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,” Hendriks said. “I don’t yell as much, but I have my moments.”
He was also the first Australian to start a postseason game
Although that didn’t go so well. Melvin opted to go with Hendriks as an opener for Oakland’s wild-card game against the Yankees last season. He put the A’s in an early hole, walking leadoff hitter Andrew McCutchen, then surrendering a two-run homer to Aaron Judge. The Yankees went on to win 7-2.
Chapman is in charge of morale … and the aux cord
It was a role thrust onto him, but Chapman has embraced it. Being the team DJ, that is.
His rookie season, veteran Matt Joyce designated him to be carrier of the boombox that travels with the team and provides a soundtrack for the clubhouse before and after games.
“He just turned me into DJ, like the rookie DJ. So I had to carry the speaker everywhere, but I played music, so it was cool,” Chapman said.
Chapman had “Party Up” by Destructo blaring in the clubhouse following the A’s 7-3 win in their first-half finale, but he said J. Cole is his go-to artist.
Chapman entered the role of team leader in charge of morale more naturally.
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Ramón Laureano late homer hands A’s win in LA against Dodgers “I feel like that’s just my personality,” he said.
While he’s not the type of leader to call a team meeting, he is the guy the clubhouse who will keep the energy up during the doldrums of summer.
“When you’re here for 162 games, there are stretches that get a little grindy,” Chapman said. “So just finding ways to have fun and make things fun, just keep the energy up. When things start to get tough and guys are dragging, if you can just keep the energy up, that makes you want to come to the yard and have fun.” | 4,800 |
SG and AUG, will be the most chaotic meta of CS ever — Casper Due (@casdueh) October 9, 2018
On the point of T-favorability, the update represents an interesting chance to eco on the second round, or at least, change the way in which you force. If a team eco’s on the second round with ~$2,050 per player, with the loss bonus scaling, they’ll have ~$4,450 in the third round. For T’s, this is enough to buy AK’s, head armour, and limited, but adequate utility (especially given the unlikeliness of AWPs on the 3rd for CT’s who’ve won the last two). For CT’s, this will put them in the same position they were often in pre-update in the fourth round after forcing in the second; no head armour, limited utility, one or defuse kits and no AWP. Alternatively, the CT’s might do something like ‘deaco’ (buy deagles, no armour) on their second round, and full eco on the third. This would give them (again, assuming no kills) ~$6,650 to spend on their fourth round. More likely though, the CT-side (just like the T-side) will force in the 2nd, lose, eco and have ~$5,300 to play with for a full-buy in the fourth, which is far better than the sketchy buy they had to piece together pre-update. This update also opens the door to a variety of novel strategies as well when it comes to saving on pistol round, or getting a bomb plant on the pistol/force. The possibilities are too exhaustive to outline in detail, but essentially we will see more scouts, rifles, and SMG’s in the second and third rounds on top of stronger force-brought pistols.
I can totally see a world where T's on Train don't buy on pistol, rush inner, get bomb down, die.
5 players with 3,500 dollarydoos.
2nd round, can have players drop Ak's, buy kev vest, and the players being dropped, drop back SMG's/pistols + still buy util.
Na`Vi be so erect. — Max Melit (@max_melit) October 9, 2018
YOU CAN FULL ECO CT PISTOL AND GO INTO THE SECOND ROUND WITH UMP HEAD ARMOUR AND 2 NADES*
WHY — Bad Churchill (@SPUNJ) October 9, 2018 | 4,801 |
Interpol has suspended its €20m partnership with Fifa until further notice, in a further blow to football’s scandal-hit world governing body following a slew of bribery claims and arrests.
The two organisations signed a 10-year agreement in 2011 to provide funds to combat match-fixing but Interpol’s secretary general, Jürgen Stock, said the decision to freeze cooperation had been made “in light of the current context” surrounding Fifa.
The international police liaison group earlier this month issued six wanted notices for some of the 14 Fifa officials and marketing executives charged with executing a “World Cup of fraud” by US prosecutors over two generations.
They included Jack Warner, the former Fifa vice-president accused of accepting a bribe in return for voting for South Africa to host the 2010 World Cup. He denies the allegation and has been bailed in Trinidad and will return to court on 9 July.
Stock, in a statement, said: “All external partners, whether public or private, must share the fundamental values and principles of the organisation.”
Fifa seemed taken aback by the move, and said it was “reaching out” to Interpol for talks. In its own statement, the governing body said: “This successful programme is unrelated to the current issues surrounding Fifa and we believe that this unilateral decision will negatively impact the fight against criminal activity.”
With seven of those arrested still in prison in Zurich awaiting extradition to the US and the outgoing Fifa president, Sepp Blatter, under pressure to quit before a promised presidential election between December and February, it is the latest blow to Fifa’s rock-bottom reputation.
The original agreement, signed in May 2011 shortly before Blatter was re-elected for a fourth term, was closely associated with the longstanding Fifa president and seen as part of his campaign.
At the time it was hailed as the largest ever private donation to Interpol and described as a key intervention in the battle against match-fixing, funding a 10-year programme operating out of Singapore.
Interpol’s surprise move capped another chaotic week for Fifa that also included the departure of its communications director Walter de Gregorio, who is believed to have lost his job after telling a joke on Swiss TV that made light of the police raids.
Elsewhere, the Vatican had earlier on Thursday night suspended a deal to accept charitable funds from Conmebol, the South American football confederation which is implicated in the ongoing US federal investigation into widespread corruption.
Legislators in Paraguay this week lifted the immunity from prosecution granted to Conmebol’s headquarters in Asunción. | 4,802 |
who has a gluten reaction because they were careless or unable to meet your needs to destroy a business. Because of that they want you satisfied!
If you are shy about explaining your gluten-free needs at a restaurant or if you like to eat ethnic foods where there might be a language barrier, you can get cards to carry with you that have your dietary needs clearly explained on them.
I recommend those provided by Triumph Dining. You can get what they call “Dining Cards” in both disposable or permanently laminated formats to explain your dietary situation to restaurant and other eatery managers and employees. Plus, they are available in 10 different languages, including English and Spanish, in case there is a language barrier.
Triumph Dining’s products are guaranteed and the company has been around since 2004 so they probably aren’t going away any time in the near future (in case you have a problem with any of their products).
I think that some people might think that their products are a “bit pricey.” But, you get what you pay for from Triumph Dining and, except for disposable items, you will be able to reuse them again and again. And, it sure beats losing two or three days of work and pay because you had a serious gluten reaction.
You can show these cards to your server or the restaurant’s manager if you are shy to explain your gluten-free food needs or if there is an obvious language barrier.
Don’t be shy – it’s your health, and your money! Even more than that, getting sick from a gluten reaction while you are away from home is to be avoided at all costs… Trust me… I’ve been there… Done that… Got the T-Shirt… You don’t want to do it… at any cost!
Good Luck!
Linked to:
Easy Green Mama’s Gluten Free Tuesday
Table for Seven’s Share Your Stuff Tuesdays
The Gluten-Free Homemaker’s Gluten-Free Wednesdays
The Tasty Alternative’s Allergy Friendly Wednesdays
Miz Helen’s Country Cottage Full Plate Thursday
Katherine’s Corner Thursday Favorite Things
Vegetarian Mamma’s Gluten-Free Fridays
Rattlebridge Farm’s Foodie Friday
Home Maid Simple’s Foodie Friday
Simply Sweet Home’s Friday Favorites
Simple Living and Eating’s Foodie Friday
Sunflower Supper Club’s Weekend Potluck | 4,803 |
“I didn’t know that angels could fly so low. Or that angels even existed anymore now that God is dead… amiright???”
That’s Nietzsche’s pick-up line, as imagined by Dan Caprera in a recent post at McSweeney’s. His other “famous philosopher’s pick-up lines” include:
René Descartes: “I would rearrange the stars for you, babe… And, technically-speaking, it is NOT IMPOSSIBLE for me to rearrange the stars, because everything that is external to me is subject to skepticism and, as such, the only thing I can truly be certain of is my own, rational existence.”
Jeremy Bentham: “Wanna maximize each other’s overall happiness, babe?”
And of course:
Immanuel Kant: “If loving you is wrong, babe… then I have a moral duty not to love you because loving you is an ethical decision that cannot be universalized.”
…among others. One gets the sense that lines like these may have been what Manet had in mind when he painted this poor bartender:
Nonetheless, I suspect some readers might be particularly good at coming up with additions to this list. Of course we needn’t be limited to the great historical philosophers everyone has heard of, so we have more to work with (just don’t be mean to the living, please). Here are a few from me:
T.M. Scanlon: “No one could reasonably reject you.”
G.E.M. Anscombe: “Them? They’re all idiots. I’m the only one who knows how you think. Let’s get out of here.”
Edmund Gettier: “I bet you don’t know what I like about you.”
Peter Singer: “The most good you could do? How about joining me for dinner?”
Susan Wolf: “You’re no saint—I like that about you.”
The Churchlands: “Trust us, don’t overthink it.”
David Benatar: “One look at you and I realized just how wrong I was.”
Your turn…
UPDATE: Philosophy Blogs’ Pick-Up Lines.
Related: “Philosophers’ Break-Up Letters“; “Philosophy Valentines” | 4,804 |
Observation: Over time, legal systems tend to build up, bit by bit, until they become unworkable messes that hinder the creation and acquisition of basic necessities like jobs, housing, or justice. This is because it is easier to pass new laws than to repeal old laws; because there are always interest groups in favor of passing some new regulation in their favor, but rarely groups in favor of repealing them; and because it is generally difficult to look back over the many laws passed over many years to deal with changing conditions and think up and pass a better, more efficient law that unifies all of the things the previous laws were trying to address into one coherent package.
In other words, the second law of thermodynamics.
The middle class is now leaving CA at high rates because they can’t afford it, due primarily to housing costs, which are in turn driven by building/environmental regulations, rental regulations, and tax laws.
Notably, California has some laws that affect taxes on housing that only make one’s tax rate go up when a home is sold, so people who’ve lived in their homes for a long time pay much lower real estate taxes than people who recently bought homes, which makes people who’ve lived in their homes for a long time much less willing to sell and move to a new home because they don’t want a big jump in taxes, which keeps a lot of the housing stock off the market and means that young people trying to buy their first homes are paying a hugely disproportionate amount of the real estate taxes.
This wouldn’t be such a huge deal if Californian could just build more houses, but with so many regulations, that’s difficult, and on top of all that, California is one of the top destinations for newcomers to the US, who also want to live in houses and so are also competing for the limited stock.
So young middle class folks increasingly find that they simply cannot afford to live in California and are leaving.
This is migration driven entirely by artificial scarcity created through bad policies, since (other than maybe water) CA is resource-rich, land rich, and has great weather.
Since it is easier to add more laws on top of old than to repeal, there is very little hope of fixing things through legal reform. Laws exist in part because someone wants them or benefits from them, after all, and the system will keep limping along for as long as it can.
The other option, acceleration, is to simply speed up the process so the system breaks sooner rather than later, forcing people to deal with it rather than punt the problems to the next generation. | 4,805 |
ASPEN, Colorado—CIA officials learned about a Russian hacking attempt targeting Senate candidates only when Microsoft publicly revealed the effort at a national security conference, according to House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff. Schiff said he and his contacts in the National Security Agency (NSA) learned of the attempt at the same time.
Schiff made the comment in an interview at the Aspen Security Forum with NBC’s Kristen Welker, after she asked how confident he was in the U.S. government’s ability to deter future election interference.
“I’m not particularly confident,” he said. “I think back a year ago to this conference, when one of the representatives of Microsoft was on a panel and revealed that two or three Senate campaigns had been the target of spear-phishing attempts by an actor that appeared to be the same Fancy Bear actor, the same Russian GRU unit, that brought us the intervention in the 2016 election. Well, that was the first time I was hearing that. That should not be the first time the Intelligence chair is hearing that. And I went back to D.C. and I talked to my contacts at NSA and CIA and I said, ‘Did you know this?’ And they did not. And I said, ‘This should not be the first time you’re hearing this.’ And that told me as a matter of quality control that something is broken here. Either it didn’t get communicated to the right place by Microsoft or it did and it was stovepiped, or whatever. But we need to find out what happened.”
It’s a stunning statement from the Intelligence Committee chairman, and points to what may be a major deficiency in the ability of America’s national security agencies to communicate with each other about election security. Spokespersons for the CIA and the NSA did not immediately return requests for comment.
Schiff learned of the targeting from Tom Burt, Microsoft’s vice president of customer security and trust. Burt made the comment at the Aspen security forum in 2018, and did not name the campaigns the Russians had targeted. The Daily Beast later revealed that one target was then-Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat in a tight race. McCaskill went on to lose her re-election.
Aki Peritz, a former CIA counterterrorism analyst, tweeted that the revelation was surprising. “Did the FBI know? Did DHS’s CISA know? Did ODNI? If not, why not? If so, how was this intel disseminated to the rest of the community?” he wrote. | 4,806 |
Abstract
Background: Corticosteroid injections have been widely used for reducing shoulder pain. However, catastrophic complications induced by corticosteroid such as infections and tendon degeneration have made surgeons hesitant to use a corticosteroid injection as a pain control modality, especially during the postoperative recovery phase.
Purpose: To determine the effectiveness and safety of a subacromial corticosteroid injection for persistent pain control during the recovery period and to analyze the factors causing persistent pain after arthroscopic rotator cuff repair.
Study Design: Cohort study; Level of evidence, 3.
Methods: A total of 458 patients who underwent arthroscopic rotator cuff repair were included in this study. Patient-specific parameters, tear size and pattern, and pain intensity were reviewed. Seventy-two patients were administered a postoperative subacromial corticosteroid injection under ultrasound guidance. The corticosteroid injection was administered to patients who awakened overnight because of constant severe shoulder pain or whose pain was exacerbated at the time of rehabilitation exercises within 8 weeks after surgery. Pain intensity, patient satisfaction, and functional outcomes using the American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) and Constant scores were compared between the patients with and without a subacromial corticosteroid injection. The retear rate was evaluated with magnetic resonance imaging at 6 months postoperatively.
Results: In patients with an injection, the mean (±SD) visual analog scale for pain (pVAS) score was 7.7 ± 1.2 at the time of the injection. This significantly decreased to 2.3 ± 1.4 at the end of the first month after the injection, demonstrating a 70.2% reduction in pain (P <.01). At 3 months after the injection, the mean pVAS score was 1.2 ± 1.8. Functional outcomes at final follow-up showed no significant differences between patients with and without an injection (ASES score: 90.1 ± 14.6 with injection, 91.9 ± 8.2 without injection [P =.91]; Constant score: 89.1 ± 12.9 with injection, 84.5 ± 13.0 without injection [P =.17]). Patients with an injection showed no significant increase in the retear rate (6.8% with injection, 18.4% without injection; P =.06). According to the tear pattern, L-shaped rotator cuff tears (41.8%) showed a higher occurrence of severe postoperative persistent pain. Preoperative shoulder stiffness was revealed as a predisposing factor for persistent pain (odds ratio, 0.2; P =.04). | 4,807 |
Grid-scale batteries will play a crucial role in stabilizing the grid, according to ARENA boss Ivor Frischknecht.
South Australia is in line for another big battery that uses Tesla Powerpack technology, at Infigen Energy’s 278.5 MW Lake Bonney Wind Farm.
Infigen has entered into funding agreements with the South Australian government and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) to underpin a deal worth around $38 million (US$27.6 million). The state government and ARENA have committed $5 million each in grant funding and construction is expected to start within weeks.
The storage system will give Infigen at least another 18 MW of power, depending on the customer load profile.
“With the firming capability of the BESS [battery energy storage system], Infigen will be able to expand its supply contracts from the Lake Bonney Wind Farm to additional commercial and industrial customers in South Australia, which is at the heart of our business strategy,” said Inigen CEO Ross Rolfe.
The company will build and operate the facility, which will be connected to grid via the Mayurra substation near Mount Gambier, in the state’s south east.
Grid-scale battery could drive regulatory changes
The battery will deliver flexible capacity and system security services, such as frequency control ancillary services, to the state electricity grid.
Popular content
“It is clear that grid-scale batteries have an important role in stabilizing the grid,” ARENA Chief Executive Ivor Frischknecht said.
“The co-location of a battery with a wind farm provides an opportunity for Infigen to pursue regulatory changes that could improve revenue outcomes for grid-scale batteries, helping to becoming more competitive,” Mr. Frischknecht said.
South Australia is already home to the world’s largest battery – a 100 MW/129 MWh system at the Hornsdale wind farm, which may be surpassed in size by SIMEC Zen Energy’s 120 MW/140 MWh battery project, announced as part of a 1 GW dispatchable renewable energy program.
Meanwhile, the largest battery project built in conjunction with a solar farm in South Australia, is the 21 MW/26 MWh battery system coupled with a 44 MW solar project near Snowtown.
Other sizable Tesla batteries can be found in Victoria, where a 25 MW/50 MWh battery is coupled with the 60 MW Gannawarra solar farm near Kerang, and a 20 MW battery operates at the 204 MW Bulgana Green Power Hub. | 4,808 |
how the balls interact with Beerus:
5l: moves the ball straight forward midrange, remains at the same height, good for midrange if you have a ball
5m: bounces the ball at a "v" angle, could be an awkard anti-approach, leaves the ball high
5h: shoots the ball straight forward full screen, bnb zoning, very quick, pushes the ball against back wall and back center
5s: moves the ball diagonally forward midrange, covers solid midrange with ki blast
2l: moves the ball diagonally forward midrange, ball setup tool, quick button so possibly good for setups when ball is too low
2m: does not hit ball
2h: shoots the ball diagonally full screen, very quick, does not go past ceiling, use questionable?
2s: shoots a new ball diagonally up forwards, floats until hit, then starts dropping, possible setup tool
j.l: moves the ball straight forward midrange, remains at the same height, very good set up when combined with 236s and 214x
j.m: moves the ball diagonally upwards, quick, covers weird angle
j.h: bnb approach, moves the ball diagonally downwards and bounces it, covers good angle,combine with iad
j.s: moves the ball diagonally up-forwards
236l: spawns a ball and kicks it at shallow downwards angle, bounces off ground, full screen, bnb zoning
236[l]: spawns a ball at chest level, good for tons of stuff
236m: spawns a ball and kicks it at steep downwards angle, bounces off ground, combo tool in corner
236[m]: spawns a ball right above Beerus' head, will float down on top of shorter characters in corner
236h: spawns and kicks 2 balls at l and m angles. covers a very good midrange angle, m ball in decent position if whiffed
236[h]: spawns 2 balls at l and m heights. setup/pressure heaven
236s: spawns 6 balls around beerus. this is really really good in setups
214l/m: spikes the ball at a sharp angle, moves ball off screen, which slowly falls from above
214h: very hard to get the balls to do anything favorably, maybe for specific setups? most likely just gonna shoot the ball into the opponent
214s: shoots all balls up forward
homing: pushes the balls slightly up forward
supers: no interaction
Reply · Report Post | 4,809 |
Riley Sheahan 12-23-16
Riley Sheahan can provide a net presence for the Red Wings, particularly on the power play.
(The Associated Press)
SAN JOSE, Calif. - Riley Sheahan hasn't scored a goal this season, but his size, net presence and faceoff ability are keeping him in the lineup for the Detroit Red Wings.
Coach Jeff Blashill said before Saturday's game in San Jose that he rarely sits out players based on point production.
"We make decisions to maybe healthy scratch somebody based on process," Blashill said. "That's defensive process, that's battle level, that's compete level, that's effort level. Just because the puck hasn't gone in for him this year, it's unfortunate, but I think his game lately has been good, to be honest with you. He's doing lots of things that help us."
Sheahan has no goals, six assists and a minus-14 rating in 38 games. The only game he missed, Dec. 29 at Ottawa, was due to an injury.
When Sheahan is playing well, like he was the final 20 games of the 2015-16 season, he's utilizing his 6-foot-3, 226-pound frame to drive to the net and create scoring opportunities and he's responsible defensively.
"I sat there for 20 minutes and had a session about getting to the net and being harder at the net and getting pucks to the net," Blashill said. "It's hard to take one of your few guys that's really a natural net presence guy out of the lineup when that's what you're looking for more of. Wouldn't make any sense.
"I think Riley has done lots of good stuff. It's well-documented that he hasn't scored. While I want him to score, I want his process to be great and I think his process has been very good lots of nights."
Sheahan said he's trying to play the same way, saying he knows he has offense in him. He had 24 points (nine goals. 15 assists) in 42 games as a rookie in 2013-14, put up a career-high 36 points the following season and had a career-high 14 goals among his 25 points in 2015-16.
"I'm going to try to do the same things," Sheahan said. "It's all I can do, get to the net, try to create some offense. I think we all need to do that in order to be successful."
The only healthy alternative the Red Wings have is Tomas Jurco, who has no points in 11 games. | 4,810 |
even though America’s most populous and progressive state is unlikely to be in play in next November’s election, it is already looming large in the Democratic nominating contest.
Much has been made of the reason why: California’s decision to move its primary from June to March 3.
Indeed, it’s worth noting that one of the Democratic Party’s top 2020 prospects, Kamala Harris, hails from the Bay Area, and has held seven California fundraisers to date.
“We must confront the dark history of slavery and government-sanctioned discrimination in this country that has had many consequences, including undermining the ability of Black families to build wealth in America for generations.”
— Elizabeth Warren, in a statement to Reuters
Noted
I'm honored to once again have the support of my good friend @KillerMike. He is a tireless advocate for social, economic and racial justice in this country. pic.twitter.com/mG0vEFO8sg — Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) February 22, 2019
Klobuchar’s ratings dud
One by one, the growing field of presidential candidates are getting the town hall treatment from CNN. But they’re not always ratings gold. This week’s Don Lemon-hosted town hall with Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., finished in third place with 1.1 million viewers, drawing more than a million fewer than MSNBC and Fox News programming in the same primetime slot.
Kamala Harris, on the other hand, drew a big audience for CNN during a January town hall, watched by nearly 2 million.
In Iowa, ranch rules
WATCH: Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand interrupted at campaign event by woman seeking ranch dressing https://t.co/htZyq1t553 pic.twitter.com/YXOw5tKWxh — The Hill (@thehill) February 19, 2019
Des Moines
• Feb. 22, Partly cloudy, 32°/30°
• Feb. 23, Freezing rain, 35°/18°
• Feb. 24, Partly cloudy, 21°/3°
Manchester, N.H.
• Feb. 22, Mostly sunny, 41°/19°
• Feb. 23, Partly cloudy, 41°/27°
• Feb. 24, Rain/snow mix, 41°/31°
Source: Weather Underground
___
Read more from Yahoo News: | 4,811 |
pursue its interest so long as they do not contradict those of the King Under the Mountain,” she smoothly replied. “We would consult with you to ensure such an unfortunate turn of events will not come to be.”
“You’re not human,” Balasi thoughtfully said. “Some sort of spirit, bound in service. The kingdom you claim to come from is not known for such pacts.”
“The world ever changes, Seeker Balasi,” Akua smiled. “New eras demand new methods, lest we be left in the dust.”
“You’re a long way from home, Callowans,” the dwarf said. “Stumbling into matters beyond your understanding. To presume to even speak of them is a dangerous kind of arrogance.”
“You are correct, Seeker,” the shade said. “We are a long way from home. With little love for those who dwell here, and a mind open to fresh opportunities. It would be a sad thing to turn a blind eye to mutual profits without good motive.”
I left her to it, my eyes drawn to the Herald’s staff. The trinkets, in particular. It was a subtle thing, but there was power to them. They were no simple decoration. My eyes narrowed. Not, not the trinkets themselves. Something inside them, bound.
“The shackles do not bind you,” the Herald of the Deeps said in perfect Lower Miezan.
The other two went silent as I met those eldritch green eyes. I called on a sliver of Winter and tore off one of the shackles like it was made of parchment, runes struggling impotently.
“They do not,” I agreed.
“You are not human,” the Herald said.
“I was,” I replied. “Then I murdered a demigod and stole his power.”
“And so you come to the Everdark,” the dwarf said. “Seeking yet more.”
“I have a great many enemies,” I said. “Enough it might be said we share a few.”
The Herald smiled, slow and mean.
