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Story highlights Some in Congress say they're planning on giving their pay to charity during shutdown
Thousands of federal workers have been furloughed and will lose pay in the shutdown
Members of Congress will still get paid, as mandated by the 27th Amendment
Some lawmakers say they will give their paychecks to the Treasury or to charity
In an extended shutdown, most of the federal workforce would go without pay, but the checks will keep coming to the 533 current members of Congress.
"That is disgraceful in my view," said freshman Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, told CNN. "Basically the only people who get paid in a shutdown are members of Congress, and that is irresponsible."
Gabbard plans to send any pay she receives during a shutdown back to the Treasury. The combat veteran said she was shocked to find out recently that members' pay is protected.
It is -- by the Constitution.
The 27th Amendment to the Constitution restricts any Congress from changing its own pay. The measure was proposed in the first days of the Republic but was not ratified until 1992, after a grass-roots movement promoted the idea and the necessary number of state legislatures approved it.
While many may have wanted to restrain Congress from increasing its pay, the amendment also blocks Congress from freezing or cutting its compensation.
The result? Congress gets paid no matter what. Gabbard is not the only member surprised.
JUST WATCHED Rep. Hoyer: GOP refusing pay is a game Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Rep. Hoyer: GOP refusing pay is a game 05:49
"I don't even know whether it stops or not," Rep. John Fleming, R-Louisiana, said when asked about his pay during a shutdown.
When told that the Constitution mandates congressional paychecks stay as-is, Fleming responded that he hadn't thought through what he would do yet but would likely donate his pay during a shutdown to charity.
"Obviously we need to share the pain of the American people," he concluded.
The offices for the top two members of Congress -- House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid -- wouldn't respond to specifics about their pay.
According to a report by the Lexington Herald-Leader newspaper , Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, plans to donate his salary to charity during the shutdown.
Rep. Pete Gallego, D-Texas, told CNN he is urging his fellow members of Congress to donate their pay to charitable causes.
"I don't think we should get paid until (the shutdown) is resolved," Rep. Pete DeSantis, R-Fla, told CNN's Jake Tapper on Tuesday. "I've asked the clerk to withhold any pay for me until we get this up and running. I just think that that's fair for the folks involved who've been negatively affected by this."
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, disagreed with DeSantis. "I think that's another game (House Republicans) want to play, appealing to a demagogic approach to this," Hoyer told Tapper on Tuesday.
"Members of Congress ought to be on the job working hard," Hoyer added, "getting this job done to the American people, getting their government opened, getting federal employees back to work and serving the public, serving the growth of our economy, serving our national security ends."
While members will get paid, they must decide which of their own office staff have to go home.
Members of Congress run their own office payroll and will decide who is essential and non essential. But even congressional staff members who work during a shutdown would not get paid until later -- only their bosses will get paid on time.
"My staffers are working with pay. Right now," Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, said Tuesday on "Crossfire."
"They're doing oversight on the federal government. ... They're continuing to work on the waste."
Coburn also said he's keeping his salary earned during the shutdown. "I'm going to keep my salary and going to make sure I spend it and tithe it and give to it charities and do the thing that I've always done. ... I'm not going to stop working."
But Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, who appeared alongside Coburn on "Crossfire" on Tuesday, is taking a different approach.
"Eighty percent of my staff, unfortunately, is on furlough," she said, "I'm going to be contributing [my salary] on a daily basis. For every day we are not seeing an open -- a government that's open, I'm contributing." |
Governor Rick Perry (R-Tex.) lashed out at President Obama Wednesday. | AP photo composite by POLITICO Perry: Obama 'hell-bent' on socialism
Texas GOP Gov. Rick Perry accused President Barack Obama on Wednesday of “punishing” Texas and being “hell-bent” on turning the United States into a socialist country.
Speaking at a luncheon for a Midland County Republican Women’s group, Perry said that “this is an administration hell-bent toward taking American towards a socialist country. And we all don’t need to be afraid to say that because that’s what it is.”
Story Continued Below
Perry praised the tea party movement to the Republican activists in attendance, crediting the grassroots groups with discouraging some Democrats in Washington from pushing for a public option in the health care bill.
“If you all think those tea parties didn’t work, then let me tell you something,” Perry said. “When they all came home in August for those town hall meetings, they got an earful. Then they went back to Washington, D.C. and the Senate voted that public option down in committee with a majority of Democrats in the Senate.”
Perry also accused the Obama administration of intentionally dumping illegal immigrants from other western states in Texas, recalling a conversation he had with local officials notifying him that illegal aliens that were caught in Nogales, Arizona were being dropped off by federal authorities in Presidio, Texas.
“Friday a week ago, I got not a phone call from Washington, not a letter from Washington and as a matter of fact, I don’t think any member of our congressional delegation was even notified. The first time we were contacted was by the superintendent of the school and the county judge of Presidio County,” Perry said.
“They said, ‘do you all know what’s fixin’ to happen?’ I said, ‘well, no. What’s going on?’ They said ‘the government has just called us and said for us to get ready for an influx of illegal aliens who were captured illegally crossing the border.’”
“It’s called the alien transfer-and-exit program,” Perry told the crowd, “trucking them from Nogales, past El Paso down to our western border in Presidio.”
The Texas governor said he sees the action as “punishing this state” and urged the assembled Republicans to “stand up” to Washington.
“I say it’s time to make tea parties twice as big as what they were,” Perry declared. “I think it’s time for us to stand up and say to Washington, D.C. that we are no longer going to accept that kind of stuff sitting down and being quiet.” |
Party wants to kickstart process so Heywood and Middleton poll can be held on day of the Clacton vote, officials say
Labour strategists are understood to be planning to stage an early byelection in a vacant Greater Manchester seat in an attempt to minimise the potential of an embarrassing threat from the UK Independence party.
Officials said the party wants to kickstart the election of a new MP in the seat of Heywood and Middleton before parliament rises on Thursday. The seat became vacant on Sunday after backbencher Jim Dobbin died aged 73. He had a majority of 6,000.
The move will be seen as evidence that Ukip are making ground in northern working class communities. Ukip's leader, Nigel Farage, has pledged to fight hard in the seat where the BNP previously won more than 3,000 votes.
Labour's preferred date for the byelection is 9 October – the same day as the Clacton byelection sparked by the resignation of the MP Douglas Carswell, who switched from the Tories to Ukip.
Party officials believe if both byelections are held on the same day, it would split Ukip's resources and stop a Ukip "bounce" in the polls.
If Labour fail to trigger a byelection by Thursday, the party may have to wait until parliament returns in October, which would mean that the election could not be held until November. Officials fear that Ukip could then experience a surge following an expected victory in Clacton.
The plan to trigger a byelection so soon after an MP's death is unusual and parties normally wait until after the funeral.
It is understood that a senior Labour figure will seek the consent of Dobbin's family before any attempt to begin the process of setting a timetable for a byelection.
Heywood and Middleton is seen as particularly volatile to issues around race and immigration. Nearby Rochdale became the centre of media attention in 2012 after a sex-trafficking gang of men of mainly Pakistani origin were found to have preyed on at least 47 girls, who were all white. Many of the victims and their families come from Heywood.
Lee Rigby, the fusilier murdered in May 2013 by two Muslim converts near Woolwich barracks in south-east London, came from Middleton, where members of his family still live.
Farage has already made clear that he is willing to campaign on the issues of child abuse and immigration.
On Sunday, he told activists in Somerset that the child sexual abuse scandal in Rotherham – where perpetrators of Pakistani origin or descent were allegedly not pursued because of fears that authorities would be perceived as racist or Islamophobic – was an example of multiculturalism leading to disaster.
A Labour spokesman declined to comment. |
Image copyright AFP
A record number of terrorist attacks were planned, foiled or carried out in European Union countries last year, with the UK reporting the highest number of attacks.
EU law enforcement agency Europol said there were 211 attacks in 2015, the highest since records began in 2006.
Of those, the UK had the highest with 103 attacks, thought mostly to have been in Northern Ireland.
More than half of arrests in the EU - 687 - were "for jihadist terrorism".
Of these arrests, 94% were later found guilty in court.
The failed, foiled and completed terrorist attacks were in six EU member states - Denmark, France, Greece, Italy, Spain and the UK.
A spokeswoman for Europol said it did not have a breakdown of the number of terror attacks that had actually been carried out in the EU.
'Worrying developments'
France had the highest number of planned, foiled or completed attacks - 72 - followed by Spain with 25.
According to the agency's EU Terrorism Situation and Trend Report, there were more than 1,000 arrests for terrorism-related offences last year - 424 of which were in France.
In addition to the jihadist terrorism arrests, there were 67 for left-wing terror, 11 right-wing terror and 168 separatist. A further 144 arrests were unspecified.
Europol said 151 people died and more than 360 were injured in terrorist incidents last year.
In its report, Europol said: "As in previous years, the attacks specifically classified as separatist terrorism accounted for the largest proportion, followed by jihadist attacks."
Europol also said the report outlines two "worrying developments".
"The overall threat is reinforced by the substantial numbers of returned foreign terrorist fighters that many member states now have on their soil, and the significant rise in nationalist (xenophobic), racist and anti-Semitic sentiments across the EU, each resulting in acts of right-wing extremism."
Potential targets
Europol said there was "no concrete evidence to date that terrorist travellers systematically use the flow of refugees to enter Europe unnoticed".
However, it noted that two of the men who carried out the Paris attacks in November, which killed 130 people, entered the EU through Greece as part of the influx of refugees from Syria.
The report said nuclear power plants and nuclear weapon facilities in the EU "remain potential targets for terrorists", as does "the deliberate contamination of water supplies".
It added: "Explosive remnants of war and illicit trafficking in explosives from former conflict areas present a significant threat to the EU.
"Chemical facilities or companies, especially these perceived as having a low profile until recently, can become a vulnerable target.
"Terrorists prefer the use of conventional firearms and explosives because of their availability, simplicity and effectiveness."
Europol also described cyber terrorism as "high potential but currently low probability". |
From Wikipreneurship
The Marcora Law - Multiplying the employees’ stakes
See also: Co-operative News article 22 Sep 15
Italy’s Marcora Law (law 49/85) allows redundant workers to use their accumulated unemployment benefit to capitalise a buyout co-operative. It thus forms part of the welfare bridge from unemployment to self-employment.
A summary of the Marcora Law’s provisions
FONCOOPER, a fund for the general promotion of co-operatives
CFI, a revolving loan fund invested in phoenix co-operatives
employees’ investment matched threefold
maximum of three years’ unemployment benefit can be capitalised
corporate investors permitted up to 25%, providing networking support
specialist monitoring and advisory body established
€40m invested
89 businesses and 3,100 jobs saved (by end 1992)
10% failure rate of co-ops
5% of capital and jobs lost through failures
The institutional set-up
The Marcora Law was passed on 27 February 1985, and provided state backing for two funds to support co-operatives. The first, FONCOOPER, is a general fund for the promotion and development of all types of cooperatives. The second, the Compagnia Finanziaria Industriale (CFI), is a special fund to help save companies in crisis. It invests only in new co-operatives set up by employees who have been laid off when companies close or downsize. CFI was capitalised by the state, and is managed on an ad hoc basis by the co-operative federations.
CFI invested in the share capital of phoenix cooperatives, up to three times what the employees invest, up to a maximum limit of three years' unemployment benefit. In return for this capital input, the employees lost their right to unemployment benefit during that period, should the cooperative fail. At the end of the period, the employees could buy the shares at face value from the fund, or they could be sold externally. The law also introduced the innovation that other outside shareholders – cooperatives, private companies or public bodies – could also contribute up to 25% of the cooperative's share capital. Up to this point, private enterprises had not been able to invest in cooperatives in this way in Italy.
Encouraging risktaking and adequate capitalisation
The effects of the Marcora Law were as follows:
It helped workers save their jobs by taking the entrepreneurial risks themselves.
It incentivised employees to contribute capital, because the amount of outside financing was directly related to the workers' own shareholdings. This was important because it created cooperatives which were adequately capitalised, and many cooperatives are undercapitalised. The average employee shareholding in cooperatives supported by CFI was €5,500, and in cases is as high as €15,000, which meant the cooperatives were strong, had a good relationship with their banks and could grow faster.
Thirdly, the link between the external capitalisation and unemployment benefit meant that there was a powerful incentive to make sure the enterprise worked; it also meant that workers were unlikely to start a co operative which was likely to fail.
About a quarter of CFI-financed cooperatives have some corporate shareholding. In some cases this is a public body or a local financial organisation, and this helps the local community get involved. In other cases, it is other cooperatives which see such a shareholding as offering the potential for synergy and ways of moving forward with greater solidarity. Or it may be a private company that is seeking the benefit of organisational or industrial synergy. In general the involvement of noncooperative shareholders has been beneficial, as it has brought in useful experience, prevented mistakes being made, and has stopped the cooperatives from becoming isolated. On the other hand there have been cases where outside shareholders have tried to take advantage of the inexperience of the cooperative members, and have tried to divide them up.
CFI feels that overall the Marcora Law worked very well. By 30th June 1992 it had invested €40 million in 89 cooperatives. These cooperatives employed more than 3,100 workers, 80% of whom were members. Their turnover exceeded €230 million. There were of course failures, and in 1992 nine cooperatives, 10% of the total, were in liquidation. However these were the smaller co operatives, and represented only about 5% of the capital and 5% of the jobs. Furthermore, this loss was compensated by asset and employment growth within the successful cooperatives. This experience shows that the availability of capital is a necessary condition for setting up new cooperatives, but is not sufficient on its own – other types of support are also necessary.
The benefits of a specialist institution
One decisive factor in this success was that the state aid was made available in the form of equity, not grant, and has been administered by a specialist institution. This meant firstly that the cooperatives had a partner who took an active interest in their performance, and who could bring its contacts and experience to assist the coop. Secondly, the dividend paid on the investments (about 15%) was returned to the movement, to help promote the growth of new cooperatives. CFI's monitoring, training and support was very similar to that provided by the Caja Laboral Popular in Mondragón.
The provisions of the Marcora Law were originally limited to an experimental period, but its success was such that parliament extended it for a further two years. However CFI was aware of the danger of becoming reliant on public financing, and actually refused additional public funding of €30 million because the government wanted it to act too hastily; it preferred to forego the extra money rather than invest in unsound cooperatives and bring the mechanism into disrepute.
This experimental law was instituted to provide an option for people who were made redundant, but its value went beyond that. First, it is important that among the workers there is a nucleus that is prepared to become entrepreneurs. Secondly, the Marcora Law provided the means to surmount some of the traditional obstacles that new cooperatives face: it provides incentives that help coops succeed. The Marcora Law provides a very good example for panEuropean legislation.
Reconfiguration post-2000
The programme was suspended the 1990s because it was deemed to contravene European competition law by giving over-generous state support to one form of business model - worker self-management. The Marcora Law re-emerged post 2000 reconstructed to offer financial support to workers on a 1:1 basis rather than 3:1 (CFI to worker contribution) for worker co-operative buyouts. Professor Alberto Zevi of CFI reported in 2011 that the Marcora Law was working well, with 11 buyouts assisted in recent months.
References
Source: Alberto Zevi, Compagnia Finanziaria Industriale (CFI) at the Strategies for Democratic Employee Ownership conference organised by Industrial Common Ownership Movement (ICOM) in London on 13-14 November 1992. Report by Toby Johnson. ISBN 1 870018 09 5
Text also quoted in Insolvency, Employee Rights & Employee Buyouts. A Strategy for Restructuring by Anthony Jensen, Ithaca Consultancy for the Common Cause Foundation, available at: http://www.efesonline.org/LIBRARY/2006/Insolvency,%20Employee%20Rights%20&%20Employee%20Buyouts.pdf
Description on Confcooperative site: http://www.confcooperative.it/CD%20Finanziamenti/capitolo%20VI.swf
Update: Saving business through worker co-operatives, Co-operatives UK, 2012: http://www.uk.coop/sites/storage/public/downloads/savingbusiness_0.pdf |
Surreal, simple, and peculiar is how Brawl in the Family started out, and I enjoy dipping into oddball visual gags like this from time to time.
You may have noticed that things feel a little differently around here, though. I’m proud to present Brawl in the Family’s official site redesign! Yes, thanks to many tireless hours from site designer Chris, we’ve assembled a bevy of new images and goodies for you to peruse, as well as a WORKING RSS FEED (!) and some other nifty additions. Keep in mind that everything is still at a pretty early stage, so we’ll be hammering out the issues over the next several days (similar to how our forums had to adjust over a few days). But for now, take your time and look through the site.
– Matthew
Yes, it’s been a long time coming. I hope you like the new design! Please be aware that this is still a work in progress and we will be smoothing out the rough spots and adding additional content in the weeks to come.
Thanks for reading!
– Chris |
Nearly six months after the death of Robin Williams, the Academy Award-winning actor and comedian, his widow and his children have become engaged in a contentious legal dispute over his estate.
Court documents filed in December and January outline a bitter disagreement over money and property between the widow, Susan Schneider Williams, who was Mr. Williams’s third wife, and Zak, Zelda and Cody Williams, the comedian’s children from two previous marriages that ended in divorce.
At stake is not only a portion of the wealth that Mr. Williams accumulated in a film, television and stage career of some 40 years, but also cherished belongings that include his clothing, collectibles and personal photographs.
In their court papers, both sides display keen interest in such memorabilia — everything from Mr. Williams’s bicycles to his collections of fossils and toys — as tangible, deeply personal reminders of the irrepressible, manic imagination that drove his performances as a comedian and actor. |
In cash-strapped Washington, President Obama’s $1 trillion health care law is presenting a tempting target for lawmakers seeking funds for other projects, as Congress last week raided the health care piggy bank for the third time in less than a year.
Congress last week axed a part of Democrats’ signature domestic achievement to find $11 billion to cover the cost of repealing a withholding tax that otherwise would have hit government contractors in 2013. Mr. Obama signed that bill into law on Monday.
The withholding bill follows two other efforts — one in December and another in April — that reworked the health care law to squeeze savings for other priorities. The December bill funded higher payments for doctors who treat Medicare patients, and the April legislation repealed a paperwork provision in the original health care law that businesses said would be onerous.
All told, Congress and the president have tapped some $50 billion earmarked to pay for benefits and programs in the health care overhaul in future years to fund more-immediate spending needs.
Both earlier efforts dealt with health care issues, but the bill Mr. Obama signed Monday marks the first time that the massive 2010 law has been tapped to fund something completely unrelated.
“They don’t want to open it up. They’re getting forced to open it up now and then, but to open it up for budgetary reasons, I think the pressures are pretty real,” said former Congressional Budget Office Director Doug Holtz-Eakin, who said it’s easier to cut future benefits than it is to cut programs that are already paying out.
Most of the health care law’s benefits won’t begin paying out for several years, and Mr. Holtz-Eakin said he expects legislators to revisit the law again before then.
The failure of the bipartisan supercommittee this week to come up with a plan to shrink the federal deficit and find spending cuts and revenues is likely to increase the pressure to raid the health care program for funds.
Rising cap
In December and April, lawmakers adjusted the formula that calculated how much of a subsidy would be given initially to buy health insurance through the new exchanges. Under the original law, many Americans would receive a subsidy larger than their income reflected, but Congress capped the amount that they would have to repay.
In December, Congress raised the repayment cap — effectively lowering the government’s payout tab — and used the savings to cover higher payments to Medicare doctors. In April, Congress raised the cap again, this time retargeting the money to cover the costs of repealing the so-called 1099 reporting requirement that small businesses said was far too burdensome.
Dipping into the Affordable Care Act to fund other projects angers some supporters of the law, including Igor Volsky, with the Center for American Progress, though Mr. Volsky said the raids have been relatively small in the scope of the whole law.
“I don’t think lawmakers should be taking money out of the law, particularly since the law hasn’t been implemented,” he said. “We don’t know how things are going to shake out. Give it a chance to work; maybe then you can go back in and make some changes.”
New formula
The rare bipartisan agreement last week to repeal the plan to withhold 3 percent of payments from government contractors would cost the government $11 billion — money that had to come from somewhere.
Mr. Obama and House Republicans eyed a formula in the health care law known as modified adjusted gross income, saying it was out of kilter with how eligibility is calculated in other federal programs for low-income earners, such as food stamps and housing assistance.
Under the old formula for modified adjusted gross income, a couple with an annual income of $64,000 would be able to qualify for Medicaid because not all Social Security benefits were counted as income. That will change under the revised formula, meaning that fewer people will qualify for Medicaid, exchange subsidies and the program for the states subsidizing health insurance for children.
Changing the formula doesn’t affect anyone now because it does not kick in until 2014.
But the modification means that, in time, 500,000 to 1 million fewer Americans will be able to join Medicaid each year beginning in 2014. Most of those no longer eligible instead could qualify for subsidies on the exchanges, according to the Congressional Budget Office. In turn, some people would lose their eligibility for subsidies and be bumped off the exchanges.
Political magnet
In floor debates, Democrats argued that middle-class Americans also need help paying for insurance, while Republicans said the government should focus its resources on the poor. Rep. Diane Black, Tennessee Republican and sponsor of modified adjusted gross income, called the formula an “unintended consequence” of the Affordable Care Act.
“This is unacceptable, and I very strongly believe that it is our duty to ensure that the very scarce Medicaid resources will be there for the most in need,” Mrs. Black said.
Rep. Joseph Crowley, New York Democrat, countered that the original income rule was not a glitch.
“It was written into the law deliberately, and anyone who actually read the bill would have known that,” he said. “This language was deliberately put into the health care law to expand affordable health insurance and will particularly help early retirees between the ages of 62 and 64, as well as Americans on disability.”
He led Democrats in opposing the revision, though the bill passed by a vote of 262-157. While 27 Democrats joined Republicans in voting for the change, all 157 “no” votes came from Democrats.
The formula change eventually was rolled into a broader bill that included the withholding tax repeal and new tax credits for businesses to hire veterans. The broader bill passed unanimously, 95-0 in the Senate and 422-0 in the House.
Democrats who opposed the alteration were reluctant to talk about why their opposition softened.
“I don’t have any comment on that,” said Rep. Henry A. Waxman of California, the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, when asked by The Washington Times about his votes.
Rep. Daniel Lipinski, an Illinois Democrat who voted for the revision both times, cited the administration’s support and said changing the formula wasn’t likely to affect many Americans.
“That was the pay-for that was offered on the floor,” he said. “I supported it because I think things should be paid for. Some people, it may limit what they get in subsidy, but I think most people agree and the president can agree that it’s not going to have that large of an impact.”
Copyright © 2019 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission. |
The early signs regarding Saturday night's UFC on FOX ratings were not good as compared to usual late-January numbers.
According to TVbythenumbers.com, the overnight ratings for the show headlined by Valentina Shevchenko's second-round win over Julianna Pena in a battle of top women's bantamweights, did a 0.7 rating in the 18-49 demo and 2.02 million viewers.
The previous lowest audience on the overnights for the annual January show on FOX was 2.43 million for last year's show headlined by Anthony "Rumble" Johnson's quick knockout win over Ryan Bader. The January average over the past four years for the overnights was 2.78 million viewers.
FOX also finished last among the four major networks in terms of total viewers, and only beat CBS in the 18-49 demo.
NBC did a 0.8 in the demo and 4.85 million viewers, winning the night, with a 48 Hours rerun.
ABC did a 0.8 in the demo and 2.58 million viewers for a night headlined by a Golden State Warriors vs. Los Angeles Clippers matchup.
Because the overnights only measure the FOX stations between 8-10 p.m. Eastern, 7-9 p.m Central, 6-8 p.m. Mountain and 8-10 p.m. Pacific, the slots when most prime time shows air, for sports, the number will almost always rise when the final ratings come out in a few days. The overnight numbers measure whatever the FOX affiliates aired on the West Coast from 8-10 p.m., and not the live UFC programming.
In addition, for most UFC on FOX shows, portions, and at times the entire main event isn't figured into the ratings, since the overnights for FOX only measure up to 10 p.m. and often the show lasts until nearly 10:30 p.m. with the most-watched portion of the show after 10 p.m.
In this case, the jump from this already-low 2.02 million viewer won't be as significant. Due to quick finishes, the show went off the air at 10 p.m.
Women main events with Shevchenko vs. Holly Holm in July, and Michelle Waterson vs. Paige VanZant in December, did strong numbers, the former being the best summer numbers the UFC has ever done and the latter being the best overall number in a few years. |
They call themselves the Worldwide Loyalty Team. Among some employees, they are known as the Apple Gestapo, a group of moles always spying in headquarters and stores, reporting directly to Jobs and Oppenheimer. Here's how they hunt people down.
"You may want to know about their Worldwide Loyalty Team," Tom told me recently in an email. I read what he had to say. It felt like a description of the Gestapo, without the torture and killing part.
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Tom never lived in Nazi Germany, back in the time when the Geheime Staatspolizei had the power to get into any house or any office, at any time of the day or night, without any warrant or reason, to seize whatever or whoever they wanted in their never ending search to find enemies of the state. A place in which you had no right to privacy whatsoever. A place in which you were guilty until proven otherwise.
No, Tom never lived in Nazi Germany, nor in East Germany, nor in the Soviet Union, nor in Communist China. He lives in the United States. For sure, he has never been scared of losing his life nor the ones he loves, like thousands of millions in those countries. But he knows how it feels to be watched, to always be considered guilty of crimes against another kind of state. He knew how it felt to have no privacy whatsoever when he was working right here, in a little Californian town called Cupertino, in a legendary place located in One Infinite Loop.
Tom knew about all that pretty well, back when he was working at Apple Inc.
Operation Lockdown
Of course, if Tom had never sent any sensitive information to media outlets, he would have never had the fear of being caught, only to get fired and sued into oblivion by Apple Legal. But the lack of any privacy whatsoever is something that he shared with all his fellow employees.
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"Apple has these moles working everywhere, especially in departments where leaks are suspected. Management is not aware of them," he told me, "once they suspect a leak, the special forces—as we call them—will walk in the office at any hour, especially in the mornings. They will contact whoever was the most senior manager in the building, and ask them to coordinate the operation."
The operation, as Tom calls it, is not anything special. It is not one of a kind event. It's just a normal practice, and the process is pretty simple: The manager will instruct all employees to stay at their desks, telling them what to do and what to expect at any given time. The Apple Gestapo never handles the communication. They are there, present, supervising the supervisors, making sure everything goes as planned.
All cellphones are then taken. Usually, they collect them all at the same time, which means that the process could take a long time. If you need to contact the exterior during the time your cellphone is under examination, you will have to ask for permission, and your call will be monitored.
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They don't ask for cameras because there are no cameras at Apple: Employees are not allowed to get into the campus with them. If the cellphone is an iPhone, it gets backed up onto a laptop. "In fact, at the beginning they used to say that the iPhones were really their property, since Apple gave every employee a free iPhone," he points out. All the employees are asked to unlock and disable any locking features in their cellphones, and then the special forces will proceed to check them for recent activity.
They back up everything and go through all the other phones' text messages and pictures. If you have porn in your phone, they will see it. If you have text messages to your spouse, lover, or Tiger Woods, they will see them, too. Just like that. No privacy, no limits.
While all this is happening, the employees are ordered to activate the screensaver on their computers, so the special forces are sure there are no chats happening between employees or with the exterior. They are told not to speak, text or call one other when the lockdown is happening: "It is like a gag order, and if the employee does not want to participate, they are basically asked to leave and never come back."
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2009 Is Like "1984"
Of course, all this is voluntary. Management recommends that you relinquish your phones. If you don't do it they will fire you, or they will investigate why you didn't want to give them your cellphone. Simultaneously, everyone is asked to sign NDA's during the investigations, even though they already signed Apple NDAs to work there.
"I was at several events. When they find what they are looking for—which they usually do—the person is asked to stay until the end of the business day. Then he is asked to leave the premises quietly, escorted by security," Tom says. While he's there, the special forces hang around, watching. "There is a lot that goes behind doors that I don't really know about. I do know, however, that they really interrogate people that are serious suspects, intimidating them by threatening to sue."
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There is no way to know how often this happens, however, as everything is handled very quietly. The same Worldwide Loyalty Team does many other things to keep everyone in check, from searching out the email history of every employee—which is also a normal practice in other corporations and government agencies—to seeding fake images to catch potential leaks and diffuse the hype about some product introductions.
As Tom was describing all this, my mind was getting back to all I've read about Steve Jobs and Apple, back when he was El Capitán of the brave group of free pirates who created the Macintosh. The Mac was a secret project too, but there was no secret police making sure there were no leaks. After a hard day of work, all the Mac team sometimes played on the beaches of California, careless and happy, confident that this new revolutionary computer would change the world, one desktop at a time. All of them shared information, there were no seeeecrets, and that's why they came up with an "insanely great" computer, as Steve Jobs himself used to refer to it.
And while I understand that secrecy is paramount to success in today's extremely competitive market—hello, dear marketdrones—now I look at this story on the Worldwide Loyalty Team, and it makes me realize how much Apple has changed. From a happy hippie company, to a company that does KGB-style lockdowns and Gestapo interrogations that end in suicides.
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I wonder if the special forces have ever chased anyone through the Infinite Loop campus, dressed in their full 1984 regalia.
I wouldn't be surprised. |
“This place runs on memories,” Hector (Gael Garcia Bernal) informs an awed Miguel (Anthony Gonzalez) as they wander the land of the dead in Pixar’s newest film, Coco. Preserved through the memories of their family, people are kept alive, as jubilant in the afterlife as they were in life — sometimes even more so.
In Coco, death is just a new beginning. Less so a film about grief and loss, Coco is a story about celebrating life through the people that the dead once touched and affected. It’s aligns perfectly with the values of Dia de los Muertos, otherwise known as the Day of the Dead.
“[In] Dia de los Muertos, the whole point is to never say goodbye to anyone and to always remember them,” director Lee Unkrich told me in an interview a few month’s prior to the release of Coco. “And it’s your responsibility to keep their memories alive.”
Tonight is About Family
Despite the Mexican holiday’s macabre iconography, the Day of the Dead is a joyous celebration that permeates every corner of that nation’s communities: parties are thrown, music is played, the cobbled streets are lit by candlelight and the effervescent glow of scattered marigold petals, and rich flavors waft from the kitchens of every house. It seems like an anomaly to most American audiences, who commonly associate death with somber funeral processions and cold, empty graveyards.
But the rituals of the Day of the Dead are echoed across cultures throughout the world. In China, every house boasts a spirit tablet of ancestors at an altar before which family members light incense and leave food offerings. In Madagascar, millions periodically dance with the bones of the dead and rewrap them in fresh cloth in a ritual called famadihana. In Gaelic Celtic cultures, northwestern Europeans mark the beginning of the harvest by leaving food and drink offerings outside for the spirits who crossed over during this liminal time period; this Celtic pagan ritual would eventually be absorbed into the Catholic All Saint’s Day Eve, known today as, you guessed it, Halloween.
“Over the course of working on [Coco], we had done research not only on Mexican customs but also on similar customs and traditions around the world,” Unkrich said. “We were surprised by how many different cultures had traditions that are similar to Dia de los Muertos.”
These rituals all share one thing in common: they revolve around communicating across the boundary of life and death. Ancestors are but an incense candle or a muttered prayer away from the living, able to convey guidance to the living family members or listen in on the latest town news. It’s not based in any one religion — you can find it in Buddhist, Hindu, animist households — but is a surprisingly widespread practice across the world.
Widespread across the world, except perhaps in America. Death is never much cause for celebration in the U.S., much less rituals that celebrate those deaths years later.
“It’s interesting that we don’t [celebrate these customs] in America, like I wish we did,” Unkrich said. I hope that after people see this film they’ll start adopting some of these traditions.”
But there may be a few more pockets of communities throughout America that celebrate these customs than you would think.
Keeping a Culture Alive
The altar at my home used to be populated by a few grainy photos of austere middle-aged men and women, some clad in magisterial clothes. My grandmother on my father’s side smiles serenely from her picture, long, floor-length hair in a tight bun. Now there are a few half-burnt wax candles and an empty incense bowl, but the altar has mostly remained barren for the past few years, with my other relatives’ houses becoming the go-to place for the celebration of gio (there’s a special character in the proper spelling of this word, but it won’t show up here, so if you wish to see how it’s really spelled, head here).
Quite literally a “death anniversary,” gio is a ceremony in which my extended family members all gather to celebrate the life of a recent deceased relative by eating food — often the favorite dishes of the deceased relative who we’re celebrating — and reminiscing. It sounds morbid, I know (I still have trouble explaining to a lot of my friends that I can’t hang out with them because I have a “death anniversary”), but it’s truthfully one of the most comforting regular rituals of my life. Every few months, I get to see my 25-plus cousins and catch up with the gossip about our lives while eating piping hot cha ca, or debate the merits of the Ken Burns Vietnam War documentary with my uncle. It’s almost an afterthought when my mom asks me if I have done lay yet — which is the process of lighting an incense stick and praying to the altar which holds my relative’s picture and the dishes of their favorite food.
Not yet, I tell her.
I light the incense stick and watch the end catch fire until it burns down to a sizzle. I’m not religious in the least, but I’ve always liked this part. Closing my eyes, breathing in the woody smell of incense and clapping my hands together, sometimes I count to 10. Or I ask them how they’re doing. “Is heaven nice?” I used to ask my grandmother’s picture when I was a kid. I place the incense in a bowl filled with dried rice and the ashy remains of incense sticks before it.
When I watched Coco, it struck me how similar the traditions of the Day of the Dead were to gio. The ofrenda in Coco which became such a pivotal plot point, the food that fills up the altar holding up hundreds of grainy pictures of relatives. The nonchalance with which Miguel treats the whole ritual — it only got in the way of his impassioned pursuit of music.
I was shaken. Here was a culture with which I was so unfamiliar with, and yet it felt like a huge portion of my childhood was playing out on screen. The guilt I felt over brushing off gio so many times as a kid resurfaced, and just seeing the plethora of rich, spicy foods being placed at the ofrenda stirred in me memories of beef stew and rice balls wafting from my aunt’s kitchen. I asked Unkrich and Coco co-director Adrian Molina if they had gotten similar responses from people of other cultures like mine.
“I think the fact that so many people do have these traditions and do have these celebrations speaks to the kind of universal desire to have that connection and maintain that connection to the people that you love,” Molina said. “And when people see this movie, it’s surprising how across cultures everyone has a real emotional reaction because you want that, and you want that for your family.” |
Lead counsel for Ms Stein's campaign said they would continue to fight for a statewide recount.
Green Party candidate Jill Stein has abruptly dropped her petition for a recount of all votes cast in the US presidential election in Pennsylvania after a judge ordered her campaign to post a $US1 million ($1.34 million) bond, according to court documents.
But her team vowed to continue the fight in federal court.
"The Stein campaign will continue to fight for a statewide recount in Pennsylvania," Jonathan Abady, lead counsel to Ms Stein's recount efforts, said in a statement late on Saturday (local time).
Saying it has become clear that "the state court system is so ill-equipped to address this problem", the statement said "we must seek federal court intervention".
The Stein campaign said it would file for emergency relief in the Pennsylvania effort in federal court on Monday, "demanding a statewide recount on constitutional grounds".
The bond was set by the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania a day after representatives of President-elect Donald Trump requested a $US10 million bond, according to court papers.
The court gave the petitioners until 5:00pm on Monday to post the bond, but said it could modify the amount if shown good cause. Instead, Ms Stein's campaign withdrew.
"Petitioners are regular citizens of ordinary means. They cannot afford to post the $1 million bond required by the court," wrote attorney Lawrence Otter, informing the court of the decision to withdraw.
Ms Stein, who garnered about 1 per cent of the presidential vote, has also sought recounts in Michigan and Wisconsin, after crowdfunding $US3.5 million for the filing fees.
Mr Trump won narrow victories over Democrat Hillary Clinton in all three battleground states, part of the industrial heartland of the country until manufacturers started leaving for Mexico and other low-wage countries.
Mr Trump and his allies have attempted to stop the initiatives in the states, calling the recount effort a "scam". Mrs Clinton's campaign has said it would take part in the recounts.
"The judge's outrageous demand that voters pay such an exorbitant figure is a shameful, unacceptable barrier to democratic participation," Ms Stein said in a statement.
"No voter in America should be forced to pay thousands of dollars to know if her or his vote was counted."
Even if all the recounts were to take place, the overall election outcome would not likely change.
The race is decided by the electoral college, or a tally of wins from the state-by-state contests, rather than by the popular national vote.
Mr Trump surpassed the 270 electoral votes needed to win, with 306. Recounts would have to flip the result to Mrs Clinton in all three states to change the result.
In the popular vote, Mrs Clinton had more than 2.5 million votes over Mr Trump, the independent Cook Political Report said.
Reuters |
After months of rumors and media speculation we can now exclusively confirm that former NABA Cruiserweight champ Denton Daley is officially returning to the ring.
The 12-1 Canadian Boxing Star will step through the ropes once again on Saturday May 9th, 2015 for United Promotions when they stage another incredible night of boxing action at The 17th Steakhouse, Grand Ballroom at 5165 Dixie Road in Mississauga, Ontario.
Daley is a standout athlete who has achieved phenomenal success since entering the boxing world in 2010, and immediately began electrifying fans with a spectacular 12 fight winning streak.
Daley’s opponent for the event has yet to be confirmed.
Tables seating 10, will be sold for $1,250.00 and chair seating will range from $75.00 – $100.00.
We would encourage all fans to check out this event in person. Televised boxing is great, but there is nothing quite like the excitement and immersive experience of attending a live professional boxing event!
We will bring you confirmation on Daley’s opponent as soon as it becomes available, in the meantime fans wishing to get in early can sign-up here to be notified via email about our exclusive pre-sale ticket deals.
Visit DentonDaley.com for more info.
Fight Date: Saturday, May 9th, 2015.
Venue:
The 17th Steakhouse
Grand Ballroom
5165 Dixie Road
Mississauga, Ontario
Tickets:
Tables seating 10, will be sold for $ 1,250.00.
Chair seating will range from $75.00 – $100.00. |
You may remember when POST/POP released a Double A side single for PEPA KNIGHT a few months ago. You may have even bought it. If so, you will be one of the many people who have been positively frothing at the ear (is that a thing?) for more PEPA, and it’s about time we wiped that froth from your… ear. Luckily PEPA KNIGHT is better at producing incredible music, than I am with analogies, so here he is with the winter-busting HYPNOTIZED VOL. 1!
HERE IS A PREVIEW OF 3 SONGS FROM HYPNOTIZED VOL. 1
This is what I thought about ‘Rahh!’ and ‘Clams’ //
but what about the rest of Vol.1? Well you know how in the A-Team you have a bunch of guys who bring something different to the table and use those differences to reach a common goal? That’s this album. You have Rahh! which is the natural leader of the group, bringing the whole plan together. You have ‘Clams’ the pretty one, which at first you think is all surface, before you hear the layers and layers of pop that elevate the track to something far more than expected. You have “Coyote Choir” which I’m branding as the ‘misunderstood’ one as every time I listen to it, I hear something new and unexpected. Something even more beautiful than the previous listen. You also have the bombastic “Hypnotized” which is like a punch in the face of POP, and presumably would need to be chloroformed to get on a “damn plane”. “Fortress” and “Desert Guide” are like wonderful cameos that lift the rest of the album to new pop heights with PEPA’s further exploration of world music and it’s place on a 21st Century pop album.
What we have here is the complete antithesis of an identikit-garageband-x-factor pop act. It takes a brave man to put tribal drums and a sitar front and centre on a pop song without a single wink or tongue in cheek. It’s the dedication to do something different in an industry where that kind of thinking is frowned upon, that I respect most about PEPA. He not only manages to do this, but wraps up his eastern influences with a western blanket that allows to those nuances to be nurtured and come alive. I feel like Hypnotized Vol. 1 will be the gateway drug to alot of World music for most people. I had friends tell me “I didn’t know I liked this kind of music until I heard Rahh!” and it’s this kind of comment that fills me with complete joy and hope that we will hear more bands attempt something a little different. It’s the only way for music to evolve, and if msic is not evolving, then it is stagnant and dead. PEPA KNIGHT is keeping the flame alive.
You can preorder HYPNOTIZED VOL.1 from POST/POP NOW! Here is the link:
HYPNOTIZED VOL. 1 by PEPA KNIGHT
https://www.facebook.com/pepaknight
https://soundcloud.com/pepaknight
https://twitter.com/pepa_knight
http://instagram.com/pepa_knight
this isn’t on the album, but this collab with Japanese Wallpaper is incredible!
forever,
jed |
In the case of the Clinton Foundation, The Times started with a legitimate issue: did the former secretary of state give improper access to foreign countries that donated tens of millions of dollars to her family foundation? That’s a question voters deserve to have answered. In fact, reporting by The Times and others has turned up so many potential conflicts that the foundation decided to stop accepting foreign government funding if Clinton becomes president.
On the other hand, some foundation stories revealed relatively little bad behavior, yet were written as if they did. That’s not good journalism. But I suspect the explanation lies less with making matchy-matchy comparisons of the two candidates’ records than with journalists losing perspective on a line of reporting they’re heavily invested in.
I asked Amy Chozick, the lead Clinton reporter and author of several foundation stories, for her view on false balance in The Times’s political coverage.
“I hear a lot from readers concerned about ‘false balance,’” she said, “and while we need to be cautious about falling into that trap, a general election campaign between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump means both candidates’ records, positions and backgrounds should be equally scrutinized and, when appropriate, compared and contrasted.”
This, of course, is not a typical election. Trump is so erratic and his comments so inflammatory that many in his own party have rejected him. But it is also true that these are two presidential candidates with the lowest approval ratings in history. Neither is very trusted or liked. Which means if ever there was a time to shine light in all directions, this is it.
If Trump is unequivocally more flawed than his opponent, that should be plenty evident to the voting public come November. But it should be evident from the kinds of facts that bold and dogged reporting unearths, not from journalists being encouraged to impose their own values to tip the scale.
I can’t help wondering about the ideological motives of those crying false balance, given that they are using the argument mostly in support of liberal causes and candidates. CNN’s Brian Stelter focused his show, “Reliable Sources,” on this subject last weekend. He asked a guest, Jacob Weisberg of Slate magazine, to frame the idea of false balance. Weisberg used an analogy, saying journalists are accustomed to covering candidates who may be apples and oranges, but at least are still both fruits. In Trump, he said, we have not fruit but rancid meat. That sounds like a partisan’s explanation passed off as a factual judgment. |
BALTIMORE, Md. -- Tennessee senior quarterback Joshua Dobbs has been named to the 2016 Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award Watch List.
Dobbs is one of 43 quarterbacks on the watch list, all from the Football Bowl Subdivision. The winner will be announced on Dec. 9, 2016.
Established in 1987 and named after the former Louisville Cardinal and NFL Hall of Famer, the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award is presented annually at the end of each season to the nation's top college quarterback based on character, citizenship, scholastic achievement, leadership qualities and athletic accomplishments.
VFL Peyton Manning won the award in 1997.
Dobbs is also on the preseason watch lists for the CFPA National Performer of the Year award, the Walter Camp Player of the Year award, the Maxwell Award, the Davey O'Brien National Quarterback Award and the Wuerffel Trophy.
Dobbs started all 13 games for the Vols last season and is 14-5 in his last 19 starts. During that span, Tennessee has averaged 34.2 points and more than 424 yards of total offense per game. Last season, Dobbs threw for 2,291 yards and 15 touchdowns while also rushing for 671 yards -- the most ever by a quarterback at Tennessee. He is one of just three SEC quarterbacks in the last 20 years to have 300 yards passing and 100 yards rushing in the same game -- joining Johnny Manziel and Tim Tebow -- having accomplished that feat twice over the past two seasons (against Georgia in 2015 and South Carolina in 2014).
The watch list for the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award includes:
Tommy Armstrong, Nebraska
J.T. Barrett, Ohio State
CJ Beathard, Iowa
Max Browne, USC
Matt Davis, SMU
Luke Del Rio, Florida
Joshua Dobbs, TENNESSEE
Dane Evans, Tulsa
Luke Falk, Washington State
Quinton Flowers, USF
Drew Hare, Northern Illinois
Kenny Hill, TCU
Bart Houston, Wisconsin
Skyler Howard, West Virginia
Brad Kaaya, U of Miami
Chad Kelly, Ole Miss
Gunner Kiel, Cincinnati
Trevor Knight, Texas A&M
Taylor Lamb, Appalachian State
Mitch Leidner, Minnesota
Davis Webb, California
Malik Zaire, Notre Dame
Wes Lunt, Illinois
Sean Maguire, Florida State
Patrick Mahomes, Texas Tech
Baker Mayfield, Oklahoma
Nick Mullens, Southern Miss
Tyler O'Connor, Michigan State
John O'Korn, Michigan
Nathan Peterman, Pittsburgh
Kenny Potter, San Jose State
Mason Rudolph, Oklahoma State
Cooper Rush, Central Michigan
Seth Russell, Baylor
Thomas Sirk, Duke
Nick Stevens, Colorado State
Zach Terrell, Western Michigan
Patrick Towles, Boston College
Mitch Trubisky, North Carolina
P.J. Walker, Temple
Greg Ward, Houston
Deshaun Watson, Clemson
Thomas Woodson, Akron |
It’s sad that there still are companies out there turning a quick profit with disregard about who they trample over on the way. Virgin and Vodafone, that’s you guys. Today’s post is about out of bundle data charges and shock bills by the big mobile phone providers in the UK. How can we let companies get away with charging £26 for 1 GB of data, when they can sell the same data for £2 or less? What justifies the extra £24 and why do regulators let them get away with it? Do you know how quickly your charges can get out of hand? Vodafone charged this family £2,000 for 33GB of data. Just to contrast that, I get my normal 4G data at around £0.50 per GB with EE. That’s £1,970 extra that Vodafone is charging someone because the consumption of data wasn’t agreed. That’s like walking into McDonald’s, eating a BigMac you see on the counter and paying £1,000 for the privilege of doing so. You thought you said two burgers, in fact, you ordered one. We wouldn’t stand for that, would we?
Mobile phone bill shock is like walking into McDonald's, eating a BigMac you see on the counter and paying £1,000 for the privilege of doing so. Click To Tweet
The bystander effect, how we blame the technologically un-savvy.
It’s a well known psychological finding, the more bystanders there are in an incident, the less chance there is you’ll get help. If this happens, your best bet is pointing someone out and saying, you, help me please. Could this be happening in our tolerance of “bill shock”? The BBC said Ofcom was working on this five years ago, and yet still nothing? Why are they getting away with this?
It’s all too easy to put the blame on the customers. It’s their fault; they should learn to manage technology better, I saw some say. Some recommend installing a data monitoring tool. This means compromising our online privacy even more. No thanks. Some point towards your phone settings, indeed, I was on-top of them for two years, until I wasn’t anymore. But does the responsibility really lie with us alone? What do the naysayers say when this happens to someone like me? I have a degree in Computer Science and Psychology, definitely kind of tech savvy. Is the reason truly ignorance, or perhaps our human psychology is being exploited for extra profits?
Since I have a good level of self-serving bias, I’d like to convince you it’s the latter and I I’ve got some evidence for it. My background in psychology, computer science, business and tech start-ups gives me a unique perspective. By sharing this story, I hope that one day the situation will change.
The honeymoon period: rats in a cage and how it all began.
