, and support them once they arrive.
Boone said the Health Authority is aware of the problems created by the closure of smaller emergency rooms and has protocols in place at the regional emergency department to try to alleviate the overcrowding.
He said the authority is continually looking for family physicians willing to take on ER shifts, in addition to trying to recruit new doctors. | 3,848 |
made the change. It was not the politicians or the military that removed two regimes. It is you, the people. The greatness of the Egyptian will have been evidently witnessed. However, we need to recognize that we are destined to do all in our powers to overcome future difficulties. The making of the future is a joint effort. It is a contract between the ruler and the people where the ruler is responsible before God and the people for his part and the people also have a commitment to work hard and show patience. A ruler cannot succeed alone … it takes the joint effort of both the ruler and the people to succeed.
The whole Egyptian people know that big victories can be attained for they have done that before. Yet, our will and desire to achieve victory have to couple with hard work. The abilities and talents of 7,000 years have to ally with hard work.
It is the hard, sincere and patriotic work that makes successful countries.
Every Egyptian able to work will be required to exert real efforts and I will be the first to spare no pains for a future well-earned by Egypt. This is the time to rally for the sake of our country.
Openness and clarity
With complete openness and under the circumstances that you all know, I am not going to launch a traditional presidential campaign. However, it is your right to share my vision of the future. This will be in a clear platform that seeks a modern and democratic Egypt once the High Electoral Commission allows for that. Yet, if you may, I will do that with no extravagance neither in words, funds or traditional practices for the circumstances are not in our favour.
My fellow citizens
We are threatened by the terrorists … by parties who seek the destruction of our life, safety and security. It is true this is my last day in uniform but I will fight every day for Egypt free of fear and terror … not only Egypt but the whole region… I repeat what I have said before "we'd rather die before Egyptians are terrorized".
Finally, I will speak about hope... hope that is the outcome of hard work … hope that is the security and stability. Hope is the dream to usher Egypt to its leading place in the world. It is the dream to restore its strength, power and influence and teach the world as it did before.
I cannot make miracles. Rather, I propose hard work and self-denial. And know that if I am granted the honour of the leadership, I promise that we together, leadership and people, can achieve stability, safety and hope for Egypt.
God bless Egypt and its glorious people. Thank you." | 3,849 |
New Jersey's gas crunch in the wake of Hurricane Sandy has become so severe that state officials are implementing gas rationing for passenger vehicles in the counties hardest hit by the storm.
Gov. Chris Christie signed an executive order today announcing a state of energy emergency and instituting gas rationing for the purchase of fuel by motorists in 12 counties, starting Saturday at noon.
Calling the fuel supply in the state a "shortage" that could endanger public health, safety and welfare, the rationing will take place in Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Middlesex, Morris, Monmouth, Passaic, Somerset, Sussex, Union and Warren counties.
"As New Jerseyans continue the long process of recovering from Hurricane Sandy, it's imperative that our families have secure, reliable access to essential supplies like fuel," said Christie in a statement issued just before 8 p.m. He cited the long lines and otherwise disorderly sales of fuel following Hurricane Sandy.
READ THE FULL EXECUTIVE ORDER HERE
According to the order, all retail gasoline dealers are required to sell fuel for use in a passenger vehicle according to the last number appearing on a vehicle's license plate.
Vehicles with license plates, the last number of which is an odd number, can fill up at stations in these counties only on odd-numbered days of the month, the order said.
Vehicles with license plates, the last number of which is an even number, can fill up only on even-numbered days.
Zero is considered an even number.
The order does not apply to the purchase of fuel by individuals with gas canisters. Walk-ups are still permitted.
All license plates not displaying a number, such as vanity plates, are considered odd, and should fill up on odd numbered days of the month, the order said.
The ration order will remain in effect for as long as the limited declared state of energy emergency is in effect.
"I encourage all New Jerseyans to abide by this system – motorists and retail dealers alike – to ease wait times and improve access for everyone," said Attorney General Jeffery S. Chiesa. "Those who choose to disregard this order will be prosecuted to the fullest extent permitted under the Governor’s state of emergency authority."
Related coverage:
• Belleville votes to ration gasoline after Hurricane Sandy
• Sandy update: Gas lines still hours long, more than 1M still without power
• Hurricane Sandy gas lines: Twitter updates from across N.J.
• Live gas blog: Hurricane Sandy causes massive lines at N.J. gas stations | 3,850 |
, Borodich is convinced.
CBDC or Central Bank Digital Currencies
CBDCs, or national digital currencies, are digital assets issued and controlled by the government regulator, usually the Central Bank. They are exactly opposite to decentralized cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin in that they represent fiat money in digital form. Each CBDC digital note is a digital equivalent of an actual paper note with its face value and serial number, which exists in digital form and is protected from forgery by Universa Blockchain technologies.
CBDC take the best of both worlds, combining the convenience and security of digital money with the proven functionality of national currencies regulated and backed by the country’s reserves.
According to Bank for International Settlements (BIS) report for 2019, as many as 70% of Central Banks worldwide started preparation to CBDC migration.
First Test Transaction
With the participation of the head of the Central Bank of Tunisia Marouane El Abassi and a representative of the International Monetary Fund, the participants in the presentation carried out a symbolic operation to transfer one U-Dinar from one account to another, thus starting the system. In a test form, it will work for several months, after which it will receive new functions and the plan is for it to be launched in a large numbers of stores, cafes and restaurants.
Future plans include for two thousand kiosks to be placed in Tunisia, where citizens can replenish their digital wallet. At the initial stage, they will pay via the browser on the smartphone, and later a mobile application will be available. They will be able to send digital money or make a purchase by scanning a QR code.
Heads of Central Banks and Universa Founder Alexander Borodich
Universa Expansion Plans
According to Universa, Tunisia is the first country to launch the U-Dinar, but could be quickly followed by other countries, including countries of Southeast Asia (Malaysia and the Philippines), Latin America (Argentina and Brazil) and China. With the latter, the Russian company is unlikely to be able to conclude a contract – the Celestial Empire will prefer to create its own blockchain platform by copying technology, Borodich believes. But he looks forward to working with Latin American and Maghreb countries.
According to CEO of Universa, electronic money will greatly change the principles of private banks. Physically, all the money will remain in the Central Bank, and banks will become a kind of operators, providing only services and competing for the quality of services. And, since banks cease to fulfill the function of storing money, their possible bankruptcy also ceases to be dangerous for customers. | 3,851 |
The US Air Force has called for all units to stand down for a day in response to rising suicide rates in the ranks. In a letter to commanders, general David Goldfein, the USAF chief of staff, ordered a day-long “operational pause” for every unit to discuss the issue and take stock of its members’ mental health. Commanders must pick a day to stand down during the next six weeks.
Goldfein reportedly described suicide as “an adversary that is killing more of our airmen than any enemy on the planet.” His letter stated that there had been 78 deaths by suicide among Air Force members in 2019. That number has since hit 79, according to Brian Everstine of Air Force Magazine, who first reported the news of the stand-down order.
“That’s 28 more than this time last year,” chief master sergeant Kaleth Wright said in a video distributed to commanders, referencing the earlier tally of 78 deaths. “If we don’t do something, we could lose 150, 160 airmen in 2019. We can’t let this keep happening.”
The Air Force normally reports about 100 deaths by suicide annually.
Wright explained that Goldfein had “directed this resilience tactical pause, a break in the daily grind, so that we can focus on our airmen and their well-being.”
He maintained, however, that the day-long stand down is not a “one-day effort,” but rather the beginning of a new, more open dialogue between enlisted service members and their superiors.
“Most importantly, keep this as a primary focus beyond this pause,” Wright said in the video. “Make every single airman count, every single day. You know, someone right now, in your organization, is struggling.”
Last year, the service branch stood down for a day to focus on safety after a number of fatal plane crashes.
It is difficult to pinpoint specific reasons for the uptick in deaths by suicide within the Air Force, Wright told Air Force Magazine’s Bridenstine. Seven members of the New York City Police Department have died by suicide so far this year, and mental health issues, including cases that have resulted in deaths by suicide, continue to affect US Customs and Border Protection officers.
Approximately 129 Americans die from suicide each day. If you or someone you know is in crisis, you can call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, 24/7, for confidential support at 1-800-273-8255. | 3,852 |
YouTube announced it is changing the attribution criteria for TrueView for action video ads. TrueView for action ads are designed for performance advertisers and feature call-to-action banners at the base of the video ads.
What’s changing? There are two key attribution points that are changing:
YouTube will now count an ‘Engagement’ whenever a user clicks or watches 10 seconds or more of a TrueView for action ad when using maximize conversions or target CPA bidding. That’s a change from 30 seconds.
of a TrueView for action ad when using maximize conversions or target CPA bidding. That’s a change from 30 seconds. A ‘Conversion’ will be counted, by default, when a user takes action on an ad within 3 days of an ‘Engagement.’ If you want this changed, you will have to ask your Google rep to customize this time frame. That’s a change from 30 days.
of an ‘Engagement.’ If you want this changed, you will have to ask your Google rep to customize this time frame. That’s a change from 30 days. For users who click your ad, YouTube will still attribute conversions according to the conversion window you have set (the default is 30 days).
Why the change? YouTube says it is changing the default attribution window from 30 seconds and 30 days to 10 seconds and 3 days to better reflect “the relationship between video ad exposure and conversions.”
Nicky Rettke, YouTube group product manager, wrote, “We conducted large-scale experiments to analyze the incremental conversion volume driven by TrueView for action ads across a broad range of advertiser industries and conversion types.”
What it means for advertisers? The shorter engagement-to-conversion window will mean faster ramp up times for target CPA campaigns and more current reporting, says Google.
Advertisers are charged on an engagement basis for TrueView ads, but because TrueView for action campaigns that use Target CPA and Maximize Conversions, are optimized to drive the most conversions at the target price set by the advertiser, they will continue to be billed on an impression basis. Advertisers will need to monitor their TrueView for action campaigns to understand the impact of this change on their budgets and performance.
This story first appeared on Search Engine Land. For more on search marketing and SEO, click here.
Correction: This story originally stated that advertisers would be charged per engagement. This change only applies to campaigns using Smart Bidding, so they will be charged based on impression. | 3,853 |
NEW DELHI: Sale of packaged water and soft drinks above MRP (Maximum Retail Price) — including at airports, multiplexes and hotels — will attract stringent penal actions like fines and jail term, Consumer Affairs Minister Ram Vilas Paswan said today."Charging above MRP is violation of the law. But we still see at airports, multiplex and hotels, that packaged water is sold at more than the MRP. This needs to be stopped," Paswan said here.He said packaged drinking water is sold at 10-20 per cent higher rates at these places, while in some cases, MRP is not even written on the water bottle and "soft drinks like Coca Cola are sold in loose at an increased rate"."We have sufficient powers to take action against violators and we will take if consumers file complaints in this regard. There is penalty and even jail term for violators," Paswan said on the sidelines of an event.Speaking at an event commemorating 47th World's Standards Day with theme of 'Standards build trust', the Minister said the 'ISI' quality certification mark is mandatory for packaged water bottles and this needs to be implemented in true spirit in the interest of consumers.Recently, the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) had imposed a penalty on a multiplex for selling water above MRP, he said adding that there is a need to create more awareness about consumer rights on this."Despite this judgement, water is still continued to be sold above MRP in multiplexes and airports. So, consumers need to be more aware and file complaints. If there is no complaint, how can we take action?" he said.Talking about standards, the Minister said the government's 'Make in India' programme cannot be successful unless domestic products/services follow the standards of international level.Calling for building trust among consumers about Indian standards, he said, "We go abroad and buy branded clothes happily when we see the label 'Made in US'. The moment we see 'Made in India' label, we don't buy as there is lack of trust among consumers."This perception need to be changed by creating awareness among consumers by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), which is the nodal agency for making standards, he said.Stating that BIS makes standards for betterment of both industry and also to protect consumers, Minister of State for Consumer Affairs C R Choudhary said: "I would like to request the industry to follow standards strictly because those will survive who will provide best goods/services to consumers."More than 35 countries are adopting Indian standards and BIS is working on having unified standards for SAARC nations, he added. | 3,854 |
As it happens almost every year, Lenovo announced the new versions of the ThinkPad T series. T480 and T580 are simple updates of their predecessors, but the ThinkPad T480s is a complete redesign compared with the T470s.