“I offer hospitality to you, Queen of Callow,” he said. “Let us eat, drink, and talk of murdering gods.”
Well, now they were speaking my language. | 4,812 |
must then examine the interrupt to ensure it is handled properly. PCIe interrupts do not use physical hardware; instead, a message is sent to the device driver by writing to the block of memory assigned to the device—PCIe uses the same system for interrupts as it does for data transfer. This avoids the need to share interrupt lines, by enabling interrupts to be directed specifically and solely to the device that needs them.
Virtualizing PCI and PCIe
So, how do these things get virtualized? The first approach is emulation. Just as CPU emulation requires an entire virtual CPU to be run "in software," the same is true of device emulation. Generally, the approach taken is for the virtualization software to emulate well-known real-world devices. All the PCI infrastructure—device enumeration and identification, interrupts, DMA—is replicated in software. These software models respond to the same commands, and do the same thing as their hardware counterparts. The guest OS will write to its virtualized device memory (whether it be system memory, x86 I/O, or PCI configuration space), and trigger interrupts, and the VMM software will respond as if it were real hardware. Even this interrupt signalling uses emulation; one of the emulated devices is an interrupt controller.
This "response" generally means making an equivalent call to the host OS. So, for example, to write some data to disk, the guest OS will use its driver to write that to the disk controller's device memory, which sits inside a device model—a kind of virtual controller—along with the PCI configuration space and a virtual version of the controller chip. Then, using an interrupt sent via the VM's virtual interrupt controller, the guest OS commands the VMM's virtual disk controller to write that to a particular location on the disk. In turn, the VMM's disk controller will tell the host OS to write the data to a particular spot in a file (or, when used with so-called raw disks, to a particular spot on disk). The host OS then does the same thing as the guest OS—it copies the data to the disk controller's device memory via its driver and signals an interrupt.
A software-emulated device
In the diagram above, you can see that there's an entire virtual device and a virtual interrupt controller in the VM, and then another pair of these in the VMM. That's two layers of emulation before you get to the hardware. (The one element of the diagram above that's probably not at all self-explanatory is the little tab with gears on it beneath the OS. That's the device driver, and device model in the VMM uses it to interface with the hardware.) | 4,813 |
later teens at that point in his life.
Other lawmakers on Sunday downplayed the potential impact of Trump’s position on Moore, including Sen. Tim Scott Timothy (Tim) Eugene ScottAuthor Ryan Girdusky: RNC worked best when highlighting'regular people' as opposed to'standard Republicans' Now is the time to renew our focus on students and their futures GOP lobbyists pleasantly surprised by Republican convention MORE (R-S.C.), who said the president’s remarks about Moore do not necessarily compromise his moral authority.
“Well, there's certainly — I don't think so,” Scott told ABC’s “This Week.”
“I think the reality of it is that while I have read through as many stories as I could get my hands on, I think the issue in the case is compelling, I have reached the conclusion. I think there are many Americans who disagree with me vehemently. I don't necessarily understand how, but they do.”
Rep. Barbara Comstock Barbara Jean ComstockLive coverage: House holds third day of public impeachment hearings Gun debate raises stakes in battle for Virginia legislature Progressives face steep odds in ousting incumbent Democrats MORE (R-Va.), when questioned about Trump’s apparent backing of the Alabama Republican, reiterated that she believes Moore should exit the race.
“Well, I think we have a lot of — there's so much support, bipartisan support, that's going to be a political issue but I've already said that I think Roy Moore should step aside, the way Tim Scott did,” Comstock told ABC. “But it's important for us to focus on these victims.”
Moore has remained defiant despite losing support from key fundraising resources like the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the Republican National Committee (RNC).
But RNC chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel in an interview noted that while the RNC pulled its resources due to the “concerning” accusations, Alabama will ultimately decide whether or not to send Moore to the Senate.
"He is the candidate. The Alabama [Republican] Party has stood by that,” McDaniel told radio host John Catsimatidis. “Now the Alabama voters are going to have to be the judge and jury on this."
Polls since the allegations first came to light have shown that Jones is inching closer to Moore in the deep-red state, where a Democrat has not served as a senator since 1997, when former Sen. Howell Heflin retired.
One poll last week had Moore receiving 47 percent of the vote to Jones’s 45 percent. | 4,814 |
A federal judge on Friday temporarily blocked the Trump administration's plan to spend billions to construct a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border with Defense Department funds.
U.S. District Court Judge Haywood Gilliam’s ruling halts the administration from using the reallocated funds for projects in specific areas in Texas and Arizona. Trump declared a national emergency in February to redirect funding from the Department of Defense to begin construction of his long-promised border wall.
“In short, the position that when Congress declines the Executive’s request to appropriate funds, the Executive nonetheless may simply find a way to spend those funds “without Congress” does not square with fundamental separation of powers principles dating back to the earliest days of our Republic,” wrote Gilliam, who was appointed to the bench by former President Barack Obama.
THAT LOOSE CHANGE LEFT AT AIRPORTS MAY BE USED TO HELP FUND BORDER OPERATIONS
The move was a workaround Congress, which had not given in to his demands to fund the barrier. The wall has been Trump's signature promise. Gilliam's ruling doesn't prevent the Trump administration from using other sources to fund the wall.
He said Trump's plan to divert Pentagon funds for border-wall construction was unconstitutional because the argument White House relied on applied to unforeseen needs, Politico reported.
“Defendants’ argument that the need for the requested border barrier construction funding was ‘unforeseen’ cannot logically be squared with the Administration’s multiple requests for funding for exactly that purpose dating back to at least early 2018,” the Obama nominee wrote.
The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a Fox News request for comment.
Trump declared the national emergency after a stand-off between him and Democrats over border wall funding resulted in the 35-day partial government shutdown.
Around 20 states, environmental groups and civil liberties groups sued the administration to halt plans for the wall.
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“This order is a win for our system of checks and balances, the rule of law, and border communities,” Dror Ladin, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union's National Security Project, said in a statement. “The court blocked all the wall projects currently slated for immediate construction. If the administration begins illegally diverting additional military funds, we'll be back in court to block that as well.”
The ACLU filed a motion on behalf of the Sierra Club and the Southern Border Communities Coalition to block wall construction.
This is a developing story. Check back with Fox News for updates. | 4,815 |
An optical image of the sky showing the location of the black hole, Cygnus X-1. (Right) An artist's conception of the black hole system, showing the black hole drawing material towards it from a massive, blue companion star. This material forms a disk and jets that emit radiation. Credit: Optical: DSS; Illustration: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss
Black holes are among the most amazing and bizarre predictions of Einstein's theory of gravity. A black hole is thought to be point-like in dimension, but it is surrounded by an imaginary surface, or "edge," of finite size (its "event horizon") within which anything that ventures becomes lost forever to the rest of the universe.
Despite their reputation as implacable sinks for matter and energy, the regions around black holes are often sources of powerful emission. They can be ringed by a disk of matter, for example contributed by gas from an orbiting companion star; when infalling material interacts with that disk, radiation and matter can be ejected.
A black hole is so simple that it can be completely described by only three parameters: its mass, its spin, and its electric charge, but measuring these values is far from simple. The charge is usually considered to be negligibly small, leaving only two parameters. The mass can be found when the black hole has an orbiting companion, since the periodic orbital motions of the pair are precisely determined by their masses and the orbit's size. Infalling material provides a source of radiation to measure the period, but ascertaining the size of the orbit requires knowing the distance to the source.
All these difficulties have been overcome in a set of three papers appearing together this month. CfA astronomers Mark Reid, Jeff McClintock, Ramesh Narayan, Lijun Gou, James Steiner, and Jingen Xiang, together with their colleagues, used radio wavelength parallax techniques to measure the precise distance to the first discovered black hole, Cygnus X-1: it is 6060 light-years away, with an uncertainty of about 6%. The firm distance estimate enabled the scientists to infer the mass of the black hole: 14.8 solar masses with about the same uncertainty, 7%. Not least, the sole remaining parameter of a black hole -- its spin -- could now also be determined. The team calculated that the black hole is rotating at about 95% of the maximum rotation permitted in Einstein's theory, corresponding to its event horizon whirling around about 800 times per second. While these objects are still just as amazing and bizarre, these new papers are a dramatic step forward in our understanding of their basic properties.
Explore further The Milky Way's supermassive black hole | 4,816 |
Britain is reportedly interested in joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade bloc after it leaves the European Union.
Key points: Britain would have to leave the EU before entering into the TPP
Britain would have to leave the EU before entering into the TPP The UK Government is hoping to boost post-Brexit exports
The UK Government is hoping to boost post-Brexit exports The 11-country pact was salvaged after the US pulled out in January
Britain has started informal talks about joining the bloc in a bid to boost post-Brexit exports, the Financial Times newspaper said.
The United States pulled out of the talks to form the 12-nation bloc nearly a year ago, however the other TPP countries — including Australia — have pledged to move forward with plans for a trade group.
While British Trade Minister Liam Fox said Britain wanted "to talk to our global trading partners", he said it was too soon to formally seek membership of the TPP.
"We don't know what the success of the TPP is going to yet look like, because it isn't yet negotiated," he said.
"So, it would be a little bit premature for us to be wanting to sign up to something that we're not sure what the final details will look like.
"However, we have said that we want to be an open, outward-looking country, and therefore it would be foolish for us to rule out any particular outcomes for the future. So, we'll keep an open mind, and we'll want to talk to our global trading partners."
EU rules state that Britain cannot agree to new trade deals before it leaves the bloc in March 2019.
The newspaper quoted an official from a TPP country as saying it was "way too soon" to discuss UK accession before a Brexit deal.
The TPP has so far involved only countries around the Pacific Rim such as Japan, Canada and Mexico.
However, the UK's junior trade minister Greg Hands said there was no geographical restriction that would prevent Britain's participation.
"Nothing is excluded in all of this," he told the Financial Times.
"With these kind of plurilateral relationships, there doesn't have to be any geographical restriction."
The 11 countries involved in the deal have been working to salvage it after the US decided to pull out in January last year.
The Australian Government was quick to say it would seek a revised deal, while the Opposition said the agreement was "dead in the water" without US support.
In November, trade ministers from all of the nations agreed to rebadge the deal as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Reuters/ABC | 4,817 |
I don’t want to introduce this post by saying why smoking is bad. I was a smoker in the past. I quit only because I wanted to have a baby and I believed me smoking was harmful for my child. But I am still annoyed when people start educating me why smoking is bad.
I think that’s every person’s business and choice. So what I was looking at in the following anti-smoking campaigns is not the educative value (I personally doubt smokers aren’t aware of the risk already) but creativity and original idea (the way it was implemented).
Street campaigns:
Stop Smoking Bus Advertisement: “Ready to quit?”
Smoke Is Poison Advertisement: 12 meter long chemical tanker that looks like a giant cigarette was used by Cancer Research UK to highlight the toxic smoke in cigarettes (via toxel.com).
Bus stop anti-smoking campaign:
“What we see when you smoke”
This one from the Cancer Patient Aid Association was put on the roofs of outdoor smoking areas (via inventorspot.com):
Anti-smoking promotion for ‘World No Tobacco Day’ found at coffee shops in Dubai, where people come to smoke (via inventorspot.com):
“Fight Smoking“: an ad campaign throughout the gyms:
Anti-smoking campaign as a stylish piece:
This anti-smoking hat looks both stylish and scary (via moolf.com)
Print negative advertisements:
“For more information on lung cancer, keep smoking”
“Before it’s too late”
Wyoming Department of Health: “Don’t secondsmoke the messenger”
“Second hand smoke in the home hospitalises 17,000 UK children a year” (the campaign for Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, the UK medical research charity dedicated to dedicated to defeating lung cancer):
Another campaign for Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation: Deathbed:
“Smoking causes premature ageing”
“There is an easier way of committing suicide: try smoking”
“It’s called suicide because it’s your choice. Give up smoking: 0 8008 700 700”
“Non-smoking area”
A similar concept (via adsoftheworld.com):
Post image by darcy.gill
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An unusual split has opened between conservative Republicans and the American military leadership over the U.S.-Russia nuclear treaty, with current and former generals urging swift passage but politicians expressing far more skepticism.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has called the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) "essential to our future security." Retired generals have been so concerned about getting it ratified that some have traveled around the country promoting it.
Seven of eight former commanders of U.S. nuclear forces have urged the Senate to approve the treaty.
But five Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said in a recent report that New START was "a bad deal." They added that U.S. military leaders had made assumptions about the pact - including that Russia will honor it - that are "optimistic in the extreme."
Meanwhile, the conservative Heritage Foundation's grass-roots lobbying arm is targeting Republican senators with mailings warning that the treaty "benefits Russia's interests, not ours."
Retired Lt. Gen. Dirk Jameson, the former deputy commander of U.S. nuclear forces, said Friday that it was "quite puzzling to me why all of this support [for New START]... is ignored. I don't know what that says about the trust that people have and the confidence they have in our military."
The New START treaty would reduce the two nuclear giants' stockpiles of long-range, deployed weapons by as much as 30 percent, leaving each country with about 1,550 warheads. President Obama said Thursday that he had "no higher national security priority" during the lame-duck session than having it ratified.
Winning approval could be tougher next year, when Republicans will have five more votes in the Senate.
For current and former senior U.S. military officials, the treaty is valuable because it allows the continuation of a dialogue with a country that still has enough weapons to wipe America off the map.
"If you've had experience with this stuff, and a sense of where we've been, how far we've come... this is an absolute no-brainer," said retired Adm. William J. "Fox" Fallon, who was head of Central Command and Pacific Command.
Military leaders say the treaty will allow the two countries to resume inspections of each other's stockpiles, which make up 95 percent of the world's nuclear weapons. Such visits lapsed when the first START treaty expired last year.
Without such inspections, U.S. military leaders would have less insight into Russia's arsenal and might have to work off worst-case scenarios, and could consider increasing their own stockpile, officials say. | 4,819 |
WEST BABYLON, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) — A needle in a haystack may be hard to find, but a Long Island woman topped that when she lost her wedding rings in a pile of garbage.
Colleen Dyckman panicked Monday morning when she realized she must have accidentally swept her engagement ring and wedding band into the garbage while cooking, CBS2’s Carolyn Gusoff reported.
“I knew in an instant I threw them out, because I knew I had cleaned the night before,” she said.
Dyckman frantically followed her garbage truck to the Babylon town dump, where she tearfully begged workers to stop before her trash and treasure were incinerated.
“She was visibly upset, she was ripping through garbage, disgusting stuff,” Jeremy Aretakis, of the Town of Babylon Recycling Center said.
Eight employees joined Dyckman and her husband as they searched through a mountain of muck.
“She didn’t stop, so none of us stopped,” Aretakis said.
They looked for the $5,000 rings that were placed on her finger with love nearly 20 years ago.
After about four hours, with hopes waning, her trash bags surfaced, but there were no rings inside.
Town employee Kim Weathers wasn’t convinced.
“I said, ‘I’m just doing to double check,’ and I double checked and opened one up and wow — the ring,” she said.
Buried between soggy cereal and slimy meat was the diamond in the rough.
“I started crying and hugging her,” Dyckman said.
“I was saying to myself, ‘I hope I find this ring,’ so I’m happy I found it, I really am,” Weather said.
“It was beautiful, it was like out of a movie,” Aretakis said. “One of the coolest things I’ve ever seen in my life.”
The Dyckmans couldn’t thank the crew enough. They gave them all credit, plus boxes of pizza brownies.
Now, the rings are back where they belong.
“I wanted to give up, but they never did,” Dyckman said. “It’s like my faith in humanity is restored.”
Workers said they often dig through the dump, but rarely for something that’s so small and precious. | 4,820 |
Philippe Reines, a former aide to Hillary Clinton, told National Review podcast host Jamie Weinstein in an interview released Monday that he does not believe Juanita Broaddrick’s rape allegations against former President Bill Clinton, calling the retired nurse “full of sh*t.”
Pressed on a recent New York Times report about how Democrats have largely shied away from inviting the Clintons to campaign for them during the midterm election, Reines conceded the #MeToo movement has caused some to view the former commander-in-chief in a different light. Reines reminded Weinstein that Clinton paid a heavy price for allegations of sexual misconduct, having been impeached, contending the ex-president did not “get off scot-free.”
The remark prompted Weinstein to recall that Broaddrick’s allegations were not investigated, to which Reines shot back, “Juanita Broaddrick is full of shit.”
“So you don’t think she’s telling the truth about that?” asked Weinstein.
“I do not think she’s telling the truth,” Reines replied. “More importantly, Ken Starr did not think that she was telling the truth.”
“For me, I assume Ken Starr pulled no punches,” he added.
Broaddrick, a former Arkansas nursing home administrator, first claimed 17 years ago that Bill Clinton raped her during a meeting in Little Rock in 1978. She sued Bill Clinton in 1999; the case was dismissed in 2001. Of course, Broaddrick is not the only woman to accuse Clinton of sexual assault.
In October, Broaddrick launched a White House petition, calling for an investigation into Clinton’s “sex crimes.”
“We demand an investigation into the rape of Juanita Broaddrick,” reads the petition. “Additionally, these may constitute civil rights violations because women were specifically were [sic] targeted.”
Paula Jones, a former Arkansas state worker, alleged in 1991 that Clinton propositioned and exposed himself to her. In 1994, Jones filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against the former president. Clinton’s lawyers tried to have the suit dismissed, and in November 1998, he paid Jones $850,000 to settle the case without apologizing or acknowledging culpability.
Further, Kathleen Willey, a former White House volunteer, has long accused Clinton of forcing himself on her in 1993. He denied her charge, and an independent prosecutor later concluded there was no evidence to doubt that denial.
The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 4,821 |
The driver who allegedly plowed into counter-protesters at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville has been identified as James Alex Fields Jr., a 20-year-old Ohio man.
Both the Charlottesville police and Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail Superintendent Col. Martin Kumer confirmed his identity.
Fields, 20, from Ohio, is facing charges of second-degree murder, malicious wounding and failure to stop at the scene of an accident that resulted in a death.
James Alex Fields, 20, has been charged in the fatal car crash in Charlottesville. Albemarle Charlottesville Regional Jail
The deceased victim was a 32-year-old woman who was crossing the street at the time, Charlottesville Police Chief Al Thomas said Saturday night, adding that police were still in the process of notifying the next of kin.
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The FBI and the Department of Justice said Saturday night that they would be opening an investigation into the deadly crash. In a statement, Attorney General Jeff Session said "violence and deaths in Charlottesville strike at the heart of American law and justice."
"The FBI has been supporting state and local authorities throughout the day," Sessions said. "U.S. Attorney Rick Mountcastle has commenced a federal investigation and will have the full support of the Department of Justice. Justice will prevail."
Five of the injured were listed in critical condition Saturday night. Four thers were in serious condition, sixwere in fair condition, and four others were in good condition, authorities said Saturday.
Video of the incident showed a grey Dodge Challenger plowing into counter-protesters who were marching through the city's shopping district. The force of the collision hurled several people into the air. Bystanders could be seen running in every direction while others stood by screaming for help.
Footage from another angle showed the car speeding in reverse in an attempt to flee the scene.
Field's mother, Samantha Bloom, told The Associated Press on Saturday night that she knew her son was attending a rally in Virginia but didn't know it was a white supremacist rally.
"I thought it had something to do with Trump. Trump's not a white supremacist," Bloom said.
"He had an African-American friend so...," she said before her voice trailed off. She added that she'd be surprised if her son's views were that far right.
Bloom, who became visibly upset as she learned of the injuries and deaths at the rally, said she and her son had just moved to the Toledo area from the northern Kentucky city of Florence. She said that's where Fields grew up. She relocated to Ohio for work. | 4,822 |
Taylor Swift's security team reportedly installed a kiosk at a concert that used facial recognition technology to scan unwitting fans for potential stalkers, something privacy advocates said is something the public should be concerned about.
Rolling Stone reported Wednesday that the technology was deployed for at least one of Swift's concerts at a kiosk playing rehearsal footage on the outside as the faces of fans who stopped to watch were surreptitiously scanned. The data was then reportedly sent to a control center in Nashville that cross-referenced the images with a database of Swift's known stalkers.
Mike Downing, chief security officer for Oak View Group, who observed the kiosk in action, told Rolling Stone that “everybody who went by would stop and stare at it, and the software would start working.”
Representatives for Swift and Oak View Group did not immediately respond to requests for comment. And the technology has been used at venues in places like Japan for years. However, consumer privacy advocates met the Swift news with warnings about how the technology could get out of control.
While the kiosks are an innovative way to minimize risks at concerts — especially in the aftermath of tragedies like the terrorist attack at Ariana Grande's Manchester concert in 2017, or the shooting death of singer Christina Grimmie at a concert in 2016 — they still exist in an ethical gray area.
For example, no clear answers have been given on who owns the Swift concert photos, or how long the data is kept in the system, which alarmed Human Rights Watch researcher Sarah St. Vincent. She told Slate that, in the interest of human rights, surveillance of concertgoers should be “really limited to what is strictly necessary to achieve a legitimate aim.”
If, say, the data collector was able to learn that a Swift concertgoer then engaged in other behavior, like going to a bar, “that’s data that’s valuable for them to sell.”
She added that the security tactic could invasively harvest data that gets monetized, letting other companies know who attended Taylor Swift concerts and maybe what they ate and drank, or the company they kept.
The gray area between security and privacy also exists without much regulation — especially since concerts are technically private events, where companies aren't required to inform attendees before collecting biometric data.
Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst for the American Civil Liberties Union, told Slate the industry is basically “a Wild West” at the moment.
“As long as it's private property, they can take your image and do whatever analytics they want with it, including facial recognition,” he said. | 4,823 |
Qualcomm's Snapdragon ARM-based systems-on-chips are mainstays of the smartphone world, but the company is now positioning them as more than just smartphone processors: in conjunction with Microsoft and the new Windows 10 for ARM processors, Qualcomm is now pitching the chips as components of a new PC platform that brings together the best of the PC and the smartphone.
The Snapdragon 835 chip, incorporating Qualcomm's latest X16 LTE modem, forms the basis of the Snapdragon Mobile PC Platform. Qualcomm claims that using the Snapdragon platform will offer a combination of the PC form factor and breadth of software with features that are standard in smartphones: on-the-go connectivity, light weight, silent operation, long battery life, and no fan.
Qualcomm says that PCs built using the new chips will offer up to 50 percent more battery life than x86 systems, with four- to five-times longer standby times. They'll take the Connected Standby capability already found in some Windows PCs—this allows the system to do things like sync mail and receive notifications even when "sleeping"—and make it better, thanks to their LTE connectivity.
With a Snapdragon inside your PC, you'll no longer need Wi-Fi to fetch your latest e-mail and catch up on Twitter. Instead, you'll be able to get online wherever there's cellular connectivity. The X16 modem supports up to gigabit LTE connections, too. So as long as your network operator is cooperative and has embraced the cutting edge, this mobile connection will be fast, too.
Asus, HP, and Lenovo are all planning to introduce Snapdragon Mobile PC systems at some unspecified time in the future, for some unspecified price. These machines will be laptop-style systems, just without the traditional x86 processor on the inside. Snapdragon 835 has a higher level of integration than Intel's mobile chips, enabling, as the Qualcomm-provided pictures above show, smaller motherboards. This in turn should tend to increase the space available for battery, or reduce the size and weight of machines, or perhaps even both.
Windows 10 for ARM is Microsoft's second attempt at building a version of Windows for ARM chips. That previous effort, named Windows RT, flopped on the market due to a crippling shortage of software. This time around, things may do better, not least because the new operating system will include x86 emulation, giving it the ability to run 32-bit Windows desktop applications unmodified. Given the laptop form factor, we're not expecting this capability to be restricted to, for example, plugged-in scenarios. Instead, we'd expect that they'll be able to seamlessly run x86 applications without any obvious indication that they're doing so. | 4,824 |
Javier Hernandez is looking for game time ahead of the World Cup
Javier Hernandez has admitted he did ask to leave West Ham in January but says he is committed to helping the club stay in the Premier League.
The former Manchester United forward joined the Hammers from Bayer Leverkusen in July for £16m but has struggled for consistency with five goals in 24 appearances in all competitions this season.
