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<p>Last week, the&#160;Washington Post’s Tehran correspondent was arrested. The charges are unspecified, but according to the paper, Jason Rezaian, 38, his Iranian wife, Yeganeh Salehi, and two other U.S. citizens were detained. State Department spokesman Marie Harf issued a protest that didn’t even rise to the level of tepid, saying, “Our highest priority is the safety and welfare of U.S. citizens abroad.”</p>
<p>Reassured? Rezaian and the others join a list of Americans held captive — many for years and years.</p>
<p>Former FBI agent Bob Levinson, 66, went missing after traveling to Iran in 2007. Warren Weinstein, 72, was operating in Lahore, Pakistan, as an aid worker when he was kidnapped by al-Qaeda in 2011. Alan Gross, 65, had gone to Cuba as a State Department contractor in 2009. He was arrested and tried for the crime of distributing Internet hook-ups. In failing health, Gross has lost the sight in one eye, can barely walk, and is reportedly deeply depressed. Caitlyn Coleman was captured with her Canadian husband in Afghanistan in 2012. She was pregnant at the time.</p>
<p>Gholam-Hossein Esmaili, director general of the Tehran Province Justice Department, confirmed that Rezaian and the others were detained (one has since been released), adding that “Iranian security forces are vigilant towards all kind of enemies’ activities.”</p>
<p>Enemies? Someone should alert John Kerry and Barack Obama, who are pursuing Tehran like groupies after a rock band.</p>
<p>The Committee to Protect Journalists ranks Iran as one of the three worst “jailers of the press” in the world. Unlike the U.S. State Department, which said little about the&#160;Washington Post&#160;reporter, and unlike the White House, which said nothing, the CPJ issued a strong protest: “We call on Iranian authorities to immediately explain why&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;[the] journalists have been detained, and we call for their immediate release. Iran has a dismal record with regard to its treatment of imprisoned journalists. We hold the Iranian government responsible for the safety of these four.”</p>
<p>The administration’s limp response to this obvious provocation will surprise no one. The administration has failed to secure the release of so many Americans. The one captive who was freed, Bowe Bergdahl, seemed to have been exchanged not so much for his own sake, but rather as a convenient excuse for releasing several of Guantanamo’s worst.</p>
<p>The Obama courtship of Iran persists despite everything. It has been the president’s fixed intention from the first days of this presidency when he sent warm greetings to the regime and has proved utterly resistant to rebuff, to insult, and to glaring failure. Obama is determinedly driving the policy toward the cliff, swerving around one huge blinking danger sign after another.</p>
<p>Iran conspires to blow up a Saudi diplomat — along with countless others — in Café Milano, a popular Washington, D.C. restaurant? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran has repeatedly lied about its secret nuclear-weapons-development program, as even the UN’s Mohammed el-Baradei confirmed? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran sends boatloads of weapons to Hamas, Hezbollah, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (the outfit whose errant missile actually hit that school in Gaza)? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran is the chief state sponsor of terror? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran’s Supreme Leader stands before a huge banner at a rally and proclaims, vis-á-vis Iran’s plan to become a nuclear power, “America cannot do a damned thing”? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran kidnaps American citizens? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran funds and supports the regime of Bashar Assad as it massacres 120,000 Syrians? Keep driving.</p>
<p>Iran promises to replenish the weapons and other supplies lost by Hamas in this latest battle against Israel? Keep driving. (Those weapons included the longer-range M-75 rocket, which has permitted Hamas to hit Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, as well as drones and thousands of rounds of ammunition.)</p>
<p>Iran insists, against American denials, that the P5+1 talks in Geneva gave Iran the “right to enrich uranium”? Keep driving.</p>
<p>To what destination? Does Mr. Obama imagine that a deal with Iran and loosening sanctions will further world peace? Just last week, his own administration acknowledged that Russia has been cheating on the INF treaty — since 1987! Does this revelation dim Mr. Obama’s enthusiasm for arms treaties? Does it sober him up? Not a bit. President Obama sent President Putin a letter, outlining the cheating, and — wait for it — conveying that the United States is prepared to engage in “senior-level bilateral dialogue immediately.”</p>
<p>Not a strong letter. Not even strong letter to follow. There is nothing to follow — as the world — and particularly Iran, knows so well.</p>
<p>—&#160;Mona Charen is a nationally syndicated columnist and a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. © 2014&#160; <a href="http://creators.com/" type="external">Creators Syndicate</a>, Inc.</p> | Courting Iran Despite Everything | false | https://eppc.org/publications/courting-iran-despite-everything/ | 1 |
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<p>STANFORD, Calif. (AP) - Stanford defensive lineman Harrison Phillips will bypass his final year of eligibility to enter the NFL draft.</p>
<p>Phillips announced his decision on Thursday.</p>
<p>Phillips was a third-team All-American this season when he had 14 1/2 tackles for loss and 7 1/2 sacks for the Cardinal.</p>
<p>Phillips had one year of eligibility remaining because he had a season-ending knee injury in the 2015 opener and was eligible for a medical redshirt.</p>
<p>Stanford tight end Dalton Schultz declared for the draft earlier this week. The Cardinal are still waiting for a decision from star running back and Heisman runner-up Bryce Love.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>More AP college football: www.collegefootball.ap.org and <a href="http://www.twitter.com/AP_Top25" type="external">www.twitter.com/AP_Top25</a></p>
<p>STANFORD, Calif. (AP) - Stanford defensive lineman Harrison Phillips will bypass his final year of eligibility to enter the NFL draft.</p>
<p>Phillips announced his decision on Thursday.</p>
<p>Phillips was a third-team All-American this season when he had 14 1/2 tackles for loss and 7 1/2 sacks for the Cardinal.</p>
<p>Phillips had one year of eligibility remaining because he had a season-ending knee injury in the 2015 opener and was eligible for a medical redshirt.</p>
<p>Stanford tight end Dalton Schultz declared for the draft earlier this week. The Cardinal are still waiting for a decision from star running back and Heisman runner-up Bryce Love.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>More AP college football: www.collegefootball.ap.org and <a href="http://www.twitter.com/AP_Top25" type="external">www.twitter.com/AP_Top25</a></p> | Stanford DL Harrison Phillips to enter NFL draft | false | https://apnews.com/d8502ae4de9e422898581e33e83756c3 | 2018-01-05 | 2 |
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<p>FAMED AUTHOR APPEARS: Critically acclaimed author Terry McMillan will appear on stage in the John Lewis Theater at the South Broadway Cultural Center, 1025 Broadway SE, at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 10. She will talk about her latest novel, “Who Asked You?” Tickets to the event are $27.95 and include a hardcover book to be autographed. Each regularly priced ticket holder can purchase one more ticket for $5, which does not include an additional book. Tickets are available at <a href="http://www.bkwrks.com/mcmillan-tix" type="external">www.bkwrks.com/mcmillan-tix</a> or at the door. The event is presented by Bookworks.</p>
<p>AT BOOKWORKS: Local authors Elizabeth Rose , author of “A Poet Under a Soldier’s Hat,” and Beth Gineris , author of “Turning Me to We: The Art of Partnering with Mindfulness,” will sign their books at 3 today.</p>
<p>At 7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 8 National Book Award winner Bob Shacochis will visit Bookworks with his new novel, “The Woman Who Lost Her Soul.” Renowned for his four award-winning book on the Caribbean, Shacochis returns to occupied Haiti in an opus that sweeps across time and continents to unravel tangled knots of romance, espionage and vengeance.</p>
<p>Robert F. Gish will be at the bookstore at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 10 with his book “River of Ghosts.” Magic realism meets myth in the real and imaginary worlds of two small towns in the Cedar Valley that face encroaching corruption and evil.</p>
<p>Paul de Blassie will talk and sign copies of his book “The Unholy” at 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 12. A young curandera intent on uncovering the secrets of her past is forced into a life-and-death battle against an evil archbishop.</p>
<p>Bookworks is at 4022 Rio Grande NW.</p>
<p>AT PAGE ONE: Stephen D. Cork , a retired U.S. Army colonel, will talk about and sign his action-adventure thriller “Sir, I Can Explain,” at 3 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 12. It is part of his Jenny O’Shane series.</p>
<p>Page One, at 11018 Montgomery NE, will host a poetry open mic night at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 8. The featured poet for October is Richard Wolfson . Kenneth P. Gurney will host the event. Sign-up for the open mic session is at 6:45 p.m.</p>
<p>AT ALAMOSA BOOKS: Local author Marcy Heller will be at the bookstore with her Balloon Fiesta picture book, “Paloma and the Dust Devil at the Balloon Festival,” at 4 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 8</p>
<p>Best-selling author T.A. Barron will sign his new fantasy adventure, “Atlantis Rising,” at 7 p.m. Oct. 9 at the bookstore. He is the author of the best-selling “Merlin Saga.”</p>
<p>Albuquerque author Carolyn Meyer will be at the Alamosa Books Reading Room at 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 12 with her book “Beauty’s Daughter: The Story of Hermione and Helen of Troy,” a fictional exploration of Greek mythology.</p>
<p>Alamosa is on the northwest corner of Paseo del Norte and Ventura NE.</p>
<p>AT TREASURE HOUSE: Local author and producer Ronn Perea will sign his latest novel, “The Email Tango,” from noon-5 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 12 at Treasure House Books &amp; Gifts, 2012 South Plaza NW in Old Town.</p>
<p>READING: The New Mexico Literary Association will hold its fifth annual Gratitude Awards reading with 2013 award winners Larry Goodell of Placitas and Mitch Reyes of Albuquerque of The Projects at 6 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 10 at Collected Works Bookstore, 202 Galisteo St., Santa Fe.</p>
<p>The award recipients will read from their work, followed by a reading of a linked poem, “Connected Works” by Joan Logghe, Michelle Holland, Anne Valley-Fox, JB Bryan, Don McIver, Elizabeth Raby, Edie Tsong and Shebana Coelho. The event is free but donations will be accepted.</p>
<p /> | Stuart Woods to speak, sign ‘Hard Time’ | false | https://abqjournal.com/276199/new-mexico-book-notes-28.html | 2013-10-06 | 2 |
<p>Add former secretary for Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson to the growing list of likely Republican presidential candidates in ’08. Like John McCain and Rudy Giuliani before him, Thompson has announced plans to form an exploratory committee, <a href="http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/T/THOMPSON_2008?SITE=AP&amp;SECTION=HOME&amp;TEMPLATE=DEFAULT" type="external">signaling his intention</a> to run.</p>
<p>AP:</p>
<p>Thompson would start out months behind potential rivals, such as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), many of whom have staff on the ground in Iowa and are beginning to build campaign organizations. Money will be a big question mark.</p>
<p>Thompson, who will turn 65 on Sunday, spent nearly four decades in politics and government, including 14 years as Wisconsin’s governor. He pushed for an overhaul of Wisconsin welfare laws, well before Congress and President Clinton took up the issue on the national level.</p>
<p />
<p>His tenure as HHS secretary was marked by anthrax attacks, a flu vaccine shortage and passage of the Medicare prescription law.</p>
<p>A month after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the nation faced its first case of bioterrorism in the form of anthrax attacks against government and media targets in Washington, Florida and New York. Thompson generally escaped criticism, but lawmakers complained that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reacted slowly to the crisis.</p>
<p><a href="http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/T/THOMPSON_2008?SITE=AP&amp;SECTION=HOME&amp;TEMPLATE=DEFAULT" type="external">Link</a></p> | Tommy Thompson Wants a Promotion | true | https://truthdig.com/articles/tommy-thompson-wants-a-promotion/ | 2006-11-16 | 4 |
<p>Phil (left) and Don Everly, in a Cadence Records publicity photo.&lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Everly_Borthers.JPG"&gt;Bruno of Hollywood&lt;/a&gt;/Wikimedia Commons</p>
<p />
<p>Phil Everly, who with his older brother Don made up the country/rock ‘n roll duo the Everly Brothers, died on Friday in Burbank, California, due to <a href="http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/posts/la-et-ms-phil-everly-of-the-everly-brothers-dies-at-74-20140103,0,2091176.story#axzz2pOXUp5gh" type="external">complications</a> from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He was 74.</p>
<p>The Everly Brothers’ influence on popular music in the 1950s and 1960s was immense. The songs they strummed and sang (in legendary <a href="http://www.eonline.com/news/495710/phil-everly-of-the-everly-brothers-dead-at-74-here-are-5-of-the-duo-s-essential-hits" type="external">harmonies</a>) were often big hits. During the height of their powers, they had almost three dozen hits on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, including “ <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4X7b2E_Jq-k" type="external">Wake Up Little Susie</a>” and “ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bye_Bye_Love_%28The_Everly_Brothers_song%29" type="external">Bye Bye Love</a>.” The Everly Brothers were among the first ten acts inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The duo influenced some of the best artists of the 20th century, such as <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=YJUWJhIbkccC&amp;q=cathy%27s+clown#v=snippet&amp;q=cathy%27s%20clown&amp;f=false" type="external">The Beatles</a> and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPeExALp0F4" type="external">The Byrds</a>. “We owe [the Everly Brothers] everything,” Bob Dylan <a href="http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=861&amp;dat=19860328&amp;id=y1dTAAAAIBAJ&amp;sjid=MYUDAAAAIBAJ&amp;pg=7090,7666777" type="external">said</a>. “They started it all.”</p>
<p>I’m not going to pretend that I’m capable of writing the definitive or the most comprehensive Phil Everly obituary. There are a lot of remembrances already <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=Phil+Everly+dies&amp;ie=utf-8&amp;oe=utf-8&amp;aq=t&amp;rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&amp;client=firefox-a&amp;channel=fflb" type="external">out there</a>, and plenty of rock historians who can tell you much more about Everly’s place in musical history than I ever could. But what I can offer is my favorite Everly story—one regarding perhaps the most brilliant song that Everly never wrote.</p>
<p>In an interview with the Wall Street Journal published in June 2013, he talks about his beautiful house outside of Nashville, Tennessee, in Maury County. It was built in 1846, and has this unique bit of history to it, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887323893504578559533026791250" type="external">according to Everly</a>:</p>
<p>During the Civil War, a famous Confederate lieutenant general named Nathan Bedford Forrest had a violent argument with a lieutenant named A. Willis Gould. Words were exchanged, Gould shot Forrest in the hip, and Forrest wound up [fatally stabbing] him. Forrest recuperated in our bedroom. I suppose there’s a song in that story someplace.</p>
<p>I’m not sure if Forrest’s ghost is hanging around, but I have a theory about this house. It won’t let you do anything to the structure it doesn’t like. We had a roof leak a few years back, and the carpenter impulsively wanted to solve the problem by drilling a hole in the floor. But the bit snapped right off. The house wouldn’t let him do it. This kind of thing has happened several other times.</p>
<p>(For the record, Forrest died in Memphis, but let’s just say it’s plausible that this Confederate&#160;ghost could find its way back to this estate.)</p>
<p>The idea for a Nathan Bedford Forrest death-match / freaky haunted-house country-rock song is even more interesting when you consider that Forrest was also the first Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan, the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raVFzZZLp3A" type="external">namesake</a> of Forrest Gump, and an accused <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/roadshow/fts/palmsprings_200801A41.html" type="external">war criminal</a>. Under Forrest’s command, Confederate troops carried out the atrocity at <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1864/04/26/news/fort-pillow-massacre-statement-eye-witness-participant-full-confirmation.html" type="external">Fort Pillow</a>, where hundreds of surrendered black soldiers were slaughtered.</p>
<p>So who knows if he was being serious about this song. I hope so, since it would make for a terrific song. Sadly, it seems that Everly never got around to writing and recording it. But what he <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Everly_Brothers_discography" type="external">accomplished</a> in life was, of course, already way more than enough. Some of the greatest rock music of the ’60s would not have sounded the way it did if it weren’t for Phil and Don. That’s a hell of a legacy to leave behind.</p>
<p /> | The KKK Leader Haunted-House Song the Late Phil Everly Never Got To Write | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2014/01/phil-everly-brothers-dead-74-nathan-bedford-forrest-shot-house-ghost-song/ | 2014-01-04 | 4 |
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<p>In a press conference in Richmond, Virginia, Ed Gillespie, a George Allen campaign advisor and former Republican National Committee Chairman, <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&amp;sid=aSvIP2tNJyPQ&amp;refer=us" type="external">announced</a> that Allen will wait until the requisite certified recount results are released on November 27.</p>
<p>At that point, either candidate will be legally entitled under Virginia law to demand a recount.</p>
<p>Gillespie declined to say whether Allen might ask for a recount if he still comes up short. “On Nov. 27, you may be asking Mr. Webb” that question, he said.</p>
<p>With the Senate hanging in the balance of this election, Democrat Jim Webb claimed victory at a celebration in Tyson’s Corner at 1 a.m. this morning. Webb is expected to announce the members of his transition team sometime later today.</p>
<p>According to Virginia law, the losing party must request a recount if the difference in votes is less than one per cent, reported the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/08/us/politics/08cnd-virginia.html?ei=5094&amp;en=25747ed16ef092ae&amp;hp=&amp;ex=1163048400&amp;adxnnl=1&amp;partner=homepage&amp;adxnnlx=1163022948-/x6CLekVWd7uHjIwc6LGZQ" type="external">New York Times</a>.</p>
<p>— Caroline Dobuzinskis</p>
<p /> | Nov. 27 Might Be the Deciding Day for Virginia Senate Race | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2006/11/nov-27-might-be-deciding-day-virginia-senate-race/ | 2006-11-08 | 4 |
<p>Patrick Fallon/Zuma</p>
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<p>Bobby Jindal isn’t happy with BP’s faltering response to the 2010&#160;Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and he isn’t shy about letting them hear about it. At an event on Wednesday, the Governor of Louisiana&#160;blasted the company for spending “more money on television commercials than they have on actually restoring the natural resources they impacted.” Three years after the spill, in which a drilling rig blowout killed 11 men and poured 4 million barrels into the gulf, BP has <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/318375-bp-pushes-back-at-gulf-oil-spill-settlement" type="external">started to push back</a> on damages claims, and Jindal&#160;seems determined to make the company pay for it.</p>
<p>Addressing the Gulf Coastal Ecosystem Restoration Council (GCERC)&#160;Jindal&#160;said,&#160;“BP needs to stop spending hundreds of millions of dollars on their public relations campaign telling us how great they are and start proving it by addressing their Clean Water Act and Natural Resources Damage liabilities now.” The GCERC&#160;is responsible for allocating money from the Clean Water Act fines paid after the Deepwater spill to restoration and economic recovery projects, and controls about 60 percent of the funds from those fines.</p>
<p>With the $8 billion dollar damages fund that BP set up after the spill has dwindled now looking&#160;like it will fall <a href="http://www.nasdaq.com/article/bp-says-spill-fund-is-running-on-fumes-20130730-00253" type="external">as much as $6&#160;billion&#160;short</a>, the company has rolled out a <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/318375-bp-pushes-back-at-gulf-oil-spill-settlement" type="external">PR campaign</a> alleging that it has been the target of fraud. BP has requested, and <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-28/bp-loses-bid-to-halt-spill-payments-pending-investigation.html" type="external">twice been denied</a>, that the federal judge who presided over the settlement negotiation freeze payments&#160;until a state appointed investigator can look into potentially fraudulent claims, with the most recent refusal <a href="http://www.wwltv.com/news/local/Judge-refuses-to-suspend-BP-settlement-payments-221482841.html" type="external">coming on Wednesday</a>. Earlier this summer, the company set up a hotline for residents to “ <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intelligence/2013/07/16/fraud-claims-bp-wants-gulf-coast-residents-to-do-the-right-thing/?mod=wsj_nview_latest" type="external">do the right thing</a>” and report fraudulent claims&#160;(1-800-NO-2-FRAUD), and&#160;took <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/26/business/energy-environment/bp-challenges-settlements-in-gulf-oil-spill.html?_r=0" type="external">out full-page ads</a> in three of the county’s largest newspapers pleading the case for honesty and fairness. (“Whatever you think about BP, we can all agree that it’s wrong for anyone to take money they don’t deserve,” the ad read. “And it’s unfair to everyone in the Gulf—commercial fishermen, restaurant and hotel owners, and all the other hard-working people who’ve filed legitimate claims for real losses.”)</p>
<p>BP’s cries of foul play have found some sympathetic ears. In June, Bloomberg Businessweek ran a cover&#160;that read “BP is getting rolled in the Gulf,” with a story cataloging the injustices that the company was up against: a feeding frenzy for settlement money, fraudulent claims, an uncooperative judge, and a generally unsympathetic public. And on top of it all,&#160;the line that BP has been spending more on commercials than on ecological&#160;restoration has become <a href="http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-06-27/how-bp-got-screwed-on-gulf-oil-spill-claims#p2" type="external">a familiar refrain</a> coming from the governor’s office, which the company <a href="http://www.nola.com/environment/index.ssf/2013/08/gulf_restoration_council_appro.html" type="external">has called</a> “both false and irresponsible.”</p>
<p>“Today we are working to ensure that our willingness to do the right thing is not taken advantage of and distorted to provide windfalls to undeserving businesses, including law firms,” <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/318375-bp-pushes-back-at-gulf-oil-spill-settlement" type="external">said BP spokesman</a> Geoff Morrell in a statement earlier this week. The company has paid some $25 billion thus far, and is staring down another $3.5 to $17.5 billion, depending on a court ruling on the company’s level of negligence.</p>
<p>But before Jindal&#160;gets a reputation as some kind of environmental hero, note that earlier this month he <a href="" type="internal">asked the courts to kill a lawsuit</a> by the&#160;Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority–East that hits many of the same issues that have him so fired up at BP. <a href="" type="internal">This might very well pan out just like things did after the spill</a>, when critics pointed out that his sharp response had been overshadowed by his support for the kinds of anti-regulatory policies <a href="" type="internal">that had facilitated the blowout</a>. It could be that the governor has found a good target, but his bluster doesn’t match his politics.</p>
<p>Update, 8/30/2013: In response to governor&#160;Jindal’s&#160;criticisms, Morrell released this statement: “Governor Jindal and his aide Garret Graves have completely misrepresented BP’s record in the Gulf as well as the legal framework under which further funding related to the Deepwater Horizon accident would become available. Their political grandstanding contains patently false assertions, defies the demonstrated record of environmental recovery that has occurred across the Gulf, and defames the massive efforts of tens of thousands of people to foster prompt recovery and restoration.&#160;Not that BP or anyone else should be surprised—these recent comments are their latest in a series of over-the-top statements and overblown demands since the accident.”</p>
<p /> | Bobby Jindal Takes a Shot at BP’s Gulf Oil Spill PR Campaign (Updated) | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/bobby-jindal-bp-gulf-campaign/ | 2013-08-30 | 4 |
<p>Floods in India have forced almost one million people to flee their homes, as violent monsoon rains rage down on the north-eastern state of Assam.</p>
<p>The state's agriculture minister, Nilamoni Sen Deka, <a href="http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hBMcsHp76EwMRn-yIzs1OWl6RB6A?docId=CNG.8ce61e811a998e6ec041f250a9f4356c.811" type="external">told the Agence France Presse</a> that 27 people had been killed due to flooding, five of whom drowned in a swollen river when their boat sank, while around 900,000 others had been displaced from their homes. A state government spokesman told the news agency that flash floods had struck 21 of Assam's 27 districts.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-18639529" type="external">According to the BBC</a>, Assam has been lashed by torrential rains for the past fortnight. The state's health minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-18639529" type="external">told the BBC</a> that all Assam's major rivers - including one of Asia's largest, the Brahmaputra "" were "running menacingly high with breaches reported in many places."</p>
<p>More from GlobalPost: <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/india/120217/pramath-sinha-business-economy" type="external">Old problems plague New India</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2012/06/201262965358979542.html" type="external">According to Al Jazeera</a>, the Indian Air Force has been delivering food packages to people seeking shelter on patches of dry land, while rescue teams are being dropped by helicopter into inundated areas to help those stranded by the flooding. The state's telephone lines have been knocked out, while some rail services have been cancelled after train tracks were swamped by mud.</p>