I signed up with Virgin on a 30-day sim-only rolling contract worth around £6. The promise was no-hassle, stress-free, contract-free great service with a decent amount of data. Whenever I’d come close to my data limit, Virgin would kindly let me know at 50%, 75% and 90% of consumption. Wonderful. This great feedback loop is rooted in behavioural psychology. Much like all of Skinner’s experiments with rats and food pellets this feedback loop resulted in a habit. The habit reinforced was that I’d simply shut off my data after the 90% warning. Thanks Virgin, so considerate. I had my doubts, could they not simply cut me off instead? It seemed good enough, better the devil you know I thought.
Reinforcement did it’s job. I kept shutting off my data, and my reward was avoiding punishment. After a year or so I finally gave in and upgraded to a £12 plan as I needed more data. One time they even charged me a tenner or two for going over the data allowance. It was fair enough, after all, they had been sending me an SMS saying I’ve nearly reached my limit. I must have forgotten to act on it. After my first £10 charge I paid more attention to the SMSs, it wasn’t too much work, although kind of annoying. I got the 90% warning, and I’d disable my data until the allowance was refreshed, the SMSs kept coming!
Things go quiet. Much like in divorce, communication stops.
Just like it often occurs before couples divorce, communication breaks down. Virgin stopped sending me messages about data being close to the limit from January 2017. I kept receiving the “your allowance has been refreshed” SMS, so I figured I had been using data within my limits. A reasonable assumption, my data usage must be under control.
I want to quit the gym and being charged without explicit consent.
Everything was fine until June. Without any sort of notification or warning, I received an invoice for £60! I’ll admit this amount is not the end of the world but its the principle at stake here. £60 is a lot of money to many, and months of wages in certain parts of the world where people live off $1.50 a day. £60 is about 30 malaria nets that can save lives in Africa, and if philanthropy is not your kind of thing, I’m sure we can all find a better use for £50 than to pay for a few gigs of your phone updating, and it could have easily been £2,000!
If you complain loudly enough, they will waive some of the charges and in some cases perhaps all. For me, Virgin went from nil, to £10 credit, to £25 credit, but I told them kindly to (you know what). I didn’t say that but I thought it, and I asked them to close my account. It then became a case of that Friends episode, when Chandler wants to quit the gym. I literally had to say; please cancel my account five times before they let me do so. Yes, I rejected a part-refund, but I will miss £50 as much as I will £25. It’s the ethical implications that bother me. No thanks.
Virgin also said they’d re-enable the notifications if I accepted the £25 part-refund and stayed with them. Not sure who or what disabled them in the first place and I’ll put this down to an uninformed rep, since if this is indeed a feature that was triggered on and off then it’s quite suspicious…
Why is this a big deal? If you are not aware, you can end up paying £364 in a couple of hours.
Modern mobile phones are data-eating monsters. They can quickly auto-update and use many gigs of data in just a day. You’ve shut off updates over 4G you say, but what if one day you enable it for 100MB and forget to disable it? A plausible scenario. At £26 per GB you will barely have to stream one Netflix movie in HD before you owe almost half a grand (£26 * 14GB =£364 = $468 USD). If you are one of the people forced to use 4G at home like me, I suggest you move to a company that has better policies asap!
Modern mobile phones are data-eating monsters. They can quickly auto-update and use many gigs of data in just a day. #billshock Click To Tweet
The ethical alternatives. Are there any? What should phone companies do?
The straight forward alternative is for companies like Virgin and Vodafone to cut you off if you are out of data. This is what EE does who so far have worked out well for me. EE displays your options when you are out of data and you are welcome to buy an extra bundle at a higher price if you’d like. I also switched my mobile to Tesco who offer “Bill Shock” protection. They disable your data if you hit a self-imposed limit. Funny enough they don’t let you set this limit less than £2.50, I wanted mine to be £0. At least it’s upfront and I’ll just see it as a part of my tariff as I am sure I’ll hit this cap multiple times but it will never be £10 or £60.
I asked Vodafone about this, who billed me £26 for 1GB of data, and they said it was not technically possible to do what EE or Tesco do. Odd. Since Vodafone, unlike Virgin, did in fact send me notifications to a dark corner of the web where you are unlikely ever to see them, I didn’t dispute their charge as much. They said it was not possible to send system notifications to my e-mail either. Fine, you robbed me for £26, and you told me you would (kind of), I just didn’t read the text on time. Who checks texts on routers anyway? Fair enough, I guess… I cancelled my account. The irony is they did offer to waive my charges if I upgrade my contract to a 12-month locking one. Really? The cheek of it.
How hard is it to do what EE and Tesco do, to stop serving data if you haven’t paid for it?
An educated guess here. I don’t own a big mobile phone company or work for one (maybe I should start one up next). Considering EE have done it, and using my programming background, I’d think it wouldn’t be very hard at all for Virgin and Vodafone to follow suit. These companies just have to decide to change their policies, but they don’t want to. Probably a day’s worth of work for their developer, if that. Maybe even a simple configuration change for functionality that probably already exists.
As a businessman, I can see some roadblocks in rewriting their terms of service, but they could use that anyway. After all, terms of service are meant to protect the customer as much as the company, something we made a big point of when writing our new terms at Chessable. My value to Virgin was £150 per year. To Vodafone I was around £360 per year. They lost me as a customer for £50 and £26 respectively. That’s poor business in my eyes. However, if they had managed a £2,000 charge then they would have made around six to twelve years worth of profit in a few days. You can start to see why they may keep things the way they are. The only question is why do we keep putting up with it!
What can we do?
Switch, switch, switch. Before you sign up to a service, ask about terms for allowances, how does it work? If they cut you off on reaching your data allowance like EE, go for it. If they say they send you notifications, beware, like Virgin, they might stop.
Of course, there are the small courts, but this is stress and extra time down the drain and only worth for the larger amounts. There are also formal complaints and resolution services, but I satisfied myself with writing this search engine optimised blog post (ha, what happens when you upset an internet marketer!), and submitted a complaint to Ofcom, who will reflect my voice in the yearly statistics. I will be one of those 24 out of 100,000 people with an official complaint. I suspect this only reflects 10% of us, with the majority of us remaining silent as is typical in surveys.
Having shed some light on the psychology, business and programming side of things, I have tried to persuade at least some of you that this practice by the mobile phone providers is simply daylight robbery. It’s made possible by wordy terms of service that no one ever reads. Companies like Vodafone and Virgin Mobile make vast profits to the tune of £350m per year and have no excuse not to change the way they work. Let’s stop putting up with it. After all, my £50, and your £50 could have made a huge difference in other places. |
All this alarmism surrounding firearms in America lately is getting out of control.
I figure it’s time to offer a unique take on the issue–one that puts American gun rights and their continued need into perspective.
From the amateurish House sit-in to the full-on assault on AR-15 semi-automatic rifles, your assumptions about Democrats pursuing full disarmanent under the guise of “gun control” are correct. They mean it.
As a Virginia gun owner and concealed handgun permit (CHP) holder myself, I hope my perspective get can you to think differently about firearms if you have doubts.
Don’t know the Second Amendment? Let me list it for you:
The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution reads: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
But, but, but this amendment is outdated, archaic and Draconian! But, but, but there’s no explicit mention of individual gun ownership! (Nope, and nope!)
When I hear the most ardent supporters of gun control (aka disarmament) use these talking points, I cannot help but think of societies where totalitarian regimes succeeded in oppressing people by first disarming them–like the former Soviet Union.
Guns and freedom go hand-in-hand
My parents never despised guns before coming to America, except when they were in the hands of bad people.
When they came here 30 years ago, they were intrigued by the American way of life and boundless freedom here. They knew Americans owned firearms (especially the likes of actor John Wayne) and proudly touted the Second Amendment. Compared to the U.S., Soviet-occupied Lithuania was gun-free except for those in elite governmental positions. My dad always said the Soviets succeeded in oppressing Lithuanians and others by first disarming them. I always knew he was right, but aimed to confirm his assertions. Low and behold, he was right about gun confiscation as a pretext to installing tyranny in a country.
Here’s a case study from Firearms Possession by ‘Non-State Actors’: The Question of Sovereignty (2004) published in Texas Review of Law & Politics. Examples of gun control are bolded below:
Indeed, the best testimony to the power of an armed populace is the vigor with which the Warsaw Pact dictatorships enforced gun control. When the Communists took over Bulgaria on September 9, 1944, they immediately confiscated every weapon in private possession. In East Germany, private gun ownership was outlawed, though selected members of agricultural collectives were allowed to possess hunting weapons while participating in government-organized collective hunts, under immediate government supervision. Immediately after World War II, Hungary was governed by a coalition of democrats and Communists. Preparing the way for a total Communist takeover, Laszlo Rajk, the Communist Minister of the Interior, ordered the dissolution of all pistol and hunting clubs, as well as of other organizations which might prove a threat to government power. Rajk claimed he acted “in order to more efficiently protect the democratic system of the state.” Poland, on the other hand, did initially allow limited ownership of registered target guns with a license from the so-called “Citizen’s Militia.” However, in December 1981, Poland’s dictator, General Jaruzelski, decided that Solidarnosc had gone too far. He declared martial law, arrested all the pro-democracy leaders he could find, and ordered all firearms and ammunition be turned over to the government. (424)
A 2007 Harvard study confirmed a disarmed, gun-free Soviet Union saw worse crime rates than an armed America. Below is the study’s findings, also bolded:
Since at least 1965, the false assertion that the United States has the industrialized world’s highest murder rate has been an artifact of politically motivated Soviet minimization designed to hide the true homicide rates. Since well before that date, the Soviet Union possessed extremely stringent gun controls that were effectuated by a police state apparatus providing stringent enforcement. So successful was that regime that few Russian civilians now have firearms and very few murders involve them. Yet, manifest success in keeping its people disarmed did not prevent the Soviet Union from having far and away the highest murder rate in the developed world. In the 1960s and early 1970s, the gunless Soviet Union’s murder rates paralleled or generally exceeded those of gun‐ridden America. While American rates stabilized and then steeply declined, however, Russian murder increased so drastically that by the early 1990s the Russian rate was three times higher than that of the United States. Between 1998‐2004 (the latest figure available for Russia), Russian murder rates were nearly four times higher than American rates.
Imagine that–an armed society is a polite society? Who knew!
Not only do studies point to gun control failures, personal experiences shed light on this too. Enter former Cuba resident Manuel Martinez. His testimony in support of the Second Amendment before a Salem, Oregon, hearing in April 2013 went viral. Here’s an excerpt from the video:
In 1959 a Revolution … individuals … malicious individuals, masquerading as Democrats, revolutionaries, established a regime … a dictatorial regime … in my nation. Called Communism, Socialism, Stalinism, Marxism, and whatever other named -ism you want to put on it. The reason why it was done was to take away the guns from the People. The right of the People to wear guns. That is a God-given Right. It’s not given by anybody. It’s not given by any group. It’s the same thing as freedom, which is a God-given Right. And no one, absolutely no one, has the authority to take it away. To cease to defend the Second Amendment, and my God-given Right of freedom, will cease only with my death. I’ve been through it. I’ve been there. You people don’t know what freedom is because you never lost it. You haven’t been tortured. You haven’t been [sic] assassinations, you haven’t been mothers begging for the life of their son not to be killed because the only reason is they wanted to be free. And they killed the mothers and they killed the son.
Here’s the full video:
More guns in hands of good people = less overall crime by bad people with guns
Another thing my parents understood about private ownership of guns having lived in the Soviet Union is that guns in the hands of good people helps stop the threat of tyranny–whether immediate or not.
When good, law-abiding people are armed, the threat of tyranny can be quashed–and law enforcement can be assisted. When more people are properly trained and prepared to handle firearms, society is a safer place. When good people are defenseless against attack, chaos ensues, my dad always said. Look what happened in Eastern Europe, Nazi Germany, South America, and Asia during the 20th century. What did they have in common? Gun control, collectivism, and equitable sharing of misery.
The gun culture doesn’t alarm my family. In fact, they welcome it.
People have an inalienable, human right to self-defense under the Second Amendment
Unlike the former Soviet Union, the U.S. specifically gives us the right to individually keep and bear arms. There was never a right (or many rights, for that matter) in the former USSR allowing people to own guns. Heck, you couldn’t even own your own property in that hellhole! Everything belonged to the state. It was miserable, my parents said. The dehumanization of people there was intolerable.
Although my family didn’t own guns up until recently-it was impossible to own them back in California-they understood that good, law-abiding Americans have a right to protect themselves. They appreciate the Second Amendment like every other amendment to the Constitution (which is a unique, sacred document unlike any other). Without rights, tyranny takes shape. They always remind me of this, and proudly stand alongside supporters of the Second Amendment as a result.
This post was very lengthy, I know. I went into great detail citing historical examples of gun control failures–something not often spotlighted. It’s super important to see the historical failures of gun control to know of its potential here. This is not red-baiting or fear-mongering; it’s learning from the past to not repeat mistakes in the future.
As the never-ending quest to remove firearms from American society persists, remember this: be armed with facts and don’t allow people to malign gun rights–especially if they lack basic understanding of firearms. The facts will always trump hysteria–always! And don’t be afraid to share your story–people need to hear it.
Previously posted at GabriellaHoffman.com. |
(Photo: Stan Shillingburg/Dreamstime)
Students who sent a campus-wide e-mailing calling for white girls to stop wearing hoop earrings are denouncing a campus newspaper for publishing their comments.
Three Pitzer College students are slamming a school newspaper, the Claremont Independent, for publishing an article about their crusade against white girls wearing hoop earrings after people on the Internet attacked them for their opinion.
In case you aren’t familiar with the story, a group of Latina students at Pitzer started what was essentially a campaign against white girls wearing hoop earrings on the grounds that that’s cultural appropriation. They spray-painted “White girls, take OFF your hoops” on a dormitory free-speech wall, one of the spray-painters sent out a campus-wide e-mail about how offensive hoops were, and another spray-painter replied to that thread with her own e-mail saying the same thing.
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They, themselves, decided to make their opinions public. They made this decision repeatedly by taking multiple actions to ensure that their views on hoops reached a large audience. And now — now! — they’re mad at a school publication for covering them.
Earlier this month, three of the women — including the two women who had written the e-mails — wrote a post for LatinoRebels.com accusing the Independent of having put “young women of color in danger” by writing a piece about the controversy.
The post claims that it “seems that [the Independent’s] writer has released students’ emails and identities to a larger community.” Now, the article did identify two of the women by name: The women who willingly sent out those e-mails on the issue with their names attached to them. I have seen no proof that the writer actually did release anyone’s e-mail address, and it seems that the authors of the post haven’t either, seeing as they qualified their accusation with “it seems that” rather than stating it outright. If the author did do this, I don’t support that decision, but I also don’t think that it’s something we can confidently accuse him of, especially considering that students’ .edu e-mail addresses are not all that difficult to figure out.
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According to the post, the women “now are facing harassment from ultra right-wing groups and individuals, including a death threat through Facebook messenger,” the post continues.
Obviously, death threats and harassment are not okay. What’s more, I know exactly what it’s like to receive them, because I’ve been through it myself. Once, I was flooded with threats of rape, death and other violence — including one e-mail wishing that I would die from the same disease that had just killed my mother — over a joke about Star Wars that I’d made on a late-night TV show. Basically, a popular YouTuber had picked up my joke and covered it on his channel, and then some of the people who saw it decided they hated me, and then those people berated me with unthinkable vitriol.
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Make no mistake: I absolutely did speak out against the people who were threatening me, just like these girls did, and just like they absolutely should have. Here’s the difference, though: I never, ever censured that YouTuber for covering my comments. Why? Because I myself had decided to make this joke on television, with my name attached to it, which means that it was completely fair for this YouTuber to cover it.
This, of course, does not mean that we should consider violent reactions to be a normal, acceptable response to someone having said something publicly. But to say that we should not expect our attention-seeking efforts to receive attention when we’ve invited it? Well, that’s about as backwards as it gets.
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Now, I understand that these students did not make their hoop-comments on a television show — but they certainly did make them in a way that invited public commentary. Think about it: If you are going to e-mail the entire campus about an issue, why would you then turn around and slam the campus newspaper for covering it? You yourself signaled that your comments were relevant to the entire student body by e-mailing them to the entire student body. Sending an e-mail to an entire institution with your name on it, and then suggesting that you intended for that e-mail to stay private is a completely absurd line of thinking. An e-mail like that could be called a press release before it could be called private communication, and it’s completely disingenuous to suggest that anything else is true.
If you want to keep your opinions personal, then fine. Do that. The best way to keep them not private? Spray painting them all over a public wall and sending them out to thousands of people. That’s not discouraging publicity; it’s demanding it.
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This story was previously covered in an article on Heat Street.
— Katherine Timpf is a reporter for National Review Online. |
Develop on Windows as if it was Unix
In this post I’d like to share a setup I recently found out and frankly love. I can’t always code on Linux, but I love the terminal and the environment, when working with open source software everything feels just easier, everything fits together without manually duct taping everything together.
With this setup you can get away with most of the simple daily tasks.
I’ll assume you have nothing installed, so starting from scratch…
The Terminal
Windows’ cmd just sucks… Nevertheless there are some nice alternatives out there if you are willing to spend some time googling, recently I found out about cmder, it packages together conemu, msysgit and clink, to give you a really neat terminal with no configuration at all! It even packs the good ol’ monokai theme.
It’s portable so just drop it somewhere on your system. It packs with a bin/ folder, so you can just drop anything you want to run from the terminal there.
Just by using cmder you get git, a decent terminal and most common unix commands (ls, mv, cp, grep, cat, etc)
Git
It’s already in cmder! Isn’t that neat?
Chocolatey
As we’ll be using the terminal quite a lot, I find Chocolatey to be quite nice!
To install just do @powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy unrestricted -Command "iex ((new-object net.webclient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))" && SET PATH=%PATH%;%systemdrive%\chocolatey\bin
Do you need to install xampp? cinst xampp.app will do! Remember you can choose where to install it, normally it’s in D:\xampp .
Do you need ruby? cinst ruby
Wget
This little utility is just too good to miss, also, some common utilities (like composer) use it for a quick and easy installation.
To get it just do cinst Wget .
Nano
I really like this little editor for quick editting, cinst nano is everything you need to do if you want it!
It’s important to note that ^W is mapped to close tab so you will have to remove that mapping from cmder’s settings.
Vim
Do you use Vim? cinst vim will do, of course, all vim users religiously know how to install and configure vim…
Duct Taping XAMPP
Well… It’s windows after all… I find doing this is easier than installing apache + mysql.
XAMPP does not add anything to Windows PATH so if you want to run php in the command line set PATH=%PATH%;D:\xampp\php , assuming you installed XAMPP in D:\xampp !
If you do php --version you should not get an error, if you do get an error check your XAMPP directory.
Another step, if you are going to use PHP’s pear command, you’ll encounter an error like this
ERROR: failed to mkdir C:\php\pear\data\Auth\Auth\Frontend ERROR: failed to mkdir C:\php\pear\docs\Benchmark\doc ERROR: failed to mkdir C:\php\pear\data\Cache\Container ERROR: failed to mkdir C:\php\pear\docs\Cache_Lite\docs ERROR: failed to mkdir C:\php\pear\docs\Calendar\docs\examples ERROR: failed to mkdir C:\php\pear\docs\Config\docs
This is because XAMPP doesn’t bother to configure pear, so, assuming you installed XAMPP in D:\xampp , do
D: to switch to that partition, then cd D:\xampp\php pear config-set doc_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\docs pear config-set cfg_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\cfg pear config-set data_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\data pear config-set cache_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\cache pear config-set download_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\download pear config-set temp_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\temp pear config-set test_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\tests pear config-set www_dir d:\xampp\php\pear\www
That’s good enough for pear.
Conclusion
All in all I’m pretty happy with that setup, and I keep improving it slowly, of course, I’m open to suggestions ;)
Cheers! |
5:40 p.m.: Some good news, there have no reports of deaths or significant injuries from Tupelo.
Tupelo Mayor on @weatherchannel : No reports of death in city, non-life threatening injuries. — Andrew Freedman (@afreedma) April 28, 2014
However, multiple counties remain under tornado warnings in Mississippi and Alabama and environmental conditions will continue to support violent, rotating thunderstorm formation for the next few hours.
A large tornado up to a mile wide, with an unmistakable signature of producing debris on radar, is moving through Louisville, Miss.
BREAKING: Large wedge tornado on the ground near Louisville, Mississippi. via @weatherchannel pic.twitter.com/D2H5UY2E4b — NBC Nightly News (@NBCNightlyNews) April 28, 2014
4:33pm: If you live in Louisville you should already be in your shelter. This tornado has caused tremendous damage across Winston County! — NWS Jackson MS (@NWSJacksonMS) April 28, 2014
Tornado emergency: Radar shows debris signature over Louisville, MS at 2:40 pm CT pic.twitter.com/vjYzINXoTQ — BuzzFeed Storm (@BuzzFeedStorm) April 28, 2014
This is our last update for now, but we may resume updates later if needed… To keep up with the storms, I suggest following the links below:
Resources to track storms: Latest warnings | Jackson, Miss. radar | Columbus Air Force Base, Miss. radar | Regional Radar
Twitter feeds to follow: @capitalweather | @wcl_shawn | @afreedma | @ericholthaus | @wxbrad | @stormchaster4850 | @TWCBreaking | @28storms | @BuzzFeedStorm
5:20 p.m.: A large and dangerous tornado is on the ground in Winston County, Miss. This is likely the same tornado discussed in the 4:57 p.m. update. It is headed towards the town of Louisville, Miss – where a tornado emergency is in effect. Here’s a photo:
5:15 p.m.: The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) reports extensive damage in and around Tupelo.
MEMA is getting reports of extensive damage in and around Tupelo. A shelter will be opening at the Bancorp South… http://t.co/qCZhZ8HsaC — MSEMA (@MSEMA) April 28, 2014
5:10 p.m.: The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center warns the significant tornado threat will last several more hours in northeast Mississippi and northwest Alabama:
ALIGNMENT OF THE STORM INITIATION AND SPACING OF THE STORMS IN CENTRAL MS SUGGEST THAT THESE STORMS WILL REMAIN DISCRETE FOR SEVERAL HOURS…SUPPORTING THE POTENTIAL FOR LONG-TRACK TORNADOES.
5:05 p.m.: Here’s storm chaser video of the large tornado that raked the Tupelo area earlier:
4:57 p.m.: Tornado-warned thunderstorm northwest of Philadelphia, Miss. (for Attala and Leake county) shows extremely intense rotation; the National Weather Service is cautioning “complete destruction” of cars, businesses and homes possible with this storm:
Fierce rotation in #supercell northwest of Philadelphia, MS 4:52p EDT pic.twitter.com/cdVbqXPHJA — Greg Postel (@GregPostel) April 28, 2014
4:55 p.m.: Before and after view of gas station destroyed by tornado near Tupelo, Miss.:
Wow | Just created this before/after pic of #tornado damage at Shell Station in Tupelo #MSwx Google/@Charles_Loring pic.twitter.com/mbv7h1M66A — Shawn Reynolds (@WCL_Shawn) April 28, 2014
4:48 p.m.: Look at this infrared satellite view of the storms erupting over Mississippi into southern Tennessee.
4:38 p.m.: Eight tornado warnings are active from central Mississippi to northwest Alabama. More damage pics out of Tupelo:
This is Vanellis in Tupelo where I work. Everyone is safe. Praising God for His hand of mercy over my coworkers. pic.twitter.com/2iyDneDy9O — Brandy Davis (@brandydavis01) April 28, 2014
4:23 p.m.: Watch: Flustered Tupelo TV meteorologist (WTVA) evacuates studio as large tornado bears down
4:12 p.m.: More damage/images out of Tupelo.
I think images are about to get worse out of Tupelo. The debris ball was insane on radar. pic.twitter.com/csuA8ikkmX — Tate Harrington (@TheTateProject) April 28, 2014
Just witnessed this massive wedge near Tupelo, MS. pic.twitter.com/Ix4GaOn9Km — Jenn Brindley (JBe) (@JBePhotography) April 28, 2014
4:09 p.m.: Parts of 11 counties in Mississippi are under tornado warnings.
4:03 p.m.: A large, damaging tornado has reportedly tracked through the Tupelo, Miss. area. Some tweets:
RT @stormchaser4850: DEVELOPING: Trained spotter reports several tractor trailers blown off highways in Tupelo, #MS (2:50 pm CDT) — Capital Weather Gang (@capitalweather) April 28, 2014
BREAKING: First pic of Tupelo, MS #tornado damage coming in #MSwx RT @stevenheicher: MAJOR damage in North Tupelo. pic.twitter.com/MfxLn7vZ1X — Shawn Reynolds (@WCL_Shawn) April 28, 2014
Overview, 3:45 p.m.: Following Monday’s deadly tornado outbreak from Kansas to Arkansas, a new round of violent thunderstorms is erupting in the Southern U.S. Tornadoes have already developed and additional tornadoes will form through this evening, a few of which may be intense. Damaging winds and large hail will also accompany some storms.
The zone of greatest concern extends from northeast Louisiana through Mississippi into northwest Alabama and southern Tennessee where a “particularly dangerous situation” tornado watch has been issued. Strong tornadoes and hail to three inches in diameter could occur in this area (or have already), which includes Jackson, Miss., Tupelo, Miss. and Huntsville, Ala.
Particularly dangerous tornado watch area outlined in red. Red shaded polygons indicate active tornado warnings at 3:45 p.m. EDT. (SPC)
The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center has declared part of this region – from central Mississippi to northwest Arkansas – under a rare “high risk” of severe thunderstorms. This is the second straight day SPC has issued a “high risk” designation. It’s the first case of back-to-back high risk days since April 2011.
MT @EricHolthaus Just the 6th tornado outbreak in last 10 years with back-to-back high risks. — U.S. Tornadoes (@USTornadoes) April 28, 2014
“Confidence has increased in greater coverage of tornadoes, warranting the high risk upgrade,” writes SPC. “Significant tornadoes are expected.”
Significant tornado parameter (STP). Values greater than 1 have been associated with elevated risk of strong tornadoes (SPC)
Tornado watches have also been hoisted in 1) eastern Tennessee, extreme eastern Kentucky, and extreme southwest Virginia – including Chattanooga, Knoxville, and Bristol, and 2) southern Iowa, western Illinois, and northwest Missouri – including St. Louis and Des Moines.
Tornado watches in effect as 3:45 p.m. EDT (SPC)
Numerous tornado warnings, for either doppler-indicated tornadoes and/or tornadoes spotted on the ground – were in effect as of 3:45 p.m.
Link: Active tornado warnings
Across the lower 48 states, more than 45 million are under an elevated risk of severe thunderstorms today.
Areas under elevated risk of severe thunderstorms (slight, moderate or high) in yellow, red, and pink-shaded areas (SPC)
A strong upper level low pressure system over the Plains is pumping extremely moist, unstable air into South out of the Gulf of Mexico. Meanwhile, changing winds with height – or strong wind shear – due a strong high-altiude jet stream charging into the region from the west – is helping developing storms rotate and turn tornadic.
You can track the storm activity on the interactive map below. |
Israel's sports minister has defended the country’s travel restrictions against Palestinian football players in a letter to FIFA president Sepp Blatter, citing security concerns.
Tel Aviv indicates potential attacks by Palestinian militants as the pretext for the prohibitive travel rules that affect most Palestinians, including athletes. Israel has barred travel between the West Bank and Gaza – territories located on opposite ends of Israel which Palestinians seek to include in a future state.
Israeli sports minister Limor Livnat said to Blatter in the letter that Israel would allow Palestinian athletes to “exit and enter for the purpose of sports, excluding occasions in which there are attempts to make use of sports in order to injure or threaten the security of our citizens.”
Livnat said Israel detained Palestinian national team player Sameh Maraabeh in April based on suspicion over a meeting with a “military activist” of the Islamic militant group Hamas during his team’s training in Qatar. She alleged that Maraabeh took funding, a mobile phone, and a written message from the activist. He remains in detention.
“I am confident you will find this information worrisome and constituting clear evidence of the misuse of sports in a fashion that threatens the security of Israeli civilians,” Livnat wrote, according to AP.
The Palestine Football Association had previously called on the FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) Congress to suspend Israel from FIFA until it relieves the restrictions on Palestinian players.
FIFA is to meet in Sao Paulo, Brazil on Tuesday and Wednesday this week ahead of the World Cup tournament beginning Thursday.
In May, Blatter attempted to bring the two sides together during a trip to Jerusalem and the West Bank. He has called on the parties to “separate politics and sports” and to find a way to allow Palestinian players to travel.
In her letter to Blatter, Livnat also accused Jibril Rajoub, head of the Palestinian Football Association, of incitement against Israel.
Rajoub has described Israel as the “bully of the neighborhood,” and called on FIFA to levy sanctions against Tel Aviv for policies toward Palestinians.
Those policies include delaying or preventing visiting athletes and sports delegations from entering the West Bank and blocking some Palestinian players from leaving Gaza, according to Palestinian officials.
Jamal Mahmoud, head coach of the Palestinian national team, said he is not aware of a meeting between Maraabeh and Hamas during the team’s training in Qatar.
“If he did talk to a member of Hamas, it was his own individual decision,” Mahmoud said.
Palestinian football officials are trying to secure a location for training before the 2015 Asian Cup. The final location depends on Israeli permission based on movements of players in and between Palestinian territories.
“The hope from these discussions is that Israel treats our Palestinian players and those responsible for our Palestinian players by the national law and the charter per the agreement with FIFA,” said Ghassan Jaradat, media director for the Palestine Football Association. |
This is the first article to kick off our new Debian column here on OMG! Ubuntu!
Ever since the release of Debian 6.0 “Squeeze”, there’s an ongoing debate about whether Debian is still relevant or whether the project is going to die.
It all started with Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols (and the discussion continued here and here). It’s not the first time I see sensationalism from his part and I can’t really blame him for that… however I want to react to his article.
After some bashing concerning the exclusion of non-free firmwares (and some praise of the new BSD variants), he concludes:
Ubuntu […] is now the ground-breaking Linux distribution that Debian once was.
He goes on with “At the same time, Ubuntu is continuing to expand the Linux audience, while Debian continues to be a system that only hard-core Debian Linux fans will use“.
While it’s true that many innovations find their root in Ubuntu, it’s not always the case. There is a lot of stuff happening in Debian, and Ubuntu is glad that this is the case. One must not forget what Mark Shuttleworth once said:
Debian is the rock upon which Ubuntu is built.
Yes, Ubuntu benefits from Debian and Debian benefits from Ubuntu. Ubuntu would not exist without Debian (74% of the Ubuntu packages come straight from Debian)… thus if Ubuntu is relevant, then Debian can only be relevant!
Now is Debian only intended for hard-core Linux fans? Definitely not!
It’s true that the firmware change will create problems for some, but users are not really left out in the cold. They are warned during upgrade or during the installation process. Furthermore it’s not very difficult to find an installation media that includes non-free firmwares, Debian is even providing one (it’s labeled unofficial to avoid any confusion).
Myself I have seen many Ubuntu users and contributors switch to Debian when they become more experienced with Linux. As long as the relationship between Debian and Ubuntu works, this is a benefit for everybody since any improvement to Debian means an improvement for Ubuntu (and for the dozens of other Debian derivatives!).
It’s also in this spirit that OMG! Ubuntu! Editor Benjamin approached the Debian Project for a “Debian column” on OMG! Ubuntu. The project was very welcoming and myself and another Debian contributor have been accepted as authors, so expect more articles from me in the future.
About the author: Raphaël Hertzog is a Debian developer, he works on the package manager (dpkg) and teaches Debian/Ubuntu technologies on his blog apt-get install debian-wizard. |
Started as a fun deck to play with the cards I've picked up getting into the game, and buying some boosters, fatpacks, and event decks. Since then, I've done some trading, designing, and even ordered a few cards.
Basically, I love Deathtouch/Trample as a combo, and I can achieve that with Nylea, God of the Hunt and Bow of Nylea , if I can get them both out. I also have a good bunch of strong creatures with trample already, so I don't have to rely on any one card in the deck.
Ruric Thar, the Unbowed from the sideboard is fantastic against almost all heavy non-creature users.Most of these cards are fillers for now, and I have a separate deck on TappedOut that I design and play with, which is what I am trying to make this into.
Feel free to come with suggestions |
Josh Harris and David Blitzer pictured in 2013 when they were annouced as co-owners of the New Jersey Devils
Sky Sports News HQ understands that a group of American businessmen, led by Josh Harris and David Blitzer, have agreed a £100m deal to buy a controlling stake in Crystal Palace.
The deal, finally signed off in the United States on Wednesday night, sees 70 per cent of Palace shares changing hands - with chairman Steve Parish retaining an equal shareholding of 18 per cent alongside Harris and Blitzer.
The Americans, who own the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers and the NHL's New Jersey Devils, will invest a further £50m on expanding and improving Selhurst Park and supplementing the playing squad.
And Parish told Sky Sports: "Josh, David and I will control the club, and then the guys who were in before, who've been brilliant, will reduce their share-hold.
"It's a new era for the club. We need to be clear about that. The ownership structure is changing, but I still have day-to-day control and can stop anything from happening.
"I've built a good relationship with Josh and David over the last couple of years. We are getting fresh capital and fresh ideas into the club, and that does come with a say.
"They're not here for the ride, they are part of the executive management of the club along with me. But I can assure people that I wouldn't have let people into the club if they couldn't add a lot of value."
The US deal, more than 18 months in the making, is bigger than previously thought and the £50m investment may just be the first phase.
Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish will retain an equal shareholding
This latest agreement will see Parish maintain an 18 per cent stake-holding, which will be matched by both the Americans in an executive general partnership.
All three will have controlling or executive powers with Parish continuing to run the club on a day-to-day basis.
Parish's existing partners Stephen Browett, Jeremy Hosking and Martin Long will also continue as shareholders.
SSN HQ understands Parish, who helped rescue the club from bankruptcy in 2010, has been keen throughout negotiations for all new investors to sign up to a reinvestment plan for the Selhurst Park stadium.
Selhurst Park is set to be redeveloped after new investment
Plans to redevelop the stadium are at an advanced stage, but Parish has needed more money to speed up the process.
SSN HQ understands lawyers for all sides finally agreed the deal in the early hours, although final paperwork remains on both sides of the Atlantic - with an official announcement expected from Palace later on Thursday.
The final agreements would still require Premier League approval, however. |
Listen to a narrated version of this essay:
One of the smaller ironies in my life has been teaching Henry David Thoreau at an Ivy League school for half a century. Asking young people to read Thoreau can make me feel like Victor Frankenstein, waiting for a bolt of lightning: look, it’s moving, it’s alive, it’s alive! Most students are indifferent—they memorize, regurgitate, and move serenely on, untouched. Those bound for Wall Street often yawn or snicker at his call to simplify, to refuse, to resist. Perhaps a third of them react with irritation, shading into hatred. How dare he question the point of property, the meaning of wealth? The smallest contingent, and the most gratifying, are those who wake to his message.
Late adolescence is a fine time to meet a work that jolts. These days, Ayn Rand’s stock is stratospheric, J. D. Salinger’s, once untouchable, in decline. WASPs of any gender continue to weep at A River Runs Through It, and first-generation collegians still thrill to Gatsby, even when I remind them that Jay is shot dead in his gaudy swimming pool. In truth, films move them far more; they talk about The Matrix the way my friends once discussed Hemingway or Kerouac. But Walden can still start a fight. The only other book that possesses this galvanizing quality is Moby-Dick.
Down the decades, more than a few students have told me that in bad times they return to Thoreau, hoping for comfort, or at least advice. After the electoral map bled red last fall, I went to him for counsel too, but found mostly controversy. In this bicentennial year of Thoreau’s birth, Walden, or Life in the Woods (1854) is still our most famous antebellum book, and in American history he is the figure who most speaks for nature. The cultural meme of the lone seeker in the woods has become Thoreau’s chief public legacy: regrettable for him, dangerous for us.
The Walden we think we know offers an unnamed narrator, weary of town life, who builds a small house by a woodland pond. There he lives for a year in solitude, observing inner and outer weather. (Or possibly she lives, since we never learn the narrator’s gender.) Early on, the author says these pages address “poor students,” yet Walden is also a midlife dream of solitude, a daring act of therapy in which an older writer revisits a headstrong, often pompous early self. This doubled narrative, both memoir and spiritual journey, never ranges more than a few miles from the family home in Concord, Massachusetts, or costs more than 30 startup dollars—$28.12, to be exact (he kept accounts); in today’s currency, about $730.
Who among us would not benefit from 12 bargain months of freedom? In real life, Thoreau never got that time. The small house by the pond—he always calls it a house, not a hut or cabin—was a literary lab for free days and weekends, intended from the first as a temporary structure, as its sand cellar and rough-laid foundation attest. Philosopher lairs were fashionable then, in England and America; antebellum Concord had several. In his front yard, Bronson Alcott reposed in a bower of branches, hoping for admirers. The chief local celebrity, Ralph Waldo Emerson, planned a retreat for the woodlot he owned on Walden. He hacked brush and imagined designs until he lost interest and let Thoreau use the site instead. For years Emerson had hired his serious young neighbor as handyman, editorial assistant, and au pair; his casual question when Thoreau finished college—“Do you keep a journal?”—altered the course of American letters. Privately, Emerson thought Thoreau had no thirst for success. Perhaps a pond sojourn, demonstrating Transcendentalist virtues, would prove a useful advertisement, for mentor and acolyte both.
Today, Walden and its woodlands form a state park in metro Boston, with nearly 500,000 annual visitors, but in July 1845, its shores were a dismal mix of stump-cut lots, old industrial sites, and squatter shacks. When the 28-year-old Thoreau sat reading in the doorway of his recycled chicken coop, the water views he loved were framed by telegraph poles. Wind singing in the wires delighted him, an upwelling of the life invisible. He called the wires his telegraph harp, seeing them as analogs to the Aeolian harps often placed in town windows. “I put my ear to one of the posts,” he told his Journal in 1851, “… and it seemed to me as if every pore of the wood was filled with music, labored with the strain—as if every fibre was affected and being seasoned or timed, rearranged according to a new and more harmonious law.”
At the opening of Walden, he writes, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” Death was on his mind: he went to the pond planning to write an entirely different book, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, which recounts a trip with his beloved brother, John, who died in 1842 of lockjaw.
Walden is a literary accident. It began as a ragbag of recycled talks, scrapped bits of essays, and a great deal of personal venting. Many passages seem addressed to an invisible companion. Midway through his pond sojourn, Thoreau spent a night in the Concord jail for refusing to pay a poll tax that funded, in his view, a pro-slavery war with Mexico. After someone (possibly an aunt) paid his fine, he went to climb mountains in Maine. Caught in a storm high on Mount Katahdin, he took shelter near a patch of burnt forest, where the sight of regenerating foliage filled him with wonder: “The solid earth! The actual world! The common sense!” Thoreau rarely used italics or exclamations, but in this passage from The Maine Woods, he needed half a dozen to accept loss and seize life. “Contact! Contact! Who are we? Where are we?”
The two experiences, jail and mountain, became fodder for public lectures, but they also transmuted Walden from parochial rant into cosmic encounter. As literary historian J. Lyndon Shanley demonstrated in the early 1970s, that evolution required numerous distinct drafts, over nearly a decade. You can see the book’s outline, rising like a trout to the surface, in other early writings: his Journal entries on hoeing beans and plastering a house; a lecture on “getting a living” that argues for a simple life; a survey map of the pond, hinting at its unseen depths.
In autumn 1847, the year he turned 30, Thoreau left the pond house and never returned. A Week appeared in 1849. Its attempt to combine moral discourse with travel narrative was high-flown and digressive, and the book failed. Thoreau had to pay for unsold copies, hauling the loose sheets home from the railway in a wheelbarrow. (“I have now a library of nearly nine hundred volumes,” he confided to his Journal, “over seven hundred of which I wrote myself.”) To cover his publishing debts, he became a surveyor. Soon he was Concord’s most trusted practitioner, an experience that helped him improve his family’s manufacturing business and also understand his three-river town as an ecosystem, something quite new in Western thought.
The failure of A Week meant postponing his vague plans for Walden. Private Journal entries occupied more of his time and grew into a masterpiece of natural observation, often mined for the pond book. Yet as generations of irritated readers have discovered, Walden remains a bifurcated, even schizophrenic, text, with one of the worst openings in literature. Concord had many fine stylists—Nathaniel Hawthorne, Margaret Fuller, Bronson Alcott—but Thoreau seems to have shown the manuscript to no one, except perhaps his sister Sophia, and even the Journal holds few hints of the accreting book. Thus Walden’s initial chapter, “Economy,” is overlong, dated, and harsh, a warmed-over early lecture barely hinting at a later self, as when he casts his life as a mystic search for a lost hound, a bay horse, and a turtledove. (“You will pardon some obscurities, for there are more secrets in my trade than in most men’s, and yet not voluntarily kept, but inseparable from its very nature.”)
Sometimes I urge students who detest “Economy” to skip to the book’s second beginning, “Where I Lived, and What I Lived For.” From that point, his real theme, the life of secrets, of learning from writing, flows unimpeded, launched by the announcement that two years at the pond will appear as one, a signal that he has left literal history—and entered the realm of fable. Thoreau’s favorite narrative schemes are the journey and the calendar. Walden blends both, as time becomes a summer stream, its current sliding toward eternity.
Walden is also a relentlessly sociable narrative, crowded with encounter, incident, and remembered conversation. The chapter “Reading” prompts us to study every text “deliberately and reservedly,” since words are “the work of art nearest to life itself.” “Sounds” explores the language that “all things and events speak without metaphor,” sensed in moments of revelation. “Solitude” brings an entirely new sense of self—“This is a delicious evening, when the whole body is one sense, and imbibes delight through every pore”—and poses not commands but subversive questions: “Shall I not have intelligence with the earth? Am I not partly leaves and vegetable mould myself?”
Fall chill awakens his sense of place as a crucial mystery. Visits to “The Village” mean walks home along dark paths, guided by instinct; the adventure of isolation makes him feel lost yet found, better able to “realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations,” whether those neighbors are muskrats or barbershop gossips. “The Ponds” examines Walden’s paradoxes. Both wild place and working waterscape, it is deep and pure, with no visible inlet or outlet; a shimmering, beguiling surface cloaks depths said to be bottomless. “It is Earth’s eye,” he decides, “looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.” The book turns on this discovery: that our identity is what we are able to behold.
In “Higher Laws” Thoreau questions our drive to kill and eat animals, and by extension our appetite for violence and possession. The only true America, he tells an immigrant neighbor, is one where we are at liberty to do without. By late fall he turns to “Brute Neighbors” to learn survival. As he rows on Walden’s dark waters, a single loon teases him, diving and ducking, leading him always to the pond’s enigmatic center.
Winter brings dormancy and reflection. In “House-Warming” Thoreau stocks his woodpile; in “Former Inhabitants; and Winter Visitors” he explores ruins and cellar-holes to recall Walden as a traditional refuge for town outcasts. Finding a barred owl asleep on a branch, he rouses it to fly away to a higher perch, “where he might in peace await the dawning of his day,” like other “Winter Animals.”
In the final cold month we reach the book’s climax, as Thoreau turns to “The Pond in Winter.” On icy mornings he wakes to ask of purpose and place, “as what—how—when—where?” He watches ice gangs, a hundred strong, harvest five tons in three weeks, for shipment to Bombay and Calcutta. He also conducts the first-ever formal survey of Walden, charting its length and breadth, then sounding its depths. As the loon foretold, the lines cross at the deepest point, 102 feet. He reasons that a great “law of average” prevails everywhere, just as the profile of hill and cove mirror the unseen bottom, the harmonies of fact and spirit again revealed.
As his year’s circle closes, that balance repeats in the equinox of “Spring,” when a day epitomizes a year, passing evenly through the cycle of light and dark. On a slope cut by the railway, least romantic of landscapes, he sees thawed and flowing mud shape complex patterns of “sand foliage,” proof that the lowliest elements, patiently observed, evolve into thrilling creation, from leaves to bodies to words. “The very globe,” he exclaims, “continually transcends and translates itself, and becomes winged in its orbit.” To love the earth is a private and a public good, he sees at last, for in “our own recovered innocence we discern the innocence of our neighbors. … Only that day dawns to which we are awake.” The self-involved lecturer has evolved. He shuts his door and returns to town, saying only, “I had several more lives to live.”
When published, Walden caused barely a ripple. One of its few reviews came from England, a nation with little use for American prose. The British reader praised Walden’s “great beauty” and its “deep poetic sensibility.” That notice was signed “George Eliot.”
Thoreau lived to write far more than Walden. His blueprint for radical reform, the 1848 essay “Resistance to Civil Government,” commonly known as “Civil Disobedience,” directly shaped world history, thanks to such admirers as Gandhi, King, and Mandela. His private labors as a philosophical naturalist are finally receiving their due as well. Concord friends dismissed his daily walks as eccentricity, especially when he tucked plant specimens inside his “botany box,” a large floppy hat; half the town demanded that he organize their pleasure sails, picnics, and berry-picking parties. (“Ask me for a certain number of dollars if you will,” Thoreau grumbled to his Journal, “but do not ask me for my afternoons.”) What peers considered pointless rambles, climatologists now see as priceless research. Thoreau’s detailed studies of Concord rivers, streams, and ponds have brought belated appreciation of his role as America’s first limnologist, just as his scrupulous botanical records have become essential to the study of global warming.
Thoreau died of tuberculosis at 44, one year into the Civil War. He never saw Europe, or anywhere west of Minnesota or south of Philadelphia. We wonder what he might have done with more time; had Sam Clemens also died at that age, we would not have Life on the Mississippi, Connecticut Yankee, or Huckleberry Finn. Thoreau had no taste for fiction and was an indifferent poet, but he wrote sharp character studies, and his travel books about Canada, Maine, and Cape Cod show a gift for story structure, pinned to the ways that landforms shape journeys. He might have tackled Reconstruction and its effects on freed slaves and natural resources, or toured California, like Whitman and Emerson, or investigated Native American cultures (his last words were “Moose” and “Indian”). Most likely, he would have continued as a devoted observer of Concord and its natural history. His late-career speculations on the dispersal and succession of plants, if completed, could have rivaled Darwin’s, for Thoreau was an early, avid reader of Origin of Species, and the first American to field-test its ideas.
Our times have never needed the shock of Thoreau more. We face a government eager to kill all measures of natural protection in the name of corporate profit. Elected officials openly bray that environmentalism “is the greatest threat to freedom.” On federal, state, and local levels, civil liberties and free speech are under severe attack. Thoreau is too; the barriers to reading him as a voice of resistance—or reading him at all—are multiplying swiftly.
First, he is becoming an unperson. From the 1920s to the early 2000s, Walden was required reading in hundreds of thousands of U.S. high school and college survey courses. Today, Thoreau is taught far less widely. The intricate prose of Walden is a tough read in the age of tweets, so much so that several “plain English” translations are now marketed. “Civil Disobedience” was a major target of McCarthyite suppression in the 1950s, and may be again.
Second, as F. Scott Fitzgerald said, in the end authors write for professors, and the scholarly fate of Thoreau is clouded. Until the postwar era, Thoreau studies were largely left to enthusiasts. Academic criticism now argues for many versions of Thoreau (manic-depressive, gay, straight, misogynist, Marxist, Catholic, Buddhist, faerie-fixated). But other aspects still await full study: the family man, the man of spirituality, the man of science—and the man who wrote the Journal.