Reviews, News, CPU, GPU, Articles, Columns, Other "or" search relation. 5G, Accessory, AMD, Android, Apple, ARM, Audio, Bay Trail, Business, Cannon Lake, Charts, Chinese Tech, Chromebook, Coffee Lake, Comet Lake, Console, Convertible / 2-in-1, Cryptocurrency, Cyberlaw, Deal, Desktop, Fail, Foldable, Gadget, Galaxy Note, Galaxy S, Gamecheck, Gaming, Geforce, Google Nexus / Pixel, How To, Ice Lake, Internet of Things (IoT), iOS, iPad Pro, iPhone, Kaby Lake, Lakefield, Laptop, Launch, Linux / Unix, MacBook, Mini PC, Monitor, MSI, OnePlus, Opinion, Phablet, Project Athena, Renoir, Review Snippet, Rocket Lake, Rumor, Ryzen (Zen), Security, Smart Home, Smartphone, Smartwatch, Software, Storage, Tablet, ThinkPad, Thunderbolt, Tiger Lake, Touchscreen, Ultrabook, Virtual Reality (VR) / Augmented Reality (AR), Wearable, Whiskey Lake, Windows, Workstation, XPS, Zen 3 (Vermeer) Ticker
The ThinkPad T series is a true mainstay of the Notebook market since the year 2000. Since then, the traditional line of business-laptops is updated almost every year. Sometimes its just a small update, sometimes its a complete redesign. For 2018, the manufacturer Lenovo does both: The T480s gets a new design, while the T480 and T580 are just updates of their predecessors T470 and T570.
One new feature is present on all new T series notebooks of the year 2018: The camera-shutter for the 720p webcam, dubbed "ThinkShutter", which is supposed to make the often seen post-it-note over the webcam redundant.
Lenovo ThinkPad T480s
When you see the T480s, one could easily come to the conclusion: Redesign? Doesn't look very different compared with the Thinkpad T470s. Some detail-changes of course are easily spotted such as the power-button, which was shifted to a different position – or the slightly different touchpad. But the weight is barely lower and the T480s is practically the same in thickness and size as the T470s. | 3,855 |
Brazil crisis: Rio police fire on rioters from church Published duration 6 December 2016
image copyright AP image caption Demonstrators set up road blocks out the Rio state assembly
Roman Catholic authorities in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro have promised an inquiry after riot police fired rubber bullets from a church.
Police clashed with anti-austerity demonstrators in the city amid a budget crisis in the state.
Many protesters were public workers who have not been paid in months.
Police used tear gas and stun grenades during the unrest near the state assembly building, where spending cuts were being debated.
Legislators are discussing steps to cover a huge deficit in the city's state budget.
Hundreds of public sector workers had gathered outside the assembly building to protest against the measures.
image copyright EPA image caption Police fired on protesters from inside a church
image copyright AP image caption Fencing was kicked down to build a barricade
image copyright Getty Images image caption Several protesters were injured in the clashes
During the clashes, police officers entered a nearby church and fired rubber bullets from a window.
The Rio diocese protested against this "invasion" and said it would investigate.
Several people - both demonstrators and police - were injured.
'Clinging to their luxuries'
Speaking during the protests, a spokesman for the Oil Workers' Union in Rio, Ronaldo Moreno, said people were angry at those in power.
"As you can see here in Brazil, we have thieves coming and going in government, in the state government, in the federal government, in congress," he told the Associated Press.
"So the people can't stand it anymore. What is happening today is a fight by public workers but it is a fight by everyone. A fight against this corruption, these criminals, these politicians who are in the legislative assembly and don't want to let go. They only vote against the people. They don't want to get rid of their luxuries."
A number of protests have been held outside the assembly in recent weeks against the planned budget cuts, but Tuesday's events has been the most violent so far, the BBC's Julia Carneiro reports from Rio.
Last month the federal government froze Rio's accounts, ordering the state to pay unpaid debt amounting to millions of dollars.
The state declared a financial emergency ahead of the Rio Olympics earlier this year, saying it did not have the funds to provide security for the Games and to finish a metro line.
image copyright Reuters image caption Traffic cones...
image copyright AP image caption...and stones were hurled by protesters | 3,856 |
of publicly funded art, the censors have won. Congress’s response to the “culture wars” was to require the NEA to “take into consideration general standards of decency and respect for the diverse beliefs and values of the American public” in making arts funding decisions. The Supreme Court upheld that requirement. Public arts institutions learned that political controversy could jeopardize their financial support, and publicly funded arts have never been the same. When the National Portrait Gallery put on “Hide/Seek,” it made sure to finance it only with private donations, undoubtedly recognizing that it might stir protest. The show’s private funding was insufficient, however, to steel the Smithsonian when it faced criticism. (And now one of the largest private funders, the Andy Warhol Foundation, has threatened to cut off its financial support because the museum caved to pressure).
But while the recent censorship of Wojnarowicz’s work recalls what happened in the early 1990s, the differences are also instructive. When the Corcoran closed the Mapplethorpe show and the NEA revoked Karen Finley’s funding, widespread public outcry followed. The Smithsonian’s decision to remove Wojnarowicz’s video, by contrast, has attracted comparatively little attention. We have come to expect timidity in public arts institutions. In some sense, the surprise is not that the Smithsonian removed the video, but that it put on “Hide/Seek” in the first place.
The muted public response to the current controversy points in two different directions. On the one hand, homosexual self-expression is substantially more accepted today than it was twenty years ago. David would, I think, be surprised and gratified by the changes wrought in American culture. Those changes have come about largely because David and others like him have been willing to speak out from the margins of our society, even as they found themselves hated by people they did not know simply because they were brave enough to express their sexual identities. On the other hand, the fundamentalist censorial strain remains a profound force in American society, reflected today in the populist and often intolerant undertones of the religious right and the Tea Party. And one thing has remained a disappointing constant—public institutions’ willingness to cave on issues of public controversy. Like so many other wars, the culture wars of the 1980s have left their traces on America’s character.
Owing to an editorial error, an earlier version of this post stated that William Donoghue had demanded that the Smithsonian take down the piece by Wojnarowicz. This was not the case. | 3,857 |
From author T.A. Frank, an often-reasonable liberal, in the often-unreasonable pages of Vanity Fair:
We’ve reached a strange place. After the Republican Party’s panic-stricken, months-long search to find alternatives to Donald Trump—even taking aim at its own front-runner in Tuesday’s rebuttal to the State of the Union address—the buyer keeps saying the same thing: Yeah, the one you hate most? I’ll take him. Barring unexpected death, the G.O.P. primaries must end in either a Trump victory or a Trump defeat. It’s a bit like contemplating whether or not there’s life somewhere in outer space. Either possibility is hard to grasp. Yet one must be true.
The intellectual groundwork for Trump’s campaign, and the Republican civil war that he has unleashed, was laid without much notice in an unlikely place. In the summer of 2013, Alabama senator Jeff Sessions noted that passing immigration reform, at least as Washington understood the term, would be an unmitigated disaster. “Now is the time to speak directly to the real and legitimate concerns of millions of hurting Americans whose wages have declined and whose job prospects have grown only bleaker,” he wrote in a memo to his colleagues. “This humble and honest populism... would open the ears of millions who have turned away from our party. Of course, such a clear and honest message would require saying ‘no’ to certain business demands and powerful interests who shaped the immigration bill in the Senate.”
As it turned out, Sessions was right about the audience for his message. What he probably didn’t guess—what nobody guessed—was that the populism would be catalyzed by a member of the 1 percent of the 1 percent of the 1 percent. And that the messenger might not be super concerned about the “humble” bit.
There’s a lot to say about what strains of American political tradition best explain the rise of Trump, and answers will differ. (Don’t miss a learned one from John Judis in National Journal.) Trump is on many fronts less extreme than his competitors, but he is without doubt a radical. And he has irrevocably changed the course of our politics. If Trump wins the primaries, he becomes the new face of the Republican Party. This means a repudiation of a 30-year consensus in support of free trade, generous immigration, and even more generous military intervention. On all of these issues, much of Republican Washington feels far closer to Hillary Clinton than to Donald Trump. | 3,858 |
natural resources. We should try, instead, to develop alternative stocks of resources such as renewable (or nuclear) energy. At the same time, we should avoid to exploit highly polluting and expensive resources such as tar sands, oil shales, deepwater oil, and, in general, applying the "drill, baby, drill" philosophy. All those strategies are recipes for doom. Unfortunately, these are also examples of exactly what we are doing.
I don't know what Seneca would say if he could see this planet-wide effort we are making in order to put into practice the idea that he expressed in his letter to his friend, Lucilius. I can only imagine that he would take it with some stoicism. Or, maybe, he would comment with what he said in his "De Providentia" "Let Nature deal with matter, which is her own, as she pleases; let us be cheerful and brave in the face of everything, reflecting that it is nothing of our own that perishes."
Thanks to Dmitry Orlov for having been the source of inspiration for this post with his article "Peak Oil is History".
___________________________________________
References
Bardi, U., 2007, Energy prices and resource depletion: Lessons from the case of whaling in the nineteenth century” Bardi U. Energy Sources, part B- Economics Planning and Policy Volume: 2 Issue: 3 Pages: 297-304
Bardi, U. and Lavacchi, A., 2009, "A Simple Interpretation of Hubbert’s Model of Resource Exploitation” Energies 2009, 2(3), 646-661; doi:10.3390/en20300646
Bardi, U. 2011 "The Limits to Growth Revisited", Springer, ISBN 978-1-4419-9415-8
Bardi, U., Lavacchi, A., Yaxley L., 2011 “Modelling EROEI and net energy in the exploitation of non renewable resources” Ecological Modelling, In Press.
Brandt, A.R. (2007). Testing Hubbert. Energy Policy, 35(May):3074-3088. DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2006.11.004
Dunning, N., D. Rue, T. Beach, A. Covich, A. Traverse, 1998, "Human - Environment Interactions in a Tropical Watershed: the Paleoecology of Laguna Tamarindito, Guatemala," Journal of Field Archaeology 25 (1998):139-151. | 3,859 |
Ford Land Development Co. plans to tear down an old brass factory in Corktown and redevelop the vacant site with a large new building, the head of Ford's real estate division said this week.
CEO and Chairman Dave Dubensky told Crain's that The Alchemy building at 2051 Rosa Parks Blvd. has significant environmental issues that need to be addressed, so instead of repurposing the property it will be leveled.
"From our perspective there's no way to remediate the issues there," he said. "Our teams tell me they gotta take out about 6 feet of soil. You've got to scrape out 6 feet of soil. It's not historic, really no architectural value, so we'd probably scrape that one, take out the soil and build something knew there."
The new building would rival the Michigan Central Station in terms of square footage, with about 500,000-600,000 square feet of mixed-use space.
On Tuesday, Ford Motor Co. formally announced its plans for a 1.2 million-square-foot campus in the Corktown neighborhood west of downtown Detroit, anchored by the vacant train station on 15th Street that hasn't been used in 30 years.
It's part of a push for tech and engineering talent as the Dearborn-based automaker looks to develop autonomous and electric vehicles. The first step in Ford's campus was acquiring The Factory at Corktown, a 45,000-square-foot building on Michigan Avenue east of the train station, which had been owned by the Moroun family for more than two decades.
The deal for The Alchemy building has not yet closed. It sits on nearly 3 acres of land and is being marketed by Farmington Hills-based Friedman Integrated Real Estate Solutions LLC.
Any rehabilitation of the train station, which has been emblematic of Detroit's dramatic rise and fall in the 20th and early 21st centuries, would likely seek millions of dollars in tax incentives; that project alone would probably cost north of $200 million. Along with Michigan Central Station, Ford also purchased from the Morouns a former Detroit Public Schools book depository building east of the depot, plus land north of Bobcat Bonnie's restaurant from other landlords.
Dubensky said this week that the company has not yet selected contractors to work on the overall campus project.
He also said he believes Ford is "done with our (property) assemblage for now."
"We have enough property to do everything we want," Dubensky said. "That's not to say that in some point in the future we might not do more, but for now we are done." | 3,860 |
This update covers the time we spent in Muscat, Oman. It was an incredible visit as we stayed with some amazingly intelligent and insightful people (via couchsurfing) who were very accommodating and showed us around their part of the world. Also, the food... stunning. The video doesn�t show, but during this time we both ate chicken hearts for the first time!
Seriously, don't mess with these cliffs!
This is the Omani Sultan's house. Stylish!
A view from the back of the Sultan's house. The epic artillery was a bit intimidating.
You couldn't be this pimp if you tried!
Seeing Claire's written in Arabic is interesting. Also, Claire's is surprising international. We have seen these shops all over the world.
After a challenging swim to an island, we climbed to the top. If you look in the middle of the photo you can see us and our friend, Isaac!
Isaac took us out for an amazing dinner of excellently cooked goat meat and rice. The meat was slow roasted in a hole was dug in the ground. The sun slowly roasted the meat to perfection!