<p>In neighboring Bangladesh <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/120627/at-least-90-dead-bangladesh-monsoon-rains-and-landslides" type="external">four days of heavy monsoon rains</a> have caused flash floods and landslides which have left at least 100 people dead and about a quarter of a million stranded.</p>
<p>More from GlobalPost:&#160; <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/120627/at-least-90-dead-bangladesh-monsoon-rains-and-landslides" type="external">At least 100 dead, quarter million stranded in Bangladesh due to monsoon rains and landslides</a></p> | Floods in India force almost a million people to flee homes | false | https://pri.org/stories/2012-06-29/floods-india-force-almost-million-people-flee-homes | 2012-06-29 | 3 |
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<p>(Little Online) &#160;</p>
<p>A transnational coalition of labor unions and community groups in the United States and Mexico charged multinational retail corporation Chedraui Commercial Group with violations of municipal, federal, and international labor law on November 12, filing unprecedented dual claims under compliant mechanisms embedded within the North American Free-Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).</p>
<p>Lance Compa, an international labor law expert at Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor Relations told&#160;In These Times&#160;via email, “The simultaneous NAFTA and OECD complaints reflect an innovative union strategy for putting local and national labor disputes under an international spotlight. No one has ever tried this before. Unions have filed complaints under the NAFTA labor agreement, and under the OECD guidelines, but in unrelated cases.”</p>
<p>Compa explains that the complaints, carried out by Southern California’s United Food and Commercial Workers at Local 770 and the Frente Auténtico del Trabajo (FAT) labor federation in Mexico, is important as it brings unprecedented transnational public and federal pressure to Chedraui’s retail operations across both countries.</p>
<p>“The U.S. labor department will consult with the labor department of Mexico on the NAFTA complaint, and the U.S. state department will consult with the foreign affairs department of Mexico in the OECD complaint. Now Chedraui management in Mexico and El Super management in the United States have both governments looking at the company’s practices and trying to forge a solution,” he explains.</p>
<p>Chedraui is Mexico’s third biggest retailer, with a retail footprint of 35,000 employees across 200 stores. Forbes <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/erincarlyle/2013/01/14/head-of-mexican-wal-mart-competitor-alfredo-chedraui-obeso-now-a-billionaire/" type="external">reports</a> that the personal wealth of Chedraui’s Chairman of the Board, Alfredo Chedraui Obeso, stands at $1 billion, noting as well that Chedraui Obeso is <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/doliaestevez/2014/10/22/mexicos-five-luxury-superyacht-owners/" type="external">one of five</a> yacht owners in Mexico (getting his at an estimated $50 million). &#160;</p>
<p>FAT alleges through the NAFTA portion of the dual compliant that Chedraui has boosted dozens of “sham” unions throughout the country to ensure that management is in control, preventing any effective check by independent unions actually backed by workers. FAT has also called for investigations over several violations of NAFTA’s labor guidelines, including alleged underage labor, wage theft and health and safety hazards. The compliant gives the Department of Labor sixty days to decide whether it will investigate and report on Chedraui’s Mexican retail operations.</p>
<p>Chedraui has also been conducting business on American soil since 1997, when it took a controlling interest in the California-based Bodega Latina Corporation and its El Super chain. Today, Chedraui possess a formidable share of the Southwestern American market with 49 El Super storefronts across California, Arizona and Arizona, employing a low-wage workforce largely of Mexican descent, 5,000 in all.</p>
<p>While all El Super markets in the Southwest are non-union, it <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2008/aug/23/business/fi-latinogrocery23" type="external">acquired</a> seven unionized stores in Southern California from from the now-defunct Mexican chain Gigante in 2008. The representatives of the approximately 600 workers at these 7 stores, the United Food and Commercial Workers at Locals 770, 324, 1428 and 1167, attempted to renegotiate the collective bargaining agreements that Chedraui inherited when these contracts expired in 2013. The union instead says it found that the multinational corporation was not ready to bargain in good faith when it came to the workers’ central concerns, especially a guarantee of 40 hours per week for full-time workers that are currently only offered 32.</p>
<p>“We went through the negotiation process for a good amount of time before they gave us a last and final offer which did not bring the workers up to parity, or even to a place where they could lead dignified lives in a city expensive as Los Angeles is to live in,” Rigoberto Valdez, Organizing Director of UFCW Local 770, tells In These Times.</p>
<p>After the company’s last and final offer came in April 2014, Chedraui left the bargaining table, and workers at the seven unionized El Super stores say that they faced intense union-busting, management-led attempts at union decertification, and alleged captive audience store meetings with El Super CEO Carlos A. Smith that demonized the union process. El Super employees responded by voting overwhelmingly to reject the company’s last contract offer, also <a href="http://www.ocregister.com/articles/union-613446-workers-super.html" type="external">authorizing</a> union executives to call a strike if they deemed it necessary.</p>
<p>UFCW investigations into managerial practices at El Super resulted in the California Labor Commissioner <a href="http://radiobilingue.org/en/features/multan-a-cadena-de-supermercados-el-super-por-robo-de-salarios/" type="external">fining</a> the company $180,668 in penalties for wage theft violations and ordering the company to reimburse workers a collective $100,000 for violating state law by forcing them to buy their own uniforms. UFCW later beat decertification attempts by a 3-to-1 margin in an election held December 2014, union staff say, reaffirming El Super workers’ desire for their union. That same month, the union and the rank and file started a boycott of El Super stores that staffers say is having a clear effect—whereas sales were growing in previous quarters, company financial records reflect that sales fell as soon as the boycott started.</p>
<p>Before its effects were felt, however, El Super fired rank-and-file leader Fermin Rodriguez, an employee of six years, due to his alleged public presence in promoting the boycott. Further cause for discontent came when El Super made short-notice changes to its employee vacation time policies, resulting in the sudden loss of substantial paid time-off for a number of employees. A rare court <a href="http://mynewsla.com/business/2015/07/31/judge-orders-local-supermarket-chain-to-remedy-alleged-workers-rights-violations/" type="external">injunction</a>, brought forth by the National Labor Relations Board, eventually got Rodriguez reinstated at a Southern Los Angeles El Super in July. The federal ruling also restored vacation time that was previously lost.</p>
<p>“I am back at El Super now because my union, [UFCW] Local 770, fought for me so that I could regain my employment. The Federal government was on my side and obligated El Super to reinstate me immediately,” Rodriguez tells In These Times in Spanish, alleging that El Super has acted in abusive and unjust manner.</p>
<p>Now, El Super management is back at the bargaining table under federal mediation. The workers at the seven unionized El Super stores have been able to stave off the company’s allegedly anti-worker policies through UFCW legal determination in state and federal and its rallying on the ground with a community supported boycott and civil disobedience that has <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wna3njdksw" type="external">shut down intersections</a>. Its boycott led UFCW to investigate the multinational’s practices in Mexico, finding reason and inspiration to collaborate with its Mexican peer, FAT.</p>
<p>By taking the unprecedented steps of filing a joint claim with FAT (utilizing compliance mechanisms typically used by labor in manufacturing and agriculture, not retail), UFCW organizers like Rigoberto Valdez say they are hopeful that the extra scrutiny placed on Chedraui and its El Super stores will result in a meaningful victory that can be built upon by retail workers at multinational companies everywhere. &#160;</p>
<p>“As we head into a new transnational free trade agreement, it’s important that our communities are protected and the reason these processes are included is to do that. I’m not sure that they’ve been properly utilized in the past so we hope that the [Obama] Administration takes this complaint seriously and investigates in order to make certain that the further deterioration of standards doesn’t continue to happen,” Valdez says.</p>
<p>All three Democratic presidential candidates have <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/07/politics/hillary-clinton-opposes-tpp/" type="external">publicly denounced</a> the Trans Pacific Partnership trade agreement strongly promoted by President Obama. Favorable rulings for workers represented by UFCW and FAT unions through NAFTA and OECD could be used by the Obama Administration to magnify the fact that trade agreements do include space for some sort of labor recourse. Already, though, the UFCW has set up a model for transnational labor solidarity by defending the rights of workers at Chedraui properties in Mexico and the United States.</p>
<p>El Super workers at the seven unionized stores went on a one-day <a href="" type="internal">strike the day before Thanksgiving</a>. As Fermin Rodriguez explains, he and his co-workers are ready to do their part on the ground. “Right now, the workers are united and we’re strong enough for whatever is necessary. We’re used to doing what we have to in order to make it, and if that includes striking, then we will strike. We’re going to keep fighting and we’re not going to give up until we’ve won.” &#160;</p>
<p>Valdez, who describes Chedraui’s treatment of Mexican workers abroad as “disgusting”, says that they will not wait for a NAFTA and OECD decision in its fight against Chedraui Commercial Group. “We are going to continue to escalate our actions in Mexico as well as in the United States to make sure that this company abides by all laws—municipal, federal, and international law.”</p> | “No one has ever tried this before”: Mexican, U.S. Workers Bring Employer Charges Under NAFTA | true | http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/18661/no_one_has_ever_tried_this_before_mexican_u.s._workers_bring_employer_charg | 2015-12-09 | 4 |
<p>PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — Catherine Zeta-Jones says that husband Michael Douglas, who has denied allegations of sexual harassment, is a strong supporter of the #MeToo movement.</p>
<p>"Michael is 110 percent behind this movement," says Zeta-Jones, who noted that the 73-year-old Douglas is both the husband and son of actresses. "He's been in this business working creatively with women for over 50 years."</p>
<p>Zeta-Jones spoke Sunday in Pasadena while promoting the TV movie "Cocaine Godmother."</p>
<p>Earlier this month, Douglas issued what he called a pre-emptive denial of allegations, yet to be published, that he harassed an employee in the 1980s and damaged her career.</p>
<p>He acknowledged using "colorful language" but otherwise said the harassment story was a lie and that he was proud of his reputation.</p>
<p>Zeta-Jones did not directly address the allegations Sunday. But she said she was "very, very happy" with his statement and felt that he expressed himself "in a very, very concise, clear and personal manner."</p>
<p>Douglas' parents are the actors Kirk Douglas and Diana Douglas.</p>
<p>PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — Catherine Zeta-Jones says that husband Michael Douglas, who has denied allegations of sexual harassment, is a strong supporter of the #MeToo movement.</p>
<p>"Michael is 110 percent behind this movement," says Zeta-Jones, who noted that the 73-year-old Douglas is both the husband and son of actresses. "He's been in this business working creatively with women for over 50 years."</p>
<p>Zeta-Jones spoke Sunday in Pasadena while promoting the TV movie "Cocaine Godmother."</p>
<p>Earlier this month, Douglas issued what he called a pre-emptive denial of allegations, yet to be published, that he harassed an employee in the 1980s and damaged her career.</p>
<p>He acknowledged using "colorful language" but otherwise said the harassment story was a lie and that he was proud of his reputation.</p>
<p>Zeta-Jones did not directly address the allegations Sunday. But she said she was "very, very happy" with his statement and felt that he expressed himself "in a very, very concise, clear and personal manner."</p>
<p>Douglas' parents are the actors Kirk Douglas and Diana Douglas.</p> | Zeta-Jones says Michael Douglas is a 'Me Too' supporter | false | https://apnews.com/amp/752dde8a19934c22893427d3cb69f8bb | 2018-01-15 | 2 |
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<p>One gentleman's thoughts reflected a point of view we had not considered.</p>
<p>He said that the standards for common sense have been deteriorating for the past 50 years. That's a new way of looking at it and has some validity.</p>
<p>It's not that people don't use common sense; it's that acceptable levels of "standard" behavior are not as high as they used to be and therefore not as common.</p>
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<p>It still makes one question a society that doesn't require folks to - as they used to say in the olden times - use "the sense God gave them."</p>
<p>Or maybe we're just being a little harsh or old-fashioned.</p>
<p>Following are some other areas that people thought were lacking in common sense.</p>
<p>When did it reach the point that employers couldn't use common sense when it comes to hiring and firing? There is so much fear that an employee or applicant will sue that there are a gazillion rules to follow, so many things you can't say, so much required documentation that common sense no longer has a place.</p>
<p>Even, sometimes, the workplace seems dominated by rules put in place to make sure nobody's feelings are hurt.</p>
<p>There are often lists of things you can and can't talk about. We don't seem to trust adults in today's world to use common sense and civility.</p>
<p>Parents are sometimes afraid to use basic common sense when raising children because there is so much "self-help" information available that they feel bound to do what the experts say, rather than trust in their own judgment.</p>
<p>We believe gathering all the knowledge experts have to offer is beneficial, but their recommendations must be added to your own knowledge, experience and sense of the situation.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>One complaint that came up several times is the trendy zero-tolerance policies that seem to have replaced common sense.</p>
<p>For example, not one single person - we hope - believes it is acceptable for students to bring weapons to school. It should not be allowed, yet because zero-tolerance policies allow no room for common sense, kids can get in trouble for eating a Pop Tart into the shape of a gun.</p>
<p>We can almost guarantee the gun-shaped Pop Tart didn't scare as many people as the zero-tolerance reaction to it.</p>
<p>Folks who talked to us seemed to agree that they didn't need rules and regulations to tell them soda, beer, giant cheeseburgers and ice cream sundaes were not the most healthy of foods. That only took common sense and, hopefully, their common sense also told them those things should be consumed in moderation. No rules necessary.</p>
<p>Obviously, however, a lot of people need to be told, using the threat of tickets and fines, that one cannot safely drive a car and text at the same time.</p>
<p>Who would think so many people couldn't figure that out on their own?</p>
<p>So, we can wish, advocate, hope, pray for the return of common sense, but it only takes a little common sense to figure out we don't have that much power.</p>
<p>It doesn't make us quit wishing for what is evidently impossible.</p>
<p>Contact the Ryans at <a href="" type="internal">[email protected]</a>.</p>
<p /> | Common sense column seems to strike a chord | false | https://abqjournal.com/649831/common-sense-column-seems-to-strike-a-chord.html | 2 |
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<p>As we know, on 9/11 members of congress came down with an uncharacteristic bout of bipartisanship. (And if you think bipartisanship is a good in itself I’d just refer you to the USA Patriot Act.) It didn’t last, of course–which is fine by me: the ruinous Bush policies of the past five years have cried out for vigorous opposition, and the only cause for regret is that it hasn’t been vigorous enough.</p>
<p>Democrats have too often been cowed by the administration’s strategy of equating political dissent to the politicization of 9/11 and the war on terror, even as Republicans have perfected that art. Of course, “evenhanded” media accounts cast both sides as equally apt to turn terror to political advantage (as in <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060911/ap_on_el_ge/terror_war_politics" type="external">this AP piece</a> in which the tendency is bemoaned as “a danger both parties face”). Except that Democrats don’t get to dominate the airwaves, as the president does, with vague ( <a href="/mojoblog/archives/2006/09/study_bush_rais.html" type="external">and poll-boosting</a>) warnings; don’t get to <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-05-10-ridge-alerts_x.htm" type="external">raise terror alerts</a> at political whim; and don’t get to stage Republican-only symbolic photo ops like the one below.</p>
<p />
<p>Pondering this shot, <a href="http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_09/009474.php" type="external">Kevin Drum writes</a>:</p>
<p>Bush and his handlers understand very well that pictures are everything these days, and even on a day like this they’d rather have their big toes cut off than include New York’s two Democratic senators in a ceremony where cameras are rolling.</p>
<p>These guys just don’t know when to quit. It’s enough to make you ill.</p>
<p>Amen. America would be much nicer–and its politics more productive–if there were less partisanship and less political exploitation of genuinely important issues–like the very real threat from terrorism. (On which see “The Master Plan” Lawrence Wright’s terrifying piece in the Sept. 11 issue of the New Yorker, not yet online.) But as long as the current crew–for whom no political maneuver is too crass–is in charge, I’d say we need more, not less, partisanship.</p>
<p /> | 9/11, Partisanship, and Politicization | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2006/09/911-partisanship-and-politicization/ | 2006-09-11 | 4 |
<p>A man who has a long history of making what appear to be baseless accusations against conservative Hollywood icon James Woods got what was coming to him Wednesday night.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.jesseberney.com/" type="external">Liberal activist</a> Jesse Berney, who formerly was with the DNC and Hillary Clinton’s first presidential campaign, accused Woods of being a cocaine addict on Twitter. Woods was not amused.</p>
<p>The incident started when Berney attacked Donald Trump Jr. on Twitter, calling him a “malignant potato” because of his views on socialism. Woods corrected Berney’s statement regarding socialism, and that is when the fireworks started.</p>
<p>Berney responded to Woods’ tweet, accusing him of being a cocaine addict.</p>
<p>LOL including this random Twitter cocaine addict <a href="https://t.co/cqFuQX1jji" type="external">https://t.co/cqFuQX1jji</a></p>
<p>Things escalated quickly from there.</p>
<p>I'm not saying you're a coke addict, just there must be some reason that poor 19 year old dated you, and it wasn't looks or personality.</p>
<p>Then Woods dropped the bomb on Berney.</p>
<p>A review of Berney's Twitter account revealed that he has not only accused Woods of having a cocaine problem in the past but has also publicly accused Woods of being a racist, labeling him a white supremacist — an accusation for which he offered no evidence and which Woods' past statements on race on Twitter seem to disprove.</p>
<p>lol just kidding, I know who told him (it was a giant bag of cocaine) <a href="https://twitter.com/RealJamesWoods?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@RealJamesWoods</a></p>
<p><a href="https://twitter.com/RealJamesWoods?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@RealJamesWoods</a> cocaine is a helluva drug</p>
<p>I refuse to eat Colombian food after what those people did to <a href="https://twitter.com/RealJamesWoods?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@RealJamesWoods</a>.</p>
<p>Hahaha James Woods is openly white supremacist now. <a href="https://t.co/FxHyQ7DhZB" type="external">https://t.co/FxHyQ7DhZB</a></p>
<p>Apparently, Berney even knew it was a bad idea to accuse Woods of being a cocaine addict, yet he did it anyway.</p>
<p><a href="https://twitter.com/dntsqzthchrmn?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@dntsqzthchrmn</a> the bad news is James Woods just sued you for calling him a cocaine addict</p> | Liberal Activist Smears James Woods On Twitter. Woods Shreds Him. | true | https://dailywire.com/news/23061/liberal-activist-smears-james-woods-twitter-woods-ryan-saavedra | 2017-11-02 | 0 |
<p>The leaders of the US, UK, France, Germany and the EU have all called for Syria's President Assad to step down over his suppression of protesters. President Barack Obama said: "The time has come for President Assad to step aside." It marks a significant increase in pressure on Assad for sending in his army against the protesters. Anchor Lisa Mullins speaks with reporter Ben Gilbert who is monitoring events from Beirut.</p> | World Leaders Call For Syria's President Assad To Step Down | false | https://pri.org/stories/2011-08-18/world-leaders-call-syrias-president-assad-step-down | 2011-08-18 | 3 |
<p>HOLLIDAYSBURG (PA)Tribune-DemocratBy SUSAN EVANS, TRIBUNE-DEMOCRAT NORTHERN CAMBRIA BUREAUHOLLIDAYSBURG – A long-stalled lawsuit to force insurance companies to kick in more to the Roman Catholic diocese’s payments in a high-profile sex abuse case will go forward.Judge Hiram Carpenter ruled this week that the insurance lawsuit will be activated. If the church wins, the faithful could save more than $1 million.The legal logjam in Blair County courts is on its way to being cleared in time for hearings on nine new sex abuse lawsuits against Altoona-Johnstown Roman Catholic Diocese.Gathering dust in the courthouse has been a dispute between the diocese and its insurance companies over who is liable for damages awarded in an earlier sex abuse case.Specifically at issue is a diocese lawsuit against its insurance carriers that has been on hold for more than a year.Diocese attorneys repeatedly have asked that the suit go forward, complaining that its insurance claims are on hold, throwing its insurance fund into a $637,000 deficit.Carpenter, also the judge in the new sex abuse lawsuits, ordered that the first insurance dispute conference be held Nov. 24.</p> | Priest-abuse damages suit goes ahead | false | https://poynter.org/news/priest-abuse-damages-suit-goes-ahead | 2003-10-24 | 2 |
<p>Published time: 18 Aug, 2017 15:40Edited time: 18 Aug, 2017 16:26</p>
<p>One person has been killed and another injured in a knife attack in the German city of Wuppertal, according to media reports citing police. A manhunt is currently underway and police special forces (SEK) are at the scene.</p>
<p>The person was killed following an argument near the city’s main train station, a police spokesperson said, <a href="http://www.bz-berlin.de/deutschland/ein-toter-bei-messerattacke-in-wuppertal" type="external">according</a> to BZ news outlet.&#160;</p>
<p>The attack took place at a hair salon, <a href="http://www.wz.de/amp/lokales/wuppertal/ein-toter-bei-messerstecherei-in-elberfeld-1.2497992" type="external">according</a> to the Westdeutsche Zeitung.&#160;</p>
<p>Der Westen reports, citing authorities, that the police are not sure whether there were several perpetrators or just one.</p>
<p>Police are conducting searches in nearby buildings, according to a special forces commander cited by Express.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/400121-finnland-turku-shots-injured/" type="external">READ MORE: 2 dead in Finland stabbing attack, unclear if incident related to terrorism – police</a></p>
<p>The person who was killed in the attack was reportedly a 31-year-old man. The injured person is 25 years old.</p>
<p>The incident comes just two hours after a separate stabbing attack took place in the Finnish city of Turku, where police said at least several people were injured.</p> | 1 person killed, 1 injured after knife attack in Wuppertal, Germany, police op underway – reports | false | https://newsline.com/1-person-killed-1-injured-after-knife-attack-in-wuppertal-germany-police-op-underway-reports/ | 2017-08-18 | 1 |
<p>The Politically Incorrect Guide To Communism: The Killingest Idea Ever by Paul Kengor is one of the latest in a string of PIG volumes touching on hot button issues, including hunting, religion, Western Civilization, and American history.</p>
<p>This nonfiction book examines communism and its roots. Kengor discusses the history, philosophy, leadership, and activities of communism and how Western civilization has risen up to battle this political ideology.</p>
<p>In the first two chapters, the author breaks down how communism has infiltrated popular culture and has had its history rewritten by so-called progressives who are drawn to the tyrannical ideology.</p>
<p>In the next section, Kengor discusses far-left thought leader Karl Marx and how he came to write the founding document, The Communist Manifesto. It talks about his influences and how he came to embrace the idea that he was entitled to have his every need covered by a big government. There is a stunning chapter on Marx’s life, illuminating Marx's many flaws, including how he was a bum who refused to work, mooching off his friends and family, leading to a life of abject poverty.</p>
<p>From here, Kengor takes us on a journey of how communism came to infect Russia, Eastern Europe, Pan-Asia, and later South America.</p>
<p>The section on communism in Cuba is particularly powerful. With millennials wearing the face of Che Guevara on their shirts, this chapter offers a sobering look into the brutal man who would become, quite literally, the face of far-left politics.</p>
<p>Paul Kengor knows the history and the topic. He is a political science professor at Groves City College, a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution, and the director of the Center for Visions and Values. He has written several other books on history, including The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism.</p>
<p>The Politically Incorrect Guide To Communism is brutally honest. While it is critical of communist ideology, it is not a hatchet job. Kengor does an excellent job of citing historical sources on both sides of the aisle to break down his analysis. It is a timely look at the history of far-left politics and how they affect our world to this day.</p> | Book Review: 'The Politically Incorrect Guide To Communism' By Paul Kengor | true | https://dailywire.com/news/22772/book-review-politically-incorrect-guide-communism-jacob-airey | 2017-10-26 | 0 |