Sky Sports News reported a week before the end of the transfer window that the Hammers were willing to listen to offers for the 29-year-old, but he was prevented from leaving when Andy Carroll got injured and Diafra Sakho sold to Rennes for £8m.
"Yes, it was the case that I wanted to go," Hernandez told The Mirror. "Not because I don't like West Ham, but because I need to have minutes on the pitch.
"The World Cup is just around the corner and I want to play. But you can see that, even though my agent says I want to go, I have been doing everything I can in a West Ham shirt to help the team.
"Against Bournemouth I scored a goal, I tried to play pretty well in the Cup [against Wigan last weekend] and, in the last game, against Crystal Palace, I tried to do my best.
West Ham's new Portuguese signing Joao Mario opens up about having to adapt quickly to the Premier League West Ham's new Portuguese signing Joao Mario opens up about having to adapt quickly to the Premier League
"I am a very professional guy and I want to do that. Words can come and go. Your acts are going to speak for themselves.
"Now that the window is closed I am here and trying to achieve the main goals for the club, which is to be safe from relegation. Then, in the summer, we will see."
West Ham are just four points above the relegation zone ahead of their game against Brighton on Saturday and Hernandez accepts the supporters will be keeping an eye on him.
"I feel good with the fans," Hernandez added. "I think they are happy with me. They have treated me very well since the beginning. But I want to be better. I want to deliver for them.
"Obviously, they are concerned, but what I see in the dressing room, what I feel, is that we want to be better. We all try to work very hard. We all want more points, more good results, to be higher in the table.
"We want to make the fans happier and we are trying. We are working hard and the season is not over yet." | 4,825 |
Photo taken on June 21, 2017 shows the trial mining site in the Shenhu area of the South China Sea.(Photo/Xinhua)
China has pledged to push further ahead with the exploration and production of gas hydrate in the Shenhu area of the South China Sea, following its success in mining gas hydrate in the region.
The Ministry of Land and Resources, Guangdong province and China National Petroleum Corp, the nation's largest oil producer and supplier, reached a cooperation agreement in Beijing last week to set up a pilot site exploring gas hydrate in the Shenhu area, the ministry said on Saturday.
Promoting the industrialization of gas hydrate will not only upgrade the country's energy security but also reshape its energy mix, said Minister of Land and Resources Jiang Daming.
China needs to speed up drawing up regulations on exploitation, management and industrial policy so that gas hydrate, as combustible ice or flammable ice, can soon be applied to the development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and the country's economic development.
China completed its first test exploration of natural gas hydrates, commonly known as combustible ice, in the South China Sea on July 9, which lasted 60 days, with total production capacity and daily production capacity exceeding 300,000 cubic meters and 5,000 cu m, respectively.
Starting from May 10, the mining operation in waters 320 kilometers southeast of the Pearl River estuary achieved better-than-expected results, according to the China Geological Survey Bureau.
The exploration collected 6.47 million sets of experimental data and set world records in both the time of the experiment and the total amount of the gas extracted, said the bureau.
CNPC Chairman Wang Yilin said China's successful mining of combustible ice in May was seen as a breakthrough toward a global energy revolution and the company will continue to take advantage of its technologies in natural gas exploration and deep-sea hydrate test production in setting up the pilot site.
According to Lu Hailong, a professor at the Institute of Ocean Research at Peking University and the chief scientist in the first mining trials, successful mining of gas hydrate in China is seen as a breakthrough toward a global energy revolution.
With no country able to produce gas commercially due to the challenging conditions and concerns about potential pollution, China, with ample experience accumulated, has become the frontrunner in gas hydrate mining technology.
Li Jinfa, deputy director of China Geological Survey Bureau, said the test drilling and production conducted by China International Marine Containers Group and China National Petroleum Corp created a solid foundation for commercial use of the resource before 2030. | 4,826 |
attack.
Russell, Harold – Witness in the vicinity of the Tippit crime scene. Saw escape of Tippit killer with Warren Reynolds. Blow to the head head by a cop in a bar. Heart failure.
Worrell, James – Saw man flee from rear of Texas School Book Depository. Motor accident.
Whaley, William Cab driver who reportedly drove Oswald to Oak Cliff (only Dallas taxi driver to die on duty). Accident: motor collision
Martin, Frank Dallas policeman Captain who witnessed Oswald slaying; told WC: “there is a lot to be said but its best that I don’t say it”. Sudden Cancer.
Ruby, Jack – Oswald’s slayer. Connected with Mob. Believed he was poisoned in prison. Died from sudden cancer.
In this press conference, Ruby claimed a government conspiracy to murder JFK.
Dr. Mary’s Monke... Haslam, Edward T. Best Price: $6.00 Buy New $18.26 (as of 08:55 EST - Details)
“Everything pertaining to what’s happening has never come to the surface. The world will never know the true facts, of what occurred, my motives. The people had- that had so much to gain and had such an ulterior motive for putting me in the position I’m in, will never let the true facts come above board to the world.”
Reporter: “Are these people in very high positions Jack?”
Jack: “Yes.”
1972-1977
Hale Boggs was a congressman who served on the Warren Commission. He expressed disagreement with the conclusion that Oswald was the assassin. He died in a mysterious plane crash over Alaska.
J. Edgar Hoover, FBI Director, died suddenly. There was no autopsy.
The FBI did not reveal warnings from the field (Abraham Bolden) of a plot to assassinate JFK and later withheld this information from the Warren Commission.
Roger Craig, a Dallas Deputy sheriff, found a German Mauser rifle in the TSBD, before the police claimed that Oswald used a Mannlicher-Carcano. Died from gunshot.
These Warren Commission witnesses died just before they were due to testify at HSCA in 1977:
Alan Belmont – FBI liaison to Warren Commission. Long illness.
James Cadigan – FBI document expert. Accidental fall in home.
George De Morenshildt – CIA friend of Oswald, suicide by gunshot.
In this video, Mark Lane interviews researcher Penn Jones. | 4,827 |
For anyone who has taken this tradition for granted, here's its origin.
Don't be intimidated by the length of the ingredient list for this thrifty Southern stew. The majority of the ingredients are used to make a fantastic stock that starts with a Southern classic: potlikker. Then we use loads of fresh, aromatic vegetables, herbs, and spices to round out the flavor. Serve the stew ladled over hot cooked rice, and sprinkle with the fresh herbs.
We are a region of long held superstitions. We paint our porch ceilings light blue to stave off the "haints." We hang mirrors outside our garden and save old wine, sparkling water, and even Bud Platinum bottles to put on dead tree branches for the same reason. We won't invite 13 guests to dinner nor will we leave a rocking chair without ceasing its motion to ward off illness and misfortune.
But perhaps one of our longest held traditions is that of eating black-eyed peas and collard greens in some form on New Year's Day. In fact, this tradition is so pervasive throughout the Southeast that black-eyed peas appear in recipes as varied as Cowboy Caviar in Texas to Hoppin' John in Alabama to Peas with Ham up in North Carolina.
According to legendary Southern food researcher John Egerton's Southern Food: At Home, On the Road, In History, black-eyed peas are associated with a "mystical and mythical power to bring good luck." As for collard greens, they're green like money and will ensure you a financially prosperous new year. And isn't that all what we want anyway?
There's evidence that people ate black-eyed peas for luck as early as 500 A.D. as a part of the Jewish holiday Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. But the tradition of eating black-eyed peas with rice is African in origin and spread throughout the South, especially in the Carolinas, in the form of pilaus or rice dishes simmered for a long time with chicken or shrimp. When black-eyed peas were added to the pilau, it became Hoppin' John.
WATCH: Hoppin' John Soup
If you serve peas with cornbread, it represents gold, and if they are stewed with tomatoes, it symbolizes wealth and health. Although we don't endorse this practice, some people will even put a penny or a dime inside the pot of peas. Whoever is "lucky" enough to receive the coin will have the most luck for the rest of the year.
You'll even find black-eyed peas and collards on restaurant menus and daily specials throughout the South as the New Year approaches. | 4,828 |
PMC Bank crisis: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman discussed the matter with the RBI Governor
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Saturday that the government would ensure that Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank depositors' concerns are "comprehensively addressed". The comments came after Nirmala Sitharaman met Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das to discuss the PMC Bank matter, following her meeting with customers of the cooperative bank outside the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) office in Mumbai on Friday. "He (the RBI Governor) assured me that clients and their concerns will be kept on top priority," the Finance Minister said on Twitter. (Also read: PMC Bank Scam - Police Custody Of HDIL Directors Extended)
Spoken to governor @RBI on the #PMCBank matter. He assured me that clients & their concerns will be kept on top priority. I wish to reiterate that @FinMinIndia will ensure that customers concerns are comprehensively addressed. We understand the justified worries of the customers. Nirmala Sitharaman (@nsitharaman) October 12, 2019
"We understand the justified worries of the customers," the Finance Minister said on Saturday. Ms Sitharaman had earlier said the government is considering amending laws to curb malpractices at the country's co-operative banks, following allegations of fraud in PMC Bank.
PMC Bank is facing a crisis after an alleged scam worth Rs 4,500 crore came to light last month. The cooperative bank had allegedly lent over 70 per cent of its loans worth Rs 9,000 crore to near-bankrupt realty player HDIL.
The PMC Bank case has sparked renewed concerns about the health of the country's banking sector, which is struggling against more than Rs. 10 lakh crore of non-performing assets or bad loans.
The Reserve Bank of India this month raised the withdrawal limit for PMC Bank account holders to Rs. 25,000 from Rs. 10,000, saying that the move would enable more than 70 per cent of the depositors to withdraw their entire balance.
The country's financial system has been rocked by a Rs. 13,000-crore fraud at Punjab National Bank and the collapse of IL&FS - one of India's biggest non-banking finance companies - last year. IL&FS has said it aims to resolve 50 per cent of its debt by March 2020.
More than two dozen co-operative banks are now under the RBI administration, but PMC Bank - with deposits of Rs 11,620 crore as of March 31 - is by far the largest. | 4,829 |
Story highlights The talks will begin in Oslo and then move to Havana
Colombia's president says the outlook is good
The president says there will be no cease-fire while the two are in talks
The two sides have been a war since the 1960s
Talks aimed at ending 50 years of fighting between FARC guerrillas and Colombian forces are expected to take place Wednesday in Norway.
Santos said he has been thinking about the possibility of peace ever since the FARC's military commander was killed in 2010.
A developing economy and the military successes Colombia has scored against the FARC make it a good time for negotiations, according to Santos.
JUST WATCHED Colombia's president on FARC Replay More Videos... MUST WATCH Colombia's president on FARC 08:32
After starting in Oslo, the talks will move to Havana, Cuba.
The two sides have been at war since the 1960s, making it Latin America's oldest insurgency.
Santos said the group must be permitted to participate in the political process.
"You can't ask the FARC to simply kneel down, surrender and give us the arms," Santos said. "They will not do that, so there has to be some kind of way out, and this way out has to be you can be able to participate in the political arena. This is a way any conflict is settled, not only the Colombian conflict."
Yet, the president has said their will be no cease-fire while the two sides are in talks, though the rebels have said they would ask for one.
"I've told them there will be cease-fire and we will stop any military operation when we reach a final agreement," Santos said. "And if I see that there's no progress, that they are simply trying to buy time, I will stand up and continue business as usual. And that's why there's no cease-fire, no decrease in our military operations, and my government agenda will continue as it was until then."
The rebels continue to carry out kidnappings and attack security forces, though it has been severely weakened in recent years, thanks in part to a U.S.-backed security campaign.
U.S. officials praised news of the talks.
"President Obama welcomes President Santos' deep commitment to working for peace and recognizes the courage and sacrifice of successive Colombian governments -- and most especially of the Colombian people -- in achieving this milestone," the White House said in September. "The FARC should now take this opportunity to end its decades of terrorism and narcotics trafficking, and allow the Colombian people to continue building a democratic, prosperous and just society." | 4,830 |
threat of bacteria. On the other hand, with their tertiary Ni, I could see how they could also be paranoid germaphobes who carry hand sanitizer wherever they go. It could go either way, but to all the people who don’t clean their mitts – you know who you are.
ISFP
Playing with phone apps and taking selfies at work – ISFPs are easily bored and are inclined to seek out sensory stimulation as a distraction while on the job. They are likely to be among the people who will secretly watch Sponge Bob clips on Youtube or snap self-indulgent selfies when they should be finishing up that TPS report the boss asked them for. These types of discursions are not productive uses of anyone’s time but all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy as they say and it may very well be that taking several micro-breaks could be beneficial in allaying tedium-induced brain fog.
ESFP
Checking your reflection on almost every reflective surface you encounter – ESFPs are bound to be a bit vain and superficial, but that’s not necessarily such a bad thing if not taken overboard. Some ESFPs might be very preoccupied with their appearance and among the people in the world who have never seen a mirror they didn’t like gazing at. In all likelihood, such an ESFP would probably unabashed about their narcissistic preening but others may have a neurotic concern with their appearance that compels them to frequently check themselves perhaps due to some kind of body image dysmorphia. A lot of people are probably too self-conscious to intensively scrutinize their reflection and perceived flaws while others are people are present.
ESTP
Oggling attractive people – Leering at people is just plain rude but sometimes it is hard not to. ESTPs are very visual and they are highly attuned to their physical surroundings and everyone in it. They may be a bit superficial in their appreciation for appearances but they can hardly pass up the chance to feast their eyes on a beautiful man or woman. They likely try to soak up as much as they can with furtive glances and sneaky peeks unbeknownst to the other person. They may do this especially while wearing dark sunglasses that can mask the direction of their perverted peepers.
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BRASILIA (Reuters) - Jailed former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has increased his support by 5 percentage points and would win Brazil’s October presidential election if he was allowed to run, a poll by CNT/MDA showed on Monday.
Brazil's former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's supporters walk during the Free Lula March in Brasilia, Brazil, August 14, 2018. REUTERS/Adriano Machado
The survey, which was last taken in May, found that almost half of the leftist leader’s supporters would transfer their votes to his running mate Fernando Haddad if Lula is disqualified from Brazil’s most uncertain race in decades.
The Brazilian real led losses among Latin American currencies after the poll showed investors’ favorite Geraldo Alckmin, the candidate most likely to enact fiscal reforms, lagging far behind his rivals.
Electoral authorities are expected to bar Lula from the election due to a corruption conviction. Despite that, he took 37.3 percent of voter intentions in the latest poll, up from 32.4 percent in the same poll in May.
His nearest rival was far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro with 18.3 percent, followed by environmentalist Marina Silva with 5.6 percent and business-friendly Alckmin with 4.9 percent.
Support for Marina Silva and center-left candidate Ciro Gomes has slipped since the May poll, while support increased for Bolsonaro. Alckmin, a former governor of Sao Paulo state, has also gained ground marginally.
It was the first major poll since candidacies were officially registered last week, but it did not provide results for the likely scenario of a race without Lula.
Lula’s supporters were asked who they would back if he is out of the race and 17.3 percent of the people surveyed said they would cast their vote for Haddad, a former Sao Paulo mayor who would head the Workers Party ticket.
Another 11.9 percent of the voters surveyed would migrate to Marina Silva, 9.6 percent to Gomes, 6.2 percent to Bolsonaro and 3.7 percent to Alckmin.
Lula, Brazil’s first working class president and whose social policies lifted millions from poverty in Latin America’s largest nation, was jailed in April to start serving a 12-year sentence for receiving bribes.
The nationwide survey of 2,002 people was carried out by pollster MDA for the transportation sector lobby CNT between Aug. 15-18 and has a margin of error of 2.2 percentage points. | 4,832 |
Saudi Arabia’s decision to impose 100 percent value added tax (VAT) on tobacco and its products will bring down the number of smokers in the country, said Dr. Mohammed Yamani, chairman of the board of directors of Naqa, an NGO that helps smokers kick the habit.
“The move is a positive and important step toward combating the unhealthy habit,” he told Okaz/Saudi Gazette.
Saudi Arabia has one of the world’s highest rates of smokers as 14 percent of its teenagers and seven percent of its women smoke.
“Smoking habit among young Saudis aged 18 and below has increased with their rate reaching 13 to 14 percent. The figure is close to the study conducted by the World Health Organization,” Yamani said.
He said the VAT on tobacco and its products would be imposed in the second quarter of 2017 as part of the government’s efforts to achieve fiscal balance.
“Cigarette prices in the Kingdom and other Gulf states are still low compared to other countries,” he pointed out.
Yamani, who has been working to combat smoking during the past several years, emphasized the need to bring price of a cigarette packet to SR35-SR40. “VAT will be imposed on import cost. So the price of a cigarette packet will not reach double of the present price,” he explained.
He wanted the Kingdom to increase taxes on cigarettes to bring prices to international level. He said low prices have contributed to increasing the number of smokers in the Gulf region, especially among teenagers and people having low income.
“The increase in cigarette price will not prevent people from smoking but bring down the number of smokers,” Yamani said citing studies conducted in advanced countries.
He said the executive bylaw for preventing smoking in public places will be published shortly.
“The Cabinet has already passed the law and the health minister has told us two weeks ago that the law will be implemented within a few days,” he added.
The Kingdom has widened the scope of public places where smoking is not allowed and it includes prayer places, schools and restaurants. It’s the longest article of the law.
He said VAT would be imposed on harmful materials beginning from the second quarter of next year. The Saudi finance minister has already signed a resolution taken by the GCC Supreme Council to impose 50 percent tax on beverages and 100 percent tax on tobacco and its products.
This article was first published on the Saudi Gazette on Dec. 29, 2016.
Last Update: Wednesday, 20 May 2020 KSA 09:48 - GMT 06:48 | 4,833 |
Eddie Irvine says Lewis Hamilton 'lost the plot' when he went 'too showbiz'
Hamilton's solitary victory in 2013 occurred at the Hungarian GP
The 28-year-old burst onto the scene in 2007, finishing second in the standings and ahead of reigning champion and McLaren team-mate Fernando Alonso, before securing the drivers' crown the following season.
Since then, however, Hamilton has failed to mount a sustained title challenge, never finishing higher than fourth in the Drivers' Championship.
Irvine, who narrowly missed out on the 1999 title, feels Hamilton has been distracted by matters off the track, but still thinks the Mercedes driver can be the man to end Sebastian Vettel's domination.
"I think Lewis lost the plot a little bit because he went too showbiz," he told the Belfast Telegraph.
"His entry into Formula 1 was fantastic and his talent was amazing. Then he wanted to be a movie star or a rapper or something else. People want their sports stars to be 100% committed to being sports stars.
"I think he is coming back from that now and it would be nice if he could challenge Vettel. Lewis and Fernando Alonso are the two guys capable of taking Vettel on if their cars are up to it. Unfortunately, they aren't at the moment."
Vettel's current period of domination has been compared with that of fellow German Michael Schumacher's at the turn of the century. Irvine, who was team-mates with Schumacher at Ferrari for four years, doesn't think they can be compared, however, as the seven-time World Champion moved teams from Benetton and "rebuilt Ferrari".
"Vettel's record is amazing, though he has kept the best car pretty much every year which Michael didn't have," the Ulsterman added.
"The one thing about Michael was when he won his first two championships he felt, 'This is boring, I'm going to go to Ferrari and re-build Ferrari' and that was very admirable. He struggled there for four years before he won another championship.
"Vettel just staying at Red Bull winning trophies is boring. I don't see what he's trying to prove. Okay, he's going to collect a lot of championships, but you know what, who cares?"
Now 48, Irvine revealed he doesn't keep close contact with any of the drivers, even if Kimi Raikkonen does occasionally call him.
"Not really. I pretty much do my own thing," he revealed. "I don't really keep in touch with anyone. Kimi Raikkonen rings me the odd time when he's drunk!" | 4,834 |
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Not having enough sleep and continuous exposure to light and electronic media is damaging your skin under the eyes?Because most of the delicate skin you are having under the eyes. With irregular works schedules and an unhealthy lifestyle of people, every body organ is getting affected.Bellapierre Revitalizing Vita Under Eye Gel is made considering all of the above factors. Regular use of it will help lightens dark circles under the eyes, & reduces puffiness & wrinkles around the eyes.Revitalizing Vita Under Eye Gel is an eye skin care product. Its ingredients are highly effective in nature and are polysorbate 20, aqua, isopropyl alcohol, advanced moisture complex, butylene glycol, Chenopodium quinoa extract, Medicago sativa extract, hydrolyzed lupine protein etc.Bellapierre Revitalizing Vita Under Eye Gel helps in the removal of dark circles under the eyes. The skin under your eyes is the softest one and is easily affected in comparison to other body skin. Those who don’t get enough sleep or work for more time period can prefer its use to reduce the puffiness of eyes. | 4,835 |
about snow plows that said, in part: "I can confirm that this is absolutely not true. Snow plowing and salting of roads are conducted based on winter conditions..."
Additionally, Leary said many of the items that Reilich points to as accomplishments are hidden examples of wasteful spending.
"Look at all the money they put into that one playground," he said, referring to the one that opened earlier this year at Town Hall. "That was $675,000 on just one playground when we have 16 of them in the town. Why not put $100,000 into this park, and then $100,000 into that park?"
Leary also questioned the town's practice of issuing take-home cars to the supervisor, the deputy supervisor and some department heads.
"To me, that's an awful lot of wasteful spending of taxpayer dollars," he said. "Why does the highway commissioner need a take-home car?"
If elected, Leary said, he'd undertake a study to see how often those take-home cars are used for town business during off hours and revisit the policy determining who does and doesn't get a car.
Also, he said, he'd strive to expand the town's contingent of crossing guards to better ensure that students make it safely across the roads. He said Greece pays its guards $3 less than some other towns and that he would revisit that pay scale.
But overall, he said, the biggest issue in the town is morale.
"If the employees are happy, they come in with a good attitude and that reflects on the customers, the taxpayers," he said. "You end up with the plow guys doing a better job, etc. It's a domino effect."
The town supervisor presides over Town Board meetings and votes on all matters before the board, as well as serving as the chief financial officer for the town. In Greece, supervisors serve a four-year term. The 2018 salary is $124,099.
[email protected]
About the candidates
Bill Reilich
Age: 60
Residence: Melwood Drive
Occupation: Greece town supervisor, chairman of the Monroe County Republican Committee
Party: Republican, Conservative, Independence, Reform
Top priority: Keeping town spending in line and "making a good town great again."
Jim Leary
Age: 62
Residence: Clearwater Circle
Occupation: Retired Greece police officer
Party: Democratic, Working Families
Top priority: Improving the delivery of town services by improving morale within Town Hall. | 4,836 |
to be the society embracing a program that would be an alternative to incarceration for those offending parties — for the offenders — to participate in a restorative process in lieu of prosecution or time in jail,” Acosta said.
The notion of a “Homeless Bill of Rights” has gained traction in other states as a way to address the many problems homeless populations face. Missouri previously proposed legislation that would enact homeless hate crimes provisions but also counteract laws targeting the homeless while encouraging greater access to shelter and social services.
Meanwhile, the California legislature passed Penal Code 13519.64, which provides for law enforcement training regarding homelessness and calls for data collection related to housing deprivation.
Craig Willse, author of The Value of Homelessness: Managing Surplus Life in the United States, who worked as a homeless advocate in Los Angeles before becoming an academic, remains critical of proposed hate crime legislation and of the tendency to reduce homelessness to cost-benefit analyses through constant counting of populations for purposes of managing them.
“I think hate crime legislation has proven to be a failed approach — it does not protect vulnerable groups, but does strengthen a racist police and prison system,” Willse told Truthout. “Those laws do not keep people safe. And while individual acts of violence against people living without shelter must be stopped, these kinds of laws, by turning attention to individual perpetrators, turn attention away from the real and systemic source of violence — the state and capitalism.”
In his book, Willse unpacks the invention of “chronic homelessness” as a category and the initiatives that accompany it. “The proliferation of chronic homelessness programs, the circulation of funding, the commissioning of studies and reports — all of this forms part of the nonprofit industrial complex, where the post-social state meets postindustrial service and knowledge industries,” he writes. “Contrary to the rhetoric that associates ‘the homeless’ with waste and cost, housing insecurity and deprivation prove to be sites of economic productivity in which individuals organized as ‘chronically homeless’ become the raw material out of which studies and services are produced.”