It was an eat-with-your-hands situation! YUM!
Isaac and Marcel took us to a wadi which was located at the base of a dam. We all decided the climb to the top of the dam was worth it. Each step that you see is about waist height. It was an exhausting hike!
All of us brave climbers! Isaac is on the right and Marcel is standing next to Eric.
We can see the light at the end of the tunnel!
This is a view from the top of the dam. You can see many people swimming below and, at the bottom, you can see Kyde in mid-jump clearing a step. Down was way easier than up!
Playing in the the burst water main! The water was freezing!
Having a little wadi-side tea and coffee!
Eric and Isaac visited Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque in the heart of Muscat. The chandalier in the mosque is exquisite and one of the largest in the world.
In this picture, you can see the two items the mosque is famous for, the chandlier, noted above, and the carpet. The carpet is the 2nd largest hand-woven carpet in the world, it measures 70x60 meters (35x30 Erics)! If you need a better reference to understand the massive size of these two items, Eric is in the middle of the picture! Find him! | 3,861 |
It's been no secret that at some point before the end of the season, Leon Rose is going to become the next man tasked with guiding the Knicks to the long-awaited promised land.
"At some point" may be just a few days away.
Multiple sources tell SI.com that Rose's position as President of Basketball Operations for the Knicks will be made official either this week or next week, with a press conference likely coming soon thereafter.
Sources also confirmed that Rose was delayed in officially taking the job by his involvement in the Dwayne Wade "L3GACY" celebration this weekend in Miami, as first reported last week by Marc Berman of the New York Post. Rose, of course, is widely credited with helping bring together the "Big Three" of Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh a decade ago.
Berman noted that Rose's appointment should be official by the time the Knicks play in Miami on March 13 — which is just under three weeks from now.
But sources confirmed to SI.com that with Wade's celebration now done, there's nothing else holding up the hire, and it should become official this week.
On the coaching front, some around the Knicks also feel as if Tom Thibodeau is becoming a stronger and stronger possibility for the head coaching position currently occupied by interim coach Mike Miller. One person with knowledge of their thinking put the odds at 90 percent that Thibs will get the job, with Miller staying on in some capacity.
Miller, of course, has done nothing but an admirable job since taking over for David Fizdale. The Knicks are 15th in defensive rating since he became coach, whereas they ranked 25th at the time Fizdale was ousted.
It's unclear at this point how amenable Miller would be to staying on in a reduced role, but perhaps the title of associate head coach would help sway him. Pat Sullivan, who has been something of a defensive coordinator under Miller, is also a safe bet to be retained.
Of course, all of these decisions will be more thoroughly vetted once Leon Rose officially takes over and begins assessing matters from within. One thing to watch for when he does: Miller has been steadfast that all lineup and rotation decisions are made with input from Scott Perry. Just how much that continues or in what way those decisions are altered with Rose at the helm remains to be seen.
We won't have to wait long to find out how it all will go.
The Knicks have 26 games remaining. By all indications, Rose will have an up close and personal view of most of them before he heads into the offseason and the real work begins. | 3,862 |
It’s been five months since Honolulu Police officially rolled out its body camera program. Since then, it’s expanded to include more officers in more places on Oahu.
Two out of the eight districts on Oahu have body cameras now. HPD still has a ways to go for a complete rollout but after that officials will be taking a hard look at the cost to run this system. Nearly 300 body cameras have already been rolled out, first in District 1 Central Honolulu, followed by District 6 Waikiki.
SHOPO President Malcolm Lutu works in District 6 and received his body camera. He says the lessons learned in District 1 helped the officers here in Waikiki.
“I think they actually had to go through the growing pains on learning about it. Learning when to turn it on, when to turn it off so getting a lot of the minor issues straightened out,” said Lutu.
When it first rolled out, we were told it would cost about $1.5 million a year just for the video storage. While many agree that body cameras are a great tool, the cost has always been an issue.
Police Commission Chair Loretta Sheehan tells us she would like to see if body cameras are absolutely necessary for the city.
“Where there are issues of trust, Ferguson, Missouri, Chicago, L.A., body cameras are a must in those areas,” said Sheehan. “Hopefully, here we haven’t reached that point. I don’t think we have. I think people generally trust the police departments throughout the islands so we’ll see.”
“The contract is for 5 years and we need to roll it out completely for the whole department and then at that point evaluate and see if it’s the amount of money that’s being spent the return on investment, said Honolulu Police Chief Susan Ballard, “I really want the community to be able to weigh-in and say is this something that you want your officers to do or not to do.”
“At this point, we haven’t seen any videos that were used to solve a crime or to stop any type of complaint. It’s not there yet but we only have two districts who it’s been rolled out,” said Chief Ballard.
Next month, Chief Ballard says District 7, which is East Honolulu, will be getting body cameras. That’s about 150 cameras. In two years or less, all 12-hundred patrol officers will have them. | 3,863 |
On September 18, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that four of Washington DC’s gun registration requirements are unconstitutional.
The plaintiff in the case District of Columbia v. Heller was Dick Anthony Heller, who prevailed in 2008 when the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) struck down DC’s gun ban. In that same year, Heller filed suit against DC’s “gun registration scheme”—claiming it was “inconsistent with the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.” A district court sided with DC in the case, and Heller appealed.
In the course of the appellate process that followed, “the D.C. Council enacted the Firearms Amendment Act of 2012, D.C., …which repealed certain of the conditions for registration, such as the requirement that a pistol be submitted for ballistic identification as part of the registration process, and reduced the burden upon registrants imposed by other provisions.” But gun registration remained, so Heller augmented his suit to reflect the Firearms Amendment Act while continuing to appeal the decision upholding registration.
The DC Circuit’s ruling makes clear there were many facets to Heller’s case that included various requirements pertaining to registration; these differed between handguns and long guns and the processes related to both. In the end, the court upheld some of the requirements while siding with Heller in rejecting others.
The court upheld “the basic registration requirement as applied to long guns”; “the requirement that a registrant be fingerprinted and photographed and make a personal appearance to register a firearm”; “the requirement that an individual pay certain fees associated with the registration of a firearm”; and “the requirement that registrants complete a firearms safety and training course.”
However, the DC Circuit struck down “the requirement that a person bring with him the firearm to be registered”; “the requirement that a gun owner re-register his firearm every three years”; “the requirement that [makes] registration of a firearm [dependent] upon passing a test of knowledge of the District’s firearms laws”; and the ban on registering “more than one pistol per registrant during any 30-day period.”
The DC Circuit’s decision was handed down in a 2-1 vote by a three-judge panel. DC has yet to decide if they will appeal to SCOTUS.
Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at [email protected]. | 3,864 |
Younkers Black Friday Ads, Deals, and Sales 2020 – Younkers is one of the popular stores, acquiring a decent among of regular customers and for all of them, the Younkers Black Friday 2020 Deals & Sales are available today.
But this does not imply, that deals just because of their regular clients, anybody, who feels they can purchase their favorite merchandise with a higher discounts from this shop can avail these deals. So, is not it a fantastic idea posed by the enterprise to acquire more customers and make their ordinary purchasers happy? Yeah! It is.
Nonetheless, you might have found it hard, if you have to go through all the goods to find the best prices for yourself, however, we solved your problem, as now, you will not have to any excess work, because below is the list of Younkers Black Friday Deals, which you can readily avail by one click. So, hurry Up! Grab supplies as soon as possible.
Here we have listed top free deals available online Younkers Store online. So without wasting our time let’s have a look at the list of Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Thanksgiving, and Christmas deals.
Younkers Black Friday Sale, Deals, Coupons and Ads 2020 – BlackFridaySalez.com Younkers Black Friday Sale, Deals, Coupons and Ads 2020 – BlackFridaySalez.com
Younkers Black Friday Sale, Deals, Coupons and Ads 2020:
How to use Younkers Coupons Codes and get Discount This Black Friday:
Whenever we found any discount, deals and Younkers Promo Codes we update this page for free. You can easily follow our free updates to stay alert. You can also subscribe us via your email and allow us for push notification for free of cost. If you want to buy the latest best products at a discount offer you have to follow the step by step guide below.
1.) First of all, visit Younkers and look for available products online.
2.) Choose the products as per your requirements like whether it’s for your home uses or for the office purpose.
3.) Then look for the available Younkers coupon codes for your choice of product at Younkers deal 2019 to get the maximum discount.
4) Add your product to cart and checkout with the available option.
5) If you stuck anywhere and needed more Thanksgiving, black Friday and Cyber Monday deals then you can visit Black Friday Salez.
Check Out Top Black Friday and Cyber Monday Online Stores:
Check Out Youtube Video On Younkers Store: | 3,865 |
Oh boy! Here comes the SEC, but is this really bad that they are starting to investigate ICOs? I think it's good, not saying that OVERSTOCK has done anything wrong with theirs, but just in general there's a ton of scams out there. The SEC just wants to do their job and make sure no federal Securities laws are broken. I'm posting some quotes and clippings from the CCN article below:
Before we get into Overstock and the articles here's some info on what Tzero is..
TZero, at its core, is a SEC-regulated alternative trading system (ATS). Rather than depending on broker dealers to buy and sell securities, tZero works, in theory, like money sender Transferwise by matching buyers and sellers in a dark pool. The goal is to create an alternative to the NASDAQ with a ledger that is open, transparent, and immutable. Here's an article posted about it from Tech Crunch in DEC tZero
From the CCN article
The e-commerce company, which has acquired a growing portfolio of blockchain startups over the past few years, made this disclosure in a document dated March 1 and filed with the SEC.
The filing stated that the SEC’s enforcement division contacted Overstock in February and asked them to voluntarily hand over documents related to the structure of the tZero ICO. The company said that it is currently in the process of responding to this request and intends to cooperate with the agency during the investigation.
From the filing:
“While the SEC is trying to determine whether there have been any violations of the federal securities laws, the investigation does not mean that the SEC has concluded that anyone has violated the law. Also, the investigation does not mean that the SEC has a negative opinion of any person, entity, or security.”
Overstock has conducted the tZero ICO under a simple agreement for future equity (SAFE) — the investment instrument from which the SAFT was derived — aiming to raise $250 million to develop an SEC- and FINRA-compliant security token exchange.
The company has said that tokens will bear characteristics of both a utility and a security, as investors can either use them to receive discounts on platform trading fees or hold them to receive a portion of tZero’s profits.
I guess time will tell what happens with this filling and future SEC probing with other ICOs. We all knew this was coming... Enjoy the Knowledge!
Source
LINKS to my the podcast
SoundCloud
iTunes
Follow me here @producerbtw | 3,866 |
specifically questioned if Swedes should accept refugees into their home, wanting to know if they would consider housing an unaccompanied minor or refugee in their living space. They were amicable in their answers until a real opportunity presented itself.
When he had a refugee with him who needed a place to stay, the responders stuttered and stammered, came up with excuses, and, in the end, nobody took in the unknown foreigner.
These are not the only ones to have reservations about accepting a total stranger into their home. J.K. Rowling, an elitist multimillionaire, tweets about how important it is to let migrants into the U.K., and anyone who questions that is a racist. Unfortunately, despite having an 18-bedroom mansion, she has not housed a single refugee. Hundreds of refugees have established a shantytown near George Clooney’s beautiful Lake Como home in Italy, so why isn’t he letting these people stay in his elegant villa?
What Leftists Have In Common
When Homer Simpson ran for sanitation commissioner in Springfield, he came up with a campaign slogan that would personify the left: “Can’t Someone Else Do It?” It is apropos for those on the left on a wide variety of issues, from taxation to migration and the environment. They lead the charge to let someone else pay higher taxes or assist the poor. It’s akin to the self-righteous virtue-signalers who tweet all day about how white people stole land from Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-MA) ancestors but undoubtedly would refuse to cede their own property to Native Americans.
Democrats love to grab easy political points by alluding to unconscious biases and how there needs to be more minorities and women in public office. Yet, these same individuals never admit to implicit prejudice – it’s always somebody else – and you will not see former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) or Sen. Sanders bow out of the race to let a minority or female take his place.
The doctrine of leftism advocates that it is your moral duty to advance pseudo-moralistic social justice. But the leftists’ genuine ethical stance is to sacrifice others before sacrificing themselves. It’s like the old joke about neoconservatives who proudly say they have given to the war effort, by having three cousins and their wives’ brothers die in battle.
Rather than signing a petition and marching in a social justice parade, leftists should instead turn the moral mirror on themselves. If they did, they would see the Picture of Dorian Gray. | 3,867 |
Washington Times columnist and National Rifle Association board member Ted Nugent claimed that gun owners will be the next Rosa Parks if President Obama issues an executive order confiscating guns.