Those who study his peers, such as Emerson, Melville, or Dickinson, routinely examine each author’s entire output. Thoreau scholars have yet to deal fully or consistently with the Journal, which runs longer than two million words (many still unpublished), and fills 47 manuscript volumes, or 7,000 pages. It is the great untold secret of American letters, and also the distorting lens of Thoreau studies.
I spent years reading manuscript pages of the Journal, watching Thoreau’s insights take form, day upon day, as unmediated prose experiments. Unlike Emerson’s volumes, arrayed in topical order, Thoreau’s Journal follows time. Some notations arise from his surveying jobs, hiking through fields and pausing to note discoveries: a blooming plant, a foraging bird, the look of tree-shadows on water. His eye and mind are relentless. Although the entries are in present tense and seem written currente calamo, offhandedly, with the pen running on, in fact he worked from field notes, usually the next day, turning ground-truth into literature. He finds a riverbank hollow of frost crystals, and replicates exactly how they look, at a distance and then closer, imagining how they formed. His interest is in the objects, but also in how a subject perceives them—the phenomenology of observation and learning. He finds a mushroom, phallus impudicus, in the form of a penis: “Pray, what was Nature thinking of when she made this? She almost puts herself on a level of those who draw in privies.” His father’s pig escapes and leads its pursuers all over town, helpless before the animal’s cunning. He watches snowflakes land on his coat sleeve: “And they all sing, melting as they sing, of the mysteries of the number six; six, six, six.” None of these entries reached print; they celebrate instead the gift of writing.
Third, Thoreau’s literary genes have split and recombined in our culture, with disturbing results. Organic hipster? Off-the-grid prepper? His popular image has become both blurred and politicized. If Thoreau as American eco-hero peaked around the first Earth Day (1970), today he is derided by conservatives who detest his anti-business sentiments and by postmodern thinkers for whom nature is a suspect green blur. (I still recall one faculty meeting at which a tenured English professor dismissed DNA as all right, “if you believe in that sort of thing.”)
Thoreau has always had detractors, even among his friends. Emerson’s delicate, vicious smear job at his funeral, a masterly takedown in eulogy form that enraged family and friends, set the pattern for enemies like James Russell Lowell (though happily not Lowell’s goddaughter, Virginia Woolf). Our own period sensibilities can flinch when confronted with Thoreaus we did not expect—the efficient capitalist, improving graphite mixes for the family pencil works; the schoolmaster who caned nine pupils at random, then quit in a fury; the early Victorian who may have chosen chastity because his brother John never lived a full life. (Henry’s most explicit statement on the subject of sex, even in the Journal: “I fell in love with a shrub oak.”)
Yet lately I have noted a new wave of loathing. When witnesses to his life still abounded, the prime criticism of Thoreau was Not Genteel. Now, the tag is Massive Hypocrite. Reader comments on Goodreads and Amazon alone are a deluge of angry, misspelled assertions that Thoreau was a rich-boy slacker, a humorless, arrogant, lying elitist. In the trolling of Thoreau by the digital hive mind, the most durable myth is Cookies-and-Laundry: that Thoreau, claiming independence at Walden, brought his washing home to his mother, and enjoyed her cooking besides. Claims by Concord neighbors that he was a pie-stealing layabout appear as early as the 1880s; Emerson’s youngest son felt compelled to rebut them, calling his childhood friend wise, gentle, and lovable.
The most recent eruption is “Pond Scum,” a 2015 New Yorker piece of fractal wrongness by Kathryn Schulz, who paints Thoreau as cold, parochial, egotistical, incurious, misanthropic, illogical, naïve, and cruel—and misses the real story of Walden, his journey from alienation to insight. I have spent a lifetime with Thoreau. I neither love nor hate him, but I know him well. I tracked down his papers, lived in Concord, walked his trails, repeated his journeys, and read, twice, the full Journal. I knew we were in the realm of alternative facts when Schulz dismissed Thoreau as “a well-off Harvard-educated man without dependents.” For that misreading alone, Schulz stands as the Kellyanne Conway of Thoreau commentary. He was the first in his family to attend college, a minority admit (owing to regional bias against French names), working-class to the bone, and after John’s death, the one son, obliged to support his family’s two businesses, boarding house and pencil factory—inhaling graphite dust from the latter fatally weakened his lungs. He was graduated from Harvard, yes, but into a wrenching depression, the Panic of 1837, and during Walden stays, he washed his dishes, floors, and laundry with cold pond water.
Did he go home often? Of course, because his father needed help at the shop. Did he do laundry in town? We do not know, but as the only surviving son of aging
boardinghouse-keepers, Thoreau was no stranger to the backbreaking, soul-killing round of 19th-century commercial domestic labor. He knew no other life until he made another one, at Walden.
Pushback on “Pond Scum” was swift and gratifying, and gifted critics such as Donovan Hohn, Jedediah Purdy, and Rebecca Solnit, who have written so well on Thoreau, reassure me that as his third century opens, intelligent readers will continue to find him. But the path to Walden is, increasingly, neglected and overgrown. I constantly meet undergraduates who have never hiked alone, held an after-school job, or lived off schedule. They don’t know the source of milk or the direction of north. They really don’t like to unplug. In seminars, they look up from Walden in cautious wonder: “Can you even say this?” Thoreau worries them; he smells of resistance and of virtue. He is powerfully, compulsively original. He will not settle.
What is the future of reading Thoreau? That depends on how well we absorb his advice on resisting predation and falsity, but also on our ability to take science to heart, as he did. Thoreau is a prophet of the Anthropocene. His awareness that Walden was lovely yet broken speaks to our moment, when PCBs and Spam cans foul the Marianas Trench, Antarctica melts, pollinator drones may replace dying bees, and the cumulative weight of industrialism deforms the earth’s surface. The cold, clear Walden he knew is silted now with heavy metals, radioactive traces, and industrial phosphorous. “What use is a house,” Thoreau wrote a friend in 1860, “if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?”
I am certain that he would have loved parts of our era: the miracle of music on demand, the wonder (especially to a surveyor) of GPS, the wealth of YouTube nature videos. He would have loved the power of databases and admired current attempts to make Walden interdisciplinary and hyperlinked, in order to translate and visualize his narrative for a text-averse world.
In the world that trained me, official literary and historical editions mattered hugely. They were the new scriptoria, creating perfect renditions and textual genealogies of each significant corpus of American papers for posterity. But posterity is here, and manuscript curators may need instead to take their cue from the impromptu gangs of coders who recently worked around the clock for a month to save NASA earth-science data before the new government could erase it all, gag the federal scientists, and shutter the research programs.
For a long while, we editors thought our big problem was going to be succession. Ten years ago, the Thoreau Edition board held a national search for a new project head, and could find no qualified candidate. Not one. Now we face a sudden darkness, as elected officials bay for an end to humanities budgets. I well recall the convoluted application process for National Endowment for the Humanities funding, and also how that money gave the Thoreau Edition, and its many peers, the luxury of getting it right. Perhaps scholars and students who care about the literary record should scan the hundreds of manuscript pages of still-unedited Thoreau, release it all onto the Internet, and crowdsource the job of transcription, one page per reader. If the Congress is ready to send the stately papers of Jefferson, Madison, and Lincoln into oblivion, expect no mercy for the Concord dissenter, even if Emerson did, in the end, say that “no truer American existed than Thoreau.”
Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the machine, he urges in “Civil Disobedience.” Roused readers are formidable; reading Thoreau is one American privilege still open to us all. Let us make sure it stays that way. |
Payments Start For N.C. Eugenics Victims, But Many Won't Qualify
Enlarge this image toggle caption Eric Mennel/WUNC Eric Mennel/WUNC
Debra Blackmon was about to turn 14 in January 1972, when two social workers came to her home.
Court and medical documents offer some details about what happened that day. Blackmon was "severely retarded," they note, and had "psychic problems" that made her difficult to manage during menstruation.
Her parents were counseled during the visit, and it was deemed in Blackmon's best interest that she be sterilized.
Blackmon is among the more than 7,000 people in North Carolina — many poor, many African-American, many disabled — who were sterilized between 1929 and 1976 in one of the country's most aggressive eugenics programs.
North Carolina passed a law to compensate victims of the state-run program last year. This week, the state sent out the first checks to qualified applicants. But Blackmon, like many others who are fighting for restitution, is not among them.
Blackmon, now 56, has a hard time with the details of that day in 1972 — but she does remember a few things from her trip to Charlotte Memorial Hospital. "My daddy said, 'Don't hurt this baby.' And he was crying," she recalls.
Latoya Adams, Blackmon's niece, grew up knowing her aunt had been sterilized. But, she says, "we didn't find out until recently the extent — exactly what all they did to her." After the compensation law passed, she went looking for documentation — and came back with a mother lode: a court order, names of social workers and the entire procedure, outlined from pre-op to discharge.
The doctor had labeled it a "eugenics sterilization." And while it was it relief to have the information, she says, it was also remarkably sad.
They were telling my grandparents that the surgery was going to be minimally invasive. They told them it would be a tubal ligation. And they [wound] up doing a full abdominal hysterectomy — on a 14-year-old.
"They were telling my grandparents that the surgery was going to be minimally invasive. They told them it would be a tubal ligation. And they [wound] up doing a full abdominal hysterectomy — on a 14-year-old," Adams says.
With all this evidence, Adams and her family thought they had a case. They filed the paperwork, and waited to hear back. The news wasn't good.
"The denial letter, the only thing it really stated was that there were no records found and that her case was not approved by the North Carolina Eugenics Board," Adams says.
The problem lies in a technicality.
The new compensation law says, to be eligible, operations have to have occurred under the state's Eugenics Board. As it turns out, the board very likely wasn't aware of all the sterilizations taking place. Judges and social service workers were greenlighting sterilizations, as well.
"That's kind of become the fundamental problem here," says Bob Bollinger, an attorney representing Blackmon and a few other people who say they are victims.
"You have some old dusty filing cabinet in Raleigh that's full of Eugenics Board paperwork from decades ago, but yet you've got all these people who got sterilized involuntarily, where it was instigated at the local level and their paperwork didn't wind up being preserved in the eugenics files in Raleigh — if it was ever there to begin with," he says.
Graham Wilson, a spokesman for the North Carolina Industrial Commission, which decides who qualifies for compensation from the $10 million fund, says, "A lot of people may have had this done under the auspices of local county groups. They're not qualified," he says.
"They may think they're qualified, and obviously they had this procedure done to them," he says. "But if it was not done under the Eugenics Board of North Carolina, then they're not qualified."
Lawyers working with victims estimate hundreds of people — people like Blackmon — could fall into this category.
Blackmon's operation was ordered by a judge who was part of the state court system. That judge cited a state law.
When asked if that, then, makes the state responsible, Wilson says, "That's kind of hard to say. Again, it's just an unfortunate part of our history. It's just something that was done. So it's kind of hard to say that the state would be responsible when it was just kind of an accepted practice."
"It's frustrating sometimes. It really is," Blackmon says.
She's not the only one frustrated. Her niece, Adams, says the denial feels like a double blow.
"Everything is there, but because you can't find a piece of paper saying it got approved by the North Carolina board, you're not gonna be compensated. I think it's sad. I really think it's sad. It's like, you've hurt her once before, but then now I feel like you're turning around and hurting her once again."
There is an appeals process, and Adams and Blackmon are working through that right now. As for people who will be compensated, the first half of the money went out this week --220 checks for $20,000 each. The rest will be disbursed next summer, after the approval process is complete. |
Mark Zuckerberg announced the latest update to streaming Gear VR 360° videos.
At Samsung’s Barcelona Unpacked event, Zuckerberg took to the stage and reiterated the strong partnership Samsung and Facebook both have with the Gear VR platform. Zuckerberg shared his excitement for the future potential of virtual reality and how both companies are ready for VR being “the next platform” and the “most social platform.”
When it comes to mobile VR experiences, the Samsung Gear VR is definitely the best option on the market right now. According to Zuckerberg, it is because it combines the best hardware from Samsung and the best software from Facebook’s Oculus.
Now according to Zuckerberg, the VR software for 360-degree video playback on the Gear VR is getting a pretty exciting new update. Over the next few weeks, the social network will update its 360-degree videos with “dynamic streaming” inside the Oculus Video player. If the update works like stated, the change will result in VR video that is higher quality and uses less data when being watched with a Gear VR headset.
Oculus introduces “dynamic streaming” for 360 VR video in the clip below:
“Dynamic streaming” means Facebook will process and store all of its 360° videos in multiple resolutions. So when you are watching the video, only the best version will be shown for the spot you’re actually looking at – the rest is a lower resolution file that’s automatically swapped out as you look left and right.
According to Zuckerberg, this means that Facebook will quadruple the resolution quality of 360° streaming video in VR, while also reducing the amount of required bandwidth by four times – giving us clearer and faster playback in this portable headset. Reduced network bandwidth is a needed optimization aside from quality considering videos will be watched on a smartphone that may not always have access to wifi.
Zuckerberg also gave us a few new stats to digest on stage, stating that over 1 million hours of video have been watched in the Gear VR to date. When it came to the social network, he shared that “over a million people are watching 360° videos every day on Facebook and over 20,000 360-degree videos have been uploaded to the platform.”
As Facebook works with Samsung to push the whole state of the technology forward, Zuckerberg ended by sharing that Facebook has created a “Social VR team” at Facebook. It is not clear exactly what that means considering Facebook is an inherently social company, but the idea is to explore the “future of social interaction in VR” with a team led by Mike Booth, best known as the designer of Left 4 Dead, and Daniel James, who worked on a multiplayer online game called Puzzle Pirates.
As other social platforms like Twitter and Snapchat start to explore integrating 360° video into their platforms, Facebook already has a head start leading the pack to continue evolving from 360° video to more interactive and social VR experiences for their users. |
THE SHELL TO Sea campaign has made fresh calls this morning for whistleblowers in to come forward to “expose malpractice and corruption” in the Shell gas project in Corrib, Co Mayo.
The call comes in the wake of the publication of the Guerin report last week in which serious concern was expressed about the way in which whistleblower allegations at one garda station were dealt with.
Speaking yesterday after two campaigners appeared in court on charges arising from a mass protest at the pipeline site, Shell to Sea’s Terence Conway said the group is asking whistleblowers from within the ranks of An Garda Síochána, Shell, Shell contractors and any State agency involved in facilitation the project to come forward.
One former Shell subcontractor alleged last year that it was tasked with providing local residents with items like tennis courts and television sets on behalf of Shell to keep them on side. The company also claimed it had delivered €35,000 worth of alcohol to Belmullet Garda Station in December 2007. The Garda Ombudsman is now investigating these allegations.
“Despite Shell’s many attempts at powerful spin and their continued handing out of beads and baubles, the final determination of the Corrib gas project is by no means a foregone conclusion,” Shell to Sea spokesperson Maura Harrington said. “There are a number high court cases yet to be heard, and along with the current unease of people all over the country, it remains to be seen how this saga will finally turn out”. |
KARACHI: While security officials claimed that they have eliminated the strongholds and infrastructure of the outlawed Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in Karachi, they are apprehensive about reports that the banned outfit was attempting to re-establish its financial network in the city in a bid to increase its capability to launch terrorist attacks.
The officials also claimed that although the capability of banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi had ‘almost’ been wiped out in Karachi, its activities were increasing particularly in upper Sindh with the help of “Afghans” and financial support from the militant Islamic State group.
They added that the IS did not have a “formal structure” anywhere in the country but there were reports it was operating in some parts of Sindh with the help of sectarian outfits and it reportedly attracted “educated militants” of Karachi.
The LJ militants who escaped from prison may target PSP, MQM workers in Karachi
The security officials assessed that the recent emergence of Ansarul Sharia Pakistan in Karachi — the outfit which was involved in a number of attacks targeting a former army official and several policemen — posed a serious threats to law enforcers.
In a recent analysis of threat perceptions in Sindh, the Counter-Terrorism Department assessed that the TTP’s infrastructure and capability had been severely eroded due to both Operation Zarb-i-Azb and the Karachi operation.
“They have largely been eradicated from the localities that were formerly under their control, such as Kunwari Colony and parts of Sohrab Goth,” the analysis said.
New TTP Karachi ‘emir’
But the CTD apprehended that by appointing Dawood Khan, a former police constable from the Quaidabad police station as their emir, or local chief, they indicated that Karachi remained a key battleground for them.
“The TTP was most likely to focus on re-establishing their financial support networks in Karachi and rebuilding the capability to launch large-scale attacks on public places or security forces,” feared the CTD.
The CTD claimed that LJ’s largest faction, the Naeem Bukhari group, had been almost completely eliminated in the provincial capital.
“While their ability to conduct large attacks has been mitigated, LJ retains a large support network and cadres in Karachi, who are most likely to either merge with other groups, such as IS, or create independent splinter cells to conduct targeted killings,” warned the CTD.
Regarding other parts of Sindh, the security officials apprehended that LJ was increasingly active there, operating largely through a network of veterans of Afghan training camps and their families, such as the Hafeez Brohi network.
“The ability, especially of Brohis, to move freely across the Sindh-Balochistan border means they can transport explosive materials and suicide bombers without hindrance.”
Citing intelligence reports that these sectarian outfits were “now receiving financial support from IS”, the CTD warned that if these groups joined hands then their capability was likely to be further enhanced, and an escalation in attacks in upper Sindh could be feared.
“They are likely to continue to target Shia community, Sufi shrines, and local political notables.”
The CTD also warned that such outfits might carry out attacks on venues like Garhi Khuda Bakhsh Bhutto.
Pointing out the recent escape of two high-profile LJ militants from the Karachi Central Prison, the CTD assessed that there was a possibility that the escaped militants might attempt to form a new cell to start targeted killings of Shias and workers of the Pak Sarzameen Party, Muttahida Qaumi Movement and other political parties.
IS operating through banned groups
The CTD claimed that IS did not have a “formal command and control structure” in Sindh or other parts of Pakistan but it appeared that it had preferred to act through either the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi al-Alami, with whom it had made a strategic alliance in Kandahar, or by co-opting local factions of LJ (such as the Hafeez Brohi network).
Regarding its possible presence in Karachi, the CTD assumed that young hardliners were likely to be attracted to the militant outfit’s global image.
“While these individuals will have lower capabilities than established terrorist groups, they will likely come from more educated backgrounds, and thus will be more innovative in planning terror attacks.”
About Ansarul Sharia Pakistan, the CTD believed that ideologically it was a new and independent group that did not owe its allegiance to either Al Qaeda or IS.
The group’s modus operandi was to go after “soft targets” affiliated with the security services.
The police feared that this new outfit might target personnel of security forces, particularly ‘soft targets’ such as retired personnel and patrolling teams of police and Rangers.
The CTD also claimed that there was compelling evidence that the banned Jeay Sindh Muttahida Mahaz (JSMM) and “Sindhi sub-nationalist groups” were receiving support from “hostile foreign intelligence agencies”.
“Their target pattern will focus on IED attacks on economic projects especially CPEC-related projects or other projects where Chinese nationals are involved,” it said.
About the Altaf Hussain-led MQM, commonly known as MQM-London, the CTD report said: “If Altaf Hussain perceives that he is being squeezed out of political space, he may launch an escalation of attacks in Karachi, basically meant to remind the provincial and federal governments of his nuisance value and to undermine the claims of the government that the Karachi operation has restored peace to the city.
“Attacks would be carried out by militants loyal to MQM-London and they are likely to target the media, police and law enforcement agencies and potentially plan assassinations of prominent social or political figures,” it added.
Published in Dawn, July 30th, 2017 |
This year a few mice are set to become the first patients for a brand-new kind of heart disease treatment.
It’s a surgery being performed by tiny microsurgeons. The surgeons, called nanorobots, are really tiny groups of magnetically charged particles that band together to break up clogged arteries.
The robot molecules work on blockages in two stages. First they deliver drugs that help soften clogged arteries. Then they charge into battle, drilling in to blast heart blockages apart.
Biomedical engineer MinJun Kim, a professor at Drexel University, is part of the international team of scientists from the U.S., Switzerland, and South Korea who are working on the tech. He says the robots are controlled by harnessing the power of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), the tunnel-like machines more commonly used for X-ray imaging in hospitals. Working with the nanobots, the MRI machines can serve as a kind of command and control center: both steering and observing the magnetically charged bots as they navigate their way around inside the body.
Kim’s already tried this out in the lab. But it’s a strategy that still needs some fine-tuning before human trials. The nanobots need to perfect their drilling techniques. The plan is to try that out this summer with mice at a national hospital in South Korea. Then the team will move on to testing in rabbits and pigs. If all goes well, by 2019 they’ll be launching the bots into humans (via catheter injection).
Many have tried for years to build nanobots that can serve as minisurgeons inside the body. The robots have been touted as potential solutions for detecting cancer and helping out with eye surgery. Google’s new Verily, the life sciences division of Alphabet, started its own partnership with Johnson & Johnson (jnj) on surgical robots in 2015 dubbed “Verb Surgical.” But little’s known about how far along Google (googl) might be with its surgical bots, and there haven’t been any other definitive human trial results just yet.
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Surgeons are already using bigger external robots to assist with heart surgeries. By remote-controlling robotic arms, the doctors can make smaller incisions and more precise movements than they’d be able to using human hands.
WATCH: Surgery goes robotic:
When it comes to the tiny nanobot models that Kim and his team are working on, though, he says “the smaller the better.” That way, after arteries have been blasted and unclogged, the molecules can just swim off the job and biodegrade. |
Welcome to the redesigned Scheduled Events page. The information presented below not only displays Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine’s events, but anyone representing Hillary for America, including Bill Clinton, Chelsea Clinton, and other politicians and celebrities appearing on the behalf of HFA.
Hyperlinks below will lead to the official page for the event where you can RSVP or purchase tickets. The lack of a hyperlink or a blank field indicates that the information for the event is not currently available. For past events, please visit the Speech Archive.
Note: Fundraisers are scheduled a month in advance while public events are only scheduled a few days in advance. The list below will be heavy with fundraisers due to this fact. Check back daily for an updated scheduled public events or visit hillaryclinton.com/events to view events in your area.
Image Source: MSNBC |
Teaching assistant Suriyah Bi is persuing claims against Heartlands Academy (Picture: Caters)
A Muslim teaching assistant has taken her school to tribunal after she claims she was sacked when she complained about a video showing the events on 9/11 to a class of 11-year-olds.
Branding the footage as X-rated, Suriyah Bi lost her job at Birmingham’s Heartlands Academy after just a week – and is now pursuing claims for unfair dismissal and religious discrimination.
Mortified parents pay up after daughter, 23, does a runner from a restaurant »
The school said it will oppose Suriyah’s claims, and says the 24-year-old simply no longer wanted to work at the school.
The video was not mentioned in detail during the brief preliminary hearing which dealt with technical and legal matters.
But outside the hearing, Suriyah said: ‘It was shown to some 30 children during class. I understand the video was shown without the permission of the authorities.
She objected to footage that showed people taking their own lives
‘It raised questions about what safeguards there are in schools to protect children.
‘These were children aged 11, of whom many knew little, or nothing, about the 9/11 horror.
Man arrested after two dead bodies found in Cardiff »
‘They were subjected to graphic scenes and some were shocked and upset. The video not only showed the plane crashing into the Twin Towers but also showed people committing suicide by jumping to their deaths from the tower blocks.
‘Such young children should not been shown things like that because it is well-known that it can play on their minds and even induce them to kill themselves.
‘I was in the classroom when the video was shown and I quickly objected. Later, I was told to leave the school.
‘There was an investigation into the matter but I was dismissed for making a whistle blowing complaint.’
Suriyah said she believed no action was taken against the teacher who screened the video, but some people regarded the showing as ‘misguided’.
Tiny kittens found alive after being born inside tumble dryer »
The class had been studying a poem about a victim of the 9/11 terrorist attack. The poem is part of the AQA GCSE syllabus.
E-Act told the tribunal judge Ron Broughton that the teacher no longer wanted to work for them.
They complained there had been no need for the preliminary hearing and were considering making a claim for costs against Suriyah for causing delays.
Mr Broughton said she could go ahead with her legal claims at a full hearing later this year and he would not consider a claim for costs at this stage. |
It is currently spreading around the web that a PS+ subscription will be required in order for you to make use of the PS4 and Vita’s Remote Play features, which seems like a massive drawback since it’s such a core feature.
That is not the case however – the original comment asks whether PlayStation Plus will be required for playing PS4 games online on the Vita, with Playstation Blog Manager Fred Dutton confirming that, quite obviously, you would need PS+ for that, as all online multiplayer games on PS4 require a subscription to the service.
He also confirms that online gaming on the Vita – as with the upcoming Killzone: Mercenary – will remain outside of the PS+ paywall even after the PS4’s release, as it always has.
Seems like a bit of a misread then, we just thought it would be best to make a post in order to clear up any confusion.
A list of PlayStation Plus features can be found here. |
Sometimes it feels like there isn’t enough booze or bud in the world to make your life seem any easier. From political drama (who the fuck knows what Trump will do and/or tweet next) to celebrity deaths (RIP Mary Tyler Moore), 2017 promises to be rough—but don’t worry, we’re here to help you get through it all!
Our friends over at Cut.com have been whipping up cannabis cocktails, and we’ve compiled the best of the best to help you forget your troubles, at least for a little while.
1. Weed Whiskey
Ingredients:
750 mL bottle of Bourbon Whiskey
1/4 oz Ground Weed
Directions:
Pour the bottle of whiskey into a sealable jar (or pour out a little bit of whiskey to make up for the added volume of the weed) and add the ground weed.
Shake the bottle and let it sit, out of the sun, for at least 48 hours. Shake it up at least once a day until it has reached your desired potency—up to one month, if possible. The longer it sits, the more potent it will be.
Pour the whiskey mixture into a glass container, using a cheesecloth to strain out all ground weed from the whiskey. Repeat this step as necessary to strain all of the whiskey from the ground weed, and discard the remaining weed.
2. Weed Sazerac
Ingredients:
2 oz Weed Rye Whiskey
1 cube Sugar
2 dashes Peychauds Bitters
1/2 tsp Water
Directions:
Dose the sugar cube with bitters. Crush it into the bottom of glass. Add water.
In a mixing glass, stir rye with ice and one more dash of Peychauds. Strain into sugar. Add lemon twist, if desired.
3. Heady Eggnog
Ingredients:
6 Eggs
3 cups Heavy Cream
1 tsp Salt
1 tbsp Vanilla Extract
3/4 cup Sugar
1 cup Weed Bourbon Whiskey
Nutmeg
Directions:
Separate egg yolks and egg whites into two bowls.
Add sugar to the yolks and whisk rapidly for 2 minutes.
Add the heavy cream, vanilla extract and bourbon, and whisk until ingredients are distributed evenly.
Place the egg whites in a stand mixer (or use a hand mixer), add salt, and whip on high speed until stiff peaks form.
Gently fold stiff egg whites into the yolk mixture. Grate nutmeg into the mixture while folding.
Refrigerate one hour and serve with grated nutmeg on top.
4. Weed Margarita
Ingredients:
2 oz Weed Tequila
3/4 oz Lime Juice
3/4 oz Simple Syrup
1/2 oz Grand Marnier
Pinch of Salt
Directions:
Shake all ingredients together. Muddle. Strain over ice into a collins glass and garnish with lime peel.
5. Bacon Buddy Mary
Ingredients:
1 qt Tomato Juice
1 tbsp Horseradish
2 tbsp Worcestershire
1/4 cup Lemon Juice
2 tbsp Sriracha
1 clove Garlic, finely chopped
2 tbsp Weed Bacon Fat
Celery Salt Rim
Slice of Bacon
Celery
2 oz Weed Vodka
Directions:
Step 1: Make Weed Vodka
Pour 1/8 oz weed into 750 ml vodka. Shake. Store for two days to one month. Strain.
Step 2: Make Bloody Mix
Squeeze 1/4 cup lemon juice. Add 1 tbsp horseradish. Add 2 tbsp Worcestershire and Sriracha. Pour in 4 oz tomato juice. Add pinch of salt and pepper. Add 1 clove of finely chopped garlic. Stir in 2 oz weed bacon fat.
Step 3: Make Cocktail
Pour 2 oz of weed vodka into an empty pint glass. Add ice cubes. Pour in bloody mix. Shake vigorously.
Rub lemon along the rim of a clean glass. Rub the rim in celery salt. Pour and garnish.
6. Mai High
Ingredients:
2 oz Weed-Infused Rum
3/4 oz Freshly Squeezed Lime Juice
1/2 oz Orange Curaçao
1/4 oz Rich Simple Syrup
1/4 oz Orgeat
1 Mint Sprig/Weed Leaf (for garnish)
Directions:
Combine all ingredients in a cocktail shaker. Shake vigorously. Pour the entire contents into a double old fashioned glass. Garnish with the juiced lime half and a mint sprig and/or pot leaf.
7. Perfect Weedtini
Ingredients:
2.5 oz Weed Gin
0.5 oz Dry Vermouth
1 dash Orange Bitters
Lemon Twist/Weed Leaf
Directions:
Add all the ingredients to a mixing glass. Fill with ice. Stir until very cold and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist and/or weed leaf.
8. Weed Highland Latte
Ingredients:
1 Egg
Punt e Mes (It’s an Italian vermouth, for all y’all about to Google that.)
Weed Scotch
Bitters
Cynar (This one’s an Italian bitter liquer…)
Directions:
Step 1—Make Weed Scotch
Add 1/8 oz of weed to 750 ml of scotch. Shake and store for 2 days to 1 month, then strain.
Step 2—Make Cocktail
Separate egg whites from yolk. Pour yolk into glass. Cover and Shake.
Add weed scotch.
Add Cynar and Punt e Mes.
Add a few dashes of bitters.
Pour in egg whites.
Add ice. Cover and shake. Strain into latte mug. Add a dash of bitters and swirl.
9. Weed Chapulin
Directions:
Muddle a handful of cilantro.
Add 1/2 oz of agave nectar.
Add 1/2 oz of lime and grapefruit juices.
Pour in 1/2 oz of weed tequila.
Add 1/2 oz of weed mezcal.
Muddle.
Add ice.
Shake, strain and garnish with a lime peel. |
Hawai‘i State House majority floor leader, Rep. Cindy Evans recently introduced the Sustainable Living Research Bill (HB873 and SB109) to allow for the development of sustainable practices under a new permit process which allows for some exemptions from the rules that have long been obstacles to sustainable living.
The bill is co-sponsored by Rep. Tom Brower, Rep. Romy M. Cachola, Rep. Angus McKelvey, Rep. Mark Nakashima, Rep. Joy A. San Buenaventura, Rep. Chris Todd, Rep. Ryan I. Yamane and Sen. Karl Rhoads.
“We all want to be in compliance with county codes, rules and protocol, but for many the things required for compliance are simply out of reach,” said Leonard Sussman, founder of the Kirpal Meditation and Ecological Center. This legislation will enable agricultural communities to show all of the incredible innovations that are taking place within the sustainable living community and be able to prove their viability. There are remarkable people working to save our planet by building, working and living sustainably. These noble efforts should be legal.”
The Sustainable Living Research Bill will:
Increase real affordable and sustainable green housing; positively impacting Hawai‘i’s high homeless numbers;
Improve our state’s disaster preparedness by researching and developing practices to alleviate impacts due to a state of emergency;
Increase employment in small business sustainable enterprises;
Promote the growth of small, locally owned farms that educate and employ a new breed of young farmers;
Provide additional protection for consumers from the disruptions in transport of supplies to the Hawaiian Islands;
Reduce dependence on imports of food and energy by promoting locally sustainable alternatives;
Alleviate landfill problems by increasing ways to reduce, reuse and recycle;
Promote the development of think tanks focusing on sustainable research and development;
Bring current zoning and land use codes into compliance with local community values;
Work in unison with Hawai‘i’s Aloha Challenge Goals for 2030.
For information about the Hawaii Sustainable Community Alliance, go online. |
This interview was conducted with the maker of the McHeatoN burger at McDonalds right before his departure for the Vatican. This is what Arvid had to say about his creation:
How does it feel to have your own burger at McDonalds?
It feels wonderful to have my own burger at McDonalds! Almost a little surreal. To think that I’m going to walk in on McDonalds and see my own face there along with my creation. Just surreal really.
Have you tasted the burger and if so, did you like it?
During the competition I got to both make and taste it myself, and it was awesome. I think I ate 3 of them in total, and the final one was amazing. It is perfect for me who likes a little spicy tastes, but not too spicy, when it comes to food.
How did you choose the name for the burger? Why name it after an e-sport legend?
Well, I first found out about the competition on an online forum, and the first thing I came to think of was how much e-sport was evolving and how much I love it. Then I thought of what Emil HeatoN Christensen had done for the e-sport community, I mean if anyone deserves a burger, it is him! And also, the name fit the burger perfectly ”Heat-oN” since it is spicy, the heat is on!
Do you play any online games yourself?
Yes, mostly CS:GO with my friends in our team Wolfshirt. But I also watch most games online and try to follow the scene as much as I possibly can. |
How GridFS Works
In part 1 we looked at some of the use cases that are appropriate for GridFS. In this post we take a closer look at how GridFS works and how you can use it in your apps.
GridFS stores large binary files by breaking the files into smaller files called “chunks” and saving them in MongoDB. It essentially saves you, the application developer, from having to write all the code to break large files up into chunks, saving all the individual chunks into MongoDB, and then, when retrieving the files, combining all the chunks back together. GridFS gives you all this functionality for free.
The way GridFS works is shown in Figure 1. GridFS uses two collections to save a file to a database: fs.files and fs.chunks . (The default prefix is “fs”, but you can rename it.) The fs.chunks collection contains the binary file broken up into 255k chunks. The fs.files collection contains the metadata for the document.
Figure 1 - GridFS Structure
An Example
Let’s work through an example to see how this works. I wrote a small Perl program to load a set of videos my wife had taken on her iPhone of my son’s baseball games and my daughter’s gymnastics meets. Figure 2 shows the core of the program (you can download the entire program from github). The program performs the following steps:
Establishes a connection to MongoDB and creates database object for the “digital” database into which we want to load the files
Creates a gridFS object for the database to gain access to the gridFS API
Reads the Movies directory on my laptop and finds all the .MOV files
Each .MOV file is inserted into MongoDB with three metadata fields: `filename`, `content-type`, and `author`.
my $movieDir = "/Users/jayrunkel/Movies"; my $client = MongoDB::MongoClient->new(host => 'localhost', port => 27017); my $database = $client->get_database( 'digital' ); my $grid = $database->get_gridfs; my @vidFiles = getFiles($movieDir); $grid->drop(); foreach my $file (@vidFiles) { my $fh = IO::File->new("$movieDir/$file", "r"); $grid->insert($fh, {"filename" => $file, "content-type" => "video/quicktime", "author" => "deb"}); }
Figure 2 - Loading binary files using GridFS
As the files are inserted into the database, MongoDB calculates the MD5 checksum of the file and compares that to the checksum calculated by the file system. If they don’t match an error condition occurs. My program will simply die, but it could handle the error and do something more intelligent.
Going to the mongoshell and looking at the digital database shows that there are two collections: fs.chunks and fs.files , just as we expect.
> use digital > show collections fs.chunks fs.files system.indexes
Let’s first look at the fs.files collection (Figure 3). This collection contains one document for each of the MOV files we loaded into MongoDB. Each document contains the metadata for the corresponding file. This metadata consists of the GridFS defined metadata fields ( length , chunksize , and uploadDate ) plus the metadata fields I supplied when I inserted the MOV files: content-type , author , and filename . The length field is the size of the document in bytes, the chunk field is the size of each chunk in bytes, and the uploadDate is the date the document was first inserted into MongoDB.
You can define any metadata fields as appropriate and due to the flexibility of MongoDB, each document can have the specific set of fields that make sense. There isn’t a requirement that all files have the same set of metadata fields and you can feel free to add or modify fields as your application evolves.
{ "_id": ObjectId("546fb304f9781507293f9891"), "length": NumberLong("834284"), "content-type": "video/quicktime", "uploadDate": ISODate("2014-11-21T21:47:48Z"), "chunkSize": NumberLong("261120"), "filename": "IMG_0425.MOV", "author": "deb" }
Figure 3 - fs.files collection
Each document in the fs.files collection is associated with a set of documents in the fs.chunks collection (Figure 4). The fs.chunks documents are numbered from 0 to n (see the “n” field) with binary data for the chunk stored in the “data” field. The fs.files document is related to its corresponding chunk documents in the fs.chunks collection by the files_id field. The files_id field is the _id of the corresponding document in the fs.files collection. Here are the first two chunks associated with the document whose ObjectId is 546fb304f9781507293f9896 .
{ "_id": ObjectId("546fb304f9781507293f98a6"), "files_id": ObjectId("546fb304f9781507293f9896"), "data": BinData(0, "+QWU+Pwf1u03d………..."), "n": NumberLong("0") } { "_id": ObjectId("546fb304f9781507293f9898"), "files_id": ObjectId("546fb304f9781507293f9896"), "data": BinData(0, "EgKwOoOAOYEwFoi…."), "n": NumberLong("1") } ...
Figure 4 - fs.chunks collection
Because the goal of the GridFS API is to make it easy and efficient to retrieve and reassemble the binary document, GridFS will automatically create a compound index on the fs.chunks collection on the files_id and n fields. This will enable MongoDB to quickly identify all the chunks associated with a particular file, sort them from 0 to n using the n field, and return them to the driver so that they can be assembled back into the original document. To demonstrate this, here is the output of running getIndexes on the fs.chunks collection. As you see the Perl driver automatically created the compound index when I inserted the first document into my database.
> db.fs.chunks.getIndexes() [ { "v": 1, "key": { "_id": 1 }, "name": "_id_", "ns": "digital.fs.chunks" }, { "v": 1, "unique": true, "key": { "files_id": NumberLong("1"), "n": NumberLong("1") }, "name": "files_id_1_n_1", "ns": "digital.fs.chunks" } ]
Figure 5 - fs.chunks indexes
How do you use the GridFS API to build an application
Using the GridFS API to build an application is simple. GridFS does all the hard work. All you need to do is insert your binary documents into MongoDB using the GridFS API. When you insert the documents, you can provide the document metadata and you can update this metadata during the life of the document in your application using the same update queries you use to update other documents in MongoDB.
Retrieving and deleting documents is simple as well. The GridFS API provides methods for retrieving a document, as a whole or in parts, which can be very useful for “skipping” to the middle of an audio or video file. This function combines the chunk files to recreate the original file and returns a file object to your application. The delete method removes the documents from the fs.file and fs.chunks collection so that the original document has been removed from MongoDB.
That is all there is to it. Use the GridFS API to insert, retrieve, and remove binary documents to and from MongoDB. GridFS will do all complex work leaving you to focus on the rest of your application. And if you’re interested in learning more about the architecture of MongoDB, download our guide:
About Jay Runkel
Jay Runkel is a Solutions Architect Manager at MongoDB and has been working with Fortune 500 companies to architect enterprise solutions using NoSQL document databases for over five years. Before MongoDB, Runkel was a Principal Technologist at MarkLogic where he worked with Financial Service, Medical, and Media organizations to develop operational systems for analytics and custom publishing. Runkel has also recently been a Sales Engineering Manager at Venafi where he he assisted large financial institutions, retailers, health care and insurance organizations improve security by securing, protecting, and managing their encryption assets. Runkel has also held various positions developing automated underwriting, product information management, and CRM solutions. Runkel has a BS in Applied Mathematics from Carnegie Mellon and a Masters in Computer Science from the University of Michigan. |
Reuters Two top allies of presidential candidate and US Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) were charged with violating campaign finance laws during the 2012 presidential campaign, the Department of Justice announced Wednesday.
Jesse Benton, who worked on the presidential bid of Paul's father, Ron, was named as one of three political operatives in the alleged scheme to conceal payments to an Iowa state senator.
According to a National Journal report last April, Benton was tapped to run a Paul-sanctioned super PAC, America's Liberty PAC, supporting the senator's 2016 presidential bid.
John Tate, who is listed as the group's founder and president, was also named in the charges. The other operative named was Dimitrios Kesari, a former deputy campaign manager on Ron Paul's campaign.
The indictment was based on six counts, including conspiracy, filing false records, false statements, and obstruction of justice.
Though the indictment did not name which 2012 presidential candidate Benton, Tate, and Kesari worked on, there is little doubt that it is referring to former Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), Rand Paul's father.
Benton resigned as Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Kentucky) reelection campaign manager last year amid new revelations from the investigation. Former Iowa State Sen. Kent Sorenson (R) pleaded guilty to two federal charges last year and admitted that he had accepted payments from the campaigns of Ron Paul and former US Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minnesota) to secure his endorsement, according to The Washington Post.
The Justice Department accused the operatives of covering up more than $70,000 in payments to Sorenson, who they allege "negotiated with the defendants to switch his support to" Ron Paul in 2012.
At the time, according to The Post, he said, "inaccurate press accounts and unsubstantiated media rumors about me and my role in past campaigns that are politically motivated, unfair and, most importantly, untrue."
Benton and Liberty PAC did not respond to requests for comment from Business Insider. However, both Pauls issued statements decrying the indictment's timing as suspicious given that Thursday will feature the first Republican debate.
"Senator Rand Paul is disappointed that the Obama Justice Department chose to release this just prior to the highly anticipated first Republican presidential debate; it certainly appears suspiciously timed and possibly, politically motivated," a Rand Paul spokesman said. "Additionally, these actions are from 2012 and have nothing to do with our campaign."
View the indictment below: |
While the debate over net neutrality continues to rage in the United States, the British government is planning to block European Union legislation on the matter.
It’s a surprising turn of events. Just last month, the European Parliament voted to place the principles of net neutrality into law. However, before it becomes law throughout Europe, each member country must also pass the legislation. On Thursday, the British government indicated it may veto it instead.
At issue is a new provision that critics argue would restrict the British government’s “ability to block illegal material.” The amendment made it so that only a court order would allow for the banning of content, and not a legislative provision, as originally proposed, according to RT.
“We do not support any proposals that mean we cannot enforce our laws, including blocking child abuse images,” a government spokesperson told BuzzFeed.
In 2010, when the current government came into office, Ed Vaizey, the minister for culture, communications and creative industries, stated he would support “two speed internet,” which sparked intense debate about net neutrality. Remarking after the European legislation passed recently, Vaizey waded into the debate again, claiming the British government “will not agree to any proposals that restrict the ability of parents to protect their children from inappropriate content on line.”
Vaizey went on to state he was “confident that this was not the intention of the European Parliament.” The British is government is reportedly working with other EU member states and others to develop a workable solution for a free and more secure Internet.
Illustration by Jason Reed |
Paul Wernick is a Canadian television/movie screenwriter and producer.[1] He is best known for writing the screenplays to the 2016 superhero film Deadpool and its 2018 sequel with his creative partner Rhett Reese.
Career [ edit ]
Early career [ edit ]
Wernick has produced several network reality shows, including CBS's Big Brother 2 and ABC's I'm a Celebrity... Get Me out of Here!. Wernick has won three Emmy Awards for his work in news,[2] which included producing stints at KVOA, KOLD, KTVK, KSL and KCAL.
Rhett Reese and Wernick partnered in 2001 to create Reese Wernick Productions, a company dedicated to the creation and production of entertainment in various media.
Film [ edit ]
Wernick and Reese's first feature collaboration was the 2009 film Zombieland, which they created and also executive-produced. The film was released by Sony Pictures in theaters October 2, 2009, and went on to become one of the highest grossing zombie movies of all-time.[3]
Wernick and Reese followed Zombieland with Paramount Pictures’ G.I. Joe: Retaliation,[4][5] starring Dwayne Johnson, Channing Tatum, and Bruce Willis, which was released on March 27, 2013. The sequel outperformed the original, grossing $375 million.[6]
Paul Wernick wrote and executive produced 20th Century Fox's Deadpool, along with Reese. Deadpool starred Ryan Reynolds, and was directed by Tim Miller.[7] The R-rated film was released on February 12, 2016. Its opening weekend was the highest grossing of all time for R-Rated films, and it went on to gross more than $780 million worldwide.[8] The team's next project, sci-fi thriller Life, was released in March 2017. The film was directed by Daniel Espinosa, produced by Skydance, and through Sony Pictures, with Ryan Reynolds, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Rebecca Ferguson starring. They wrote Deadpool 2 in 2018, which like its predecessor was released to positive reviews.
Wernick and Reese were announced as the co-screenwriters of the feature film adaptation of Cowboy Ninja Viking. Reportedly Chris Pratt will star in the film as well as also serve as executive-produce. The film is being distributed by Universal Pictures.[citation needed] Their original science fiction spec screenplay Epsilon was sold to Sony Pictures; with contracts to co-produce in partnership with Michael De Luca.[citation needed] Wernick and Reese recently optioned Thomas Oliver's book, The Real Coke, The Real Story, about the failed launch of New Coke. The pair will write and produce the project.[citation needed]
Television [ edit ]
Wernick and Reese first collaborated in 2001, creating, writing, and executive-producing The Joe Schmo Show for Spike TV. The series drew Spike’s highest-ever ratings. Joe Schmo was named to numerous Best Of lists, including Time's "Top 10 TV Shows of 2003" and Entertainment Weekly's "50 Best TV Shows Ever on DVD."[citation needed]
The Schmo format has sold internationally, in the UK, France, Spain, and New Zealand. Wernick and Reese followed up with Invasion Iowa, a high-concept, high-stakes comedy hybrid starring William Shatner. The show premiered on Spike in the first quarter of 2005 and aired internationally immediately following. Invasion Iowa was released on DVD in May, 2009.[citation needed]
Reese and Wernick created and executive-produced Stuck on ODB, a comedy reality show starring Ol' Dirty Bastard (ODB) of the Wu Tang Clan. ODB died before the show ever aired.[citation needed]
Filmography [ edit ]
Film
Television
Short |
Obama to send 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan
Support for the Afghan mission among the US public has been falling President Barack Obama is to send 30,000 new US troops to Afghanistan, pre-released excerpts from his new strategy speech say. President Obama will say the troops will be deployed "in the first part of 2010 - the fastest pace possible". Mr Obama is also spelling out key elements of an exit plan, including beginning to hand over to Afghan security forces by mid-2011. The president will deliver his speech in the next two hours. The surge will bring US troop strength in Afghanistan to more than 100,000. Appeal to allies Mr Obama will deliver his televised speech shortly to cadets at the West Point military academy in New York. MARDELL'S AMERICA The danger for the president is that this middling figure will annoy hawks, while annoying those who think any new build-up is undesirable
Read Mark's thoughts in full Send us your comments According to the excerpts from the speech released in advance by the White House, he will argue that the surge will help "create the conditions for the United States to transfer responsibility to the Afghans". He will also call on America's allies to boost their troop commitment. "Some have already provided additional troops, and we are confident that there will be further contributions in the days and weeks ahead," he is due to say. "Our friends have fought and bled and died alongside us in Afghanistan. Now, we must come together to end this war successfully. For what's at stake is not simply a test of Nato's credibility - what's at stake is the security of our Allies, and the common security of the world." Mr Obama will say that the US will take the Iraq experience as its model for withdrawal. "Just as we have done in Iraq, we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground," he will say. America, he will add, "will continue to advise and assist Afghanistan's security forces to ensure that they can succeed over the long haul". OBAMA'S SCHEDULE 2100 GMT: Meets Congressional leaders at White House 2230 GMT: Departs for West Point, New York 0100 GMT Weds: Address to the nation 0340 GMT Weds: Arrives back at the White House
Marines train for Afghanistan Afghans sceptical on new troops Mixed feelings in Afghanistan "But it will be clear to the Afghan government - and, more importantly, to the Afghan people - that they will ultimately be responsible for their own country," the US president will say. Mr Obama's speech is likely to give a sense that the troops are going in hard to deal with the Taliban, then looking to get out again as soon as possible, says the BBC's North America editor, Mark Mardell. In a country suspicious of sending more troops, where the word Vietnam still resonates, it is important that there is no lingering sense of a conflict that will drag on, he adds. Mr Obama has reached his deployment decision after more than three months of deliberations and 10 top-level meetings with advisers. It is the second time he is increasing the US contingent in Afghanistan after a reinforcement of 17,000 troops in February. Some 32,000 other foreign troops are serving in Afghanistan but Nato allies have been cautious about contributing further forces. The US president outlined his new strategy to Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai in an hour-long video conference on Tuesday morning. He told Mr Karzai that US efforts in Afghanistan were not "open-ended" and would be measured against goals over a two-year period, the White House said. Rising violence - more than 900 US soldiers have died in Afghanistan - and August's discredited elections have fanned mounting domestic opposition to the eight-year-old war. Earlier this year, the US military commander in Afghanistan, Gen Stanley McChrystal, warned America risked failure unless troop numbers were increased. He requested 40,000 more soldiers. French refusal The BBC's Martin Patience in Kabul says that while the speech will probably receive a cautious welcome from the Afghan government, many people in the country do not want any more foreign forces. They say every time America sends more troops the security situation gets worse, and some question why the US is spending billions of dollars on the military - and not on aid and reconstruction, our correspondent says. France said it might be able to spare some personnel to train Afghan forces Nato officials said on Tuesday that President Obama had asked European allies to contribute between 5,000 and 10,000 new troops to Afghanistan. But President Nicolas Sarkozy has ruled out deploying more soldiers, although he might send military trainers, his special envoy to Afghanistan told AFP news agency. French Defence Minister Herve Morin said earlier: "If there were to be an additional effort, the only effort that would make sense would be in terms of Afghan army and police training." In Berlin, Chancellor Angela Merkel told a news conference Germany would wait until after a 28 January conference in London on Afghanistan before deciding on any troop increases. On Monday, Britain confirmed it was sending 500 more troops, taking the UK's total deployment to 10,000. Italy has also said it will increase its force, although without saying by how much.