Those initiatives remove homeless people from places where they might impede consumerism, Willse explained, and simultaneously invest in a nonprofit industry of population management — one with adverse effects for challenging the conditions responsible for the creation of homelessness in California and beyond.
“The social services approach to homelessness has had a depoliticizing effect — so we deal with individual cases rather than the big picture,” Willse told Truthout. “And I think linking those movements to movements against policing and prisons is a key next step.” | 4,837 |
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Monday should indeed be a red-letter day in Blount County, Tennessee. On Monday, the Blount County Board of Commissioners will formally consider a resolution asking God not to punish them and to spare their region from “His coming wrath” which has resulted from the “lawless judiciary”of the United States forcing them to recognize same-sex marriages.
Wouldn’t it just be easier to say a prayer and get on with the real business of the county? Apparently not.
The resolution was proposed by Commissioner Karen Miller and appears on the agenda thusly:
“Resolution condemning judicial tyranny and petitioning God’s mercy. (Resolution 15-10-006)”
Judicial tyranny? What about religious tyranny? Has Ms. Miller forgotten that while she may be personally offended by same-sex marriage, not everyone shares that view?
This completely ludicrous resolution states:
“Federal judges have once again usurped powers not delegated to them, and have violated Reason, the Rule of Law and Natural Law by purporting to strike down State laws and acts of the People recognizing and protecting Natural Marriage.”
Natural law? Who decides what that means? The Bible-thumping intolerant hicks like Miller and whoever else supports this unenforceable and untenable piece of pseudolegislation? If so, God help us all.
But wait, there’s more. Much more. Like this:
“WE adopt this Resolution before God that He pass us by in His Coming Wrath and not destroy our County as He did Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighboring cities. As the Passover Lamb was a means of salvation to the ancient Children of Israel, so we stand upon the safety of the Lamb of God to save us. WE adopt this Resolution begging His favor in light of the fact that we have been forced to comply and recognize that the State of Tennessee, like so many other God-fearing States, MAY have fallen prey to a lawless judiciary in legalizing what God and the Bible expressly forbids.”
Attention Blount County Board of Commissioners! Listen carefully to what I’m about to say: We run this country by a Constitution, NOT by the Bible. End of story. And if you don’t like it that way, then maybe it’s time for you to leave because there are lots of us who are happy with the system of government the Founding Fathers gave us.
Featured image by Bible Study Outlines, available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial license. | 4,838 |
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did not consistently disclose health risks to human test subjects it used to study the risks of pollutants, sometimes keeping information about cancer possibilities from participants, the agency’s internal watchdog said Wednesday.
The EPA’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) found that the agency obtained the proper approvals from participants before exposing them to airborne exhaust and diesel pollutants, including particulate matter, in 2010 and 2011. However, the consent forms were inconsistent in their disclosures and did not warn of potential long-term risks of exposure to the gases.
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“This was because they only planned to perform short-term exposures and the risk of getting cancer from a single two-hour exposure was minimal,” the OIG said, citing information from an EPA manager who said health risks are calculated for 40 years of exposure.
The OIG found that the agency's research estimated a three in one billion chance of cancer from exposure.
“In our view, the agency should inform study subjects of any potential cancer risks of a pollutant to which they are being exposed so that study subjects can make the most informed decision possible about whether to participate in a study,” the report said.
The EPA considers particulate matter to lead to premature death, and has issued regulations to reduce its emissions.
Sen. David Vitter David Bruce VitterLysol, Charmin keep new consumer brand group lobbyist busy during pandemic Bottom line Bottom line MORE (La.), the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, which oversees the EPA, said the report shows the agency’s issues with science and transparency. His committee and the House Science, Space and Technology Committee have worked for years to find problems with the science the EPA uses to justify its controversial regulations.
“When justifying a job-killing regulation, EPA argues exposure to particulate matter is deadly, but when they are conducting experiments, they say human exposure studies are not harmful,” Vitter said in a statement. “This is a prime example of how EPA handpicks what scientific information and uncertainties they use to support their overreaching agenda.”
The EPA said in a statement it followed all necessary laws, but agrees with the OIG’s finding that changing its practices could be helpful.
“EPA concurs with and is adopting the OIG’s recommendations to ensure its policies and procedures are strengthened even further,” spokeswoman Alisha Johnson said.
Bob Kavlock, EPA’s deputy assistant administrator for science, wrote a blog post Wednesday defending the agency’s actions and saying it would incorporate the recommendations. | 4,839 |
own life down to a near-fatal fall he suffered at his home in 2008, which left him virtually paralysed and with impaired speech.
But some say it is that very incident that proves just how much the elder statesman needs Kohl-Richter by his side. Dirk Metz, a leader CDU politician and an old friend of Kohl-Richter's from her hometown who originally invited her to join the Young CDU, is one of the few still allowed to visit Kohl at home. In an interview with the Süddeutsche, Zeitung he recalled a moving exchange with the ageing politician in his garden, in which Kohl reportedly said to him: "Without her I wouldn't be here anymore".
Kohl-Richter, an economist who has been on leave of absence from her job at the economics ministry so that she can care for her husband, has so far not responded to the sons' accounts or to repeated requests by German journalists to interview her, which have been met with polite written refusals from Helmut Kohl's Berlin office. But some suspect she might soon be forced to break her silence.
It is speculated she may have been behind a statement supposedly issued by Helmut Kohl in 2011, in which he called portrayals of his private life at a time when rumours abounded that he was estranged from his sons, "inappropriate and inaccurate". He said: "I feel the marketing of and public displays about my private life by third parties are inappropriate."
Political historians have expressed their concerns that Kohl-Richter has almost complete control of Helmut Kohl's archives, with most of his letters – everything from the correspondence between him and Hannelore, letters to and from him and the likes of George Bush Sr. and François Mitterrand or the handwritten condolence letter from Prince Charles after his wife took her life – stored at Oggersheim.
Those close to Kohl, including his would-be biographer Heribert Schwan, say they fear she could choose to edit his life and therefore shape his legacy, as she sees fit.
The brothers, who say the proceeds from the book will go to the foundation their mother set up in 1983, but with which their father has officially ceased all contact, say they have gone public with their concerns for the sake of her memory.
"In her suicide note her message to us all was 'tolerate each other', but we have failed to do that," said Peter.
"I think of the decades in which my mother strained to keep the family together. I could never have thought such a closely-knit family was capable of falling apart." | 4,840 |
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The Los Angeles Lakers said Monday they have returned a $4.6 million loan received under the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Program, an initiative meant to help cash-strapped small businesses weather the financial effects of the coronavirus pandemic.
The Lakers are the latest of several larger businesses opting to return the funds after the Small Business Administration hit its initial $349 billion lending limit in less than two weeks. Many small businesses in need of financial relief did not receive their loans before the money ran out.
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"The Lakers qualified for and received a loan under the Payroll Protection Program," the Lakers said in a statement to ESPN. "Once we found out the funds from the program had been depleted, we repaid the loan so that financial support would be directed to those most in need. The Lakers remain completely committed to supporting both our employees and our community."
Larger businesses and institutions drew criticism for receiving financial relief meant for smaller companies. Aside from the Lakers, major chains such as Shake Shack, PotBelly and Ruth’s Chris Steak House returned money received under PPP following a public backlash.
EX-SAINTS STAR MARQUES COLSTON'S QUARANTINE ROUTINE
The application process for the second round of PPP funds began Monday. The Trump administration is discouraging larger companies from pursuing loans. Publicly traded firms who received PPP funds were asked to return them by May 7 without penalty.
The Lakers are the NBA’s second most valuable franchise, with an estimated worth of $4.4 billion, according to Forbes. The franchise earned an estimated $434 million in revenue for the 12 months ending in February 2020.
Top Lakers executives agreed to take 20 percent salary deferrals in April. The franchise has vowed not to conduct layoffs and joined with other local professional teams to create a $5 million fund to support hourly stadium employees.
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NBA franchises have lost tens of millions of dollars in expected revenue after the league was forced to suspend its 2019-20 season due to the pandemic. It’s unclear if or when the NBA will be able to resume its games.
The league will withhold 15 percent of player salaries beginning on May 15 as a check against the financial uncertainty. The money will be returned if the NBA is able to complete its full 82-game season without cancellations. | 4,841 |
NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) – CBS 11 has learned a fifth child in North Texas was shot this weekend in four separate shooting cases, that included the death of a 4-year-old boy in Fort Worth.
A 14-year-old girl received treatment at Cook Children’s Hospital in Fort Worth after being transported there from a Burleson medical facility early Sunday morning.
On Monday, Child Protective Services said it’s investigating the accidental shooting in Fort Worth and two others in Arlington.
A CPS spokeswoman says it has not removed any children from the three homes.
In Fort Worth, police say criminal charges will not be filed against the parents of the 4-year-old boy who died after being shot by his 5-year-old brother.
A 2-year-old boy was in the home at the time but not hurt.
The CPS spokeswoman says the agency has previously visited the home, but couldn’t provide more information.
Police wouldn’t disclose any information about the gun or other details.
In Arlington, police say the 6-year-old boy who was shot in the head remains in very grave condition.
Authorities say they believe the victim’s ten or eleven year old brother shot him.
A three year old sister, police say, may have been grazed by a bullet.
Police say the 10 or 11-year-old is non-verbal, and that an older brother, perhaps 16, told them he bought the weapon used – a 22-caliber rifle.
According to investigators, the parents said they didn’t know anything about the gun.
In another case being investigated by Arlington Police, an eight year old girl shot in the buttocks continues to recover.
Police say the family told them that the weapon, a nine millimeter semi-automatic Uzi-Mach 10, fired after she sat on it.
Authorities say the weapon was reported stolen in Bastrop near Austin.
Lt. Christopher Cook of the Arlington Police Department says the shooting of the 6-year-old boy was difficult for officers to face.
“I heard the radio traffic of the officers there. They were screaming for EMS to get there as fast as they could because as any first responder, your heart goes out. You have a child shot in the head, so it’s tough,” Lt. Cook said.
The ATF is assisting Arlington Police with the investigation to trace the guns.
Lt. Cook said they have not filed any criminal charges in their two separate cases but their investigations are continuing. | 4,842 |
filmmakers coming over to make more personal movies for the small screen just after a plethora of movie star actors began to make the jump to TV. The stigma of "Oh, it's television" soon faded and the medium's robust possibilities and heightened reputation obliterated the old belief that film was more prestigious. Now actors and directors cross over with such regularity it's not a story (though Netflix and Amazon as new outlets for launching films still is).
Results are a mixed bag, however, probably because it's dependent on project and outlet. Someone like Steven Soderbergh has proven to be exceptionally adept at this, directing with precision and unforced style all 20 episodes and two seasons of Cinemax's The Knick, HBO's political series K Street, its movie Behind the Candelabra and many other one-offs, while also executive producing Amazon's Red Oaks, Starz's The Girlfriend Experience, Netflix's Godless and the upcoming Starz comedy Now Apocalypse (with Gregg Araki). He's irrefutably comfortable in both realms.
On the other hand, while Showtime got tons of much-needed ink with David Lynch returning to direct and write Twin Peaks, his unmatched visual creativity and weirdness clearly overwhelmed his writing and plotting skills on that one, reducing it to a muddle meditation on... whatever. The point is, Twin Peaks was all about the freaky, not the story.
HBO has also successfully used Jean-Marc Vallee (Dallas Buyers Club) to bring limited series (Sharp Objects, Big Little Lies) to the channel.
More famously, HBO used Martin Scorsese to set up Boardwalk Empire, and his lush direction certainly created the visual template and mood of the series (the show ended up being a top-tier drama, but not in the same stratosphere as, say, The Sopranos). Much less effectively, HBO used Scorsese to launch Vinyl, and you could make an argument that his directing of the pilot hindered more than helped the series, because his stylistic flourishes couldn't be sustained (or, in some instances, endured) week-to-week. That said, Scorsese has also worked successfully on two PBS projects. He, too, shows no fear of television when the right project is there.
Ultimately, what television does best with directors is attract exceptional ones (and it has been instrumental, especially lately, in showcasing female directors who have had a harder time getting a shot with films) who know how to work to enhance and improve the written word, not upstage it.
Let's hope that continues and holds back the incursion of the "director-first" trend we're starting to see. | 4,843 |
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With this far from convenient for a number of Jambos travelling from Edinburgh, it wasn’t a surprise to see supporters reacting with outrage at the news on social media.
@Crawf1980: “This is b*******. My young son attended his first 2 games for Hearts in the last 2 rounds and was promised to go to every round. Will be heart broken at 8 not to be able to go to this.”
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Hearts fans in the away stand at Partick Thistle. Picture: SNS
@adairfraser_: “Was looking forward to planning on going but thanks @BBCSportScot, way to go guys, we know where your priorities lie.”
@TStanders: “Fans number 1 priority as always.”
@siggymiller: “Disgrace. A quarter final on Monday night in Glasgow?! Are you not wanting any fans from Edinburgh to travel through?”
BigGWBK: “No thought for working fans who will struggle to get to the game for 19:05 from Edinburgh.”
@scottishchicp: “Absolutely agree. I work in Edinburgh so making it to Maryhill for 7.05 is a fair challenge!”
@Soprano_Lou: “Finish work in city centre at 5.30pm. Tram home and get in car at 6.10pm. Drive to Glasgow, find parking space, arrive at Firrhill just in time for KO... of the second half!”
@Purvis1J: “There not even a game on at the Saturday lunch why not just put it then instead of a Monday at 7.05?”
@smclean1986: “Week days are for cup REPLAYS. All ties should take part at the weekend.”
@GrahamPow: “Surely the club should be protesting about this - Anne talks about how great the fans are etc.”
@TolboothCobbles: “Is the TV deal really worth that much? Dreadful scheduling by @BBCSportScot especially when the whole of Saturday until 5.15 is available to play this game. The @ScottishCup really don’t care about the fans eh?” | 4,844 |
It’s taken us a long time to arrive at this “endgame.” I think back to the seismic year of 2002, when the five-year cycle of sci-fi/fantasy that had been brewing (starting, really, in 1997 with the “Star Wars” re-releases, and rolling through “The Matrix,” “The Phantom Menace,” the first “X-Men” movie and the dueling kickoffs in 2001 of the “Harry Potter” and “Lord of the Rings” franchises) culminated with “Spider-Man” and “Attack of the Clones” in May and “Chamber of Secrets” and “The Two Towers” in November and December. Franchise starters or continuations all, they set the stage for the replenishing systems of incredibly diverse variations on these genres. Because, really, those four movies have next to nothing in common in terms of setting, tone or aesthetics.
When people dismissively bemoan “the state of things” culturally and use Marvel/Disney dominance as their primary target, all I can see is a square, flat-topped father drinking a beer in a barca lounger while the game is on, telling his son to quit playing guitar/painting/writing/reading comic books/daydreaming and get a real job. It’s hard for me to empathize with the person who feels lost in a world where the biggest show in the history of television stars dragons and the biggest moment in the biggest movie of the year (and possibly all time) involves Mjolnir the Asgardian hammer, whose name I learned how to pronounce when I was nine.
There are countless athletes and Olympians whose names I have no interest in learning. But why be so negative about the entertainment that is fully culturally dominant and very pleasurable to millions? This is being a bully, slamming me into a metaphorical locker and screaming “nerd.” Ultimately, I couldn’t care less what people want to spend their time watching (so long as I am not asked to participate) and would like everybody else to feel the same. Isn’t that the freedom that Tony Stark died for?
Alex Ross Perry is an American film director, screenwriter, and actor. He most recently wrote, directed, and produced the Elisabeth Moss-starring punk rock drama “Her Smell,” which is currently in theaters.
Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here. | 4,845 |
SAN DIEGO, California — A cafeteria crusader whose selfless actions are well known to the students who love her got a special thank you at Hoover High School Monday. Her students gave her a car.
Debra Davis is everyone’s favorite lunch lady at the City Heights school.
“They call me Aunt Debbie,” Davis said. “I’m just a servant. I just love helping people."
For the last 26 years, Davis has served students in the San Diego Unified School District, most recently at Hoover High School. She still finds the time to cook for the homeless.
“I use my car to serve the people," Davis said. Her only problem is her mode of transportation.
“I call her, 'Transformer.' She is my 1976 Chevy Malibu," Davis laughed.
She calls it a classic but poor Transformer' is more of a junker. Davis always had the Auto Club on speed dial.
“Come get the car, because the car stopped, the car needs a battery," she said.
When San Diego Unified partnered up with State Farm Insurance for the Recycled Rides program, Aunt Debbie was their top candidate.
State Farm donated a 2014 Mazda 3 to nearby Morse High school’s prestigious auto body program.
Morse is the only high shool in the state to have the National Automotive Technician Education Foundation certification, giving students a big edge when looking for jobs right out of high school.
For three weeks, students fixed up all the dents and scratches.
“They are showing off their skills of repairing, and at the same time, giving away to some of their work in the community," said auto body teacher Leonardo Zarate.
At the big reveal Monday morning, students saw that their hard work was well worth it.
Davis could not hold her emotion. She cried, she laughed, she jumped, even danced, as she gazed at her bright, new ride.
“I thank God that they see my spirit. So I want to tell them all thank you," Davis said. "No one has ever done anything like this for me. I thought I was going to get my heaven in heaven. But I got a little piece of heaven right here."
She now has about 40 years of car technology to catch up on, and the difficult task of naming her new serve-mobile.
“I don’t know what I’m going to call you, but 'Transformer' is going to be upset with you," she laughed, talking to her new ride. | 4,846 |
Neurosis, by Susanne A. Maathuis Photography
Post-Metal legends Neurosis have booked a new tour of the USA this summer, on top of their upcoming spring tour of Europe with YOB, according to a report from Brooklyn Vegan. Direct support on the new dates will come from Bell Witch and Deafkids. Deafkids, for the uninitiated, is a Brazillian hardcore band on Neurosis imprint Neurot Records. Their new album releases on March 25th. Tickets for that show go on sale Friday (3/8) at 10 AM with an AmEx presale starting Wednesday (3/6) at 10 AM. Neurosis continues to support their 2016 album Fires Within Fires, and has toured the world celebrating the 30th anniversary of the bands, which was in 2017.
Neurosis with YOB, EU/UK DATES
11.07.2019 IT Rome Ostia Antica Roman Amphitheater*
12.07.2019 IT Milan Carroponte*
13.07.2019 BE Dour Dour Festival*
14.07.2019 CH Bern Dachstock *
16.07.2019 ES Barcelona Sala Apolo*
17.07.2019 FR Biarritz Atabal*
18.07.2019 FR Paris Bataclan*
19.07.2019 UK Birmingham Supersonic*
20.07.2019 UK London O2 Forum Kentish Town (w/Godflesh)*
22.07.2019 SI Tolmin Metal Days
23.07.2019 AT Vienna Arena*
24.07.2019 HU Budapest Dürer Kert*
25.07.2019 GER Berlin Festsaal Kreuzberg*
26.07.2019 PL Warsaw Progresja*
27.07.2019 PL Gdansk B90*
* – w/ YOB
Neurosis with with Deafkids & Bell Witch – North American Dates
8/7 Atlanta, GA @ Masquerade
8/8 Carrboro, NC @ Cat’s Cradle
8/9 Washington D.C. @ 9:30 Club
8/10 Philadelphia, PA @ Theatre of Living Arts
8/11 Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel
8/13 Boston, MA @ Paradise Rock Club
8/14 Montreal, QC @ Corona Theatre
8/15 Toronto, ON @ The Opera House
8/16 Detroit, MI @ Saint Andrew’s Hall
8/17 Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall | 4,847 |
Alienware has announced its new m15 gaming laptop, and the company is looking to follow in the footsteps of recent gaming laptops from companies like Razer and MSI by building its thinnest and lightest 15-inch laptop yet.
The thinnest Alienware laptop ever
The m15 has all of the things you’d expect from a 2018 gaming laptop: a thinner, Nvidia Max-Q design that trades some performance for portability, 8th Gen Intel processors, up to 32GB of RAM, and plenty of different storage options. Customers will also have the choice between a 60Hz FHD display, a 144Hz FHD panel designed for gaming, and a 60Hz UHD display that offers better resolution.
The design is the biggest jump from Alienware’s previous models, and it’s immediately apparent when you compare them side by side. The new m15 offers slimmer bezels, a reduced footprint, and it looks way better than Alienware’s clunky old design.
The new m15 measures in at 4.76 pounds and 0.83 inches thick. (By comparison, the 2018 Razer Blade — which is currently the best gaming laptop you can buy — weighs 4.63 pounds and is 0.68 inches thick.) Alienware says that the m15 is the thinnest laptop it’s ever made, and it compares it against the old 13-inch model, which weighs 5.8 pounds and is 14 percent thicker than the m15.
Alienware has also updated the keyboard to a chiclet design (don’t worry, it’s still backlit) and squeezes in a full numpad and trackpad into a more modern combined pad. Ports-wise, it has three USB ports, one USB-C Thunderbolt 3 port, HDMI and Mini DisplayPorts, Ethernet, and Alienware’s proprietary Graphics Amplifier plug.
The m15 is not the thinnest or lightest laptop around. After all, an Alienware laptop is still an Alienware laptop, and that means that gaming performance is always going to be the top priority. But like the other Max Q laptops out there, the m15 is the first from Alienware that feels like it might not only be useful as a gaming laptop. Its size and weight that could make it a viable option as a day-to-day computer, too, and that’s a very encouraging thing to see.
The m15 will be available on October 25th starting at $1,299.
Correction: The m15 will start at $1,299, not $1,099. | 4,848 |
Although it’s not something he can ever get used to, it’s something he has learned to absorb so he can move on — until the next time it happens.
It happens frequently. Steve Tzeng will walk down Grand River Avenue on weekend nights and will have to deal with racial slurs and comments about his Asian ethnicity.
Three incidents of racial slurs against Asians were reported in the last year, Chinese Faculty Club president John Jiang said.
“There seems to be a big (divide between) international students and other students on campus,” Tzeng said.
Last week, Tzeng was shocked to learn of a Twitter account named @MSU_Token_Asian, with a “bio” reading “I Come To MSU For Bettah Lifestyle.”
The Asian Pacific American Student Organization, or APASO, began posting about the issue with comments saying “it still demonstrates the growing anti-Asian sentiment at MSU.” Tzeng, a supply chain management senior is APASO’s former co-president.
The owner of the Twitter account was unable to be contacted and the account has since been deleted.
Although Tzeng said accounts such as this further divide students by promoting stereotypes, computer engineering junior Xinye Ji said stereotypical jokes such as these can sometimes be funny.
“It really shouldn’t be acceptable, but when it happens you can only ignore it and laugh,” said Ji, who immigrated to the U.S. from China as a child.
Ji said there is a problem with prejudice and racism against Asians and has heard many students say that Asian students should “Go back to China.”
Jiang said his group, Spartans for a Global Tomorrow, works to bridge the gap between international students and American-born students, and gives students tips to avoid issues, such as not buying expensive cars that may be targeted.
“Students are afraid to report this,” Jiang said. “We have over 3,000 (Chinese) students now enrolled at MSU … a lot of Chinese students, they do want to have American friends but somehow they don’t know how.”
Tzeng said having a separate building for the Multicultural Center would help.
Although Jiang said steps are being taken to encourage cultural integrations, he still sometimes becomes upset or saddened by racial incidents against Asians on campus or around town.