<p>On Wednesday, a family <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-news/ci_28556332/new-allegations-racial-profiling-by-san-jose-cops" type="external">filed a lawsuit</a> against the San Jose Police Department after they were forced to endure a horrifically racist and inappropriate confrontation.&#160;Emmanuel Stephens and his wife, Jasmine Whitley, are African-American and were racially profiled by Officer Alexander Keller. The couple was held at gunpoint right in front of their 7-year-old daughter for absolutely no reason other than their skin color.</p>
<p>Stephens and Whitley were headed home after picking up their young daughter from school – little did they know, they were being trailed by Officer Keller. According to the lawsuit, Keller followed the family all the way to their home, got out of his car and pointed his gun at them. Stephens was placed in handcuffs and put in the back of the patrol car. Keller threatened to put&#160;the couple’s teen daughter, who had been inside but came out of the house upon hearing the commotion, in juvenile hall if she made any attempt to record&#160;the incident on her cell phone.&#160;The family was then subjected to a vehicle search without probable cause, in which the officers cited Whitley for a hint of medical marijuana, which she provided proof of a prescription for.</p>
<p>Later on, the shaken family was told by another cop that police had received calls about a “suspicious black man with a purple backpack.” Even if this were true, Stephens didn’t possess a purple backpack, and Keller couldn’t have possibly seen inside of his car even if he had.</p>
<p>Keller’s actions were unquestionably&#160;motivated by racism, although officials have denied and racial bias. <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-news/ci_28556332/new-allegations-racial-profiling-by-san-jose-cops" type="external">Whitley said</a>&#160;of the lawsuit,&#160;“My goal is to get the police to respect the citizens.&#160;Not everyone who is African-American is a crook or criminal. There are many productive citizens, and I am one of them.”</p>
<p>Attorney Paul B. Justi is representing the family in court, and stated that the family was lucky that this horrifying situation didn’t turn tragic like so many interactions between police and minorities. Justi <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-news/ci_28556332/new-allegations-racial-profiling-by-san-jose-cops" type="external">said:</a></p>
<p>“What happened to my clients happens all the time and is a real problem.&#160;This type of police misconduct only gets attention when someone ends up dead, but this type of non-lethal harassment is much more widespread and also need to be brought to light and stopped.”</p>
<p>Because the San Jose Police Department has been pretty silent on this case, people have taken to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/SanJosePD?fref=ts" type="external">its Facebook page</a> to call the department out:</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" /></p>
<p>This is a photo of some of the department’s officers,&#160;which is a team that completely lacks diversity:</p>
<p>San Jose Police Department Facebook page</p>
<p>So many times, we’ve seen racial biases amongst police officers turn deadly.&#160;Ferguson, Missouri; Staten Island, New York; and Baltimore are just a few of the high-profile cases, but Attorney Justi is correct:&#160;black people are harassed all the time and most of those cases never do get reported. For Keller to prevent the couple’s teen daughter from recording this incident is also a horrendous abuse of power and manipulation, because often times what has allowed these police brutality cases to be reported is evidence from a witness with a cell phone.&#160;Fortunately, this family made it out of their confrontation with Keller alive, and are planning a lawsuit instead of a funeral.</p>
<p>For the San Jose Police Department, what happened to this family was not an isolated case. Earlier this year, an African-American man&#160; <a href="http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/San-Jose-Police-Lawsuit-Racial-Profiling-Targeted-Man-Based-On-Skin-Color-303351841.html" type="external">sued</a>&#160;the department for&#160;repeatedly stopping him for minor traffic violations due to his skin color.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/diversey/2821768676/in/photolist-5imiw5-6NiNCy-8g5KYs-78nTUJ-CM8QB-8kpbC-6eX3zF-9QZrjw-uDoHT-pXbNfq-8kpJZ-5Qvzbk-514KRJ-bD2EzD-bq7Jzw-c3cWm-9pggb-9RBpsF-9QWzb4-6aQPKZ-rgYnd-8bX4gj-4tAnKz-4HG6Lu-9QWBgn-fWNdHG-jU8tTR-fGmP2R-fWNAxH-hQPP4H-9QZqJE-tEsAP-dLDAtj-de7NQa-fWN666-mEg3oJ-4RFCeW-4HBPVP-3b1ey-fWNb4T-bwe6Ye-gqiM-254TZ-8ZvUkb-9vKBvY-fWN1YG-aPb1fx-do4WJP-pV82L9-9B6pgC" type="external">Featured image courtesy of Tony Webster via Flickr.</a></p> | San Jose Cop Stalks Family, Holds Them At Gunpoint For Being Black (IMAGES) | true | http://addictinginfo.org/2015/07/31/san-jose-cop-stalks-family-holds-them-at-gunpoint-for-being-black-images/ | 2015-07-31 | 4 |
<p>MECHANICSVILLE, Va. — Baptists must acknowledge their reputation is suffering in many quarters of American life, but society has regarded Baptists with suspicion since the movement was born in the 17th century.</p>
<p>That was the assessment of church historian Bill Leonard, who joined pastor Darryl Aaron to discuss was it means to be Baptist in the 21st century at the recent annual General Assembly of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Virginia.</p>
<p>Leonard, professor of church history at Wake Forest University School of Divinity, and Aaron, senior pastor of First Baptist Church-Highland Avenue in Winston-Salem, N.C., were featured speakers at the General Assembly, which drew several hundred people to Walnut Grove Baptist Church in Mechanicsville for two days of speakers, missional workshops and strategic discussions about CBFVA’s future.</p>
<p>“When I speak around, someone always asks me why they should keep the word ‘Baptist’ on their front church sign,” said Leonard. “The fact is, Baptists have an image problem and they need to own it. But Baptists have had an image problem since their beginnings in 1609.</p>
<p />
<p>“Baptists were scandalous from the beginning primarily because the primary issue in Baptist identity is this — the church should be composed only of believers, those who have confessed their own personal faith in Christ,” he said. “And from that idea comes the conviction that faith is uncoerced and because of that, neither an established church nor a Christianized state can dictate the boundaries of faith to its citizens.”</p>
<p>While Baptists are characterized by several beliefs and practices, a believers’ church is their defining distinction and foundational identity, said Leonard.</p>
<p>Aaron — who is Leonard’s pastor — said Baptists in the 21st century must find a biblical pattern that is adapted to their cultural settings.</p>
<p>“Every church must break its own code and find its own way to be transformative,” said Aaron. “Specific Baptist churches have used specific formulas, but replicating models won’t suffice in a society that is rapidly changing.”</p>
<p>One way to “break the code” is to listen to the experiences of church members, Aaron maintained.</p>
<p>“The church is always moving from message to incarnation,” he said. “People are changed by how they describe their experiences. Something unplanned happens when we share our stories. Testimony is not about God fixing people — it is about God making wholeness.”</p>
<p>If Baptists are to have an impact in society, they must find a way to be transformative, Aaron said.</p>
<p>“Transformation will not allow a person just to be,” he said. “Change is the result. Too often the church believes that change is secular and anti-Christian. But the Bible says change is of the Holy Spirit. If the church is to be alive today in a world where everything is shifting, it must be open to the breath of God.”</p>
<p>In looking toward their own future, General Assembly participants explored four “innovations” for the CBFVA proposed by its coordinating council.</p>
<p>“These innovations are just outlines — nothing is engraved in stone,” said CBFVA treasurer Dennis Sacrey of Fredericksburg, Va. “We are dialoguing.”</p>
<p>The innovations include:</p>
<p>• Officially incorporate the organization. “A few years ago Virginia made it legal for churches to incorporate and some congregations have done that,” said Sacrey. “The primary reason a religious organization would incorporate is to have better liability protection. It’s a shame that we have to think about that but in this day and age that’s the way it is. Incorporation protects our leaders and our assets.” The assembly later authorized the coordinating council to pursue plans for incorporation.</p>
<p>• Change its fiscal year to match that of the national Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. Currently the CBFVA’s fiscal year is April 1-March 31; the national CBF’s is Oct. 1-Sept. 30. “There’s an exchange of funds between the two organizations and sometimes things don’t mesh [because of the different fiscal years],” said Sacrey.</p>
<p>• Move from one annual General Assembly to four annual regional assemblies across Virginia. “We think this would increase the ability of folks to attend CBFVA meetings,” said Sacrey. Each assembly likely would be a one-night meeting, he said.</p>
<p>• Move the vote on the CBFVA budget and its leadership to the state meeting held during the annual General Assembly of the national CBF. Currently both are adopted during the annual state General Assembly held in Virginia. Sacrey said such a move would be necessary if the CBFVA moved to four regional meetings. But&#160; he added that attendance at the state meeting during the national General Assembly is typically larger than at the annual meeting in Virginia. “It would be good to give all our constituents a vote,” he said.</p>
<p>In a report to the assembly, CBFVA field coordinator Rob Fox said the description of Jesus’ ministry in the Gospel of Luke — to proclaim good news to the poor, free the prisoners and the oppressed, and bring sight to the blind — has “become the core of what we are about.”</p>
<p>“What I find curious is that we are connecting in mission but missing the mark in connecting with laity,” said Fox. “As we look to the future, I think you’re going to see us making new connections, especially to those who sit in the pews.”</p>
<p>In other action, the CBFVA:</p>
<p>• Elected a slate of officers for the next year, including Sacrey, who will serve as moderator, succeeding Bert Browning of Richmond, Va. Jennifer Clatterbuck of Danville, Va., was elected moderator-elect.</p>
<p>• Recognized Harvey Skinner as he concludes 10 years as the CBFVA’s reference and referral administrator. “We appreciate your work in helping us keep on task and connect churches and ministers. Thank you for a job well done,” Browning told Skinner and his wife, Barbara.</p>
<p>• Adopted a budget of $128,807 for 2011-2012. The amount is less than the $138,000 budgeted for this year, but Sacrey said the reduction reflected in part the retirement of Skinner, whose position will not be filled.</p>
<p>In a closing sermon, Tiffany Hall told participants that if they claim the spirit of Christ, they can carry out the same mission he did.</p>
<p>“It’s not a question of whether we have the spirit, but whether we will give it freedom to move and whether we will recognize it, both individually and collectively, as white Baptists, black Baptists and even as postmodern Baptists,” said Hall, who is program director for the Micah Initiative at Richmond Hill, a retreat center near downtown Richmond.</p>
<p>The Micah Initiative is a partnership among churches, synagogues, mosques and other communities of faith in Richmond and the Richmond public schools to support education and nurture of the city’s children.</p>
<p>“If we are followers of Christ and Christ’s mission was to preach good news to the poor and release the captives and recover sight, to free the oppressed and proclaim the year of jubilee, are we willing to make that our mission?” she asked. “My prayer is that we Baptists, we sisters and brothers in Christ, whites and blacks together, would respond with a collective ‘yes.’ ”</p> | CBFVA explores what it means to be Baptist in the 21st century | false | https://baptistnews.com/article/cbfvaexploreswhatitmeanstobebaptistinthe21stcentury/ | 3 |
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<p><a href="" type="internal" /></p>
<p>As Muslims were gathered inside the Oklahoma state capitol and were praying loudly, a brave Christian interrupted their prayer with the Lord’s Prayer – the Our Father. That’s the good news. The bad news? Police threw her out and allowed the Muslims to continue praying.</p>
<p>Nice separation of church and state, huh?</p>
<p>Muslim call to prayer in OK State Capitol interrupted by Christian protester <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/CAIR?src=hash" type="external">#CAIR</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Islam?src=hash" type="external">#Islam</a> <a href="http://t.co/UqsxEv7wiN" type="external">pic.twitter.com/UqsxEv7wiN</a></p>
<p>— randy r. potts (@thephatic) <a href="https://twitter.com/thephatic/status/571405048493658112" type="external">February 27, 2015</a></p>
<p />
<p />
<p>Oklahoma State Rep. John Bennett is one of the very few politicians who will speak openly about the threat of Islam. During the event that was interrupted by the ‘Our Father’, it was Bennett who passed out <a href="http://www.amazon.com:80url=search-alias%3Daps&amp;amp;field-keywords=Bibles&amp;amp;rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3ABibles/?_encoding=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;linkCode=ur2&amp;tag=freedomoutpos-20&amp;linkId=34EL7F3Z5BQ2UTDO" type="external">Bibles</a> and fliers which included questions like:</p>
<p>“Will you denounce the terrorist organization Hamas?”</p>
<p>As for the woman who began praying the ‘Our Father’, it appears to be the same woman <a href="http://freedomoutpost.com/2015/01/christian-woman-takes-podium-muslim-event-islam-will-never-dominate-united-states-grace-god-will-never-dominate-texas/" type="external">who interrupted</a> <a href="" type="internal">Texas Muslims at the Capitol Day</a> last month:</p>
<p />
<p>As was the case at the Oklahoma State Capitol, there was one Texas State Rep. who took a stand against similar proceedings in Austin. Her name is Molly White and she put an Israeli flag on her desk while asking all Muslims who entered her office that day to pledge loyalty to the U.S. White was scorched by the media and was even thrown under the bus by the Texas State Speaker Joe Straus. Nonetheless, she <a href="http://shoebat.com/2015/02/05/texas-version-michele-bachmann/" type="external">didn’t back down,</a> releasing this YouTube video within days:</p>
<p />
<p><a href="" type="internal">The woman</a> who shouted the ‘Our Father’ also appears to be the same woman who <a href="http://shoebat.com/2014/11/18/islam-continues-planting-flag-inside-churches-halls-power/" type="external">righteously interrupted</a> Muslim prayers <a href="" type="internal">inside the Washington National Cathedral last November</a>:</p>
<p />
<p>It’s safe to say that this woman has more guts than the <a href="http://freedomoutpost.com/?s=Speaker+of+the+House%2C+John+Boehner%2C+" type="external">Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives John Boehner,</a> who introduced <a href="" type="internal">an Imam</a> on the floor of the house one day prior to the <a href="" type="internal">National Cathedral</a> incident, and bowed his head as <a href="" type="internal">the Imam delivered a prayer</a>:</p>
<p />
<p><a href="http://shoebat.com/2015/02/28/courageous-christian-woman-interrupts-muslim-prayer-inside-state-capitol-building-with-the-our-father-police-turn-backs-on-god-and-throw-her-out/" type="external">Source</a></p>
<p>Walid Shoebat is a former member of the Muslim Brotherhood who was converted to Christianity, and author of the book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00C0UQGLU/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B00C0UQGLU&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=freedomoutpos-20" type="external">God’s War on Terror</a>.</p>
<p>Courtesy of <a href="http://freedomoutpost.com/2015/02/courageous-christian-woman-interrupts-muslim-prayer-inside-state-capitol-building-with-the-our-father-police-turn-backs-on-god-and-throw-her-out/" type="external">Freedom Outpost</a>.</p>
<p />
<p /> | Courageous Christian Woman Interrupts Muslim Prayer inside State Capitol Building with Lord’s Prayer – Police Turn Backs on God and Throw Her Out | true | http://dcclothesline.com/2015/02/28/courageous-christian-woman-interrupts-muslim-prayer-inside-state-capitol-building-with-lords-prayer-police-turn-backs-on-god-and-throw-her-out/ | 2015-02-28 | 0 |
<p>Francisco Xavier emerges from a payday loan shop, his brow more furrowed with worry than when he entered. His loan request was denied, and he has no idea how he is going to pay out-of-control bills, including credit card payments that gobble up nearly half his monthly income.</p>
<p>Xavier, a taxi driver, is among the rapidly burgeoning ranks of "super debtors" — people who rose into the middle class during Brazil's nearly decade-long boom, but now find themselves drowning in debt as Latin America's largest economy stalls, causing inflation to heat up and unemployment to rise.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Brazil's top credit information bureaus estimate that as of April, more than 55 million Brazilians were behind on paying off credit cards or loans. That's 37 percent of the adult population in a country of about 200 million people, and the numbers are rising. According to the SPC credit information bureau, the lists have grown by an estimated 700,000 people since January, when the top credit bureaus began working together on combined lists for the first time.</p>
<p>Soraia Panella, coordinator of customer service at Rio de Janeiro's Procon consumer protection agency, said she routinely sees people living so close to the edge financially that any sudden misfortune can plunge them into a hole from which it's nearly impossible to climb out.</p>
<p>"The majority of people who come here break down in tears and cry and cry. They're ashamed and feel they have no way out," said Panella, whose team helps about 450 debtors consolidate their payments every day. "I think it's going to get much worse than it already is."</p>
<p>After peaking at 7.5 percent annual growth in 2010, Brazil's economy has steadily retreated. And this year, it contracted 0.2 percent in the first quarter and is forecast to fall more than 1 percent for the full year.</p>
<p>The boom was fueled partly by China's hunger for Brazilian commodities, such as iron ore and soy. But the left-leaning governments of President Dilma Rousseff and especially her predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, also relied heavily on consumers for growth for about a decade. Among other things, the government used tax breaks to enoucrage car sales, ended a tax on big-ticket household goods, slashed interest rates and gave incentives to banks to expand credit for lower-middle class Brazilians.</p>
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<p>Domestic consumption, which in 2004 accounted for 53 percent of Brazil's GDP, rose to 63 percent of the total in 2014. Consumers newly armed with credit cards and tax-break incentives snapped up flat-screen TVs, refrigerators, motor scooters and compact cars.</p>
<p>With access to easy credit and a tradition of paying for small-ticket items like tennis shoes or even groceries over several monthly installments, Brazilian consumers racked up such large bills that nearly 30 percent of disposable income now goes to servicing debt, the Central Bank says. By contrast, consumer debt servicing in the U.S. accounts for just over 5 percent of disposable income, according to the Federal Reserve.</p>
<p>That debt threatens to push some of the new middle class back into the ranks of the poor. The government's Agencia Brasil news agency reported late last year that the number of people in extreme poverty rose in 2013 for the first time in a decade, increasing 3.5 percent over the previous year. Figures for 2014 are not yet available.</p>
<p>Much of the problem, analysts say, lies in credit cards, which have been aggressively marketed to lower-income consumers.</p>
<p>Interest rates on Brazilian credit cards are astronomical, averaging around 200 percent a year, compared to about 12 percent in the U.S. Banks say the high rates are justified because they lack data on individuals' credit ratings, while critics contend banks are simply gouging customers. Whatever the cause, it means that one late payment can easily snowball into a giant debt.</p>
<p>"Credit cards are my temptation," said Xavier, the taxi driver. Appliances, furnishings for his new apartment and impulse splurging on things like clothing and perfume led to credit card payments that eat up half his roughly $2,000 monthly income. After rent and support for his four kids, Xavier said he is left with nearly nothing but regret at having the cards.</p>
<p>"I wish I'd have cut them into bits," he said.</p>
<p>Years of hyperinflation in the early 1990s habituated Brazilians such as Xavier to spend immediately lest they see the value of their money shrink overnight.</p>
<p>"Consumers in Brazil live on the limit," said the SPC's chief economist, Marcela Kawauti. "They spend everything they have every month ... and don't worry too much if they don't have anything to fall back on if something happens."</p>
<p>Rio resident Paulo Dutra Alves, whose only income is a $254 a month disability check due to a bad back, said his quality of life is crumbling.</p>
<p>After doctors diagnosed a hernia, Alves turned to a payday loan shop to pay for new medicines and cover back rent. With interest, that $540 loan has ballooned to $1,325 in just a few months. He has no idea how he'll pay it back and fears he'll soon find himself living on the street.</p>
<p>"I moved into a cheaper place, I stopped taking the bus and I've even cut down on food," Alves said. "There's nowhere else I can cut."</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Jenny Barchfield on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jennybarchfield</p> | Amid Brazil's economic crisis, consumers struggle to pay off debts run up in the good times | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2015/06/15/amid-brazil-economic-crisis-consumers-struggle-to-pay-off-debts-run-up-in-good.html | 2016-03-05 | 0 |
<p>MARIMONDA ALTA, Colombia — After a taxing, three-hour hike into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Sandra Vargas spotted her family’s abandoned farmhouse — and the makeshift cemetery in the backyard.</p>
<p>It was here, on Jan. 6, 1991, that guerrillas executed her brother, Jose de Jesus Vargas, and ordered their parents to inter him.</p>
<p>Now, accompanied by forensic anthropologists, Sandra Vargas had returned to extract the remains of her brother and give him a proper burial. “I’ve always wanted to do this but never had the chance,” Vargas said as the search team began turning over dirt. “I’ve been waiting for 18 years.”</p>
<p>The waiting is over for legions of Colombians whose loved ones were killed in the country’s 45-year-old war. The ongoing conflict pits leftist guerrillas against government troops and right-wing paramilitary death squads but most of the victims are civilians.</p>
<p>The excavations began in 2005 after thousands of paramilitaries disarmed. In exchange for lighter prison terms, the militia commanders — who ordered thousands of killings — had to confess their crimes and provide information on where the dead are buried.</p>
<p />
<p>So far, forensic anthropologists have uncovered the remains of nearly 2,500 people. But their work is just beginning. More than 21,000 noncombatants have been officially registered as disappeared with some cases dating back to 1974.</p>
<p>Other victims were targeted by the guerrillas and the Colombian army. In fact, there are so many pending cases that the government’s 15 teams of forensic anthropologists have narrowed their focus to sites where they have a clear idea of the identities of the dead in order to return the remains to relatives.</p>
<p>“For the families, it helps bring closure,” said Fernan Gonzalez, a Roman Catholic priest and a member of a government-appointed reconciliation commission that is putting together a history of the war.</p>
<p>Unlike similar efforts in Bosnia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Peru and Argentina, which were carried out once the hostilities had largely ended, some of the excavations in Colombia are taking place in active war zones.</p>
<p>As a result, the search parties must embed with Colombian Army troops who search the area for guerrilla and paramilitary units then set up a security perimeter.</p>
<p>Some team members are a little surprised at their line of work.</p>
<p>After earning a university degree in anthropology, Juliana Lopez figured she’d spend most of her time uncovering ancient ruins at archaeological sites. Instead, she’s getting a crash course in Colombia’s more recent — and tragic — history.</p>
<p>To locate the remains of Jose de Jesus Vargas, who was killed by a now-defunct Maoist guerrilla group known as the Popular Liberation Army, Lopez and two other anthropologists were joined by Sandra Vargas, the victim’s sister, who knew where her brother was buried and served as their guide.</p>
<p>Sandra, who was only 6 when the crime occurred, has no idea why the guerrillas executed her brother, who was 24. But in many cases, civilians are targeted for allegedly collaborating with the enemy. After the killing, the Vargas family fled the area and Sandra was returning to the farm for the first time in years.</p>
<p>The day began at 3 a.m. when she met the search team in the coastal city of Santa Marta. After picking up a squad of soldiers, they drove into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, which jut dramatically out of the mostly flat landscape along Colombia’s Caribbean coast. Their craggy peaks and valleys have long provided refuge for guerrilla and paramilitary groups. Thus, when the road petered out and the long march began, the soldiers fanned out to clear the way.</p>
<p>Reaching the grave site was half the battle. The anthropologists loaded some of their gear onto the back of a rented mule but as they crossed streams and negotiated the winding footpath, they were soon sweaty and exhausted.</p>
<p>They reached the Vargas farm at 1 p.m., and had to work fast. Guerrilla groups were in the area so instead of camping overnight, the team had to find the body and get back down the mountain before darkness set in.</p>
<p>Mosquitoes and gnats filled the air and the forest floor was alive with biting ants. But the search team paid no attention. Sandra indicated the spot where she thought her brother was interred and the anthropologists began jamming a metal probe into the ground.</p>
<p>After a few false starts, they detected a soft spot, indicating that the soil had been moved. When they removed the top layer of dirt, they noted that the underlying soil gave off a reddish hue. The change in color, they said, was due to a chemical reaction, likely caused by the decomposition of bones.</p>
<p>They were getting closer.</p>
<p>Now lying on their bellies, the anthropologists switched from shovels to trowels for the delicate work that lay ahead. Soon, they found a rotten length of belt and then a ragged pair of underwear. Next, they spotted something black and shiny: a rubber boot with a grey shin bone sticking out of the top.</p>
<p>Sandra took a deep breath. The team had found her brother.</p>
<p>“Now he is with us again,” she said.</p>
<p>After photographing rib, femur and finger bones, the anthropologists placed the remains in plastic bags, taped them shut, and slung them onto the back of the mule. The bones would eventually be transferred to a government laboratory for DNA testing then returned to the family for the last rites.</p>