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Bird strikes are loosely defined as a collision between an airborne animal and a human-made vehicle. The animal in question is usually a bird but can also be a bat (and in one bizarre incident, a fish). Annual damages caused by bird strikes are estimated at US$1.2 billion for commercial aircraft worldwide.
Initial aviators had no idea that birds would become such a danger to aircraft. Wilbur Wright observed birds in order to design a control system when he first became interested in mechanical aeronautical experiments. He noticed that birds changed the angle of the ends of their wings to make their bodies roll right or left. Wilbur concluded that their flying machine should bank or lean into the turn just like a bird and that this would also enable recovery in gusty winds. This was a major breakthrough for aviation, where the idea of deliberately leaning or rolling seemed undesirable, if they thought about it at all.
Meanwhile, Orville goes down in history as the first known bird strike to a powered aircraft. It was the 7th of September in 1908. According to the Wright Brother’s diaries, Orville flew 4,751 metres (15,587 feet) in four minutes and 45 seconds as four complete circles. He passed over the fence in Beard’s cornfield twice and then chased a flock of birds for two rounds. He killed one, which landed on the flying machine but fell off when Orville was swinging a sharp curve.
The first bird strike fatal to humans was four years later, in 1912 at Long Beach, California, killing the pilot.
The Wright Brothers set up a commercial aviation business called the Wright Company in Dayton, Ohio at the end of 1909. The Wright Company had no interest in innovation. believing there was more money to be made in obtaining royalties from competing manufacturers or patent infringers.
John Rodgers was a Navy man who studied flying at the Wright Company in 1911 and became the second American naval officer to fly for the United States Army.
John’s cousin Calbraith Perry Rodgers went to visit John at the flying school in March 1911. Cal was immediately fascinated and signed up for flying lessons himself. He received an hour and a half of flying lesson from Orville Wright and on the 7th of August that same year, he passed his official flying examination at Huffman Prairie Flying Field, the same airfield where the Wright brothers had tested their aircraft since 1904.
The Fédération Aéronautique Internationale was founded at a conference in Paris in October, 1905 as an association to regulate the sport of flying.
FAI History
From its inception, the FAI defined its principal aims as being to”methodically catalogue the best performances achieved, so that they be known to everybody; to identify their distinguishing features so as to permit comparisons to be made; and to verify evidence and thus ensure that record-holders have undisputed claims to their titles.” The statutes also specified that each body holding sporting powers (i.e. the national members of FAI) should retain full and autonomous control over its own affairs.
It is now is the world governing body for air sports, aeronautics and astronautics world records.
In 1911, Cal Rodgers was the 49th aviator licensed to fly by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale.
He bought a new Flier, the first Wright machine ever sold to a private buyer, and set off to cross the United States in it. William Randolph Hearst offered a $50,000 reward to the first pilot to fly cross-country across the US in 30 days or less and with his new plane and 90 minutes flying instruction, Cal was up for the challenge.
Cal also created the precursor to banner advertising, arranging with a Chicago businessman, J. Ogden Armour, to sponsor the flight. In return for Armour’s sponsorship, Cal named the aircraft Vin Fiz, after Armour’s new soft drink, and spelled it out on the rudders and the undersides of the wings.
He had his first run in with birds on the second day of his cross country flight, when he clipped a tree with a wheel and crashed into a chicken shed. The flight was beset with difficulties and landed 75 times en route, 16 of which were crashes. The Wright brothers mechanic, Charlie Taylor, followed behind by train and repaired the aircraft so many times, almost none of the original build remained by the time they arrived in California.
Cal Rodgers completed the first transcontinental flight across the US but did not make it within the 30 days required to collect the Hearst reward. Nevertheless, he was cheered as a hero when he landed on the beach after travelling 6,400 kilometres (4,000 miles) from coast to coast. The actual flying time was just under 84 hours.
The following year, Cal was still in California and spent a week doing daily flights at Long Beach. He often took passengers with him. One of those flights went terribly wrong.
Daily Times; Chattanooga, Tennessee; April 4, 1912
Today he started from his usual place and soared out over the ocean, crossing the pier, and then returning, dipped close to a roller coaster in a beach amusement park. “Seeing a flock of gulls disporting themselves among a great shoal of sardines, just over the breakers, Rodgers again turned and dived down into the, scattering the seafowl in all directions. “Highly elated with the outcome of his dive, Rodgers then flew farther out to sea, all the time gradually rising until he had reached a height of about 200 feet. Making a short steep turn, he started at full speed for a pier, then suddenly dipped his planes and his machine began a frightful (rapid?) descent. Rodgers was seen by hundreds of persons on the pier to relax his hold on the levers and then, seemingly realizing that he was in danger, he made strenuous efforts to pull the nose of his machine into a level position.
When he’d flown into the flock of birds, he struck a gull. It jammed the rudder control, which he was unable to clear. The aircraft crashed into the surf just a few hundred feet where he’d finished his transcontinental flight with Vin Fiz.
Two lifeguards were the first to the scene and found Cal hanging over the wing. They lifted him to carry him to the hospital but he died on the way there. Later examination showed that his neck, jawbone and back were broken.
Cal Rodgers was the 127th aeroplane fatality since aviation had begun and the 22nd American aviator to be killed. He was just 33. |
Attorney General Jeff Sessions raises his hand to be sworn in before the House Judiciary Committee. (Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post)
Meetings he had with the Russian ambassador during the campaign. Campaign-related conversations he had with the Russian ambassador. Shutting down campaign aide George Papadopoulos after Papadopoulos suggested then-candidate Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin get together.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions said he couldn't remember any of these events — that is until the media or Robert S. Mueller III's investigation remembered them for him.
That's the key takeaway from Sessions's hearing before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. What is typically a routine check-in between Congress and the head of the Justice Department got political real fast, largely because of Russia.
Here are four takeaways from Sessions's nearly day-long hearing:
1. Sessions is not helping clear up questions about the Trump campaign's Russian involvement.
Here's why Sessions said Tuesday he couldn't remember any of these Russian contacts or conversations: “It was a brilliant campaign in many ways, but it was a form of chaos every day . . . Sleep was in short supply.”
It's certainly possible Sessions didn't remember any number of Russia connections that have now come to light until they came to light.
But Sessions has also demonstrated that once his memory gets jogged, he can recall details of events, such as what he spoke about with the Russian ambassador in two separate meetings and the fact he told Papadopoulos not to set up a Trump-Putin meeting. Which opened the door to Democrats to ask: Why haven't you gotten your facts straight about Russia by now?
Sessions didn't really have any answer to that other than even if he did misremember these events, he didn't do anything wrong during them. His meetings with the Russian ambassador were legal and normal, he said. He didn't encourage Papadaopulous to set up a meeting with Putin; he discouraged it. “I pushed back and said you shouldn't do it,” Sessions recalled. “So I don't think it is right to accuse me of doing something wrong.”
At the very least, Sessions's consistent memory lapses before Congress don't help the president's public image. A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found 49 percent of Americans think it is likely Trump committed a crime in connection with possible Russia meddling, although more say this view is based on suspicion rather than evidence.
2. Sessions doesn’t seem that keen on a special counsel looking into Hillary Clinton’s affairs.
Trump wants one. About two-dozen Republican members of Congress want one. Sessions is entertaining the idea of appointing a special counsel to investigate the Clinton Foundation and the sale of a uranium company to Russia and how the FBI exonerated Hillary Clinton on her emails.
But Sessions himself doesn't seem totally convinced that is necessary.
“ ‘Looks like’ is not enough basis to appoint a special counsel,” he told Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) after Jordan listed a number of things he thinks Democrats did during the 2016 presidential campaign that he thought looked fishy, such as the Clinton campaign paying for research that ultimately led to a controversial, unproven dossier alleging Trump wrongdoing in Russia.
“It would take a factual basis that meets the standards of a special counsel,” Sessions replied.
So what's that standard? According to The Post's Matt Zapotosky: A special counsel can be appointed when the Justice Department or a U.S. attorney’s office has a conflict of interest, when there are other “extraordinary circumstances” or when it would otherwise be “in the public interest” to do so, according to the federal regulation governing such appointments.
3. Sessions sides with Roy Moore’s accusers.
It's fair to ask if Roy Moore — the GOP Senate candidate trying to fill Sessions's seat in the Senate — has any friends in Washington right now besides Stephen K. Bannon. Sessions is definitely not one of them.
“I have no reason to doubt these young women,” Sessions said when asked whether he believes Moore's five accusers who recently said that Moore had tried to have romantic or sexual relationships with them when he was twice their age.
Other Republicans, such as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), have ditched Moore. But the McConnells of the world could arguably boost Moore's appeal in Alabama.
But Sessions is different. He had represented Alabama in the Senate for nearly 20 years before becoming Trump's attorney general. He is one of the most well-known politicians in the state. Does his ditching of Moore change the dynamic of the race? We'll find out in less than a month.
4. Sessions is suspicious of WikiLeaks.
It now appears that Donald Trump Jr. communicated with WikiLeaks, the organization that published Democratic emails that were allegedly hacked by Russians. The Atlantic reported, and Trump Jr. confirmed, that he exchanged Twitter messages with WikiLeaks during the campaign.
Sessions indicated that if he were Trump Jr., he probably wouldn't have been so trusting of WikiLeaks. |
A woman has been shamed after being caught on camera launching into an expletive-laden rant at a man for using food stamps in a Walmart.
According to the video's poster on YouTube, the woman spotted the man in front of her paying with a food stamps card.
She then told her young son: 'See, this is why you go to college, so you don't take handouts.'
This sparked an argument, with the man saying: 'You know, I put in 50-60 hour weeks trying to provide for my family' as his young son sat in a grocery cart next to him.
The uploader of the video pointed out that the man was using a 'W.I.C.' or 'Women, Infants, and Children' card to buy products for his son in the store, somewhere in the US.
Shocking: The unidentified woman berated the young father in front of her for using food stamps to pay for his food at a Walmart
The man, whose son is in a grocery cart next to him, tells her that he works 50 to 60 hours a week, but needs to provide for his family - the woman counters that he isn't, that she is, since the money for food stamps comes out of her paycheck
'You’re not providing for it, I am!' the woman retorted. 'The government is.'
'You're not,' he said.
'They take it out of my check,' she insisted. 'Bulls*** they don't.'
When the man tells her to complain to her local Senator or to vote Republican, she replies,'Oh, trust me, I am not a bleeding heart f**king liberal. That ain't gonna happen.'
The man finally turns away from her, shoves his hands in his pockets, and says: 'I don't care about you lady, shut the f*** up.
Many expletives are exchanged during the heated argument, in which the man tells her to complain to her senator if she doesn't like the rules, and she says he must be a Bernie Sanders supporter
'I don't have to, it's a free country, remember?' she retorts. Then she tells him he must be a Bernie Sanders supporter. 'That's who you vote for. They give it to you, so you vote that way.'
When the man says something unintelligible, and even starts to laugh a little, she says, 'I have a degree. I am pretty damn smart.'
They exchange more words and then the man says, 'Mind your own business. Vote Republican and get 'em out of there. Until then, deal with it, b*tch.'
When the man says, 'I don't make the rules, lady,' she replies, 'No, you just take advantage of them like everyone else.'
'Why wouldn't I?' he asks, getting out his wallet.
The video has been viewed almost three million times since it was uploaded on April 24. It's unclear which city the heated exchange took place in.
A 2014 report found that Walmart, where the video subjects were shopping, costs taxpayers $6.2billion a year in food stamps, subsidized housing, Medicaid, and other forms of public assistance because of the low wages it pays its employees, according to the group Americans for Tax Fairness.
'A single Walmart Supercenter cost taxpayers between $904,542 and $1.75 million per year, or between $3,015 and $5,815 on average for each of 300 workers,' said the report, entitled 'How Americans Subsidize America's Biggest Employer and Richest Family.'
The report found that Walmart also collected almost 18 percent of the food stamp market in 2013. |
Terry Matthews, owner of the overnight eatery The Brown Bag in Troy, responded viciously to a negative review on Yelp, using the c-word toward the reviewer, repeatedly calling her a “bitch,” saying “you’ve got no idea who you’re dealing with you (f-ing) bitch” and “I really wish you would (return to the restaurant) so I can smack the (sh-t) outta you honey.”
I was first made aware of this in November, but, because the commenter, who goes by the nom-de-Yelp of Emma S, also works in the restaurant business in Troy and insisted on remaining anonymous, I chose not to spotlight it. I confirmed with Matthews at the time that the responses were indeed from him; he said he regretted their extremity. But Emma S, who has now unmasked herself to her hundreds of Facebook friends as Kim LaBerge, says she has heard from others who have received similar attacks from Matthews, including one who also emailed me with proof, and LaBerge says she continues to be harassed because of her Yelp reviews, by Matthews and his supporters.
Matthews has a history of incendiary responses to online criticism. In fall 2013, after a crowd mobbed Fourth Street in downtown Troy near the former club Kokopellis and forced Matthews to close for the night, he sprayed nastiness all over Facebook and threatened to close his business for good, though he later recanted. And earlier that year, when a Yelp reviewer described The Brown Bag’s fries as excessively greasy and shared a photo of a grease-soaked bag, Matthews responded, “you obviously have some serious problems. Please do not return to my restaurant.” |
Today, Senate Bill 169 passed the Senate Judiciary Committee with a vote of 3-2. SB 169 would allow for the concealed carry of a firearm without a concealed carry license anywhere in the state where an individual is legally allowed to be. SB 169 will now head to the Senate floor for consideration. Please contact your senator and urge them to SUPPORT this important Right to Carry legislation. Click the “Take Action” button below to contact your senator.
SB 169 would also expand the list of places where firearm owners can legally carry and make the current concealed carry licensing system optional. This allows citizens to obtain a license and take advantage of reciprocity agreements with other states.
Self-defense situations are difficult, if not impossible, to anticipate. Accordingly, a law-abiding adult’s right to defend themselves in such situations should not be conditioned by government-mandated time delays and taxes.
SB 169 would eliminate these government mandates and allow individuals to carry in a manner that best suits their needs. Under current law, an individual can carry a firearm openly without a concealed carry license; however, if an individual would rather carry their firearm in a purse or briefcase, or if their firearm becomes covered by a coat, they would be in violation of current concealed carry laws unless they obtained a concealed carry license. This bill recognizes a law-abiding adult’s unconditional Right to Keep and Bear Arms for self-defense in the manner he or she chooses. Further, twelve states currently have similar Right to Carry laws which allow law-abiding individuals to possess a concealed firearm for self-defense without a permit.
Your NRA would like to thank state Senators Van Wanggaard (R-21), Patrick Testin (R-24), and Duey Stroebel (R-20) for voting in favor of this critical legislation to ensure that the people may defend themselves in Wisconsin. Again, please contact your Senator and urge them to vote in favor of this important legislation. Stay tuned to www.nraila.org and your email inbox for further updates on this bill. |
An alien planet climate analysis cuts nearly in half the estimated number of habitable planets in our galaxy, scientists reported on Wednesday.
The findings arise from a new 3-D computer model that reveals the climates of other worlds may be warmer than researchers expected.
Detections of planets by NASA's Kepler space telescope has led to recent estimates that roughly 22 percent of sun-like stars might host a rocky Earth-size planet within their habitable zones. With some 100 billion stars in the Milky Way, this hinted there could be as many as 22 billion Earth-like planets in the galaxy.
However, this number depends on defining the habitable zone of a sun-like star as ranging from one-half to two astronomical units (AU) around it, where one AU is the average distance between Earth and the sun, some 93 million miles (150 million kilometers).
The new alien planet atmosphere analysis, released by a team led by astrophysicist Jérémy Leconte, of the Pierre Simon Laplace Institute in Paris, in the journal Nature, narrows back the inner edge of habitable zones around sun-like stars to about 0.95 AU from those stars, roughly 90 million miles (145 million kilometers).
This could nearly halve the estimated number of Earth-like planets in the Milky Way.
New, More Complex Model
Past models of temperatures on alien worlds essentially treated such planets as simple dots, one-dimensional objects that averaged the amount of heat they reflected or absorbed from their stars. The new research instead uses a 3-D climate model, which can account for details such as the way air flows.
"We can start to treat exoplanets as real three-dimensional planets, where complex processes like cloud formation can occur," said Leconte.
One factor the study model analyzed is water vapor, which traps heat. If a world is too close to its star, too much water on its surface can vaporize, heating that planet enough to eventually cause all its water to vaporize, rendering its surface uninhabitable to life as we know it.
Researchers suspect this "runaway greenhouse" effect is what happened to Venus in our solar system.
Until now, scientists thought clouds of water vapor helped cool planets by reflecting heat back into space. The new model reveals that some clouds instead might trap heat and help destabilize climate on alien worlds. Although clouds near the surface of planets do reflect heat back into space, clouds at high altitudes are colder and so absorb some of this heat, allowing less of it to escape, Leconte said.
Stabilizing Climate
Although these findings regarding clouds suggest it might be much easier to send planets hurtling toward runaway greenhouse scenarios than previously thought, the new model showed that there are other factors that help stabilize climate.
For instance, an atmosphere moves warm, moist air from tropical regions to colder polar ones. "These regions are very important for stabilizing a planet's climate, keeping it from a runaway greenhouse," Leconte said.
In addition, the new model reveals the "moist greenhouse effect," in which the host star's light is thought to cook away water vapor in the upper atmosphere, may be much less of a concern for the habitability of planets than previously thought.
"We found the upper atmosphere of planets gets much colder than it was thought to get," Leconte said. "This means any water vapor would [turn to] rain or snow it before it gets to very high altitudes where it can get broken down."
Where to Look for Habitable Planets
The new 0.95 AU estimate for the inner edge of habitable zones is actually very similar to some other estimates from simpler models of alien climates, acknowledge the researchers.
"At first it was a little disappointing not finding a bigger difference," Leconte said. "The important thing is we now are finally beginning to understand how the climates of real planets might behave."
Planetary scientist Ravi Kopparapu at Pennsylvania State University, who did not take part in this research, agreed it was likely that the inner edge of habitable zones for Earth-size planets in sun-like systems lies beyond 0.5 AU. "Venus, which is completely desiccated, is at 0.72 AU," Kopparapu said. "That is telling us the inner edge of the [habitable zone] probably lies beyond 0.72 AU."
Planetary scientist James Kasting, who is also at Pennsylvania State University and was not involved in this study, noted that if the habitable zone is narrow, "then many stars must be searched to find an Earth-like planet, and the telescope must be correspondingly large."
Future Directions
Future research by the team will explore if 3-D models alter estimates of where the outer edges of habitable zones lie. Current estimates for the outer edge of habitable zones for Earth-mass planets around sun-like stars range from 1.7 to 2 AU. "The way air circulates in a 3-D model could keep water from freezing at greater distances from stars than before thought," Leconte said.
Scientists can also investigate what climates are like in systems unlike that of Earth and the sun. For instance, planets around smaller stars likely get tidally locked, always keeping the same side facing their stars.
"This means that, like the moon around the Earth, they always present the same day side to the star and have a permanent night side," Leconte said. "This will profoundly change both the atmospheric circulation and the location of clouds." |
Come on in and have a listen before this beast drops tomorrow!
Tomorrow, Melbourne’s Gravemind will unleash their second EP, ‘The Deathgate‘, unto the world in full. After dropping the two prior banging singles that were the monstrous ‘Anaesthesia‘ and the sinister ‘Echo‘, and with all of the effort that this six-piece have put into this latest release – from a mysterious website, audio log recordings, embedding secret links to unreleased songs in said recordings, and more – it’s all hopefully about to pay off for this damn fine local deathcore crew. Because when I think about it, the only other band in Australia off the top of my head that puts this much effort and thought into their release’s promotion is Northlane. And I honestly think that Gravemind have the real potential to reach a similar level within their own genre.
In my recent review of this six-track EP and in scoring it 82/100, I stated that “Gravemind don’t need deathcore, deathcore needs Gravemind” and that this new EP was “Eldritch deathcore from the deepest void“. Which is simply just writer’s code for “you really need to listen to this shit!”
So, check out our exclusive stream of ‘The Deathgate‘ EP below in full before it drops tomorrow and fucks up each and every single one of your worlds. Go on, I dare you to find out why we’re so stoked on this band.
You can still pre-order the ‘The Deathgate’ EP here or here. In support of this mighty release, Gravemind will be playing a handful of headline dates in September with their good mates in Blind Oracle. Find the dates below, and suss out the event guide for more info by clicking here.
Thursday 14th September – Brisbane, QLD, CROWBAR
w/ Blind Oracle, Initiate Jericho and Season Unending
Thursday 21st September – Melbourne, VIC, THE WORKERS CLUB
w/ Blind Oracle, Windwaker, The Gloom in the Corner
Saturday 23rd September – Launceston, TAS, THE GREENWOOD BAR
with Uncle Geezer, Majula and special guests |
Police in New Jersey are the highest paid in the entire country, according to a lengthy report and data analysis by The Star-Ledger.
But, in the one city where violent crime ranks highest -- Camden -- those officers, on average, are among the lowest-paid municipal police officers in the entire state.
Some of the report's key findings:
The average municipal police officer in New Jersey made $89,630 last year. The average Joe-Citizen made $50,313.
Three out of 10 officers made over $100,000 in 2009.
Suburban cops make the most money.
In Camden, routinely among the country’s most violent cities, the median salary was $79,656 last year. Richard Loccke, a Hackensack labor attorney who represents several local police unions, said poorer areas have long paid their officers less. "That’s a conundrum that nobody’s gotten by," he said. "(Are salaries) based on the ability to pay, or is it based on the type of work?"
Find out how much cops in your town make. |
Temple and Georgia Tech will meet on the gridiron for the first time in the storied history of the two football programs with the announcement today of a home-and-home agreement between the schools.Georgia Tech is the fourth Atlantic Coast Conference member school to agree to a home-and-home series with the 2016 American Athletic Conference champions. The other three ACC schools are Boston College, Duke and Miami.Temple will host Georgia Tech on Sept. 28, 2019, in Philadelphia. The Owls will play the Yellow Jackets in Atlanta on Sept. 20, 2025, at Bobby Dodd Stadium.Head coach, who grew up outside Atlanta and had worked at Georgia Tech from 1999-2001 and again in 2006, knows the value of playing and recruiting in that area."We talk about dominating our recruiting footprint, which is obviously Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C.," said Collins. "My experience in the SEC and the ACC makes Georgia and Florida very important areas for recruiting as well. That's why the Georgia Tech and Miami games are integral parts of establishing our national presence for Temple football."The addition of the Georgia Tech series gives Temple Football 18 non-conference games against Power 6 conference schools through the 2028 season. Temple will play at least one non-conference Power 6 school in each of the next nine seasons starting with the 2017 opener at Notre Dame (Sept. 2).Temple also has future home-and-home series scheduled with Oklahoma (Big 12), Maryland (Big 10) and Rutgers (Big 10).In order to fit these games into the schedule, Temple canceled its previously announced game against Army in 2019.Here is a listing of the Owls' non-conference schedules through 2028:2017 – at Notre Dame (Sept. 2), Villanova (Sept. 9), UMass (Sept. 16), at Army (Oct. 21)2018 – Villanova (Sept. 1), Buffalo (Sept. 8), at Maryland (Sept. 15), at Boston College (Sept. 29)2019 – Bucknell (Aug. 31), Maryland (Sept. 14) at Buffalo (Sept. 21), Georgia Tech (Sept 28)2020 – at Miami (Sept. 5), Idaho (Sept. 12), Rutgers (Sept. 19)2021 – at Rutgers (Sept. 4), Boston College (Sept. 18)2022 – at Duke (Sept. 3), Rutgers (Sept. 17)2023 – at Rutgers (Sept. 9), Miami (Sept. 23)2024 – at Oklahoma (Aug. 31)2025 – Oklahoma (Sept. 13), at Georgia Tech (Sept. 20)2028 - at Oklahoma (Sept. 2), Duke (Sept. 16) |
U.S. President Barack Obama makes remarks on the situation in Syria, at the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington August 31, 2013. REUTERS/Mike Theiler
BEIRUT (Reuters) - President Barack Obama’s decision to seek congressional approval before going ahead with a military strike on Syria is the start of a U.S. “retreat”, Syrian state media said on Sunday.
“Obama announced yesterday, directly or through implication, the beginning of the historic American retreat,” said the comments, which were carried in a front-page editorial in Syria’s official al-Thawra newspaper.
The U.S. president said on Saturday he would seek congressional consent before taking military action against Damascus for its apparent use of chemical weapons, a move likely to delay an attack for at least 10 days.
“A decision to wage war on Syria is a criminal decision and an incorrect decision. We are confident that we will be victorious,” Syria’s deputy foreign minister Faisal Mekdad told reporters outside a hotel in Damascus. |
Story highlights Two Yemenis and three Tunisians transferred
Guantanamo Bay has held nearly 800 detainees
The U.S. government has transferred five more Guantanamo Bay detainees, shrinking the number to 127.
The detainees, two Yemeni and three Tunisians, were repatriated to Kazakhstan, after the Guantanamo Review Task Force said it determined the men did not pose security threats.
The Defense Department identified the men as Asim Thabit Abdullah Al-Khalaqi, Muhammad Ali Husayn Khanayna, Sabri Muhammad Ibrahim Al Qurashi, Adel Al-Hakeemy, and Abdullah Bin Ali Al-Lufti.
The move advances President Barack Obama's goal of drawing down the number of those held at the U.S. naval base in southeastern Cuba, something that has been ongoing for years.
JUST WATCHED Graham on North Korea and Guantanamo Bay Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Graham on North Korea and Guantanamo Bay 04:34
The departures of the five men means that 127 people are still detained at Guantanamo.
This is down significantly from the numbers soon after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, when the facility widely known as Gitmo was repurposed to hold detainees from the "war on terror."
JUST WATCHED McCain offers hope that Gitmo could be closed Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH McCain offers hope that Gitmo could be closed 01:29
The administration of then-President George W. Bush claimed that, since Gitmo detainees weren't held on American soil, they could be considered " enemy combatants " and be denied some legal protections. Almost all of the nearly 800 detainees were held without charges.
This legal limbo, as well as allegations of torture and other mistreatment, spurred criticism of Gitmo. Shortly after his 2009 inauguration, President Barack Obama signed an executive order to close the detention facility within a year.
That didn't happen.
One reason was because of strong opposition from lawmakers, many of them Republicans, who cited the risk of freeing men who had fought to kill Americans.
About 17% of the 620 Gitmo detainees released -- most of them during Bush's presidency -- went on to engage in terrorist activities, a September semiannual report from the director of national intelligence found. Another 12% are suspected of having engaged in terrorist or insurgent activities. |
The Amazon Dash button is a tiny device that orders products from Amazon.com at the press of a button. It's designed to be put wherever you store consumeables like paper towels, trash bags, etc. so that you can easily order more when they run out. The Dash is great at what it's designed to do, but did you know inside the Dash is a powerful ARM Cortex-M3 processor and WiFi module that are very similar to wireless development boards like the Particle Photon? You'll even find there are easily accessible test pads on the Dash which allow you to reprogram its CPU and turn it into your own $5 internet button! This guide will explore how to take apart the Dash and reprogram its CPU to run your own code.
This is a good introduction to 'bare-metal' embedded development where you write code to run on a chip without any operating system. Just like an Arduino you have total control over what the CPU does, but unlike Arduino you need to get closer to the hardware to tell it exactly what to do. Be warned that you'll want to have some experience soldering, programming C, and using development tools from the command line to follow this guide--this is not a good intro to electronics project!
This guide builds on some great work by others to understand the hardware available on the Dash. In particular this Exploring Amazon Dash Button project and Amazon Dash Teardown blog post are good sources of info that describe the Dash hardware:
The CPU is a STM32F205RG6 processor which is an ARM Cortex-M3 that can run up to 120mhz and has 128 kilobytes of RAM and 1 megabyte of flash memory for program storage.
The WiFi module is a BCM943362 module which in combination with the CPU make it a platform for Broadcom's WICED SDK.
There's a 16 megabit SPI flash ROM which is typically used in conjunction with the WICED SDK for storing application data.
An ADMP441 microphone is connected to the CPU and used by the Dash iOS application to configure the device using the speaker on a phone/tablet.
There's a single RGB LED and a button.
It's still early days in the undestanding of the Dash hardware so this guide will only show how to program the Dash CPU and use its LED. Unfortunately the WiFi module isn't useable yet until a little more investigation is done to understand how it's connected to the Dash CPU and exposed to the WICED SDK. For now you can control the LEDs and even output data on a serial UART with the example code in this guide. In the future as more Dash functionality is understood later guides can explore using more Dash features like its WiFi radio. |
DARPA and Boston Dynamics, of BigDog, Petman, and Cheetah fame, have unveiled their most advanced humanoid robot yet: Atlas. At 6’2″ (188cm) and 330lbs (150kg), Atlas is incredibly imposing; with 28 hydraulically actuated joints, LIDAR and stereo vision, a beefy on-board computer, and some of the most advanced robotic limbs ever conceived, Atlas is remarkably human-like in its behavior. While Atlas is initially conceived as a disaster response robot, such as cleaning up and looking for survivors after a Fukushima-like disaster, it’s easy to imagine Atlas being the basis of a robotic army, supported by BigDog mules.
As you can see in the photo above and the video below, Atlas is incredibly technologically advanced. With 28 hydraulic joints, Atlas can replicate almost every degree of human motion — or, in the case of the robot hands provided by iRobot and Sandia National Labs, surpass them. Vision is provided by a Carnegie Robotics LIDAR and stereo camera system; LIDAR, or light-based radar, is the same detection and ranging system used by autonomous vehicles, such as Google’s self-driving car. LIDAR is expensive, but incredibly accurate. The tech specs say that Atlas has its own on-board hydraulic pump, but you can see in the video that it’s still tethered to some kind of off-board power/hydraulic supply. Like BigDog, which started off tethered, Atlas will eventually be self-powered and free to roam wherever it wishes.
Atlas has an on-board, real-time computer — but it hasn’t yet been loaded up with its software brain. As it stands, Atlas is a shell, and more than a dozen teams will now compete in the DARPA Robotics Challenge (DRC) to see who can create the best brain for Atlas. In December 2013, each team will load up an Atlas with its software and compete in a series of disaster response trials. The best teams will receive continued funding from DARPA, and will then compete in the DRC finals in December 2014. Whoever wins that will receive $2 million from DARPA, and presumably a big contract for the commercial production of Atlas robots.
The ostensible purpose of Atlas is disaster response. As you can see in the video, Atlas has no problem walking over rough terrain, and the robotic hands that it’s equipped with are some of most dexterous and flexible hands that money can buy. (Read more about the iRobot and Sandia robot hands.) Hopefully, Atlas will be able to wade into dangerous disaster zones and save human lives.
It is hard to ignore the fact that Atlas looks like a Terminator, though. Given that its canine predecessor, BigDog, will soon join the US Marines, it seems inevitable that Atlas will eventually find its way to the battlefield. When that happens, the US will be able to field robot soldiers that are stronger, more resilient, and probably more accurate with their weapons than their human counterparts. At first, as with today’s UAVs, Atlas soldiers will probably be operated by humans situated safely in a bunker back home — but as their software improves, autonomous robot soldiers are not out of the question.
And then, a few months or years or decades later, they’ll take over the world.
Now read: DARPA reveals Avatar program, robot soldiers incoming |
An international student from China who gave the student address at the University of Maryland’s commencement ceremony is facing a backlash in her home country after her speech went viral.
Yang Shuping, an international student from China, praised the United States’ commitment to free expression in the student address at the University of Maryland’s 2017 commencement ceremony. She claimed that she will be “forever grateful” for the “fresh air of free speech” that exists in the United States as opposed to
“People often ask me: ‘Why did you come to the University of Maryland?'” she said in her speech. “I always answer: Fresh air.” “I grew up in a city in China where I had to wear a face mask every time I went outside, otherwise I might get sick. However, the moment I inhaled and exhaled outside the airport, I felt free,” she said, referring to her arrival in the United States. “I would soon feel another kind of fresh air for which I will be forever grateful. The fresh air of free speech. Democracy and free speech should not be taken for granted. Democracy and freedom are the fresh air that is worth fighting for.”
In her speech, Yang claimed that her life in China convinced her that only state authorities within the Communist Party could define truth.
Her speech drew over 50 million views on social media in her home country, with many condemning the speech.
“China does not need a traitor like you. Just stay in the US and breathe your fresh air. No matter how bad China is, and even though you are speaking of your personal opinion, as a student representative, it is irresponsible of you to paint an inadequate picture of China,” one user posted, according to the Washington Post.
“Our motherland has done so much to make us stand up among Western countries, but what have you done? We have been working so hard to eliminate the stereotypes the West has put on us, but what are you doing? Don’t let me meet you in the United States; I am afraid I could not stop myself from going up and smacking you in the face,” another user chirped.
The People’s Daily Online, a mouthpiece for the communist party in China, condemned Shuping, claiming that her speech helped ““[bolster] negative Chinese stereotypes.”
A few users praised Shuping’s speech and condemned those who attacked her for speaking her mind.
Yang responded to the criticisms and offered an apology to her home country on Monday.
“I love my country and home town and I’m proud of its prosperity,” she wrote on her social media accounts.
“I hope to make contributions to it using what I have learned overseas. The speech was just to share my experiences overseas, and I had no intentions of belittling my country and home town… I am deeply sorry and hope for forgiveness,” she finished.
Tom Ciccotta is a libertarian who writes about economics and higher education for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter @tciccotta or email him at [email protected] |
Product Details
The ADF4350 allows implementation of fractional-N or integer-N phase-locked loop (PLL) frequency synthesizers if used with an external loop filter and external reference frequency.
The ADF4350 has an integrated voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) with a fundamental output frequency ranging from 2200 MHz to 4400 MHz. In addition, divide-by-1/2/4/8 or 16 circuits allow the user to generate RF output frequencies as low as 137.5 MHz. For applications that require isolation, the RF output stage can be muted. The mute function is both pin- and software-controllable. An auxiliary RF output is also available, which can be powered down if not in use.
Control of all the on-chip registers is through a simple 3-wire interface. The device operates with a power supply ranging from 3.0 V to 3.6 V and can be powered down when not in use.
Applications |
I sat down to lunch with the atheist engineer and felt—awkward!
His wife had suggested that we meet together since he was skeptical about the whole God thing and about the church his wife was starting to attend.
But we had nothing in common. He was a scientist and I was, in his view, a religious nut. Worse, I was a professional religious nut, since I was the pastor of the church. In his mind, I was paid to be irrational.
And he was, above all else, a rationalist—and proud of it.
We swapped superficial pleasantries as we ordered from the menu, but both of us felt uncomfortable. So with an industrial strength level of self-confidence, he barreled ahead with what I felt to be a patronizing comment.
“Well, my wife suggested that we have lunch and talk over my questions about the rationality of religion. You probably haven’t heard these comments before, so I hope you won’t be offended.”
“Oh pleeease,” I moaned inwardly, “he thinks he has me pegged. He has no clue that I studied Ph.D.-level philosophy at a secular university, or that I’ve talked with many, many skeptics over the years. Plus, I’m a pastor, so I should be better at this whole patience thing by now, so get a grip and listen…”
I knew that arguments don’t lead to changed hearts. Plus, I knew something he didn’t: that we both actually believed in and cared about many of the same things. I’ve learned to find common ground with skeptics and atheists, and prompt them to think deeply about the things they value.
But my goals were to aid his wife and not alienate him, so I simply said, “Well, give me your best shot.”
So he talked. And talked. About science, about the big bang, and about Bertrand Russell and his fixation with that fig tree.
But this wasn’t my first rodeo, so I knew that arguments don’t lead to changed hearts. Plus, I knew something he didn’t: that we both actually believed in and cared about many of the same things. Over the years I’ve simply learned to find common ground with skeptics and atheists, and prompt them to think deeply about the things they value.
So I began with science. “I’m glad you love science and always seek to follow the scientific method. I love science too. But I’ve noticed that there are some things the scientific method just can’t prove.”
“Like what?”
“Well, there are many, but this is a big one: you can’t prove the scientific method by the scientific method.”
Silence. Again—awkward.
So I asked, “Who are your all-time favorite scientists?”
“Galileo, Kepler, Newton, Einstein,” he responded.
“Me too. Incredible geniuses, every one. And, by the way, all of them believed in God. Especially Newton, who wrote more pages on biblical studies than he did on science.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“It’s true,” I said, “Also, did you know that the scientific method developed only in western civilization because it was based on Christian principles?”
“That’s not true.”
“Well, I have graduate degrees in philosophy and theology, and there are some fabulous books by science historians that verify this—one just published recently from Oxford. Would you be interested in reading it with me, and discussing chapters over lunch?”
“I would love that!” He exclaimed, “And so will my wife!” We both laughed.
In the years that followed, he and I read dozens of books together. And he became a close friend—and, in time, a fellow believer.
Since then I’ve had numerous encounters with other skeptics and have always found that we share much in common. We love music, whether classic rock or jazz; we enjoy movies and books, from sci-fi to zombies; and we like sports or museums. Plus, we strongly oppose sex trafficking here and around the world, we despise people who are cruel to animals, and we think Hitler was evil and deserved to be defeated.
But the biggest surprise of all was when I looked deeper into these diverse likes and dislikes, and I found that each of them, in their own unique but definite way, pointed to God. That is, each made more sense in a theistic worldview than in an atheistic one.
I’ve learned that God is indeed real, but he hides in our deepest likes and loathings, ready to reveal himself to us in the very parts of life that we care most about. |
Voting Rights issues focus of possible legal actions
The voting rights of the Native American residents of San Juan County is the topic of two separate legal claims.An ongoing legal action against the county claims that both the San Juan County Commission voting districts and the San Juan School Board voting districts deny Native American voters “equal weight in representation”.In another matter, the Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission claims that the 2014 election, which used only mail-in ballots, had a negative impact on Navajo voters. The Human Rights Commission is threatening to file a lawsuit regarding the program.The voting rights issues go back several decades, culminating in a restructuring of the commission voting districts in the late 1980s. Before that time, there had been no Native Americans elected to the three-person San Juan County Commission.Since that restructuring, which was under the direction of the Office of Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Justice, there have been two Anglos and one Native American member of the County Commission.Similarly, since the school voting districts were adjusted in 1992, there have been two Native Americans and three Anglo members on the five-person San Juan School Board.Leonard Gorman, Executive Director for the Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission, said, “Navajo voters in San Juan County deserve and have the right, in accordance with the 1965 Voting Rights Act, to elect candidates of their choice, which was obviously repressed by the county commission going on three decades.“As a protected class of citizens, Navajos can increase their ability to elect candidates that make the majority in the county commission and school board, based on the 2010 U.S. census.”According to Gorman, the plan he supports assures that Navajo voters can elect two candidates of choice for the three county commissioners and three candidates of choice for the five school board members.The school voting districts follow precinct lines and, with few exceptions, follow the boundary lines of the district high schools.The current school voting districts include two districts with a clear Anglo majority and two districts with a clear Native American majority. The fifth district has a Native American majority but has always elected an Anglo board member.In another matter related to Native American Voting Rights, Gorman is expressing concerns about the mail-in ballots for the 2014 primary and general elections.Gorman said, “The mail-in ballots disparately impacted Navajo voters in San Juan County.”San Juan County initiated the first election with mail-only ballots in November, 2014. Voter turnout in 2014 was similar to the prior midterm election in 2010, with a small decrease.County officials expressed satisfaction that the election went well, culminating more than one year of effort to notify and train voters on the changes.Gorman said there were several issues of concern with the mail-in ballots, including the differences in postal date stamping of the completed ballots, and the fear that voters may have considered the ballots to be junk mail.Language challenges are also a concern. Gorman said the county has a responsibility to provide Navajo language assistance to Navajo voters during county elections. He said the 2014 San Juan County ballots had several technical amendments to the Utah constitution, which Navajos had difficulty translating from English to Navajo.An additional concern is for voters who show up at the polling places on Election Day and may not be able to vote or get an official postmarked ballot in the mail. According to Gorman, doing away with the mail-in ballot will eliminate the vast confusion with U.S. mail system. |
ALEPPO, SYRIA (12:00 P.M.) – The Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS) claimed their forces killed an American soldier near the northeastern Aleppo town of Menbeij on Monday morning.
According to the statement released by the Islamic State’s official media wing “Al-‘Amaq,” the terrorist group killed the American soldier at the village of Gharatah Al-Saghir after a violent battle near Menbeij.
In addition to killing the American soldier, the Islamic State alleged that their forces killed 9 members of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) at Gharatah Al-Saghir.
ISIS typically refers to all fighters from the People’s Protection Units (YPG) and Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) as “PKK militants”; this is why they used that acronym in their statement.
The Pentagon has yet to comment on this Islamic State claim.
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MUMBAI: The commissioning of the first Scorpene-class submarine - ' INS Kalvari ' - into the Indian Navy reaffirms the giant strides taken under the 'Make in India' programme, defence PSU Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Ltd (MDL) said today.The induction of Kalvari into the Indian Navy would be a game-changer in the field of underwater warfare and its commissioning has added another feather in MDL's cap, the shipbuilder said after Prime Minister Narendra Modi commissioned the submarine at the naval dockyard here today."The commissioning of INS Kalvari reaffirms the giant strides taken by Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Ltd in the ongoing 'Make In India' programme, which is being actively implemented by the Department of Defence Production (Ministry of Defence)," the MDL said in a statement."MDL is constructing six Scorpene-class submarines with technology transfer from M/s Naval Group (formerly known as DCNS) of France," it read.Commodore (retd) Rakesh Anand, the chairman and managing director of MDL, said the induction of Kalvari into the Indian Navy would be a game-changer in the field of underwater warfare due to its superiority in all operational aspects.He also highlighted the aspect pertaining to completion of all weapon firings prior to commissioning of the submarine which, he said, was indeed a unique achievement.The technology used in the submarine has ensured superior stealth features, such as advanced acoustic silencing techniques, low radiated noise levels, hydro-dynamically optimised shape and the ability to launch a crippling attack on the enemy using precision guided weapons, the MDL said.An attack can be launched with both torpedoes and tube- launched anti-ship missiles, whilst underwater or on surface, it said.The stealth of this potent platform is enhanced by the special attention given to various signatures. These stealth features give it invulnerability, unmatched by most submarines, the statement said.The Scorpene submarines can undertake multifarious types of missions, such as anti-surface warfare, anti-submarine warfare, intelligence gathering, mine laying and area surveillance, it said.The submarine is designed to operate in all theatres, with means provided to ensure interoperability with other components of a Naval task force.It is a potent platform, marking a generational shift in submarine operations, it said."The building of the Scorpene was indeed a challenge as the complexity of the simplest of tasks increased exponentially due to all work having to be done in the most congested of spaces," the MDL said."This complexity was further aggravated due to the stringent tolerances required to be achieved. However, these challenges were successfully overcome by MDL, without any compromise in quality," it said.The second of the Scorpenes under construction at MDL, Khanderi, was launched in January 2017, and is undergoing rigorous sea trials.The third Scorpene, Karanj, is being readied for launch shortly.The remaining three submarines are in various stages of outfitting. The project is expected to be completed by 2020, the MDL said.Kalvari is named after the dreaded tiger shark, a deadly deep sea predator of the Indian Ocean.As is the tradition, ships and submarines of the Navy, are 're-incarnated' after decommissioning, the MDL said.So it is with Kalvari. The first Kalvari, commissioned on December 8 1967, was also the first submarine of the Indian Navy. It was decommissioned on May 31, 1996 after almost 30 years of yeoman service to the nation."The experience and expertise that MDL has gained from the Scorpene project together with enhanced and upgraded infrastructure has ensured that the shipyard is fully geared for undertaking construction of the next generation submarines," it said. |
Nestlé Waters North America's CEO, Tim Brown. Youtube / Nestlé IR Nestle Waters North America's CEO Tim Brown is defending his company's claim to 700 million gallons of water in California, a state currently in the throes of a historic drought.
In an interview with Southern California Public Radio's KPCC, Brown took questions from host Larry Mantle, hydrologist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab Jay Famiglietti, and locals who called into the station. His answers largely fell in line with policy delineated on Nestle's website— that the company will continue to operate five bottling facilities across California because "people need to drink water." Brown's words, however, seemed to come off as shockingly cavalier.
"If I stop bottling water tomorrow, people would buy a different brand of bottled water. We see this everyday," Brown told KPCC. "In fact, if I could increase [bottling], I would."
Following one of California's driest years on record and the state-wide mandatory water cutbacks, experts such as Famiglietti — as well as many members of the general public— are questioning Nestle Waters' use of so much California water.