While Vice President Joe Biden has suggested that the White House could take executive action on guns, no one in the administration has said that such action would involve gun confiscation. The administration has reportedly previously considered executive action to ensure that more records of mental illness were included in the FBI's background check system.
During an interview with conspiracy clearinghouse WorldNetDaily, Nugent predicted that if an “actual confiscatory directive” came from Obama, then “heroes of the law enforcement will defy this order.” Nonetheless, he worried that there were “enough soulless sheep within our government who would act on such an illegal order” and predicted peaceful resistance from “law-abiding gun owners,” who would “be the Rosa Parks and we will sit down on the front seat of the bus” :
“If it comes to the actual implementation of an actual confiscatory directive from our president, then I do believe that the heroes of the law enforcement will defy this order. I do believe that there are enough soulless sheep within our government who would act on such an illegal order but I believe the powers that be at the local, state, and regional law enforcement would halt such an illegal, anti-American order,” said Nugent. Nugent continued, "You are talking to a guy who talks to more gun owners in more heated and concerned conversations than anyone who lives. These are top notch heroes of law enforcement and military who understand this experiment in self-government and we will not let it [gun confiscation] happen, we will do it peaceful. “But there will come a time when the gun owners of America, the law-abiding gun owners of America, will be the Rosa Parks and we will sit down on the front seat of the bus, case closed.”
Nugent's comments are also being promoted by Fox Nation.
Last week, former NRA president Marion Hammer faced widespread criticism for claiming that a proposal by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) to ban assault weapons was similar to racial discrimination. Hammer told NRA News that “banning people and things because of the way they look went out a long time ago. But here they are again. The color of a gun. The way it looks. It's just bad politics.”
After news of a potential executive order on guns emerged on January 9, Matt Drudge highlighted the report with pictures of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. | 3,868 |
Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister is hoping to discuss carbon taxes and climate change with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau when the federal cabinet holds a retreat in Winnipeg next week.
Pallister said he hopes Trudeau can show some flexibility on the carbon tax that Ottawa has imposed on Manitoba and other provinces that have refused to implement their own, especially after poor Liberal election results on the Prairies last fall.
"We have an opportunity now, post federal election, for the federal government to demonstrate the sincerity of its commitments," Pallister said Wednesday.
"It said, during the election and since, that it wanted to reach out, essentially, to capture the hearts and minds of western Canadians."
The federal government has also imposed a carbon tax on Ontario, New Brunswick, and Saskatchewan — as well as on Alberta, where United Conservative Premier Jason Kenney repealed the tax brought in by his NDP predecessor.
Some of the provinces, including Manitoba, are challenging the tax in court. Saskatchewan has a Supreme Court of Canada hearing scheduled for the spring.
Pallister had originally proposed a lower carbon tax than what Ottawa was demanding, then pulled the idea altogether when Ottawa refused to budge. He said Wednesday the federal government should credit Manitoba for the billions of dollars it has spent to develop hydroelectric power, some of which is exported.
"Wisconsin, for example, (and) Minnesota benefit by the purchase of clean hydro electricity produced in Manitoba. Yet we get no respect from the federal government for that contribution to a better planet."
The federal government has said carbon pricing is a necessary part of a plan to reduce emissions and the tax is offset by income tax rebates.
Pallister said he is not seeking a deal with Ottawa similar to one obtained by New Brunswick last month. New Brunswick is being allowed to apply its own levy on consumer fuels such as gasoline and propane, while also cutting its provincial gas tax to offset the tax.
Pallister described that deal as "robbing Peter to pay Paul."
'I don't surf': Pallister
"Quite frankly, allowing some provinces to … lower their fuel tax while raising a carbon tax isn't going to achieve any changes in consumer preference and isn't going to help us fight climate change."
Pallister had yet to hear whether Trudeau will agree to meet with him during the cabinet retreat.
He indicated he did not meet with Trudeau while the prime minister was vacationing over the holidays in Costa Rica, where Pallister owns a vacation home and spends a few weeks each year.
"Actually, I don't surf," Pallister said without elaborating. | 3,869 |
The future of Windows 10 Mobile has been a popular topic among fans and critics ever since Microsoft announced that development of Windows 10 Mobile would be moving to a new "feature2" branch and remaining there. While Microsoft has said this change is insignificant, my sources paint a different story; that Windows 10 Mobile development has been separated from the rest of Windows 10 on other platforms. But why?
Microsoft has separated Windows 10 Mobile development away from the rest of Windows 10 because Windows 10 Mobile is no longer needed for what Microsoft is planning next for Windows on mobile devices. My contacts suggest that Microsoft's next mobile device (codenamed Andromeda) will be running something internally referred to as Windows Core OS; a version of Windows that aims to be modular enough to run on any form factor, and as a result removes the need for a separate "Windows 10 Mobile" SKU.
Because of this, Microsoft no longer needs a phone-specific version of Windows 10, which means Windows 10 Mobile is now redundant. This is great news, except for one crucial detail; existing Windows phones won't be getting an upgrade to this "Windows Core OS." So what's next for existing devices? Well first, it's important to understand what the feature2 development branch is actually for.
The feature2 branch
According to my sources, the feature2 branch exists to continue supporting existing Windows phone handsets over the next year and a half. The feature2 branch's main goal is to continue servicing Windows 10 Mobile devices through 2018 with bug fixes, security updates, and new Enterprise specific features. I'm also told Microsoft may backport some UWP APIs that are introduced in Redstone 3 and Redstone 4 on PC over the next year. Microsoft itself has also confirmed that it will be bringing new APIs to Windows 10 Mobile.
The reason these APIs are being "backported" and not natively introduced is because the feature2 branch is technically Redstone 2 under the hood. When Microsoft branched off Windows 10 Mobile into the feature2 branch, it also froze OneCore development at Redstone 2. Now, considering Windows 10 Mobile won't be rejoining the rest of Windows 10 development, this means Windows 10 Mobile will be keeping with Redstone 2 for the remainder of its life.
So, to compensate for this, Microsoft will backport some UWP APIs that get introduced in Redstone 3 and Redstone 4. This means that if an app developer is targeting any new UWP APIs that get introduced in the next couple of Windows 10 releases, those apps will continue to work on Windows 10 Mobile. This should give Windows 10 Mobile an extra push of life through the next year or so. | 3,870 |
-street research in homeless communities. He mentioned six sources of money he would support tapping, including document fees and something known as a linkage fee on new developments. He said he’s open to any source of new funding but has doubts that voters would approve a parcel tax or housing bond.
Interested in the stories shaping California? Sign up for the free Essential California newsletter >>
Our conversation made it even more clear to me that Garcetti understands the complexities and huge costs of an honest fix.
If he wants to establish a steady source of money and be the mayor who helps to solve the crisis of people living like stray dogs in a city of riches, however, he’s going to have to get out front and pull, rather than stand back and push.
Or, as the city plan from city administrative officer Miguel Santana puts it: “While the costs to fully address homelessness are significant, the cost of inaction will continue to grow.”
There was no inaction or hesitation on the part of the team I tagged along with Friday. It included engagement workers Hector Gonzalez and Tulus Hairston and addiction specialist Debra Fracasso.
By the end of morning rounds, the team had directed three people into detox programs. They learned that one of their earlier contacts had already moved into housing and another was about to be placed.
Hairston and Fracasso have an advantage on the streets. They were both once homeless and resisted help, so they know how to relate, and they’re not discouraged when someone brushes them off at first, as people with mental illness often do.
“We have to get them to trust that we’re going to work with them all the way through,” said Hairston, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia and went from homelessness to a rescue mission to transitional housing to having his own place. He wants to get a college degree in public policy.
“This is what we came from. This is us,” Fracasso said after interviewing a woman with mental health issues and four years of homelessness. “Just because people are down here doesn’t mean they can’t change.”
[email protected]
Twitter: @LATstevelopez
MORE FROM STEVE LOPEZ
Will the safe choice for L.A. Unified chief turn out to be the best?
For a man’s makeshift home, destruction swiftly follows El Niño’s arrival
At Motion Picture & Television Fund retirement home, an unlikely love story blooms | 3,871 |
Sherman was hired by the Giants’ coach, Steve Owen, in 1949 to convert Conerly, a former tailback at Mississippi, to the T-formation.
After serving as the Giants’ backfield coach and then head coach of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in Canada, Sherman was named the Giants’ offensive coach in 1959, replacing Vince Lombardi, who had become the Packers’ coach and general manager. When Jim Lee Howell retired as the Giants’ head coach after the 1960 season, Sherman succeeded him.
Sherman inherited an aging team that was not considered a contender, and he was the Giants’ second choice for the job; he was hired only after the owner, Wellington Mara, could not pry Lombardi from the Packers. But Sherman was an instant success as the Giants bolstered their offense with trades bringing in Tittle, Shofner and tight end Joe Walton.
Sherman’s teams lost only eight regular-season games on the way to Eastern Conference titles from 1961 to 1963. Sherman was voted the N.F.L. coach of the year in his first two seasons in balloting by sportswriters and broadcasters.
But the Giants plunged to a 2-10-2 record in 1964. The fans at Yankee Stadium, who had been chanting “Dee-fense, Dee-fense,” began to sing “Goodbye Allie” to protest the trade of Huff, a hugely popular middle linebacker, and the outstanding defensive tackle Dick Modzelewski before the season.
Sherman would never again have a winning team, and in January 1969, the New York Jets took over the local spotlight long enjoyed by the Giants when Joe Namath engineered their stunning upset of the Baltimore Colts in the Super Bowl. In August of that year, the Jets whipped the Giants, 37-14, in an exhibition game, the first meeting between the teams, and the Giants went on to lose all five preseason games that summer. A week before the 1969 regular season began, Sherman was fired and replaced by Webster, the former star running back who had been one of his assistant coaches.
Sherman left with a career record of 57-51-4 and five years remaining on his 10-year contract. He never again coached football, but he was part of a group that made an unsuccessful bid to buy the Jets in 1970. He became an executive with Warner Communications, oversaw marketing for Warner’s New York Cosmos soccer team, worked as a pro football studio analyst for ESPN and served as president of the New York City Off-Track Betting Corporation from 1994 to 1997. | 3,872 |
Washington --
In his West Virginia district, the TV ads attacking Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall over the calamitous startup of President Obama's health care law have already begun.
The 19-term veteran, a perennial target in a GOP-shifting state, is among many in the president's party who have recited to constituents Obama's assurance that they could keep insurance coverage they liked under the 2010 overhaul.
That has proved untrue for several million Americans, igniting a public uproar that has forced Obama to reverse himself on part of the law and sent many Democrats scrambling into political self-preservation mode ahead of next year's congressional elections.
Rahall was among 39 Democrats who, despite an Obama veto threat, voted Friday for a GOP measure that would let insurers continue selling policies to individuals that fall short of the health care law's requirements. It was approved 261-157.
"I'm concerned about my integrity with voters who have returned me here 38 years. They know me enough to know I wouldn't purposely mislead them," Rahall said. "I want them to continue to have that confidence in me."
Republicans are emboldened by Obama's reversal and the Democrats' scramble for cover. They are already compiling lists of dozens of Senate and House Democrats such as Rahall who, in video clips and written statements, have parroted Obama's pledge that voters' existing coverage would not be annulled.
"There's nothing more damaging than when your word is devalued and people think they were misled," said Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., who heads the National Republican Congressional Committee. "And especially damaging is when it actually affects you and your family. So in terms of degree of impact, this is off the Richter scale."
Top Democrats, who need to gain 17 seats to retake the House majority, scoff that next November's elections are far off. They say by then, the health care law will be to their advantage because it will be working well.
Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., who leads the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said his party will focus the campaign on the economy, Democratic efforts to fix it and the GOP's preference for cutting Medicare and granting tax breaks to the wealthy.
Other Democrats agree that plenty can change in a year but concede that the issue poses problems.
America Rising, a GOP political action committee that compiles research on opposition candidates, is collecting video of Democrats' comments on the law. Some conservative groups are already running television spots, with Americans for Prosperity airing ads attacking Rahall and Sen. Kay Hagan, D-N.C. | 3,873 |
Sited deep in the Bush of Southwestern Alaska, the Donlin Gold prospect is the largest proposed gold mine in Alaska's history. However, an overwhelming majority of Alaskan residents are unfamiliar with the details of it's development and implications. Located above a tributary that flows into the mighty Kuskokwim River, this open pit mine would bring both economic opportunities and environmental consequences to this remote region. Numerous local residents seek employment at the mine, with promise of an increased quality of life on a monetary scale, barring the threat of acid-mine drainage and mercury contamination of the watershed.