“It’s alarming,” Jiang said. “This is not the MSU I know.” | 4,849 |
NEW DELHI: Representatives of various religions and interfaith groups issued a joint statement on Wednesday emphasising that true religion must be in harmony with science and acceptable to reason.Coming in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the statement was issued by faith leaders including Parmarth Niketan’s Swami Chidanand Saraswati, Imam Umer Ahmed Ilyasi, chief of the All India Imam Organisation, Archbishop of Delhi and Bangalore, Anil Joseph Thomas Couto and Peter Machado, Rabbi Ezekiel Malekar, chief priest of the Judah Hayam Synagogue in New Delhi, Swami Shantatmananda, secretary of Ramakrishna Mission in New Delhi, the office of Public Affairs of the Baha’is of India, and chairman of the Bangla Sahib Gurdwara, Paramjeet Singh Chandok, among others.Calling religion the “most powerful means for mobilising human conscience to serve the common good”, the faith leaders said, “It would be an unpardonable loss if the resources of faith are left scattered and in disarray and not allowed to come together as a singular force to lend impetus to this collective endeavour....A word of clarification is in order about the cases of religious fanaticism, superstition and contempt for science that are being expressed in the name of religion in the context of the pandemic. These have done incalculable harm not only by exposing thousands to the virus but also by vitiating public discourse with half-truths, falsehoods, conspiracy theories and doomsday narratives….What dispels this darkness is the principle that true religion must be in harmony with science and acceptable to reason,” they said.Warning against the ‘misuse’ of faith, they also said statements and prescriptions made in the name of religion must “not create confusion on how this pandemic must be addressed or contradict established scientific advice. It is in response to this urgent imperative that we, the representatives of various faiths and interfaith groups are issuing this statement to reiterate those principles common to all religions that have the greatest bearing on our response to the present crisis. We appeal to those of all religions to unite in a common commitment to these principles and, in the larger national interest, to put aside their differences,” the statement said.“The age-old habit of dividing the world into an ‘us’ and a ‘them’ (many times evoked in the name of religion) and of restricting the sphere of concern to the particular group to which we belong, has shown to be a dangerous and life-threatening delusion in the context of the present crisis,” the faith leaders added in their statement. | 4,850 |
Venezuela's annual inflation rises to 63.4% Published duration 10 September 2014
image copyright Reuters image caption When scarce staples become available, Venezuelans often take advantage and buy in bulk
Venezuela's annual inflation rate has risen to 63.4%, the highest in Latin America, according to official figures published on Tuesday.
The figures are the first released by the central bank since May, which has led critics to accuse the government of withholding data for political reasons.
The poor state of the economy, among other issues, triggered mass anti-government protests earlier this year.
They have since died down, but many continue to grapple with shortages.
The central bank did not publish its scarcity index, a measure of goods that are missing from store shelves, but shortages of basic items such as flour, milk and toilet paper continue to be the bane of many shoppers.
'Protest slump'
While the bank said that month-to-month inflation had eased in August for the third straight month to 3.9%, the annual inflation rate reached a six-year high.
The government of President Nicolas Maduro blamed the soaring inflation on the protests, which rocked the country earlier in the year.
image copyright Reuters image caption In February and March, there were mass opposition rallies in the capital, Caracas, and in other key cities
Officials have argued that roadblocks erected by opposition activists hampered trade, and violent clashes between protesters and the security forces often forced shops to close early.
But many international economists argue that massive government spending and exchange rate controls are to blame.
Smugglers' paradise
Price controls have also ensured that many products are much cheaper in Venezuela than in neighbouring Colombia, making the smuggling of goods a profitable business.
The government estimates that 40% of subsidised goods are smuggled into Colombia, further exacerbating shortages in Venezuela.
In an attempt to cut down on smuggling, the Venezuelan government announced last month that it would close the border at night time.
image copyright AFP image caption President Maduro says that more than a third of subsidised goods are smuggled out of Venezuela
image copyright AFP image caption Venezuela's border with Colombia has been closed between 22:00 local time and 05:00 every night
The Venezuelan prosecutor general said more than 350 people had been detained as part of the operation.
The government in Caracas has not yet revealed its gross domestic product (GDP) forecast for 2014, but a number of international economists have been gloomy in their assessment.
London-based economic research consultancy Capital Economics has predicted that Venezuela's GDP will contract by a cumulative 5% in 2014-2015. | 4,851 |
The BBC reports on the latest warnings about the dire humanitarian conditions in Yemen:
The United Nations is warning that 13 million people in Yemen are facing starvation. It’s calling on the military coalition, led by Saudi Arabia, to halt air strikes which are killing civilians, and contributing to what the UN says could become “the worst famine in the world in 100 years”.
It can be difficult to fathom the sheer scale of Yemen’s catastrophe. The U.N. warns that 13 million people are facing starvation if conditions do not improve, and yet Yemen’s humanitarian crisis is not close to being the most urgent priority for the world’s governments. How many millions of people have to be at risk of starving to death before it is recognized as the most important issue in the world? What percentage of a country’s population has to be on the verge of dying from preventable causes before it holds the world’s interest?
Despite being potentially the worst humanitarian disaster in generations, Yemen’s plight is still ignored and neglected by almost everyone. If something good is to come from the recent surge in criticism of the Saudi government, I hope it will be to make everyone see what the Saudis and their allies have done to Yemen and then to do all that can be done to prevent the worst-case scenario from unfolding. Time has already run out for many tens of thousands of Yemenis who have died from preventable causes over the last three and a half years, and if things keep going as they have millions and millions more innocent people are at risk of joining them. Yemen’s population was estimated to be just under 27 million in 2015. The starvation of 13 million people would mean that roughly half the population is on the verge of being wiped out by preventable hunger as a result of an indefensible war.
The starvation of the people of Yemen is a crime against humanity, and it needs to be described as such. It has many authors, but chief among them are the Saudi coalition and their Western patrons, including our government, that escalated this war and have kept it going for years. The governments responsible for the devastation and starvation of Yemen are among the wealthiest in the world, and they are helping to bring about the destruction of one of the world’s poorest countries. They have it within their power to lessen the suffering of millions of people right now, but that will happen only if they halt their campaign, lift the blockade, stabilize the economy, and support a massive relief effort to rescue Yemen’s impoverished, starving people. If that doesn’t happen soon, these governments will be responsible for causing massive loss of life on a horrifying scale. | 4,852 |
Undertoad Radical Centrist
Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Cottage of Prussia Posts: 31,292
4/12/2006: Ellsworth AFB foam test Quick note... if you are linking to this very popular thread, please link to the blog view version instead. It saves resources for the rest of the cellar.org community. Thanks!
How do you figure out whether a foam firefighting system in an air force hangar is set up correctly and works? Well you turn it on for a few seconds, to make sure it's got pressure and everything. First you set up a scaffolding so you can record the event and show the flow coming out of all nozzles.
And then you let 'er rip. After 15 seconds you can see foam is covering all areas it has to, so the test is successful. Shut 'er off.
Uh, guys? Shut 'er off?
Aw crap. Whatever was meant to shut off the system after 15 seconds, did NOT shut it off and the foam continued to flow. After a few minutes...
The foam is a story high and still flowing!
Uh, Joe? you can climb the scaffolding ladder now...
Two stories high.
This is the guy standing on top of the scaffolding.
So they just let it go.
Thanks to xoxoxoBruce for the initial set of photos and then I googled and found a great How do you figure out whether a foam firefighting system in an air force hangar is set up correctly and works? Well you turn it on for a few seconds, to make sure it's got pressure and everything. First you set up a scaffolding so you can record the event and show the flow coming out of all nozzles.And then you let 'er rip. After 15 seconds you can see foam is covering all areas it has to, so the test is successful. Shut 'er off.Uh, guys? Shut 'er off?Aw crap. Whatever was meant to shut off the system after 15 seconds, did NOT shut it off and the foam continued to flow. After a few minutes...The foam is a story high and still flowing!Uh, Joe? you can climb the scaffolding ladder now...Two stories high.This is the guy standing on top of the scaffolding.So they just let it go.Thanks to xoxoxoBruce for the initial set of photos and then I googled and found a great gallery at Strategypage | 4,853 |
DYNAMO
Part cyberpunk romp, space opera, and dark dystopia, this science fiction opus from the creatives at Karma Pirates draws from each of those sub-genres to create a surreal aesthetic all its own that defies categorization.
Filled with breathtaking visual effects, you will be hard pressed not to believe this web series didn’t cost millions to produce.
Haphead
This series is set in a near-future dystopia where video games use advanced haptic technology to create fully immersive experiences. When young Maxine and her friends gain access to experimental haptic peripherals, they discover they retain the skills learned in their virtual gaming environment. Soon they become members of an underground subculture of rebels who use the technology to learn lethal combat skills.
Haphead not only features an intriguing narrative centered around a relatable young heroine, but its subject matter also seems eerily prophetic — especially in light of sensational virtual reality tech like Oculus Rift and Microsoft’s Hololens making headlines.
Nightwing: The Series
Produced by Ismahawk Productions, this web series is the latest to capitalize on the red-hot popularity of comic book superheroes. Nightwing tells the story of Dick Grayson, Batman’s former partner who has embarked on his own solo crime-fighting career in the city of Bludhaven. Filled with explosive action scenes and dynamic fight choreography, this project looks like an unofficial companion show to hit CW series such as Arrow and The Flash.
BAMF GIRLS CLUB
Produced by Comediva, this hilarious web series imagines what would happen if some of the world’s most famous fictional heroines were to live under the same roof a la Big Brother. This imaginative satire both celebrates and satirizes these pop culture favorites with sharply funny observational humor.
Anamnesis
This dazzling science fiction mystery involves a disparate group of individuals whose lives are affected by the mysterious phenomenon known as lucid dreaming. Produced by Finite Films, Anamnesis uses gorgeous, surreal cinematography in addition to captivating performances to create a world where dreams and reality intertwine in unpredictable ways.
RCVR
Set in the 1970s, RCVR centers on a federal agent who has been tasked with investigating UFO sightings across the country. However, as the investigation progresses, it becomes clear the government is involved in an elaborate conspiracy regarding UFOs, and extraterrestrial contact with earth.
Produced by the multi-channel digital network Machinima, RCVR is a dark and riveting science fiction mystery-thriller reminiscent of The X-Files. | 4,854 |
Calgary’s Inglewood neighbourhood is filled with sandstone buildings and hundred-year-old homes — but now there are plans for a 50-metre condo tower in the city’s oldest neighbourhood that have some residents upset.
“A 50-metre building, according to the developer, will be like a landmark gateway to the community but it will actually be an eyesore to the community,” said Phil Levson, president of the Inglewood Community Association, on Saturday.
“It doesn’t fit. The pure height of the building is not in any kind of historical context.” Tweet This
The project is called the Grid and would be located on a former gas station site just off 17 Avenue S.E. by 19 Street S.E. The proposed building would be 16 storeys. The current standard height under the Area Redevelopment Plan is six storeys.
Residents who protested against the development on Saturday said they’re not anti-development and would be in favour of more mid-rise buildings like the ones already in the neighbourhood.
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“It feels like the city has an agenda because this is going to be a transit stop — they want to have density,” said resident Fiona McKenzie. “It’s not that were opposed to density but we would like to have some discussions and be engaged.” Tweet This
Proponents of the project said it’s a great fit for Inglewood because it will be close to a new Bus Rapid Transit station and it fills a hole in an area that is dominated by automotive businesses and parking lots.
Ward 9 Coun. Gian-Carlo Carra believes there is a compelling case for the developer but said he’s also sympathetic to the community’s angst about the change.
“My question to them when you stand on the street: do you really know whether it’s 16 storeys or 12 storeys? That doesn’t really matter. The person on the street is much more focused on the quality of the public realm,” Carra said.
“This is density where density belongs and it interfaces with the community in all the ways you could possibly want.” Tweet This
Council approved the tower in principle on Dec. 10. Second and third readings are being withheld pending the results of talks between the province, city and airport authority in making exemptions to the airport vicinity protection area regulation.
Those regulations limit development in the flight path, so the tower would not be allowed under current regulations.
Story continues below advertisement | 4,855 |
GETTY David Cameron faces a headache after a poll revealed huge support for leaving the EU
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Well over half of Britons now want to sever ties with Brussels permanently as anti-EU feeling continues to grow in the light of the Paris massacre and the ongoing migrant crisis. A poll commissioned for the Mail on Sunday revealed that 53% of Britons now want out of the EU, compared to 47% who believe we should stay in.
That means the leave campaign has opened up a commanding 6% lead as the upcoming referendum on Britain’s membership of the 28-nation bloc looms ever closer. Even more astonishingly, that lead would grow to a cavernous 8% if Mayor of London Boris Johnson agreed to front the campaign to quit the EU.
GETTY Mr Cameron hopes to announce a raft of agreement to shore up EU support
The result will be a devastating blow for David Cameron, who is trying to convince voters that he can secure meaningful reforms from Brussels which will make staying in the EU more appealing. But world events appear to have overtaken the Prime Minister with November’s shocking Paris massacre, the Cologne sex attacks and the ongoing migrant crisis plaguing mainland Europe all hardening Eurosceptic feeling across the country. More worryingly still for Mr Cameron the poll reveals the true extent of the colossal swing towards an EU exit, with the out campaign gathering momentum at the critical time.
GETTY The lead would grow even further if Boris Johnson fronted the leave campaign
GETTY Issues including the migrant crisis have strengthened Eurosceptic feeling
Last May a survey by the same pollsters produced almost exact reverse result, with 54% of Britons in favour of remaining in the EU and just 46% intending to vote to leave. The latest result means that public perception has swung an astonishing 7% in favour of Brexit in just eight months. The shock poll was revealed as it emerged that the Prime Minister has drawn up a secret plan to deliver three surprise “rabbits from the hat” in his renegotiation with European leaders which he hopes will help shore up support for the EU. According to the Times, Mr Cameron is set to unveil an agreement signed by the other 27 EU leaders rebranding Britain as a different sort of member state, meaning it would be exempt from some Brussels rulings. He will also announce an “emergency brake” on EU migration to Britain which would enable the Government to step in and block new arrivals if public services become overwhelmed. | 4,856 |
• Real Madrid striker will spend Wednesday night at police station in Versailles • Former Liverpool striker Djibril Cissé was questioned in same case
This article is more than 4 years old
This article is more than 4 years old
The French international footballer Karim Benzema will remain in custody overnight after being questioned on Wednesday as part of an investigation into a blackmail case over a sex tape involving another player.
Benzema’s lawyer Sylvain Cormier told reporters that the Real Madrid forward would spend the night at a police station in Versailles.
Detectives detained the Real Madrid striker for questioning a fortnight after the former France and Liverpool striker Djibril Cissé was interviewed and released as part of the same investigation.
Benzema, 27, was summoned to the police station at Versailles shortly before 9am on Wednesday morning. Afterwards the public prosecutor’s office would only confirm that he was being held for questioning.
The affair centres on the alleged attempted blackmail of an international midfielder with what the French news agency AFP said was a sex tape recorded on a mobile phone.
L’Equipe said investigators wanted to establish whether a conversation between Benzema and the player during a meeting of the French national team at the beginning of October was simply friendly advice or part of the plot.
Three suspects said to be in the “entourage” of several footballers have been officially mis en examen – the French equivalent of being charged – since October.
The police investigation into the alleged blackmail attempt was opened at the end of July. Cissé was interviewed and immediately released from further inquiries.
Cissé protested his innocence on French television, saying he had nothing to do with the case. He later announced his retirement from the game.
Attempted blackmail carries a maximum five-year prison sentence in France.
On Wednesday, Benzema’s lawyer Sylvain Cormier told Le Parisien that the footballer was “ready to answer” any questions. He added that after Benzema’s name appeared in the press linked to the investigation, the player himself informed the investigating judge that he was available for questioning.
“It was therefore completely normal that he should respond to the summons. In fact, he would like to put an end to the controversy sparked by this affair in which he has played no part, as soon as possible,” Cormier said.
Benzema’s name apparently came to the attention of police investigating the alleged blackmail after he mentioned the sex tape during a gathering of the French national team at Clairefontaine before Les Bleus met Armenia and Denmark. | 4,857 |
Okay...I can imagine a scenario with this interpretation of Yang:
Yang is lying back on a tree, moping as usual. Shattered. Hollow. A shell of her former self. Suddenly, a bomb comes in and blasts in the distance. Yang gets up and decides to run to where it is. What she saw causes her eyes to widen in shock: the White Fang are attacking Patch. Multiple people are either killed or wounded, many buildings set ablaze. But most heart-wrenching if them all for her is the sight of Taiyang, a massive slash wound from his lower right back to his left shoulder. He's passed out, but the position he's in makes her think the White Fang killed him. She slowly lowers her head, her world becoming more broken then it is. She suddenly starts getting flashes. Herself being surrounded by Atlesian troops after being framed at the Vytal Tournament. Penny being bisected. Vale in ruins by the Grimm. Pyrrha being shot in the heart by Cinder. Yang's arm being cut off by Adam. Finally, a single solitary figure within a wildfire. The figure looks behind them. The figure is Blake, a somber expression on her face. During the flashes, Yang gets angrier and angrier. After she sees the flash with Blake in a wildfire, she snaps. Her eyes snap open, glowing an intense red. She then lets out a roar of rage that would put even the most beastly of Grimm to shame, some of her rage manifesting into a monster-like right arm. The White Fang spots her, and attempt to capture her. They end up brutally murdered instead. Yang stands in a puddle of blood and guts from the White Fang members. She looks down at her right arm. As she looks at it, she realizes that her spark has been reignited. She then says, "My fire...it's been reignited. I burn again." She looks up at the distance from the shore of the island, then says, "And soon, all of you...the mother who left my family behind *Flash of Raven*...the man who framed me *Flash of Mercury*...the woman who destroyed Vale *Flash of Cinder*...the bastard who cut my arm off *Flash of Adam*...and you...Blake...YOU ALL WILL BURN WITH ME!!!", the last six words hollered out in primal rage. She is neither the cheery, fun-loving girl she was, or the moping depressed girl she was, but is now a wrathful, enraged, and cynical girl. Nothing, not even her friends and sister, can stop her vengeance. She will have it one way or another. | 4,858 |
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Jurgen Klopp took charge of his first Liverpool training session on Monday – and was handed an immediate boost with Philippe Coutinho among the players taking part.
The Brazilian, who pulled out of Dunga's national squad last week due to a groin injury, was one of nine first-team players participating with several players still missing through injury or international duty.
Klopp arrived at Melwood early on Monday, three days after being unveiled as the club's new manager, having watched the youth teams play at the Academy on Saturday.
The session, which began at 2.30pm, was believed to have lasted between 60 minutes and 75 minutes, and contained a number of players in contention for a starting place for Saturday's trip to Tottenham.
As well as being boosted by Coutinho's fitness, Daniel Sturridge, Alberto Moreno and Lucas Leiva were present.
In addition, James Milner and Mamadou Sakho, who had been away on international duty, returned, while Kolo Toure and Joao Carlos Teixeira also featured.
Dejan Lovren, who was stretchered off against Carlisle last month, was back in training too – but Roberto Firmino, who suffered a back injury in the same game, remained absent, along with the likes of Jordan Henderson and Christian Benteke.
IN PICS: Klopp's arrives at Melwood
Three young goalkeepers were also called up to take part in the training, which was taken by Klopp, as well as Peter Krawietz – one of his assistants at Dortmund – and Pep Lijnders.
Zeljko Buvac, another one of the club's assistants, is yet to arrive.
Before the session began, the new manager gathered the players into a huddle and spoke to them for just under five minutes.
One player who was not at Melwood was Adam Lallana, who is on international duty with England.
Ahead of the Three Lions' game in Lithuania, he hailed the appointment of Klopp at Anfield.
“I am excited, very excited, to work with the new manager,” he said.
“I saw the press conference and, like everyone at the press conference and the reaction he is getting, it is going to be exciting.
“I have obviously got one more game with England and I am fully focused on it, but I am excited to get back to the club afterwards.” | 4,859 |
of a new trade deal with Mexico and Canada (which would help farmers and factory workers), bipartisan drug pricing reform, or infrastructure. The White House is and should be very confident, then. Trump’s approval rating is already up since this impeachment frenzy began. Democrats and the media probably just handed Trump a second term.”
‘COMEY’ THE MINISERIES
Of course Hollywood is interested in the saga of James B. Comey, and a major production centered on him is scheduled to begin in a matter of weeks.
“CBS Television Studios is assembling a powerhouse cast for a miniseries based on former FBI director James Comey’s memoir ‘A Higher Loyalty.’ Jeff Daniels has signed on to play Comey in the production, and Brendan Gleeson will also star as Donald Trump,” advises the Hollywood Reporter, an industry publication.
In addition, Michael Kelly — a veteran of the Netflix series “House of Cards” — will play Andrew McCabe, who became acting FBI director after Mr. Comey was fired by Mr. Trump.
“Billy Ray — who directed ‘Shattered Glass’ and ‘Captain Phillips’ — adapted the book and will direct the miniseries, which is scheduled to go into production in November. A premiere date hasn’t been set; CBS executives also have yet to decide whether the project will air on Showtime, CBS All Access or potentially both,” The Hollywood Reporter said.
POLL DU JOUR
• 31% of Americans overall trust the Supreme Court “a great deal” or “quite a lot”; 52% of Republicans, 25% of independents and 22% of Democrats agree.
• 34% overall trust the high court “some”; 32% of Republicans, 32% of independents and 38% of Democrats agree.
• 18% trust the court “very little”; 9% of Republicans, 19% of independents and 24% of Democrats agree.
• 9% don’t trust the court “at all”; 4% of Republicans, 11% of independents and 9% of Democrats agree.
• 8% don’t know; 3% of Republicans, 13% of independents and 6% of Democrats agree.
Source: An Economist/YouGov poll of 1,500 U.S. adults conducted Sept. 22-24 and released Friday.
• Helpful information to [email protected]
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Copyright © 2020 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission. | 4,860 |
McLaren boss Zak Brown has rubbished suggestions Fernando Alonso could miss this year's Singapore Grand Prix to contest IndyCar's championship finale at Sonoma.
In May Alonso missed the Monaco Grand Prix to contest the Indy 500 in a McLaren entry powered by Andretti Autosport and Honda. Alonso's attempt to win the iconic oval race ended with a Honda engine failure, prompting him to declare he would return to the event in future.
Alonso's decision to skip Monaco was motivated by Honda's failure to deliver a competitive and reliable engine for the third consecutive year, and doubts remain over where he will be driving in 2018. The Spaniard is using Formula One's summer break to dwell on the decision.
Michael Hickey/Getty Images
This week rumours circulated in North America that Alonso is considering another one-off IndyCar appearance in a fifth car run by Andretti Autosport at California's Sonoma Raceway, a race which clashes with F1's famous street race under the lights of Marina Bay on September 17. Brown has dismissed those suggestions.
"It's completely crazy," he told Racer. "He would have to first make that request through us, which he has not, and that event conflicts with F1 in Singapore. It's fake news."
Alonso has made it clear his top priority next year is to stay in F1 and find a car capable of challenging for the third world championship which has eluded him for a decade. McLaren and Renault seem to be the most logical destinations, though the uncertainty over Sebastian Vettel's next move has prompted rumours of a return to Ferrari in 2018 or 2019.
Fernando Alonso's orange McLaren-Andretti was a popular, surprise entry in this year's Indy 500 Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images
The questions over Alonso's future come with McLaren still weighing up whether to continue with Honda into 2018, though it appears too late for the team to switch manufacturers at this stage. Andretti Autosport is also in discussions which Chevrolet about an engine supply in 2018, which Racer suggests could thwart plans for McLaren to link up with the team for another Indy 500 appearance in future -- something both Brown and Michael Andretti have indicated a desire to do.
Brown says it is currently unclear how Andretti's engine plans would impact its hopes for another crack at the Borg-Warner Trophy, though he suggests a lot will hinge on its own relationship with Honda come next year.
"50-50; it could make a difference or not make a difference. It really depends where our Honda relationship goes as to whether it's important there would be a Honda engine in the car [at the Indy 500]." | 4,861 |
Press release – June, 7 2019 – 8:30am
Weborama’s parent company tops Amazon’s bid to acquire
Sizmek Ad Server and DCO
Weborama’s parent company Ycor has decided to top Amazon’s bid for Sizmek Ad Server and DCO, with the vision of building the independent alternative the advertising industry needs.
On March 29, 2019, Sizmek – the second largest Ad Server globally, far outweighed by Google’s Ad Manager division – filed for US Chapter 11 protection. Multiple companies have expressed interest in acquiring the Ad Serving part of the company. On May 31, 2019, Amazon announced it signed an agreement to acquire Sizmek Ad Server and Sizmek DCO.