"The individual companies may be using thousands of acre-feet, and bottling up thousands of acre-feet a year, which doesn't really sound like much, but an acre-foot [nearly 326,000 gallons] is enough water to supply an entire family for a year. So, in this time when we're being asked to flush our toilets less and less, we have to ask the question: Is this really an environmentally, ethically correct thing to be doing right now?" Famiglietti asked on the show.
Denika Beltran, 10, whose family's well has run dry, washes her hands from a water tub next to the kitchen sink in Porterville, California October 14, 2014. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson
Nestlé Waters says it's providing healthy hydration legally and transparently.
Brown claims the company has complied with all regulatory agencies and makes every effort to become more efficient to adapt to the water-scarce environment, with plans to save up to 89 million gallons annually.
"The fact is, the use of water for bottling in California is the most efficient use of water among packaged beverages and is literally a 'drop in the bucket' in comparison to how much water is used for other purposes," Brown wrote in an op-ed for The Desert Sun.
But Famiglietti says bottling water still takes 30% to 50% more water than turning on the tap.
When he asked point blank if Nestlé Waters would stop bottling water in California both to address public opinion as well as environmental concerns, Brown responded: "Absolutely not."
"We feel good about what we're doing, delivering healthy hydration to people throughout the state of California as we've been doing for 120 years," Brown added on the show.
Ignoring Brown's enthusiasm for healthy beverages, Famiglietti remained doubtful to the environmental sanity of Nestlé Waters business model. He made the point that no reliable way exists to tell how exactly the bottling facility affects the region's water table in the region because Nestlé Waters' operation in the San Bernardino valley has been going on since 1894, long before anyone had any idea what the normal water table should look like.
A section of Lake Oroville is seen nearly dry on August 19, 2014 in Oroville, California. As the severe drought in California continues for a third straight year, water levels in the State's lakes and reservoirs is reaching historic lows. Lake Oroville is currently at 32 percent of its total 3,537,577 acre feet. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Nestlé Waters produces more than 15 brands of bottled waters and tea, including Arrowhead, Poland Springs, and Zephyrhills. One of its competitors, Starbucks, which bottles the Ethos brand of water, has stopped production in California due public concern over the drought. |
In November 2013, managers at H.J. Heinz Co. gathered their workers in the cafeteria of the company’s century-old plant in Leamington and broke some bad news.
The plant’s new owners — Berkshire Hathaway and Brazilian private equity firm 3G capital — had decided to shut the plant down. It was unclear whether the small Southwestern Ontario town was going to recover from such a crippling blow.
The plant had 740 full time employees and 350 seasonal workers. The tomatoes it processed for Heinz accounted for half of Ontario’s $52 million crop. Devastated workers left the meeting in a hail of curses and tears, making panicked calls to real estate agents about the value of their homes.
A few months later, a new company called Highbury Canco Corp. offered a reprieve. The company took over the plant and signed a letter of intent to continue processing tomatoes for Heinz — but not for ketchup, its former signature product, and not enough to keep more than about one-third of the plant’s workers employed.
Little did Heinz know that two years later, lingering anger over its treatment of Leamington would play right into the hands of one of its biggest competitors.
In late 2014 to little fanfare, The French’s Food Co. LLC — best known for its mustard — started selling ketchup in grocery stores. Heinz hit back a few months later, ramping up distribution and marketing of its retail mustard: “For years, Heinz ketchup has been with the wrong mustard. Well, not anymore,” said the voiceover of a commercial released in April 2015.
Struggling to challenge Heinz’s market leadership, French’s rolled out a new marketing campaign positioning itself as the natural, local condiment alternative, free from additives, high fructose corn syrup and gluten. That included buying paste made by Highbury Canco from tomatoes grown in Southwestern Ontario for its Canadian ketchup.
Today’s consumers, especially millennials, “want things local,” said French’s president Elliott Penner. “They don’t want to see things that they don’t know where they came from.”
And boy, was he right. At least if you’re counting likes and shares — and willing to stretch the definition of “local.”
In January, a month after French’s starting sending out press releases touting that “working with local farmers in Ontario, French’s Ketchup is now made with 100% Canadian tomatoes,” the CBC bit and ran a story about how Leamington tomatoes were being used for ketchup again. About six weeks later, a construction worker in Orillia came across that story and wrote a viral Facebook post with 133,000 shares and counting, saying his family had decided to switch to French’s: “Absolutely love it!! Bye. Bye. Heinz.”
When word got out last week that Loblaw Cos. Ltd. was pulling regular-flavoured French’s ketchup from stores, citing low sales, the mood on social media turned from love-in to lynch mob.
Yet another post went viral, a video featuring an irate and heavily tattooed man standing in front of a Loblaws store holding a bottle of French’s ketchup and vowing to never shop there again unless the company reverses its decision. “FRENCH’S are creating jobs for Canadians while Loblaws/Heinz are taking away jobs from Canadians.CALL AND COMPLAIN NOW !!” he wrote in a Facebook post accompanying the video.
And complain people did: #Frenchsketchup became a trending hashtag on Twitter and Loblaw announced it would restock French’s regular ketchup (lost in the din was the fact Loblaw hadn’t pulled the product completely: French’s Buffalo and garlic ketchups had never left shelves of the company’s various grocery brands). It was a clear PR victory for French’s — but maybe not so much for Canadian jobs.
Just like Heinz, French’s is owned by a foreign multinational. U.K.-based Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC has a market capitalization of US$46.72 billion and its portfolio includes brands such as Clearasil, Durex and Lysol, in addition to French’s.
Loblaw, meanwhile, is one of Canada’s biggest and most successful companies, employing 200,000 people across the country. Its PC brand of ketchup is produced at a plant in Winona, Ont., that employs 430 people; French’s retail ketchup is manufactured in Ohio.
Sylvain Charlebois, a professor at the University of Guelph’s Food Institute, said the social media response was more emotional than rational.
“Other brands may be as Canadian as French’s,” he said. “In the end, it doesn’t matter. It’s all about perceptions.”
So how, exactly, did that perception spread so quickly?
According to an analysis performed for the Financial Post by McGill University computer science professor Xue Liu and his students Mingyuan Xia and Xinye Lin, the original viral Facebook post by the Orillia construction worker doesn’t show any signs of meddling by French’s or anyone else. “We think this post going viral is a true social event,” Liu said in an email.
The other mystery is whether all the attention has translated into actual sales for French’s ketchup. Penner, the president of French’s, claims it has, saying sales to retailers have quadrupled over the last four weeks: “It is humbling what happened. It shows you the power of consumers…. For anyone to think that’s not translating to sales, I don’t know what to say.”
But those numbers are impossible to verify. French’s share of the ketchup market is too small for research firms to track — particularly in Canada, where Heinz ketchup accounted for 84 per cent of sales in 2015, according to data from Euromonitor International. In Loblaw’s statement announcing it would restock French’s ketchup, the company alluded to previous poor performance at the cash register: “We will re-stock French’s ketchup and hope that the enthusiasm we are seeing in the media and on social media translates into sales of the product.”
What’s clear is the power of Leamington’s story, a David and Goliath tale that pits hard-working, blue-collar Canadians against a giant, foreign corporation. And while Penner denies this has anything to do with Heinz at all, the fact Canadians are letting French’s play the hero to Heinz’s villain is great news for the would-be condiment king.
[email protected]
Twitter.com/clabrow |
To my three or four tumblr followers, and to my few Facebook friends who would actually read something I write about a TV show they haven’t seen, I have to tell you something. And that is: “Holy shit, you should watch Black Mirror.” It’s a Channel 4 show that airs only on DirecTv in America. So that means you should torrent it if you can’t find a good way to give money to the show. But whatever way you can watch it, you just SHOULD.
It’s an anthology show that is sort-of-maybe-kind-of-possibly-could-be-ok-obviously-it-is-inspired by The Twilight Zone. Every episode has a different premise and cast. It’s about modern technology and what can happen if we’re not careful with it in our present or future use. There are only two seasons so far. There are only three hour-long episodes per season. I’m writing in broken up sentences because I haven’t been so excited about a show in a long time, at least not one like this. That’s because there is only one other show that I know of on TV that is anything like Black Mirror, and it pales in comparison.
I’ve only watched the first season of American Horror Story. I thought the first season (which will be heretofore referred to by it’s post-mortem moniker Murder House) was fun, addictive, sexy, and totally heavy handed in every way. It’s a show that should be scary, but it can’t be too scary, because then it would scare away too many people. But alas! It’s an anthology show. If you don’t like this season, then the next season will be totally different, so you might end up liking just a chapter or two of American Horror Story. That means there has to be something distinctly different about the seasons, with loose style threads connecting them, all while trying to coax back previously disappointed viewers while maintaining your core viewership. And from what I’ve heard about AHS: Asylum, and AHS: Coven, not much has changed in terms of its scary-factor, and it’s still very much a Ryan Murphy production (if you didn’t know that he also created Glee and Nip/Tuck, now you do).
I will try Asylum when it gets on Netflix, for sure. Because despite the faults I think American Horror Story has, it is still so, so cool that an anthology show can be embraced by so many people, especially since the number of viewers has grown through its third season (I guarantee this is because of Murder House being on Netflix, but the snake fellatio might have had something to do with it too.) But if Asylum doesn’t do it for me, I won’t continue, because why should I watch a show with the word “horror” in its title when it does little to elicit that response?
Which is where Black Mirror comes in.
Black Mirror isn’t scary like Murder House was at points. There aren’t ghosts walking around. There isn’t a lot of bloody murders and rehashed Black Dahlias. It’s scary in a way that cuts straight to the bone, right before embedding itself there for hours. It doesn’t keep you awake at night because every bump you hear in the night could be death incarnate. It keeps you awake because somewhere, an alarm is set on a phone, and without that tiny little device, your whole world would be different, and it will never be the way it was before ever, ever again. And that thought will marinate in your brain all week as you look at screens, navigating your way through ones and zeroes. Every time you close your laptop or turn off your TV, you’ll think, “Good for you,” and for a few minutes you will do something in the world, uninhibited by the presence of the eponymous black mirror in your pocket, on your desk, on your wall. And then, like everyone else, you will return to it, and life will continue like you didn’t even leave.
Horrifying isn’t the best word to describe Black Mirror. Terrifying is a much better choice. From the first beat of the first season, creator Charlie Brooker does an excellent job at setting up the worlds he’s created with each new episode, despite the fact that we find ourselves in wildly different environments every hour. The first episode, The National Anthem, takes place in what must be present day London. There is no reason for the story to take place in the future, though ten years ago it would have made for a sly parable of where we could possibly end up “if things get out of hand.”
The story goes as such: A princess from the Royal Family (much like Kate Middleton) is taken prisoner, where she is forced to make a video for the Prime Minister. In it she gives the kidnapper’s ransom demand, which involves the PM personally. I can’t go any further in telling you what it is, because hearing it for the first time is such a delightful treat. I thought it would be something else, an old trope that I’m sure others will guess at, but Black Mirror impressed me in the first five minutes by setting up a demand so hilarious and fucked up that I definitely believed that someone would do it tomorrow. Watching the world react to the demand is very true-to-life, mimicking every major story that we’ve seen since twitter was invented: so-called journalists reciting the views of completely random people floating on the internet, who probably spend more time complaining about The Walking Dead than they do worrying about what the Prime Minister is up to.
In short, the hour descends from dark humor to extremely dark humor, humor so dark that it’s not funny at all; it’s “humorous” only because of its presentation of reality. Everything spirals to shit. Somewhere in the middle are sprinkles of hope for a different ending, but they are all obliterated by the storm that the kidnapper has thrust upon the world. I was afraid that the next two episodes would not hold up to the same standard, but again, Black Mirror surprised me.
The second episode, Fifteen Million Merits, is set in the probably-pretty-distant future, where humans are drones who ride stationary bikes so they can keep the lights on for the world, all while collecting “merits” for their deeds that will buy them food or subscriptions to porn websites or reality shows, or even skip a forced advertisement for a small fee. Their bedrooms are giant screens. Everyone has an avatar. Only the special people, who save enough merits, can get a chance to go on a reality show a la The X Factor, where they might be discovered, therefore giving them a chance to get off the bike forever, and live the life of a glorious celebrity, some of whom even have windows where they can look outside.
The first two episodes are biting commentaries, to state the obvious. If these premises were given to less talented individuals, the stories could seem hokey and heavy handed. Charlie Brooker is clearly an excellent puppet master though; for what his show lacks in subtext he makes up for in terrific acting, directing, production design, and the way the writers lay out rules of his worlds. That isn’t to say that Black Mirror shouts its morals at you, but the stories are critiquing things we have all been saying for years, things George Orwell, Rod Serling, and Ray Bradbury explored ages ago. The reason Black Mirror works is that these stories are presented slowly, surely, and confidently. It does not underestimate its audience’s intelligence, and if the ending can be guessed, fear not; watching it will be better than you could have ever imagined it being executed.
Its third episode, The Entire History of You, is a perfect example of how a tale as old as time can be freshly retold through great acting and concept design. The show, which just a week earlier, showed us the completely fluorescent dystopian future, pedals back to show us what actually looks like a pretty nice not-so-distant future. Every character we meet in this episode has a beautiful house, with great stuff and great people to fill it with. They all also have a camera embedded in their head, which records everything they do. They can rewind, replay, and save events for later to watch in their head, or with the tap of a fob, projected on a futuristic screen. They call this camera a “Grain,” which lives just behind their ear. This technology can do almost anything: zoom in, listen from afar, lip read, save endless amounts of video, and replay it a million times. It’s possible that past writers would have suggested that everyone was grained by force, but it’s quite the contrary. To be grained is elective, and it’s extremely popular. To get it removed is totally fine, though to do so could be frowned upon by the same types of people who might frown upon someone for deciding to ditch their cell phone in 2013. They can imagine what it’s like to live without it, they just don’t want to.
Most (but I hope all!) of us have been in romantic relationships, and that is directly where this episode lives. The implications of having this type of device are endless when it comes to our closest companions. Past arguments reexamined, old sex experiences re-lived, touching moments of love and impulsivity replayed as many times as you like. Jesse Armstrong, the writer of this episode and the co-creator of Peep Show, makes sure that we know how versatile the Grain is, and how many things it can show us that can change the way we see our world. What’s more impressive is all of the things it doesn’t show us that we are forced to imagine on our own. The legal world would be turned upside down, college lectures would all recorded and catalogued, no recipe or thing you have read is ever far away. Things are forgotten only for a second before your finger can swipe at the fob in your pocket that controls the Grain, making every second of your life a permanent eternity that can be referenced, catalogued, proved, and reviewed for evidence of your right or wrong-doing forever. There is no need for memory anymore. There is only recall.
The conflict and the conclusion of the episode is seen from a mile away, but again, the slow burn to the conclusion is too fun to watch to care about the predictability of the ending. After all, Armstrong gives us everything we need to know in the first ten minutes of the episode. The genius is that we only really start to see it all unfold after it’s rewinded and re-watched (a “re-do,” as the characters say). Watching re-dos of extremely personal moments is only made more uncomfortable by the fact that there is already something capable of this, and it’s called Google Glass. The future is already here, and there is no doubt that it will be used for these purposes. We have to ask ourselves what we would do. Would we want to be right so bad that we would give up ambiguity? Could you ever forgive someone completely, when what they did can be seen again not just on a screen, but exactly the way it was seen in your head?
Black Mirror succeeds in every way because of these questions. It’s the same reason that The Twilight Zone was so effective. Could you allow your neighbors to die so you could have enough rations in your bomb shelter? Would you sell your soul for a chance to prove that you’re the best at something? Do you really know your neighbors, and if so, do you trust them? (Bonus: How the fuck would you kill Talking Tina, and why didn’t you just use gasoline? Nothing survives fire!) Black Mirror bothers you every time you log into Facebook, and right now as I write this I am feeling slightly disgusted by just how many hours of my life were taken up today by screens. Tomorrow is another day, but I won’t change. Maybe Black Mirror knows that.
There isn’t much more than a glimmer of hope at the ending of these episodes, but it is still there. Maybe Charlie Brooker knows that the light at the end of the tunnel is far too small and too far away, and maybe he knows that even if you got there, the light wouldn’t be what you hoped it would be. Black Mirror isn’t telling us to be better people, to ditch our screens, to regress. I think more than anything it is asking us to think about time: how fast it goes when we wish we could stop it, how slow it drags when we wish it to be over, and which one of the these we’re feeling with every second we spend gazing into our black mirrors.
By Brad Moore
BLACK MIRROR is two series, with three hour-long episodes in each series. It airs on Channel 4 in the UK and exclusively on DirecTv in the US. The first series is available on Amazon, and the second series just wrapped up earlier this year. I haven’t watched the second series yet but I’m sure it’s fantastic.
I personally downloaded these episode through torrent sites, but as an aspiring content creator I would recommend that you try your best to find a way to somehow help give the show your money. Since this is very difficult, I won’t (and can’t) judge you for taking the illegal way out until they find a better way to distribute it. I have already looked up if there will be a third series: it hasn’t be ordered by Channel 4 yet, but Brooker says he has scripts he could use for a third series if they want it. I am pleading to the Gods that this happens. |
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Earlier this year, Sony Pictures released one hell of an internal IT assessment. The report showed that not only was the company ignoring basic security protocol, its IT security was plagued with unmonitored devices, miscommunication, and a lack of accountability. It's dated Sept 25th, almost two months to the day before hackers exposed thousands of the company's most sensitive documents.
In an email to a group consisting largely of information security higher-ups and legal department heads, Sony's corporate audit department released a report detailing both its past protocol for dealing with "security incidents," and how management plans to prevent similar events in the future. What they found wasn't pretty.
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Until September of 2013, Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) had outsourced its IT security to a third party security service—nothing unusual there. For huge companies like Sony, hiring out generally makes sense both in terms of cost and in-house resources (or lack thereof). Then, when something does go wrong, an additional third party is usually called in to figure out where the first one went wrong. SPE did this, too, until late last year.
According to the report, in 2013, Sony—SPE's parent company—decided to put its Global Security Incident Response Team (GSIRT) in charge of overseeing core responsibilities and general monitoring for the company's various subsidiaries, including Sony Pictures. While GSIRT would monitor security overall, the third-party team that SPE had been using was still responsible for implementing various security measures (firewalls, intrusion prevention systems, etc.).
It appears that's when things started breaking down.
According to the report, after the GSIRT took over monitoring duties, 1 out of 42 of SPE's firewalls and 148 non-security devices (e.g. routers and servers) went totally unmonitored because, according to the report, SPE's third-party security vendor never explicitly told its new overseer to do so. Which means that were any breach to take place on one of these devices, it's possible that no one would have any way of knowing.
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It gets worse. From the report (emphasis added):
In addition, procedures have not been developed to reconcile the population of security devices that are being monitored by GSIRT to the actual SPE security devices that should be monitored to validate accuracy and completeness. As a result, additions, changes, and deletions not communicated by SPE to GSIRT may not be detected, and critical security devices may not be monitored.
To put it simply: Yes, parent company Sony's IT management is aware that it's leaving a significant number of devices unmonitored and, consequently, vulnerable. What's more, it has no process in place to prevent that problem from getting worse. As Jérôme Segura, a senior security researcher at Malwarebytes, explained to us over email, "Miscommunication, or lack of it can create serious issues that may go unnoticed but will come back to haunt."
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While we don't know whether these particular vulnerabilities had anything to do with the devastating attacks that came to light last week—or if those attacks could have been prevented even with air-tight monitoring—that they existed and that Sony was so slow to react to them indicates a culture that failed to prioritize information security. Segura points out that "attackers only need to find one weakness, whether it may be an employee that they spear phish or an insecure network, to perpetrate their crime. Thinking that a company, because of its size and resources, would be hard to compromise is a fallacy."
To make matters worse, bringing in GSIRT—with its own set of priorities—appears to have led to some internal head-butting. Before the Sony parent company's security unit took over monitoring duties, SPE's own IT would receive regular security reports from whichever firm had previously been in charge of monitoring. Once GSIRT came on, though, those reports came to a halt. Segura notes that, "The reason given by GSIRT is that other things have 'have taken priority over executive reporting.' One can imagine how SPE's IT must have reacted to this comment." In other words, in terms of vital security, SPE's own IT was being left in the dark, and GSIRT's best response was that turning on the lights "would come later."
And what exactly was in these reports that GSIRT no longer felt the need send over? According to the audit (emphasis added):
The reports provided by the prior security monitoring providers included security threat trending (e.g.,common threats across SPE), log monitoring statistics (e.g., total events for a given month and how they are addressed), top attack categories for a given month, top sources of attacks by country, security devices providing the most alerts, top devices contributing to event correlation, the number of events triggered by more than one source (correlated events) and a summary of what SPE could do to reduce specific attacks.
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In other words, SPE's IT no longer had access to the same sort of data that could prove invaluable in thwarting a hacker.
Again, it's likely that this attack could still have taken place even if Sony had done everything right. According to Matthew Green, a cryptographer and research professor at Johns Hopkins University, "I'm not sure if you can draw a direct line from this to the fact that they were hacked. Even working and monitored Intrusion Detection Systems systems are hardly a silver bullet when it comes to detecting sophisticated attacks like this one."
And as Green further points out, "It's not clear that nobody was monitoring them, just that some portions of the network weren't being monitored by the central security department." So while we do know for a fact that GSIRT wasn't actively monitoring a number of SPE's own devices, we can't say with any certainty that someone else wasn't filling that void.
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Still, while it's important not to draw too many lines between this report and what increasingly appears to be the worst corporate hack in history, it does illustrate SPE's at times dysfunctional relationship with information technology. Even after SPE was made fully aware of the vulnerabilities it faced, it appears not to have been proactive in fixing them. That "would come later."
Art by Jim Cooke |
A giant, fuchsia-pink jellyfish has been spotted in the Adriatic Sea for the first time in 70 years.
The Drymonema dalmatinum, which can grow to more than three feet in diameter, was photographed by amateur divers off the northern coast of Italy.
It is one of the rarest jellyfish to occur in the Mediterranean and had not been documented in the Adriatic since 1945.
The bizarre but beautiful creature derives its Latin name from the fact that it was first discovered off the coast of Dalmatia in the 1880s by a German naturalist, Ernst Haeckel.
It was observed on a few occasions after that but sightings dried up at the end of the Second World War, only for the species to emerge again now.
Little is known about the jellyfish - marine biologists do not even know how powerful its sting is. Nor are they sure whether the species’ sudden re-emergence in the Adriatic is linked to the effects of global warming.
Experts say that jellyfish such as Drymonema dalmatinum have two distinct phases in their lives - an early phase when they are bottom-dwelling polyps, and a secondary phase in which they coalesce into floating jellyfish.
It may be that this particular species spends decades living at the bottom of the sea before evolving into a fully-formed jellyfish and that its reappearance has nothing to do with warmer seas.
“The polips are normally small and can live for a long time,” said Ferdinando Boero, from Salento University in Puglia, one of Italy’s foremost experts on jellyfish.
“Every now and then they produce jellyfish. Some species remain small, others become much bigger,” he told La Stampa newspaper.
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TRENTON -- A government-funded health insurance company launched to create more competition in the Obamacare marketplace is financially insolvent and will not make a comeback, state Department of Banking and Insurance Commissioner Richard Badolato announced Friday.
Health Republic Insurance of New Jersey served its 35,000 customers through the end of 2016, as promised, and the department assisted the 26,000 customers covered by individual policies in finding a new insurance carrier in time for 2017, Badolato's statement said.
The remaining 9,000 former Health Republic customers had purchased policies through the small employer market who were not facing an open enrollment deadline, according to the announcement.
Another N.J. insurance company drops out of Obamacare
Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey and AmeriHealth continue to write insurance policies for Obamacare.
Medical providers, such as doctors and hospitals, continue to be paid, the commissioner's statement said.
But what was announced in September as a "rehabilitation" plan for the four-year-old start-up is now a liquidation plan, requiring the state to squeeze out whatever money is left to satisfy debts, Badolato said.
A state Superior Court judge approved the liquidation plan Friday, Badolato's statement said.
Health Republic started writing health insurance policies in 2014, as the health exchange created under the Affordable Care Act was launched. The co-op got its start with $107 million loan through the landmark health care law, in an effort to create competition.
In the first quarter of 2016, Health Republic held a 7.34 percent share in the state's Individual Health Coverage market and a 2.1 percent market share in the Small Employer Health market.
The company still owes $46.3 million, according to the commissioner's announcement.
A Health Republic spokeswoman declined to comment.
What happened to Health Republic has been seen across the country. More than half of these nonprofit co-ops (or consumer-operated and oriented programs) have folded, crippled by higher than anticipated expenses and the financial requirements of the landmark health care law.
The future of Obamacare is in doubt under President Trump's administration and a Republican-controlled Congress -- both of which have vowed to repeal the law.
Susan K. Livio may be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @SusanKLivio. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook. |
The Beast !
I buy this card to replace my Radeon 5770 who can't support properly Battlefield 4. I had no frame rate in battlefield at all, all video setting to minimum (even lowering the resolution) with red status. I plug this beast and put everithing to maximum setting to see the difference with a frame rate of 112. Catalyst say's 92. Well that's good for me. I have and SSD acceleration on my hard drive, 16Go ram, A gamming asus P8 motherboard, it's probably help. That's true this card is really huge I had to remove a part of the plastic to fit in my box 2 mm longer and I had to cut some plastic part. I run it on a 500w power supplie. My first attempt to overclocking was crash but catalyst wasn't install properly, I decide to just let the setting as they are. The graphic are better but not as much as I expected, but it's not video laging anymore and I really enjoy that. |
Introduction
There has been a significant change in the types of injuries sustained on the modern battlefield due to the use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) which are designed to cause severe penetrating injuries to limbs and torso, often resulting in massive haemorrhage in injured soldiers. Massive haemorrhage is the most common preventable cause of death for soldiers wounded in combat1. Hence life saving training techniques and practices are being used by US military medical personnel in an effort to reduce this incidence. ‘Live tissue trauma training’ (LTTT), or ‘combat medic training’2, as it is referred to in the US, involves the use of animals (mostly goats and pigs) for the purposes of direct surgical intervention in which physicians and paramedical personnel (military and civilian) obtain surgical skills by treating severe traumatic injuries. Once animals are deeply anaesthetized, wounds of the type army paramedics and doctors are likely to see in combat situations are inflicted. Such wounds are then appropriately treated in order to gain valuable ‘trauma care’ experience not likely to be offered in any other form. Upon completion of LTTT, animals are humanely euthanased without ever regaining consciousness. Despite the understandable highly emotive and sensitive nature of LTTT, by
providing new combat medics with methods in how to manage critically-injured soldiers within the first few hours post-event, and where there is no local access to doctors or medical facilities, military personnel assert that such realistic training programs are necessary and have facilitated the saving of countless lives of soldiers who have sustained life-threatening injuries on the battlefield.2,7,8,9 In this ‘opinion’ article the author explains how and why animals are used for LTTT and in some areas of military medical research (MMR), as well as why he feels that the continued use of animals for LTTT is justified at this time. He also highlights opinions and recent examples of the animal research/training debate from both the pro- and anti- points of view and provides examples of alternative types of LTTT tuition. He hopes that this article will encourage wider discussion within respective scientific, defence and animal welfare circles, leading to further refinements in the welfare and protection of animals used for these important, although often controversial, purposes.
Why LTTT needs to continue
Jim Hanson2, a former member of a US Special Forces unit, writes in the Washington Times (‘Save people, not pets’), that in his view animal use should continue for LTTT because ‘banning medic training using live animals could kill US troops’. Interestingly, this publication was intentionally timely and was in direct response to a bill before the US Senate at the time. This bill, known as the ‘Battlefield Excellence Through Superior Training Practices Act’3, sought to amend the US Defense Appropriations Act which aimed to phase in human-based training methods and replace the current use of live animals for LTTT. If passed, this bill will require the US Department of Defense, no later than 1st October 2014, ‘to use only human-based methods for training members of the Armed Forces in the treatment of severe combat and chemical and biological injuries’. It will also prohibit the use of animals in such training.3 One of the main groups that are seeking this change is the U.S. Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), who strongly oppose the use of animals for research and training in any arena. Many believe that this bill (known as the ‘BEST Practices Act’) will likely end up costing the lives of US troops in order to save the lives of some animals simply because US military medics will no longer have access to vital and realistic LTTT.
The PCRM, and other groups that oppose vivisection (surgery used for experimental purposes on living organisms4) such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) seek an expanded use of simulators and other training aids so as to completely replace LTTT, despite the fact that such simulators and training aids cannot adequately mimic bodily functions or recreate the reality of a wounded living being. In contrast, it is widely accepted in US defence circles that, were it not for training programs such as LTTT, most medics would be sent into combat situations never having had the experience of treating a real traumatic injury. The viewpoint of most medics is that the visceral reaction that a living animal can invoke, being similar to that which each medic must face when a (human) life is in danger, is something that no simulator or training aid can provide. According to the PCRM, the US Department of Defense currently uses approximately 9,000 pigs and goats, and 20 vervet monkeys annually to teach Army medics, Navy corpsmen and Air Force personnel to respond to the most common causes of preventable battlefield fatalities.1 Others claim that these figures are more than fifty-fold higher5, though these claims appear unsupported by any firm evidence. This is put into perspective when one considers that in just one week in the month of February 2009 in the U.S., 2,236,000 hogs were slaughtered for meat consumption.6 In LTTT sessions, military trainees practice procedures including tourniquet application, emergency management of haemorrhage, blocked airway emergency techniques (such as cricothyroidotomy) and chest tube placement. This is because combat medics are ‘trained and prepared to save life, and to keep the casualty alive in austere high-threat conditions for hours on end’. Faces are often destroyed due to blast and burns injuries caused by IEDs used by insurgents, and there is a need to rapidly apply surgical airways.. Hence, ‘the spectrum of care they are expected to provide at any given moment exceeds what an entire civilian trauma centre might encounter in a week or month’.7
While most LTTT tuition involves the infliction of wounds using surgical instruments, some select US special operations units8,9,10 have conducted LTTT using various ‘projectile’ methods such as gunshot wounds, (bayonet) stab wounds, (napalm) burns, and amputations. Such courses, known as ‘Combat Trauma Management’, are ‘designed to test and reinforce the application of knowledge with regard to patient stabilization and treatment on an injured animal-patient. The use of ballistic wounding in these courses is used to create a variation of wounds and environments to complicate patient management and increase training realism’.7 It should be stressed that during such procedures, animals are always deeply anaesthetised (at a surgical plane of anaesthesia) for the entire period, given appropriate analgesia, and humanely euthanased post-training.
The production of extensive injuries in animals used for LTTT is important so that medics, when faced with a real combat situation are unlikely to ‘freeze’ due to emotional shock and they are able to quickly identify what they need to do, and apply it immediately and confidently. Such is the reality of LTTT that even hardened military personnel, when observing a gunshot wound for the first time, cannot remain unaffected by the experience. LTTT training also provides clinical and psychological ‘conditioning for the horrors and chaos of war.’ Indeed there are many medics belonging to Special Forces (elite) units who would gladly provide testimonials in support of the fact that such training, albeit graphic, has saved the lives of their colleagues who had sustained severe wounds in actual combat.2,8,9,10 Despite numerous advances in modern military technology, such as personal body armour and armour-plating of vehicles, it cannot be disputed that a confident and well-trained combat medic is probably the most likely ‘instrument’ to save a wounded soldier on the battlefield. Furthermore, a military spokesman for the US Army in Europe recently announced that effective combat trauma training, such as LTTT, had contributed to the lowest ‘killed-in-action rate in military history’.11 Thus, as LTTT actually saves lives, military personnel believe that this vindicates their position, and that LTTT should continue. The author, who also believes that priority should be given to human life over that of animals, concurs with this view. Indeed, it would seem that others are also of this view. David Hull, in his review of ‘Animal Liberation’,12 wrote that “if a choice has to be made between saving a human being and saving a pig, we would be morally obligated to save the human being because human beings are capable of greater sentience (possession of feelings such as pain and emotional states such as fear) than pigs. One must be careful when drawing such conclusions however as the degree of pain experienced by an organism cannot be assumed to be proportionate to its level of sentience. 13
Military Medical Research
In the area of MMR numerous devices (for example, tourniquets), procedures (damage control surgery) and clinical practice guidelines (use of balanced plasma to packed cell ratios) have been promulgated in the military through initial animal studies and subsequent clinical studies. Subsequently, training procedures employing the use of animals have been modified to reduce the use of animals, refined to maximize their use and where possible, replaced by the introduction of wide and varied techniques including simulators.
Another major factor within the battlefield scenario, is the issue dealing with blood loss. Uncontrolled haemorrhage is by far the major cause of death for wounded soldiers.2,7,8,9,10 Blood loss accounts for 40% of all combat deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to the Army Institute of Surgical Research Joint Trauma System, but 79% of ‘potentially survivable’ deaths.14 Medics in the field are restricted in their ability to maintain blood pressure and to ensure that there is enough circulating blood as possible within the body . Mostly the only tools a medic has in order to achieve these aims include the use of compression bandages, various bandaging techniques, the use of thrombotic drugs to assist in slowing the loss of blood and the knowledge and experience gained from LTTT in dealing with complex traumatic injuries. Through their experience on the battlefield, medics have found that soldiers can often recover relatively well if haemorrhage and potential massive blood loss has been arrested.7,14
The Pentagon has recently invested approximately $10 million dollars in MMR to investigate strategies to increase the survival rate of soldiers through induction of a hibernation-like state.14 The medical research arm of the US military has commissioned Texas A & M University to undertake studies which initially have shown that hydrogen sulphide can put rodents into a state of ‘induced hibernation’. An extension of this work will seek to find scientific solutions that could potentially allow human cells to survive with less oxygen carried in the bloodstream and able to keep soldiers alive for up to six hours despite massive blood loss.14 Essentially, such research is aimed at reducing the body’s requirements at the cellular level regardless of the state of consciousness. If successful, this area of MMR is likely to have applications within the civilian world as well, for example in assisting victims of motor transport accidents.
Another significant part of MMR is the issue of chemical weapons defense research (CWDR; as opposed to chemical weapons offence research – banned in US for decades). This is another area where animals are used for military purposes.1,2,4,5 In order to find cures for soldiers exposed to deadly chemical attacks on the battlefield, vervet monkeys are used as a model for CWDR. In this work, the monkeys are anaesthetized and administered a non-lethal dose of a drug that mimics the symptoms of a chemical weapon, and then given an appropriate treatment. The efficacy and safety of chemical warfare antidotes and vaccines must be screened on animals prior to their use in humans. This methodology has to date become standard practise in this area of MMR.
Combat-experienced soldiers, having first-hand experience with regard to the types of injuries often sustained in modern military conflicts as well as seeing the benefits of LTTT, haemostatic training and CWDR, are strong advocates of LTTT and MMR for the purposes of saving human lives (lives of soldiers sent to war) over animals. They feel that LTTT should not be considered as a ‘callous disregard of animals. It is the careful and thoughtful regard for the survivability of the men and women that are sent to war’ by giving them (medics) all the tools and training that can help them save lives.2
The LTTT situation in Australia
LTTT has been similarly practised in Australia to aid in the training of both civilian doctors and Australian Defence Force (ADF) personnel in the initial assessment and management of the trauma victim. This training essentially concentrates on the first hour of emergency care post-event, and does not include the infliction of firearm/projectile injuries (ie. gunshot, grenade wounds) as is practised by select US military groups conducting LTTT. In Australia, LTTT is known as Early Management of Severe Trauma (EMST)15 and since 1988, training programs have been regularly provided for civilian and ADF medical and paramedical personnel across the country. It is important to note that EMST training, when it is conducted, is carried out in full compliance with National Health & Medical Research Council Guidelines, NHMRC (2009). Guidelines on the use of animals for training interventional medical practitioners and demonstrating medical equipment and techniques.16 The EMST focus is purely on the ‘trauma’ patient, regardless of whether that is within a civilian casualty or a military casualty context. EMST training was essentially ‘imported’ into Australia in the early 1980s when the Royal Australian College of Surgeons (RACS) liaised with its equivalent body in the United States, the American College of Surgeons, to seek support and permission in setting up the Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) training programme for the Australasian region. As a result, the first EMST course, made available by the RACS, was offered to potential trainees in 1988, and has to date been providing this type of training as well as refresher training (normally undertaken if not done within four years of the initial EMST training) ever since.
The LTTT situation in the United Kingdom
In an article supporting the use of LTTT, Reeds (2010) states that ‘it would be prudent to clarify that the Royal College of Surgeons of England (RCSE) neither supports nor objects to the use of live animals for trauma training’.17 In a document published by the RCSE in 1999, titled ‘Surgical Competence Challenges of Assessment in Training and Practice’, the RCSE remained ‘neutral’ by providing information as to the benefits of LTTT, but also emphasizing the disadvantages relating to animal welfare considerations. Rather than outlining the formal policy of the RCSE on LTTT, this document was simply a discussion of issues relating to surgical training and LTTT, which was collated as a summary of various conference presentations. As such, the document ‘has confirmed that it does not hold any formal opinion or policy (on LTTT) nor has it ever considered the same.’ 18
Anti-vivisectionist groups also oppose civil medical research
Anti-vivisection groups such as PCRM, PETA and the more militant group Animal Liberation Front (ALF) of the UK have traditionally been strongly opposed to the use of animals for research purposes of any kind. Effectively they believe it is ‘inhumane’ and claim that those biomedical research organisations who conduct animal research, do so in a totally unregulated environment which is fraught with animal
cruelty. Recently, these groups have been very active on a world-wide scale by protesting (PETA and ALF, violently)19,20,21,22 against any form of animal-based research or training. PETA, ALF and recently PCRM, seem to have realised that if they can’t force a change to their views of various industry and government bodies, they can certainly be more effective by using official processes to file complaints against major US research institutions . This results in the delay or stopping of research progress, the waste of much-needed resources and results in frustrating delays while complaints are investigated, many of which usually result in ‘non-event’ outcomes. It seems that their collective influence is spreading, for example, one just has to take note of the ever-increasing, official filed complaints to animal welfare regulatory bodies such as the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). These obstructive tactics have had, at least in some cases, their desired effect, with a few major internationally-respected research institutions very recently having ceased using live animals.23
This has occurred not due to the institutions in question having breached any federal animal welfare laws but rather because it simply was easier for the institutions to avoid the time-consuming nature of such USDA investigations and the associated disruption to research, teaching and training. The two Canadian hospitals in question, namely Hamilton Health Sciences in Ontario and Saint John Regional in New BrunswickCanada, have indeed halted their Advanced Trauma Treatment Courses (ATTC) using live pigs, and have commenced using patient simulators23. Despite being accused of ‘caving in’ to external pressure exerted by the PCRM by some commentators, there was resistance by the Hamilton institution staff to the loss of the ATTC. Surgical residents at Hamilton openly expressed their opposition to the changes, as they considered the new simulators as poor replacements in their training when compared to their previous experience using live pigs. The medical students repeatedly demanded the return of the pigs for this type of training, because they felt that the ‘tissue’ on the mannequins simply was neither lifelike nor realistic.23
Citing stark factual differences, a university veterinarian at Hamilton made it clear that some (anti-vivisectionist) groups often deliberately used misinformation to get their point across.23 For example, in this very situation, the pigs used in ATTC were cared for by well-trained, dedicated staff who would ensure that they were housed in a comfortable environment, were well-fed and treated with the utmost care and respect. Pre-delivery to the institution, the pigs would be transported in an air-conditioned van and given a period in which to acclimatize to their new surroundings. The pigs would be carefully anaesthetized before undergoing the ATTC procedure, and prior to the conclusion of the training, they would be humanely euthanased with an overdose of anaesthetic while still unconscious. This entire protocol certainly does not reflect a portrait of inhumane treatment of animals, as claimed by some anti-vivisectionist groups.
PETA filed a complaint in 2010 to the USDA against the University of Michigan (UM), which conducts Survival Flight Training using animals.24 It claimed that the UM had violated the US Animal Welfare Act because it used cats and pigs in an emergency training course for its Survival Flight nurses (personnel providing emergency air transportation service for patients in critical care). PETA stated that the UM should use human simulators instead of live animals to practise common emergency procedures such as endotracheal intubation, which involves inserting a breathing tube into the trachea to ventilate the lungs.
Responding to the PETA complaint, the UM veterinarian and director for laboratory animal medicine stated that ‘the work of the Survival Flight nurses required that such procedures were performed on living tissue’, and that there was no substitute for this type of training, claiming that both simulators and associated teaching aids simply weren’t adequate.24 This training was designed for practising various essential life- saving techniques, which ultimately would be used for helping young children. The clinicians felt that because of the anatomical similarities between some animals and humans, they were simply the best learning models available for this training, 24 and importantly, the animals were under anaesthesia when such training was being conducted.
In another separate animal welfare complaint, filed by the PCRM to the USDAs APHIS against the University of Washington (UW) School of Paediatrics,25 the PCRM claimed that this institution was breaking federal animal welfare laws because it used live (anaesthetized) ferrets as a model to train paediatric medical residents to insert breathing tubes, as would be used for emergency procedures in premature babies. Responding to the complaint, a UW Medical Director and Professor of paediatrics stated that up to ten ferrets (maximum) were used for paediatric training sessions per year. He reported the species was a good model for such training as they were a hardy animal which, when anaesthetized, could easily tolerate between six to eight intubation attempts with minimal airway irritation. Recovery is rapid and they could be used again within a few weeks.25 The Professor said that this training was important as it helped train medical students to insert breathing tubes in very low birth weight babies, where medical simulators (mostly plastic models which contain semi-realistic anatomical features, and unable to adequately duplicate the airway passage in extremely small infants) simply weren’t at the level of sophistication required for these tiny infants.
Anatomical and physiological differences
Anti-vivisection groups often cite the anatomical and physiological differences between animals and humans as one of their main arguments in opposing LTTT. In a brief prepared by the PCRM for consideration by the US Senate in relation to the BEST Practices Act30 the PCRM states that ‘the use of pigs and goats for combat casualty care training (another name for LTTT) is suboptimal due to, among other issues, the animals’ anatomical and physiological differences from humans. Compared with humans, pigs and goats have smaller torsos and limbs, thicker skin, different responses to anaesthesia and analgesia, and important differences in anatomy of the head and neck, internal organs, limbs, blood vessels and airway’.
The same report also seems to recognise however that the most important elements of LTTT for practitioners is realism, human-specific injuries and treatments, volume of trauma exposure and ‘team-building’.30 In essence, they recommend combined use of simulators, human cadaver use and access to civilian trauma centres. While in theory this combination of training elements does sound ideal for LTTT, and in fact they are used by the military wherever and whenever possible, all of these separate elements do have their own inherent problems.
In addressing the first argument above, it needs to be stated that it is the reaction or response of living tissue to injury or irritation, rather than the anatomical or physiological species differences which is the main issue in question. Live tissue appears to be the most suitable element in training combat medics. ‘Most patient simulators do not bleed, and those that can, do not respond in the same biological way that bleeding patients do in clinical practice’.31 Using the example of physician training, real vascular injuries allow trainees opportunities to perform various techniques that respond authentically to injuries that they realistically encounter during clinical practice; this is a distinct advantage of the Advanced Trauma Operative Management course (or LTTT) that uses the live tissue porcine model and which has been shown to be of great benefit to trainees.32,33 ‘An additional benefit is the pathophysiological response to traumatic injuries that live tissue provides and the appropriate physiologic response of the patient that is observed to the trainees interventions/clinical management’.17,31 Simulators and human cadavers cannot produce this same effect. Endoscopy and other associated training techniques have also been used as part of LTTT. Some operators, Barthet et al (2007), also have ‘demonstrated significantly increased competence using live liver tissue in performing diagnostic procedures with regard to visualizing anatomic structures, performance of fine needle aspiration, and, to a lesser extent, endoscopic ultrasound-guided celiac neurolysis (endoluminal ultrasound)’.34
With respect to the use of human cadavers and simulators as an alternative to LTTT, another distinct advantage of live tissue is that organ texture and tissue handling characteristics are optimal, both of which are limited in cadavers and simulators. Although cadavers and simulators have their uses in certain applications, neither respond authentically to surgical procedures and other medical interventions in the same way that living patients do in everyday trauma practice.31 There are various (human) simulators on the market, most of which have been developed to meet certain requirements for training. One of them, ‘Trauma Man’ (Simulab Corporation) was constructed specifically for advanced trauma surgical skills training. According to the Surgeon General of the US Army, Major General Gale S. Pollock, ‘use of this simulator is not applicable for haemorrhage control, the largest, preventable killer of our Service members on the battlefield’.7 Furthermore, in a study done at the US Army Base at Fort Lewis, a haemorrhage simulator was used to training military medics. However the control group had received no exposure to the simulator. There was no comparison with live animal haemorrhage training. 35 It should be remembered that simulation is a training step; it is not the end of the training process.7
The use of civilian trauma centres, as an alternative to LTTT and on the scale that the military requires it, is also unrealistic and naïve. Hospital emergency rooms simply do not have the capacity or the resources to accommodate the needs of the military. As a rough guide, their programmes can only provide training for approximately 24 men (only) every 6-8 weeks.7 To put the US military’s requirements into some perspective, Major General Pollock made the following statement in 2007, “On any given day more than 12,000 Army medics – physicians, dentists, veterinarians, nurses, allied health professionals, administrators, and combat medics – are deployed around the world supporting the (US) Army in combat, participating in humanitarian assistance missionsand training throughout the world”.36 Furthermore, he added that “to date, more than 17,800 Combat Medics have received training in Medical Simulation Training Centers which use computerized mannequins that stimulate human response to trauma. (Only) use of live tissue best simulates the challenges and stress inherent in stopping actual bleeding”.36 From the above statements, it should be obvious to the reader that LTTT is the optimal method of training delivery and that the ‘through-put’ of hospital trauma centres cannot provide pre-deployment training requirements for combat medics,, especially in adequate emergency case management experience. Other problems with the use of civilian trauma centres for combat medics is that the types of injury encountered in hospital trauma centres are quite different to the spectrum of injuries that service members often encounter on the battlefield. Lastly, putting combat medics in civilian trauma centres for the purposes of training also removes them from their daily duties and thus reduces their capacity to provide healthcare for other military personnel.
In terms of military medical preparation for the treatment of combat casualties, advocates strongly believe that LTTT is the current solution because it is effective (it saves lives) and is the most advanced kind of training available. I It trains its participants to observe, assess, triage and treat based on the severity of the penetrating trauma presented, and all set within a ‘battlefield scenario’ where the need for rapid decision- making in a ‘high-stress’ environment is a constant challenge for the course participants.7 Participants in LTTT build an individual proficiency and a level of confidence in their ability to treat real combat casualties.37
The US military already uses a range of simulators including Trauma Man, the Combat Trauma Patient Simulation System, and other training modalities as described by Cherry and Ali.38 While these simulators are used where appropriate, and although they can enhance the experience of learning trauma training, they are only at best a progression towards, rather than a replacement for, LTTT, as they cannot replace all of the procedures used in training combat medics. So, effectively, the use of live animals cannot be eliminated altogether and this remains the reason that the US military uses the LTTT model for its troops pre-deployment.39 However, ‘ ‘hybrid’ courses have been developed by military training providers which offer a combination of LTTT, use of simulators, human cadavers and civilian trauma centres to aid in the training of military medical personnel. Though the success of some of these programmes has been variable, 40,41,42 the use of live tissue has remained an essential component of such training.