Careful engineering, promised by Donlin LLC (a NovaGold and Barrick Gold collaboration), could mitigate the negative impacts. However, open-pit mining can require the perpetual storage of harmful waste material and if so, the site would need to be diligently monitored and maintained to ensure the containment of toxins detrimental to the watershed and subsistence-based lifestyles. Forever.
'Where the Heck is Donlin?' is finished!
We rode our snow bikes on 350 miles of the historic Iditarod trail. We paddled our Alpacka packrafts on 500 miles of wildly remote Kuskokwim waters and we returned to the river with our snow bikes for a third trip this last spring. We visited residents, lodge-owners, trail-users, small villages, schools, and fish camps. We met and interviewed the people in the region. We documented it all with our small budget and simple equipment. Now it's time to share our story in a feature length documentary: Where The Heck Is Donlin?
The completed film will provide visibility and insight for things that can make a tremendous difference if the mine is built – things like a high level, comprehensive study on the mercury threat, environmental advocacy work to bring the Alaska mine permitting system into the 21st century, and a constant monitoring effort to make sure the mine is not putting profits before people.
People from the Kuskokwim region, greater Alaska, and from the far corners of the globe have encouraged and supported the need for awareness on this issue. Our Kickstarter campaign was a success and we received enough donations to complete the film on scheduel. Now, we are currently looking for festivals and venues in Alaska and beyond to screen the film. We plan to have DVDs available through Ground Truth Trekking once public screening has wound down. If you would like to host a screening of the film please send an email to: [email protected]
Watch the trailer here: https://vimeo.com/78318933
Visit our slideshow. | 3,874 |
Aged care minister says he was disturbed by footage of elderly men being chemically and physically restrained
This article is more than 1 year old
This article is more than 1 year old
On the eve of the royal commission into the aged care sector’s first hearing, the Morrison government has flagged new regulations on the use of chemical and physical restraints in nursing homes.
There are no rules in Australia governing the use of restraints in aged care facilities, unlike the US, Britain and Europe.
The aged care minister, Ken Wyatt, said he was disturbed by footage on the ABC’s 7.30 on Wednesday night, which showed a New South Wales dementia patient docile after being given sedatives without his family’s permission. He had also spent 14 hours strapped to a chair. There was footage of another elderly man physically restrained, bunny hopping across the room.
• Sign up to receive the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning
“That is unacceptable in this day and age and I’m not prepared to allow that to occur and nor is our government,” Wyatt told reporters in Perth.
“Today I’ve asked my department to prepare regulations that will protect senior Australians within residential care.”
He asked his department to pick up the pace on the issue and insisted there had been joint work going on with the Attorney General’s Department.
Asked about a time frame Wyatt said: “It’ll be within weeks at the most.”
Wyatt insisted the media reporting was not what prompted him to act quickly.
“If we neglect a child or we neglect an animal, there are penalties,” he said. “If we neglect a senior Australian, there is no measure other than state and territory legislation. One of the complexities of doing this is having to work with states and territories.”
There are some concerns the controversial practice of doping aged care residents with medication is being used to make up for a shortfall in staff.
Nursing homes turning residents into 'zombies', aged care royal commission to hear Read more
The royal commission’s first hearing is scheduled for Adelaide on Friday and commissioners Richard Tracey and Lynelle Briggs will outline their vision for how the inquiry will operate.
Their main task is to examine evidence of substandard aged care, abuse, systematic failures and draw up recommendations for improvement.
The commission will hold hearings in February and March in Adelaide before travelling across Australian cities and regional hubs.
The commission’s final report deadline is 30 April 2020. | 3,875 |
NASHVILLE, Tenn. – November 19, 2018 – Richard N. Schott, 51, of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and Kendra L. Glenn, 43, of Hartwell, Georgia, and formerly of Murfreesboro, are facing federal healthcare fraud charges for operating a scheme to defraud healthcare benefit programs, announced U.S. Attorney Don Cochran for the Middle District of Tennessee. Schott surrendered to U.S. Marshals in Nashville last week and Glenn was arrested at her home in Georgia this morning by FBI agents. Schott is charged with conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and Glenn is facing seven counts of healthcare fraud and one count of conspiracy.
According to the charging documents, Schott is a licensed dentist who owns and operates Dental Excellence, a dental practice with three locations in Murfreesboro and one location in Lebanon, Tennessee. Kendra Glenn was employed by Dental Excellence and served as the Practice Administrator.
The charging documents allege that between November 2013 and January 2018, Schott and Glenn caused the submission of false and fraudulent claims to healthcare benefit programs, including Delta Dental, Cigna, TennCare and DentaQuest, TennCare’s dental benefits program administrator. The fraudulent claims included billing for dental work that had not been completed or performed at all; falsifying dates of service to appear to comply with benefit programs’ timeframe and preauthorization requirements; falsifying claims to appear that services had been rendered by a benefits program credentialed dentist; falsifying supporting documents and adding false narratives to support the upcoding of claims; and others, including continuing to submit false claims after being advised by insurance companies that audits had determined a pattern of false claims and that the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation was conducting a criminal investigation into the company’s billing practices.
The charges further allege that Schott and Glenn took steps to conceal the fraud by discouraging employees from questioning billing practices; instructing employees to lie if questioned by insurance companies; and disciplining and even firing employees who questioned the legality of the billing practices. The allegations also include that Schott and Glenn used the proceeds from the fraudulent scheme for their own personal use and that Glenn was paid bonuses based on the amount of money collected from the fraudulent scheme.
If convicted, Schott and Glenn face up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each count.
This case was investigated by the FBI and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kathryn W. Booth and Byron Jones.
The charges are merely accusations and the defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. | 3,876 |
Taoiseach Enda Kenny has confirmed he will raise his concerns about US president Donald Trump’s travel ban during their meeting in Washington next week.
Mr Trump has set out his second attempt at blocking entry to the US for people from a number of Muslim majority countries after the first effort was blocked by judges within weeks of its implementation in January.
The revised order comes into force on March 16th, the day the Taoiseach is due to meet Mr Trump.
Mr Kenny previously spoke out against the original travel ban and voiced strong disagreement with the measure. The revised version will bar entry to the country from Libya, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
The Taoiseach told reporters on Wednesday that he will ensure the travel ban is brought up in discussions with Mr Trump and vice-president Mike Pence.
“Obviously I’ve commented on this in public before, and obviously I will speak to both the president and the vice president about it when I arrive in Washington,” he said.
A total of 29 Government Ministers will travel to 27 countries to mark St Patrick’s Day and engage in trade negotiations. Mr Kenny on Wednesday set out Ireland Connected, a new trade and investment strategy which runs until 2020.
The plan envisages a 26 per cent growth in indigenous exports over the next three years, along with an extra 30,000 jobs in the tourism sector and a 27 per cent increase in the number of overseas students studying in Ireland.
Reshuffle
Mr Kenny stood beside Minister for Transport Shane Ross during the announcement, who will remain in Ireland during the Ministers’ exodus.
Mr Ross joked that he would order a Cabinet reshuffle while all other senior Ministers are out of the country. “John Halligan will move to health,” he quipped.
The Taoiseach also addressed questions on the commission of inquiry into the handling of abuse allegations in the southeast healthcare region following on from reports on the ‘Grace’ case.
He reiterated the commitment from Minister of State with responsibility for Disabilities Finian McGrath to revise the terms of reference of the inquiry so that other potential victims can be included.
“I want to make this clear: the Government and Minister McGrath are quite open to having this commission of investigation deal with other cases,” he said, adding that the ‘Grace’ case will be dealt with “as a priority” first.
“As evidence comes in and new information becomes available the Government is quite willing and quite open that it be extended.” | 3,877 |
Australia to post YouTube film to curb people-smuggling Published duration 2 August 2011
image caption Australia recently signed a controversial deal with Malaysia to swap asylum seekers
The Australian government is to post on YouTube images of so-called boatpeople being turned away and sent to Malaysia, in an effort to deter asylum seekers.
The video will show arrivals at Australia's offshore detention centre on Christmas Island being expelled and boarding aircraft.
Canberra recently signed a deal with Malaysia to accept 800 boatpeople intercepted in Australia.
Asylum seekers remain a politically sensitive issue in Australia.
Australia currently has more than 6,000 asylum seekers in detention, originating from countries including Iran, Iraq, Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan.
In return for Malaysia accepting the new arrivals by boat, Australia will take 4,000 immigrants who are already registered there over the next four years.
Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has said the move will "smash the business model of people-smugglers".
But human rights groups have criticised Australia over the deal, because Malaysia has not signed the UN Convention on refugees, and the groups say asylum seekers are routinely mistreated there.
'Futile trip'
The footage posted by the Australian government on YouTube will show boatpeople arriving at the country's offshore detention centre in Christmas Island, boarding a plane to Malaysia and then arriving at camps in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.
It is intended to drive home the point that asylum seekers heading for Australian shores will now end up in Malaysia, says the BBC's Nick Bryant in Sydney.
Previously, the government has used dramatised videos of people in detention or losing their lives at sea to act as a deterrent.
This, however, is the first time that real asylum seekers have been filmed being expelled from Australia - although, for security reasons, their faces will be pixelated, our correspondent says.
The footage will be posted on YouTube in eight languages, targeting Iranians, Afghans, Sri Lankans and Iraqis in particular.
The aim, according to immigration officials, is to demonstrate the futility of risking your life at sea, only to be put on a plane to be flown back to Malaysia.
"We know that people-smugglers tell lies. We know that people-smugglers will be out there saying, 'Look, this won't apply to you'... because they are desperate to make money off desperate people," Immigration Minister Chris Bowen told Australian radio.
"I do think that many people would have access to that sort of social media, and word-of-mouth will spread quickly." | 3,878 |
return, if it's not nil or empty string, it will be sended to the sender. return &answertext }
Help handler
func help(bot tgbot.TgBot, msg tgbot.Message, text string) *string { // The text to send! answertext := `Currently this is just a sample bot. The commands available are: - /help - /start @tutorialbot by @rockneurotiko version 0.0.1` // Send it replying the message bot.Answer(msg).Text(answertext).ReplyToMessage(msg.ID).End() return nil }
The way of sending the message are implemented differently, in the start function, the string is returned as a pointer, and the library will send it to the sender.
In the help function instead, we use the pretty way (to me) of sending things. In this case I added one more thing, the ReplyToMessage(msg.ID). This will do that the bot send the text replying to the message. I love to read this chains in plain language: Bot, answer the sender of this message with this text replying this message id. Thanks (The last “Thanks” is the “End()” call :P)
You can download the example here.
As before, let’s execute it (with go run or building it and executing the binary) and this are the results:
If you want to have the commands in the client GUI, talk with @BotFather, send him the command /setcommands, select the bot and send the text with the commands:
Text used:
start - Start the bot! help - Show the help text :)
See you!
And that’s all for today! We made two bots! Two simple bots, but are two bots ^^
In the next posts I’ll show how to send other things more insteresting like images, audio, videos, documents and stickers.
If you have some idea for a good bot to implement for this posts series, please share it and let’s see if is simple enough but complicated at the same time for future posts.
I’m thinking too in doing future posts of implementing nice things like protect the bot with password, have a simple database with the users, …
Also, I’ll maybe do some screencast for more complicated bots :)
Let me know what do you thing, your ideas and what do you expect in the comments or in telegram | 3,879 |
the Middle East, backed by the state, that Muslims in the West are puzzled as to why they cannot practice their personal status code.) Christians have freedom of religion, though there are sensitivities about attempts to convert others (as there are everywhere in the Middle East, including Israel). And Christians are represented in the legislature. With Switzerland’s 5 percent Muslim population, how many Muslim members of parliament does it have?
It will also be alleged that in Egypt some clergymen gave fatwas or legal opinions that building churches is a sin, and it will be argued that Christians have been attacked by Muslims in Upper Egypt.
These arguments are fallacies. You cannot compare the behavior of some Muslim fanatics in rural Egypt to the laws and ideals of the Swiss Republic. We have to look at Egyptian law and policy.
The Grand Sheikh of al-Azhar Seminary, the foremost center of Sunni Muslim learning, ‘added in statements carried by Egyptian newspaper Youm al-Saba’a that Muslims can make voluntary contributions to build churches, pointing out that the church is a house for “worshipping and tolerance.” ‘ He condemned the fundamentalist Muslims for saying church-building is sinful. And Egypt has lots of churches, including new Presbyterian ones, following John Calvin who I believe lived in... Geneva. Aout 6 percent of the population is Christian.