Weborama is a leading European tech and data company, which serves global clients in the fields of Ad Serving, DMP and state-of-the-art Semantic AI. Weborama and Ycor have spent the last two months assessing the acquisition of Sizmek Ad Server and DCO. We believe overbidding today the existing offer is the best decision from an industry perspective. Acquisition will be made by Ycor, Weborama’s parent company.
Alain Lévy, CEO of Weborama and Partner at Ycor, said: “Obviously, we are conscious that, given how incommensurate Amazon’s resources are, it can bring “David versus Goliath” to mind. Today, we make a financial commitment, taking into account what is at stake for the industry as a whole: prevent the advent of a duopoly. We do believe that no one should turn a blind eye on Sizmek Ad Server being possibly acquired by a global platform – be it Amazon or another. Choice must prevail.”
Marketers and agencies need an independent, neutral and transparent Ad Server player, able to serve as a fair alternative to dominant offerings. The same applies to talent who, when given the choice, might opt to join a dedicated close-knit company whose sole craft is to help raise the bar of precision marketing.
Teaming up with Sizmek, Weborama will provide marketers and agencies with such an independent alternative, powered by dedicated cutting-edge technologies.
Contacts
WEBORAMA / YCOR – Alain Lévy – [email protected]
CALYPTUS – Mathieu Calleux - 01.53.65.68.68 – [email protected]
Attachment | 4,862 |
When announcing the plan, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Democrats have a choice: “Do they stand with Bernie or do they stand for freedom?”
The resolution could put vulnerable Democrats — who have broken with their party on GOP procedural votes before — in a tough spot. Several Democratic lawmakers have slammed Sanders for his remarks, and there is growing concern Sanders could cost them key Senate and House races as well as their quest for the White House if he becomes their presidential nominee.
But there is also a desire among Democrats to show party unity, especially as Sanders has emerged as a frontrunner in the primary.
"Whatever the atmosphere is — and I would hope that everyone would say, no matter who the nominee is for president — we wholeheartedly embrace that person," Speaker Nancy Pelosi told her members during a closed-door caucus meeting on Wednesday.
Still, several Democrats have openly expressed discomfort with Sanders’ sympathetic comments toward Castro, which are fueling broader concern about whether his brand of democratic socialism will be an easy sell in key swing states like Florida.
"As the first South American immigrant member of Congress who proudly represents thousands of Cuban Americans, I find Senator Bernie Sanders' comments on Castro's Cuba absolutely unacceptable," tweeted freshman Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (D-Fla.), who flipped a GOP-held district in 2018.
Even Democratic lawmakers outside Florida have sought to distance themselves from Sanders.
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“Stalin doubled literacy in the Soviet Union, even as he murdered tens of millions of people. Apologists for dictatorship - Cuba, Russia, Saudi Arabia - always say ‘they do some bad things, and some good things.’ It's a way of making them seem just like us. It's utterly wrong,” tweeted freshman Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-N.J.), who also represents a swing district.
Sanders has also come under fire from Democrats for other foreign policy positions, including his decision to boycott the hawkish American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which he has accused of “bigotry.”
"Senator Sanders owes an immediate apology for his appalling comments about AIPAC and those who believe deeply in the US-Israel relationship — a strategic alliance that is key in the fight against terror," tweeted centrist Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.). | 4,863 |
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A shoplifter high on drugs who thought he was invisible was proved wrong when he was spotted stealing from a shop.
Andrew Simon Mylan was “off his head” on zopiclone when he was caught shoplifting in a Stockton store, a court heard.
One of the effects of the drugs was that the thief believed that he was invisible, said his solicitor Denis Chisman.
But his imagined cloak of invisibility wasn’t enough to stop him being arrested, magistrates were told.
Teesside Magistrates’ Court heard how the 38-year-old went into McColls in Stockton high street with an empty bag.
Prosecutor Guy Prest told the court that Mylan filled up the bag with toiletries, worth £26, which he then failed to pay for.
He was caught and, following his arrest, he admitted he was “out of his head” on zopiclone at the time of the offence.
Zopiclone is prescribed by doctors for the treatment of insomnia but, used as a street drug, is known as “zimmers” or “zimmies”.
And, according to one online user’s guide, zopiclone users “can get over-confident, with the worst cases becoming deluded that they are more-or-less invisible”.
This can “lead users into unplanned risky activities, believing that they won’t get caught – like shoplifting in a store” the website added.
Mylan, of Squadron Court, Martinet Road, Thornaby, admitted stealing the items from the store.
Mr Chisman, in mitigation, said Mylan had the ability to keep out of trouble but at the moment he was struggling with an addiction to zopiclone.
Mylan knew full well that if he continued to commit offences he would end up in Holme House Prison and he didn’t want that, said his solicitor.
The magistrates told him he was “skating on thin ice”.
They said it was so serious that the custody threshhold had been passed but they were willing to suspend the sentence.
He was given a six-week prison sentence suspended for six months and warned that he would go to prison if he re-offended.
Mylan, who is on benefits, wasn’t ordered to pay compensation.
Read more stories from the region's courts | 4,864 |
Last week, there was widespread news that Thailand largest commercial bank is planning to use XRP, however, the bank has denied the information.
Earlier, the Siam Commercial Bank (SCB), mistakenly said it is going to start using the digital currency soon, as seen in a tweet by the bank where it says “XRP system will be announced soon”.
Siam Commercial Bank did not mention the time to start the usage but promised to communicate its customers the moment it begins using the digital currency.
Today, however, the bank communicated its customers on Twitter claiming the first message was a mistake. It states that there is no plan to begin the use of the Ripple’s XRP for now.
SCB says: “We are so sorry for the previous information of the previous post. As of now we have no plan on using XRP”.
The bank, deleted a tweet where it first stated that it is planning to use XRP for cross-border transaction. When questioned, it said it did because it is not planning to use XRP any moment.
Note that SCB is using Ripple for cross-border remittance, just like prominent banks across the world are pitching behind the blockchain remittance technology offered by the San Francisco firm. In fact, SCB was the first financial institution to make use of RippleNet’s “multi-hop” feature.
Philippine’s SendFriend is Launching this Month
While Siam Bank rejected the usage of Ripple’s XRP, Philippine’s SendFriend has said it is launching by the end of the month. There is high expectation that the launch of SendFriend will increase XRP liquidity in Philippines since the payment application makes use of xRapid, a cross-border remittance tool that makes use of XRP.
Early this year, SendFriend announced it is using Ripple’s blockchain technology for cross-border payment. The announcement came shortly after the firm sealed a deal with Ripple Inc.
The partnership was centered on offering cheaper and seamless cross-border payment with the use of Ripple’s xRapid.
As Ripple keeps partnering with different financial institutions across the globe, the firm is as well increasing the usage of XRP by introducing its xRapid network to them.
Now, Ripple has announced that any financial institution making use of RippleNet has the advantage to use xRapid since the technology is included in the network.
Addendum: In a fresh reply to an XRP enthusiast, SCB said it is using Ripple’s xRapid from JPY to THB. | 4,865 |
Korea's Kim, which Trump agreed to on the spot when a South Korean delegation came bearing an invitation from the North. Few of Trump's advisers were anticipating the move.
"This is not careful, modulated foreign policy where we're thinking three or four moves ahead," said Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations who served Republican and Democratic presidents. "This is foreign policy one impulse, one tweet, one step at a time. We're playing against people who think much more strategically."
Kelly's role
There was a time in the Trump administration when chief of staff John Kelly was regarded as a savior of functional policy process after a series of missteps and rushed announcements. His efforts to shepherd through massive tax reform legislation were well-regarded by the President and congressional Republicans.
But even those efforts have been subject to Trump's whims. At an event in West Virginia on Thursday arranged to herald the tax measure, Trump made a dramatic show of tossing his page-long prepared speech into the air. He chose instead to discuss, in harsh terms, the immigration matter.
"To hell with it," Trump said as the discarded speech fluttered to the ground. "That would have been a little boring."
Kelly's strict management style has clashed with the President's freewheeling instincts, Kelly's stature has been reduced. Trump no longer consults with him on every policy announcement, and Kelly has found himself as caught off guard by certain announcements as other aides, White House officials say.
That included Trump's impromptu announcement during a meeting last month that he was imposing new tariffs on steel and aluminum -- a vow he'd long promised but that few aides, including Kelly, knew was coming. In the following week, staffers hastily drafted the language, which required extensive legal vetting. Up until the morning Trump signed the orders, it was unclear whether the documents would be ready for his signature.
Still, Kelly has continued working to impose more order on the policy process, even as he finds his influence slipping. He installed a new deputy for policy coordination, Chris Liddell, who told staffers during a meeting last week that new structures would be enacted for policy rollouts and implementation, according to a White House official.
But since then, Trump has announced by himself new policy initiatives for Syria and the border, with little sign of pre-planning.
"It appears to be government by impulse rather than government by deliberation," said David Gergen, a CNN political analyst and co-director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School who served as an adviser to four presidents. "And that does cause waves of anxiety and scrambling among people around him." | 4,866 |
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Is Tina a true warbler or is this just gobbledygook?
Turkeys might be known to gobble - but perhaps none as well as Tina.
The 17-month-old rescue turkey sings to her owner each day in a variety of clucks, chirps and whistles.
She is also a hit on social media - where posts of her warbling generate thousands of views and likes.
Mary Frankland, founder of the Dean Farm Animal Sanctuary in Chepstow, Monmouthshire, said: "We have four turkeys here but Tina is by far the most inquisitive and chatty."
"She follows me around as I work and will warn me if strangers are approaching." Ms Frankland added.
"She is the star of the rescue centre, is very sociable and loves to sing."
Image copyright Dean Farm Trust Image caption Dean Farm turkeys sharing a straw bed with a rescue pig
Tina was one of four turkeys rescued last year from a farm in Monmouthshire.
Due to be slaughtered for Christmas, the birds instead found themselves on Ms Frankland's 62-acre (25-hectare) rescue farm, where they are free to roam and forage.
Tina, a bronze turkey or Meleagris gallopavo, now spends her life catching a ride on the backs of the rescue pigs and laying her eggs in the hedgerows during the summer months.
Ms Frankland said: "People never really come into contact with turkeys except once a year when they are on their dinner plate.
"But each time we have an open day, children and adults are mesmerised by them.
"They are big, beautiful birds and very intelligent and sociable. Like dogs, they create lasting social bonds with both people and animals.
"They love to be stroked and cuddled and are a real treat to have around."
Image copyright BBC news Image caption Mary Frankland, of the Dean Farm Animal Sanctuary, rescued Tina just before Christmas 2016
Turkeys - which are believed to have originated from Mexico and imported into Europe in the 16th Century - have a natural life expectancy of about 10 years.
They are known to make over 20 distinct vocalisations, including a distinctive gobble, produced by males, which can be heard a mile away.
They also have unique voices helping them recognise one another.
Roughly 10 million turkeys will be eaten in the UK this Christmas, but on Monday, Tina will be gobbling her favourite food - melon. | 4,867 |
Yesterday at Hi-Rez Expo 2018, free-to-play hero shooter Paladins: Champions of the Realm announced a new battle royale mode named Paladins: Battlegrounds. In the face of the rising trend, more games are adding similar modes to their makeup, however this one's name raised a few eyebrows—given how closely it reflects PUBG Corp's megahit PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds.
Now, Hi-Rez Studios president Stew Chisam has explained why he and his team opted for 'Battlegrounds' over, say, battle royale, or a similar appendage.
In conversation with Pip on the expo show floor, Chisam suggested that the term better reflected MMO battlegrounds—such as WoW's Alterac Valley—than anything perhaps more obvious.
"We actually had a lot of conversations," says Chisam. "Do we call it Battle Royale, do we call it Battlegrounds, do we call it something else? We thought if we call it something completely out of the blue people might not know what it was, or if we call it Survival which we previously had [as a mode] people might think it was the previous version. But Battlegrounds—we actually settled on Battlegrounds because—I don't know if you got the same feeling when you played but when we got to actually playing the mode, you're in your four-person team with your classes, it felt like an MMO raid party.
"Then you're getting on these horses and you're galloping through this big fantasy landscape, right? For us it was more evocative of the old MMO battlegrounds. And so to us, choosing that name versus battle royale was more of an homage to those big MMO battleground-type settings."
Chisam also admits that opting for Battlegrounds is sure to "get a little bit of buzz" in the current climate, and that "no one will have too many doubts" about what kind of game mode Paladins: Battlegrounds offers.
He adds: "You have to remember that for us too it's just a game mode, like Siege or Conquest or whatever, so it's not really going to play a major role in the marketing of the overall game over the long haul… I think whether we call it battle royale, whether we call it Battlegrounds, whether we call it anything else, there was always going to be a little bit of—there's always going to be that one element. When you actually play the mode you see that it is quite different from the other modes."
Additional reporting by Philippa Warr. | 4,868 |
that people didn’t know what Bitcoin would become a decade ago, much less whether or not alt coins would prove to be valuable thereafter. Even today, with more and more people being exposed to cryptocurrency thanks to mainstream media attention and increased levels of adoption, nobody knows when the valuations of cryptocurrencies will reach their peak.
To Buy Litecoin, Or Not To Buy Litecoin?
You might think it’s cheesy to quote Warren Buffet, but he does provide many great insights into the principles of investing that might help you put investing in any asset, including cryptocurrency, into perspective. One of those principles is that if you don’t believe in something enough to stay invested in it for a decade, don’t invest.
Put that principle in the context of an industry that’s only 11 years old. The cryptocurrency journey we’re on as been filled with so many ups and downs so far. Multiple bubbles, hacks that saw users lose billions of dollars in the blink of an eye, black market websites that saw kingpins get life sentences, governments claiming they’re going to catch everybody evading taxes, and still, Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity is crypto’s best-kept secret.
Take a moment and think about what you just read. In crypto were an action hero, his life story would make for one hell of a movie. Don’t you agree?
Here’s the thing, it’s easy to get excited when you read posts like this one and think that you want a piece of the action, here’s the thing. Most of what you read about cryptocurrencies in the past is just that, the past. Watching markets go up and down while millions of dollars in crypto changes hands anonymously is more exciting when you’re not the one getting shot at in the Wild West.
All of that being said, I love cryptocurrency and even though I’ve been burned by many market fluctuations including halving events, I do recommend following Buffet’s advice. Invest only what you can afford to lose, and do it with the mindset that you’re staying in the game for a long time and won’t start sweating if the price of Litecoin drops next week, or next month.
Remember, any investment in cryptocurrency is also an opportunity to learn. Heck, I wouldn’t be writing about cryptocurrency if the excitement of the market hadn’t captured my imagination in mid-2017.
Either way, just know that when you’re ready to start trading Litecoin and other cryptocurrencies, you can do it right here at Bitbuy. | 4,869 |
This article is a guest-blogger response to a previously posted opinion piece entitled “Do I Really Want a Swiss Army Phone?” written by one of our staff members.
Not that many years ago, when I went on business trips I used to carry a whole host of devices. Cell phone, media player, GPS, PDA, digital camera, plus a few smaller items (like WiFi detector). Taken together, they took up half my bag – and although I did my best to consolidate their various power requirements, batteries and chargers added quite a bit more.
Now, guess what? Nine times out of ten, I just take my G1. Sure, if I need to do serious work on the road a laptop will come along, but for many minor tasks – including email and web surfing – I’m happy with the handset. As an Android enthusiast, it’s hardly surprising that I love my “Swiss Army Phone,” but on a practical level it has also really lightened my load.
I’m not arguing that my G1 does everything better than all of those. It will always be the case that a top-notch, optimized specialist is better at its one job than a generalist is. For example, when I go out running I like my tunes, so I wear an old (but tiny) Qoolqee X – and when it dies, a new Sports Walkman is in my sights. I’d never take my G1 running. But the rest of the time, I’m not that much of a media junkie, and I’m perfectly happy with Android’s default player. It’s taken the place of other player hardware for me, in no small part because I always have it with me.
Which brings me to the other reason why an Android handset is the convergent device of choice: If you don’t like the media player (or any other app), you can change it! The Market has a bunch of player options, SlideMe has more, and of course, if push comes to shove you can even build your own. It’s as if you could replace the crappy scissors on your Swiss Army knife with a Fiskars, or the knife blade with a Henckel, or the awl you never use with a Torx driver that’s just the size you need.
A Swiss Android Phone? Yes please!
PS: For old-school hardware, skip the Swiss Army knife and go with a Leatherman. ;^) | 4,870 |
WASHINGTON — Former President Barack Obama criticized his successor Tuesday for rescinding an immigration program that protects some undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children from deportation, calling the decision "cruel."
Preserving Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, is "about basic decency," Obama said, defending his signiature action in one of his few public statements since President Donald Trump took office.
“To target these young people is wrong — because they have done nothing wrong. It is self-defeating — because they want to start new businesses, staff our labs, serve in our military, and otherwise contribute to the country we love,” Obama said. “And it is cruel. What if our kid’s science teacher, or our friendly neighbor turns out to be a Dreamer? Where are we supposed to send her? To a country she doesn’t know or remember, with a language she may not even speak?”
The Morning Rundown Get a head start on the morning's top stories. This site is protected by recaptcha
The president authorized DACA in June 2012 to protect so-called “Dreamers,” children under the age of 16 without serious criminal histories who were brought to the United States before 2007. The program allows eligible young people to seek DACA protection for renewable two-year periods. Immigration hardliners have argued the executive action was unconstitutional, and Trump pledged to undo the program during his 2016 campaign.
Related: What Is DACA? Here's What You Need to Know About the Program Trump Is Ending
Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the administration’s plan Tuesday morning, giving Congress six months to possibly save the policy as well as make changes to the nation's immigration laws “through the process set forth by our Founders in a way that advances the interest of the nation.”
Obama has largely stayed out of sight during Trump’s presidency, weighing in only on major issues like health care and with tweets indirectly referring to Trump. However, the former president signaled ahead of Trump’s decision that he would respond if the future of DACA was threatened. His statement Tuesday was his most expansive since leaving the White House.
“Whatever concerns or complaints Americans may have about immigration in general, we shouldn’t threaten the future of this group of young people who are here through no fault of their own, who pose no threat, who are not taking away anything from the rest of us,” Obama said.
Former Vice President Joe Biden weighed in with his own statement shortly after, saying it would be "inhumane" to expel Dreamers, as DACA recipients are known. | 4,871 |
on Facebook were abruptly fired, said Maha Shehade, a lawyer at Worker’s Hotline, an Israeli group that advocates for employee rights.
Their postings highlighted the different perceptions. One post showed photos of dead Palestinian children. Another person posed at a protest with a Palestinian flag. Someone called the Israeli army immoral; another accused it of war crimes.
“Everything they posted did not fit the consensus, and that was the reason for them being fired,” Shehade said.
Some of the postings have been deeply offensive to many Israelis. A couple dozen Facebook groups were created in response, such as one titled “Boycott Israeli companies who employ traitors.” It republished the posts — such as one by a woman who wrote “Another 11 soldiers killed! :)” — beside the names and photos of Israeli Arabs and urged followers to pressure their employers to fire them.
In late July, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman urged Israelis to boycott businesses run by Israeli Arabs who participate in protests against the operation in Gaza.
Liel, of the New Israel Fund, said Lieberman’s call for a boycott of some Arab businesses was heard by many Israeli Jews as a call to boycott all Arab businesses.
“You’re now sending a clear signal to Arabs: You are not part of society,” she said.
In this vitriolic atmosphere, some Israelis decided on their own it was prudent to stay away from Arab towns and businesses they once visited without a care.
Muhammed Mahajneh said some of his Jewish suppliers no longer make deliveries to his farming-implement store in Umm al-Fahm, the cultural and social center of the Arab towns and villages that make up an area known as Wadi Ara southeast of Haifa. Those who are willing to come to his store, he said, call him from the road and insist on an escort into town.
“I have Jewish friends who still come visit, but they call me first and ask if it’s safe,” he said. “They never did that before.”
There were many antiwar protests in Umm al-Fahm, a town of 48,000 that is home to both a fundamentalist group known as the Northern Islamic Movement and an internationally acclaimed art gallery dedicated to exhibitions that promote dialogue between Jews and Arabs.
“We continue to be loyal to Israel and our identity,” said owner Said Abu Shakra. “But it’s very difficult to be Arab in Israel these days.”
Halpern reported from Jerusalem. | 4,872 |
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Amid the raft of new car concepts at the Frankfurt Motor Show this month, one of the head-turners was Volkswagen's bright orange ray of sunshine, the buggy up! concept.The buggy up! is inspired by the Californian beach buggies of the 1960s. These buggies, pioneered by people such as American Bruce Meyers, took the simple, reliable Beetle chassis and engine and replaced the steel bodies with glassfibre, creating agile, fun vehicles that perfectly reflected the care-free California in which they were created.That same California feeling is encapsulated in the lightweight steel construction of the two-seater buggy up!, which brings the beach buggy bang up to date. Based on the brand-new up!, the buggy up! keeps its city sibling's (reinforced) underbody, running gear and drive technology, while the roof-less and door-less exterior is completely redesigned, and the ride height is lowered by 20 mm. Everything is different: the bonnet is flatter, the bumpers have been reworked and the rear has been completely redesigned.The buggy up! does not have any C-pillars, and neither does it have a boot like the standard up! model. The bootlid is constructed of two pieces: the main part of the lid lifts upward like a saloon's bootlid, but the section above the bumper folds down, like the tailgate on a pick-up, making it extremely easy to stow bulky items. On top of the lid, there are also tie-down straps for luggage. Despite all these changes, there's no mistaking the buggy up! for anything but an up!.Climb into the buggy up! and you'll find specially designed neoprene-covered seats that are 58 mm lower than those in the production model. To match this, engineers reduced the basic angle of the height-adjustable steering wheel by four degrees to an angle of 21 degrees, creating a go-kart like driving position. Passengers also get something to hold on to, in the shape of a sturdy handle on the dash panel, because you never know what lies over the next dune.Even if there are rainclouds over the next dune, that's no problem for the buggy up!, because as well as a rudimentary fabric roof, the interior is completely waterproof. The seats have drains in them, as do the sills and the floor. Even the controls for the iPod-compatible infotainment system are waterproof, and you can remove the entire module – including the integrated loudspeakers – so that you've got a sound system for your beach party. All you need to add is your favourite Beach Boys tracks. | 4,873 |
Dollar General Takes Swift Action Against Anti-Gun Cashier
MOFFAT TX – When Jason Orsek, co-founder and Vice President of Come and Take It Texas attempted to purchase a beer from his local Dollar General store last week, the cashier (we’ll call her Cynthia) blatantly refused to accept Orseks state issued gun permit as a valid form of ID. Cynthia’s seemingly anti-gun posture did not sit well with Orsek.
After reporting the incident to Cynthia’s manager, Orsek was reassured that the issue would be handled and that Cynthia, along with the rest of the staff would be told that that the Texas License to Carry (LTC) is an acceptable form of identification. However, no less than one week later, Orsek was once again met with resistance from Cynthia. According to Orsek’s Facebook post, Cynthia intervened during his second transaction and told the another cashier not to accept his LTC…
After making a formal complaint to the Dollar General headquarters, Orsek got a very swift response. The store manager called Orsek at 7am today and said she had an email from corporate about the incident. They were not happy that Cynthia defied orders to discriminate against gun owners. Orsek reports that Cynthia has been written up and reprimanded. Orsek was happy with the response…
Very speedy response time! The manager said this was a very important issue to them (corp) and they had instructed her to rectify it immediately.
On top of the quick response, Orsek received another call a few hours later from the store manager who offered up a $10 gift card for his troubles. He posted a video of him purchasing another beer with his LTC and gift card, likely on principle. He plans to use the remaining balance to buy more beer when Cynthia is back on duty.
This incident serves as a microcosm of the anti-gun left. They will use any any power, from the cashiers ability to refuse service, to the highest political office in the land to make life difficult for gun owners. Orsek could have easily shown his drivers license to acquiesce to Cynthia’s demands and continue with his day, but he decided to make an example of her. Now, not only has Cynthia been dealt with, but likely the entire Dollar General workforce will be made aware of this issue. I respect Dollar General for dealing with this situation quickly and with seriousness it deserved.