One of the better developed hybrid courses is the US Army’s ‘Tactical Combat Casualty Course’ which consists of didactic sessions, interactive human surgical simulators, triage scenarios, use of animal tissues and LTTT. It would be interesting to see how changing the relative proportions of such hybrid training may affect overall tuition, hence further research in this area is needed. Currently, until a simulation technique is developed that is documented to equal the benefit of live tissue training in preparing medics to manage combat trauma, appropriately conducted LTTT should be supported as an essential component of combat medic training.7,43
There are a number of simulators available for generic training which, although improved in their ability to provide useful training, they do not yet have the full capability of encompassing all aspects of live tissue training.44 It is for this reason that the American College of Surgeons (ACS) “supports the use and humane care and treatment of laboratory animals used in research, education, teaching and product safety testing in accordance with applicable local, state, and federal animal welfare laws”. The ACS also states that “wherever feasible, alternatives to the use of live animals should be developed and employed” but “believes that now and in the foreseeable future it is not possible to completely replace the use of animals and that the study of whole living organisms, tissues and cells is an indispensible element of biomedical research, education and teaching”.45
The benefits and controls of animal-based research and training
Military medical personnel and researchers across most institutions acknowledge the use and usefulness of alternative approaches as being very important. They do not use animals unnecessarily or uncaringly. All personnel consider it a privilege to use animals in research or training, and demonstrate this by treating them with the utmost level of care and respect.
Military research groups often support their argument by reminding us as to the many lives of soldiers saved directly, both in the past and currently, as a consequence of LTTT, CWDR and MMR. This has similarly been the case in the civilian arena of medical research as well, where the life-saving benefits to human health have been enormous, as has the reduction of human suffering caused by widespread, global infectious diseases.26 This has only been possible, because of the far-reaching implications of animal-based research and training. Interestingly, recent figures from the US National Academy of Science confirm that world rankings on average life expectancy have shown that they have increased over the last 25 years, due mostly to the advances in medical research and training.27 There have also been immense direct benefits to veterinary medicine as a result of animal-based biomedical research. Unfortunately, many anti-vivisection groups continually dismiss these enormous advances in human and animal medicine and continue to incorrectly propagate the view that these advances have been achieved at the expense of ‘humane’ care of animals.
Surely the ‘common denominator’ on both sides of this debate must primarily be the increased protection and safety of service personnel, together with enhanced humane welfare and protection of animals used for LTTT, CWDR and MMR purposes. It should be noted that the US Animal Welfare Act28 does permit the use of live animals for research and training purposes in both the civil and military arenas. However, it is the role of this Act to regulate whether animals are treated humanely. Violations of the Act are promptly investigated. Routine monitoring of conduct often involves unannounced visits to research and training establishments, aiming to ensure that animals are being treated humanely and with the utmost care. Actions taken for non-compliance can be severe and range from official warnings to fines being imposed on the institution, with the possibility of suspension of work or the revocation of research licenses .
The majority, if not all, research and training institutions both military and civil, operate within a rigid environment of internal and external controls governing their use of animals. This environment is highly regulated by the federal government, overseen by federal agencies which mandate several layers of review and involve a dedicated staff of caretakers and research animal veterinarians.26 Additionally, each institution has effective animal care and use committees set up to provide internal controls. A requirement of these committees mandates that a lay-person (an ordinary member of the community) serve as a member of its quorum. Indeed, the system on which this model is based is in place in many western countries today. Taking all of these factors into account, it should be evident that claims such as ‘inhumane treatment’, ‘fraught with animal cruelty’ and the like, appear to be without foundation. Nonetheless, there is no room for complacency as it is important that regulatory authorities continue to monitor the welfare of animals used for military and civil research and training activities, and continue to maintain the high standards expected of such institutions. Those ‘high standards’ have long been a tradition in the military services as ‘military medicine has always been at the forefront of research. It spans everything from disease prevention to rehabilitation’.29
Summary
This article highlights the importance of military training in life saving techniques and treatments developed through clinical research and now used by physicians and combat medics operating in the emergency arena of warfare. To this end, it should be remembered that such protocols have been refined to minimise pain and distress to animals, that the number of animals used is always reduced to the absolute minimum possible and that where effective non-animal alternatives exist, every effort is made to promptly implement or adapt them for current use. And although military and civil researchers will make use of new alternate technology and training methodologies wherever possible, at this point in time, animals (along with other types of tuition) remain vital in advancing medicine and for use in life-saving training techniques.
Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Dr. Julianne Djordjevic and Dr. Julie Ferguson for their critical review of the manuscript. |
Theodoric of Freiberg[1] (; c. 1250 – c. 1310) was a German member of the Dominican order and a theologian and physicist. He was named provincial of the Dominican Order in 1293, Albert the Great's old post.
Early life [ edit ]
Dietrich became a Dominican friar very early on in his life, and he studied and taught at the local convent in Freiberg around the year 1271 (Teske 2003). He lived around the time of Albert the Great (1193 to 1280) (Fuhrer 1992) and was greatly inspired by him. Though other philosophers at this time followed in Albert’s footsteps as well, Dietrich “showed the most marked tendency to Albert’s universality of interests” (Fuhrer 1992). From the dates of Albert’s life, we can assume that Dietrich was still young when Albert’s career was almost at its end, and no assumption can be made to whether or not Dietrich ever met or studied under Albert. In medieval documents he is assigned the title of “magister”, which tells us he had a great deal of university training at an advanced level (Fuhrer 1992).
Career and early works [ edit ]
After teaching in Freiberg for some time, he journeyed to Paris to study there between the years of 1272 to 1274 (Gillispie 2008), although we do not know whom he may have studied with. In a book titled “Treatise on the Intellect and the Intelligible” translated by M.L. Fuhrer, Fuhrer writes that in the second part of a treatise Dietrich talks about a “solemn master” in Paris. Fuhrer goes on to say that Henry of Ghent was known as “doctor solemnis” by his students, but ultimately states that there can be no certainty that they actually met or knew each other.
Dietrich then returned home to Germany for a while before coming back to Paris. Here he began his lectures on Sentences in 1281 (Pasnau 2010). Exactly how long Dietrich remained in Paris in not clear, but it is agreed that he was made the prior of the Dominican convent in Wurzburg around 1293 (Fuhrer 1992). Further sources indicate that he was appointed provincial of Teutonia in 1293 as well (SOMERSET, FIONA 1998). Dietrich was then “promoted”, to the Provincial Superior for the province of Germany, the position previously held by Albert the Great (Pasnau 2010, Fuhrer 1992). Around the years of 1296 and 1297 he was named “master of theology’ in Paris, where he taught up to around 1300 (Teske 2008). Dietrich was also present for the general chapter of the Dominican order at Toulouse and his name appears in the general chapter of the order in Piacenza. The last position Dietrich was appointed to was Vicar provincial of Germany in 1310 (Gillispie 2008). Dietrich’s name does not appear in any kind of document after this time.
Physics [ edit ]
While 13th century authors failed to provide an accurate explanation for the rainbow, at the turn of the fourteenth century Theodoric was able to give one of the first correct geometrical analyses of this phenomenon, which was "probably the most dramatic development of 14th- and 15th-century optics". [2][3]
Drawing from his two earlier works on light and colour, he wrote De iride et radialibus impressionibus (On the Rainbow and the impressions created by irradiance, c. 1304-1311), relying on geometry, experiment, falsification and other methods. Among other properties he explained in detail:
the colors of the primary and secondary rainbows
the positions of the primary and secondary rainbows
the path of sunlight within a drop: light beams are refracted when entering the atmospheric droplets, then reflected inside the droplets and finally refracted again when leaving them.
the formation of the rainbow: he explains the role of the individual drops in creating the rainbow
the phenomenon of color reversal in the secondary rainbow
Using spherical flasks and glass globes filled with water, Freiberg was able to simulate the water droplets during rainfall. Still in its early stages, experimental instrumentation would later expand to be used primarily for making measurements, extending the human senses and creating and isolated environment for the experimenter. During his experimentation with these glass globes, Freiberg was correct in asserting that the colors formed by the interaction of sunlight with the water droplets.
Recently, scientists have found evidence of the experimental instrumentation used by Freiberg. Currently on loan to Universities in Providence, Rhode Island, the instrumentation does, indeed, simulate a droplet of water by which sunlight is reflected and refracted, thereby creating a rainbow.
One of his contemporaries, Kamal al-Din al-Farisi, offered the same experimentally-established explanation of the rainbow (without any contacts between them) in his Kitab tanqih al-manazir (The Revision of the Optics). Both authors however relied on the Book of Optics by Ibn al-Haytham (Alhacen)/ Alhazen.[4]
Theology [ edit ]
Dietrich's theological works tend to be heavily Neoplatonic, while his more secular philosophical works are more Aristotelian. Dietrich disagreed with Thomas Aquinas on certain metaphysical issues, and seems to have written in opposition to particular works by Aquinas.
He had a remarkable influence on the 10 years younger Meister Eckhart, mainly via the treatises De visione beatifica (Of the beatific vision) and De intellectu et intelligibili (Of the intellect and the intelligible), and one of his extraordinary contributions to medieval philosophy was a theory of the soul that equalled the Aristotelian notion of "agent intellect" and the Augustinian notion of "abditum mentis" (i.e. the hiddenness, or hidden place of the soul).
The theory of the agent intellect says that in knowing, the mind is not merely passive, it has to work on producing a conception of its object, a conception which is then received and retained by the passive part of the mind. The hiddenness of the soul, in turn, is the ground of the soul in which God's image is imprinted, a spiritual apex of man's being by which he transcends space and time.
Works [ edit ]
Theological works [ edit ]
De visione beatifica
De corpore Christi mortuo
De dotibus corporum gloriosorum
De substantiis spiritualibus et corporibus futuræ resurrectionis.
Philosophical works [ edit ]
De habitibus
De ente et essentia
De magis et minus
De natura contrariorum
De cognitione entium separatorum et maxime animarum separatarum
De intelligentiis et motoribus cælorum
De corporibus cælestibus quoad naturam eorum corporalem
De animatione cæli
De accidentibus
De quiditatibus entium
De origine rerum prædicamentalium
De mensuris
De natura et proprietate continuorum
De intellectu et intelligibili.
Scientific works [ edit ]
De luce et ejus origine
De coloribus
De iride et radialibus impressionibus
De miscibilibus in mixto
De elementis corporum naturalium.
Modern editions [ edit ]
Opera omnia = Corpus Philosophorum Teutonicorum Medii Ævi , Hamburg, Felix Meiner Verlag, vol. 1-4: Burckhard Mojsisch (ed.), Schriften zur Intellekttheorie , Hamburg, 1977. Ruedi Imbach, Maria Rita Pagnoni-Sturlese, Hartmund Steffan et Loris Sturlese (eds.), Schriften zur Metaphysik und Theologie , Hamburg, 1980. Jean-Daniel Cavigioli, Ruedi Imbach, Burckhard Mojsisch, Maria Rita Pagnoni-Sturlese, Rudolf Rehn et Loris Sturlese (eds.), Schriften zur Naturphilosophie und Metaphysik. Quæstiones , Hamburg, 1983. Maria Rita Pagnoni-Sturlese, Rudolf Rehn, Loris Sturlese et William A. Wallace (eds.), Schriften zur Naturwissenschaft. Briefe , Hambourg, 1985.
= , Hamburg, Felix Meiner Verlag, vol. 1-4:
English translations [ edit ]
Dietrich of Frieberg ( 1992). “Treatise on the Intellect and the Intelligible”, Milwaukee: Marquette University Press
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
^ Also known as Thierry de Fribourg, Thierry of Freburg, Dietrich of Freiberg, Theodoricus Teutonicus de Vrîberg, or simply Meister Dietrich. ^ Grant, Edward (1974). A source book in medieval science. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. p. 864. ISBN 978-0-674-82360-0. ^ Commentarj sopra la storia e le teorie dell' ottica [Commentary on the history and theory of optics], vol. 1 , (Bologna, (Italy): Fratelli Masi, e Compagno, 1814), III. Dell' iride, degli aloni e de' paregli [On the rainbow, halos, and parhelia [i.e., sun dogs]] (in Italian and Latin), Theodoric's study of the rainbow was brought to the attention of modern scholars by the Italian physicist Giovanni Battista Venturi in 1814: Giambatista Venturi,[Commentary on the history and theory of optics], vol. 1 , (Bologna, (Italy): Fratelli Masi, e Compagno, 1814),[On the rainbow, halos, and parhelia [i.e., sun dogs]] (in Italian and Latin), pp. 149–180. ^ Nader El-Bizri 'Ibn al-Haytham et le problème de la couleur', Oriens-Occidens: Cahiers du centre d'histoire des sciences et des philosophies arabes et médiévales, C.N.R.S. 7 (2009), pp. 201–226. |
For other people named "Bob Barr" or "Robert Barr", see Robert Barr (disambiguation)
Robert Laurence Barr Jr.[1] (born November 5, 1948) is an American attorney and politician. He served as a federal prosecutor and as a Congressman.[2]
He represented Georgia's 7th congressional district as a Republican from 1995 to 2003.[2][3] Barr attained national prominence as one of the leaders of the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.[2]
Barr joined the Libertarian Party in 2006[4] and served on its National Committee.[5] He was the Libertarian Party's nominee for President of the United States in the 2008 election.[6]
Early life [ edit ]
Barr was born in Iowa City, Iowa,[2] to Robert Laurence Barr and Beatrice Barr.[7] His father, a career military officer who had graduated from West Point,[7][8] was stationed in various locations around the world while pursuing his career in civil engineering.[7][9]
The second of six children, Bob Jr. lived as a boy in Malaysia, Pakistan, Panama, Peru, Baghdad,[10] and finally Tehran, Iran, where he graduated from Community High School in 1966.[2][7][9]
He returned to the United States for college, attending the University of Southern California. There he joined the Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity in 1967. He was elected to the position of Grand Prytanis on the fraternity's Grand Council, serving from 2013 to 2015.[11][12]
During this time, Barr's mother Beatrice introduced him to the work of writer Ayn Rand.[7][9] This fostered a new-found appreciation for conservatism and prompted Barr to join the Young Trojan Republican Club.[7][9] He completed his B.A., cum laude,[13] from the University of Southern California (USC) in 1970.[2] He married his first wife while still in college.[7] They divorced in 1976.[14]
Early career [ edit ]
Barr continued in graduate school, earning a master's degree in International Affairs[15] from George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs in 1972. He next earned his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center (attending at night)[10] in 1977.[15][2] From 1971 (1970?[2]) to 1978, Barr worked for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) as an analyst of Latin American issues.[15][3][10]
Barr married his second wife, Gail, in 1976.[14][16][14] They have two children.[14][17][18][14][17] Gail and Bob Barr divorced in 1986.[14][16]
After leaving the CIA, Barr moved to northern Georgia. He practiced law and became active in the Republican Party, serving as county chair.[14][10] Barr made an unsuccessful bid for the Georgia House of Representatives in 1984.[14]
In 1986 Barr married his third wife, Jerilyn Dobbins,[14][16] who was later known as Jeri Barr.[19] Barr's website stated in 2008 that Jeri and he have four children and six grandchildren.[19]
In 1986, Barr was appointed by President Ronald Reagan[3] to serve as U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia – a post Barr held until 1990.[2] His office prosecuted state and local officials, members of the Medellin drug cartel, and got a perjury indictment on then-sitting Republican Congressman Pat Swindall,[20] who ultimately served a year in prison on the charges. From 1990 to 1991, Barr was president of the Southeastern Legal Foundation,[2] an Atlanta-based law firm and policy center that litigates in support of "limited government, individual economic freedom, and the free enterprise system".[21]
Congressional career [ edit ]
Barr sought the Republican Party nomination for U.S. Senate in 1992, but lost the primary election to Paul Coverdell.[22] The primary was very close, with Barr losing by fewer than 1,600 votes in a runoff election.[22] Subsequently, Coverdell came in behind incumbent Senator Wyche Fowler in the general election, but the 3% showing by a Libertarian candidate (Jim Hudson) forced a runoff, which Coverdell won.[citation needed]
Barr was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1994 as a Republican, upsetting six-term Democrat Buddy Darden, to represent Georgia's 7th congressional district in the 104th United States Congress. Barr was one of 73 Republican freshmen ushered into Congress in that election.[23] The election became known as the "Republican Revolution" because it resulted in the first Republican House majority in 40 years – since the 1955 adjournment of the 83rd Congress.[24][25]
After a Federal Election Commission audit of his 1994 and 1996 campaigns, Barr paid a $28,000 fine for illegal campaign payments.[26]
Barr was later re-elected three times, serving from 1995 to 2003.[2] While in Congress, Barr served as a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, as Vice-Chairman of the Government Reform Committee,[3] and as a member of the Committee on Financial Services and the Committee on Veteran's Affairs.[15][3]
In Congress, Barr became famous for his "dour" image and told constituents, "You don't send me to Washington to smile."[10] He also said in a radio interview "If it's not in the Constitution, I won't smile".[27] He later explained "I don't consider politicians who smile to be worth a heck of a lot... all things considered, it doesn't make a dime's worth of difference if the politicians in Washington smile or not, what matters is how much of your hard-earned dollars they take to spend in pure pork".[28] Barr said in 2010 "I can see a situation where the federal government is going to bring an entire suitcase of San Francisco values to the American family, and while I would love to explain all the things that are wrong with that, the fact is that this is a corrupting, left-leaning, influence on a section of society that so many liberal elites want to see taken out of the 'red state' column. The only solution to this kind of behavior is dour and austere social conservatism, like my own".[27] Adding to his image, Barr has frequently protested about "cult hairstyles", saying "I cannot abide by people who adopt a cult hairstyle, or persistently dress inappropriately for meetings with me".[29][better source needed]
Georgia's congressional districts were reorganized by the Democratic-controlled Georgia legislature ahead of the 2002 elections for the 108th Congress.[30] As part of the legislature's effort to get more Democrats elected from the state, Barr's district was renumbered as the 11th District and made significantly more Democratic. A large slice of his base was drawn into the same district as fellow Republican John Linder. The new district was numerically Barr's district – the 7th – but contained most of the territory from Linder's old 11th District. This move profited Democrats by leading to the inevitable defeat of an incumbent Republican (i.e., either Barr or Linder).[31] Recognizing Barr's precarious situation, the Libertarian Party seized on the opportunity to oust one of the federal drug war's most vocal proponents (Barr), and ran TV ads criticizing Barr's opposition to medical marijuana during the Republican primaries.[32] Barr was soundly defeated by a 2-to-1 margin. Before the medical marijuana ads were aired,[32] the Linder campaign acknowledged the race as being tight;[33] and Pat Gartland, southeastern director of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, saw the race as "too close to call".[31]
Barr's defeat was applauded by many Democrats and Libertarians. Rob Kampia of the Marijuana Policy Project called it "glorious news".[34] Ron Crickenberger, producer of the TV ads, was quick to warn other supporters of the War on Drugs:
With this victory, we have fired a warning shot for every drug warrior in Congress to hear. And any member of Congress – Democrat or Republican – who introduces legislation to make federal drug laws even more oppressive could be next on our list.
— Ron Crickenberger, Libertarian Party Political Director, August 2002[32]
However, some individuals within these groups lamented Barr's defeat as a setback for privacy rights[35] and libertarian causes in general.[33] Libertarian J. Bradley Jansen opined:
The LP has a historic opportunity to present itself as a viable alternative to the big parties, instead of spending its money and energy trying to defeat one of libertarianism's few friends in Congress just because they disagree with him on one issue.
— J. Bradley Jansen, vice chair of the Libertarian Party in the District of Columbia, Liberty (August 2002)[33]
Political positions in Congress [ edit ]
During his tenure, Barr was regarded as one of the most conservative members of Congress.[36] In 2002, he was described by Bill Shipp in an OnlineAthens.com article as "the idol of the gun-toting, abortion-fighting, IRS-hating hard right wing of American politics".[31] However, Barr's criticism of the Bush administration's policies on privacy and other civil liberties after the 9/11 attacks was unusual among House Republicans (see Criticism of Bush Administration below).[31] This criticism earned Barr other labels such as "Maverick",[31] "Jekyll-and-Hyde",[37] and "Libertarian".[33]
Gun ownership [ edit ]
Barr is a staunch proponent of gun rights, and is opposed to any and all efforts to restrict the ownership of guns.[38][better source needed]
During the 2002 race, a supporter handed Barr an antique pistol during a fundraiser at a private home. The gun went off in Barr's hands, though no one was injured.[39]
War on drugs [ edit ]
Barr was originally a strong supporter of the War on Drugs, reflecting his previous experience as an Anti-Drug Coordinator for the United States Department of Justice.[2] While in Congress, he was a member of the Speaker's Task Force for a Drug-Free America.[37] This task force was established in 1998 by then-Speaker Newt Gingrich to "design a World War II-style victory plan to save America's children from illegal drugs."[40] The task force crafted legislation specifically designed to "win the War on Drugs by 2002".[40]
Barr advocated complete federal prohibition of medical marijuana. In 1998, he successfully blocked implementation of Initiative 59[41] – the "Legalization of Marijuana for Medical Treatment Initiative of 1998" – which would have legalized medical marijuana in Washington, D.C.[42] The "Barr Amendment" to the 1999 Omnibus spending bill not only blocked implementation of Initiative 59, but also prohibited the vote tally from even being released.[42][43] Nearly a year passed before a lawsuit[44] filed by the American Civil Liberties Union eventually revealed the initiative had received 69 percent of the vote.[45] In response to the judge's ruling,[46] Barr simply attached another "Barr Amendment" to the 2000 Omnibus spending bill that overturned Initiative 59 outright.[47] The Barr Amendment also prohibited future laws that would "decrease the penalties for marijuana or other Schedule I drugs" in Washington, D.C.[48] This preemptively blocked future attempts by Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) to reform marijuana laws in DC via the initiative process.[48] In March 2002, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan struck down this portion of the Barr Amendment as being an unconstitutional restriction on free speech.[48][49] Barr's response to the ruling was defiant:
Clearly, the court today has ignored the constitutional right and responsibility of Congress to pass laws protecting citizens from dangerous and addictive narcotics, and the right of Congress to exert legislative control over the District of Columbia as the nation's capital.
— Bob Barr, March 28, 2002[50]
The federal government later prevailed on appeal,[51] reinstating the Barr Amendment just in time to thwart MPP's initiative 63 – "The Medical Marijuana Initiative of 2002" – which had already qualified for the November 2002 ballot.[52][53] In 2009, both the United States Senate and House of Representatives voted to lift the ban against a medical marijuana initiative, effectively overturning the Barr Amendment.[54]
Barr later reversed his position on medical marijuana, joining MPP as a lobbyist five years later. In a June 4, 2008, interview with Stephen Colbert on the Colbert Report, Barr confirmed that he now supports ending marijuana prohibition, as well as the War on Drugs, for which he once vehemently fought.[55] In 2009, he was hired by the MPP to lobby to successfully overturn the amendment that he had authored.[56]
Same-sex marriage [ edit ]
Barr took a lead in legislative debate concerning same-sex marriage. He authored and sponsored the Defense of Marriage Act, a law enacted in 1996 which states that only marriages that are between a man and a woman can be federally recognized, and individual states may choose not to recognize a same-sex marriage performed in another state.[57] At the 2008 Libertarian National Convention, he apologized for the part of the Defense of Marriage Act which prevents the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages.[58]
He now supports same-sex marriage,[59] opposes the Federal Marriage Amendment, contending it is a violation of states' rights,[60] and supports the Respect for Marriage Act, which would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act.[61]
Terrorism [ edit ]
He voted for the first USA PATRIOT Act,[62] but only after his amendments adding "sunset clauses" were added to the final bill.[63] Barr played a similar role during the debate over Bill Clinton's Comprehensive Anti-terrorism Act of 1995, crafting pro-civil liberties amendments to the original text.[64] He now publicly regrets[36] his Patriot Act vote.[65]
War in Iraq [ edit ]
In 2002 Barr voted for the Iraq Resolution.[66] He has since called for withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, leaving no permanent military bases. A press release from Barr's presidential campaign stated: "The next president should commit to a speedy and complete withdrawal from Iraq, and tell the Iraqi people that the U.S. troops will be going home."[67]
Religious freedom [ edit ]
In Congress, he also proposed that the Pentagon ban the practice of Wicca in the military.[36][68]
Economic freedom [ edit ]
Barr advocates the repeal of the 16th Amendment, which gives the U.S. Congress the power to levy an income tax without apportionment. As an alternative, he proposes a form of consumption tax, such as the FairTax.[69]
He also favors drastic reductions in government spending and the elimination of corporate welfare.[69]
Waco hearings [ edit ]
The National Review described Barr as one of the few people able to "ask effective questions and make clear points" while questioning government witnesses during the 1995 House Waco siege hearings on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and Federal Bureau of Investigation actions against the Branch Davidians in 1993, sponsored by subcommittees of the House Judiciary Committee and Government Reform and Oversight Committee.[70] Barr has written: "The hearing was a farce: a virtual lovefest, during which members of the Clinton Administration responded to softball questions from their colleagues in the House with superficial answers, and Republican queries were ignored or glossed over with disdain, if not outright contempt."[71] Barr called for Congress to reopen investigations, but senior House Republicans refused.[72] In 2003 testimony submitted to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Barr wrote: "[T]here remains time to turn back the constitutional clock and roll back excessive post-9/11 powers before we turn the corner into another Japanese internment or, closer to our own experiences, before we witness a legally sanctioned Ruby Ridge or Waco scenario."[73]
Controversies over Barr's personal conduct [ edit ]
In the early 1990s, Barr was photographed at a fundraising event licking whipped cream off a woman.[74] According to the Washington Post "Two people who observed the act say it wasn't exactly a bosom lick but more like a neckline lick, at the sort of event where business and civic leaders perform dares to raise money. 'Not exactly Mr. Effusive,' says Matt Towery, the former chairman of Newt Gingrich's political organization, who observed the brief and awkward licking. 'You can hardly get the guy to smile.'"[75]
Role in Clinton impeachment [ edit ]
Barr is best known for his role as one of the House managers during President Bill Clinton's impeachment trial. It was Barr who first introduced a resolution directing the House Judiciary Committee to inquire into impeachment proceedings[76] – months before the Monica Lewinsky scandal came to light. Foremost among the concerns Barr cited at the time was apparent obstruction of Justice Department investigations into Clinton campaign fundraising from foreign sources, chiefly the People's Republic of China.[77]
After the Lewinsky scandal broke, Barr was the first lawmaker in either chamber to call for Clinton's resignation.[78] During debate on the impeachment resolution on the House floor, Barr argued that Clinton's attempt to interfere with Lewinsky's testimony in the Paula Jones case endangered the Constitution. In doing so, Barr said, Clinton violated what Barr called a "fundamental right" of any American citizen – "the unshakable right each one of us has to walk into a courtroom and demand the righting of a wrong."[79]
In 1999, during Clinton's impeachment trial, Hustler publisher Larry Flynt offered money to anyone who could provide evidence about prominent Republicans who had engaged in an extramarital affair. According to the American Journalism Review,[80] investigators for Flynt said that Barr was "guilty of king-size hypocrisy." Flynt subsequently paid a sum of money to Barr's second wife, Gail Barr, after she had sworn out an affidavit.[10] Investigators reported that Bob Barr then "invoked a legal privilege from his 1985 divorce proceeding so he could refuse to answer questions on whether he'd cheated on his second wife with the woman who is now his third" (Jerilyn).[81]
Criticism of Bush Administration [ edit ]
“ A man faithful to the Constitution doesn't stop criticizing presidents when the letter after their names change. ” — Bob Barr, 2007[63]
Since leaving Congress in 2003, Barr has become a vocal opponent of the Patriot Act and has stated that he voted for it reluctantly[10] and regrets voting for it, only agreeing because the Bush administration promised not to attempt to expand the granted powers or use them for non-terrorism purposes, and the administration agreed to report to Congress on their usage.[82] Barr says that the Bush administration promptly ignored these three promises given to Congress and has used the powers granted from the Patriot Act to further erode due process of law even in matters unrelated to terrorism.[82] Barr claims that the Clinton administration did much of the same thing.[36] In 2005 – the year the Patriot Act was due for renewal – Barr helped found an organization called Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances, a bipartisan group dedicated to eliminating aspects of the Patriot Act that could potentially affect law-abiding citizens rather than terrorists, and to "restore traditional checks and balances on government power so the country can effectively fight terror without sacrificing the rights of innocent Americans, rights that are guaranteed by the Constitution."[83] Barr still serves as the group's chairman.
Barr has been a vocal opponent of President George W. Bush's claim of authorization to wiretap transnational phone calls without individual judicial license. He has said, "What's wrong with it is several-fold. One, it's bad policy for our government to be spying on American citizens through the National Security Agency. Secondly, it's bad to be spying on Americans without court oversight. And thirdly, it's bad to be spying on Americans apparently in violation of federal laws against doing it without court order."[84]
In 2006, he debated the architect of the Patriot Act, Viet Dinh, on terrorism and privacy issues.[85]
Departure from Republican Party [ edit ]
In the 2004 presidential election, Barr left the Republican Party and publicly endorsed[86] the Libertarian Party presidential nominee Michael Badnarik.[87]
In 2006, he joined the Libertarian Party as a regional representative, then serving on the Libertarian National Committee.[88]
Political associations [ edit ]
Barr sat on the Board of Directors of the National Rifle Association from 2001 to 2007.[89]
Barr is a commentator on political and social issues and is chairman of the American Conservative Union Foundation's '21st Century Center for Privacy and Freedom'.[90]
In January 2006, to emphasize the bipartisan nature of the event, Barr planned on introducing Al Gore at a speech co-sponsored by the Liberty Coalition and the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy to address what they called the "NSA Spying Scandal", in which Gore compared warrantless wiretapping to the FBI's surveillance of Martin Luther King, Jr.[91]
Libertarian Party [ edit ]
On December 12, 2006, Barr became a regional representative on the Libertarian National Committee, representing the Party's Southeast Region. Barr said: "I'm happy to announce that I am now a proud, card-carrying Libertarian who is committed to helping elect leaders who will strive for smaller government, lower taxes and abundant individual freedom."[5]
Marijuana Policy Project [ edit ]
“ Regarding the drug war, I've been there, done that, and know firsthand our current strategy is not working. Continuing to have the federal government run roughshod over the states, even if the citizens of a state decide they wish to legalize medicinal marijuana, for example, is wrong. ” — Bob Barr, May 22, 2008[92]
In Congress, Barr's strong stance against medical marijuana put him at odds with marijuana policy reformers such as the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP). Despite this historic antagonism, in March 2007, Barr reversed his stance on medical marijuana[93] and began lobbying on behalf of MPP.[94][95] This new partnership saw Barr working to repeal his very own "Barr Amendment"[92] – the amendment[93] that overturned a voter-approved medical marijuana initiative in Washington, D.C.[94] and bars consideration of similar initiatives.[96]
Barr has been careful to note that he isn't pro-drug, but rather against government intrusion.[93] In interviews he has expressed the nuanced position of simultaneously opposing legalization, yet advocating the federalist ideals of State legislation and enforcement over Federal control.[97][98]
Barr's reversal on drug policy surprised many, particularly MPP.[95] His new-found appreciation for harm reduction was heartily welcomed:
It's very rare to find someone who's willing to change their position and then be so public about it. [Barr has] definitely increased the credibility of the Marijuana Policy Project. People have to take us seriously when we walk through the door with Bob Barr.
— Rob Kampia, Executive Director, Marijuana Policy Project, May 2008[92]
American Freedom Agenda [ edit ]
Barr is one of the four founders of the American Freedom Agenda, which is described as "a coalition established to restore checks and balances and civil liberties protections under assault by the executive branch." The American Freedom Agenda has established a 10-point Freedom Pledge for presidential candidates to confirm their commitment to civil liberties.[99] He is also a member of the Constitution Project's bipartisan Liberty and Security Committee.[100]
Liberty Guard [ edit ]
Barr is Chairman of the Board of Directors of Liberty Guard,[101] an IRS 501(c)4 organization, which states its mission is to protect and defend individual liberty.
Other activities [ edit ]
In early 2008, Barr became an adjunct professor at Kennesaw State University and was scheduled to teach a course on privacy rights titled "Privacy and Public Policy in 21st Century Business and Society."[102]
Barr appeared in the mock documentary Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. In his scene, he met with "Borat" (portrayed by Sacha Baron Cohen) in the United States Capitol. Borat gave him cheese described as being made from Borat's wife's breast milk.[103]
Barr endorsed the Free State Project on July 22, 2008 saying, "I think it's tremendous!"[104][105]
Barr is listed as the President of the Law Enforcement Education Organization, a non-profit organization with a mission of serving "active-duty and retired law enforcement officers, by educating and assisting law enforcement personnel and agencies meet challenges posed by certain laws and regulations."[106][107]
Barr wrote The Meaning of Is: The Squandered Impeachment and Wasted Legacy of William Jefferson Clinton (published in 2004). He briefly wrote a regular column for Creative Loafing (Atlanta), an alternative weekly newspaper serving the Atlanta metropolitan area.[36][108]
In 2008 Barr hosted a political talk radio show on Radio America called Bob Barr's Laws of the Universe.[109] He has said that he plans to write a book with that title.[110]
In August 2008, Barr published an opinion piece in the Washington Times that criticized the United States' response to the conflict between Russia and Georgia as being too emotional and not based on legitimate American national security concerns. He wrote: "The most important American interest is defending America; and intervening on behalf of Georgia against Russia has nothing to do with defending America."[111] In October 2008, Barr gave a one-hour talk at Carnegie Mellon University, allowing time to take audience questions. This was one of numerous lectures for which he was paid.
In 2008, in an Op-Ed article published in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Barr lambasted the new policy of Boston, Massachusetts police to allow warrantless search for firearms in teenagers' homes.[112] On March 7, 2009, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution announced that Barr would be a weekly columnist for the paper.[113] His blog is known as The Barr Code.[114]
Advising former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier [ edit ]
In 2011, Barr traveled to Haiti to lobby on behalf of "former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier."[115] According to Barr, "he is not serving as Duvalier's attorney, but is in Port-au-Prince to consult, assist and be Duvalier's voice to the international community."[115]
2008 presidential campaign [ edit ]
In early 2008, rumors circulated that Barr was considering a presidential run under the Libertarian Party banner. Activists began a Facebook group dedicated to drafting Barr into the nomination contest,[116] and Barr later confirmed his interest.[117] He launched a presidential exploratory committee and campaign website[118] on April 5,[119] and formally announced his candidacy[120] for the Libertarian nomination on May 12.[121] His announcement came a mere ten days before the start of the Libertarian Party Convention, where delegates select the presidential candidate.[122]
Bob Barr speaks in October 2008.
Following his announcement, Rasmussen Reports had Barr polling at 6% nationwide against Barack Obama (42%), John McCain (38%), and Ralph Nader (4%).[123] The study identified Barr as the Libertarian candidate, but most voters said they did not know enough about him to have an opinion of him personally.[123] Barr's support in the poll was a net drain on Republicans; he picked up 7% of the Republican vote, 5% of the Democratic vote, and 5% of the unaffiliated vote.[123]
On May 25, 2008, Barr became the 2008 Libertarian presidential nominee after six rounds of voting at the 2008 Libertarian convention. He beat Mary Ruwart in the final round of voting, with 324 delegates to Ruwart's 276, with 26 none-of-the-above votes.[124] Barr had received the endorsement of Wayne Allyn Root, one of his rivals for the nomination, after Root was eliminated following the fifth round of balloting. Barr, in turn, endorsed Root for the party's vice presidential nomination, which he received. Reason magazine senior editor Radley Balko called Barr "the first serious candidate the LP has run since I've been eligible to vote."[125]
On June 4, 2008, Barr invited the Republican Party's presumptive presidential nominee, John McCain, and the Democratic Party's presumptive presidential nominee, Barack Obama, to weekly presidential debates through an official press release.[126]
Many opinion leaders predicted that Barr could siphon off conservative votes that would have otherwise gone to McCain. John Linder, who defeated Barr for the Republican nomination in a 2002 congressional race, said that Barr could cause serious problems for McCain in some states.[127] Barr repeatedly rejected this assertion as scapegoating, responding that small-government Republicans would not vote for McCain anyway, nor would civil liberties advocates vote for Obama.[128]
Barr appeared on the ballot in 45 states.[129] In July, he filed a lawsuit against Oklahoma for its unusually restrictive ballot access laws,[130] which he contends are contrary to the First Amendment right to petition one's government for a redress of grievances.[131] In July, a Zogby poll had Barr receiving 6% of the vote nationwide, as well as double digits in several states.[132]
A Zogby poll released on August 15, 2008, indicated that most Republican and Democratic voters wanted Barr to be included in the presidential debates. The poll also indicated that almost 70% of independent voters would have liked to see him included.[133]
On September 17, 2008, Barr filed suit in Texas to remove both McCain and Obama from the ballot. Both political parties failed to file their nominees by the deadline.[134] On September 23, 2008, the Texas Supreme Court rejected the request without giving a reason for its decision.[135]
Among his campaign positions, Barr distinguished himself strongly from Obama and McCain by opposing the financial bailout bill.[136]
On November 4, 2008, Barr received 523,686 votes, 0.4% of the national vote.[137]
Return to Republican Party [ edit ]
Barr speaking at the 2016 FreedomFest in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Following his statement that he would not challenge the Republican incumbent in the 2012 primary race for Georgia's 14th congressional district, he subsequently indicated his return to the Republican Party and support for 2012 GOP congressional candidates when stating – "Our country is at a serious cross-roads, without question we need new leadership in the White House, and a part of that turnaround in 2012 will be solid GOP majorities in both chambers of Congress." [138]
Aborted 2012 congressional campaign [ edit ]
Barr had expressed interest in running for Congress again as a Republican in 2012, challenging incumbent Republican Tom Graves in Georgia's 14th district. The district was previously the 9th, but redistricting added Floyd and Paulding counties to the district. Those two counties were part of the territory Barr represented in his first congressional stint, and make up 38 percent of the 14th's population. Barr has lived in Smyrna, in Cobb County, for many years, but has told several friends he plans to move to Paulding County.[139] Despite strong polling numbers, Barr chose to abandon his plans for running, citing concern on the potential impact it would have on his law firm and family.[138]
Endorsement of Newt Gingrich for President [ edit ]
In an interview with The Daily Caller, he endorsed and encouraged libertarians to support Newt Gingrich's campaign for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, much to the surprise of many minarchist libertarians who assumed he would support Texas Congressman Ron Paul.[140]
2014 congressional campaign [ edit ]
Barr held a news conference on March 28, 2013 at Adventure Outdoors in Smyrna, Georgia where he announced his upcoming run for his old congressional seat, the 11th. The seat had come open after his successor, Phil Gingrey, gave it up to run for Senate.[141] Barr was vying to become the first Georgia Republican to return to the U.S. House after a gap in service.[142] Barr placed second in his six-way House primary with 26% of the vote. State Senator Barry Loudermilk, who was backed by the Senate Conservatives Fund, placed first in the primary with 37%. Since no candidate won at least 50% (plus 1) of the vote, a runoff took place on July 22, 2014.[143] Barr lost the runoff to Loudermilk by a nearly 2:1 margin.[144]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Presidential campaign
Video
Congress |
A Company 5 Rifles deploys to the Falkland Islands in September 2014. In addition to the military mission that it has been ordered to achieve, the Company will also conduct a Charity Challenge to raise funds for Care for Casualties, the Regimental charity established for the welfare of injured riflemen, veterans, and the families of those riflemen wounded and killed in operations over the last 10 years and more.
What are we going to do?
In groups of about 28 (3 x Platoons, and a Company HQ Group), we will march, run, swim or row the distance from Mount Pleasant Complex in the Falklands Islands to Alanbrooke Barracks, Paderborn; a total distance of 13,108 kms.
So what?
A Company will be in the Falkland Islands for a total of 2 months. Due to the operational mission set us, the Company will be on patrol or exercise for over half of that time. The challenge will be conducted over the 26 days that the Platoons will be in Mount Pleasant. Which means that, within their Platoons, each and every rifleman will need to march, run, swim or row an average of 18 kms on each day.
That doesn’t sound difficult.
Really? Please bear in mind that, when back in Mount Pleasant the Company will still need to maintain its duties, which will mean full working days for all riflemen. They will do their 18kms in their own free time. 18kms as a one-off distance doesn’t seem all the difficult. But the cumulative effect of doing it every day, for 26 days, in between military exercises and patrolling… it will be punishing! And it’s a team effort – if a rifleman has to drop out at any time, for any reason, his fellow riflemen will need to take up the slack.
Blimey! Okay, it’s a challenge. How do I sponsor?
All riflemen will go on leave with a charity donation sheet. They will be delighted to accept your pledges. Alternatively, we have set up a Challenge page on the Just Giving website - and you are now reading it! So please sponsor us - it will only take a minute...
The small print
· The CV activities that count are marching, running, cross training, swimming, rowing and cycling.
· To encourage swimming, and to even the time/distance ratio across the activities, all swimming distances will be doubled.
· To discourage cycling (too easy to clock up the miles!), all cycling distances will be reduced to a third.
· Section Commanders will sign off on the Riflemen’s tally card. Platoon Commanders will check every week. Any cheating discovered will zero the distances achieved by the rifleman to that date.
· Although it can’t be conducted as a race, due to Platoons being on different tasks at different times, a progress report will be posted on the website on a weekly basis.
· We are aiming to raise £5000. If every rifleman raises £50 in sponsorship we will easily exceed this. All proceeds will go to Care for Casualties.
· There will be no refund of donations if Platoons do not manage to return to Alanbrooke; they will face the shame and ignominy for ever more as penance. |
Benjamin Netanyahu is following a trend set by British imperialists. (IsraelinUSA/Flickr)
Few pundits have defended Benjamin Netanyahu’s by now infamous claim that a Palestinian leader gave Adolf Hitler the idea of exterminating Europe’s Jews. One exception is the right-wing British columnist Melanie Phillips.
Writing in The Jerusalem Post this week, Phillips contends that the Israeli prime minister was “fundamentally correct.”
As “support” for her assertion, Phillips refers to a statement made by Dieter Wisliceny, an associate of Adolf Eichmann, the Holocaust’s architect. During the 1946 Nuremberg trials, Wisliceny alleged that Haj Amin al-Husseini, the grand mufti of Jerusalem, was “one of the instigators of the systematic extermination of European Jewry.”
Phillips neglected to remind her readers that Netanyahu himself had cited Wisliceny last week while the prime minister was trying to “clarify” his accusations about the mufti. That damage limitation exercise had been criticized by historians and even by hawkish media outlets.
Baseless
The Times of Israel, for example, states: “It is not some, but rather most, serious historians who doubt the veracity of Wisliceny’s account.” That website quotes “Israel’s preeminent Holocaust scholar” Yehuda Bauer, who pointed out that the mass killing of the Jews had already been underway for six months before Hitler met the mufti in 1941 and who called Netanyahu’s version of events “entirely baseless.”
By coincidence, I found some fascinating papers about the mufti in the UK’s national archives a few days ago.
In an October 1936 letter, Arthur Wauchope, then Britain’s high commissioner for Palestine, signaled there were differences of opinion between himself and John Dill, the newly-appointed commander of British troops in Palestine, over whether or not the mufti should be deported.
“Children, savages and RAF [Royal Air Force] intelligence officers love creating bogies,” Wauchope wrote to the Colonial Office in London. “They are now getting Dill and others to believe that the mufti created, organized and was solely responsible for keeping going the strikes and disorders.”
Wauchope was alluding to the Palestinian Arab revolt which kicked off that year. A general strike in April 1936 was called without the mufti’s involvement. It was only afterwards that he assumed the presidency of a committee bringing together the various Palestinian Arab political factions.
The administration led by Wauchope behaved in a brutal manner. By ordering the large-scale demolition of Palestinian homes — notably in Jaffa — it ushered in a form of collective punishment that Israel still practices in 2015.
Despite how Wauchope played down the mufti’s role in the revolt, he regarded al-Husseini as a bitter foe. In the same letter, Wauchope complained of the mufti’s “hatred of Zionism” and expressed a desire to “clip his wings.” Less than a year later, Wauchope relayed to London a request that Britain “took some action against this Frankenstein monster created by Samuel” (Herbert Samuel, the first high commissioner in Palestine, had appointed al-Husseini as mufti).
Trend
Yet what struck me about Wauchope’s papers was how he recognized as early as 1936 that the mufti had become a bogeyman.
By blaming al-Hussaini for the Holocaust, Netanyahu therefore seems to be following a trend set by British imperialists.
Netanyahu’s lies are too much for Israel’s scholars to swallow. But that does not negate how the mufti has long been Israel’s bogeyman.
I noticed such a distortion of history on my first visit to Palestine in 2001. On that occasion, I accompanied an EU “peace” mission on a trip to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. There, I was astonished to see a whole section devoted to the mufti’s brief encounter with Hitler.
Although my knowledge of Middle Eastern politics was superficial at that time, I knew enough about the Holocaust to discern how something that should really be a footnote had been elevated to an event of central importance. The Palestinians were being held responsible for the crimes of Nazi Germany.
The demolition policy that Britain introduced has been invoked by Israel as part of its mythmaking over the Holocaust.
In 2009, Avigdor Lieberman, then Israel’s foreign minister, tried to “justify” the construction of a Jewish-only settlement on the site of the Shepherd’s Hotel in occupied East Jerusalem by pointing out that it once hosted the mufti’s headquarters. Lieberman went so far as to instruct diplomats to circulate a photograph of Hitler’s meeting with al-Husseini.
It was a typically crude attempt to manipulate the past so Israel could get away with ethnic cleansing.
Melanie Phillips last year urged Israel to think seriously about its propaganda. While visiting Jerusalem, she said that Israel was hampered by a “strategic failure on the battleground of the mind.”
Her willingness to applaud Netanyahu suggests that the truth has no place on whatever battleground she was talking about. |
Police have rescued dozens of dogs in the Bronx, allegedly being trained to fight in a dog-fighting ring. Katy Tur reports. (Published Thursday, June 21, 2012)
Authorities seized dozens of dogs, including puppies, from a Bronx apartment on Thursday where they allege the pups were being trained to fight, police said.
The super of the building is being charged with running an illegal training facility for dogs from the basement apartment of the building on Sherman Avenue, sources told NBC 4 New York.
Police said the basement served as a makeshift arena with an estimated capacity for 100 spectators. The dogs, ranging in ages from 12 weeks to five years, were found in cages and had various injuries indicative of dog fighting.
Investigators found harnesses and muzzles, dog treadmills, a loaded handgun, syringes and 22 wooden crates in the apartment.
Sources say police also found a ring used for dog fighting.
The ASPCA was on scene Thursday as the dogs were taken from the home. Officials said the dogs appeared to be responsive and in good condition, other than scars and wounds from fighting.