The other problem with excusing Switzerland with reference to Muslims’ own imperfect adherence to human rights ideals is that two wrongs don’t make a right. The bigotted Right doesn’t even have the moral insight of kindergartners if that is the sort of argument they advance. The International Declaration of Human Rights was crafted with the participation of Pakistan, a Muslim country; the global contemporary rights regime is imperfectly adhered to by all countries– it is a claim on the world’s behavior, something we must all strive for. If the Swiss stepped back from it, they stepped back in absolute terms. It doesn’t help us get to global human rights to say that is o.k. because others are also failing to live up to the Declaration.
The other Wahhabi state besides Saudi Arabia, Qatar, has allowed the building of Christian churches. But they are not allowed to have steeples or bells. This policy is a mirror image to that of the Swiss. So Switzerland, after centuries of striving for civilization and enlightenment, has just about reached the same level of tolerance as that exhibited by a small Gulf Wahhabi country, the people of which were mostly Bedouins only a hundred years ago.
End/ (Not Continued) | 3,880 |
There was excitement in the air in Waterloo Wednesday morning, as hundreds of people lined up in frigid temperatures ahead of the much anticipated grand opening of T&T Supermarket.
Tina Lee, chief executive office of the Canadian chain, shared that excitement and was thrilled to finally have the store open in Waterloo.
“We’ve been so excited to be opening in Waterloo, looking for a site for over six years now,” said Lee, who took over the post from her mother, Cindy, in 2014. "I’ve been getting letters honestly from residents of Waterloo and students from the University of Waterloo for years, and they‘re the people that inspire me to come. The Asian community is still a growing community, but I would say that together with the student community something we’re really excited to bring the T&T offerings to.
“We certainly are an Asian supermarket, but we believe we have an offering that appeals to a lot of different customers. Certainly if you’re a Chinese Canadian or you’re an international student, you love the store, because it brings this feeling of homecoming and nostalgia. But for mainstream Canadians, they love our store because they’re discovering new ingredients and new foods and new flavours, so it’s fun for everyone."
The grand opening of T&T at Westmount Place, which is at the corner of Erb Street and Westmount Road, within walking distance of the university district, didn’t disappoint as upwards of 500 people lined up well before the doors opened at 10 a.m.
“It’s really humbling, actually,” Lee said of the excitement. “I didn’t expect the crowd we’re seeing outside of our stores. It’s very flattering to know people are excited about T&T, we just hope they come in the store, they enjoy their shopping experience, and that they’ll come back every week after this.”
Customers who waited in the sub-zero temperatures to enter the store were serenaded with a traditional Chinese lion dance, which Lee says is performed to bring “good fortune” to the store. The line bent all the way around the store and onto the sidewalk along Westmount Road, but the mood was exuberance as customers waited their turn to shop at the 26th T&T in Canada.
T and T lineup is...long pic.twitter.com/BHvlrkR5VK — Namish Modi (@NamishModi) December 5, 2018 | 3,881 |
Steven Finn has emerged as a major injury doubt ahead of the fourth Test in Nagpur after suffering a back injury. Finn, who missed the first two Tests with a thigh strain, reported some soreness on the final day of the Kolkata Test. A scan has shown a minor disc injury in his lower back and he was unable to take any part in training on Wednesday.
While the England team management are not ruling Finn out of the Test, his inclusion would appear to involve them taking an uncharacteristic risk. They are expected to pick just two seamers for the game, so will be loathe to go into it with any injury doubts over one of them.
Stuart Broad has been ruled out of the Test after a scan on his left heel showed bruising. He will remain with the squad for now with a decision taken over his availability for the Twenty20 games over the next few days.
Tim Bresnan is the likely replacement for Finn. Bresnan was dropped after a disappointing performance in the first Test in Ahmedabad but, with his ability to bat and his experience, is likely to be preferred to Graham Onions, who has struggled for rhythm in his few opportunities on the tour.
The England Performance Programme (EPP) squad is currently in Pune, but there are no plans to call-up a substitute for Broad or Finn. Stuart Meaker, who was called up as cover for Finn and Broad earlier in the tour, joined the EPP squad ahead of the Kolkata Test and is not with the Test squad.
The news completes a miserable Test tour for Broad. Named vice-captain at the start, he failed to take a wicket in either of the first two Tests, was dropped for the first time since 2008 ahead of Kolkata and has struggled with injuries and illness throughout.
"Stuart Broad is out of this Test match," England's captain, Alastair Cook, said. "His scan has showed a bruised heel and we'll assess him over the next day or so to see what happens with the Twenty20. We'll know a bit more when it settles down.
"It's the nature of sport, isn't it? Some people have good tours and some people don't. Unfortunately, more down to niggles and illnesses, Broady hasn't quite managed to get into the tour. It's frustrating for him and disappointing for us as a side. But we all know the class of Broady, and he'll be back."
England are currently leading the four match series 2-1 and looking to complete their first series win in India since 1984-85. | 3,882 |
TOKYO - Hitachi, Fanuc and AI-startup Preferred Networks are creating a joint venture to develop manufacturing systems that combine artificial intelligence and edge computing technologies to achieve superior productivity.
Intelligent Edge System will be capitalized at 30 million yen ($275,000), with the three companies contributing an equal amount, the trio said Wednesday. The joint venture will be established April 2 in Yamanashi Prefecture, where industrial robot and factory automation company Fanuc is headquartered.
The new company will be led by Yutaka Saito, currently an executive at Hitachi. He will take up the post of senior executive vice president at Fanuc on April 1 and become the joint venture's CEO.
Intelligent Edge System will develop fast, real-time control systems for network-linked industrial robots and machine tools. By utilizing deep learning AI technology, these control systems will "learn" and "become smarter" as linked machines manufacture products.
Deep learning is a type of AI technology designed to mimic the human brain's functions to sift through information more efficiently and speed up data analysis. The technology, a strong suit of Preferred Networks, is expected to boost production line productivity by making it possible for robots to recognize different bolts and nuts and adjust their moves accordingly, for instance. It will also likely enable robots to automatically take on the task of an adjacent robot on the production line if it breaks down.
Edge computing will also play a major role in the joint venture's control systems. Instead of centrally processing data, the technology handles the task at the edge of the network, letting machines on the production line process the massive amount of data, such as the movement of mechanical hands, on the spot.
Preferred Networks is an unlisted AI venture boasting some 100 engineers. At 232.6 billion yen, it ranked No. 1 in terms of business value in a November survey of rising Japanese startups by The Nikkei.
The AI developer's expertise has been highly sought after by such major Japanese corporations as Toyota Motor and Nippon Telegraph & Telephone.
The leading Japanese automaker invested 11.5 billion yen in Preferred Networks, with the hope that the startup's expertise will help development of autonomous vehicles that can learn various driving conditions by processing data by themselves rather than relying on cloud-computing.
NTT's initial interest in Preferred Networks was big data analysis, but the tie-up with the startup led to a partnership with Toyota in the development of "connected vehicles."
From the U.S., Microsoft and Nvidia have expressed interest in partnerships with Preferred Networks, as they are looking to use the Japanese startup's software. | 3,883 |
Get the biggest United stories, analysis and transfer window updates delivered straight to your inbox Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email
Ed Woodward has promised Manchester United supporters the club will back Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in the transfer market after a tempestuous summer window last year.
United ended the window last year without two priority targets amid interest in a central defender and a winger and Jose Mourinho warned United faced a 'difficult' season if they did not reinforce their defence. Despite a prolonged managerial bounce under Solskjaer, United shipped 54 Premier League goals in their worst top-flight defensive performance since 1978-79.
Diogo Dalot, Fred and Lee Grant arrived for a combined £72.5million last year - a drastic drop-off from the £140.9m United spent on Victor Lindelof, Romelu Lukaku and Nemanja Matic in 2017.
United have already confirmed the departures of Antonio Valencia and Ander Herrera and are keen to offload Matteo Darmian, Marcos Rojo and Alexis Sanchez. The club are prepared to sign as many players that are sold in the upcoming window and Woodward reaffirmed his support for Solskjaer before his first window as permanent manager.
"It clearly didn't end the way we hoped, finishing sixth place," Woodward said on United's quarterly three conference call. "And with a disruptive managerial change part way through.
"However, Ole and the squad battled back from December to be in contention to qualify for the Champions League next season but ultimately we came up short.
"While the last few weeks were disappointing, we are delighted to have confirmed the appointment of Ole as our manager on a three-year contract, and to have confirmed key members of the coaching team: Mick Phelan, Michael Carrick, Kieran McKenna and Mark Dempsey will all be remaining at the club.
"Everyone at the club - the board, the manager, the squad and all the staff are resolute in our desire to get United back to the top of English football, we continually look to improve staff on and off the pitch to achieve this.
"The strength of our business means we have the financial resources to continue to provide backing for the manager and creating success on the pitch. This - as ever - remains our number one goal."
On the call, chief financing officer Cliff Baty confirmed United received £6.3million from Shandong Luneng for the sale of Marouane Fellaini in February. Managing director Richard Arnold added: "The app continues to perform ahead of expectations." | 3,884 |
seen here. That's the page related to the current build that corresponds to the current commit.
There is also a general page with the Coveralls report of the perl5-markua-parser repository. At the bottom of this page there is a notification about the missing Coveralls badge.
Yes, it is a nice marketing ploy by the folks at Coveralls. It makes it super easy to add a coveralls badge to your project. Click on the "Embed" button, select the appropriate snippet (I selected the Markdown snippet as my README file is README.md which is in Markdown format.) I've pasted that snippet of code in the README.md just under the Travis-CI badge.
examples/markua-parser/a7decfc/README.md
# Markua Parser [](https://travis-ci.org/szabgab/perl5-markua-parser) [](https://coveralls.io/github/szabgab/perl5-markua-parser?branch=master) [Markua](https://leanpub.com/markua/) is a Markdown-inspired format to write books. This module implements parsing (part of) the Markua specification.
$ git add. $ git commit -m "Add Coveralls badge" $ git push
commit
Then we can click on the "refresh" button on the green banner that offered the badge. I think it checks if the badge was installed and if it was then it disappears.
This of course will trigger a new build on Travis and a new report on Coveralls, but we are not worried about that.
The report BTW looks like this:
It tells us we have reached 100 test coverage which is rare, but in our case not very surprising. After all we hardly have any code and we wrote a test or two. Later in the project we'll probably fall behind a bit, but this a good start.
In another project where I was much less disciplined I have not started to write tests at the beginning and when I first added coverage reporting I was at 79% test coverage. | 3,885 |
21 home games against International Conference opponents**
21 road games against International Conference opponents**
8 home games against the Western Conference (Division A and C)
8 away games against the Western Conference (Division B and D)
8 home games against the Eastern Conference (Division A and C)
8 away games against the Eastern Conference (Division B and D)
**(Both home/road include each team once, plus two additional inter-divisional games)
Play across conferences would alternate between divisions each year, so the obvious major changes between 2018 and 2068 scheduling would be that each team won’t play every other team every year, and there will be more of an emphasis on inter-divisional play, going from three or four games against divisional opponents in 2018 to six in the 2068 NBA.
How Do We Get Here?
Ladies and gentlemen, I’m here to tell you that it isn’t all that far-fetched that the NBA will swell to 48 teams over the next 50 years.
The growth rate of the league from 22 teams in 1980 to 30 teams in 2004 was an average of a team every three years; adding 18 teams in 50 years will be one every 2.7 years. While there will absolutely be new challenges when it comes to expanding across oceans, improved technology will assist in streamlining this process.
Will the NBA eventually reward Australia’s massive group of League Pass subscribers with a team of their own? What about the Starbury fans in Beijing or the Way of Wade followers in Shanghai?
If global domination is truly one of the NBA’s goals — and it certainly seems to be — they are on the right path to achieve it. Basketball is the second-most popular sport internationally next to soccer, and the NBA’s attempted conversion of basketball fans into NBA fans seems to be going swimmingly.
Look for domestic expansion to come next, be it Seattle or Hampton Roads or Las Vegas, followed by Mexico City and/or Vancouver. That will happen in the next decade, and will be followed closely by a higher frequency of regular season games played overseas, as the NFL has been doing in recent years.
Schedule reduction will come next in the name of rest, and once planes are measurably faster, European expansion would be the logical next step, followed closely by Asia. And once that happens, things should move rapidly towards a full-fledged, 48-team monster of a league that dominates the international sports landscape.
Now, if we could just get a team back in Seattle… | 3,886 |
Property home to iconic pub listed for $2M
The Hillsboro Village building home to Sportsman’s Grille is for sale for $2 million.
J.C. Darby, a broker with Nashville-based Southeast Venture, is handling the marketing and sale of the property. Darby said the property was listed Monday and is not yet under contract.