When Cynthia rings up Orseks beer in the future with his LTC, he might as well be drinking liberal tears, and nothing tastes better than liberal tears. | 4,874 |
, CRZYBTCH, HABZUK
Criminal activity: 15
Sample: CARJACKD, 1PITBULL, SCOFFLAW, HAACKER, CRYMPAYS, PYROBRAD, DEOFENDR
Political: 44
Sample: TAXESCUT, 44.OBAMA, BH.OBAMA, HOPEBAMA, OBAMA.44, OBAMACAN, AL.GOR, BILL.C38, EL.CHE01, NEXT.PM, ANARKEY, GM.RIP
Dignitaries/Law enforcement: 81
Sample: ICUFFEM, OLD.RCMP, SSGT.RET, CHECKCPIC, K9.UNIT1, GO2JAIL, L8ROFICR, BE.A.COP, PADIWAGN, SHERRIF, CHER.IFF, CIA.FBI1, GOVERNOR, HWYPATROL, LINEIMUP, LILCOPPR, OPP7324, OPP.2747, HYOFFICR, HIOFISER, NO.POPOS, RENTACOP, HARPER59, PMCANADA, OBAMA.09, NO.PIGS, X.RCMP, THEWARDN
Racism: 128
Sample: CYNAMAN, CRZCZECH, GRINGO.1, IGOTRICE, 1SEXYWOP, PIEDNOIR, PACKEE, 4NEWFIES, ARYNRACE, ARYEN, GRINGOGRL, CRACKER7, DRTWTBOY, RCECOOKR, SLUMDOG, A.WHITEY, DTCHGEEK, GYPSY.V, MAMMY.B
Abusive/obscene language: 180
Sample: FRIG.OFF, OLDFARTS, SCHMUCK, OMFG, DAMM.5, FRIGGIT
Reason listed as “Unknown”: 1,075
BALLERRR, BDECEASED, FLYINBYU, GTO.HELL, INTMED8R, NICE.ASH, RDNCKGRL, RED.NEKK, REDNEC55, DUN.DEVL, THERAPST, 12INCHES, BAAAAAAA, BUBBIEZ, KOCKY, PORNKING, RACEGUY, RACEFANN
Read more about: | 4,875 |
For over a decade, a string of Jane Does told our criminal justice system about the many sins of Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and their barbaric band of billionaires who captured children and turned them into sex slaves.
And for over a decade, the justice system laughed in their faces, letting Epstein off with a flew slaps on the wrist in civil courts and, as a result of a non-prosecution agreement protecting any and all co-conspirators, just one charge in criminal court for the solicitation of prostitution — as though a girl young enough to be in middle school has the capacity to consent to selling her own body for sex.
Everything changed last November, when the Miami Herald's Julie K. Brown ripped open not just the dirty deals that protected Epstein during his criminal trial but also the identities of those Jane Does. Jane Doe 1 was no longer a shadow. She was now Courtney Wild, a straight-A student and captain of the cheerleading team, whom Epstein helped turn into a drug addict and a stripper. For over a decade, the world ignored Jane Doe after Jane Doe after Jane Doe. But overnight, Virginia Giuffre wasn't just one woman yelling into the void anymore. Instead Giuffre was joined by a series of battle-hardened women willing to share their worst pain with the world.
They did not owe us their stories. In cases involving sexual abuse or assault, especially regarding that of minors, the media will not identify accusers to the public, based on the understanding that to force a victim to undergo yet another invasion of privacy would constitute a second punishment and cause a chilling effect among other victims pondering whether to report. Yet countless women and girls went to the authorities with evidence of multiple felonies, and the system was quite literally rigged against them. So they had to speak up. They placed the most intimate and violent details of their lives for the country to see in print. It was undoubtedly empowering. It was also one of the greatest acts of sacrifice a victim can do for the world.
Even after the world woke up to the horrors of not just Epstein's crimes but the political machinations complicit in protecting him, the justice system failed his victims once more. The Metropolitan Correctional Center allowed Epstein, just two weeks after a suicide attempt, have the final laugh and use a bedsheet to asphyxiate himself until he evaded justice for the final time.
But Ghislaine Maxwell is still out there. Prince Andrew is still out there. Dozens if not hundreds of predators who cycled through Epstein's house of horrors are still out there. There is still justice to mete out, and it's time that the system do some of the work for a change. | 4,876 |
Germany has not suffered a large-scale attack from Islamist militants like those seen in neighbouring Belgium and France.
But it was shaken by two smaller attacks in Bavaria over the summer, one on a train near Würzburg and another at a music festival in Ansbach that wounded 20 people. Both were also claimed to have been carried out by Islamic State.
And government officials have said the country, which accepted nearly 900,000 migrants last year, many from the war-torn Middle East, lies in the “crosshairs of terrorism”.
In mid-October, police arrested a Syrian refugee suspected of planning a bomb attack on an airport in Berlin. The 22-year-old man committed suicide in prison shortly after his arrest.
People urged to stay away
A government spokesman said Chancellor Angela Merkel was briefed on the situation by de Maizière and Berlin’s mayor. Police said there were no indications of further dangerous situations in the area but urged people to stay away from the scene.
“I’m deeply shaken about the horrible news of what occurred at the memorial church in Berlin,” Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said.
The truck veered into the market around 8pm, normally a crowded time when adults and children would be gathering in the traditional cluster of wooden huts that sell food and Christmas goods in an annual celebration replicated across Germany and much of Central Europe.
Berlin police assume truck was deliberately driven into Christmas market. Latest updates on our LIVE blog: https://t.co/uqCf9EkoZs pic.twitter.com/BnAE2gZ4W3 — Reuters Top News (@Reuters) December 20, 2016
Ariel Zurawski, whose Polish freight company owns the truck, said the driver of the truck did not work for him.
“It wasn’t my driver,” Zurawski told Polish private broadcaster TVN 24. “I vouch for him. He’s my cousin.”
The incident took place near a famous Berlin landmark, the Gedächtniskirche or memorial church, built in 1891-95, which was left a ruin with a jagged tower after it was damaged in World War Two bombing raids as a monument to peace and reconciliation.
Police cars and ambulances converged quickly on the scene.
Please help us. Stay home and do not spread rumors. Follow us here for important information. #Breitscheidplatz — PolizeiBerlinEinsatz (@PolizeiBerlin_E) December 19, 2016 | 4,877 |
Stefania LaVie Owen has joined Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Amy Adams, and Bill Pullman in Annapura’s Dick Cheney bioic, titled Backseat, written and directed by Adam McKay. The pic chronicles Cheney’s rise to becoming the most powerful Vice President in history. Shooting starts next month. Plan B’s Brad Pitt and Dede Garner are also producing alongside McKay, Will Ferrell and Kevin Messick under their Gary Sanchez Productions banner. Currently, Owen appears in the Hulu series Chance, which will return for a second season in the fall. Repped by Paradigm, McKeon/Myones Entertainment as well as Johnson and Laird Management in New Zealand, Owen’s other credits include Lovely Bones, Carrie Diaries, Krampus, and recently co-starred in Katie Holmes’ directorial debut film All We Had.
REX/Shutterstock
1st Born, a joint U.S./Iranian co-production, has added Prison Break‘s Robert Knepper and The Promise actor Armin Amiri to the Ali Atshani-directed comedy. The duo joins previously announced cast Val Kilmer, William Baldwin and Jay Abdo in the film about a young newlywed couple, Iranian born Ben and American Kate, whose pregnancy complications forces the extended family to put their differences aside and find common ground to come together for the sake of Ben and Kate and their first child. Sam Khoze, Tarek Zohdy and Medhi Alimirzayi penned the screenplay. LA Independent Film and Entertainment is producing with Khoze and Edwin Avaness. Knepper is repped by Innovative and LINK, while Amiri is with Ellis Talent Group, Camilla Storey Management, and Headline Talent Agency.
Courtesy of Impact Artists Group.
Teen Wolf actor Tom Choi is set for Blumhouse’s latest horror thriller Truth Or Dare, directed by Jeff Wadlow. The film stars Lucy Hale as a college student who is conned into playing a supernatural version of Truth or Dare. The game doesn’t stop and follows her and her friends back home. Tyler Posey, Violett Beane, Nolan Gerard Funk, Hayden Szeto, Sophia Taylor and Aurora Perrineau co-star. Wadlow co-wrote the script with Chris Roach and Jillian Jacobs from a story by Michael Reisz. Producers are Jason Blum, Wadlow, and Roach. Up next, Choi appears in WB’s Geostorm with Gerard Butler and Beautiful Boy starring Steve Carell. He’s repped by TalentWorks and Impact Artists Group. | 4,878 |
Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah says the crises in Middle East and North Africa serve the interests of the Israeli regime.
Nasrallah made the remarks in a speech on the occasion of the International Quds Day, which falls on the last Friday of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.
He noted that the commemoration of the International Quds Day is spreading across the world, saying more countries are observing the event since it was announced by the late founder of the Islamic Republic, Imam Khomeini.
Nasrallah said the main goal of the latest developments and wars in the region was to make regional countries accept Tel Aviv’s conditions. He added that the Israeli regime was taking advantage of the status quo in the region to marginalize the issue of Palestine.
'Takfiri terrorists were born to topple Syrian government'
Also in his remarks, he said the Takfiri terrorist groups of Daesh and al-Nusra Front were formed by the United States and other countries to topple Syria’s government, which he described as an obstacle to any compromise that aimed to bring down the issue of Palestine.
He added that Daesh was sent to Iraq after the Baghdad government expressed unwavering support for resistance groups.
He said the Saudi war on Yemen was launched because Yemenis stood by the Palestinian people. Nasrallah added that the regime in Riyadh launched the war as there were movements in Yemen against Israel.
The Hezbollah secretary general praised Iran’s role as the main supporter of Palestine and resistance groups. He said Saudi Arabia was trying to isolate Iran in the region and take the war into Iran’s territory. He, however, said Riyadh was too weak and scared to launch such a war against Iran.
Nasrallah said Iran’s power and influence on regional issues were increasing.
He said Iran’s presence in Syria would be bolder, referring to its recent missile attack against Daesh targets in eastern Syria that killed many terrorists and destroyed their positions.
Nasrallah said Syria was steadfast in the axis of resistance.
'Israel in no position to launch a new war'
Nasrallah also stated that Israel was participating in the war on Yemen, adding that its air force had conducted airstrikes on the impoverished country.
He said the Israeli regime sought to achieve its goal by launching proxy wars in the region.
The Hezbollah chief said Israel avoids a war on Lebanon or the Gaza Strip as it knows it will be expensive.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Nasrallah said the regimes that conspire against the resistance axis must know that they will fail to achieve anything. | 4,879 |
Tube network to fight grime with industrial vacuum cleaners and magnetic wands after discovery of threatening bacteria
This article is more than 3 years old
This article is more than 3 years old
Industrial vacuum cleaners and magnetic wands will be used in a bid to rid the tube network of eight of the most dangerous superbugs.
Cleaning of the London Underground will be stepped up each night over the summer to remove metal particles, dust, oil and grease from about 50 stations and five tunnels.
An investigation published last month by London Metropolitan University and taxi insurers Staveley Head found 121 types of bacteria and mould on public transport in the capital.
Eight of the most threatening bacteria to human health were discovered on the tube, with the Victoria line deemed the dirtiest route.
The expanded cleaning regime is one of a series of measures announced by the London mayor, Sadiq Khan, as part of a new air quality action plan.
Tests will be carried out at more than a dozen stations to monitor how dust levels change at various times and locations. Information from an improved air quality monitoring programme will be published on the Transport for London (TfL) website.
London mayor issues emergency air quality alert amid heatwave Read more
Khan said: “Tube staff and the millions of passengers who use the underground regularly deserve to breathe the cleanest air possible. TfL’s new underground air quality programme will help ensure dust and particles are kept to an absolute minimum.
“But I want to leave no stone unturned and I’ve also asked for an updated scientific analysis of pollution on the tube so we can fully assess the air quality levels and take appropriate measures to ensure that the air is clean.”
The combination of friction from tube trains running along rails, air ventilation and skin particles from passengers all contribute to dust on the network.
A TfL-funded study in 2004 found the dust did not pose a health risk but Khan has asked TfL to commission an updated review.
Advice will be sought from the Department of Health’s independent expert committee on the medical effects of air pollutants.
London Underground’s managing director, Mark Wild, said: “We have been monitoring dust levels on the tube for many years and, through a wide range of measures, have ensured that particle levels are well within Health and Safety Executive guidelines.
“But as scientific understanding of the effects of particles develops, we are ensuring that we’re both using the very latest research and that we’re doing everything possible to keep the air underground clean for our customers and staff.” | 4,880 |
Well this has crept up on us quickly this year! It’s time to vote for the VMworld Sessions that will be part of the US and Europe VMworld’s held later in the year. The Session Voting is more Session liking as you have the ability to mark multiple sessions as ones that you would like to see. Apparently there are 1900 odd sessions, however the voting site lists 1500 that where submitted and are listed in the Online Catalog.
EDIT
David Hill, VMware
Anthony Spiteri, Veeam
Service Providers globally are enthusiastically embracing hybrid cloud as both a way of reducing costs and improving the quality of service they provide to end customers. To achieve this, Service Providers are looking to VMware vCloud Air Network and Veeam to help them build a scalable cost effect cloud solution. In this session we will get into the details of the technology. We’ll focus on how these solutions are architected and what that implies in real-life implementations. A participant in this session will leave with a technical understanding of how to leverage technology to provide a successful cloud based storage service.
Session Type: Breakout Session Track : Integrate Public Clouds Integrate Public Clouds Subtrack: Leverage Hybrid Clouds Market Segment: No Specific Segment Session Audience: IT – All, IT – Operations, Technical Support Product and Topics: vCloud Technical Level: Technical – Advanced Event Submitted For: Both
]: I totally forgot that David Hill submitted a joint session
Having gone through the session catalog it’s pleasing to see the number of cloud and service provider content feature prominently again. NSX, vSAN and vCloud Director all have a number of decent sessions. Click below on the links to view the related sessions.
I was surprised with the number of sessions submitted for NSX-T, but there is obviously a lot of interest in the hypervisor agnostic NSX…along side the huge number of NSX-v sessions listed. AWS is mentioned in 51 sessions showing you another change of direction at VMworld and there is a decent amount of automation and container based sessions. It will be interesting to see what the final cut is and how those numbers look when the offical catalog becomes available.
As per the VMworld Session Voting FAQ Session Voting is open March 28 to April 16…which is a lot earlier than last years May 12 to May 26 voting period. So it’s not just me that thinks this has come around sooner than previous years.
VMworld 2017 registration goes live on April 4!
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A federal judge late Tuesday refused to let Justice Department lawyers withdraw from a dispute over the citizenship question on the 2020 census form, in a case that continues after the Supreme Court's ruling in late June.
Eleven lawyers from the DOJ asked Judge Jesse Furman of the U.S. district court for the Southern District of New York on Monday for permission to step down from representing the government in the dispute. Attorney General William Barr has said that given the department's decision to press ahead on the issue, "I can understand if they're not interested in participating in this phase."
DOJ officials said privately that Barr acted before the lawyers could officially object to further work on the matter.
But Furman said that before lawyers can get off a case, court rules require them to explain why they wish to withdraw and that the DOJ request was "patently deficient." That's especially true, he said, given that legal briefs are due in a few days on whether the judge should issue an order preventing any action by the government to put the question on the form.
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The case has been litigated on the premise, at the government's insistence, that a speedy resolution "is a matter of great private and public importance," Furman said.
His order allowed the government lawyers to resubmit their request to withdraw, provided that they offer satisfactory reasons and agree to make themselves available if needed at any future hearings.
The judge allowed two of the 11 lawyers to withdraw. One has left the DOJ, the other is no longer in the Civil Division, which handles lawsuits of this type.
The American Civil Liberties Union, which has been fighting to keep the question off the form, praised the judge’s order. "The Justice Department owes the public and the courts an explanation for its unprecedented substitution of the entire legal team that has been working on this case. The Trump administration is acting like it has something to hide, and we won’t rest until we know the truth,” Dale Ho, director of the group’s Voting Rights Project, said.
The Trump administration continues to print the census forms without the citizenship question. But both President Donald Trump and Barr have said that an announcement is coming in the next few days of how the administration intends to try a new approach to have the question be part of the census process.
Tuesday night, the president addressed the judge's decision on Twitter, writing: "So now the Obama appointed judge on the Census case (Are you a Citizen of the United States?) won’t let the Justice Department use the lawyers that it wants to use. Could this be a first?" | 4,882 |
Jim Crow-esque or antebellum era types of whiteness. This is what is going on. Some of you are conscious of it while some of you are engaging in it unconsciously. (I’d gander most are unconsciously doing it). A majority of you continue to be a fake bystander in this – – not because you don’t know what to do… but because you un/consciously know that if you actually do something to dismantle systemic racism you will lose the privileges, resources, power, etc afforded to you as part of the [neoliberal], “but I’m not racist like Trump” [whiteness] club.
P.S. It’s amazing that the majority of people are white who say they will leave the USA if Trump wins; white people who don’t even talk about how being an “ex-patriot” is a white racial privilege when sh*t hits the fan. When you tell me that you have plans to move to a European country, this blows my mind. A lot of non-white ‘we’ don’t have this privilege and a lot of us would opt to stay and fight. I know there are non-white people who have plans to leave too, but there are far more white people saying this than non-white folk in my life.
About Dr. A. Breeze Harper Dr. Harper’s most recently published book,Scars: A Black Lesbian Experience in Rural White New England (Sense Publishers 2014)interrogates how systems of oppression and power impact the life of the only Black teenager living in an all white and working class rural New England town. Dr. Harper has been invited to deliver many keynote addresses and lectures at universities and conferences throughout North America. In 2015, her lecture circuit focused on the analysis of food and whiteness in her bookScars and on “Gs Up Hoes Down:” Black Masculinity, Veganism, and Ethical Consumption (The Remix)which explored how key Black vegan men us hip-hop methods to create “race-conscious” and decolonizing approaches to vegan philosophies. Her latest book project is Recipes for Racial Tension Headaches: A Critical Race Feminist’s Journey Through the ‘Post-Racial’ Ethical Foodscape (2017). BECOME A MONTHLY DONOR. THE SISTAH VEGAN PROJECT ALREADY HAS SEVERAL THOUSAND FOLLOWERS. JUST IMAGINE WHAT COULD BE ACCOMPLISHED IF HALF OR MORE FOLLOWERS PLEDGED $5-$15 PER MONTH. | 4,883 |
ing Newman for going into business with a felon – she and her husband briefly partnered with an ex-con in a restaurant venture before disengaging months later.
But one of its attacks may end up backfiring on Lipinski. The group sent a mailer contrasting Newman to President Obama, saying he was “known for leading” while she was “known for misleading.” That incensed some of Obama’s top deputies, who were quick to point out that Lipinski not only voted against Obamacare, he publicly refused to endorse Obama in his 2012 reelection campaign. Former top Obama adviser David Axelrod lit into him on Twitter, then held a press conference with former advisers to attack Lipinski as a hypocrite.
In fact, Lipinski was one of the few Democrats who voted against the Affordable Care Act, which makes the Obama mailer even more galling. — David Axelrod (@davidaxelrod) March 14, 2018
He also got a last-minute boost from the anti-abortion Susan B. Anthony List, which is spending a small amount and sending canvassers to knock on 17,000 doors to turn out the district’s pro-life (largely Catholic) voters.
“Dan Lipinski is one of the few remaining pro-life Democrats in Congress, and he has shown extraordinary courage,” SBA List President Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a Thursday statement. “He stood firm against Obamacare’s expansion of taxpayer-funded abortion under intense pressure from party leaders to give in. Now Lipinski is under attack for his pro-life convictions again, with a primary challenger backed by the radical abortion lobby. That’s why SBA List is going all in for Lipinski.”
Lipinski’s campaign didn’t respond to multiple calls and emails to discuss the race.
Lipinski’s side has had the edge in recent spending and, though the SEIU is all-in for Newman with its ground game, his field operation has proven formidable in the past.
“It’s going to be tough, but I think he’s going to win,” said one Lipinski ally who’s helped on the race.
But others aren’t so sure, arguing her message has been a much more potent one in the current political climate.
“Her messaging on choice and gay rights is a lot stronger than his attacks on her business and working with felons,” said the Chicago-based Democratic strategist. “It’s looking like a coin flip here.” | 4,884 |
OnePlus is in a spending mood as it gears up to debut its OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro on May 14. Sure, talk might be cheap: executives and online media have been doing a lot of it about the Pro's unique display in recent days. But the company may have put forth its largest advertising commitment yet in telling the world that the OnePlus 7 Pro will not have a notch in its display.
@david_nyc on Twitter posted what would turn out to be the inside spread for OnePlus's ad in The New York Times. But instead of teasing the features that the OnePlus 7 Pro will have, the company is talking instead about what it won't have. For mobile display aficionados, the good news is that the phone won't have a notch or bezel.
Yes Virginia, if it's in The New York Times, it's got to be true. Welcome to the world, One Plus! pic.twitter.com/leKjS801dN — David_NYC (@david_nyc) April 29, 2019
The seemingly random promise of "No random music" could be an old jab at Apple, which loaded free copies of U2's album "Songs of Innocence" to every iTunes customer while launching the iPhone 6 back in September of 2014.
OnePlus also promoted its top-ranking position as a smartphone brand on PCMag's readers' choice awards for overall satisfaction.
The company's U.S. division later tweeted the outside spread for its ad.
https://twitter.com/OnePlus_USA/status/1122894093070237703
OnePlus has seemingly placed abstract blueprints detailing the physical layers of its upcoming phone including the three rear cameras, a metallic cooling apparatus, and a pop-up selfie camera — at least, so the leaks and speculation go.
Some accuse OnePlus, based on these speculative claims, of jumping the shark with said bells and whistles. Other commenters have been ribbing the manufacturer on its decisions to produce phones with no wireless charging and no headphone jacks.
Whether the feedback generated turns out positive or negative, we can make one conclusion from this exercise in marketing: it is expensive. The Times's rate card for technology clients shows that a full-page ad for nationwide distribution costs $179,029, with international distribution another $75,029. Keep in mind that pricing may be tweaked for placement, color specifications, and bulk orders — from what we can tell, OnePlus has bought a total of four pages.
Will OnePlus get an ad's worth of returns in buzz? That may depend on how well the OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro will sell. | 4,885 |
The founder of Huawei Technologies Ren Zhengfei said he is ready to share the company’s 5G technology with potential Western buyers. According to Ren, this would help level the playing field in global telecommunications.
In an interview with the Economist, he said that Huawei is willing to give buyers perpetual access to the company’s existing 5G patents, licenses, code, technical blueprints, and production know-how for a one-time fee.
According to Ren, the acquirer will be allowed to modify the source code which means that neither Huawei nor the Chinese government would even have hypothetical control of any telecoms infrastructure built using equipment produced by the new company.
Also on rt.com China slams Washington for ‘abusing concept of national security’ in crusade against Huawei
Huawei will likewise be free to develop its technology in whichever direction it pleases.The telecom giant aims to create a 5G rival that could compete with it (Huawei would keep its existing contracts and continue to sell its own 5G kit), the firm’s CEO explained.
That could help level the playing field at a time when the West is alarmed at the prospect of a Chinese company supplying the gear for most of the world’s new mobile-phone networks, said Ren. “A balanced distribution of interests is conducive to Huawei’s survival.”
The company is currently caught in the crossfire of the US-China trade war. In May, the US placed Huawei on its so-called “Entity List,” effectively barring American companies from doing business with the Chinese tech giant.
Washington explained the blacklisting of Huawei by accusing the Chinese firm of being a threat to its national security and foreign policy interests as it presumably operates under the rule of the Communist Party of China. Huawei has repeatedly denied this allegation.
Also on rt.com Huawei in talks to use Russia’s Aurora operating system for census
Complying with the trade blacklisting, Google decided to suspend some business activity with Huawei. According to Ren, Google has been lobbying the Trump administration to allow it to resume supplying Huawei.
Washington’s restrictions were later eased; 90-day licenses were granted to allow companies to continue working with Huawei, and further permission was given by US President Donald Trump to sell some equipment.
Despite the challenges, the Shenzhen-based company reported that its global share of telecoms equipment expanded to 28.1 percent in the first half of this year. It also remains ahead in the 5G market having announced 50 commercial 5G mobile network deals.