<p>Mission accomplished, the soldiers and the anthropologists began the long slog back down the mountain. And because so many clandestine graves have yet to be excavated, they were up before dawn the next day to set out on another dig.</p> | Digging up the dead | false | https://pri.org/stories/2009-09-09/digging-dead | 2009-09-09 | 3 |
<p>CULLOWHEE, N.C. (AP) — Marvin Smith had 24 points and nine rebounds as North Carolina Greensboro took control in the second half to beat Western Carolina 66-55 in Southern Conference action on Saturday night.</p>
<p>Smith was 9 of 15 from the floor, hitting three from distance. Francis Alonso added 20 points as he was 4 of 11 from long range.</p>
<p>Western Carolina broke a 24-24 halftime tie to take an early second-half lead before Alonso drilled a 3-pointer to go ahead 27-26. The Spartans (12-5, 3-1) never trailed again.</p>
<p>The Catamounts closed to 44-41 at the 11:30 mark but Alonso and Kyrin Galloway drilled two straight 3-pointers to stretch the lead to 50-41.</p>
<p>UNC Greensboro was 26 of 53 (49 percent) from the floor while limiting the Catamounts to 15-of-38 shooting (40 percent). The Spartans won the rebound battle 36-19.</p>
<p>Mike Amius had 19 points for Western Carolina (7-10, 3-2). Deriece Parks added 12 points.</p>
<p>CULLOWHEE, N.C. (AP) — Marvin Smith had 24 points and nine rebounds as North Carolina Greensboro took control in the second half to beat Western Carolina 66-55 in Southern Conference action on Saturday night.</p>
<p>Smith was 9 of 15 from the floor, hitting three from distance. Francis Alonso added 20 points as he was 4 of 11 from long range.</p>
<p>Western Carolina broke a 24-24 halftime tie to take an early second-half lead before Alonso drilled a 3-pointer to go ahead 27-26. The Spartans (12-5, 3-1) never trailed again.</p>
<p>The Catamounts closed to 44-41 at the 11:30 mark but Alonso and Kyrin Galloway drilled two straight 3-pointers to stretch the lead to 50-41.</p>
<p>UNC Greensboro was 26 of 53 (49 percent) from the floor while limiting the Catamounts to 15-of-38 shooting (40 percent). The Spartans won the rebound battle 36-19.</p>
<p>Mike Amius had 19 points for Western Carolina (7-10, 3-2). Deriece Parks added 12 points.</p> | UNC Greensboro takes control in 2nd, beats W. Carolina 66-55 | false | https://apnews.com/amp/ae7a83307ea7400e8ba1c8d0d7c2e772 | 2018-01-14 | 2 |
<p>As I was working on the hyper-geometric equation late one night and trying to negotiate my way around some Reimann branch cuts, I suddenly stumbled onto an integral path along the imaginary axis through a singularity at infinity that allowed passage back into reality at displaced times. So surprising was this development that I devised an electrical circuit analog to test it, and then powered it with the biggest amplifier I had in the house, from an old bass guitar. To my amazement it actually worked and I was able to receive information from the future.</p>
<p>Theoretically, were I to apply sufficient power, which would be enormous, I would be able to transmit objects — time travel!! I know how fantastic this sounds, and I am not sure my experiments are entirely safe (the space-time continuum in the vicinity of my house seems to be slowly drooping), but each tidbit of data I receive from the future is so tantalizing that I just cannot stop. Limited by amplifier power, I can only push my probing into the near future. I applied my device to sampling the future news of the current presidential campaigns, and found the following.</p>
<p>August 28, 2008.</p>
<p>In a stunning development at the Democratic National Convention, Barack Obama, the party’s candidate for the presidency, named Ron Paul as his running mate. Said Obama:</p>
<p>“Our nation yearns for unity in ending the Iraq War, change in making the government work for the people’s interest and not those of special interests, a fair system of taxation, and an end to the infringement on people’s rights and the encroachment into their private lives by government. With Ron Paul as my running mate, our campaign declares: America, we have heard you, and together we are united in leading the way to restoring our nation’s greatness and its freedoms, without sacrificing its security.”</p>
<p>Asked about his surprising new role as a vice presidential candidate on a Democratic ticket, Paul said:</p>
<p>“It makes sense. I want to end the war, but with McCain leading the Republican Party they won’t do it; and I want to reduce taxation and government spending, which could not happen under Bush, and would not happen under McCain in any meaningful way because the war and the catering to the lobbyists runs up the spending. I felt that the best way to bring the Republican Party, my party, back to its senses and to advance an anti-war low-taxation agenda was to run in a unity ticket with Barack Obama.”</p>
<p>Can you beat that?</p>
<p>September 4, 2008.</p>
<p>In what has to be seen as a Republican response to the Obama-Paul unity ticket that has rocketed the Democrats’ popularity ratings this last week, John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate, announced Hillary Clinton as his running mate. Said McCain:</p>
<p>“America wants an experienced leadership team that includes women’s perspectives. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who began her political career campaigning for Richard Nixon, understands the insights and needs of American women, and how government policy affects their lives. This election is about doing what is right for America, it is not about one party or the other. With Hillary Clinton as my running mate, we have the right team, the right ideas, and the right direction with which to lead this nation into a secure and prosperous future.”</p>
<p>Asked about her surprising new role, Hillary Clinton said:</p>
<p>“I just can’t stop fighting for America, so I am honored to be John McCain’s running mate. He is a patriot who understands the security needs of our country and will safeguard them to the utmost. Coupled with my experience at developing domestic policies, I know that the American people will recognize us as being the type of individuals it really wants to carry forward the nation’s business. For me, it will be an awesome responsibility to be only a heartbeat away from the presidency, but I know I am prepared for the job ahead.”</p>
<p>Strategists from the McCain-Clinton campaign say they were inundated with messages of support, complete with contributions, from prominent feminists and their allied organizations.</p>
<p>8 September 2008. The unprecedented duel between the unity tickets raises many new questions for members of more than one traditional voting bloc. Analysts predict that the Democratic unity ticket will appeal to blacks, committed union members, independents and younger voters; while the Republican unity ticket appeals to white men and feminists, latinos who identify less with their traditional Democratic and union affiliations and are more concerned about moral values and labor competition with blacks, and much of the former Republican base. The existing models of prediction have been thrown over, and the final result of the election is anyone’s guess. The geographical regions most likely to support each ticket are…[transmission cuts off].</p>
<p>Gadzooks!</p>
<p>I plan to check over the circuitry of my device, just to be sure the transmissions aren’t all a fluke caused by bad wiring. It has occurred to me, finally, that I don’t know whether my discovery — fluke or real — is a boon for humanity or another horrible disaster unleashed by science upon an as yet unsuspecting world. Only time will tell.</p>
<p>MANUEL GARCIA, Jr. can be reached at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a>. He likes Ralph Nader’s speeches best.</p>
<p />
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Running Mates from the Imaginary Plane | true | https://counterpunch.org/2008/05/06/running-mates-from-the-imaginary-plane/ | 2008-05-06 | 4 |
<p>Chipotle beat analyst estimates for earnings per share and posted revenues in-line with expectations. Still, disappointing same-store sales and tepid 2015 sales growth outlook sent the stock falling more than 5% in after hours trading.</p>
<p>Celebrations at the house of Mickey Mouse -- Disney reported first quarter numbers that beat on both the top and bottom lines, in large part thanks to "Frozen" merchandise sales. The stock was up more than 3% in after hours trading.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Tomorrow, don't miss a FOX Business exclusive, hour-long interview wit the man who is regarded as the most successful long-term investor in American history: the Oracle of Omaha himself, Warren Buffett. He will be speaking with FBN live at the Nebraska Furniture Mart in Omaha, Neb., in his first major interview of 2015 and the first of his 50th year running Berkshire Hathaway. We'll ask about everything from falling oil prices, to his outlook for the U.S. stock market, to his existing and future investments, what he's thinking for the years ahead and where he's putting his money today. Tune into Countdown to the Closing Bell on Wednesday for this interview and every week day at 3 p.m. ET.</p>
<p>Be sure to check out all of today's interviews on <a href="" type="internal">FOXBusiness.com/OnCall</a>.</p> | Claman on Call: 'Frozen' Toys Boost Disney in Fiscal 1Q | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2015/02/03/claman-on-call-frozen-toys-boost-disney-in-fiscal-1q.html | 2016-03-06 | 0 |
<p>Yesterday, Vice President Joe Biden issued an embargo for his on-the-record press call, asking that reporters do not publish anything about the call until it’s over. This includes Twitter, forcing journalists to wait to post live updates on the social stream. The reason? Journalists got to ask questions at the end of Biden’s remarks, giving him the chance to clarify any questions before it’s in print.</p>
<p>An email from the White House deputy press secretary Josh Earnest reads:</p>
<p>“The embargo will allow journalists to hear the entirety of the Vice President’s remarks and get the benefit of having their questions answered — before trying to condense a 30-minute conference call about a 20-page NEC report into a 140 characters.”</p>
<p>Could this be a response to Obama’s “you didn’t build that” remark that flooded our&#160;news feeds, headlines, and social networks, giving the president no time to clarify his remarks, and viewers no time to contextualize the claim?</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | No Tweeting Allowed, Says VP Joe Biden | false | https://ivn.us/2012/07/25/no-tweeting-allowed-says-vp-joe-biden/ | 2012-07-25 | 2 |
<p>Chris Cuomo / Getty Images</p>
<p>BY: <a href="" type="internal">Jack Heretik</a> September 29, 2017 10:27 am</p>
<p>CNN host Chris Cuomo told viewers to "fight injustice, reinforce morality" or "stand firm" in a video posted to his Facebook page on Thursday.</p>
<p>Cuomo first started using the "FIRM" acronym&#160;in August to offer his guiding principle of sorts toward&#160;politics.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p />
<p>In the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ChrisCCuomo/videos/1945119272407386/" type="external">video</a> posted this week, Cuomo sat in front of a chart headlined "#STANDFIRM." &#160;He used the principle to discuss the Hurricane Maria <a href="" type="internal">recovery effort in Puerto Rico</a>, as well as other timely political issues.</p>
<p>"Why aren't they getting more help to the places they need it faster? You have to push for accountability," Cuomo said. "We know that there's some intention there, we know the president was slow to it, we have to get after it."</p>
<p>Cuomo then turned his campaign to criticize Republicans' attempts at health care and tax reform.</p>
<p>"This also applies to this health care mess," Cuomo said. "They don't have the votes, the president shouldn't say that they do. That's not optimism; it's being deceptive. You need truth, you need accuracy."</p>
<p>"Lastly, on taxes, you need details because what came out helps the haves, not the have-nots," Cuomo said.</p>
<p /> | CNN’s Cuomo Encourages Viewers to ‘Stand Firm’ | true | http://freebeacon.com/politics/cnns-cuomo-stand-firm/ | 2017-09-29 | 0 |
<p>Wynn Resorts Ltd. shares rallied in the extended session Thursday even after the casino operator's earnings missed Wall Street targets. Wynn shares surged 7.3% to $102.50 after hours. The company reported fourth-quarter earnings of $1.12 a share, up from 86 cents a share in the year-ago period, owing to strong results from its Wynn Palace resort. Revenue rose to $1.3 billion from $946.9 million a year ago. On an adjusted basis, Wynn reported earnings of 50 cents a share. Analysts surveyed by FactSet had estimated adjusted earnings of 87 cents a share on revenue of $1.26 billion.</p>
<p>Copyright © 2017 MarketWatch, Inc.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p> | Wynn Shares Surge As Palace Results Overshadow Earnings Miss | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/01/26/wynn-shares-surge-as-palace-results-overshadow-earnings-miss.html | 2017-01-26 | 0 |
<p>In recent years the U.S. government has been making <a href="" type="internal">massive preparations</a>. They’ve been&#160; <a href="http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/report-disaster-looms-fema-scrambles-to-stockpile-food-reserves_08052013" type="external">stockpiling food</a>, <a href="http://www.infowars.com/dhs-puts-out-urgent-order-for-riot-gear/" type="external">riot gear</a>, <a href="" type="internal">automatic weapons</a> and <a href="http://www.thedailysheeple.com/feds-buy-2-billion-rounds-of-ammunition_022013" type="external">billions of rounds</a> of <a href="" type="internal">ammunition</a>. While no one in Federal emergency planning services is talking any specifics, recent exercises over American cities and military training simulations all suggest that whatever it is that the government is preparing for is a very serious affair. One possibility, as evidenced by war gaming simulations being performed by intelligence agencies, Homeland security and the Pentagon is that the <a href="http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/mark-levin-government-is-simulating-the-collapse-of-our-financial-system-the-collapse-of-our-society-and-the-potential-for-widespread-violence_03082013" type="external">U.S. economy could collapse</a> under the weight of trillions of dollars in debt. Another points at the real possibility of a widespread <a href="http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/experts-warn-congress-attack-on-power-grid-could-lead-to-catastrophic-civilian-casualties_05092014" type="external">attack on the U.S. power grid</a> that could throw the country back into the stone age.</p>
<p>Whatever it is, it should be clear that preparations are being made.</p>
<p>The latest eye-opener comes from the U.S. Treasury, a department tasked with managing the country’s debt as well as the banking system as a whole. According to a new report the Treasury Department has ordered over $200,000 worth of Survival Kits for as many as 3,814 employees who oversee the federal banking system.</p>
<p>It’s not clear why the federal government has ordered the kits, but perhaps they are expecting some sort of disturbance to take place and they want their employees to be prepared for it. According to <a href="http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-12-10/why-us-treasury-quietly-ordering-surival-kits-us-bankers" type="external">Zero Hedge</a>, the kits will be delivered to every major bank in the United States and include <a href="" type="internal">Wells Fargo</a>, <a href="" type="internal">JP Morgan Chase</a>, Citigroup and Capital One.</p>
<p>The “kits,” which contain items such as <a href="http://amzn.to/1uohv9P" type="external">high calorie food rations</a>, <a href="http://amzn.to/12wBfAO" type="external">emergency water</a>, <a href="http://amzn.to/1DdIdeL" type="external">first aid supplies</a> and an <a href="http://amzn.to/1qy24zN" type="external">emergency radio</a>, suggest that the Treasury Department wants their people to be prepared for scenario where they may be out of contact from officials for&#160;24 – 48 hours.</p>
<p>A full list of the specifications for the survival kits has been made available by <a href="http://freebeacon.com/issues/treasury-department-seeking-survival-kits-for-bank-employees/" type="external">Free Beacon</a>:</p>
<p>(Full Request For Proposal <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/249781337/Survival-Kits-RFP" type="external">Here</a>&#160;via <a href="http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-12-10/why-us-treasury-quietly-ordering-surival-kits-us-bankers" type="external">Zero Hedge</a>)</p>
<p>Survival kits will be delivered to every major bank in the United Statesincluding Bank of America, American Express Bank, BMO Financial Corp., Capitol One Financial Corporation, Citigroup, Inc., JPMorgan Chase &amp; Company, and Wells Fargo.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>The agency has roughly 3,814 employees, each of which would receive a survival kit. The staff includes “bank examiners” who provide “sustained supervision” of major banks in the United States.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>It is not clear why the Treasury Department is ordering the kits.</p>
<p>This, of course, begs the question: why?</p>
<p>Does the Treasury Department know something we don’t? And why bank examiners? Is it possible someone, somewhere knows something significant is about to go down?</p>
<p>They certainly understand that the U.S. <a href="" type="internal">economy</a> and financial system are susceptible to massive shocks. Last year they released a report <a href="http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/u-s-treasury-warns-of-whats-to-come-catastrophic-effect-could-last-for-more-than-a-generation_10042013" type="external">warning of&#160;a catastrophic event</a> that could last generations should&#160;the U.S. government fail to secure additional credit:</p>
<p>“In the event that a debt limit impasse were to lead to a default, it could have a&#160;catastrophic effect on not just financial markets but also on job creation, consumer spending and economic growth,” the report said.</p>
<p>“Credit markets could freeze, the value of the dollar could plummet, US interest rates could skyrocket, the negative spillovers could reverberate around the world, and there might be a financial crisis and recession that could echo the events of 2008 or worse.”</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>“Considering the experience of countries around the world that have defaulted on their debt, not only might the economic consequences of default be profound, but those consequences, including high interest rates, reduced investment, higher debt payments, and slow economic growth, could last for more than a generation,” the report states.</p>
<p>It’s only a matter of time, it seems.</p>
<p>And, while the survival kits purchased by the Treasury Department are basic units that provide about two days worth of supplies, it’s notable that they have purchased these kits specifically for their bank examiners. In the preparedness community we call it a <a href="http://readynutrition.com/resources/99-freakin-awesome-ideas-for-your-bug-out-bag_09092014/" type="external">bug out bag</a>, or depending on the circumstances, a <a href="http://readynutrition.com/resources/the-get-home-bag_02042013/" type="external">get-home bag</a>. They are part of a <a href="http://amzn.to/TwaloQ" type="external">broader preparedness strategy</a> designed to provide supplemental support to those who are away from home and out of touch in the event of an emergency. So the specific kits being distributed by the Treasury Department will provide limited support at best and are not full-out multi-month preparedness kits.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, we are seeing the government not only <a href="http://www.shtfplan.com/emergency-preparedness/homeland-security-to-regionalize-emergency-supplies-over-next-90-days_11012010" type="external">regionalize distribution centers</a> around the country and stockpile typical “prepper” supplies, but they are also now getting their individual employees and agents prepared.</p>
<p>Those who have yet to prepare for major disasters should do so now, because if whatever Treasury and other Federal agencies expect to happen actually happens then all bets are off.</p>
<p>The reason, for example, that someone would need a 2,400 calorie food bar like the one in these kits is because store shelves would likely have been looted and no food will be available. Tess Pennington, author of the best selling disaster guide <a href="http://amzn.to/TwaloQ" type="external">The Prepper’s Blueprint</a>, explains:</p>
<p>When the needs of the population cannot be met in an allotted time frame, a phenomena occurs and the mindset shifts in people. They begin to act without thinking and respond to changes in their environment in an emotionally-based manner, thus leading to chaos, instability and a breakdown in our social paradigm.</p>
<p>When you take the time to understand how a breakdown behaves and how it progresses, only then can you&#160;truly prepare for it.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://readynutrition.com/resources/the-anatomy-of-a-breakdown_12112012/" type="external">Anatomy of a Breakdown</a></p>
<p>As part of a <a href="http://amzn.to/TwaloQ" type="external">complete preparedness strategy</a> Pennington suggests having an emergency bag&#160;similar to&#160;the one being purchased by the Treasury Department – but with a little more hardcore survival built in because during a serious and widespread emergency scenario a couple thousand calories and a survival blanket may not be enough:</p>
<p>Someone in&#160;the upper echelons of government understands the threats being faced by Americans. Efforts are being made from coast-to-coast to <a href="" type="internal">prepare</a> for these threats. But, as even the director of Homeland Security has warned, in an emergency every individual needs to <a href="" type="internal">make preparations</a> for at least a two week period during which food, gas, clean water and emergency response may&#160;be unavailable.</p>
<p>Courtesy of <a href="http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/they-know-something-why-did-the-treasury-department-just-purchase-thousands-of-survival-kits-for-bank-examiners_12102014" type="external">SHTFplan.com</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" /></p>
<p />
<p /> | They Know Something: Why Did The Treasury Department Just Purchase Thousands of Survival Kits For Bank Examiners? | true | http://dcclothesline.com/2014/12/11/know-something-treasury-department-just-purchase-thousands-survival-kits-bank-examiners/ | 2014-12-11 | 0 |
<p />
<p>A Massachusetts museum, which is dedicated to Dr. Seuss, will be removing and replacing a one of the famous murals because it has been deemed “racist” by three other children’s book authors.</p>
<p>The mural portrays a Chinese man from one of his books, “And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street,” with slanted eyes and chopsticks. The other authors said that they would be boycotting an even at the museum because of the&#160;“jarring racial stereotype.”</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" /></p>
<p>Call me crazy here, but don’t people of Chinese decent have slanted eyes? Do they not, in fact, eat with chopsticks? The mural simply displays their culture. How is that racist?</p>
<p><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2017/10/06/dr-seuss-museum-mural-to-be-replaced-amid-claims-racist-depiction.html" type="external">Fox News</a>reports:</p>
<p>Three children’s authors declined an invitation to the museum’s inaugural Children’s Literature Festival, which was set for Oct. 14 before being canceled. After the museum offered to take down the mural, the authors said they would attend, but the museum has not said if the festival is back on.</p>
<p>Authors Mo Willems, Mike Curato and Lisa Yee signed a letter and posted it to social media explaining why they take issue with the mural’s depiction.</p>
<p>Their complaint said, “We recently learned that a key component of this institution honoring Dr. Seuss features a mural depicting a scene from his first book, ‘And to Think That I Saw It on Mullberry Street,’ and within the selected art is a jarring racial stereotype of a Chinese man, who is depicted with chopsticks, a pointed hat and slanted slit eyes.”</p>
<p>They added, &#160;“We find this caricature of ‘the Chinaman’ deeply hurtful, and we have concerns about children’s exposure to it.”</p>
<p />
<p>The museum is taking down the mural and replacing it work from work that came later on in Seuss’ career.</p>
<p>A spokesperson from the museum said, “This is what Dr. Seuss would have wanted us to do. His later books, like ‘The Sneetches’ and ‘Horton Hears a Who,’ showed a great respect for fairness and diversity.”</p>
<p>They added, “Dr. Seuss would have loved to be a part of this dialogue for change. In fact, Ted Geisel himself said, ‘It’s not how you start that counts.&#160; It’s what you are at the finish.'”</p>
<p>If you ask me, I think Dr. Seuss would have told all these whining babies to grow up!</p>
<p>The views expressed in this opinion article are solely those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by EagleRising.com</p> | Nonsense! Dr. Seuss Museum Mural to be Removed for “Racist Stereotype” | true | https://eaglerising.com/47722/nonsense-dr-seuss-museum-mural-to-be-removed-for-racist-stereotype/ | 2017-10-06 | 0 |
<p />
<p>There’s more to being a good boss than just doing high-quality work. Bosses should be able to inspire their employees, create a productive and efficient workplace and encourage new thoughts and ideas. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always happen.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>According to the 2012 <a href="http://www.mercer.com/press-releases/focused-on-engagement" type="external">Attraction and Retention Survey Opens a New Window.</a> conducted by Mercer, nearly twice as many organizations are reporting reduced levels of employee engagement compared today compared to two years ago (24% versus 13%, respectively). Most of the blame for this waning engagement falls squarely on the shoulders of bosses.</p>
<p>Let’s face it, most people get promoted into management roles because they were good at their job, not because they possess any real management potential. I often refer to this as the great American business tragedy. It is a tragedy because we reward workplace success by putting people in a position they don’t necessarily want and often aren’t well suited for the added responsibilities. Not everyone wants to be the boss, but in most companies upward mobility means taking on people responsibility. To make matters worse, many companies don’t spend the time or money to provide the requisite training for new bosses to actually succeed in their new role. In other words, we reward success by setting people up for failure, creating a lose-lose proposition.</p>
<p>One way to avoid falling into the “bad boss” trap this year is to take responsibility into your own hands. Regardless of how successful you are as a boss, you can always do better. Here are three tips to get any boss off to the right start in 2013.</p>
<p>Look in the Mirror. You have to know yourself before you can effectively manage others. The way you manage is a reflection of your personality, culture and upbringing. Take the time to think about how your life journey has shaped the way you manage and make decisions and consider the following:</p>
<p>Advertisement</p>
<p>&#160;Listen First, Shoot Questions Later. Good bosses are good listeners. Learn how to actively listen to those who get the job done because they are your experts and they need to know you hear them.</p>