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Copyright Associated Press / NBC New York |
Look closely at that picture. Those sims have tan lines! Seasons and Sunlit Tides will be released soon, and what better way to prepare than to give your Sims a tan? This set consists of tans that match EA base-game swimsuits. There's a tan for the Onepiece, Plunge, and Strapless full body swimsuits. The boy shorts, briefs, bikini briefs, tie bikini, and gym-type shorts all have matching tan lines in this set. The upper body tans consist of the halter bikini, tie bikini, and the strapless tops all pictured above, plus the normal bra. As an extra bonus, there's a Playboy Bunny stencil that can be placed in 8 different locations on the body. The bunny stencils are broken into 2 sets -- one for the upper body and one for the lower. The tans are done as accessories, can be worn by teens thru elders, and will stay on in the shower. The presets look very good on every skin tested, even the fantasy ones. They also look very natural with Late Night tattoos. They weren't tested with tattoos done as accessories however. They're very easy to adjust using the darkness slider in CAS and can actually be set a few shades darker than the skin tone. Play with them a little to get a feel for how light or dark you can make them. The preset is about as light as they'll go however. At the bottom of the post you'll find pics of all the in-game thumbs, except the tops. They were just too blurry to post. They look fine in-game however.Model:Hadley Smith from BTB SimsGet her Here http://205.196.120.91/jj24mjn1ahxg/...Smith.Sims3Pack Be aware that this sim come with a lot of CC. Don't come looking to burn my house down if something in there messes with your game. I removed all the CC with the Sims3Pack extractor available Here. http://www.modthesims.info/d/364038 . It was all installed as separate package files with no issues.Thanks to everyone that has taken the time to put CAS creation tutorials up. I've done a lot of them, but can't say with any certainty which ones aided with this project! I've been playing with this idea on and off for over a year now.Made withandThanks to ALL the folks that have taken the time to write tutorials |
ASMR tapping – Videos with lots of tapping sounds July 25, 2015
ASMR Videos
Comments
ASMR tapping is one of the strongest triggers. In this article you will find the best ASMR tapping videos. Many of them are over one hour long and you can listen to them as background sounds while trying to fall asleep or doing something else. Some of them contain talking and some of them are pure tapping sounds.
ASMR Tapping as a trigger
For many people, tapping is their go to ASMR trigger. The sounds are the strongest, always similar and enough variety that you don’t get too used to them and become immune.
Tapping sounds usually go side by side with scratching sounds as they both are usually done by nails. Many women content creators have actually grown long nails just to produce tingles for their viewers, which I think is amazing! The different kind of sounds are created by tapping an object (or nails) against different kind of surfaces. Different materials have very different kinds of sounds, so if you are really into tapping, you could pay attention to the used materials for your favourite sounds and make a mental note to seek out videos that use such surfaces.
Below are some of my favourite videos. I have organized them into two different categories: no talking and with talking.
ASMR Tapping videos with no talking
Sometimes the talking takes over an ASMR video. Many people concentrate on the voices they hear and are easily distracted from their own thoughts. Tapping, scratching and crinkling sounds without talking is the ideal form of background audio for many.
These are the best tapping videos in my opinion:
An hour long video containing just tapping on different surfaces. Done by Ephemeral Rift and recorded in binaural audio. Surfaces include glass, fruits and everything very creative.
Same idea as the last video, but done by a different person. I can’t decide which one of these I like more.
Tapping with nails.
ASMR tapping and scratching
This clip is actually over 5 hours long. It’s very nice to listen to when trying to fall asleep.
ASMR Tapping videos with talking
Clips with talking or whispering have more variety to them. If you get easily trigger immune, I suggest experimenting with many different triggers – not just your favourite one. If tapping is what sets you off the most, combining it with talking sometimes reinforces the main trigger.
RaffyTaphyASMR is one of our favourite ASMRrtist. His is fairly unknown in the community but does amazing tapping videos.
Comments |
Earlier in my career, I thought that innovation was solely about technology. If you wanted to address a new market or to increase sales, writing more code was always a good option. Having gained some wisdom and experience over the years, I’ve finally figured out the obvious — that innovation can also take the form of a business model!
Since I first blogged about Amazon EC2 in the summer of 2006, developers and IT professionals have found all sorts of ways to put it to use. Many of those have been covered in this blog ; we’ve written a bunch of case studies about quite a few, and I’ve bookmarked many more on the AWS Buzz feed. As our customer’s use cases have grown, we’ve done our best to listen to their feedback, adding such features as additional instances types, multiple availability zones, multiple geographic regions, persistent disk storage, support for Microsoft Windows, and control over IP addresses.
The well-known pay-as-you-go EC2 pricing model is very similar to what an economist would call an on-demand or spot market. There’s no need make any up-front commitment; you simply pay for your processing an hour at a time. This model has served us well so far and it will continue to be a fundamental aspect of our strategy.
We’ve learned that some of our customers have needs which aren’t addressed by the spot pricing model. For example, some of them were looking for even lower prices, and were willing to make a commitment ahead of time in order to achieve this. Also, quite a few customers actually told us something even more interesting: they were interested in using EC2 but needed to make sure that we would have a substantial number of instances available to them at any time in order for them to use EC2 in a DR (Disaster Recovery) scenario. In a scenario like this, you can’t simply hope that your facility has sufficient capacity to accommodate your spot needs; you need to secure a firm resource commitment ahead of time.
Taking these requirements into account, we’ve created a new EC2 pricing model, which we call Reserved Instances. After you purchase such an instance for a one-time fee, you have the option to launch an EC2 instance of a certain instance type, in a particular availability zone, for a period of either 1 of 3 years. Your launch is guaranteed to succeed; there’s no chance of encountering any transient limitations in EC2 capacity. You have no obligation to run the instances full time, so you’ll pay even less if you choose to turn them off when you are not using them.
Steady-state usage costs, when computed on an hourly basis over the term of the reservation, are significantly lower than those for the on-demand model. For example, an on-demand EC2 Small instance costs 10 cents per hour. Here’s the cost breakdown for a reserved instance (also check out the complete EC2 pricing info):
Term One-time Fee Hourly Usage Effective 24/7 Cost 1 Year $325 $0.030 $0.067 3 Year $500 $0.030 $0.049
Every one of the EC2 instance types is available at a similar savings. We’ve preserved the flexibility of the on-demand model and have given you a new and more cost-effective way to use EC2. Think of the one-time fee as somewhat akin to acquiring hardware, and the hourly usage as similar to operating costs.
All of the launching, metering, and billing is fully integrated. Once you’ve purchased one or more reserved instances, the EC2 RunInstances call will draw upon your reserve before allocating on-demand capacity. This new feature is available for Linux and OpenSolaris instances in the US now, with the same support to follow in Europe in the near future.
We’ve added a number of new command-line (API) tools to support the Reserved Instances. Here’s what they do:
The ec2-describe-reserved-instance-offerings command lists the set of instance offerings that are available for purchase.
command lists the set of instance offerings that are available for purchase. The ec2-purchase-reserved-instances-offering command makes the actual purchase of one or more reserved instances.
command makes the actual purchase of one or more reserved instances. The ec2-describe-reserved-instances command displays a list of the instances that have been purchased.
Of course, all of this new functionality is fully programmable. We’ve added a number of new EC2 APIs:
DescribeReservedInstancesOfferings returns a list of Reserved Instance offerings that are available for purchase. This call enumerates the inventory within a particular availability zone.
returns a list of Reserved Instance offerings that are available for purchase. This call enumerates the inventory within a particular availability zone. PurchaseReservedInstancesOffering makes the actual purchase of a Reserved Instance within an availability zone. Up to 20 instances can be purchased with a single call, subject to availability and account limitations. This is like “buy a vowel” from Wheel of Fortune, but you get a server (much more useful) instead.
makes the actual purchase of a Reserved Instance within an availability zone. Up to 20 instances can be purchased with a single call, subject to availability and account limitations. This is like “buy a vowel” from Wheel of Fortune, but you get a server (much more useful) instead. DescribeReservedInstances – returns a list of the instances that have been purchased for the account.
We’re planning to give the AWS Console full control over the Reserved Instances. I expect to see other tool vendors add support as well.
If you have any questions about the new Reserved Instances, check out the entries in in the newly revised EC2 FAQ.
I’m looking forward to receiving your feedback on this new and innovative business model for EC2. Please feel free to leave me a comment.
— Jeff; |
Photo illustration by Slate. Images by Scott Olson/Getty Images and Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
What happens when a police officer breaks the law? The cynical answer is, usually nothing. But since at least 1963, the legal answer has been very specific: Any evidence an officer collects by breaking the law must be excluded from the courtroom. This “fruit of the poisonous tree” doctrine is a component of the beloved, despised exclusionary rule, which typically bars evidence gathered in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Although conservative Supreme Court justices have chipped away at the exclusionary rule for decades, it remains a cornerstone of search-and-seizure jurisprudence. Law enforcement officers don’t get to enforce the law by breaking it.
Pondering how far the fruit has to be from the tree to cease being poisonous can be an amusing philosophical exercise. But, as Justice Sonia Sotomayor demonstrated during oral arguments in Utah v. Strieff on Monday, in impoverished minority communities like Ferguson, Missouri, the continued vitality of the exclusionary rule is no mere academic matter.
On first blush, you might expect Strieff to be an easy case. Detective Douglas Fackrell violated the Fourth Amendment when he stopped Edward Strieff; Fackrell, Strieff, and Utah all agree on that point. The detective had heard an anonymous tip that a house in South Salt Lake might be involved in “narcotics activity,” and over the course of sporadic surveillance, he noticed visitors entering and exiting quickly. When he saw Strieff leave the house on Dec. 21, 2006, he detained him and demanded identification. Fackrell ran a warrants check and discovered that Strieff had an outstanding warrant for a minor traffic violation. So he arrested and searched him, discovering methamphetamine in Strieff’s pockets.
One problem: The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. Fackrell’s search of Strieff’s pockets was probably legal. (To ensure their own safety, officers can generally search arrestees.) But Fackrell’s initial detainment of Strieff—in constitutional lingo, a “seizure of a person”—was not. At a minimum, officers must have individualized reasonable suspicion to stop and question somebody, even briefly. All parties agree that Fackrell did not have reasonable suspicion to detain Strieff after merely seeing him leave a house that might contain drugs. The seizure led to the search; the search led to the drug discovery. Under the exclusionary rule, then Strieff gets to suppress the evidence and walk free. Right?
Not quite, because the Supreme Court has created an “attenuation” exception to the rule. Under attenuation doctrine, evidence discovered through police misconduct is still admissible if the link between the police illegality and the evidence itself has been sufficiently weakened, usually by time or interceding events. But the court has failed to explain how much time must pass, or which events must occur, before illegally obtained evidence becomes legal once again. In 1975, the justices focused on the “temporal proximity” between the police illegality and the discovery of the evidence (how much proximity?); the presence of “intervening circumstances” (which ones?); and the “flagrancy” of the official misconduct (a curveball with no relation to the other two factors). More recently, the court has switched tacks and decided that attenuation kicks in—and evidence becomes admissible—if suppressing the evidence would fail to serve any deterrent purpose.
Some courts have interpreted these factors quite generously—including the Utah Supreme Court, which sided with Strieff and suppressed the evidence against him. When the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review that decision, court-watchers assumed that the conservative bloc would continue its campaign against the exclusionary rule by broadening the attenuation doctrine. It could do so here by ruling that the discovery of evidence was sufficiently attenuated from the illegal seizure because of the intervening discovery of an arrest warrant. But that was back when Justice Antonin Scalia, noted exclusionary rule skeptic, was still on the bench. (Scalia once asked, “Why don’t we just abolish the exclusionary rule?” It wasn’t clear that he was kidding.) Following his death last Saturday, the justices appear to be deadlocked, 4-to-4, on Strieff’s case and maybe the exclusionary rule itself.
Arguments begin with a bang, as Tyler Green, representing Utah, attempts to persuade the court that there was a clear attenuating circumstance here: Fackrell discovered an arrest warrant for Strieff, thereby breaking the chain of causation between his illegal conduct and his discovery of the evidence. Green wants the court to adopt a general rule that once an officer has discovered an outstanding arrest warrant, the “taint” of his initial illegality dissipates. Sotomayor jumps in.
“If we announce your rule,” she asks Green, “what stops us from becoming a police state and just having the police stand on the corner down here and stop every person, ask them for identification, put it through—and if a warrant comes up, searching them?”
Green answers weakly that “an officer can never count on finding a warrant, so there is no incentive to make that stop.” Sotomayor hits right back.
“If you have a town like Ferguson,” the justice says, referring to the Missouri city with a documented history of predatory policing, “where 80 percent of the residents have five minor traffic warrants out, there may be a very good incentive for just standing on the street corner in Ferguson and asking every citizen: Give me your ID. Let me see your name. And let me hope, because I have an 80 percent chance that you’re going to have a warrant.”
Everyone in the courtroom, including Green, looks a little stunned that Sotomayor went there. (Green, at least, should’ve seen it coming: Strieff’s brief heavily cites the Department of Justice’s investigation of the Ferguson Police Department.) Justice Elena Kagan leans forward with a mischievous grin to hammer home Sotomayor’s point.
“If you’re policing a community where there is some significant percentage of people who have arrest warrants out on them,” she tells Green, “it really does increase your incentive to make that stop on the chance that there will be a warrant that will allow you to search and admit whatever evidence you gained in that search.”
Kagan and Sotomayor make a compelling argument: If officers can justify an illegal seizure whenever the individual they detain turns out to have an arrest warrant, then there’s little stopping them from detaining whomever they want. Deterring police from engaging in this kind of unlawful activity is a fundamental justification for the exclusionary rule itself. So shouldn’t the court rule that an outstanding arrest warrant can’t justify an illegal seizure?
Predictably, Justice Samuel Alito hops in to defend Utah, pointing out that most communities aren’t like Ferguson, and most people don’t have outstanding arrest warrants. Kagan pushes back, noting that the police are more likely to stop individuals in high-crime neighborhoods. When Joan Watt approaches the bench to defend Strieff, it seems as though she is inserting herself into a late-night dorm-room debate between Kagan, Sotomayor, and Alito. Watt reiterates the point that Utah’s proposed rule would encourage officers to detain anybody, even without an iota of suspicion.
“There is a downside,” Alito insists. “If the officer makes an illegal stop, the officer exposes himself or herself to all sorts of consequences!” You can sense Sotomayor struggling not to roll her eyes. Police rarely face consequences when they shoot innocent civilians. Does Alito really think they’ll get in big trouble for detaining somebody unlawfully for a few minutes?
Chief Justice John Roberts wades in with a nettled grimace to point out that most Americans don’t have arrest warrants, so the police don’t have an incentive to go on what Watt calls a “fishing expedition.” (Roberts seems increasingly irritated throughout the morning. Perhaps it finally dawned on him that his 5-4 majority against the exclusionary rule has gone up in smoke.) Watt, projecting an aura of stoic patience, calmly explains that officers “can still target communities that may have a greater incidence of warrants.” (She means minority communities.) Roberts has no good response.
By this point, the battle lines are clear. The court’s liberals think that Utah’s rule would give officers a new reason to stop anybody and run a warrant check: If a warrant turns up, the illegality of the initial stop will be dissolved, and the officer can search his arrestee. Thus, to deter this behavior, the court should refuse to extend the attenuation doctrine. The conservatives, on the other hand, doubt that officers target communities where people have lots of arrest warrants, and doubt that applying the exclusionary rule here would deter police misconduct.
This dispute leads to the most searing and uncomfortable moment of the morning. Alito attempts to ridicule Watt’s deterrence arguments by asking, “Do you think the judges in traffic courts are going to start issuing lots of warrants because they want to provide a basis for randomly stopping people?”
Watt starts to answer, but Sotomayor cuts in with a brutal joust.
“I’m very surprised,” she says acidly, “that Justice Alito doesn’t know that most of these warrants are automatic. If you don’t pay your fine within a certain amount of days, they’re issued virtually automatically.”
It is one of those knockout moments so ruthless that you aren’t sure whether to cringe or cheer. Sotomayor is essentially calling out Alito’s privilege—why would he know about corrupt, scammy, racist policing?—and Alito doesn’t even attempt to respond. Instead, he wears an embarrassed smirk throughout the remainder of arguments, appearing appropriately shamed.
By the time the justices file off the bench around noon, it seems probable the court will indeed divide 4-to-4, liberals against conservatives, on Strieff. That will leave the Utah Supreme Court’s pro-exclusion ruling in place, but fail to establish any nationwide rule. It would also represent one small conservative revolution thwarted.
When Scalia died, court-watchers noted that his absence would forestall impending victories against unions, affirmative action, and voting rights. Less commented upon was the fact that the justice’s death also granted a reprieve to the Warren Court’s biggest contributions to defendants’ rights. The era of conservatives merrily hacking away at Fourth Amendment safeguards appears to be over. And Sotomayor’s aggressiveness on Monday suggests that, in the long run, she believes her side has the winning hand. |
The Canadian Press
TORONTO - Thousands of people in downtown Toronto were left without power over the lunch hour Wednesday during an outage believed to have been caused by an underground cable.
In all, an estimated 20,000 hydro customers saw their power go down around 11:35 a.m. ET -- an event that flooded the Internet with tweets about people trapped in elevators.
Still, the city and its major institutions took the blackout in stride. A major hospital switched to emergency power, subway trains and streetcars were unaffected, and the headquarters of the major banks managed to keep their lights on.
One Tim Hortons continued selling its remaining donuts to customers after its coffee ran dry.
With the G20 summit of world leaders coming to the city at month's end, at least one business saw it as an opportunity to put its summit backup plan to work.
"We've had to shut down our office and send everybody home," said Jeff Sciarra, who works at a technology company.
"But we have our G20 plan in place, and we're trying to enable that right now," said Sciarra, who added most people would be working from home.
The major disruptions expected from G20 security measures, and the threat of protests, reportedly has many downtown businesses making contingency plans, including having staff work from home during the event.
Samantha Hatton, who works for a web development company on Adelaide Street, said they too were being sent home early -- but working from home wasn't part of the plan.
"I'm going to go to the mall and make the best of it," she said.
The blacked-out area was bordered by Bay Street in the west, Jarvis in the east, Shuter in the north and Lakeshore Boulevard in the south.
While lights flickered back on shortly after 1 p.m. for most of the area, it took another 20 minutes or so to bring three remaining buildings back up.
Toronto Hydro spokeswoman Tanya Bruckmueller said it was believed an underground cable fault was to blame, and crews had turned their attention to finding the source of the problem in the afternoon.
The headquarters of the major banks were apparently not affected and the Toronto Stock Exchange was not hit by the outage.
St. Michael's Hospital was affected but operated on emergency power, a spokeswoman said.
Firefighters were called to several buildings to help people trapped in elevators.
People were also using Twitter to say they were stuck in elevators. One person tweeted there was someone trapped in an elevator at the CFL head office on Wellington Street, just east of Yonge.
Numerous traffic lights were knocked out in the affected area, causing traffic snarl-ups on streets already clogged with late morning traffic.
Toronto police spokeswoman Isabelle Cotton said officers were sent to those locations to keep traffic moving. |
Jud McMillan (Credit: Indiana House Republicans) Indiana GOP's House Leader resigns after texting sexually explicit video of himself cheating on wife to everyone on his "Contacts" list The family-values friendly Jud McMillin claimed his phone was "stolen in Canada," but resigned in disgrace anyway
The controversial House Majority Leader in Indiana -- he cosponsored the state's "religious freedom" law -- resigned suddenly on Tuesday after a sexually compromising video was sent to all of the people on his "Contacts" list, the Advocate's Bil Browning reports.
After news of the mass-texting began to circulate, Representative Jud McMillin (R) claimed that his "phone was stolen in Canada and out of my control for about 24 hours. I have just been able to reactivate it under my control. Please disregard any messages you received recently. I am truly sorry for anything offensive you may have received."
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But his "Canadian girlfriend stole my phone" defense apparently didn't convince many of his "Contacts" -- or at least, not the ones who mattered -- and so Tuesday night he released a statement in which he said that the "time is right for me to pass the torch and spend more time with my family."
During his five years in the legislature, McMillin has crusaded to "protect the integrity of the institution of marriage," but the Advocate reported that the woman on the video he texted was not, in fact, his wife. According to his campaign website, he claimed that "the family has always been the foundation of our strength of community" and that "[i]n these times of turmoil the rest of the country could learn something from our example."
It's unclear what the rest of the country could learn from his example at this time, other than -- perhaps -- opposing LGBTQ rights across the board could have karmic implications for conservative Republicans with a proclivity for taking videos of themselves cheating on their wives. |
Let's start with the facts:
In 2011, Antoine Cason had 2 interceptions, defended 17 passes and made 46 tackles.
2012 is the last year of both Cason's rookie contract and Quentin Jammer's current contract.
Cason had his best season in 2010 and — rumor has it — he struggled to form a good working relationship with Defensive Coordinator Greg Manusky in 2011.
Cason, the former Jim Thorpe Award winner — an award given to be the best defensive back in college football — certainly has the physical skills to be a shutdown cornerback in the NFL. He has great speed, great hands, good instincts and is physically strong.
Issues before 2010 were mostly the result of Cason playing out of position. Antoine is more comfortable playing WRs downfield and using his speed as a safety valve that allows him to take chances to get interceptions. In 2008 and 2009, he was asked to play the Nickel corner spot and defend against guys running 5 yard routes through traffic.
The plan when Cason was drafted seemed obvious by their contracts running out at the same time. This time next year, the Chargers would like to move Cason to the #1 CB spot. Jammer is almost irrelevant in this situation as he can move to SS or #2 CB or off the team, nevermind the fact that his contract is up and he'll likely earn less money in the next one.
Word out of Chargers Park this offseason is that 2nd year CB Shareece Wright, who was on the field for 4 snaps last season, has impressed defensive coaches and could eventually turn into the starting CB that A.J. Smith thought he could be when he was taken in the 3rd round. Marcus Gilchrist had a good first year, despite not having much of an offseason, and will be knocking on the door of Cason and Jammer if they don't play well this season.
John Pagano could have a formidable secondary if all four of those guys play well this season. If Jammer and Cason play like they did under Manusky in 2011, we'll most likely see an entirely different group of CBs heading into the 2013 NFL Season.
Jammer has some leeway. He loves the Chargers and the Chargers love him back. Even if he doesn't play that well this season and whoever plays SS plays great, the team could (rightfully) talk themselves into signing Jammer to a cheap deal and turning him into a Nickel CB.
Cason is not in the same situation. He doesn't play well in the Nickel spot and he doesn't have the same relationship with the Chargers coaching staff, front office or fans. He'll have to earn his spot as a starter on this team for the third consecutive season.
This is a make-or-break season for Antoine Cason in every respect: |
The Container
To create the body of the sign I used this container.
Rubbermaid Commercial 6306 6qt capacity clear polycarbonate container
If you would rather have a sleeker sign you could use the 4 qt version which has nearly the same opening but, would make the depth of the sign just over two inches smaller..
I used this container because I know it would be strong and already resembled the shape of the signs that I referenced online. It isn't the exact size of the real signs but it was close enough for me and it seemed like a good starting point.
Once I got the container I cut the handles off with a hack saw. I started to cut the lip of the container off too but, then realized that It would make no difference if I removed it or not.
Covering the container in Apoxie Sculpt
To be honest I don't think that this step was completely necessary. I don't think that I needed to cover the whole container with Apoxie Sculpt. I probably could have sanded the container smooth and only used the Apoxie Sculpt for the ridge that goes around the perimeter of the sign.
I always like to work with new materials, and Apoxie Sculpt was a new material for me on this project. It is essentially a two part clay that you mix together 1:1 (by weight) that will cure rock hard in 24 hours. After curing you can drill, sand, and paint the material with normal woodworking tools.
Tips
Its always best to try to get your applications of your clay as smooth as possible. This will require much less sanding and filling later. One cool thing about Apoxie sculpt is that it can be smoothed out with water. I usually put globs of the mixed clay onto the container and then smoothed out the surface with wet hands. You can see from the second picture how rough it will look if you are not patient enough to smooth it out completely. You can also see how nice it comes out after several passes of filling and sanding.
Making the ridge
For the ridge that surrounds the container, I first built up a volume using scraps of cardboard and hot glue. This will make uniformity easier and use less of the Apoxie sculpt. After I liked the look of the cardboard edging I covered it in the clay, trying to make it look as uniform as possible. I found it was easier to focus on one side of the cardboard at a time and to let it dry completely before adding clay to the other sides.
The inner perfectionist in you will hate and love this part. I filled and sanded the whole sign piece well over a dozen times to make it look as uniform as I could get it. This step will take the longest but, It is important to make it uniform and smooth if you want it to look like a painted metal version. If you start to get really bored you can skip ahead and start to work on the other parts of the sign.
Lastly, I drilled a whole for the power chord at the back of the sign. I should also mention that the container I used does not have a perfectly square opening, therefore I decided that the sign looked more natural when the height of the sign was the larger than the width. |
London Mayor Sadiq Khan issued a statement Thursday morning slamming President Donald Trump for retweeting three graphic, unverified and anti-Muslim videos from the racist leader of an extremist U.K. political party.
In the blistering statement, London’s Muslim mayor claimed the president “used Twitter to promote a vile, extremist group that exists solely to sow division and hatred in our country” — referring to Britain First, the political party whose leader first published the videos.
“Many Brits who love America and Americans will see this as a betrayal of the special relationship between our two countries,” he continued. “It beggars belief that the President of our closest ally doesn’t see that his support of this extremist group actively undermines the values of tolerance and diversity that makes Britain so great.”
Khan, who has previously called on U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May to cancel Trump’s invitation to the country, declared that “after this latest incident, it is increasingly clear that any official visit from President Trump to Britain would not be welcomed.”
The London Mayor concluded by calling on May to ask Trump to “delete these tweets and to apologise to the British people”.
Prime Minister May also had stern words for Trump in response to his retweets, calling his dissemination of fake anti-Muslim videos from an extremist group “wrong.” Trump responded, on Twitter of course, bizarrely.
The British weren’t the only allies to respond to Trump’s tweets. The Dutch Embassy replied to one of the videos — which claimed to show a “migrant” beating up a boy on crutches — by fact-checking the U.S. president:
.@realDonaldTrump Facts do matter. The perpetrator of the violent act in this video was born and raised in the Netherlands. He received and completed his sentence under Dutch law. — Netherlands Embassy 🇺🇸 (@NLintheUSA) November 29, 2017
Read Mayor Khan’s full statement here:
President Trump has used Twitter to promote a vile, extremist group that exists solely to sow division and hatred in our country. It’s increasingly clear that any official visit from President Trump to Britain would not be welcomed. pic.twitter.com/oZ1Kt0JCfY — Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) November 30, 2017
[image via screengrab]
—
Follow Aidan McLaughlin (@aidnmclaughlin) on Twitter
Have a tip we should know? [email protected] |
Window for Terminating a Copyright Transfer Agreement Opens in 2013
A little-known provision of the Copyright Act of 1976 could wreak further havoc on a publishing industry already struggling to deal with the transition from traditional print formats to digital content. Section 203 on the Copyright Act allows the original author(s) of creative works to terminate any transfer or licensing agreement 35 years after the license was signed and “reclaim” their copyrights. As this provision went into effect on Jan. 1, 1978, the “window” for terminations will open on Jan. 1, 2013. However, as this termination “window” is only open for a limited period, authors may lose their termination rights if they don’t take steps promptly.
It has long been the expectation among authors and publishers that if an author wants his or her work to be published and commercially distributed, the author will be expected to transfer or license the copyright in the work to the publisher. This made economic sense on several levels as the publisher was often in the best position to identify and exploit a market for a particular work. Also, the publisher has a substantial investment in its production and distribution infrastructure, which is protected by obtaining the copyright in the work in which it intends to invest.
In the best of all worlds, both sides benefit from these arrangements. The publisher generates revenue—and hopefully profit—from the sales of the work. In turn, the author gets royalty income from those efforts. Unfortunately, problems can arise in some cases. New or unknown authors often have less bargaining power when entering into licensing or transfer agreements and sign agreements for lower royalty rates. Should their work be an unexpected “hit,” they may not receive a fair or reasonable proportion of the revenue being generated. Another challenge may arise when the publisher determines that the work is no longer profitable and pulls it from distribution—the work goes out-of-print. However, as the publisher still controls the copyright in the work, the author may not be free to seek out an alternative publisher or pursue self-publishing.
These challenges were recognized when the Copyright Act was being redrafted in the mid-1970s. The intention of Section 203 was to give authors a “second bite of the apple,” either to renegotiate with their original publisher or seek out a new publisher, after a reasonable time had passed. Specifically, it provides that a license or transfer agreement, signed on or after Jan. 1, 1978, can be terminated during a period beginning 35 years from the date the agreement was executed and ending 5 years later. While copyright lawyers and other copyright specialists have been aware of the termination provisions for years, many authors are less familiar with their termination rights, and only recently—with the “window” for termination soon to open—has the issue started to gain attention.
Section 203 (available online as Title 17, United States Code, Section 203 at www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/203) has several provisions that require careful attention by authors seeking to reclaim their copyrights. Section 203 applies to any copyrighted work, so it applies to books, articles, music, dramatic works (including movies and movie rights agreements), photographs, artworks, etc. However, the law applies only to license or transfer agreements that are signed on or after Jan. 1, 1978. The law is not retroactive so does not apply to agreements signed before that date. It does not matter if the work was created before this date, only that the agreement was signed after this date. Therefore, a book written in 1975 but not transferred to the publisher until 1978 would be covered by the law.
The law’s 35- to 40-year “window” for terminating a license or transfer agreement also requires careful scrutiny. Works created under the 1976 law are now protected by copyright for decades (the life of the author plus 70 years, or 95 years for corporate authors). Consequently, the termination window is comparatively narrow when measured over the lifespan of the copyright. If the termination is not executed within the 5-year window, it could be lost until the copyright expires.
In addition, there is a requirement that the author give “advance notice in writing” that must be provided to the publisher “not less than 2 years or more than 10 years” before the proposed termination date. This is very critical as any author whose termination window were to open in 2013, but who has not yet given notice, finds that their 5-year window has now shrunk to 3 years.
For example, if Jane’s book was transferred on Feb. 1, 1978, her termination window is from Feb. 1, 2013 to Feb. 1, 2018. If she has not given notice yet, then the soonest she could terminate the agreement would be in 2 years. But, if Jane is unaware of her rights and only learns of them after February 2016, then her 2-year notice would extend beyond the February 2018 cut-off date and she could not terminate her rights.
But what if Jane is not the author, but the deceased author’s daughter? Section 203 deals with deceased authors, but it is complicated and is in part dictated by estate law principles. Did the author have a spouse who is still alive? Does Jane have siblings? If any of Jane’s siblings are deceased, did they have children (grandchildren of the original author)? All of these parties appear to have some role in and responsibility for acting to terminate the rights. And the critical questions are: Does Jane (or the others) even know that she has this right? Does she know who the publisher is? Does that publisher even exist anymore?
Just as the publishing industry is dealing with the challenges caused by the emergence of ebooks, alternatives to traditional booksellers, increased options for self-publishing, copyright piracy, and extensive online infringement, Section 203 comes into effect at a bad time. Back catalogs are an important part of a company’s assets, one that can be more easily exploited in a digital age. Section 203 puts those resources at risk. But only if the author knows about it. |
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No-frills carrier AirAsia has announced plans to introduce a "quiet zone" on its AirAsia X flights, allowing passengers to avoid the screams of babies and young children.
A new booking system allows passengers to reserve a seat, at no extra cost, in the designated area when booking through the airline's website.
The zone incorporates seven rows of seats towards the front of an Airbus A330, behind the airline’s Premium FlatBed seats. AirAsia claims passengers will experience “minimal noise” in the seats and soft lighting.
Any group containing a passenger younger than 12 will not be able to book these seats.
AirAsia no longer flies from the UK but has regular flights connecting Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia with south-east Asia.
The new seating plan follows a move by Malaysian Airlines earlier this year to ban children from the top deck of its A380 aircraft.
A number of surveys have claimed that the majority of passengers find noisy children their biggest gripe when flying.
The results of a recent poll of Telegraph Travel readers found that nearly 70 per cent of those who voted supported the introduction of child-free flights.
AirAsia’s “quiet zone” is available on flights departing from February 2013 onwards. |
A technical glitch meant that WhatsApp users across Europe, the US and Canada were having trouble using the messaging app as people got ready to see in 2016. Users could not respond to existing chats, share new ones or use the app's web service on one of the busiest days of the year.
The service went down at 16.28 GMT on Thursday 31 December, was working again 45 minutes only to crash again. When an existing chat was opened the name of the person or group was replaced with a spinning wheel and the word "connecting".
A spokesman for the App told MailOnline: "Some people have had trouble accessing WhatsApp for a short period today. We're working to restore service back to 100% for everyone and we apologize for the inconvenience."
The service was initially restored - but soon crashed again.
A live outage map for all the regions in which WhatsApp is available can be found at website downdetector. |
When it comes to automating the process of spotting breaking news, solving one problem can create several more.
Reuters discovered this firsthand over the past two years as it built Reuters News Tracer, a custom tool designed to monitor Twitter for major breaking news events as they emerge. While reporters curate their own lists of sources to get rapid alerts on stories they’re already looking for, the Reuters tool is designed to solve a different problem: detecting breaking news events while early reports are still coming in.
The development of the tool, which Reuters is speaking about publicly today the first time, emerged out of “an existential question for the news agency,” said Reg Chua, Reuters’ executive editor of data and innovation. “A large part of our DNA is built on the notion of being first, so we wanted to figure out how to build systems that would give us an edge on tracking this stuff at speed and at scale. You can throw a million humans at this stuff, but it wouldn’t solve the problem,” he said.
Once the tool identifies what it thinks are emerging stories, it clusters relevant tweets into events, generating information, and metadata about what that story might be about. Tweets that mention “explosions” and “bombs,” for example, would be clustered into a single story about a potential terrorist attack.
But detection is only the first, and probably easiest, problem to solve. Another challenge was figuring out how to identify which events are actually interesting, newsworthy, and not spam. Added to that is the problem of filtering out assertions of opinions (“I think it’s terrible that this event happened”) from assertions of facts (“This event happened”) and automating the processing of verifying whether reports are actually true.
The verification challenge was the most interesting and most valuable problem to solve, Chua said. Pulling from academic research on the verification of social media reports, Reuters designed its algorithm to assign verification scores to tweets based on 40 factors, including whether the report is from a verified account, how many people follow those who reported the news, whether the tweets contain links and images, and, in some cases, the structure of the tweets themselves. “Amazingly enough, a tweet that is entirely in capital letters is less likely to be true,” Chua said.
The factors, when combined, give each story cluster a score. If those stories meet a set verification threshold, Reuters has enough confidence to tweet out its own breaking news alert reporting the event, and reporters will then report on the story themselves. That score will also change over time, as more reports come in and increase or decrease the verification ranking. The process, which drew on historical datasets and insights from Reuters reporters, essentially reverse-engineered the process of spotting and verifying unconfirmed reports, combining the the skills of reporters with the speed of an algorithm. Reuters essentially taught its algorithm to think like a reporter.
The nature of Reuters News Tracer means that the tool works best for what Chua calls “witnessable events,” such as bombings and natural disasters. These are events often reported by many people simultaneously, often joined by photos and videos, which boost their legitimacy in the eye of the tool’s algorithm. The tool has already paid off in significant ways for Reuters, giving the organization, for example, an eight-minute head start on reporting on the Brussels bombings earlier this year and a 15-minute jump on sending out a news alert on the Chelsea bombing in New York in October.
This kind of speed is a big deal, not only to people whose lives could be saved by getting rapid notifications of nearby events, but also to Thomson Reuters financial clients, “who really prize breaking news,” said Chua.
But while speed is a key element of the mission of Reuters News Tracer, the tool also serves to extend the reach of the organization overall, particularly because Reuters is unable to have reporters on the ground in every place where news might break.
“With the proliferation of smartphones and social media, it means that there are lot more witnesses to a lot more events,” said Chua. “We can’t be at everything. Our tool helps shift some of the burden of witnessing and lets journalists do much more of the high value-added work.” |
This article is about the island in Wales. For the island in Cumbria, see Ramsey Island (Furness) . For the hamlet in Essex, see Ramsey Island, Essex
Ramsey Island (Welsh: Ynys Dewi) is an island about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) off St David's Head in Pembrokeshire on the northern side of St Brides Bay, in southwest Wales. It is 259 hectares (640 acres) in area. Ramsey means (in Old Norse) Hrafn's island.[1]
In Welsh the island is named after Saint David (Dewi Sant), the patron saint of Wales. It was the home of his confessor, Saint Justinian. The nearest large settlement is the city of St David's.
Ramsey Island is less than 3.2 km (2 mi) long and its highest point is 136 metres (446 ft) above sea level at Carnllundain, and is listed as a HuMP. It is the fourth largest island in Wales, after Anglesey, Holy Island and Skomer,[2] and is surrounded by a number of islets, tidal islands and rocks.
Geology [ edit ]
The island has a diverse geology for a relatively small area; it comprises sedimentary, volcanic and intrusive igneous rocks dating from the early Palaeozoic Era. The larger part of the north of the island is formed from mudstones of the Tetragraptus Mudstone Formation (also known as the 'Penmaen Dewi Shale Formation' and again as the 'Road Uchaf Formation' (sic) after the Rhod Uchaf locality on the island's east coast). However Carnysgubor stands proud to their west as it is formed from a more resistant microtonalite intrusion. In contrast the coastal cliffs between Trwyn-drain-du and Trwyn-Sion-Owen and also between Trwyn Ogof Hen and Rhod Uchaf are formed by sedimentary rocks, the mica-rich Lingula Flags and the sandstones and mudstones of the Ogof Hen Formation. The rock strata are typically steeply tilted and commonly faulted.
Southern end of Ramsey Island
Running NW–SE across the centre of the island from Aber Mawr to the vicinity of The Bitches is a band of late Arenig age tuffs and 'pencil slates' assigned to the Aber Mawr Formation. Its boundary with the sediments to the north is a fault.
The south of the island is dominated by a rhyolite intrusion as are the islets off its southern coast. To the west of the Ramsey Fault which runs from Aber Mawr to Porth Lleuog, is Carnllundain which is formed from the tough rhyolitic tuffs of the Carn Llundain Formation. These tuffs arose as volcanic ash falls, ash flows and turbidite deposits. Smaller areas of dark grey mudstones interbedded with debris flows grouped together as the Porth Llauog Formation occur around the margins of the rhyolite. Part of the southern margin of the inlet of Aber Mawr is characterised by the mudstones and sandstones of the Trwyn Llundain Formation, a part of the Solva Group of Cambrian rocks.[3][4]
Archaeology [ edit ]
Surveys in the 1990s and more recently have found evidence of prehistoric cairns, field systems, barrows and other anomalies which suggest human activity on the island dates back up to 5,000 years.[5] Mediaeval sites include a holy well and cemetery from the 9th century.[6]
Recorded history [ edit ]
From 1082, the island was part of the cantref of Dewisland under the control of the bishops of St David's. In the 12th century, it was a place of pilgrimage; St Tyfanog's Chapel existed up to the 1600s, when it was described as "decayed", and there may also have been a chapel to St Justinian.[7]
In the 13th century, the island was reported to be fertile, producing beef, sheep and goats, and wheat, barley and oats. In the 14th century, 100 acres of the island supported horses, cattle and sheep, and rabbits, rushes, heath and birds' eggs were harvested. A farmhouse, corn mill and lime kiln were recorded in the 16th century, but the farm building was a ruin by the early 19th century. The mill and kiln were in operation until the early 20th century, and in 1905 the island was sold into private hands and ceased being an ecclesiastical holding.[6] A new farmhouse was built early in the 19th century, and was Grade II listed by Cadw in 1992.[8]
Nature Reserve [ edit ]
Owned and managed by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB),[9] the island has spectacular bird cliffs, coastal scenery and heathland. It is one of the best sites in Wales to see choughs, which are attracted by an ample supply of dung beetles.
Other breeding species include ravens, common buzzards, peregrines, northern wheatears, gulls, auks, Manx shearwaters, razorbills and guillemots.
Ramsey has the most important grey seal breeding colony in southern Britain, with over 400 seal pups born each autumn.[9] In October 2017 the remnant storm of hurricane Ophelia was responsible for some 90 seal pup deaths.[10]
With a permanent population of just two human residents, the RSPB Warden and Assistant Warden who live in a farmhouse there, the island is otherwise uninhabited. Tourist boats sail around the island and a ferry service run by Thousand Islands Expeditions operates from Easter to 31 October from St Davids Lifeboat Station on the mainland.[11]
Ramsey Sound [ edit ]
The Bitches in Ramsey Sound, with the farmhouse on Ramsey
Ynys Cantwr seen from Ramsey Island
Ynys Eilun (r) and Pont yr Eilun (just visible, l), from Ynys Cantwr
Ynys Glwelltog, viewed from the sea
The waters around the island have significant tidal effects, and tidal waterfalls occur between The Bitches.[12][13] The asymmetrical underwater flow can be 3.8 m/s (12.5 ft/s) northward (flood) and 1.9 m/s (6.2 ft/s) southward (ebb), with some turbulence. The sound reaches some 66 metres (217 feet) deep, although a tidal island called Horse Rock protrudes from the water at low tide.[14]
A 400 kW tidal power turbine project was planned from 2014[15][16][17][18][19] and the first turbine of three was installed in December 2015.[20]
Ramsey Island is surrounded by a number of smaller islands, islets and rock clusters, including:
Bancyn-ffald
The Bitches
The Bishops and Clerks group, including: Carreg Rhoson and Maen Rhoson Carreg-trai Cribog Daufraich and Maen Daufraich Emsger or South Bishop (37 metres, 121 feet) Llechau-isaf and Llechau-uchaf Moelyn North Bishop (44 metres, 144 feet)
Carreg-gwylan
Meini Duon ( Black Rocks ) is the name given to three sea rocks approximately two-thirds of a mile south of Ramsey Island, [21] not far from the Bishops and Clerks. They are made of acid intrusive rock, [22] and are the furthest south-west of the group of small islets and rocks off this coast. [23]
) is the name given to three sea rocks approximately two-thirds of a mile south of Ramsey Island, not far from the Bishops and Clerks. They are made of acid intrusive rock, and are the furthest south-west of the group of small islets and rocks off this coast. Trwynmynachdy
Ynys Bery ( Falcon Island ) (71 metres, 233 feet)
) (71 metres, 233 feet) Ynys Cantwr ( Precentor's Island ; formerly owned by the precentors of St David's. [24] ), a small tidal island south of Ramsey Island. Its highest point is 54 metres. [25]
; formerly owned by the precentors of St David's. ), a small tidal island south of Ramsey Island. Its highest point is 54 metres. Ynys Eilun (5 acres (2.0 ha) [26] , length 850 feet (0.26 km) [27] ) and Pont yr Eilun are two islets about a quarter of a mile east of Ynys Bery. [28] Visiting the island is not easy because of its difficult landing. [29] The surrounding waters are swept by a northeast current caused by Ynys Eilun itself. [30]
, length 850 feet (0.26 km) ) Pont yr Eilun are two islets about a quarter of a mile east of Ynys Bery. Visiting the island is not easy because of its difficult landing. The surrounding waters are swept by a northeast current caused by Ynys Eilun itself. Ynys Gwelltog (Grassy Island; 56 metres, 184 feet),[31] a tidal island, in the past considered suitable for pasturing two sheep.[32]
Sources [ edit ]
Coordinates: |
Last week I was fortunate to go to Pressnomics for the first time. It was a really great conference that focused on business growth, particularly in WordPress.
The event caused some controversy for a quote on the last day. Matt Mullenweg, the co-founder of WordPress was taking some questions from Josh Strebel, the host of Pressnomics.
Matt's company is Automattic and they make a plugin called Jetpack which provide 30+ services, all wrapped up in a single package. Some of those services are paid, some are free and several rely on the SaaS capabilities of WordPress.com.
Josh asked Matt whether Jetpack was a trojan horse for Automattic to sell even more paid services in the future. (link)
Matt replied that the purpose was very different, "In the absence of Jetpack, I believe WordPress would be declining". (link)
That caused a real shock in the audience and a lot of debate afterwards, in the room, on Twitter and on blogs. I think some attendees found it hard to imagine WordPress market share declining and even harder to imagine it being saved by a plugin like Jetpack.
Josh and Matt at Pressnomics. Thanks to Betsy Cohen for the photo.
There's a bigger story here about open source
The debate about Jetpack is interesting, but I want to talk about the bigger picture.
I think the importance of Jetpack is an indicator of the limitations of open source in 2015.
The Pressnomics sessions were not recorded, so the most accurate quotes I have for Matt are from Twitter. Here's some of what he said:
"Naked WordPress (without plugins) is not competitive to Wix, Weebly, Squarespace". (link)
"Look at attrition rates on JP/non-JP sites, or run some new user tests on http:// u sertesting.com, it 'l l blow you away." (link) In short, there is objective proof that default WordPress is too difficult for many users and Jetpack improves on-boarding.
l blow you away." (link) In short, there is objective proof that default WordPress is too difficult for many users and Jetpack improves on-boarding. "There's secular decline of non-mobile, non-social publishing systems." (link) WordPress doesn't have a great mobile or social experience and so we should natually expect it to be declining without help from outside source like JetPack. Anecdotally, I heard at the conference that Matt is placing enormous energy into refocusing Automattic on mobile. Everyone is getting re-trained, company priorities are now centered on mobile and we will likely see new or improved WordPress apps soon.
Beyond the quotes on Twitter, I'm going to paraphrase some of what I heard from Matt. Apologies henceforth for any misquotes or misunderstanding ...
Matt seems to think the WordPress has The Innovator's Dilemma. The WordPress development community is locked into protecting its existing user base and revenue streams. As an industry becomes successful, that always brings a lack of mobility and an unwillingness to risk change.
Currently, the WordPress community isn't thinking broadly enough and doesn't fully appreciate the threat from services such as Wix, Weebly and Squarespace. Matt seemed to be prodding the audience to take these threats much more seriously.
Matt also seemed to be suggesting that there are real limitations to what open source can do alone:
The open source development process can't move fast enough to keep up with SaaS companies who can push out updates every day.
The open source community isn't well suited to building high-quality apps, particularly for platforms such as iOS.
Open source by itself can't provide many of the tools that SaaS can such as a CDN service, easy video hosting, security monitoring.
Here are some much longer quotes from Matt, talking more about the intersection of open source and SaaS.
My thoughts
It's possible I'm cherry-picking some of Matt's comments, but I wanted to write about them because that's the way I've been thinking lately, as anyone who's argued with me about auto-updates knows.
I no longer hear end users compare WordPress to Joomla or Drupal. When I'm talking to small business owners, they're making a choice between WordPress and services such as Weebly, Wix and Squarespace. Website statistics are awful and probably don't fully reflect the use of these SaaS services. Drupal has about 1 million active websites, whereas Wix claims (take this with a pinch of salt) over 57 million users.
We talked about SaaS in our predictions for 2015. The most successful open source projects in 2015 will be those who combine the best of open source and SaaS. It's worth remembering that WordPress powers over 20% because it has a SaaS product already. WordPress.com users are about 50% of all WordPress users already, so it's fair to say that WordPress is already a SaaS-first product.
So here's the tldr
The real threat to open source's market share is SaaS. To survive, open source projects need to offer some of their own centralized SaaS tools otherwise they'll lose the low and middle end of the market.