For more stories on economy & finance visit RT's business section | 4,886 |
with averages during the Harper government years.
The government is also shifting its burden of government-assisted refugees (GARS): Over the past year, 18,400 Syrians were subsidized by the federal government; next year the target is 7,500.
So while Canada has made a reputation internationally for its generous plan, there will be far fewer spots next year.
Noura is going to school for the first time. At École L'Envolée in Windsor, she found friends and is learning French. Within a few years, Noura will be trilingual: fluent in French, English and Arabic. (Susan Ormiston/CBC)
The Tonbaris know they were fortunate getting in on the first wave. Unquestionably, their lives have changed dramatically: Their oldest daughter and son — Noura, 7, and Bilal, 6 — are in school for the first time and learning French at École L'Envolée in Windsor.
"What a difference between January and June," said Michelle Lalonde, their kindergarten teacher last year.
"They had Arabic. They knew maybe one or two words in English — that was it," she said. "Now you see them relaxed. They understand us in French. This has become home."
War continues back home
At Beirut airport in November 2015, Aida Tonbari cuddles the grandson she may not see again for a very long time, if ever. She and her husband were left behind in war-torn Syria when her son and his family fled to Canada. (Susan Ormiston/CBC ) But for the parents there are no easy adjustments, not when your home country is still at war.
Zainab is pregnant with her fifth child and still taking care of the two youngest: Hilal, 18 months, and Houda, 3. She says that first winter in Windsor was "dark" and she felt low. Now, as she collects two of her kids from the school bus stop, she reflects on how happy she is that they are learning.
"Back there in Lebanon, I used to watch other kids going to school. I was so sad that mine were not," she said.
But the painful, still-hidden wound for Zainab is her family, still in Damascus.
"My mom is happy for me because my life is better here than back home, but she wants to see me," Zainab says as she begins to cry.
"I'm scared I'll never be able to go back there to see her."
WATCH: Susan Ormiston's documentary on the Tonbari family: | 4,887 |
A deadly virus that is spreading at record speed through Saudi Arabia could go global later this year when the 2014 haj (Muslim pilgrimage) begins, according to an article published by BuzzFeed.
The total number of confirmed infections of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) has jumped by a third in the kingdom in the past week. Ten new MERS cases are now being reported every day.
King Abdullah replaced the health minister, Abdullah al-Rabeeah, on Monday amid growing public disquiet at the spread of the disease, which was discovered two years ago and kills around a third of sufferers.
Rabeeah said on Sunday he did not know why there had been a surge but said it might be part of a seasonal pattern since there had also been a rise in infections last April and May.
Health care experts are accusing Saudi Arabia of obscuring information about the outbreak. “We need the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirate’s health authorities to take the stage and help us understand what’s going on,” said Ian MacKay, an associate professor at the Australia Infectious Diseases Research Centre at The University of Queensland. “In 2014 so far we’ve had more cases than in all of 2013.”
A statement released by the World Health Organization confirmed that they were not receiving timely data on the spread of MERS, as they did not have the latest infection count. On their website they advise, ” WHO encourages all Member States to continue their surveillance for severe acute respiratory infections (SARI) and to carefully review any unusual patterns.”
MERS has no vaccine or anti-viral treatment, but international and Saudi health authorities say the disease, which originated in camels, does not transmit easily between people and may simply die out.
Saudi Arabia is expected to have a large influx of pilgrims from across the world in July during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, followed in early October by the arrival of millions of people to perform the annual Haj in Mecca and Medina.
“It took us over a year to get the first hundred cases of this viral infection,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, in an interview with NPR earlier thjis week. “Now in just the last two weeks, we’ve had a hundred cases. … There’s a major change occurring that cannot just be attributed to better case detection. Something’s happening.”
Yemen, Malaysia, the Philippines and Greece also reported their first cases last week, all linked to travelers from the Gulf.
| 4,888 |
hes and pains to be statin side effects [22].
Adverse effects of statins are extensive, well-characterized and have been described in numerous reviews, at descriptive and mechanistic levels [25–30]. With regard to the issue of statin adherence, adverse effects may be considered to be of two categories. The first is an adverse effect which is perceived by the patient, and is a contributor to why statin adherence is so low. These perceived adverse effects include a high incidence of muscle pain [31–37], fatigue [38, 39], especially with exertion and exercise [40], idiopathic inflammatory myositis [41, 42], autoimmune myopathy [43–46], psychiatric and cognitive symptoms (depression, confusion, aggression, memory loss [47–55]), severe irritability [56], sleep disturbances [52], musculoskeletal disorders and injuries [57, 58], sudden sensorineural hearing loss [59] and gastrointestinal distress [60]. The second category includes later developing morbidities that may not be perceived by the users as a side effect, but are linked to statin treatment: Type-2 diabetes [27, 61–64], particularly in women [65–67], cancer [68–71], liver dysfunction and failure [72, 73], cataracts [74, 75], amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), ALS-like conditions and other central motor disorders, e.g., Parkinson’s disease and cerebellar ataxia [76–80], lupus-like syndrome [81], susceptibility to herpes zoster [82–84], interstitial cystitis [85], polymyalgia rheumatic [86], kidney injury [87, 88] and renal failure [89].
To understand why statin adherence is so low, clinicians and patients need to be provided with a comprehensive and unbiased assessment of the magnitude of the benefits of statin treatment, balanced against evidence of very real, adverse effects. It is in this context that we quote Redberg and Katz [8], who reviewed the issue of statin safety, effectiveness and adherence by concluding: “It is incumbent on clinicians to be sure that before recommending that a patient take a daily pill that has multiple adverse effects, there is evidence that the medication will lead to a better quality of life, longer life, or both. Such evidence is lacking for statins in primary prevention.”
In summary, we have integrated the literature on statin benefits versus harms, with the views of respected key opinion leaders, to conclude that non-adherence to statin treatment for primary prevention of CVD is justified because the meager benefits are more than offset by the extensive harms. | 4,889 |
Image copyright Getty Images
A group of MPs is calling for an independent fuel price watchdog - to be called Pumpwatch - to monitor the cost of petrol and diesel.
Petrol stations that charge fair prices would be entitled to display a "kitemark" logo.
The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Fair Fuel is accusing the industry of increasing its profit margins at the expense of motorists.
But petrol retailers said the idea of a watchdog was "pretty impracticable".
The plan to set up Pumpwatch follows a petition organised by pressure group FairFuel UK. It has collected 14,000 signatures since the week before Christmas.
The MPs said that petrol retailers made an average profit of 8p a litre in the first nine months of 2018, but this had increased to more than 13p a litre by the end of the year.
The margin on diesel prices had risen from 8.6p a litre to 11p a litre, they said.
The average price of unleaded petrol is currently 120.92p a litre, according to Catalyst Experian, with 65% of the price accounted for by fuel duty and VAT.
High prices
"Drivers need reassurance that they are not paying way over the odds for fuel," said Kirstene Hair, the chair of the APPG.
"In rural communities where public transport is poor and unreliable, people need their vehicles to get from A to B. It is essential that they pay the fairest price. That is where a price monitoring system would support them."
Fuel price campaigners argue that, even though pump prices have fallen over the last six months, they have not fallen as fast as wholesale costs. In other words, they remain too high.
But the industry firmly rejected the plan for a price watchdog.
"While it is possibly a well-meaning idea, it would be pretty impracticable," said Brian Madderson, chairman of the Petrol Retailers Association.
"Who is going to check prices at 8,500 forecourts? And if you have a kitemark, what's going to be the acceptable margin?"
He said that low-volume petrol stations in rural areas needed a much higher profit margin than high-volume outlets.
"If people don't like high prices, they can go to a cheaper forecourt," he added.
The RAC agreed that retailers had been increasing their profitability.
"Retailers have been taking greater margins than they would normally do, and that's caused prices to be higher than they should be," said Simon Williams, the RAC's fuel spokesman. | 4,890 |
💗TUMOR REMOVAL FOR EMOTIONAL SUPPORT ANIMAL💗
It has been awhile since I have had to do this but I’m in need of some mutual aid and financial support.
My names Riva, I am a queer, non-binary indigenous person from Minneapolis and I have two emotional support dogs, Florence & Zuko, who make up my family. A couple weeks ago i found a lump on my dog Florence, underneath her tail. I took her to urgent care the next morning to get it checked out and since than we have been in and out of the vet for testing and physical exams.
The tumor is what is called a mass cell tumor and can be pretty aggressive. Good news is that a lot of the time these can be removed and that’s the end of it, not so good news is that because it is so close to Florence’s anus and rectum area we need to go to a board specialist surgeon. Fortunately our Vet clinic, which has low income options, does have a specialist who can perform the surgery but it still is not cheap.
The next step is to see the radiologist for ultrasound testing and sampling to make sure the tumor hasn’t spread to Florence’s organs yet. These results could determine what treatment options we take next, wether that is surgery to remove the mass and hopefully be done with it or seek radiation and chemotherapy or just measures to make Florence as comfortable as possible. I already have this ultrasound appointment scheduled for this coming Thursday October 1st but haven’t come up with all the funds for the appointment which is $664.97.
The most likely scenario is that Florence will need the lump removed as soon as possible so our vet clinic has priced this out for us as well and the total estimate is $2,785.06.
Florence and I have been through so much together, iv had her for eight years since she was a tiny puppy and I can’t imagine life without her (I know you have to say goodbye are some point) but besides this lump Florence is in excellent health, she is full of energy and life and is constantly playing with my other dog. I believe if we get through this we can have many more healthy years together.
Any help and reblogs would be greatly appreciated!!!!!
Venmo@rivairene13
https://www.paypal.me/rivairene13
If you don’t have Venmo or PayPal but would like to donate please message me and we can figure something out!
Chi-Miigwetch | 4,891 |
India outrage spreads over rape of eight-year-old girl Published duration 13 April 2018
image copyright EPA image caption People are angry over the brutal rape and murder of Asifa Bano
The brutal gang rape and murder of an eight-year old girl has sparked outrage and anger across India.
The body of Asifa Bano, who belonged to a Muslim nomadic tribe, was found in a forest on 17 January near Kathua city of Indian-administered Kashmir.
The story made headlines this week when Hindu right-wing groups protested over the arrest of eight Hindu men.
The case has become a religious flashpoint in an already polarised Indian region.
The men the police have arrested include a retired government official, four police officers and a minor - all of them belong to a local Hindu community that has been involved in a land dispute with the Muslim nomads.
Anger not only over the grisly murder but also the support for the accused quickly gathered momentum on Twitter with the hashtags #Kathua and #justiceforAsifa trending since Thursday.
Some people on Twitter have also compared Asifa's death with the brutal gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old woman in Delhi, which led to huge protests and changes in India's rape laws.
The crime took place in one of India's most restive regions. Since 1989, there has been an armed revolt in the Muslim-majority Kashmir valley against Indian rule - they valley is adjacent to Hindu-majority Jammu.
Asifa's family belongs to a community of Muslim nomadic shepherds who crisscross the Himalayas with their livestock. In the winter, they often travel from the valley to Jammu, where they use public forest land for grazing - this has recently brought them into conflict with some Hindu residents in the region.
The lawyers were believed to be supporting a Hindu right-wing group that has alleged that the accused men are innocent, and have demanded that the case be transferred to India's federal police.
Protests to continue
Rahul Gandhi, the chief of the main opposition Congress party, led a candlelight march in Delhi on Thursday night.
More protests have been planned to bring attention to brutal crimes against women in India.
image copyright Courtesy family of Asifa Bano image caption Asifa Bano was eight years old
The chief of Delhi Commission for Women, Swati Maliwal, has said she will be starting an indefinite fast from Friday to demand better security for women and children in the country.
Several other activists and women have also planned protests in Delhi and other parts of the country over the weekend. | 4,892 |
Power was restored to most of the University of California, Berkeley, on Tuesday as officials confirmed that the theft of copper cables from a substation caused a campus-wide outage that preceded an explosion and evacuation.
The blast occurred Monday night in an underground utility vault outside a building that houses the chancellor's office. It came as crews were trying to get the electrical system back up following an outage that darkened the campus for several hours.
Investigators have since traced the loss of power to a secluded access point away from the main campus that was damaged last week when someone tried to remove copper grounding cables, UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof said.
“In the course of trying to yank copper wire out of our grid, they caused damage, and yesterday's power outage was a direct result of that damage done,” Mogulof said. “The explosion, however, it's not clear if that was a direct or indirect consequence of the damage.”
A female student was treated at a hospital for minor burns, and three other people who were burned refused medical treatment.
Officials were relieved that the blast, which produced flames and a cloud of smoke at least two stories high and as wide as a two-lane street, did not injure more people, Mogulof said.
Eleven buildings, including the main library, athletic facilities adjoining the campus soccer and track stadium, and the arena used by the basketball and gymnastics teams remained without power.
More than 100 classes normally held in three of the affected buildings were canceled.
Public buildings and construction sites across the nation have been hit by copper thieves as the price of the metal has soared in recent years, Mogulof said it was apparently the first time UC Berkeley had been a target.
Officials became aware of the copper theft last week and thought the damage had been repaired on Sunday, Mogulof said. He refused to pinpoint the location, other than to say it was not visible from a road or walkway.
“It appears this was a sophisticated individual or individuals who knew what they are doing,” he said. “It's not easy to pull out this type of copper wire, and they had something capable of pulling on cable so hard it flattened the cable.”
During Monday's power outage, fire crews had to free about 20 people stuck in dormitory elevators. Students were able to sleep in the dorms, which have back-up generators.Bay Area NewsExplosionUniversity of California Berkeley
If you find our journalism valuable and relevant, please consider joining our Examiner membership program.
Find out more at www.sfexaminer.com/join/ | 4,893 |
IBM SPSS 26.0 Crack With [Patch + Torrent] Latest
IBM SPSS 26– is a great and all in one software for business consumers everywhere. However, the service offers a range of analytical tools to grow up your business. This software is much helpful for your business. In addition, you easily trace the frauded of your business and cheat your business. So, many Big fishes use this software for own stable business.
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First, you go for Cracked bellow Unzip this file and run Also, after that click Generate License Key Copy it and paste it So, Done Enjoy full Version | 4,894 |
BEIJING, China — A U.S. Marine is being detained in China for what officials called a “literal breach of Chinese sovereignty” after he allegedly infiltrated the country through the use of a sophisticated tunnel system, Duffel Blog has learned.
Private First Class Bobby Sherman, 19, of Danville, Kentucky, is currently under investigation by Chinese authorities for alleged espionage and illegal entry into the communist state. The Marine has denied the allegations.
Sources confirmed Sherman, assigned to H&S 2/7 in Twentynine Palms, California, unwittingly embarked on his first journey outside of the continental United States while tasked with digging a defensive fighting position, or “slit trench.” Sherman’s buddies reported that the laborious assignment was for “no good reason at all, just because Staff Sergeant said to.”
“Alls I know is that Staff Sar’nt said, ‘You dig me a goshdarn slit trench, you hear? Don’t ask why, just dig until I get tired,’ so I just got adiggin’,” said a confused Sherman from his 3x3x3 foot confinement cell. “Next thing I know, Jackie Chan is roundhouse kickin’ me into the backseat of a cop car.”
Sherman tunneled through nearly 8,000 miles of the Earth’s crust, mantle and core, and then again, to emerge in the Chinese county of Yanqing, just outside of Beijing. Chinese officials remain perplexed at how one American could traverse so great a distance in such secrecy.
“Clearly, this Sherman agent was using some type of wormhole to invade the People’s Republic of China,” said state official Xi Ti Pun. Gesturing towards Sherman’s entrenching tool, he continued, “This technology is a grave threat to our national security. We will not rest until we have reverse-engineered it and can mass produce a grossly inferior, lead-based replica at a fraction of the cost with five times as many health risks.”
“Also, the term ‘slit trench’ is extremely racist,” he added.
Sherman suffered minor scrapes and bruises and was considerably dehydrated from his arduous ordeal, but he remains in high spirits with the hope that the U.S. government will come to his aid.
“I mean, if they brought Bergdahl back, they’ll definitely bring me back,” Sherman declared with shaky confidence. “Right? Right?” | 4,895 |
, the elite class remains immune to the law enforcement operation, enabling its members to be enlisted in the services of the state that grants them their riches. Apologia from them has ranged from dressing up fighting drugs and fighting crime as a patriotic duty commanded by the prime minister, to stoking nationalism, and diverting attention to the perceived problems or inefficiencies of other countries, especially any whose diplomats have been critical of Bangladesh. Other diversionary tactics include labelling critics as foreigners who are not aware of the reality on the ground. Furthermore, the elites make statements tacitly accepting authoritarianism, which masks their complicity and culpability in the problem by virtue of their continued refusal to hold power to account.
The government’s assertions about not sparing drug lords ring hollow when noted kingpins – such as Awami League MP Abdur Rahman Bodi, convicted on corruption charges related to illegal wealth in the past – are exonerated and allowed safe passage abroad.
Therein lies the real heart of the issue: The drug trade is impossible without the active participation of members of the ruling party and the very law enforcement agencies entrusted with rooting it out. However, these people will escape justice, thereby leaving the upper tiers of the drug network intact and the drug problem prevalent. Instead, people caught in the crosshairs of the government, Rapid Action Battalion and Directorate General of Forces Intelligence, such as Akramul Haque, will be murdered. The Rapid Action Battalion has said that they killed Haque in a gunfight on May 27 but his family has alleged that his was an extrajudicial killing and released audio clips as evidence of their claim.
Activists, press intimidated
When a handful of citizens dare to raise their voices in protest, the Rapid Action Battalion will be deployed, as it was in Dhaka on June 6, when members of the paramilitary force picked up activists protesting against the anti-narcotics drive.
When the media deviates from the state narrative and reports evidence of wrongdoing by the Rapid Action Battalion and Directorate General of Forces Intelligence, there are repercussions. For instance, on June 2, the website of The Daily Star newspaper was blocked in Bangladesh after it released the audio clips that implicated the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence and the Rapid Action Battalion in Haque’s murder.
the precedent of Thailand’s failed war on drugs, which eventually led to military rule in that country, signals a grim future for Bangladesh. A regime becomes more authoritarian as its foundations weaken. The corollary of this is that regime change only becomes possible by military might, which would plunge the citizens of Bangladesh into further crisis. The nation is being put on that road paved with violence and terror, perhaps irreversibly. | 4,896 |
Members of the Vancouver park board caved to months of vocal opposition and a citizen-backed lawsuit when they directed staff on Monday to give up on plans for a $2.2 million bike path through Hadden and Kitsilano Beach parks.
Rather than pursue a new, separated path, park board staff were told to look at ways to improve safety on the existing route through the parks, said Niki Sharma, the head of the park board, in a news release issued Monday evening.
“We’ve heard clearly from the public that there is significant concern with any proposed changes to Hadden Park,” said Sharma in a written statement. “Tonight, the Park Board gave direction to staff to discontinue proceeding with any options for a new path through (the park).”
The surprise announcement comes after park board consented to a B.C. Supreme Court injunction application in November that prevented it from breaking ground on part of the path until the case could be heard. In its entirety, the path was slated to run from the Vancouver Maritime Museum through to the other side of Kitsilano Pool.
Olympian Howard Kelsey, a member of a coalition to prevent the path, called Monday’s decision “a very pleasant surprise.”
He applauded the efforts of Megan Carvell Davis, who had brought the Supreme Court application, and also members of park board for finding “an amicable solution” to the dispute.
“It was an amazing galvanization of our concerned citizens,” he told The Sun, adding supporters of the effort to block the board’s plans came from across the region. “These are not just Kits Point residents that have their houses there.
These are people that care deeply and passionately about kits beach.”
NPA Commissioner Melissa De Genova said in a Monday press release it was “unfortunate that it took huge public outrage to get to this result. Kits Beach and Hadden Park are unique to Vancouver and I’m happy that we won’t be putting blacktop through our precious green space.”
Sharma said Monday the park board will maintain a commitment to improving safety and enjoyment for both cyclists and pedestrians. But that commitment no longer includes a new path that would complete the city’s Seaside Greenway route from Coal Harbour to Jericho Park.
The funds that had been earmarked for the project will be relocated to “other pedestrian and cycling safety priorities” around the city, said Sharma.
[email protected]
Twitter.com/mt_robinson | 4,897 |
SanDisk
You can now add 128 gigabytes of storage to your PC or another device via a flash drive that you never have to remove.
Launched on Monday by storage vendor SanDisk, the 128GB SanDisk Ultra Fit USB 3.0 flash drive is the world's smallest USB 3.0 flash drive, according to the company. Without its cap, the drive measures three-quarters of an inch in length, 0.63 inch in width and 0.35 inch in height, which Sandisk says makes it smaller than a dime. So you can plug it into any USB port and never have to worry about unplugging it.
SanDisk's 128GB drive solves one problem that affects notebook users who need more storage. Yes, you can connect any flash drive to your computer to add more capacity. But most flash drives are too big and long to keep connected to your notebook if you want to travel with it or stick it in a case. SanDisk's new drive is compact enough that you can keep it plugged in permanently. So you can carry around your music, photos, videos or other content that you want with you all the time without having to connect and disconnect the drive.
The company said it designed the drive for "media enthusiasts who want to expand storage of their notebook, tablet, TV, in-car audio system, gaming console and more." So you can also plug it into hard-to-reach devices, such as a gaming console, and just leave it alone. Also available in capacities of 16GB, 32GB and 64GB, the drive offers a transfer speed of up to 130 megabytes per second when connected to a USB 3.0 port.
The storage vendor also has unveiled a 256GB edition of its Ultra USB 3.0 flash drive with a $200 price tag. Though larger and longer than its Ultra Fit counterpart, the new drive offers twice the storage capacity, a first for this particular model. Also available in 16GB, 32GB, 64GB and 128GB capacities, the drive provides transfer speeds of up to 100MB per second in a USB 3.0 port.
Both drives come with SanDisk's SecureAccess, which lets you create encrypted password-protected folders for private files. You also receive a free year's subscription to RescuePro software, which attempts to restore files that have been lost or accidentally deleted.
SanDisk said that both of the new drives are available at online retailers and at stores around the world. Searching online, I couldn't find either drive listed at popular retailers, so they may not be available or at least not appearing just yet.
SanDisk did not immediately respond to CNET's request for comment. | 4,898 |
Auckland's biggest real estate firm saw sales volumes drop to a three year low in February, while the median price is now some $62,000 below that seen in December.
Barfoot & Thompson reported today that the median price last month was $738,000, down 2.9% on the figure for January - but still 7.5% ahead of February 2015.
However, the median price has now dropped 7.75% from the $800,000 seen at the end of 2015.
In addition, sales in the latest month dropped to their lowest level in any month for three years, with just 698 sold, compared with 843 for the same month a year ago - that's a 17.2% fall. The company's reporting that new listings have now surged.
The was a big disparity between the median and reported 'average' sales price, which was $822,024 in February, up 1.3% on the average price for January and up 10% on February last year.
New rules for Auckland housing investors, aimed at dampening the Auckland market, were introduced by the Reserve Bank in November.
Barfoot & Thompson managing director Peter Thompson explained the low number of sales in the month by saying that at the start of February the number of properties on the market was at its lowest number for 20 years, "and buyers had limited choice".
“However, as the month progressed more properties were listed, and we finished the month with 2060 new listings, the highest number in the past six months. There are currently an extremely high number of properties in the pipeline for settlement in March and April.
“At month end we had 3318 properties on our books, the highest since March last year, and we anticipate an extremely busy period through autumn.
“Another factor that affects the average and median sales price in the early part of the year is the summer break results in a relatively low number of sales in the $1 million plus price category. Throughout last year on average we sold 332 properties a month in the $1 million plus price category but in February the sales in this price category numbered 187.
“Sales of properties for under $500,000 in February made up 20.6% of all sales, whereas throughout last year they averaged 14.9% of sales.”
Thompson said while prices were down from their record highs, "based on past trends prices in coming months are most likely to build modestly".
“This trend has occurred over the past nine years where Auckland house prices have followed a cycle of falling in the first quarter of the year and then rising from autumn on." | 4,899 |
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