Via their C&C Management, Jim and Jerry Chandler own and operate Sportsman’s Grille. Their lease expires May 31. The Morris family and Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church, both based in Nashville, co-own the property.
Darby said the current owners has been pleased to have the Chandlers and their restaurant as a tenant. The pub and bar — known for its northern hunting lodge atmosphere — opened in 1991, a staple in fast-changing Hillsboro Village.
Darby said the owners of the Hillsboro Village property — which was home to Spats before converting to Sportsman's Grille — do not own the Belle Meade and Brentwood locations in which two other Sportsman’s Grille businesses operate.
Darby said the Hillsboro Village property is “ideally located,” referencing its proximity to Belmont and Vanderbilt universities and to Music Row. The site is located no more than three miles from downtown and sits on a “major arterial” (21st Avenue) that runs from Franklin on the south to the heart of Nashville on the north, he added.
About 35,000 cars pass by the building each day via 21st.
Constructed in 1953, according to Metro records, the building spans 6,922 square feet and is clad in painted brick.
The Chandlers are prepping to open Chandler Brothers Houston Street Pool Hall in Wedgewood-Houston (read more here). An opening date has not yet been announced.
Jim Chandler said that if the opportunity arises, "we may be able to negotiate a new lease" with the future owners of the building.
"Our closing date is still unknown at this time," he added. "We hope to coordinate our move date with our new location for the pub/billiard hall on Houston St."
The Chandlers once owned the since-closed Melrose Billiards and still own and operate Sportsman's Grille locations in Belle Meade and Brentwood and German restaurant Gerst Haus. The brothers also own the Gerst beer label and have Yazoo Brewing Co. contract brew the German-style brown ale.
Southeast Venture has undertaken multiple deals in the Hillsboro Village area.
| 3,887 |
It has long been recognized that higher rates of gun availability correlate with higher rates of female homicide. Women in the United States account for 84 percent of all female firearm victims in the developed world, even though they make up only a third of the developed world’s female population. And within American borders, women die at higher rates from suicide, homicide, and accidental firearm deaths in states where guns are more widely available. This is true even after controlling for factors such as urbanization, alcohol use, education, poverty, and divorce rates.
What’s more surprising is how many of these deaths occur in the home, at the hands of a male partner. In a study in the Journal of Trauma, A.L. Kellermann, director of the RAND Institute of health, and his coauthor J.A. Mercy concluded: “More than twice as many women are killed with a gun used by their husbands or intimate acquaintances than are murdered by strangers using guns, knives, or any other means.”
In another study, published in the American Journal of Public Health, researchers interviewed 417 women across 67 battered women’s shelters. Nearly a third of these women had lived in a household with a firearm. In two-thirds of the homes, their intimate partners had used the gun against them, usually threatening to kill (71.4%) them. A very small percentage of these women (7%) had used a gun successfully in self-defense, and primarily just to scare the attacking male partner away. Indeed, gun threats in the home against women by their intimate partners appear to be more common across the United States than self-defense uses of guns by women.
Another large case-control study compared women who were murdered by their intimate partner with a control group of battered women. Only 16 percent of the women who had been abused, but not murdered, had guns in their homes, whereas 51 percent of the murder victims did. In fact, not a single study to date has shown that the risk of any crime including burglary, robbery, home invasion, or spousal abuse against a female is decreased through gun ownership. Though there are examples of women using a gun to defend themselves, they are few and far between, and not statistically significant.
These facts should be as chilling to men as they are to women. A 2005 study examining mortality data from 1998-2000 found that when a female was shot by her intimate partner, the perpetrator subsequently killed himself in two thirds of the cases. This statistic not only shows necessity of getting mental help for at-risk men. It also further suggests that owning a firearm may make a household more vulnerable than ever. | 3,888 |
, Donald Trump, and Adolf Hitler along with Hanna Cornelius. She also used the word “penis” in the headline. As this country slouches its way towards another Zimbabwe with hyperinflation and empty supermarket shelves, I have become inured to the low-grade propaganda from the media.
But I was disturbed by the elements of white guilt in Willem Cornelius’s testimony before the court in which he bemoaned the “attention” showered upon his daughter and her death while thousands of other victims of rape and murder in South Africa do not elicit any media interest. Even though his “family died when Hannah died,” he still needs to show what a good liberal he is and how much he feels for the strife and decay of Cape Town’s teeming Colored ghettos. He noted that he was pleased Hannah was liberated from any form of racial or ethnic consciousness (he called it “baggage” in his testimony). He seems very traumatized and confused, having lost his daughter, his wife, and his job (he feels he can no longer work as a judge), left with only his autistic son, who keeps asking to see Hannah since her “holiday should be over by now.”
Poor Hannah. As I wrote in my first piece on this topic:
In a sense, Hannah Cornelius — my kinswoman — never had a chance. Even with her beauty, intelligence, excellent grades, mastery of French, and so on, she was never allowed to develop into a normal, care-free, protected Afrikaans girl, moving mostly in a white environment, meeting white boys her age at teenage parties or braais (our word for barbecues). Instead, she was flung into the liberal melting-pot, her identity confused, her corpse finally collected by the South African Police Service from a dirt road on the outskirts of Stellenbosch.
Even in death, Hannah is not free. Her name and those beautiful physical features that made her posthumously famous are being exploited to turn her into a poster girl for the liberal cult, to demand from us the sacrifice of yet more first-borns to feed the bloodthirsty gods of multicultural harmony.
Among Afrikaner children’s heroes is Rachel de Beer, who took off her own clothes to keep her little brother alive on a cold winter’s night in the open veld, and died in his place. I see Hannah Cornelius as a kind of postmodern Rachel de Beer. She sacrificed herself, not for her little brother, but to the liberal cult. | 3,889 |
In a letter to House Democrats, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that the House will take its first formal vote on Thursday to “affirm” the impeachment investigation. The resolution they will vote on also outlines procedures for holding public hearings and releasing interview transcripts.
Republicans have long criticized Democrats for not formally authorizing the proceedings, using the issue to justify their lack of cooperation. Ms. Pelosi had insisted a vote was not necessary, making her announcement today a precautionary step. She said the measure would “eliminate any doubt” as to whether the White House was required to comply.
Representative Adam Schiff, the House Intelligence Committee chairman leading the investigation, said that House Democrats will not ask federal courts to compel testimony from uncooperative witnesses. Mr. Schiff said petitioning the courts would “allow the White House to engage us in a lengthy game of rope-a-dope.”
Charles Kupperman, the former deputy national security adviser, defied a House subpoena today by not showing up for scheduled testimony. The White House claims he is immune from testifying, and Mr. Kupperman has filed a lawsuit seeking to clarify whether he should testify.
[Sign up to get the Impeachment Briefing in your email inbox every weeknight.]
A White House official speaks up
The Times has obtained a copy of the opening statement that Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, plans to deliver to House impeachment investigators on Tuesday. Here are four highlights:
1. He was on the July 25 phone call. Colonel Vindman was listening in when President Trump spoke with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky — a call that kick-started the investigation. He said he was alarmed by Mr. Trump’s request that Mr. Zelensky investigate the president’s political rivals.
2. He raised concerns about Ukraine. On two occasions, Colonel Vindman went to the top lawyer at the National Security Council with concerns about the administration’s conduct with Ukraine. The first was on July 10, when he said Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the E.U., urged Ukrainian officials to assist with the president’s political priorities. The second was after the phone call on July 25.
3. He tried to get military aid restored. In August, at the direction of his superiors at the National Security Council — including John Bolton, then the president’s national security adviser — Colonel Vindman drafted a memo to restart security aid that had been withheld from Ukraine. Mr. Trump refused to sign it. | 3,890 |
a position of need while not being forced to re-up Bulaga. Of course, no one would accuse Wagner of being as good as Bulaga. Wagner has had a solid career with the Ravens and Lions, but has had some consistency problems and has been a bit of a disappointment in the running game.
The Packers will probably start Billy Turner and Wagner on the right side of the line, which isn’t too exciting. The Packers have signed two more-or-less above-average offensive linemen in back-to-back years.
LaFleur may want to consider moving potential megastar Elgton Jenkins to right guard, and shift Turner to the left side to try to spread the wealth of the line. The re-signed Marcedes Lewis will likely be dispatched to this side of the line for most of his snaps. Turner and Wagner on the same side gives opposing defensive lines a clear idea of where to attack.
All told, the Packers showed that they had a very clear understanding of the market and showed a lot of health as a front office. But the Kirksey signing is puzzling as it did appear they could’ve added a massive piece to the middle of their defense at long last.
In signing two free agents that had been released by other teams, the Packers will still have the compensatory pick formula factor in only the losses of Martinez and Bulaga, which will likely net them at least two extra draft picks next year, perhaps as high as the fourth round. Gutekunst, with those extra picks expected to come his way, absolutely cannot make the same mistake he made during last season.
It was very clear that the Packers were not good enough to get to the Super Bowl when it was really time. The 49ers stampeded the helpless Packers twice with a punishing running game that “took away the manhood of the Packers” in the words of Troy Aikman.
Furthermore, the Packers still appear to have very limited targets in the passing game and will be trying to take advantage of the best wide receiver class in draft history to perhaps take a receiver in the first round for the first time since 2002. Even with the loaded talent in the draft, Aaron Rodgers is not exactly known as a dream quarterback for a rookie.
Gutekunst will need to trade for veteran help using late-round draft picks on both sides of the ball if necessary. Kirksey and Wagner are at best, lateral moves when factoring in the departed starters. The Packers are going to have to keep adding and will need to do so well after free agency has passed.
Grade: B+ | 3,891 |
Fedora is my favorite Linux distribution, but I don't always use it. Sometimes I opt for an operating system that is based on it depending on my needs at the moment. Called "Korora," it adds tweaks, repositories, codecs, and packages that aren't found in the normal Fedora operating system. As a result, Korora deviates from Red Hat's strict FOSS focus -- one of the most endearing things about Fedora. While you can add all of these things to Fedora manually, Korora can save you time by doing the work for you.
Since Korora is based on Fedora, it always lags from a version perspective. For instance, Fedora 26 was released in July, but Korora 26 is only seeing a release today. With version 26 of Korora, the big news is the fact that it is now 64-bit only -- 32-bit development for the operating system is dead. It is also the first version of the OS created with "Canvas" -- a new tool designed to simplify the process of creating the Korora operating system from Fedora.
Why is this operating system being called "Bloat?" No, it is not full of bloatware! Yes, it is a terrible name for an OS, I know. Actually, it is named after an anthropomorphized porcupine pufferfish called "Bloat" (voiced by Brad Garrett) from popular Disney/Pixar movie, "Finding Nemo." All versions of Korora are named after characters from this animated film.
There are five desktop environments available in Korora 26, all of which have been updated from the prior OS release. You can see a list of the environments below. Keep in mind, GNOME is the default environment for Fedora, so for the most authentic experience, you should use that.
Cinnamon 3.4
GNOME 3.24
KDE Plasma 5.10
Mate 1.18
Xfce 4.12
Regardless of desktop environment, you will now have solid backup options available to you, as detailed here. Speaking on these new backup options, The Korora Project Team explains, "We are always improving the range of included applications in Korora and from 26 all desktop environments now include a Backup solution. We know how important your data is to you so we wanted to make it easier for you to protect it."
Ready to download Korora 26? Just point your web browser here. Be sure to tell me how you like the operating system in the comments below.
Image Credit: AKKHARAT JARUSILAWONG / Shutterstock | 3,892 |
Deliberately preventing such functions on the server greatly reduced the motivation for individuals to cheat. Moreover the moderators try to encourage a positive gaming community where individuals develop personal rapport with other players and play with them. This placed a greater emphasis on relationships rather than competition. The outcome of these efforts has been deemed successful, as thus far efforts to maliciously hack the game have been largely isolated. Wesnoth's multiplayer implementation consists of a typical client-server infrastructure. A server, known as wesnothd, accepts connections from the Wesnoth client, and sends the client a summary of available games. Wesnoth will display a 'lobby' to the player who can choose to join a game or create a new game for others to join. Once players are in a game and the game starts, each instance of Wesnoth will generate WML commands describing the actions the player makes. These commands are sent to the server, and then the server relays them on to all the other clients in the game. The server will thus act as a very thin, simple relay. The replay system is used on the other clients to execute the WML commands. Since Wesnoth is a turn-based game, TCP/IP is used for all network communication. This system also allows observers to easily watch a game. An observer can join a game in-progress, in which case the server will send the WML representing the initial state of the game, followed by a history of all commands that have been carried out since the start of the game. This allows new observers to get up to speed on the state of the game. They can see a history of the game, although it does take time for the observer to get to the game's current position—the history of commands can be fast forwarded but it still takes time. The alternative would be to have one of the clients generate a snapshot of the game's current state as WML and send it to the new observer; however this approach would burden clients with overhead based on observers, and could facilitate denial-of-service attacks by having many observers join a game. Of course, since Wesnoth clients do not share any kind of game state with each other, only sending commands, it is important that they agree on the rules of the game. The server is segmented by version, with only players using the same version of the game able to interact. Players are immediately alerted if their client's game becomes out of sync with others. This also is a useful system to prevent cheating. Although it is rather easy for a player to cheat by modifying their client, any difference between versions will immediately be identified to players where it can be dealt with. | 3,893 |
Rescue workers are rushing to save roughly 14,600 sheep after a cargo ship carrying the animals capsized Sunday in the Black Sea off the coast of Romania.