Whenever I talk with developers about the threat of SaaS, they think I'm crazy. Even at Pressnomics after Matt's interview, a lot of people were dismissing these SaaS services as toys. Maybe I'm wrong, but I wonder if they're too focused on the codebase and on enterprise users?
Over to you, I'd love your thoughts on this ... |
Spread the love
Hartford, CT — Last year, police released dash camera footage of a controversial arrest — showing an officer in street clothes walk up to a handcuffed suspect sitting on the curb, and kick his head into the ground — it hit so hard, it bounced. Several other officers were also involved in attacking two restrained suspects. They admitted to doing it and covering it up, and now, two of them are being promoted while another gets a golden parachute.
Officers Steven Barone and Detective Christopher Mastroianni, who were recently punished for excessive force and lying on police reports, were just promoted to sergeant last week. What’s more, the officer seen on video stomping a suspect’s head, Sean Spell, who was arrested for his role in the attack, was allowed to quietly retire and avoid all accountability.
On June 4, officers pursued Ricardo Perez and Emilio Diaz through the streets of Hartford and West Hartford in a vehicle police suspected to be stolen. When the chase ended, officers arrested the pair — but the details of those arrests became the subject of multiple investigations when supervisors saw the bloody mugshots of the suspects.
The concerns over excessive force intensified in October, after Hartford police released dash camera footage of a controversial arrest — showing former Sgt. Sean Spell, 46, in street clothes walk up to a handcuffed suspect sitting on the curb, and kick his head into the ground.
Spell retired from the force amid the probe and now, this 46-year-old will draw an annual pension of $129,977 from Hartford, paid out in monthly installments of $10,831—for the rest of his life—for stomping a handcuffed man’s head.
Receiving only a slap on the wrist for their role in the case, however, Mastroianni and Barone will go on to receive higher pay and continue to police the citizens of Hartford as they get rewarded with a promotion.
According to the Hartford Currant:
During his interview with Internal Affairs, Barone provided “excuses” that seemingly contradicted themselves, according to Sgt. Kevin O’Brien, the report’s author. These included that he had recently been transferred from the Conditions Unit (which uses cruisers that don’t have dashboard cameras), yet it was “muscle memory” for him to turn cameras off. Barone also said he manually shut the camera off at the end of the chase and during the initial struggle with Diaz and Perez because he didn’t think it was “relevant” to record. He denied shutting off the camera so it wouldn’t capture the two being taken into custody, according to O’Brien, who noted that the angle the car was positioned would’ve captured at least a portion of Diaz and Perez being arrested. The report also says that Barone manually shutting off his cruiser’s camera was one reason why state’s attorney’s office investigators “were concerned that the video was physically tampered with” and sent all cruiser hard drives to be forensically tested during its probe of the incident. Mastroianni’s discipline stemmed from his delay in filing a supplemental police report or requesting a use-of-force report until June 11, a week after Diaz and Perez were arrested. During an interview with Internal Affairs, Mastroianni said he “delivered multiple foot strikes to Mr. Diaz’s torso area” during the arrest, but stopped after he saw that Diaz had been secured by other officers. Mastroianni told the investigators that he was a “little rusty” on the policy for use-of-force, but ultimately admitted that he “should have known better,” O’Brien writes.
To recap, these officers were caught in a cover-up of police brutality, admitted to violating policy, one of them was even arrested for it, and their punishment comes in the form of two promotions and a golden parachute. And people wonder why there are protests in the streets.
“On its face, the video raises very serious concerns, and I commend the Hartford Police Department for making the video public as soon as they were permitted to do so by the State’s Attorney,” said Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin in a statement at the time the video was released. “As a city, we are committed to transparency and openness, we have an outstanding and dedicated police force, and we expect our officers to uphold the highest standards – and to be held accountable when they fall short.”
So much for that one. |
German Secret Societies Colonized Mars in 1940s
In his latest interview on Gaiam TVs Cosmic Disclosure, whistleblower Corey Goode describes in detail the attempts by a secret German space program to establish bases on Mars during the Second World War era. He claims that during the subsequent colonizing effort, the Germans fought fierce territorial battles with resident Martian species that inhabited large lava tubes that ran throughout Mars subterranean regions.
Goode says that during the early 1940s, while the Second World War was still being fought, German secret societies Thule, Vril and Black Sun – had successfully established a base on the moon, and used that as a launching pad for missions to Mars. Travel time between the Moon and Mars was several hours for the Germans. Goode contrasted this with the contemporary secret space program which has cut this travel time down to a matter of minutes!
Goode describes information about the early German colonization events acquired from smart glass pads he had access to during his space service as an intuitive empath from 1987 to 2007. He says that German documents and photographs, detailing these Moon and Mars missions, were archived on the smart glass pads.
Goode previously described the power of the German secret societies in Hitlers Germany. The Thule, Vril and Black Sun societies had created a space program that was wholly independent of the Nazi SS effort to weaponize flying saucers for the war effort.
These German secret societies had established bases in Antarctica and South America that escaped the bulk of the fighting during the Second World War. Well-hidden and protected in these remote locations, the Germans had forged ahead in developing advanced space travel technologies using antigravity and space-time portals.
German secret society efforts in establishing a parallel space program was previously described by Goode in a May 20, 2015 email interview, earlier episodes of Cosmic Disclosure, and discussed in detail in the book, Insiders Reveal Secret Space Programs (2015).
In the November 10, 2015, episode of Cosmic Disclosure, Goode provides more information than earlier revealed about the challenges the early German colonists faced in establishing their bases on Mars and the Moon.
After establishing a presence in Mars equatorial regions, he describes how the Germans encountered harsh sand storms that were highly electrically charged. The lightning storms wreaked havoc with the electronics of their technologies. Goodes testimony is supported by NASA research that has confirmed that tremendous lightning bursts do occur during Mars dust storms.
Consequently, the Germans began searching elsewhere on Mars for more suitable areas for their bases. They found that the Northern and Southern regions, above the 20th parallel, offered a more hospitable environment for building bases, well away from the huge electrical Martian dust storms. The Germans discovered an ancient lava tube system about 10 times the size of lave tubes on Earth, and relocated their bases here.
Mars lava tubes and other subterranean regions were not uninhabited though. The Germans encountered two intelligent resident species that they had to wage fierce territorial battles against while establishing their bases. Goode described the two species as Reptilian and Insectoid. These brutal battles led to the loss of many German personnel and resources up until the late 1950s, when the U.S. military industrial complex began helping the German secret societies on Mars.
In mid-1952, the Germans had conducted a series of flying saucer flights over Washington D.C. in a show of force. This led to the beginning of official relations with the German secret societies. During the Eisenhower administration, the U.S. capitulated to the Germans key demands, which led to the infiltration of the military-industrial complex.
With the industrial might of the U.S. now behind them, the German secret societies were able to finally consolidate their Mars bases and protect them from the resident Martians.
Is there any evidence supporting Goodes incredible claims? First, we can look to other whistleblowers who also claim to have spent time on Mars while serving with secret space programs.
Goodes testimony has a number of important parallels with the testimony of an earlier Mars whistleblower Randy Cramer, who says that he spent 17 years on Mars (from 1987 to 2004) in an elite military unit that defended civilian colonies from resident Martians.
In an April 2014, series of interviews (six months prior to Goodes public emergence in September), Cramer said that his unit regularly fought territorial battles with two intelligent Mars species, Reptilians and Insectoids – the same two identified by Goode.
Cramer described the resident Martians as fiercely territorial who would go to battle if their territory was threatened. At other times, they would leave the human colonists alone. Again, this is consistent with Goodes claims regarding German battles with the Martians.
While Cramer did not mention any German connection, he made it clear that the military unit he served with was subservient to a corporate entity that was in charge of Mars operations. This is consistent with Goodes claims about an “Interplanetary Corporate Conglomerate” that runs Mars, which had been earlier infiltrated and taken over by German secret societies and their Nazi SS supporters.
The SS had introduced slave labor practices that were common in Nazi Germany and at the German secret society bases in Antarctica and South America. According to Albert Speer, the Armaments Minister for Nazi Germany. the Nazi SS had plans to continue these slave practices well after the war.
Cramers and Goodes testimonies about secret space program battles with indigenous Martians are consistent with a third whistleblower, Michael Relfe, who claims that he spent 20 years on Mars (from 1976 to 1996). Relfe describes fighting a variety of native and extraterrestrial threats to the secret space program running Mars operations. Goodes, Cramers and Relfes testimonies are compared and contrasted in chapter 13 of Insiders Reveal Secret Space Programs.
In addition to the testimonial evidence by Cramer and Relfe, which is consistent with Goodes claims, there is also important circumstantial evidence. From June 11 to 12, the British Interplanetary Society conducted a symposium on the theme, How to Overthrow a Martian Dictatorship.
The scenario depicted by the British Interplanetary Society was of a corporate run space program on Mars that was dominated by leaders who behaved as dictators who exploited workers as slave labor. The scenario has many similarities to the ones described by Goode and Cramer about Mars being run by corporations that use elite military forces as space mercenaries to fight their battles.
The symposium was covered by Richard Hollingham, a writer with the British Broadcasting Corporation, who alluded to a MI-6 connection. The symposium coincided with a June 22 report by Goode regarding his inspection tour of a current Mars base that appeared to be run as a dictatorship. It is more than likely that the corporate practices on Mars bases today are connected to their antecedent, the early German bases that continued the Nazi practice of using slave labor.
These Cosmic Disclosure episodes with Goode blowing the whistle on key historical events withheld from the general public, if true, must change our world view to deal responsibly with the future.
Two other alleged secret space program whistleblowers support Goodes claims, along with compelling circumstantial evidence, which includes NASA data supporting his claim of a thin breathable atmosphere on Mars. For now, there is good reason to conclude that Goode is revealing a true insiders perspective on the role German secret societies played in establishing bases and colonizing Mars in the 1940s.
© Michael E. Salla, Ph.D. Copyright Notice
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Tags: Corey Goode, Mars, Michael Relfe, Nazi Germany, Randy Cramer, Secret Societies, secret space programs |
A 13-year-old boy’s passion for making electronic toys in Somalia has won him local fame and a free education.
Guled Adan Abdi, from the northern town of Buhodle, taught himself how to make plastic toys from bits of discarded objects, and then worked out how to motorize them by studying real cars.
“I started making toys when I was younger,” he told the BBC Somali Service.
“I used to play with them without any motor. But later I said to myself: ‘Why don’t you make them into a moving machine?’
So far, he has constructed four electronic toys, including a truck and a plane, mainly using plastic from old cooking oil containers.
He has also invented a fan that can be used as a light at night.
Guled lives at home with his mother and older brother and sister, and goes to a school in Buhodle that is supported by Somalis in the diaspora.
But he has missed out on a lot of his education and is only in the third year at primary school – a class usually for eight year olds.
This is because his father disappeared in 2002 and is presumed dead.
His mother struggles to support the family by selling anjeera – Somali pancakes – so when things get tough financially, the family sometimes has to stay with relatives in a remote area where Guled cannot go to school.
But they have spent the last year in Buhodle, and Guled has dedicated hours to his inventions after school, which finishes at midday.
“From noon to late in the evening I usually work on my cars.
“I have never seen anyone make such things and I was not trained by anyone. I investigated and found out for example how a car’s tires turn.”
Read more here. |
By: Heather Seebach
DISCLAIMER: This article is intended ONLY for folks who have already seen Drew Goddard’s Cabin in the Woods. There will be EXPLICIT SPOILERS throughout. For my spoiler-free review, go here.
Before the Cabin
The Cabin
The Evil Awakens
The Evil Attacks
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The screenplay for, penned by Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard, is clever, complex, and full of inside jokes and references. It is definitely the kind of film that demands multiple viewings, especially for horror fans. I have seen the film twice already and still wish I had more sets of eyes so I could catch everything. The following is a run-down of some interesting things I noticed, be they references, jokes, or just intriguing hints. Some of these will be obvious, but worthy of discussion. Still, I hope this illuminates a few things you might have missed, and please use the comment field below to share what else you noticed! No one person can see everything, so let us pool our collective nerd powers and discuss all the fun Easter eggs hiding in this film!- The first 15 minutes or so of the film may seem pointless at first, but upon second viewing, you see how every line of dialogue is relevant to the big picture. In Dana’s room, we see how the protagonists really are before they are chemically and environmentally manipulated. Curt discusses a sociology book with Dana – he is not the dumb jock he soon becomes. Likewise, Holden goes from the star football player who catches the pigskin in the street to an egghead at the cabin. We also learn that Dana is in fact not a virgin, as she discusses sleeping with her professor. This is all subtle set-up for the transformation these characters undergo into generic horror archetypes.- Perhaps the first horror reference of the film is The Harbinger, the creepy old gas station attendant. As Richard Jenkins so beautifully states later in the film, this is a guy who practically wears a sign around his neck that says “You are going to die” but the protagonists choose to ignore him. I'm sure nobody reading this "missed" this reference, but I just wanted to point it out because I love how it later ties into the notion of free will - and that speaker phone scene was hilarious, wasn't it?- The next blatant horror movie reference is the cabin itself, which more than a little resembles the Deadite-infested cabin from. Inside, it also has the obligatory dead animal head and cellar door.- Though it is never explicitly stated, I suspect the one-way mirror between Dana and Holden's rooms is an old-school surveillance tool, since this ritual of sating the Gods has obviously been going on since the beginning of humankind. Presumably, the Buckner's (or some resident before them) installed the mirror as a means to observe the victims, just as the two scientists are watching the protagonists with cameras. It also helps that one of those rooms leads to the "Black Room" where people were clearly tortured and killed, most likely for the entertainment of the Gods (this was also hinted at in Patience's diary).- Jules' make-out session with the wolf ("moose") and her fireplace dancing are visual evidence of her gradual transformation into a "celebutard" as Marty so gracefully put it. The chemicals in her hairdye are decreasing her IQ and increasing her libido, creating the stereotypical dumb, slutty blonde.- Once the characters get down into the cellar, they are “mesmerized” by various artifacts. This is so hilarious and typical of horror movie characters. For no good reason, they are always drawn to put on a necklace, play some old film, or read ancient scripture. Of course,puts a twist on that by revealing these characters will choose their own death in doing so. In case you did not pick up on it, the puzzle sphere Curt plays with is a reference to. And the reading of the diary and its Latin is yet another homage to, where the evil is awoken by the reading of Necronomicon passages.- When the Buckners arise, that shot approaching the graves is very reminiscent of shots in- The scientists' dry-erase board includes many monsters, among them being two more Evil Dead references - "deadites" and "angry molesting tree." There is also a monster named "Kevin", who, according to the film's stars, is simply a regular dude in a button-up shirt and tie. I love the vague nature of that - who is this Kevin and what is he capable of?! Here is a screen-cap of some more nightmares:- Once in the cellar, Holden puts on glasses and continues to wear them throughout the film and later he inexplicably remembers how to speak Latin. He is essentially the “scholar” now. Also, as you may recall, Curt, who has become a sex-crazed alpha male, refers to Holden as an "egghead." Similarly, when making out with Holden, Dana inexplicably says she has never had sex, and then wonders why she said that. The characters are becoming genre archetypes against their will and do not even realize it.- In the scenes with the scientists, we frequently see monitors showing rituals from around the world, including Japan where atype scenario is playing out. King Kong can be seen in one scene, and in the Stockholm footage, we see a burned-down base with a helicopter flying overhead - an obvious reference- When Marty is thought to have been killed, the scientists release his blood and the facility shakes as if the Gods are angry. This only happens this time and at the end which seems to suggest the Gods knew Marty wasn’t actually dead (they saw what the scientists could not see on camera).- When Dana stabs the zombie in the Black Room, it seems to bleed black. Anreference perhaps? I suspect the zombie arm in the elevator later is also anreference.- In the scene where the scientists are celebrating their victory, there is a moment I love that I want to point out - Dana violently vomiting blood in the background as the scientists all chat and drink. I found this darkly hilarious and had to wonder "What is that zombie DOING to her back there?!"- Once Dana and Marty are inside the elevator, there is a very obvious reference towith the buzzsaw dude. When the camera pans back, we see a LOT of monsters. This is where I need your eagle eyes, readers!One creature I did notice (and was very giddy about) was a Boomer from. If you want to look for it next time you watch the film, it is to the right of Dana and Marty when the camera pulls back.- In the climax, the "Army of Nightmares" included numerous references:(clown);(blood elevators);(evil tree);, and probably many more. Who else did you notice? Please share in the comments below! |
Image caption The survey was conducted to coincide with European 112 Day
Most people do not know the number to call in the event of an emergency on holiday in Europe, a survey suggests.
The Foreign Office poll of more than 2,000 people in the UK found that just 14% were aware the 112 number could reach the emergency services.
Some 12% thought it connected to directory enquiries, while others believed it was a brand of perfume, the number of a bus or type of jeans.
The Foreign Office's Lynda St Cooke said knowing the number could be vital.
'Quite stunned'
She told the BBC: "112 works right across the EU and in a few other countries too. In a lot of countries you can even use English, because it will take you through to a particular call centre where there will be English-language operators.
"It works in the UK as well, you can use it in parallel with 999, which is the same in a number of EU countries but some have adopted it as their only emergency number."
Only 3% of those surveyed knew 112 was the EU emergency number, making the UK one of the bottom three countries in Europe for awareness of the service.
Ms St Cooke, from the Foreign & Commonwealth Office's Know Before You Go campaign, added: "We were quite stunned to find that only 14% of people knew that dialling 112 will reach the emergency services and only 3% recognised that it was the EU emergency number."
She said Ukraine would be using the 112 number in its cities which are hosting matches in the Euro 2012 football championship this summer.
The survey was conducted to coincide with European 112 Day, which is on the 11th day of the 2nd month of the year. |
Despite some imposed restrictions, Turkey’s open door refugee policy has resulted in an explosion of refugees and immigrants over the past five months. In his address to the UN General Assembly on Sept. 20, 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey was hosting 2.7 million Syrians and 300,000 Iraqis.
On Feb. 15, Minister of Interior Suleyman Soylu announced that the total number of refugees and immigrants has reached some 3.551 million.
In the five months between these two official statements, 551,000 more people have entered Turkey. Of course along with the number of people, their expenditures also rose. When the number of people hosted were 3 million, the monthly average expenditures for them was about $500 million.
When the 18% increase in number of refugees is applied to the expenditures, we can estimate that Turkey is now spending approximately $590 million a month.
When the Turkish government revealed that the total spent by public agencies, civil society organizations and individual Turks had reached $25 billion, it was clear that the amount spent by the government was incomplete. A more reliable figure for the total spent since the beginning of the Syrian civil war is about $29 billion, which does not include expenditures by the private sector and civil society.
So why is the number of refugees and immigrants rising so fast?
First, there was a flow of refugees from Aleppo over the past seven months. With the agreement reached with the European Union, the refugee flow from Turkey to Europe has been halted. This means refugees from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Myanmar, Georgia, Eritrea, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan who had come with the hope of reaching Europe had stayed in Turkey.
In addition to authentic refugees fleeing their homelands because of insecurity, there also are hundreds of thousands of people classified as “irregular refugees” who had entered illegally or had overstayed their residence. The Ministry of Interior recently revealed that in 2015, only 146,000 irregular refugees were apprehended.
Where do these people live?
According to official figures, as of February 2017, 260,000 Syrian refugees are staying in official camps operated by the state.
The rest are scattered all over Turkey. There are refugees in all of Turkey’s 81 provinces. Their needs are met by public bodies and civil society organizations. Services that are provided by the state, such as health and education, cover not only those living in the camps but all refugees wherever they are in Turkey.
As of October 2016, some 18 million medical consultations, plus 800,000 surgeries, were performed for the refugees, and 162,000 babies were born to refugees. The state provides education to more than 300,000 Syrian children.
Expenditures for Syrians are not limited to just basic needs. Young and cheap labor coming from Syria is preferred by small- and medium-sized Turkish enterprises. This is contributing to the unemployment rate in Turkey, which in November reached 12.1%. Registered unemployed in Turkey is now 3.7 million, with youth unemployment reaching a worrying 23%.
However, there are refugees who have money. They have set up about 5,000 companies in Turkey. But the vast majority of the workers they hire are Syrians.
When the total number of refugees and immigrants exceeded 3 million, the Turkish media began reporting that the number of refugees in Turkey was more than the populations of 61 countries.
Actually, the number of refugees in Turkey has surpassed the populations of many cities in Turkey. Many say that after Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, the refugees have become the fourth-largest city of Turkey.
The refugees’ contribution to Turkey’s population is in reality a development that tallies with the government policy of trying to increase the national population with the slogan of “at least three children per family.” Immigrants who stay in Turkey for five years are entitled to Turkish citizenship.
Many Turks sympathize with the plight of the Syrian refugees and say those people didn’t come to put a burden on Turkey. They were running for their lives. But it is also a hard reality that their financial burden on Turkey, which is undergoing a tough economic period, has become worrying. Nobody knows how long this monthly bill of $590 will continue. Sure, we cannot ignore that the refugees are contributing to national economic growth by creating additional demand, but at some point Turkey must seriously consider how this huge community that consumes without producing and whose numbers and expenditures increase by the day will adapt itself seamlessly to Turkey. |
Frankfurt: It is one of the world’s longest railways, an approximately 11,000-kilometre “modern-day silk road” that traverses Russia and Kazakhstan to link a megacity in the heart of China with a key commercial hub in western Germany.
On Saturday, as part of his landmark visit to Germany, Chinese President Xi Jinping is set to visit the last stop on the “Yuxinou” rail line, an industrial feat that promises to revolutionise transport between Europe and Asia.
Duisburg is a steel-making town of around half a million on the confluence of the Rhine and Ruhr rivers that boasts the world’s biggest inland port and is one of Germany’s most important transport and commercial hubs.
Despite the vast distances between them, it takes just 16 days for trains crammed with laptops and electronics to travel to Duisburg from Chongqing, a sprawling metropolitan symbol of rising China with a population of more than 30 million.
Xi is scheduled to welcome a freight train on Saturday afternoon as it completes a journey that has taken it through Central Asia, Russia, Belarus and Poland. Set up in 2011 by a group of rail companies, the Yuxinou is just 2,000 km short of the world’s longest rail line that links Germany to Shanghai. It has shaved more than 20 days off the sea route.
The route is particularly useful for Chongqing — home to vast carparts and IT factories — since it lies 1,500 km from China’s main seaports.
“The value of this rail link, known in China as the ‘new silk road’, is more than just symbolic,” port of Duisburg spokesman Julian Boecker said. “It has found itself a position in the market and now operates up to three weekly services,” he said.
But one of the biggest challenges will be to boost traffic in both directions to make it more profitable. It is not uncommon for the Yuxinou trains, which can transport as many as 50 containers, to be full when they arrive in Duisburg but empty when they return to China which seems to be a problem for the route. It was sea transport which gradually supplanted the historic Silk Road route linking Asia with Europe centuries ago. |
United States District Court, E.D. Michigan, S.D.
MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
WOODS, District Judge.
M & A Associates, Inc. (M & A) agreed to sell VCX, Inc. (VCX) an exclusive right to make video cassette copies of a motion picture entitled "Debbie Does Dallas." M & A was to receive royalties of ten dollars for each copy sold by VCX. M & A claims that VCX breached its obligation to pay royalties. VCX, on the other hand, claims that its performance is excused because of M & A's failure to protect the film under the Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. § 101, et seq.
The Court, having conducted a trial and having heard arguments by counsel, submits the following findings of fact and conclusions of law:
FINDINGS OF FACT
1. M & A Associates, Inc., is an assumed name under which its president, Arthur Weisberg, conducts business in Michigan. Weisberg was a Michigan resident when the complaint was filed.
2. VCX, Inc., is a California corporation with its principal place of business in California. At all times pertinent to this action VCX manufactured video tapes for sale and/or distribution.
3. Norman Arno is the president of VCX.
4. "Debbie Does Dallas" was purportedly produced in 1978 by Schoolday Productions, Inc., a New York corporation.
5. The film was created through the cooperative efforts of David Buckley and other individuals. Buckley served as the writer, director, and producer. The other individuals were independent contractors of Schoolday.
6. Buckley, as the sole officer, director, and shareholder of Schoolday, exercised complete control over Schoolday and made all decisions concerning the film.
7. Although there was no contract by which the rights to the film were transferred from Schoolday to Buckley, the written minutes and records of Schoolday recited such a conveyance.
8. Buckley never copyrighted the film.
9. The film opened in October of 1978 at the Pussycat Theatre in New York City.
10. From that time until the present, the film continued to be theatrically shown without a copyright notice.
11. In December of 1978, Buckley conveyed all right, title, and interest in the film to M & A.
12. On or about February 13, 1979, M & A assigned to VCX the right to make video cassette copies of the film. The contract stated in pertinent part as follows:
This agreement is for the sale of the exclusive video tape, video disc, and any other future, prerecorded video systems rights.
M and A, Inc.... hereby warrants that it is the sole owner of the motion picture, "Debbie Does Dallas" and is authorized to sell the exclusive video rights. Seller further warrants that it has not given said rights to any other entity, and will refrain, upon the completion of this agreement, from selling said rights or authorizing any other entity to distribute said video rights including M and A, Inc.
....
The video rights given to [VCX] by [M & A] are exclusive for world wide distribution.
[M & A] indemnifies [VCX] for any claims by others that [VCX] through this Agreement does not have the sole video rights to said motion picture, and agrees to pay the costs of any litigation, including attorney's fees, that arise from claims by others of ownership of this motion picture or ownership of the video rights of "Debbie Does Dallas."
13. The contract assigned only the video cassette rights in the film; M & A retained all theatrical rights in the film.
14. The contract is silent as to choice of law.
15. The contract became effective when signed by both parties in Michigan.
16. The contract does not specify the place of performance.
17. M & A's offices were located in Michigan, where VCX was to send its royalty payments and where M & A's performance presumably was to occur. VCX had an office in California. No acts by VCX relating to the manufacture, duplication, or sale of cassettes were expected to be performed in Michigan.
18. Arthur Weisberg knew that VCX entered into different types of contracts depending upon the type of rights VCX was acquiring, and that VCX and other companies would pay different amounts depending on whether they were obtaining exclusive or non-exclusive rights.
19. Weisberg testified that the matter of a copyright was neither mentioned nor considered by the parties prior to the time they entered into the contract. Arno testified, however, that he received a print of the film from Weisberg approximately one month after they entered into the contract. According to Arno, he asked Weisberg for "copyright protection" immediately after he received the print.
20. In April of 1979, Arno became aware of unauthorized copying of the film.
21. Arno, through VCX, retained attorneys John Lappen and Peter Berger for the purpose of bringing civil actions against "dupers" of his video cassettes. "Dupers" are individuals who, without authority from an owner, make duplicate copies of video cassettes.
22. Before VCX could commence litigation against dupers, VCX was required to make sure that reasonable efforts were taken to add copyright notices to all of the motion pictures and cassettes being published. VCX also had to file a copyright registration with the copyright office.
23. It was impossible for VCX to complete an application for a copyright registration without first obtaining information from Weisberg.
24. VCX could not protect the rights in the work "Debbie Does Dallas" by merely placing a copyright notice on the video cassettes. In order for there to be proper copyright notice, notice had to be added to both the video cassettes and the movie version shown in theatres.
25. In January of 1981, Berger informed Weisberg of the need to add copyright notice to the prints of the picture that had been sent to various theatres. Berger testified that copyright notice was needed to cure the fact that prints had been widely distributed without proper notice prior to that time.
26. The addition of a copyright notice to the prints of a picture is common in the movie industry and simple to accomplish.
27. Prints of a movie are distributed by making a negative, and then striking prints from that negative.
28. Motion picture prints of the picture are kept at print depots. When a booking is made, the print depot sends the print to the theatre.
29. Cineffects Color Laboratory, Inc., made the negative for "Debbie Does Dallas." Weisberg never asked Cineffects to insert a copyright notice on the movie.
30. Berger had several conversations with Weisberg in the months after their initial conversation in January of 1981. Berger repeatedly requested that Weisberg insert a copyright notice in the movie version of the picture. Weisberg refused to do so. To this day, the movie version of the picture does not contain a copyright notice.
31. In addition to communicating with Weisberg, Berger communicated with David Kravis, who worked for Weisberg. Berger advised Kravis that M & A needed a copyright notice inserted in the movie version of the film. Kravis also received the same advice from John Lappen. Despite receiving that advice, Kravis never inserted a copyright notice in the film.
32. At the time of the conversation between Berger and Weisberg in January of 1981, Weisberg and Arno both knew the legal significance of the omission of the copyright notice, and that such omission prevented Weisberg from having the ability to transfer exclusive video cassette rights to the film. The parties understood that such rights would be lost if reasonable efforts were not made to add the copyright notice to both the video cassettes and the movie version.
33. Weisberg also was told that if he continued to refuse to insert the copyright notice in the movie version of the film, M & A would be without any legal recourse against dupers.
34. In late 1981, Lappen and Berger determined that, under the Copyright Act, the copyright to the film was irretrievably lost since "reasonable efforts" had not been made.
35. Although VCX brought numerous civil actions against dupers of its video cassettes, the lack of a copyright notice in "Debbie Does Dallas" made it impossible for VCX to bring civil actions against dupers of that film.
36. VCX lost sales as a result of its inability to enforce its "exclusive" rights to sell video cassette copies of the film.
37. VCX nevertheless continues to the present time producing and selling copies of the film.
38. In exchange for the "exclusive" right to sell video cassette copies of the film, VCX agreed to pay a $10.00 royalty for each video cassette copy sold, along with an advance payment of $25,000.00. A rider to the agreement permitted VCX to deduct $2,500.00 each month from the $25,000.00 deposit and credit that amount to the first 10 monthly royalty payments.
39. VCX made royalty payments to M & A until March of 1982.
40. The payments totaled $235,440.00.
41. The market value of non-exclusive video cassette rights to the film is $10,000.00.
42. The parties terminated the contract on November 19, 1982.
CONCLUSIONS OF LAW
1. Both parties assume that the Court may assert jurisdiction over this case on the basis of diversity of citizenship. 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a). The allegations in "plaintiff" M & A's complaint and VCX's counterclaim, however, are jurisdictionally defective in that M & A is merely an assumed name and lacks capacity to bring or defend this action. F.R.Civ.P. 9(a). Nonetheless, the failure to name Arthur Weisberg as plaintiff and counter-defendant is at most a formal irregularity, which does not affect the diversity jurisdiction of this Court. See Blanchard v. Terry & Wright, Inc., 331 F.2d 467 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 379 U.S. 831, 85 S.Ct. 62, 13 L.Ed.2d 40 (1964). Moreover, neither party has been prejudiced by the failure to name Weisberg as plaintiff and counter-defendant. Under these circumstances, both parties may amend their pleadings to conform to the proofs and to this Court's findings of fact. F.R.Civ.P. 15(b); 28 U.S.C. § 1653; Brandon v. Holt, 469 U.S. 464, 470-71 & n. 19, 105 S.Ct. 873, 877-78 & n. 19, 83 L.Ed.2d 878 (1985). Furthermore, this Court may decide the legal issues prior to the filing of such an amendment. Brandon, 469 U.S. at 471, 105 S.Ct. at 877.
2. The Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. § 101 et seq., governs duplication rights in motion pictures.
3. Copyright generally vests in the author of the work. Id. § 201(a). Nevertheless, "[i]n the case of a work made for hire, the employer or other person for whom the work was prepared is considered the author ... and, unless the parties have expressly agreed otherwise in a written instrument signed by them, owns all of the rights comprised in the copyright." Id. § 201(b).
4. The Act defines a "work made for hire" as "a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment." Id. § 101.
5. In short, an employer owns the copyright to a work if (1) the work satisfies the requirements for copyrightability in 17 U.S.C. § 102(a); (2) the work was prepared by an employee; (3) the work was prepared within the scope of the employee's employment; and (4) the parties have not agreed otherwise in a signed, written instrument. Baltimore Orioles v. Major League Baseball Players, 805 F.2d 663, 667 (7th Cir. 1986).
6. At issue in this case is the second factor, namely, whether an employer-employee relationship existed between Schoolday and Buckley. An "employee," for purposes of the work made for hire doctrine, is any person who acts under an employer's direction and supervision. See, e.g., Evans Newton, Inc. v. Chicago Systems Software, 793 F.2d 889, 894 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 107 S.Ct. 434, 93 L.Ed.2d 383 (1986); Aldon Accessories v. Spiegel, Inc., 738 F.2d 548, 551-53 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 982, 105 S.Ct. 387, 83 L.Ed.2d 321 (1984); Murray v. Gelderman, 566 F.2d 1307, 1309-10 (5th Cir.1978).
7. Buckley was not an employee of Schoolday. Buckley, not Schoolday, was the motivating force in producing the film. He exercised complete control of the corporation, which served as his mere alter ego. There simply was no supervision of his work other than his own. As a result, Buckley owned all rights to the film upon its creation and could transfer those rights to M & A. 1
8. The next issue involves the determination of what law governs the non-copyright questions in this case. Federal courts in diversity of citizenship cases must apply the choice of law rules for the state in which they sit. Klaxon Co. v. Stentor Electric Mfg. Co., 313 U.S. 487, 61 S.Ct. 1020, 85 L.Ed. 1477 (1941). In Michigan, the nature and effect of a contract is determined according to the law of the state where the contract was made. E.g., Rubin v. Gallagher, 294 Mich. 124, 128, 292 N.W. 584 (1940); see also Wells v. 10-X Mfg. Co., 609 F.2d 248, 253 (6th Cir.1979); Leff v. NAC Agency, Inc., 639 F.Supp. 1426, 1428 (E.D.Mich.1986).
9. The fact that the contract was made in Michigan, however, does not necessarily determine the choice of law. Michigan has adopted an additional rule that if the parties intended that a contract made in one state be performed in another state, then the law of the latter state governs performance. See George Realty Co. v. Gulf Refining Co., 275 Mich. 442, 266 N.W. 411 (1936). In general, the state of performance refers to the state in which the party who allegedly breached the contract was required to perform. Liberty Mutual Insurance Co. v. Vanderbush Sheet Metal Co., 512 F.Supp. 1159, 1167 (E.D.Mich.1981) (citing, e.g., George Realty Co., supra).
10. It is not clear how the performance rule should be applied to this case. Both parties allege a breach of the contract by the other party, which suggests that both Michigan and California could be the state of performance. California could also be considered the state of performance since each of the acts by VCX relating to the distribution, manufacture, duplication, or sale of video cassettes could only have been intended, at the time the contract was formed, to take place in California. Indeed, each of these acts by VCX took place in California. On the other hand, Weisberg claims that VCX breached its obligation to pay royalties. Under Michigan law, "[a] contractual obligation to pay money is generally to be performed in the state where the creditor resides." Liberty Mutual Insurance Co., 512 F.Supp. at 1168 (citing Bastian Brothers Co. v. Brown, 293 Mich. 242, 291 N.W. 644 (1940); Douglass v. Paine, 141 Mich. 485, 104 N.W. 624 (1905)). This suggests that Michigan should be considered the state of performance. Additionally, VCX alleges that Weisberg breached his obligations under the contract. If Weisberg's performance of the contract was contemplated to have occurred in any particular state, it certainly would have been in Michigan, the only state in which Weisberg conducted business under the assumed name M & A.
11. "[W]here the place of performance is not focused in any particular state, courts have held that in the absence of evidence to the contrary, the parties intended that the law of the place where the contract was made should govern questions of validity." Structural Dynamics Research Corp. v. Engineering Mechanics Research Corp., 401 F.Supp. 1102, 1115 (E.D.Mich.1975). The Structural Dynamics court, noting the absence of Michigan authority on this point, relied on numerous decisions from other jurisdictions. Id. at 1115 & n. 9. This Court agrees that the performance rule does not determine choice of law when no state can be identified as the primary place of performance. Accordingly, the rights and obligations of the parties will be determined under Michigan law.
12. In this case the contract is silent as to copyright protection. The question is whether the contract can be interpreted as including the requirement that Weisberg obtain copyright protection for the film. When a contract is open to construction, a court must determine the true intent of the parties by looking to the language of the contract, its subject matter, and the circumstances surrounding its making. E.g., Fischbach-Natkin Co. v. Power Process Piping, Inc., 157 Mich.App. 448, 452, 403 N.W.2d 569 (1987); Damerau v. Rieckhoff Co., 155 Mich.App. 307, 311-12, 399 N.W.2d 502 (1986); Wilson v. Home Owners Insurance Co., 148 Mich.App. 485, 490, 384 N.W.2d 807, leave to appeal denied, 425 Mich. 876 (1986). The contract language should be given its ordinary and plain meaning, instead of a technical or strained construction. Wilson, 155 Mich.App. at 490, 384 N.W.2d 807. Moreover, a "contract should be interpreted to avoid an absurd or unreasonable result." Miller v. Van Kampen, 154 Mich.App. 165, 168, 397 N.W.2d 253 (1986).
13. The language of the contract suggests that Weisberg was required to obtain copyright protection for the film. The contract stated that Weisberg, through M & A, conveyed "exclusive" video rights to VCX. The following definition shows that the term "exclusive" implied that Weisberg would obtain copyright protection:
Exclusive. Appertaining to the subject alone, not including, admitting, or pertaining to any others. Sole. Shutting out; debarring from interference or participation; vested in one person alone.
Black's Law Dictionary 506 (5th ed. 1979).
14. The subject matter of the contract suggests that the parties intended that Weisberg obtain copyright protection for the film. As noted above, only Weisberg could have added a copyright notice to the movie version of the film. Until that notice was added, VCX was paying a $10.00 cassette royalty for a worthless "exclusive right" to duplicate the film on video cassette— something VCX or anyone else could have done freely without Weisberg's permission. All VCX received from the contract was a fresh print of the film and some assorted advertising material.
15. The circumstances surrounding the making of the contract similarly support the conclusion that Weisberg was required to obtain copyright protection for the film. Weisberg testified that the parties, at the time the contract was formed, never considered whether the film included a copyright notice. Arno, however, testified that as soon as he became aware of the absence of a copyright notice in the film, he immediately demanded that such notice be added. Thus, Arno apparently believed that the contract gave him the right to demand copyright protection so that he could enjoy the exclusive right to sell video cassette copies of the film.
16. Weisberg claims that the contract could be breached only if a third party claimed ownership of the film or the video rights. According to Weisberg, the term "exclusive" means that M & A would not grant such rights to any third parties. The difficulty with that argument is that Weisberg, by failing to insert copyright notice on the film, permitted and in effect granted third parties the right to sell video cassette copies of the film.
17. In short, Weisberg's agreement to provide VCX with the exclusive right to sell video cassette copies of the film "Debbie Does Dallas" included the obligation to add a copyright notice. Weisberg's failure to add such notice breached the warranty of title contained in that agreement. In so holding, this Court declines to impose an unreasonable condition on VCX, by requiring it to pay a $10.00 royalty for each video cassette sale, while any third party could freely sell such copies.
18. VCX seeks restitution for the money it paid to Weisberg. "The essential elements of such a claim are (1) receipt of a benefit by the defendant from the plaintiff and (2) which benefit it is inequitable that the defendant retain." In re McCallum Estate, 153 Mich.App. 328, 335, 395 N.W.2d 258 (1986) (citation omitted). The benefit must be conferred under circumstances such that restitution is necessary to protect the interests of the plaintiff. Id. It would be inequitable for Weisberg to retain royalty payments from VCX. VCX is entitled to restitution in the amount of $225,440.00, which represents the amount it paid to Weisberg in excess of the fair market value of what Weisberg furnished VCX.
19. Weisberg raises the defenses of laches, waiver, and estoppel. Each will be addressed in seriatim. "For one to successfully assert the defense of laches, it must be shown that there was a passage of time combined with some prejudice to the party asserting the defense of laches.... Laches is concerned mainly with the question of the inequity of permitting a claim to be enforced and depends on whether the plaintiff has been wanting in due diligence." In re Yeager Bridge Co., 150 Mich.App. 386, 398, 389 N.W.2d 99 (1986) (quoting Rofe v. Robinson (On Second Remand), 126 Mich.App. 151, 154, 336 N.W.2d 778 (1983)); see also Lothian v. City of Detroit, 414 Mich. 160, 168-70, 324 N.W.2d 9 (1982).
20. VCX became aware of the copyright problem sometime after March of 1979. It delayed in filing suit until almost four years later. Nonetheless, VCX's awareness of the copyright problem is not the only factor in determining the applicability of laches. VCX had no duty to begin a legal action until it reasonably could conclude that one was necessary. In other words, VCX had no reason to bring an action until it could reasonably conclude that Weisberg's inaction, with regard to affixing the copyright notice upon the prints of the film in theatrical distribution, had destroyed the only chance of copyright protection for the film.
21. A copyright notice must consist of a specified form including (1) the symbol ©, the word Copyright, or the abbreviation Copr.; (2) the year of the first publication; and (3) the name of the copyright owner. The copyright notice must be "affixed to" the work. 17 U.S.C. § 401.
22. The offering of copies of a movie to a group of motion picture theatres for the purpose of public performance is a publication triggering the notice requirements of § 401. See H. Rept. No. 1476, 94th Cong., 2d Sess. 138, reprinted in 1976 U.S.Code Cong. & Ad.News 5659, 5754 [hereinafter House Report]; 1 M. Nimmer, Nimmer on Copyright § 4.11[A] [hereinafter Nimmer].
23. Unless the omission of a copyright notice is excused, publication of a work without a proper notice of copyright affixed injects the work into the public domain. 17 U.S.C. § 405(a); 2 Nimmer, supra, § 7.14[A].
24. An omission of a copyright notice is excused if "registration for the work has been made before or is being made within five years after the publication without notice, and a reasonable effort is made to add notice to all copies or phonorecords that are distributed to the public in the United States after the omission has been discovered...." 17 U.S.C. § 405(a)(2).
25. Although Weisberg satisfied the registration requirement, he made no effort to add a copyright notice to the film. See Shapiro & Son Bedspread Corp. v. Royal Mills Associates, 764 F.2d 69, 73 (2d Cir.1985) ("It nevertheless seems clear that if no effort is made to add proper notice to copies distributed to the public after the defective notice is discovered, no cure is accomplished.").
26. If Weisberg had acted properly, he could have resurrected the film's copyright and thus conveyed exclusive rights to VCX. See, e.g., Hasbro Bradley, Inc. v. Sparkle Toys, Inc., 780 F.2d 189, 195 (2d Cir.1985) (registration "redounds to the benefit of the assignor as well as the assignee"). Compare Hasbro Bradley, Inc., supra, O'Neill Developments, Inc. v. Galen Kilburn, Inc., 524 F.Supp. 710 (N.D.Ga.1981), and House Report, supra, at 147, reprinted in 1976 U.S.Code Cong. & Ad.News, at 5763 (even deliberate omissions are curable under § 405(a)(2)) with Beacon Looms, Inc. v. S. Lichtenberg & Co., 552 F.Supp. 1305 (S.D.N.Y.1982) and 2 Nimmer, supra, § 7.13[B][3]) (only an unintentional omission of a copyright notice can be cured by compliance with the "reasonable effort" requirement and registration within five years).
27. Although Arno asked Weisberg for copyright protection of the film in early 1979, Weisberg first became aware of the legal significance of the omission of the copyright notice from the film in January of 1981. Weisberg thus received "notice" of the defect at that latter date. See M. Kramer Mfg. Co. v. Andrews, 783 F.2d 421, 443 & n. 21 (4th Cir. 1986). Weisberg's failure to take reasonable efforts resulted in the film being irretrievably injected into the public domain "several months" later. Gemveto Jewelry Co. v. Jeff Cooper Inc., 568 F.Supp. 319, 329-31 (S.D.N.Y.1983). See generally Nimmer, supra, § 7.13[B][2]. Thus, it was not until the middle of 1981 that VCX reasonably could conclude that the copyright was lost. VCX filed its counterclaim in early 1983, approximately a year and a half later.
28. VCX's delay did not constitute a lack of diligence. Additionally, Weisberg has not shown that he suffered prejudice because of VCX's delay. As a result, VCX's right to restitution is not barred under the doctrine of laches.
29. Waiver consists of a voluntary, intentional relinquishment of a known right. Bissell v. L.W. Edison Co., 9 Mich.App. 276, 156 N.W.2d 623 (1967). A party to a contract may waive a claim for its breach by declarations, acts, and conduct inconsistent with a purpose of exacting strict performance. Grand Rapids Asphalt Paving Co. v. City of Wyoming, 29 Mich.App. 474, 185 N.W.2d 591 (1971). VCX did not waive Weisberg's breach of warranty of title. Instead, VCX continually requested Weisberg's performance until it concluded that the copyright was lost. Moreover, VCX's continued sale of video cassettes after ceasing royalty payments was not an intentional relinquishment of a known right. VCX freely distributed its video cassettes without the payment of royalties because Weisberg's actions had thrust the film irretrievably into the public domain.
30. Weisberg finally contends that VCX is estopped from alleging that he breached warranties under the contract because VCX continued to accept benefits of the contract, and cites Aiken v. Gonser, 342 Mich. 29, 69 N.W.2d 180 (1955), to support that proposition. Estoppel does not apply to the present case because VCX never received benefits under the contract. VCX, by continuing to sell video cassette copies, merely exercised the right it shared with members of the public.
ORDER
For the reasons set forth above, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED
1. That both parties be given fourteen (14) days from the date of this Opinion to amend their pleadings to name Arthur Weisberg as plaintiff and/or counter-defendant.
2. The claims of M & A Associates, Inc., and Arthur Weisberg against VCX, Inc., are dismissed.
3. Upon VCX, Inc.'s amendment of its counterclaim to name Arthur Weisberg as counter-defendant, judgment will be entered for VCX, Inc., in the amount of $225,440.00.
So ordered. |
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Apple plans to repurpose its factory in Mesa, Arizona, following the spectacular implosion of its relationship with sapphire manufacturer GT Advanced Technologies.
A report from Bloomberg cites Mesa City Manager Christopher Brady as the source of the information. Apple, for its part, has said that it wants to focus “on preserving jobs in Arizona” and will continue to “work with state and local officials as we consider our next steps.”
The shutdown of GTA Advanced’s factory last month cost 700 people their jobs. The opening of the factory was viewed as a significant milestone in bringing Apple manufacturing back to the U.S. after relying on Asian suppliers for many years.
GTAT filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after failing to meet performance requirements, which in turn resulted in the company not receiving its final $139 million payment from Apple. The Mesa sapphire glass factory was expected to bring in over 2,000 jobs and $1 billion to the Mesa area, but after the project failed to produce any sapphire iPhone displays, Apple and GTAT reached a $439 million settlement to end all current agreements.
In the aftermath, GTAT has criticized Apple for its draconian supplier contracts.
Mesa and the state of Arizona had to fight hard to get Apple to show an interest in the 1.3 million square foot factory. Community leaders worked to fulfil Apple’s request that the facility run on 100% renewable energy, and also agreed to build a new power substation for the plant.
Apple additionally benefited from Arizona’s decision to designate the area surrounding the building a foreign trade zone — which cut potential property taxes by upwards of 70%.
While it’s great news to hear that Apple may be able to make this arrangement work, after all, it will be interesting to see exactly what the repurposed the factory will be used for. Shortly after GTAT’s collapse, it was reported that Apple had already found new sapphire suppliers in Asia. |
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