<p>Encourage More, Punish Less. Anyone who has taken Psychology 101 knows that punishment stops bad behavior, but it doesn't produce new good behavior. Learn to reinforce the good and please remember not everything is about money. In fact, it's rarely about money. People just want their good work recognized. Consider the following:</p>
<p>Whether you are a line supervisor, middle manager, or executive, as the boss you are responsible for setting the tone and creating a positive and productive work environment. When bosses fail to do this, turnover increases, morale drops, and hiring expenses skyrocket.</p> | Tips for Being a Better Boss in 2013 | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2013/01/28/tips-for-being-better-boss-in-2013.html | 2016-03-04 | 0 |
<p>ROCKY HILL, Conn. (AP) _ These Connecticut lotteries were drawn Tuesday:</p>
<p>Cash 5</p>
<p>01-02-15-21-24</p>
<p>(one, two, fifteen, twenty-one, twenty-four)</p>
<p>Lotto</p>
<p>11-16-22-25-30-38</p>
<p>(eleven, sixteen, twenty-two, twenty-five, thirty, thirty-eight)</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $1.2 million</p>
<p>Lucky Links Day</p>
<p>03-05-08-11-15-19-20-21</p>
<p>(three, five, eight, eleven, fifteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one)</p>
<p>Lucky Links Night</p>
<p>01-03-05-11-12-13-17-20</p>
<p>(one, three, five, eleven, twelve, thirteen, seventeen, twenty)</p>
<p>Mega Millions</p>
<p>02-06-30-31-55, Mega Ball: 7, Megaplier: 4</p>
<p>(two, six, thirty, thirty-one, fifty-five; Mega Ball: seven; Megaplier: four)</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $63 million</p>
<p>Play3 Day</p>
<p>4-6-1</p>
<p>(four, six, one)</p>
<p>Play3 Night</p>
<p>1-0-1</p>
<p>(one, zero, one)</p>
<p>Play4 Day</p>
<p>2-3-6-1</p>
<p>(two, three, six, one)</p>
<p>Play4 Night</p>
<p>1-3-5-6</p>
<p>(one, three, five, six)</p>
<p>Powerball</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $92 million</p>
<p>ROCKY HILL, Conn. (AP) _ These Connecticut lotteries were drawn Tuesday:</p>
<p>Cash 5</p>
<p>01-02-15-21-24</p>
<p>(one, two, fifteen, twenty-one, twenty-four)</p>
<p>Lotto</p>
<p>11-16-22-25-30-38</p>
<p>(eleven, sixteen, twenty-two, twenty-five, thirty, thirty-eight)</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $1.2 million</p>
<p>Lucky Links Day</p>
<p>03-05-08-11-15-19-20-21</p>
<p>(three, five, eight, eleven, fifteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one)</p>
<p>Lucky Links Night</p>
<p>01-03-05-11-12-13-17-20</p>
<p>(one, three, five, eleven, twelve, thirteen, seventeen, twenty)</p>
<p>Mega Millions</p>
<p>02-06-30-31-55, Mega Ball: 7, Megaplier: 4</p>
<p>(two, six, thirty, thirty-one, fifty-five; Mega Ball: seven; Megaplier: four)</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $63 million</p>
<p>Play3 Day</p>
<p>4-6-1</p>
<p>(four, six, one)</p>
<p>Play3 Night</p>
<p>1-0-1</p>
<p>(one, zero, one)</p>
<p>Play4 Day</p>
<p>2-3-6-1</p>
<p>(two, three, six, one)</p>
<p>Play4 Night</p>
<p>1-3-5-6</p>
<p>(one, three, five, six)</p>
<p>Powerball</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $92 million</p> | CT Lottery | false | https://apnews.com/amp/d4f111ae2655472291319f9ec08447d6 | 2018-01-24 | 2 |
<p>Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission has declared President Hamid Karzai the winner of a second five-year term after his rival Abdullah Abdullah dropped out of the race. Abdullah said the runoff would be just as corrupt as the original election and withdrew in protest.</p>
<p>The U.S. and Britain have already lined up behind Karzai, whose authority is so limited he is derisively known as the “Mayor of Kabul.”</p>
<p>President Barack Obama was due to give Karzai a call Monday to officially acknowledge Karzai’s victory, according to White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.</p>
<p>Karzai has been Afghanistan’s front man since the U.S. removed the Taliban from power in 2001. — PZS and KA</p>
<p />
<p>BBC:</p>
<p>Hamid Karzai has been declared president of Afghanistan, after election officials scrapped a planned second round of voting.</p>
<p>The announcement comes a day after Mr Karzai’s sole challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, pulled out of the race.</p>
<p>Dr Abdullah, who had demanded the removal of key poll officials, said the vote would not have been fair. The first round had been marred by fraud.</p>
<p><a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8337832.stm" type="external">Read more</a></p> | Without an Opponent, Karzai Declared Winner | true | https://truthdig.com/articles/without-an-opponent-karzai-declared-winner/ | 2009-11-03 | 4 |
<p>Attorney General Jeff Sessions visited the White House Monday but didn’t meet with President Donald Trump, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters.</p>
<p>Trump, Sanders said, is “very disappointed” with Sessions’ recusal from the federal investigation into Russian meddling during the 2016 presidential election.</p>
<p>“I think the president has been extremely clear about his position, I know I’ve answered this question a number of times over the last week,” Sanders told reporters aboard Air Force One according to a report in <a href="http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/343518-white-house-trump-very-disappointed-by-sessions-recusal" type="external">The Hill</a>. “He’s very disappointed that Attorney General Sessions chose to recuse himself, and there’s not much more to add.”</p>
<p>Trump last week slammed Sessions for recusing himself, telling The New York Times he never would have appointed him had he known he would do that. The president took another swipe at the attorney general Monday morning, calling him “our beleaguered A.G.” in a tweet.</p>
<p>So why aren’t the Committees and investigators, and of course our beleaguered A.G., looking into Crooked Hillarys crimes &amp; Russia relations?</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/889467610332528641" type="external">July 24, 2017</a></p> | Huckabee Sanders: Sessions Did Not Meet With Trump | false | https://newsline.com/huckabee-sanders-sessions-did-not-meet-with-trump/ | 2017-07-24 | 1 |
<p>The media predictably exploded this week after a Democratic congresswoman attacked President Donald Trump for allegedly making insensitive remarks to the family of a fallen U.S. soldier — accusing the President of saying callously that the soldier “knew what he signed up for.”</p>
<p>While other Gold Star families had come out and <a href="http://time.com/4988112/donald-trump-niger-dustin-wright/" type="external">said</a> that President Trump was respectful when he called them — suggesting the media and Democrats were taking his remarks out of context — the media instead focused on portraying the President as a heartless monster.</p>
<p>What the media did not do was point out that former President Barack Obama <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-graduation-columbus-police-divisions-114th-class" type="external">said</a> essentially the same thing to a graduating class of police officers in Columbus, Ohio in 2009:</p>
<p>The job you signed up for is not easy. It can mean long shifts and late nights. It demands focus, and determination, and great bravery in the face of unknown dangers. When you run into that building or chase down that suspect, you will be risking your own life in order to protect the lives of men and women you have never met, and some that you may never know.</p>
<p>But you knew all that when you joined the academy. You knew the risks involved, you knew the sacrifices required, and yet you stood up and said, "I’ll take that risk. I’ll make that sacrifice. I will do that job."</p>
<p>During the Obama administration, many — including top police officials — blamed the president for creating a "war on cops," often citing "systemic racism" in law enforcement while rarely urging people to support the police.</p>
<p>William Johnson, the executive director of the National Association of Police Organizations, <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/obama-war-on-cops-police-advocacy-group-225291" type="external">spoke</a> about Obama’s "war on cops" following the murder of five police officers in Dallas at a Black Lives Matter rally:</p>
<p>I think [the Obama administration] continued appeasements at the federal level with the Department of Justice, their appeasement of violent criminals, their refusal to condemn movements like Black Lives Matter, actively calling for the death of police officers, that type of thing, all the while blaming police for the problems in this country has led directly to the climate that has made Dallas possible.</p>
<p>I think one of the big differences then was you had governors and mayors and the president — whether it was President Johnson or President Nixon, Republican or Democrat — condemning violence against the police and urging support for the police.</p>
<p>Today that's markedly absent. I think that's a huge difference, and that's directly led to the climate that allows these attacks to happen.</p> | Obama Told Police: Risking Your Lives Is Part Of 'Job You Signed Up For' | true | https://dailywire.com/news/22504/obama-told-police-risking-your-lives-part-job-you-ryan-saavedra | 2017-10-19 | 0 |
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<p>RIO RANCHO - The artwork of Rio Rancho and Cleveland high school and Cyber Academy seniors will be on display as part of the annual Rio Rancho Public Schools Senior Art Show "Rising Stars."</p>
<p>The show takes place on the third and fourth floors of City Hall starting Thursday through April 22, according to a city news release. Viewing hours are Monday-Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. City Hall is located at 3200 Civic Center Circle.</p>
<p>A public reception will be held on from 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. on April 4 on the third floor of City Hall. Awards will be presented to students featured in the exhibit.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p> | Teens' art to be shown in City Hall | false | https://abqjournal.com/372919/teens-art-to-be-shown-in-city-hall.html | 2 |
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<p>ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The fire that caused an estimated $250,000 in damage to the First Baptist Church on Broadway NE has been determined to be arson, the Albuquerque Fire Department announced late Thursday.</p>
<p>The Wednesday night fire caused heavy smoke and fire damage to the first three floors of the building and minor smoke damage to the fourth floor.</p>
<p>Pick up Friday’s Albuquerque Journal to read the full story.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p> | First Baptist Church Fire Ruled Arson | false | https://abqjournal.com/6231/first-baptist-church-fire-ruled-arson.html | 2 |
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<p>It is with as much embarrassment as pundits are able to muster that I am forced to acknowledge that the Texas Board of Education may now consider itself vindicated by none other than some school administrators in a town in what is one of the more enlightened (but for its choice of Senator) states in the country. It was but a few weeks ago that this writer mocked Texas for having adopted standards for its science textbooks that contradicted any notion that evolution had affected the board’s members.</p>
<p>Confronted by evolution and global warming the Texas board insisted that its textbooks examine “all sides of scientific evidence” which includes the notion that the earth is but 6000 years old, give or take a couple hundred. The Discovery Institute that doesn’t discover contemporary truths, trumpeted what it called a “huge victory for those who favor teaching the scientific evidence for and against evolution.”</p>
<p>Dr. Don McLeroy, a dentist and probably a very good one, who headed the Texas Board of Education at the time of this triumph of rhyme over reason described the decision as winning “the Grand Slam and the Super Bowl.” Not content with such hyperbole he went on to say that: “Our science standards are light years ahead of any other state when it comes to challenging evolution.”</p>
<p>The school administrators responsible for the Weston Intermediate School, though probably not sympathetic with the successes of the Texas board, have shown that they are sensitive to the feelings of those who are troubled by the thought that they have evolved from forms they find not pleasing to contemplate. Our teacher about evolutionary matters in the Weston Connecticut school district is Mark Tangarone, a teacher in the Talented and Gifted Program (TAG).</p>
<p>Mr. Tangarone has been a teacher in the Weston school system for the last 17 years. His last day of teaching in the district will take place on the last day of the current school year. Mr. Tangarone is leaving because of evolution. His problems with the concept began in 2008.</p>
<p>In 2008 he created a program around the fact that Lincoln and Darwin were born on the same day in the same year. A part of the program dealt with Darwin’s journey to Australia and Asia and included a discussion about evolution. Mr. Tangarone submitted an outline of the program to Dr. Mark Ribbens who was then the school’s principal.</p>
<p>Dr. Ribbens rejected the proposed program because of its discussion of evolution. In an e-mail, a medium that is an obvious result of evolution, Dr. Ribbens way gave evolution credit for being a “robust scientific theory” that nonetheless provided a philosophically unsatisfactory explanation for the diversity of life.” He went on to explain that evolution “touches on a core belief-Do we share common ancestry with other living organisms? What does it mean to be a human being. . . . I know personally that I would be challenged in leading a 10-year old through this sort of discussion while maintaining the appropriate sensitivity to a family’s religious beliefs or traditions.”</p>
<p>Dr. Ribbens concluded by saying evolution was not age appropriate for Mr. Tangarone’s students and said “TAG topics need to be altered this year to eliminate the teaching of Darwin’s work and the theory of evolution.”</p>
<p>Defending Dr. Ribbens, John Drummond and Carolyn Vinton, the Weston curriculum instructional leaders, said that the schools address evolution in what they call a “developmentally appropriate manner”. The lessons are taught in kindergarten and grades 3, 8 9 and 10, as the students themselves are evolving.</p>
<p>Mr. Tangarone appealed Dr. Ribbens’ decision to the Assistant Superintendent, Tom Scarice who rejected the appeal. On February 12, 2010, Mr. Tangarone sent a letter to the school board announcing his retirement because of the censorship of his proposed program. Jerry Belaire, the school superintendent, said that the dispute had nothing to do with teaching evolution but said the 17-year veteran teacher was a disgruntled teacher who did not like being supervised and had been disciplined for attendance issues and insubordinate conduct, charges denied by Mr. Tangarone.</p>
<p>Many Weston parents, having evolved more than the members of the administration, have expressed concern and the school board has vowed to examine the circumstances surrounding the resignation. Dr. Ritter, meanwhile, has apologized for his e-mail to Mr. Tangarone saying: “Some of the things I said were written in the heat of the moment and could be wrong. If so, shame on me.” To that one can only add shame on the administration that attempted to cover up a patently absurd decision by attempting to impugn the integrity of Mr. Tangarone.</p>
<p>As the president of the school board said, speaking of Mr. Taggarone: “On a personal note, both of my children were fortunate to have Mark, and this is a real loss for our system.” That observation suggests that Weston may yet prove itself different from, and further evolved than, Texas.</p>
<p>CHRISTOPHER BRAUCHLI is a lawyer in Boulder, Colorado. He can be e-mailed at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a>.</p>
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<p><a href="http://greentags.bigcartel.com/" type="external">WORDS THAT STICK</a></p>
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<p /> | You Say You Want to Teach Some Evolution, Well, You Know … | true | https://counterpunch.org/2010/05/07/you-say-you-want-to-teach-some-evolution-well-you-know/ | 2010-05-07 | 4 |
<p>Tragedy often brings out the worst in the media. The horrific events that took place last night in Las Vegas have been no exception. Bodies are still unidentified, motives still unknown, and the media has <a href="" type="internal">predictably been quick to pounce on the gun control narrative</a>.</p>
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<p>There is something particularly vile about certain mindsets under such circumstances, and with liberalism being a mental disorder,’ even worse thoughts sometimes slip out from weak minds.</p>
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<p>Take&#160;Hayley Geftman-Gold, a legal executive working at CBS, for example.</p>
<p>A <a href="http://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2017/10/02/media-criticism-cbs-legal-exec-no-sympathy-because-country-music-fans-often-are-republican/" type="external">Daily Caller</a> report revealed the inner thoughts of Geftman-Gold – mostly because she posted them on social media for the world to see – and it isn’t pretty.</p>
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<p>The&#160;Vice President and Senior Counsel of Strategic Transactions at CBS Corporation writes that she has no sympathy for the victims of the Las Vegas mass shooting “because country music fans often are Republican gun toters.”</p>
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<p>No, she really did say that.</p>
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<p>Geftman-Gold made her comments during an online conversation with photographer Erin Fagan Silber, presumably in a discussion about gun control.</p>
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<p>Geftman-Gold’s LinkedIn profile lists her most recent position at CBS Corporation, as well as a lengthy stint with MTV and Viacom.</p>
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<p>Geftman-Gold also happens to be a big fan of former Democrat candidate for President, Hillary Clinton. So much so, that she held a block party for Hillary on election night in 2016.</p>
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<p>The block party was held at the intersection of President and Clinton Streets, where many fans laughed and joked about their candidate’s inevitable win.</p>
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<p>“Looks like the street signs in Brooklyn are rigged,” one supporter joked in a since-deleted tweet.</p>
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<p>A Facebook event posting read,&#160;“Come celebrate the election of our first female POTUS!”</p>
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<p>By the end of the night, the event organizer lamented “I’m curled up in a fetal position at home.”</p>
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<p>Now, Geftman-Gold is actively cheering the possibility that many of the victims in Las Vegas may have been Republicans. That’s how blinded she is by Clinton’s loss it would seem.</p>
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<p>What a sick, sick individual.</p>
<p>Are you surprised how people on the left are reacting to the Las Vegas shooting? Share your thoughts below!</p>
<p /> | CBS Legal Exec: No Sympathy For Vegas Victims Because ‘Country Music Fans Often Republicans’ | true | http://thepoliticalinsider.com/cbs-executive-vegas-shooting/ | 2017-10-02 | 0 |
<p><a href="//videos/37/62727" type="external" /></p>
<p>RUSH: I think it was last week, actually. Let me see, might have been Monday this week. We had a story, shared it with you, that the Regime was very quietly preparing a bunch of green cards, ID cards — it was Monday, thank you — for anywhere between nine and 34 million illegal residents. It was part of Obama’s executive action amnesty program, which many people have thought, or did think that he would implement before Labor Day.</p>
<p>Well, Labor Day came and went, nothing happened. Then people said, “Well, it’ll happen before November.” Luis Gutierrez in Chicago, congressman, started going crazy with excitement. “Oh, yeah, it’s gonna happen and we gotta get people ready for it.” And then it didn’t happen. Obama said it was gonna be delayed. Now it’s come to be expected that he will do it after all of the elections have completed, including any runoffs, and it’s thought that Mary Landrieu will be in one and that Obama’s not gonna do this prior to the election so as not to do any further damage to the Democrat Party, but after that he’s gonna do it.</p>
<p>Now, I don’t think there’s any doubt he’s going to do it. If he could have done it by now, blaming the Republicans, he would have. ‘Cause folks, whoever does this there’s gonna be hell to pay. It is gonna roil this country like nothing you have ever seen. And Obama knows it. He’s very aware of that. That’s one of the reasons to do it, I fear. I think it’s one of the motivations. There literally is no logical reason to do this. There’s no reason to grant amnesty and immediate citizenship or even tiered citizenship and at the same time keep these borders open. There’s just no point in it.</p>
<p>You’re gonna lower wages. You’re gonna put further pressure on the job market. You’re gonna marginalize native-born Americans. It’s gonna cause utter chaos. It’s going to put me more pressure on the welfare system, the welfare state. There’s nothing to recommend it, other than cheap labor. But the real reason Obama’s gonna do it is to make the Democrat Party a permanent, I mean permanent, forever, majority. That’s the reason he’s going to do it. And I am convinced the Democrat Party doesn’t really care what kind of country it is, as long as they run it. Because as long as they run it, it will be a welfare state. And the bigger welfare state, the better for them, because that means more people that can do nothing but vote for them in order to live, in order to exist.</p>
<p>They love that kind of power. You know, the heck with the founding, the heck with individuals and hard work and the American dream. All that’s bogus ’cause it doesn’t happen to everybody, so it’s illegitimate, they think. The American dream doesn’t touch everybody, but their policies will. Nobody will be left behind when the Democrats are in charge. Everybody will be equal, even if it’s miserable.</p>
<p>It’s just like FDR sought a permanent majority, a permanent Democrat Party majority with the New Deal. That had nothing to do, however, with flooding the nation with immigrants who were not citizens. That had to do with just creating a massive welfare state that couldn’t be undone, and he did it. But this gets back to another thing we talked about. After a while the American people instinctively know that’s not right, because there isn’t any prosperity for anybody. There’s no growth. There’s no reminder of what’s possible, and so they vote the Democrats out for a while until they feel it’s safe to return to them an election or two later. And I think the Democrats are trying to eliminate that cycle.</p>
<p>Even if people get tired of them, even if people get tired of their policies, there’s no way they can lose because the vast majority of people who vote are gonna be registered as Democrats, and that’s the end. So that’s his objective. To hell with what happens in the country. That doesn’t matter. Because whatever happens to the country, Obama will be insulated from it and Pelosi will be insulated from it and all these powerful Democrats and the Hollywood community, they’ll be insulated from it. They won’t have to live in and around the new America that gets created with this, so they think. That’s for the rest of us to have to put up with.</p>
<p>So, anyway, the story hit on Monday that the White House was preparing all of these IDs and green cards and what have you. The <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/oct/20/editorial-green-cards-on-the-table/" type="external">Washington Times</a> editorialized it this way. “The White House intended to remain silent about its plans for immigration. Revealing a scheme to open the floodgates of amnesty would be disastrous on the eve of the critical midterm elections. But this is the gang that canÂ’t shoot straight. The US Citizenship and Immigration Services on Friday threw open the door to as many as 100,000 Haitians, who will now move into the United States without a visa.”</p>
<p>Did you know about that? I’m sorry, I thought I had mentioned that. I thought that came up Monday when I talked about it. That happened last Friday, 100,000 Haitians. Do you remember way back in the early nineties, the boat people, and the big argument about what do we do with these people, and it was back and forth, let ’em in, send ’em home? Nothing has really changed except now a hundred thousand of them are going to be allowed to move here and come here without a visa. That was last Friday.</p>
<p>“Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican, rightly and accurately denounced enabling Haitians awaiting a U.S. visa to enter the country and legally apply for work permits as ‘an irresponsible overreach of the executive branchÂ’s authority.'” Well, it is that, but that doesn’t even get close to describing what this is.</p>
<p>“That was just the beginning.” The 100,000 Haitians being allowed entry without a visa. “The immigration agency earlier this month had solicited a printer able to handle a ‘surge’ of 9 million green cards ‘to support possible future immigration-reform initiative requirements.'” You remember back in January we uncovered that the Regime posted a jobs listing memo on the government website. What they were looking for were vendors, private sector vendors who could handle the logistics of transporting all of the kids that were expected to cross the border from Central America all over the country, which means they knew it was going to happen.</p>
<p>They advertised for these job openings in a January 29th posting on a federal website, and in March and April we began to see tens of thousands of minors from Central America cross the Southern border, nobody could stop them, and they were processed in a matter of days each and then sent somewhere. Nobody really knew where. Families took them in all over the country. Same thing here. In this case, the jobs listing was for a printer able to handle a surge of nine million green cards to support possible future immigration reform initiative requirements, meaning Obama’s amnesty.</p>
<p>Now, “In an ordinary year, about 1 million green cards are issued, and over the life of this contract the company is expected to produce up to 34 million cards.” The first year is nine million. But over the course of the contract that the government is going to award to the printing company that can handle this, they were told to get ready to be able to produce 34 million cards over the life of the contract, which I think I saw is five to six years, maybe nine years.</p>
<p>That figure, 34 million, represents an increase in the population of this country by 10%. The cards, interestingly now, these green cards that will be handed out, “do not come with automatic voter registration, but thatÂ’s obviously what the scheme portends. President ObamaÂ’s promised ‘executive actions’ to bring about this enormous wave of amnesty constitute a transparent and cynical ploy to expand the Democratic voter base, creating a permanent majority.”</p>
<p>So this story, it was either a purposeful leak or somebody bungled something, but it has become known. So the follow-up to this is, <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/10/22/immigration-detainees-released-criminal-records/17714925/" type="external">USA Today</a> had a story yesterday: “US Misinformed Congress, Public on Immigrant Release — New records contradict the Obama administration’s assurances to Congress and the public that the 2,200 people it freed from immigration jails last year to save money had only minor criminal records.” This is another story, but it dovetails because there has been a massive prisoner release, and of them, hundreds, maybe thousands of illegal alien criminals have been set free, have been set loose.</p>