Emergency services from the coastal city of Constanta managed to rescue all 21 crew members, including 20 Syrians and one Lebanese national, soon after the Queen Hind, a vessel built in 1980 that was sailing under the flag of the island nation of Palau, began to sink around noon local time, Ana-Maria Stoica, a spokeswoman for the rescuers, told AFP.
At least 32 sheep were also rescued — some after they were found swimming near the ship — which was headed from the Romanian port of Midia to Saudi Arabia.
But the fate of most of the sheep remained uncertain as emergency services restarted their operation Monday morning after an overnight break.
Many of the sheep are believed to have drowned, with livestock experts pointing out that the animals’ thick fleeces can easily become waterlogged, making it difficult to swim.
Romania is the third-largest producer of sheep in the E.U., after the U.K. and Spain. Around 100 livestock transport vessels leave the Midia port each year.
The country’s exporting of live sheep has long drawn criticism from animal rights activists, who claim the often cramped, hot and unsafe transport conditions inflict unnecessary suffering on the animals. Some have labeled the transport vessels “death ships.”
In July, after the leak of footage showing sheep being transported in extreme summer heat, the European Commission’s Health and Food Safety chief wrote to Romania’s agriculture minister to urge the halt of planned transports of 70,000 sheep to the Gulf region.
Authorities do not yet know what caused the Queen Hind to capsize, the BBC reports. An investigation will begin after rescue and salvage efforts have finished.
Get The Brief. Sign up to receive the top stories you need to know right now. Please enter a valid email address. Sign Up Now Check the box if you do not wish to receive promotional offers via email from TIME. You can unsubscribe at any time. By signing up you are agreeing to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Thank you! For your security, we've sent a confirmation email to the address you entered. Click the link to confirm your subscription and begin receiving our newsletters. If you don't get the confirmation within 10 minutes, please check your spam folder.
Write to Ciara Nugent at [email protected]. | 3,894 |
18th May 2014
Cardiff Blues are delighted to confirm the major appointment of Mark Hammett as the new Director of Rugby at the region on a three-year deal.
The former All Blacks international will link up with the Blues following the completion of his season in the Super 15 with the Hurricanes.
Hammett, 41, will front an exciting new-look coaching team at BT Sport Cardiff Arms Park with Dale McIntosh and Paul John.
The Christchurch-born ex-hooker has carved out a reputation as one of the most exciting and leading coaches in the Super 15 following spells at the Crusaders and Hurricanes.
Hammett, who won 29 caps for New Zealand between 1999 and 2003, made his name during his playing career with the Crusaders, where he won four titles.
He retired in 2003 and joined the coaching staff at Crusaders while also working with Canterbury in the Air New Zealand Cup.
Hammett took over as Head Coach at the Wellington-based Hurricanes in 2011 and is currently leading the team as they push for the end of season play-offs.
Richard Holland, Chief Executive at Cardiff Blues, said: “We conducted an extensive worldwide search, with the help of Wales coach Warren Gatland and Gareth Edwards, and are absolutely delighted that Mark Hammett will be taking the role of Director of Rugby.
“Chief (Dale McIntosh) and Johnsy (Paul John) have done a terrific job over the last few months and I know they are looking forward to working with Mark. They will form a strong partnership and we are excited to see that take the region forward.
“I have met Mark and he was the outstanding coach and person for the role. We believe his long-term vision for the Blues will take us to the next level and achieve our ambitions.
“We’ve made strong signings with New Zealand international Jarrad Hoeata, Italian back row Manoa Vosawai, Craig Mitchell, Josh Turnbull, Tavis Knoyle, George Watkins and Ieuan Jones joining us. We’re working hard on more signings and are positive about the way they will work with our talented existing squad under the guidance of Mark Hammett.
“It has always been our commitment as a region to be sustainable off the field and a competitive and successful on it.
“We’ve made the business sustainable since the return to the BT Sport Cardiff Arms Park and now, under the leadership of Mark Hammett, we believe the Blues can start to once again look forward to a bright future.”
| 3,895 |
Former Assistant Attorney General Peter Kadzik is unlikely to face any legal consequences for tipping off Clinton campaign manager John Podesta to a release of Hillary’s emails, experts tell the Daily Caller.
Kadzik’s conduct in the DOJ was described by Michael Horowitz’s IG report as constituting “poor judgment.” According to last week’s IG report, Peter Kadzik was trying to get his son hired by the Hillary Clinton campaign while Kadzik himself was part of the investigation into Clinton’s private server.
He also emailed Clinton’s 2016 campaign chair, John Podesta, with a “heads up” on when the some of her emails would be released publicly. (RELATED: DOJ Official Tipped Podesta On Clinton Email Release, Shopped His Son For Campaign Job)
Regarding Kadzik’s conduct, former FBI assistant director Ron Hosko told The Daily Caller, “(B)ased on the findings of the IG, and their analysis, I don’t see Kadzik’s activities as a violation of law.”
“If there were some more affirmative evidence of a covert exchange, a quid pro quo like the passing of sensitive or confidential investigative information in exchange for the employment of Kadzik’s son, or Kadzik trying to influence investigative activity or outcomes coupled with a job request and response, then there might be a claim of bribery or obstruction of justice.”
“Here, though, I think the IG is making the strongest case, one of poor judgment against ethical standards that DOJ employees are expected to adhere to,” he added. “Within the FBI, one could face sanction for poor judgment and creating the appearance of impropriety. I’d think DOJ would examine this similarly.”
Scott Amey, the general counsel of the watchdog group Project On Government Oversight (POGO), told TheDC, “As a lawyer you have a code of conduct and duty to your client, in this case, the Justice Department.”
“Additionally, government employees have basic obligations of public service, including avoiding conflicts of interest, being impartial, not using public office for private gain, and not sharing non-public information. While the DOJ Inspector General report cites ‘poor judgement,’ Kadzik’s activities appear much to be much more than that, but I’ll guess that the ethics office aren’t very concerned because he is a former government employee.”
Comments provided to TheDC were very lightly edited for clarity.
Follow Justin on Twitter | 3,896 |
compile the dossier for Fusion GPS. The official said to be Steele’s FBI handler has also appeared already before the Senate panel.
The Justice Department maintained that the decision to clear Strzok for House interrogation had occurred a few hours prior to the appearance of the Times and Post stories.
In addition, Rosenstein is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee on Dec. 13.
The Justice Department maintains that it has been very responsive to the House intel panel's demands, including private briefings for panel staff by senior DOJ and FBI personnel and the production of several hundred pages of classified materials available in a secure reading room at DOJ headquarters on Oct. 31.
Behind the scenes
Sources said Speaker Ryan has worked quietly behind the scenes to try to resolve the clash over dossier-related evidence and witnesses between the House intel panel on the one hand and DOJ and FBI on the other. In October, however, the speaker took the unusual step of saying publicly that the two agencies were "stonewalling" Congress.
All parties agree that some records being sought by the Nunes team belong to categories of documents that have historically never been shared with the committees that conduct oversight of the intelligence community.
Federal officials told Fox News the requested records include “highly sensitive raw intelligence,” so sensitive that officials from foreign governments have emphasized to the U.S. the “potential danger and chilling effect” it could place on foreign intelligence sources.
Justice Department officials noted that Nunes did not appear for a document-review session that his committee’s ranking Democrat, U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., attended, and once rejected a briefing by an FBI official if the panel’s Democratic members were permitted to attend.
Sources close to the various investigations agreed the discovery of Strzok’s texts raised important questions about his work on the Clinton email case, the Trump-Russia probe, and the dossier matter.
“That’s why the IG is looking into all of those things,” a Justice Department official told Fox News on Saturday.
A top House investigator asked: “If Mueller knew about the texts, what did he know about the dossier?”
Peter Carr, a spokesman for the special counsel, said: “Immediately upon learning of the allegations, the Special Counsel’s Office removed Peter Strzok from the investigation.”
Carr declined to comment on the extent to which Mueller has examined the dossier and its relationship, if any, to the counterintelligence investigation that Strzok launched during the height of the campaign season. | 3,897 |
How can it be? On Sunday, for the third time in less than four months, Western Australian police have attended a home and discovered what appears to be a mass murder.
Yesterday in Perth’s north-eastern suburb of Bedford police found two-year-old twin girls, their three-and-a-half-year-old sister, their mother and their grandmother all deceased. Two women and three children killed in suburbia.
Authorities were reportedly alerted to the property after a man attended a regional police station in WA yesterday to hand himself in. The man believed to be in his 20s is in custody but no charges have been laid yet and his relationship with the victims is unconfirmed.
Unsurprisingly attending officers have described the scene as horrific. Neighbours are shocked. The community is shattered.
“This is a tragic event and it will no doubt have an impact not only the family and friends of the deceased but for the whole of the community, those first responders who are faced with attending a scene with multiple deceased people,” the Assistant Police Commissioner Paul Steel told the gathered media yesterday. “It does send a ripple through the community of Western Australia.”
And beyond.
It takes the toll of women killed violently in Australia this year to 46, according to the Counting Dead Women Australia researchers of Destroy The Joint.
It’s shocking, but worse, that figure doesn’t count children. It doesn’t include the four children of Katrina Miles who were found shot dead in their beds, along with their mum and their grandmother, in May by their grandfather.
It doesn’t include Michelle Petersen’s two children Rua and Bella who were murdered in Perth’s north in July. It doesn’t include Sydney teenagers Jack and Jennifer Edwards who were killed by their father in the same month.
There is no end to these horrors: the injustice and brutality is unspeakable. The fact these massacres were all carried out in the victims’ homes compounds the monstrosity.
When two year old twins aren’t safe in the confines of a home where are they to go? Where is anyone to go when the gravest threat to their life isn’t posed by a stranger in a dark alley but instead within the walls of your home? It’s a question we have had cause to consider too often this year, but it’s a question we cannot ignore until we no longer have to answer it.
This is a national crisis: an epidemic of horror that words fail to adequately describe. | 3,898 |
: Once they've all cooked down in the pot together, they form a harmonious broth that's richer and deeper in flavor than you can imagine. Even assuming you can imagine quite a lot.
I find that beef stews thickened with too much flour can taste dull and pasty. Instead, I use a combination of two ingredients: just a touch of flour, which I toss with the cubed beef before adding it back to the pot, and a few packets of unflavored gelatin. Gelatin is naturally produced when connective tissue is cooked for a long time. It adds a mouth-coating texture and rich flavor to stews and sauces. But store-bought stock is very low in gelatin compared to homemade stock, so adding a few packets of pure gelatin can improve texture, while not interfering with flavor.
I blend all of my broth-base ingredients together before pouring them into the pot along with a bay leaf and some fresh thyme sprigs, sealing the pot, and letting the contents cook at high pressure for about half an hour.
After that half hour is up, I rapidly release the pressure by opening up the vent on my cooker, then unseal the lid. At this point, the beef will be mostly-but-not-quite tender, and the vegetables will have given up all their flavor. I make a swap, trading the spent vegetables for the ones that will actually be served in the final stew: the mushrooms, carrots, and pearl onions, along with a couple of cubed Yukon Gold potatoes. (I like the way their texture holds up in a stew better than that of russet potatoes.)
Another 15 minutes of cooking at high pressure is all it takes to finish tenderizing the beef and cook the added vegetables through. I'm the kind of guy who likes a few peas in his stew, so I add some frozen peas right at the end to allow them to retain their bright green color.
Because a stew cooked the traditional way in the oven develops more browned flavors (due to being heated from above), a pressure cooker stew is never going to be quite as flavorful, but you'll get 90% of the way there in a fraction of the time, which, for a weeknight, is a reasonable trade-off to make.
Someday, sometime, all of this can be yours. That day is probably today, and that time is approximately two hours from now.
Get the Recipe Pressure Cooker American Beef Stew View Recipe »
All products linked here have been independently selected by our editors. We may earn a commission on purchases, as described in our affiliate policy. | 3,899 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.