<p>The headline of this story should read, “White House Lied to Congress and Public About Illegal Alien Release.” Anyway, the upshot of all this is the Regime is now denying all of this. Josh Earnest is denying this story about the nine million to 34 million cards. He said this is a fantastic exaggeration. We don’t know where this is coming from. He’s out there trying to deny this left and right. But there’s no doubt that it’s true. It has to happen, if Obama is going to do this executive action amnesty, there are going to have to be cards or paperwork for all of these people. The print job has been put out for bid, and Josh Earnest at the White House is denying it all. “Ah, this is a bunch of people exaggerating.”</p>
<p>See, they’re afraid the news has come out too soon before the election. But these green cards, every one of these people is gonna end up with a driver’s license. You know what that gets you? A voter ID. That gets you a photo ID. You know what that gets you? On the voter rolls. That’s how they’re gonna do it. Every one of these, whether it’s nine million, 12 million, 34 million over a number of years, they’re all going to be permitted to get driver’s licenses. What do you have to have for one of those? You have to have a photo ID. Once you’ve got a driver’s license and a photo ID, you can get on the voter rolls.</p>
<p>BREAK TRANSCRIPT</p>
<p>RUSH: “The White House said Wednesday it was ‘crazy’ to attempt to divine the presidentÂ’s post-election plans for an immigration executive order based on a procurement request issued by the Department of Homeland Security.” Come on, you can’t read anything into us asking for nine million green cards to be printed. Who do you think? You can’t do that. Once again, the White House insulting everybody’s intelligence.</p>
<p>“‘I mean, this is crazy,’ White House press secretary Josh Earnest said, adding he would caution reporters against ‘making assumptions’ based on the ‘procurement of green paper,'” also known as the evidence. We’re being told to ignore the evidence. Here is Josh Earnest from the briefing yesterday afternoon in the White House. Major Garrett asked him a question. “Hey, about the printing of these additional green cards, are you saying it’s unrelated or is it coincidental?”</p>
<p>EARNEST: There are decisions that are made by lots of agencies, including the ordering of specific colored sheets of paper. Those sorts of decisions are not micromanaged by the White House.</p>
<p>GARRETT: Don’t be absurd with us. That’s not just a ordinary colored piece of paper.</p>
<p>EARNEST: I’m not suggesting that it is.</p>
<p>GARRETT: It is central to what the president has promised in public to do.</p>
<p>EARNEST: It’s also central to what they’re already doing. It’s also central to what they’re already doing.</p>
<p>GARRETT: That’s why I asked you the question, is it coincidental or is it unrelated?</p>
<p>EARNEST: You would have to ask the DHS about orders for green colored paper that they’ve ordered.</p>
<p>RUSH: There you have it, folks. I mean, that is how little regard they have for the concerns of people on amnesty. (imitating Earnest) “Green paper. You can’t expect us to be keeping track of every department’s requests for different kinds of printed colored paper.” And Major Garrett said, “Wait a second. This is central to what Obama’s promised to do. He’s been promising everybody executive action amnesty on immigration all year. And then Homeland Security offers up this print job for nine million to 34 million green cards, and you’re calling ’em green pieces of paper, print jobs that you guys can’t control?”</p>
<p>That’s how little regard this Regime has for the American people and their concerns. I mean, that is insolence. I mean, we’ve heard it before, but I think this is special because this is an outright denial that is dependent on their belief that you and I and all the rest of us are absolute blithering idiots. That we can look right at the evidence of what they intend to do, and it isn’t what we see. “There are decisions that are made by lots of agencies.” We all know what Obama intends to do! He intends amnesty. He intends to flood this country with illegal aliens.</p>
<p>He is gonna grant amnesty to those here and he’s gonna keep the border open and welcome all those who want in to come in as well. And they’re gonna get green cards, which means they’re gonna get driver’s licenses, which means they’re gonna end up on the voter registration rolls before it’s all over with motor voter. Ever heard of it? It’s called, with one signature, a permanent Democrat Party majority, not to mention the impact on the country, the culture, the economy, and everything else that’s gonna happen with this.</p>
<p>So when a reporter asks him about it, “Well, come on, these are different pieces of colored paper. Come on!” This is just… I don’t know. I’m trying to think of a word that’s permissible to use and I can’t come up with one. It’s just insolent thuggery. But I wanted to update you on the story as to the latest because I’ve been threatening to and never got to it all week. It turns out that it worked out well because of Josh Earnest and his press briefing yesterday where he says, “These stories are crazy.”</p>
<p>At the bottom of this article, it’s a Hill.com article, bottom of this article, “Business and immigration organizations lobbied Obama to expand the green card program for high-tech workers and the relatives of existing US citizens and permanent residents. They’ve suggested altering how the federal government issues green cards.” So it’s not just Obama. It’s business and immigration. Chamber of Commerce and La Raza, basically, have been lobbying Obama to do this. And the only people that do not want any part of it are the vast majority of the American people.</p> | The Regime’s Brazen Green Card Lie | true | http://rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2014/10/23/the_regime_s_brazen_green_card_lie | 2014-10-23 | 0 |
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<p>For starters, Nuñez is running as a Republican in this year’s House District 36 rematch. Nuñez served 10 years in the Legislature as a conservative Democrat but changed his party affiliation to independent in 2011 after a split with then-House Speaker Ben Lujan.</p>
<p>After being defeated in his 2012 re-election bid – Nuñez came in third with about 21 percent of the vote – he switched his affiliation once again in the run-up to this year’s election cycle.</p>
<p>“I’m the same Andy Nu</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>ñ ez I was way back when,” he insisted in a Journal interview. “I’ve never followed leadership 100 percent … And I’ve still got a lot of Democrats who are going to vote for me, I’m sure.”</p>
<p>Archuleta, a Las Cruces Democrat, said he thinks voters are skeptical of Nuñez, who plans to continue serving as Hatch mayor if elected to the Legislature.</p>
<p>“People I meet tell me they can’t trust him because he keeps switching from one party to another,” Archuleta said.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Archuleta’s two-year House term has been clouded by health problems. The retired state government employee had a leg amputated in January and missed this year’s 30-day legislative session.</p>
<p>He said he regularly watched session webcasts and sponsored several bills, but he eventually decided to return nearly $5,100 to the Legislative Council Service that he had received as compensation for attending the session.</p>
<p>Archuleta said he now has a clean bill of health and has been campaigning daily, using a motorized wheelchair.</p>
<p>“I’ve been feeling good,” he said, adding that his experience has prompted him to consider introducing legislation that would provide more scholarships for nursing students.</p>
<p>On the issues, both candidates tout the importance of water to the district, which stretches southward for about 50 miles along Interstate 25 from just north of Hatch into Las Cruces.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>“If we don’t get our water situation straightened out, we’re not going to have economic development,” Nuñez said.</p>
<p>However, they disagree over whether more money should be diverted from the state’s largest permanent fund for early childhood education – Archuleta supports the idea, while Nuñez opposes it.</p>
<p>They also disagree on the 2003 law that allows immigrants who are in the country illegally to obtain New Mexico driver’s licenses.</p>
<p>Nuñez previously has sponsored legislation to do away with the driver’s license law, and Archuleta says it helps many agricultural workers and employers in the district.</p>
<p>The race is among those that are seen as key to determining whether Democrats retain control of the House – where they now have a 37-33 advantage.</p>
<p>As of last month, Archuleta reported having $39,745 in his campaign account, with large contributions from several labor unions. Nuñez reported having $25,772 in his campaign war chest. He has received two $1,000 donations from a national Republican political committee targeting New Mexico races.</p>
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<p /> | House candidates spar over party allegiances | false | https://abqjournal.com/476835/house-candidates-spar-over-party-allegiances.html | 2 |
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<p>Dear Debt Adviser,&#160;</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>I appreciate your column. It is very informative. I was wondering if working with a credit counseling service to lower your interest rate affects your credit score. While our scores are good (715-730), we overextended ourselves and the interest/finance charges on our credit cards are outrageous (29.99% in some cases). Our goal is to get the balances down as much as possible. I know not using the card will be one of your suggestions, but it will take much longer because anything extra we pay is eaten up by the interest. Please help!&#160;</p>
<p>- Marie</p>
<p>Dear Marie,</p>
<p>Thank you for the kind words. I'm glad you enjoy the column. Let's see what we can do to answer your questions and improve your situation.</p>
<p>First, with a credit score of 715 to 730, you should qualify for a credit card with a much lower interest rate. If you have not received balance transfer offers from other credit card issuers, I suggest you look at <a href="http://www.bankrate.com/credit-cards/balance-transfer-cards.aspx?pid=p:foxbz" type="external">Bankrate's balance transfer cards Opens a New Window.</a> to find a card with a low or no transfer fee and a low interest rate. You may be able to transfer at least some if not all of the high interest rate balance to the new card. This will help with your interest rates, but not your balances.</p>
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<p>For that, contacting a nonprofit credit counseling member of the National Foundation for Credit Counseling or the Association of Independent Consumer Credit Counseling Agencies has merit. A certified counselor will review your finances and help you sort through all your options. The counseling is confidential and neither your creditors nor FICO will know about it. A debt management plan (to pay off your balances within three to five years) may or may not be a good fit for you, but regardless, you'll get a rigorous budget review. This may help you find more money to put toward balances every month. If you opt for the debt management plan, you may or may not have any damage to your credit score. It depends on how each individual creditor reports your account while in a plan.</p>
<p>You could also try to settle your debts for less than the full balance owed, but that would require a lump-sum payment and would definitely damage your credit. If you want to try to settle your debts, I suggest you contact your creditors directly and not use a debt settlement company.</p>
<p>Balance transfers, credit counseling and debt settlement each has its own consequence. No matter what you do, you need to stop adding to your debts if you ever hope to get your balances under control.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Ask the adviser</p>
<p>To ask a question of the Debt Adviser, go to the " <a href="http://www.bankrate.com/brm/ask.asp" type="external">Ask the Experts Opens a New Window.</a>" page and select "Debt" as the topic. Read more <a href="http://www.bankrate.com/finance/personal-finance/advisers/debt-adviser.aspx?pid=p:foxbz" type="external">Debt Adviser Opens a New Window.</a> columns and more <a href="http://www.bankrate.com/debt-management.aspx?pid=p:foxbz" type="external">stories Opens a New Window.</a> about debt management.</p>
<p>Bankrate's content, including the guidance of its advice-and-expert columns and this website, is intended only to assist you with financial decisions. The content is broad in scope and does not consider your personal financial situation. Bankrate recommends that you seek the advice of advisers who are fully aware of your individual circumstances before making any final decisions or implementing any financial strategy. Please remember that your use of this website is governed by <a href="http://www.bankrate.com/coinfo/disclaimer.asp" type="external">Bankrate's Terms of Use Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p>Copyright 2014, Bankrate Inc.</p> | Get Debt Down With Balance Transfer? | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2014/07/10/get-debt-down-with-balance-transfer.html | 2016-03-06 | 0 |
<p><a href="" type="internal" />Neel Kashkari is running for governor under the slogan, “Jobs. Education. That’s it.” The Republican businessman today released his detailed, 26-page plan for the first part of that promise: Jobs. The title is, “ <a href="http://www.neelkashkari.com/jobs/" type="external">Neel Kashkari’s Jobs Plan: Rebuilding the Middle Class</a>.”</p>
<p>The plan begins by attacking Gov. Jerry Brown for not doing enough for the middle class:</p>
<p>“[W]hen Governor Brown was elected more than 35 years ago, it was good to be a middle class family in California – parents had good jobs and children had access to a good education.&#160;Unfortunately for&#160;millions of&#160;families today,&#160;that is&#160;no longer&#160;true.&#160;Back then, California ranked 24th in jobs; it now ranks 47th.&#160;Back then, California had the&#160;11th most educated workforce; it has&#160;since dropped to 48th.&#160;Back then, California ranked 26th – middle of&#160;the pack – for highest poverty&#160;rate; the state now&#160;ranks 1st.&#160;Jobs, education, and poverty.&#160;In each of these areas,&#160;the state’s standing has been devastated, shrinking the middle class and foreclosing the opportunity of future generations.&#160;Jerry Brown’s legacy is the destruction&#160;of California’s&#160;middle class.”</p>
<p>The analysis has some truth to it. But one problem is that the large gap between the state and national rates began in 2006, under Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The 40-year education decline continued under not just Brown and fellow Democratic Gov. Gray Davis, but under Republican Govs. George Deukmejian, Pete Wilson and Schwarzenegger.</p>
<p>Kashkari’s plan also doesn’t finger the main culprit in both the demise of the middle-class and the rise in the poverty rate: sky-high housing values. In 1970, housing cost about the national average; but California’s moderate climate meant less spent on heating and air conditioning. By contrast, today the Orange County Register <a href="http://www.ocregister.com/articles/million-606782-dollar-listings.html" type="external">reported</a> that O.C. now has the fourth-highest number of million-dollar home values among American counties, at 24 percent.</p>
<p>Which means three of the top four counties in the Million Dollar Home Club are in California. The other three are: San Francisco, 43 percent of homes; Fairfield, Conn., 30 percent; and San Jose, 26 percent.</p>
<p>Not much can be done about this because not just liberals and environmentalists would oppose loosening housing laws to allow for more construction. So would Republicans in the middle-class who want to keep their property values from plummeting if new homes were built in vast amounts.</p>
<p>Moreover, <a href="http://www.ca-ilg.org/post/basics-sb-375" type="external">Senate Bill 375</a> was signed into law by the Republican Schwarzenegger in 2008. It makes it state policy to squeeze more people into high-rises and out of suburban, middle-class homes.</p>
<p>And throughout the past 40 years decried by Kashkari, both houses of the Legislature have been completely controlled by Democrats, excepting only a single year, 1996, when <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curt_Pringle" type="external">Republicans controlled the Assembly</a>. That isn’t going to change.</p>
<p>Coming to specifics, Kashkari’s plan includes some good ideas:</p>
<p><a href="http://gen.usc.edu/assets/001/84955.pdf" type="external">“Support safe development of the Monterey Shale Formation.”</a> He cites the <a href="http://gen.usc.edu/assets/001/84955.pdf" type="external">2013 USC study</a>on what a boon this would be to California, including the creation of 3.3 million new jobs, $223 billion added to the economy and $25 billion more for the state treasury. He writes, “While fracking has been safely conducted in California for decades, the&#160;opportunity presented by the Monterey Shale Formation presents a new frontier&#160;for in-state oil extraction.” And he&#160;charges, “Governor Brown has shown no sense&#160;of urgency to unleash energy sector jobs and appears content with the status&#160;quo.”</p>
<p>The problem will be that Brown anticipated such a challenge and last year signed into law <a href="http://www.eenews.net/stories/1059987668" type="external">SB4</a>, by state Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Calabasas, that expands fracking. Kashkari’s plan would do more. But in a debate, Brown could respond that he is advancing fracking, but in a responsible way that protects the environment. Brown would charge that Kashkari’s plan would help oil companies at the expense of the environment.</p>
<p>“Create an environment where small businesses&#160;and farms can grow and put people back to work.” Businesses continually complain California’s state and local red tape is even a greater impediment to jobs creation than high taxes. Brown has tried to pooh-pooh governors such as Rick Perry of Texas coming here to poach jobs.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">As Joseph Perkins reported</a>&#160;on CalWatchdog.com on Perry’s recent visit to California, the Lone Star State governor enticed Golden State businesses with promises of “low taxes, predictable regulations, fair legal system and skilled workforce.”</p>
<p>The plan promises:</p>
<p>“Neel will reform the regulatory system by&#160;spearheading a law that will require a 10-year rolling regulatory sunset&#160;whereby all regulations are evaluated in light of changing economic&#160;conditions, evidence that the regulation is ineffective, or at the emergence&#160;of a superseding federal regulation that may require better coordination.”</p>
<p>That might require a voter initiative to enact. But this seems like a plank that will resonate for Kashkari, especially among the Latino, Asian and African American small businesses folks the GOP is trying to attract.</p>
<p>“Ask voters to cancel high-speed rail and redirect bond money toward&#160;critical water storage projects, while working with Washington to craft a&#160;cost-sharing agreement.”</p>
<p>The rail project is impracticable and could be thrown out in court, as Kathy Hamilton <a href="" type="internal">has reported</a>on CalWatchdog.com. California voters also <a href="http://www.calnewsroom.com/2014/02/12/californians-strongly-against-high-speed-rail-new-poll-finds/" type="external">increasingly are opposing it</a>. The train is a boondoggle that could help Kashkari’s campaign.</p>
<p>Diverting money instead to water-storage projects also is something that will attract voters as the drought continues. So far, Brown’s response to the drought has been to declare an emergency and propose <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/california/ci_25181590/california-drought-aid-plan-set-687-million-plan" type="external">a $687 million plan</a>for aid and conservation.</p>
<p>“Adopt Flex Time rules to allow greater cooperation between employers and&#160;workers.” This is a good idea. California mandates overtime (with some exceptions) for any hours worked beyond eight hours a day. Most states mandate overtime based on a 40-hour week, which allows employers and employees more flexibility.</p>
<p>For example, a parent might want to work six hours on Monday to attend a child’s soccer game, then make up for it with 10 hours on Tuesday. In California, the employer must pay overtime for that extra two hours on Tuesday, so likely will turn down the request.</p>
<p>The Democratic Party, however, is strongly against any change. And it would be hard to pass an initiative that labor would label “anti-worker.”</p>
<p>Kashkari is going to have difficulty in the June Top Two primary besting his fellow Republican, Assemblyman Tim Donnelly of Hesperia. And Brown will be close to unbeatable in November.</p>
<p>But Kashkari’s plan includes a lot of good ideas and will stand him in good stead. And even losing campaigns sometimes churn up ideas that later are adopted by the victors.</p> | Analysis: Kashkari unveils economic plan | false | https://calwatchdog.com/2014/03/25/analysis-kashkari-unveils-economic-plan/ | 2018-03-20 | 3 |
<p>Perhaps the most interesting economic thinking of recent years has come out of the effort to understand the collapse of communism. And the implications of this thinking are far removed from the simplistic market worship that so many, in East and West alike, have taken up to replace shattered preconceptions.</p>
<p>Serious students of communist economics have focused on elucidating the mechanism of central planning. In neither its Stalinist nor its Brezhnevite variety, they find, did the planning mechanism represent a rational allocation of resources according to economic criteria. Rather, it was a system of bureaucratic bargaining that reconciled arbitrary directives from the top with the needs and desires of individual enterprises. The shift of power over the years from the top downward into the bureaucratic apparatus was a key element in the system's stagnation and eventual collapse.r</p>
<p /> | Bureaucracy and Markets: Lessons from the Fall of Communism | true | https://dissentmagazine.org/article/bureaucracy-and-markets-lessons-from-the-fall-of-communism | 2018-10-07 | 4 |
<p>From the <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/comey-fbi-hasn-charged-conclusions-clinton-probe-article-1.2861086?utm_content=buffer91904&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=twitter.com&amp;utm_campaign=NYDailyNewsTw" type="external">New York Daily News</a>:</p>
<p>FBI Director James Comey on Sunday once again cleared Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server — ending the agency’s surprise second probe as suddenly as it began. After nearly upending an already-raucous presidential election with an eleventh-hour reexamination of Clinton’s emails, Comey sent a letter to congressional lawmakers that left heads spinning once again.</p>
<p>“Based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July with respect to Secretary Clinton,” Comey wrote, referencing his recommendation to not press charges for Clinton’s use of a private email server. “I am very grateful to the professionals at the FBI for doing an extraordinary amount of high-quality work in a short period of time.”</p>
<p>Comey’s last-minute meddling generated immediate calls for his ouster amid charges that he could have affected the outcome of a close presidential election. Indeed, polls showed Clinton losing support — some surveys showed her falling more than 8 percentage points — over the issue in the crucial final days before Election Day. Millions of people in early-voting states have already made up their minds and cast ballots, with the first Comey letter being their last impression before making their decisions.</p>
<p>Clinton, at a rally in Cleveland, where she was joined by Cleveland Cavaliers’ star LeBron James, did not address the latest FBI development. She merely rolled her eyes and shrugged her shoulders when she found out, according to a report.</p> | New York Daily News: NOW He Tells us | true | http://joemygod.com/2016/11/07/new-york-daily-news-now-he-tells-us/ | 2016-11-07 | 4 |
<p>Comcast Corp on Thursday unveiled a wireless service with an unlimited data plan, making it the first major U.S. cable provider to enter the highly competitive wireless market.</p>
<p>Unlimited data, talk and text will be available by mid-year for $65 per line for up to five lines, or $45 per line for customers with Comcast's top X1 packages, which bundle TV, internet and phone services, the company said.</p>
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<p>U.S. wireless carriers Verizon Communications Inc , AT&amp;T Inc , T-Mobile US Inc and Sprint Corp have recently offered unlimited monthly plans ranging from $50 to $90 for a single line.</p>
<p>The details released on Thursday removed some uncertainty in the market on how Comcast would price and roll out its service, dubbed Xfinity Mobile. Comcast shares closed 2.1 percent higher at $38.13.</p>
<p>Comcast is moving into wireless as cable companies seek to add more services to reduce customer churn, or attrition, as younger viewers shun high-priced subscriptions in favor of cheaper online options.</p>
<p>Rival cable provider Charter Communications Inc plans to launch a wireless service in 2018.</p>
<p>Comcast's service will launch on Verizon's airwaves as part of a 2011 agreement between the two companies. It will allow customers to switch automatically to Comcast's Wi-Fi hotspots from 4G LTE.</p>
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<p>Comcast will limit the service's rollout to customers within its footprint, which includes major markets like Philadelphia and Chicago. It will initially be available only to subscribers with Xfinity broadband service.</p>
<p>Comcast had roughly 25 million high-speed Internet customers in 2016, according to a filing.</p>
<p>It did not state its investment in Xfinity Mobile or the expected return. Chief Financial Officer Mike Cavanagh said in a meeting with analysts on Thursday that the service would be cash flow positive over time.</p>
<p>Analysts at JPMorgan wrote in January that building a wireless business could cost Comcast hundreds of millions of dollars annually in the first few years, potentially cutting as much as 5 cents to 10 cents off earnings per share in 2017.</p>
<p>Jonathan Chaplin, an analyst at New Street Research, said in a note earlier this week that Comcast's agreement with Verizon was merely a way to enter the market.</p>
<p>"Comcast will secure far better economics in wireless in time, either through a network sharing arrangement with or an acquisition of one or more carriers," he said.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Anjali Athavaley; Editing by Dan Grebler and Richard Chang)</p> | Comcast enters U.S. wireless business with unlimited data plans | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2017/04/06/comcast-enters-us-wireless-business-with-unlimited-data-plans.html | 2017-04-06 | 0 |
<p>By Ellen Brown, Web of Debt</p>
<p><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/epsos/" type="external">epSos.de</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/" type="external">(CC BY 2.0)</a></p>
<p>This piece first appeared at <a href="http://ellenbrown.com/2015/02/10/why-public-banks-outperform-private-banks-unfair-competition-or-a-better-mousetrap/" type="external">Web of Debt</a>.</p>
<p>In November 2014, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/articles/shale-boom-helps-north-dakota-bank-earn-returns-goldman-would-envy-1416180862" type="external">the Wall Street Journal reported</a> that the Bank of North Dakota (BND), the nation’s only state-owned bank, “is more profitable than Goldman Sachs Group Inc., has a better credit rating than J.P. Morgan Chase &amp; Co. and hasn’t seen profit growth drop since 2003.” The article credited the shale oil boom; but as discussed earlier <a href="http://ellenbrown.com/2014/11/19/wsj-reports-bank-of-north-dakota-outperforms-wall-street/" type="external">here</a>, North Dakota was already reporting record profits in the spring of 2009, when every other state was in the red and the oil boom had not yet hit. The later increase in state deposits cannot explain the bank’s stellar record either.</p>
<p />
<p>Then what does explain it? The BND turns a tidy profit year after year because it has substantially lower costs and risks then private commercial banks. It has no exorbitantly-paid executives; pays no bonuses, fees, or commissions; has no private shareholders; and has low borrowing costs. It does not need to advertise for depositors (it has a captive deposit base in the state itself) or for borrowers (it is a wholesome wholesale bank that partners with local banks that have located borrowers). The BND also has no losses from derivative trades gone wrong. It engages in old-fashioned conservative banking and does not speculate in derivatives.</p>
<p>Lest there be any doubt about the greater profitability of the public banking model, however, this conclusion was confirmed in January 2015 in a report by <a href="http://www.sparkassenstiftung.de/en/home.html" type="external">the Savings Banks Foundation for International Cooperation (SBFIC)</a> (the Sparkassenstiftung für internationale Kooperation), a non-profit organization founded by the the Sparkassen Finance Group (Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe) in Germany. The SBFIC was formed in 1992 to make the experience of the German Sparkassen – municipally-owned savings banks – accessible in other countries.</p>
<p>The Sparkassen were instituted in the late 18th century as nonprofit organizations to aid the poor. The intent was to help people with low incomes save small sums of money, and to support business start-ups. <a href="http://econospeak.blogspot.com/2011/07/what-is-public-capital.html" type="external">Today, about half the total assets of the German banking system are in the public sector.</a> (Another substantial chunk is in cooperative savings banks.) Local public banks are key tools of German industrial policy, specializing in loans to the Mittelstand, the small-to-medium size businesses that are at the core of that country’s export engine. The savings banks operate a network of over 15,600 branches and offices and employ over 250,000 people, and they have a strong record of investing wisely in local businesses.</p>
<p>In January 2015, the SPFIC published a report drawn from Bundesbank data, showing that the Sparkassen not only have a return on capital that is several times greater than for the German private banking sector, but that they pay substantially more to local and federal governments in taxes. That makes them triply profitable: as revenue-generating assets for their government owners, as lucrative sources of taxes, and as a stable funding mechanism for small and medium-sized businesses (a funding mechanism sorely lacking in the US today). Three charts from the SBFIC report are reproduced in English below. (Sparkassen results are in orange. Private commercial banks are in light blue.)</p>
<p><a href="https://webofdebt.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/net-profit-sparkassen.jpg" type="external" /></p>
<p><a href="https://webofdebt.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/sparkassen-return-on-capital.jpg" type="external" /></p>
<p><a href="https://webofdebt.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/sparkassen-taxes-pd.jpg" type="external" /></p>
<p>Swiss Publicly-Owned Banks and the Swiss National Bank: Marching to a Different Drummer</p>
<p>The Swiss have a network of cantonal (provincially-owned) banks that are so similar to the Sparkassen banks that they were invited to join the SBFIC. The Swiss public banks, too, have been shown to be <a href="http://civitas.org.uk/pdf/SavingsBanks2010.pdf" type="external">more profitable than their private counterparts</a>. The Swiss public banking system helps explain the strength of the Swiss economy, the soundness of its banks, and their attractiveness as a safe haven for foreign investors.</p>
<p>The unique structure of the Swiss banking system also helps explain the surprise move by the SNB on January 15, 2015, when it lifted the cap on the Swiss franc as against the euro, anticipating the European Central Bank’s move to embark on a massive program of quantitative easing the following week. Switzerland is not a member of the EU or the Eurozone, and the Swiss National Bank (SNB) is <a href="http://blogs.ft.com/gavyndavies/2015/01/18/the-swiss-currency-bombshell-cause-and-effect/" type="external">not like other central banks</a>. It is 55% owned by the country’s 26 cantons or provinces. The remaining investors are private. Each canton has its own publicly-owned cantonal bank, which provides credit to local small and medium-sized businesses.</p>
<p>In 2011, the SNB pegged the Swiss franc to the euro at 1 to 1.20; but the value of the euro steadily dropped after that, and the SNB could maintain the peg only by printing Swiss francs, diluting their value to keep up with the euro. The fear was that once the ECB started its new money printing program, the Swiss franc would have to be diluted into hyperinflation to keep up.</p>
<p>The SNB’s unanticipated action imposed heavy losses on speculators who were long the euro (betting it would rise), and the move evoked criticism from the European central banking community for not tipping them off beforehand. But the loyalty of the Swiss National Bank is to its cantons, cantonal banks, and individual investors, not to the big private international banks that drive central bank policies in other countries. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-swiss-national-bank-move-may-have-been-done-to-protect-its-dividend-2015-1" type="external">The cantons had been complaining</a> that they were no longer receiving the hefty 6% dividend they had been able to count on for the previous century. The SNB promised to restore the dividend in 2015, and lifting the cap was evidently felt necessary to do it.</p>
<p>Publicly-owned Banks and the Trans-Pacific Partnership</p>
<p>The SBFIC is working particularly hard these days to <a href="https://webofdebt.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/sparkassen-model-in-ireland-oct-11.pdf" type="external">make information and technical help available to other countries</a> interested in pursuing their beneficial public model, because that model has <a href="http://www.webofdebt.com/articles/public_options.php" type="external">come under attack</a>. Private international competitors are pushing for regulations that would limit the advantages of publicly-owned banks, through Basel III, the European Banking Union, and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).</p>
<p>In the US, the current threat is from the TransPacific Partnership (TPP) and its European counterpart the TTIP. President Obama, the Chamber of Commerce, and other corporate groups are <a href="http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/28866-the-movement-of-movements-against-fast-tracking-the-tpp-has-the-power-to-win" type="external">pushing hard for fast track authority</a> to pass these secret trade agreements while effectively bypassing oversight from Congress.</p>
<p>The agreements are being sold as promoting trade and increasing jobs, but the effect of international trade agreements on jobs was evident with NAFTA, which hurt US employment more through the competition of cheap imports than helped it with increased exports. Moreover, only five of the TPP’s twenty-nine chapters are about trade. The remaining chapters are basically about getting government off the backs of the big international corporations and protecting their profits from competition. Corporations would be authorized to sue governments that passed laws protecting their people from corporate damage, on the ground that the laws impair corporate profits. The trade agreements put corporations before governments and the people they represent.</p>
<p>Particularly targeted are government-owned industries, which can undercut big corporate prices; and <a href="http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/04/big-banks-attempt-secret-coup-against-low-interest-loans.html" type="external">that includes publicly-owned banks</a>. Public banks are true non-profits that recycle earnings back into the community rather than siphoning them into offshore tax havens. Not only are the costs of public banks quite low, but they are <a href="http://ellenbrown.com/2013/07/05/depositors-beware-bail-in-is-now-official-eu-policy/" type="external">safer for depositors</a>; they <a href="http://ellenbrown.com/2014/06/01/infrastructure-sticker-shock-financing-costs-more-than-construction/" type="external">allow public infrastructure costs to be cut in half</a> (since the government-owned bank can keep the interest that composes 50% of infrastructure costs); and they provide a non-criminal alternative to an international banking cartel <a href="http://ellenbrown.com/2014/01/29/enough-is-enough-banksters-are-not-l-a-s-only-option/" type="external">caught in a laundry list of frauds</a>.</p>
<p>Despite these notable benefits, under the TPP and TTIP, <a href="http://truth-out.org/news/item/15142-corporate-backed-trans-pacific-partnership-shrouded-in-secrecy" type="external">publicly-owned banks might wind up getting sued for unfair competition</a> because they have advantages not available to private banks, including the backing of their local governments. They have the backing of the government because they are the government. The government would be getting sued for operating efficiently in the best interests of its constituents.</p>
<p>To truly eliminate unfair competition, the giant monopolistic multinational corporations should be broken up, since they have an obvious unfair trade advantage over small farmers and small businesses. But that outcome is liable to be long in coming. In the meantime, fast track for the secretive trade agreements needs to be vigorously opposed. To find out how you can help, go to <a href="http://www.StopFastTrack.com" type="external">www.StopFastTrack.com</a> or <a href="http://flushthetpp.org/" type="external">www.FlushtheTPP.org</a>.</p>
<p>____________________</p>
<p>Ellen Brown is an attorney, founder of the <a href="http://publicbankinginstitute.org/" type="external">Public Banking Institute</a>, and author of twelve books including the best-selling <a href="http://webofdebt.com/" type="external">Web of Debt</a>. Her latest book, <a href="http://publicbanksolution.com/" type="external">The Public Bank Solution</a>, explores successful public banking models historically and globally. Her 200+ blog articles are at <a href="http://ellenbrown.com/" type="external">EllenBrown.com</a>.</p> | Why Public Banks Outperform Private Banks | true | https://truthdig.com/articles/why-public-banks-outperform-private-banks/ | 2015-02-12 | 4 |
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<p>CHAMBERY, France — The Tour de France threw the kitchen sink at Chris Froome: steep mountain ascents followed by daredevil descents at speeds exceeding 70 kilometers (45 miles) per hour that wiped out other riders, the loss of his top teammate in a crash, a breakdown on his bike, and rivals who tried to make him crack with bursts of acceleration.</p>
<p>But the most grueling, drama-filled day so far of this 104th Tour finished, yet again, with Froome still wearing the race leader’s yellow jersey. By surviving Stage 9 that put 12 riders out of the race, and left others bloodied and bandaged, the three-time champion took a big step toward a fourth victory in Paris on July 23.</p>
<p>With seven ascents that together amounted to 4,600 meters (15,000 feet) of climbing — more than half the height of Everest — this was the “monster stage” that Froome had predicted it would be. It separated genuine contenders for victory from simple pretenders. At the start Sunday, eight riders had been within a minute of Froome in the overall standings. Now, just three are.</p>
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<p>Among top names gone completely: Richie Porte and Froome’s teammate Geraint Thomas, who led the Tour for its first four days. Both crashed out.</p>
<p>Porte, who had been fifth overall, was zooming downhill in pursuit of Froome when he missed a left-hand bend, cartwheeled across the road and bowled over another rider, Dan Martin, before slamming into a stony, vine-covered bank.</p>
<p>Medics first treated the Australian on the tarmac and then took him to a hospital where he was diagnosed with a fractured pelvis and collarbone.</p>
<p>Fabio Baldato, one of the directors of Porte’s BMC team, said the rider had shoulder pain but “was always conscious. He knew what happened and was asking for his helmet and his glasses.”</p>
<p>Thomas broke his collarbone.</p>
<p>The crashes took some of the shine off what otherwise was an impressive show of resilience from Froome. He placed third in the stage, narrowly beaten in a final sprint by Colombian Rigoberto Uran at the finish in Chambery, in the Alps. French rider Warren Barguil was just millimeters behind in second place — so close that he burst into tears thinking he had won, only to discover moments later that he hadn’t.</p>
<p>For his third place, Froome was awarded four bonus seconds that allowed him to consolidate his overall lead. With Thomas, who had been in second place, now out, Italian Fabio Aru climbed to second spot in the race rankings — 18 seconds behind Froome overall. French rider Romain Bardet, runner-up to Froome last year, is third overall, 51 seconds behind Froome. The only other rider within a minute of Froome is Uran, who jumped from 11th to fourth overall, 55 seconds behind the leader.</p>
<p>Uran thought Barguil had beaten him to the line. It was a moment of confusion aptly fitting for a day of racing so chaotic that it was difficult at times to keep track of all the drama, as riders scattered like leaves over the 181.5-kilometer (112-mile) stage — seven of them falling so far back that they missed the time cut and are now out of the Tour.</p>
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<p>Toward the front, Froome had a crisis of his own. With awful timing, the Briton survived a breakdown of his bike gears on the last, hugely tough climb that forced him to change machines just when he was riding furiously in a bunch with other top contenders.</p>
<p>As Froome was frantically signaling to members of his team following in a car that he was in trouble, Aru choose that exact moment to accelerate away, followed by other top challengers, including Porte.</p>
<p>For a few moments, Froome’s Tour seemed to be hanging by a thread.</p>
<p>But Aru and the others then slowed rather than press home their advantage — apparently adhering to the Tour’s unwritten rule that challengers shouldn’t attack the race leader when he’s in difficulty not of his own making.</p>
<p>With a replacement bike and teammates who waited for him, Froome ground his way back into the pack. Higher up the climb, he appeared to swerve across the road and nudge Aru with his right shoulder.</p>
<p>But the Briton said that was purely accidental, “a bit of a wobble,” not an attempt to reprimand the Italian for his earlier attack.</p>
<p>“It was in no way a swipe at Aru,” Froome said.</p>
<p>“I want to say ‘thank you’ to the other riders for not attacking,” Froome said. “They waited until I had changed bikes. That’s sporting and pleasing to see.”</p>
<p>Aru was riding right behind Froome when the Tour leader raised his hand to show that he was in trouble. Still, the Italian insisted that he hadn’t seen Froome’s hand signal, and that it had always been his intention to attack at that spot on the climb, with about six kilometers (4 miles) left to ascend on the Mont du Chat.</p>
<p>“Then I heard on the radio that Froome had stopped,” Aru said. “When I heard it on the radio then I stopped.”</p>
<p>Of the day’s seven notable ascents, three had the toughest “hors categorie” (beyond classification) rating on cycling’s sliding scale of climbing difficulty. Not since 2011 had organizers shoehorned three such climbs into the same stage.</p>
<p>Froome summed it up in a word: “Brutal.”</p> | On brutal Tour day that culls 12 riders, Froome still on top | false | https://abqjournal.com/1030521/on-brutal-tour-day-that-culls-12-riders-froome-still-on-top.html | 2017-07-09 | 2 |
<p>JOHANNESBURG (AP) — South African retired archbishop Desmond Tutu has undergone a “small investigative procedure” in a hospital to assess an infection, a foundation said Saturday.</p>
<p>The Nobel Peace Prize laureate will remain in the hospital in Cape Town for several more days, according to the foundation, which is named after Tutu and his wife Leah.</p>
<p>Tutu, 83, has been treated for prostate cancer for many years. The foundation quoted Tutu’s daughter, Mpho, as saying the cancer is under control but the infection is the result of past treatment for the disease.</p>
<p>Desmond Tutu “underwent a small investigative procedure last night to determine the status of an infection he has battled to shake off for several weeks,” the foundation said in a statement. It cited Mpho Tutu as saying doctors are satisfied with the progress of her father’s antibiotic treatment.</p>
<p>Tutu was admitted to the hospital on July 28 after a weeklong stay there earlier in the month.</p>
<p>He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for campaigning against apartheid.</p>
<p>JOHANNESBURG (AP) — South African retired archbishop Desmond Tutu has undergone a “small investigative procedure” in a hospital to assess an infection, a foundation said Saturday.</p>
<p>The Nobel Peace Prize laureate will remain in the hospital in Cape Town for several more days, according to the foundation, which is named after Tutu and his wife Leah.</p>
<p>Tutu, 83, has been treated for prostate cancer for many years. The foundation quoted Tutu’s daughter, Mpho, as saying the cancer is under control but the infection is the result of past treatment for the disease.</p>
<p>Desmond Tutu “underwent a small investigative procedure last night to determine the status of an infection he has battled to shake off for several weeks,” the foundation said in a statement. It cited Mpho Tutu as saying doctors are satisfied with the progress of her father’s antibiotic treatment.</p>
<p>Tutu was admitted to the hospital on July 28 after a weeklong stay there earlier in the month.</p>
<p>He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for campaigning against apartheid.</p> | Doctors in South Africa assess infection of Desmond Tutu | false | https://apnews.com/22455fe787cd488785c0aac8bd8cd80a | 2015-08-01 | 2 |
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<p>Image source: iStock/Thinkstock.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>The Dow Jones Industrial Average contains 30 of the United States' biggest and best-known companies. Included among them are three banks: JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM), Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), and American Express (NYSE: AXP).</p>
<p>*As of Sept. 16, 2016. Data source: YCharts.com.</p>
<p>There are multiple reasons why these three banks are included on the Dow while other banks are not. To this end, here's the <a href="https://www.djindexes.com/mdsidx/downloads/meth_info/Dow_Jones_Industrial_Average_Methodology.pdf" type="external">selection criteria Opens a New Window.</a> for Dow stocks:</p>
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<p>The reasons why JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and American Express made the cut relate to their size, reputation, popularity, and the specific niches in which they operate.</p>
<p>In short, it's no coincidence that these are three of the biggest and best-known bank stocks in the country, and that they're also included on the Dow Jones Industrial Average.</p>
<p>A secret billion-dollar stock opportunity The world's biggest tech company forgot to show you something, but a few Wall Street analysts and the Fool didn't miss a beat: There's a small company that's powering their brand-new gadgets and the coming revolution in technology. And we think its stock price has nearly unlimited room to run for early in-the-know investors! To be one of them, <a href="http://www.fool.com/mms/mark/ecap-foolcom-apple-wearable?aid=6965&amp;source=irbeditxt0000017&amp;ftm_cam=rb-wearable-d&amp;ftm_pit=2759&amp;ftm_veh=article_pitch&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">just click here Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p><a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/JohnMaxfield37/info.aspx" type="external">John Maxfield Opens a New Window.</a> owns shares of Bank of America and Goldman Sachs. The Motley Fool recommends American Express and Bank of America. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services <a href="http://www.fool.com/shop/newsletters/index.aspx?source=isiedilnk018048&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">free for 30 days Opens a New Window.</a>. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that <a href="http://www.fool.com/knowledge-center/motley.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">considering a diverse range of insights Opens a New Window.</a> makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | Here Are the 3 Bank Stocks on the Dow Jones Industrial Average | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/09/16/here-are-3-bank-stocks-on-dow-jones-industrial-average.html | 2016-09-16 | 0 |
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<p>Muslims and Hispanics also share the diversity paradox - people think each of our groups is homogenous, even though Hispanics don't all share the same country of origin, language, history, cultural norms, education level or citizenship status. Same goes for the Muslim community, which is bound only by faith.</p>
<p>Our growth and visibility terrify people. Hispanics are still the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. population - now from births instead of from immigration - while Muslims are the fastest-growing religious group in the world and are projected to increase in North America's population from about 3.5 million in 2010 to 10.4 million in 2050.</p>
<p>And get this: Latinos are increasingly shrugging off Catholicism and Christianity.</p>
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<p>And as American Latinos have risen in population, they've accounted for a larger share of those who've turned to Islam.</p>
<p>According to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Latinos represented 6 percent of all converts to Islam in America in 2000. That figure increased to 12 percent in 2011.</p>
<p>And both groups eat goat.</p>
<p>Yes, goat, the meat that The New York Times made such a point to include in its story about the father of one of the San Bernardino shooters.</p>
<p>"Around Christmas one year, [a neighbor] recalled, the father asked where he could buy a goat; he especially wanted a pregnant animal, saying that goat fetus was a delicacy. [The neighbor] helped him get two. They ate one, and the family kept the other alive in the backyard, along with some chickens, where neighbors heard it bleating."</p>
<p>Must it be said that there is nothing special or strange about eating goat meat? It is one of the most popular meats in the world and, according to The Washington Post, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that the number of goats slaughtered has doubled every 10 years for the past three decades.</p>
<p>In 2011, we were closing in on eating 1 million meat goats a year. (I like my cabrito spit-roasted; it's succulent.)</p>
<p>Silly stereotype sensationalism aside, by any measure Latinos share many of the same issues with Muslims. And we should be rallying to support our Muslim community as they come under attack by the most effective kind of ignorance there is: the kind driven by fear.</p>
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<p>Yes, two Muslim people - one of whom was born in Illinois - carried out a vicious attack on county offices in San Bernardino in the name of the Islamic State. It's terrorism, people say.</p>
<p>Of course it's terrorism. Just like when Timothy McVeigh bombed the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995. Or, for that matter, like any number of recent mass killings: Newtown, Tucson, the Boston Marathon, the Mother Emanuel church in Charleston, the Aurora movie theater and last month at Planned Parenthood in Colorado Springs.</p>
<p>Our terrorism problem is predominantly homegrown. So if the bad guys are almost always "us" - meaning U.S.-born, culturally American and rarely from minority groups - then there's no reason to focus our fears on "them," meaning immigrants, refugees and basically anyone with dark features.</p>
<p>Unity is a difficult word to wedge into an argument that is increasingly being framed as two-sided: one good, one evil. But the courage to unite as a country is what we need in order to keep our citizens and residents from turning on each other.</p>
<p>Courage to confront issues such as the proliferation of hateful rhetoric on the radio, social media and the Web - and from leading political candidates. Issues such as unethical journalistic practices that glorify mass killers and gain profits from clicks on stories with outrageous headlines or articles replete with red-herring details.</p>
<p>We need the courage to address basics like the lack of quality, affordable mental health services in most communities. And the dearth of opportunities for young people, mostly men, who increasingly feel marginalized without many prospects for a real future.</p>
<p>Yes, there is plenty to fear right now: Another outbreak of mass violence could happen anywhere, at any time, by anyone. But mistrust rooted in bias against race, ethnicity or religion does nothing to alleviate those fears, and makes us a poorer country indeed.</p>
<p>At the bare minimum, the dark-skinned, dark-eyed goat-eaters of America must unite - we're all equally at a false risk of being confused for a credible threat.</p>
<p>E-mail: [email protected]. Copyright, Washington Post Writers Group.</p>
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<p /> | Hispanics, Muslims are united by common issues | false | https://abqjournal.com/690774/hispanics-muslims-are-united-by-common-issues.html | 2 |
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<p>Sept. 22 (UPI) — Hurricane Maria may create “dangerous surf and rip currents” in the Southeastern United States, the National Hurricane Center said.</p>
<p>A Category 3 storm, Maria was located 245 miles east of Eleuthera Island and about 320 miles east of Nassau in the Bahamas. The storm was moving north-northwest at 8 mph, the NHC said in its <a href="http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/refresh/MIATCPAT5+shtml/221436.shtml" type="external">11 a.m. Saturday advisory</a>.</p>
<p>Forecasters added that the hurricane had maximum sustained winds of 115 mph and that dangerous conditions would continue at beaches in the U.S. southeast over the next few days.</p>
<p>There were no storm warnings or watches in effect, but the NHC cautioned observers in the Bahamas and Carolina and mid-Atlantic U.S. coasts to monitor the storm.</p>
<p>Maria is not expected to make landfall again in the Caribbean, though hurricane-force winds can extend outward up to 60 miles from the center of the storm and tropical-storm-force winds extend up to 195 miles.</p> | Hurricane Maria may cause 'dangerous' beach conditions in U.S. southeast | false | https://newsline.com/hurricane-maria-may-cause-dangerous-beach-conditions-in-u-s-southeast/ | 2017-09-23 | 1 |
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Russell_Wilson/" type="external">Russell Wilson</a> threw for 200 yards and a touchdown in just over two quarters as the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Seattle-Seahawks/" type="external">Seattle Seahawks</a> earned a 26-13 victory over the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kansas-City-Chiefs/" type="external">Kansas City Chiefs</a> on Friday night.</p>
<p>Chris Carson added 46 yards on eight carries as well as Seattle’s first-team offense amassed 273 total yards before its starters mostly checked out for the night.</p>
<p>The Chiefs marched 63 yards on 14 plays on their opening possession only to have the drive stall out inside Seattle’s 20-yard line. Kareem Hunt was stopped by K.J. Wright for a 4-yard loss on third-and-1 at the Seattle 8-yard line to force a 30-yard field goal from Sam Ficken. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Alex_Smith/" type="external">Alex Smith</a> completed just 7 of 17 passes for 44 yards before leaving the game.</p>
<p>The drive ultimately proved even more costly for the Chiefs as running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Spencer-Ware/" type="external">Spencer Ware</a> left the game on a cart with a knee injury and did not return. He was injured on a six-yard reception late in the drive as Terence Garvin made the tackle.</p>
<p>After a pair of <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Blair-Walsh/" type="external">Blair Walsh</a> field goals, Wilson connected with fullback Tre Madden for a 2-yard touchdown to give the Seahawks a 13-3 lead.</p>
<p>De’Anthony Thomas returned the ensuing kickoff 95 yards for a touchdown to close the deficit to 13-10. It was the Chiefs’ only touchdown of the night.</p>
<p>Walsh would add two more field goals to extend the lead to 19-10 early in the third quarter.</p>
<p>First-round pick <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Patrick-Mahomes/" type="external">Patrick Mahomes</a> led the Chiefs on a 74-yard drive that resulted in a 32-yard field goal by Ficken to trim Seattle’s lead to 19-13. Mahomes was 8 of 15 for 70 yards in his limited action.</p>
<p>The Seahawks added another touchdown in the fourth quarter as <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Austin_Davis/" type="external">Austin Davis</a> connected with Tanner McEvoy for a 28-yard score. Backup quarterback Trevone Boykin posted a 0.0 passer rating, going 0 for 6 with an interception.</p> | Seattle Seahawks get banner night from Russell Wilson in win vs. Kansas City Chiefs | false | https://newsline.com/seattle-seahawks-get-banner-night-from-russell-wilson-in-win-vs-kansas-city-chiefs/ | 2017-08-26 | 1 |
<p>The Occupy Wall Street demonstrations now spreading across the country are encouraging to be sure. It is stated that the Tahrir Square and other demonstrations in the Middle East and North Africa are the model. But it is also a model of the tragic 1989 Tiananmen Square hunger strike by young Chinese activists/students in Beijing. Essentially it is one of being a “leaderless” movement with no concrete demands.&#160; But why no concrete demands? I’m sure none of us think that the “corporate criminals” on Wall Street engaging, as always, in greed and corruption should come up with solutions…. nor Congress for that matter. Would you trust them? Of course not! That’s why the students, the labor unions, the working poor, the immigrants, the activists all over the country should come up with the solutions and make the demands.&#160; In fact, there can be dangerous consequences in organizing efforts when there is no clarity. It’s often a matter of life and death.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>In 2005 I wrote an article about Kingian social change for Counterpunch entitled <a href="" type="internal">“</a> <a href="" type="internal">A Matter of Life and Death:</a> <a href="" type="internal">Misconceptions About King’s Methods for Change”</a> and I think much of it needs to be reiterated as food for thought given the challenges to a “leaderless” anti-Wall Street movement that at this point largely lacks clarity.</p>
<p>I think that one of the sad legacies of the 1960’s civil rights movement was that people seem to think that demonstrations like those in the 1960’s almost magically led to changes or justice and nothing could be further from the truth. Direct action, as in demonstrations, was largely that last action in a campaign. And when people demonstrated in the 1960’s they were clear about their demands – they largely knew precisely what they wanted.</p>
<p>The tragic consequences of not having clarity was demonstrated in 1989 in China. I was in the Philippines in 1989 not long after some 4,000 activists had been killed and 20,000 wounded in what became known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre in Beijing. I talked with Filipino activists who had been in constant communication with the Chinese students who were demanding democracy in China. What concerned my Filipino friends was the lack of unity, organizational infrastructure, and clarity in the demands of the students and workers to the Chinese government, which, they said, likely helped contribute to the violent response from the Chinese government. Perhaps nothing would have altered the violent Chinese government response and the Filipinos were by no means apologists for the Chinese violent behavior, but rather they stressed the need for clarity and unity in any demands for social change when challenging a powerful state.</p>
<p>Many in the United States want us to think about Martin Luther King’s “dreams”. Now, I’m sure King had his dreams but his primary mission, and those of civil rights activists everywhere, was about “action” coupled with concrete and definitive change. Everyone concerned about injustice should take another look at King’s nonviolent methods. Nonviolent social change requires long, hard and sustained work, research, development of solutions, and, importantly, on-going commitment. It demands far more than bringing folks together to march and wave banners.</p>
<p>Mass mobilization or direct action, in fact, is only one part of the non-violent methods for social change. There are other misconceptions I would like to mention but first here’s a description of the steps King and others used in their social change work.</p>
<p>Based on the philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi, the Kingian method for nonviolent social change is a systematic one. Here is a brief summary: (1) once the problem is identified it is essential to research the issue (i.e. define the problem, who are the key players, who or what is being affected) – the research and analysis should be above reproach as disputed or incorrect facts and figures can completely undermine the efforts for the evolving campaign; (2) based on the research, state clearly what needs to change to solve the problem and identify the strategy for solving the problem; (3) recruit others to join the struggle, share your findings and strategies, get their input if necessary, but essentially seek a commitment from them (i.e. this is the problem, this is what we intend to do, are you with us?) (4) teach them in nonviolent tactics (i.e. being non-confrontational during direct action); (5) attempt to resolve the problem through negotiations (i.e. negotiations with whoever controls the policies needing to be changed); (6) if that doesn’t work, apply pressure through direct action techniques, which at times need to be sustained for a lengthy period (i.e. boycotts, mass demonstrations); (7) negotiate again, if necessary engage in direct action again – often more research is required or more clarity on the solutions needs to be developed; (8) finally, if the problem is solved, seek reconciliation.</p>
<p>The first issue that gets lost is that King sought “reconciliation” with his adversaries and an improvement of life for everyone. This is the end goal and if victory is all that’s wanted then that’s not Kingian nonviolence. Reconciliation is also probably the most difficult aspect of the Kingian philosophy for activists to embrace. In his book “Stride Toward Freedom” King said that the nonviolent methods are “not an end in themselves; they are merely means to awaken a sense of moral shame in the opponent. The end is redemption and reconciliation. The aftermath of nonviolence is the beloved community, while the aftermath of violence is tragic bitterness.”</p>
<p>There is almost always a misunderstanding of how to define the adversaries in nonviolent social change. Dr. King said it is not a “battle” against “individuals” who commit evil acts but against the evil itself. Regarding the Montgomery struggles, he said, “The tension is between justice and injustice. and not white persons who may be unjust.” King said further that “the nonviolent resister would contend that in the struggle for human dignity, the oppressed people of the world must not succumb to the temptation of becoming bitter or engaging in hate campaigns. To retaliate in-kind would do nothing but intensify the existence of hate in the universe. Along the way of life, someone must have sense enough and morality enough to cut off the chain of hate.”</p>
<p>Another misconception is that complaints can be made without concrete demands for change. Those who seek change should always develop the solutions because you don’t want to leave that in the hands of your so-called “adversary” – otherwise you’ve wasted your time. King also called for a fair hearing from the adversaries and to listen to them, as there might be some wisdom to gain from that experience, he said. However, if you don’t like what politicians or others do, you certainly don’t want them to be the chief architects in resolving problems. So don’t just engage in a “feel good” march in front of the White House, Congress, State House or Wall Street for that matter and assume that you have completed your mission, made your statement. If you haven’t developed your solutions to the problems you’re addressing, you’ve only done a quarter or less of what is necessary.</p>
<p>It is often thought that nonviolence and pacifism are the same. Not so! It is probably true that most advocates of nonviolence are also pacifists. Nevertheless, nonviolence is a “method for change”. Pacifism is “being against war”. Within this misconception is the assumption that nonviolence is cowardly, a “turn the other cheek” method, which is not true. As a method for change, nonviolence is confrontational. King said, “it must be emphasized that nonviolent resistance is not a method for cowards; it does resist. If one uses this method because he is afraid or merely because he lacks instruments of violence, he is not truly nonviolent. This is why Gandhi often said that if cowardice is the only alternative to violence, it is better to fight.”</p>
<p>King said that every nonviolent campaign should be anchored in a boycott and, importantly, voter education and voter registration. While everyone could do more on this, voter education and registration are often included in various movements. Rarely these days, however, do U.S. activists choose to challenge the bulwark and muscle of corporate America, even in spite of the unfettered capitalist abuse in which we live. King wisely recognized that going against corporate America was one of the most vital ways to change behavior. Referring to the Birmingham movement, King said, “it was not the marching alone that brought about integration of public facilities in 1963. The downtown business establishments suffered for weeks under our unbelievably effective boycott.”</p>
<p>King once said that the “Arc of the moral universe is long and it bends toward justice.” The Wall Street occupiers are definitely bending the arc but as King would say “Where to we go from here?” What do we want? Are the Wall Street Occupiers challenging capitalism and/or it’s corrupt infrastructure? If so, what do we want in America? What are our demands? Ever since the McCarthy era of the 1950’s Americans have generally been wary of challenging capitalism or discussing, on a consistent basis, alternatives to a capitalist system. If there was ever a time to shift that paradigm it is now!</p>
<p>HEATHER GRAY produces “Just Peace” on WRFG-Atlanta 89.3 FM covering local, regional, national and international news In 1985-86 she directed the nonviolent program at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta.&#160;She lives in Atlanta, Georgia and can be reached at&#160; <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a></p> | Occupy Wall Street vs. Kingian Methods | true | https://counterpunch.org/2011/10/04/occupy-wall-street-vs-kingian-methods/ | 2011-10-04 | 4 |
<p>Well, we know the role Pussy Riot played in the Russian Orthodox church. They performed an anti-Putin song in Moscow's best-loved church, Christ the Savior Cathedral and got arrested. Two still remain in jail.</p>
<p>But you know, in all this talk of Pussy Riot, we have never heard a good chunk of one of their songs.</p>
<p>The band's first big notice, a tune whose title translates as "Loosen up the Paving Stones"?. Its context: the female punk collective wrote and recorded this just after the Arab Spring.</p>
<p>They sing "Egyptian air is good for the lungs"?. Then Pussy Riot calls for a "Tahrir Square on Red Square."?</p>
<p>It's not a great tune. After all, if you like this, the internet says, you may like bands called Stereowoolf and Aunty Panty.</p> | The Music of Pussy Riot | false | https://pri.org/stories/2012-10-10/music-pussy-riot | 2012-10-10 | 3 |
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<p>More than a dozen women have publicly accused Filner, a Democrat, of making inappropriate statements or sexual advances. The 70-year-old former congressman has resisted numerous calls to resign.</p>
<p>He is set to return to work this week after undergoing behavior therapy.</p>
<p>“He is a sexual predator. He has abused the power of his office,” said Rachel Laing, spokeswoman for the recall campaign. “He can’t possibly lead or possibly reclaim his ability to lead.”</p>
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<p>Recall organizers say they have raised more than $100,000 so far and more than 1,100 people have signed up to volunteer. They sought out signatures at a half-marathon Sunday in Balboa Park, while businesswomen and military sexual-assault victims planned to lead an afternoon march downtown.</p>
<p>House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has said Filner should step aside and spare San Diego the pain and expense of a recall election.</p>
<p>The latest accusation against Filner came Thursday, when a volunteer city worker who assists senior citizens said the mayor repeatedly rubbed her hands, asked her on dates and made sexually suggestive comments.</p>
<p>The recall petitions include Filner’s response, filed Monday with the city clerk, in which he tells voters this is “not the time to go backwards” and touts his administration’s job-producing projects and quality of life initiatives, like removing cars from Balboa Park and proposing that the 2024 Olympic Games be held in San Diego and Tijuana.</p>
<p>Filner made no mention of the allegations against him in his response. He has said in the past that he has disrespected women but has denied being guilty of sexual harassment.</p>
<p>The recall effort must collect 101,597 signatures of registered San Diego voters by Sept. 26. If the petition has fewer than that, the recall campaign will have 30 more days to circulate a supplemental petition to gather additional valid signatures.</p>
<p>If enough signatures are validated by the city clerk, the petition will be presented to the City Council, which must schedule an election within 60 to 90 days.</p>
<p>Filner has stayed out of sight, but his lawyers said he completed two weeks of intensive behavior therapy.</p>
<p>Earlier this month, Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer sent a letter to Filner, urging him to step down from office.</p>
<p>“You have betrayed the trust of the women you have victimized, the San Diegans you represent and the people you have worked with throughout your decades in public life,” she wrote.</p>
<p /> | San Diego mayor may face recall | false | https://abqjournal.com/249482/san-diego-mayor-may-face-recall.html | 2013-08-19 | 2 |
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<p>The billionaire investor George Soros said on Thursday that global markets will falter given the uncertainty of incoming U.S. President Donald Trump's policies.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>"Right now uncertainty is at the peak," Soros told Bloomberg News at his annual media dinner held at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. "I don't think the markets are going to do very well."</p>
<p>Stocks in the United States surged after Trump's Nov. 8 election victory. Trump takes office on Friday.</p>
<p>"Markets see Trump dismantling regulations and reducing taxes, and that has been the dream," said Soros. "The dream has come true."</p>
<p>But Trump has called for border taxes and withdrawing from his predecessor's Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, among other policies that have unclear ramifications for U.S. growth, Soros said.</p>
<p>"It's impossible to predict exactly how Trump is going to act," he said.</p>
<p>Advertisement</p>
<p>Soros, who founded Soros Fund Management LLC and now is chairman of the New York-based firm, was a large contributor to the Super PAC fund-raising group backing Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and had donated to other groups supporting Democrats.</p>
<p>Overall, Soros said about the president-elect: "I personally am convinced that he is going to fail. Not because of people like me who would like him to fail. But because his ideas that guide him are inherently self-contradictory and the contradictions are actually already embodied by his advisers ... and his cabinet."</p>
<p>Turning to the United Kingdom, Soros said it is unlikely that Prime Minister Theresa May will "remain in power" given divisions within her government.</p>
<p>May on Tuesday laid out plans for Britain to negotiate its exit from the European Union. Soros said that process will be long and that "a bitter divorce" will hurt both sides.</p>
<p>Soros famously made huge profits in 1992 betting against the British pound as it crashed below the preset level and had to be withdrawn from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.</p>
<p>China has an interest in European unity because of the bloc's importance as an export market, Soros said.</p>
<p>He said President Xi Jinping, who on Tuesday made a case for China's leadership in Davos, can steer his country to either a more open society or a more closed society, while nudging it to a more sustainable economic growth model.</p>
<p>"Trump will do more to make China acceptable as a leading member of the international community than the Chinese could do by themselves," Soros said.</p> | George Soros: Trump Will Cause Markets to Falter | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/01/19/george-soros-trump-will-cause-markets-to-falter.html | 2017-01-19 | 0 |
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<p>While appearing on Monday’s edition of&#160;ESPN2’s “The Paul Finebaum Show,” San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich <a href="http://dailycaller.com/2017/09/25/nba-coach-white-people-especially-need-to-be-made-uncomfortable/" type="external">launched</a> into a tirade against white people, Donald Trump and the United States, asserting that white “people have to be made to feel uncomfortable.”</p>
<p>“Well, because it’s uncomfortable, and there has to be an uncomfortable element in the discourse for anything to change. Whether it’s the LGBT movement, women’s suffrage, race, it doesn’t matter. People have to be made to feel uncomfortable, and especially white people because we’re comfortable. We still have no clue of what being born white means,” he said.</p>
<p>“If you read some of the recent literature, you’ll realize there really is no such thing as whiteness, but we kind of made that up. That’s not my original thought, but it’s true,” he asserted.</p>
<p>“Because you were born white, you have advantages that are systemically, culturally, psychologically there. And they have been built up and cemented for hundreds of years. But many people can’t look at it. It’s too difficult,” he added. &#160;“It can’t be something that is on their plate on a daily basis. People want to hold their position, people want the status quo, people don’t want to give that up. And until it’s given up, it’s not going to be fixed.”</p>
<p>Here’s video of his statement:</p>
<p />
<p>Here’s another, longer clip, where he says that “our country’s an embarrassment.”</p>
<p />
<p>“Our country is an embarrassment in the world,” he <a href="http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/20817911/gregg-popovich-san-antonio-spurs-united-states-embarrassment-world" type="external">said</a>. &#160;“This is an individual that when people held arms during games, [he thought] that they were doing it to honor the flag. That’s delusional. But it’s what we have to live with. You’ve got a choice: We can continue to bounce our heads off the walls with his conduct, or we can decide the institutions of our country are more important, people are more important, [the] decent America we all have and want is more important — get down to business at the grassroots level and do what we have to do.”</p>
<p>Paul Joseph Watson <a href="https://www.infowars.com/nba-coach-white-people-have-to-be-made-to-feel-uncomfortable/" type="external">observed</a>:</p>
<p>It’s odd that all this “white privilege” doesn’t extend to violent encounters with cops (the very thing the ‘take a knee’ gesture was started to protest). Figures <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/07/11/arent-more-white-people-than-black-people-killed-by-police-yes-but-no/?utm_term=.cf4c02809292" type="external">show</a> that significantly more white people are shot dead by cops every year, despite black people committing more violent crimes.</p>
<p>Popovich also failed to explain how white people being “uncomfortable” about their skin color is going to prevent the relentless carnage that is black on black murder.</p>
<p>Around 2400 black men are killed by other black men every single year. Compare that to just 16 unarmed black men who are killed by police every year (about the same number who get struck by lightning).</p>
<p>None of that has anything to do with “white privilege,” but then again, Popovich doesn’t really care about black lives, he cares about tedious virtue signalling and genuflecting to political correctness to make himself look good.</p>
<p>Writing at the <a href="http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2017/09/nba-coach-popovich-pops-off-white-people-especially-need-made-uncomfortable-video/" type="external">Gateway Pundit</a>, Cristina Laila correctly noted:</p>
<p>Millions of white people and Christians were starved and murdered because of Communism but they had white privilege so who cares, right Popovich?</p>
<p>Well over 1 million WHITE American men have died in wars, including the Civil War which ultimately freed black slaves. How’s that for ‘white privilege’?</p>
<p>There are also many impoverished whites in America today yet the left continues their attacks. This is precisely why Donald Trump won the 2016 election. Americans are fed up with round-the-clock accusations of racism.</p>
<p>Popovich, who happens to be white, served in the Air Force during the 1970s.</p>
<p>Related:</p>
<p>If you haven’t checked out and liked our&#160; <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ConservativeFiringLine?fref=ts" type="external">Facebook</a>&#160;page, please go&#160; <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ConservativeFiringLine?fref=ts" type="external">here</a>&#160;and do so.</p>
<p>And if you’re as concerned about online censorship as we are, go <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Banned-Facebook-Enables-Militant-Islamic/dp/1944212221/" type="external">here</a> and order this book (Remember, half of what we earn will be <a href="" type="internal">donated to Hurricane Harvey relief</a>):</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | White NBA coach says white people ‘especially’ need to be made ‘uncomfortable’; U.S. an embarrassment — Video | true | http://conservativefiringline.com/white-nba-coach-says-white-people-especially-need-made-uncomfortable-embarrassment-video/ | 2017-09-27 | 0 |
<p><a href="http://pienews.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Tommy.jpeg" type="external" />Businessman Tom MacArthur won the Republican nomination for New Jersey's 3rd district Tuesday night, setting up Republicans with their best shot at holding onto retiring Rep. Jon Runyan's (R-N.J.) competitive seat. MacArthur took 60 percent of the vote to 2013 GOP Senate candidate Steve Lonegan's 40 percent of the [?]</p>
<p />
<p><a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/house-races/208168-national-republicans-get-their-pick-in-nj" type="external">Click here to view original web page at thehill.com</a></p>
<p /> | GOP sets themselves up for a senate win in NJ | true | http://politicalillusionsexposed.com/national-republicans-get-their-pick-in-nj/ | 0 |
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<p>It turns out there’s even more behind the story of last week’s call between Donald Trump and Argentine President Mauricio Macri, separate from a <a href="" type="internal">report on Argentine television</a> that Trump asked Macri for help getting approval for a planned Trump-branded office tower in Buenos Aires. Both parties denied Monday that the two leaders discussed the project on that call.</p>
<p>However, the Argentine press also reported that Macri was able to get through to the President-elect in the first place because Trump’s partner in the Buenos Aires project facilitated their connection. That detail was surfaced last night by Susan Simpson, a lawyer who specializes in the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and <a href="https://twitter.com/TheViewFromLL2/status/800907771101270016" type="external">went on a tweetstorm</a> about the Trump project in the capital.</p>
<p />
<p>Citing sources in the private sector, <a href="http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1955833-acuerdan-con-el-hijo-de-trump-una-llamada-entre-los-presidentes" type="external">La Nación reported</a> that Felipe Yaryura, the business partner developing the Buenos Aires tower who <a href="http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1955208-la-emocion-del-socio-argentino-de-trump" type="external">was photographed celebrating</a> with Eric Trump on election night in New York, was one of the people who put Susana Malcorra, the foreign minister, in contact with the Trump scion. Yaryura has a direct line to the Trump children after <a href="" type="internal">working with them</a> to develop Trump Tower Punta del Este in neighboring Uruguay.</p>
<p>In the lead-up to the U.S. election, Macri had <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/javieraceves/entrevista-buzzfeed-macri-1?utm_term=.cuLyRKo8a#.alP0owNK5" type="external">voiced support</a> for Hillary Clinton. There was only one person on his staff who thought Trump even had a shot at winning on Election Day, according to the report: A top aide and confidant named José Torello. La Nación reported it’s an open secret in business circles that in the weeks leading up to the election, Torello invited Yaryura to the Casa Rosada, Argentina’s presidential palace, and continued to meet with him to establish a relationship. Torello spent Election Day in Washington, D.C., according to the report, and once it became clear that Trump had won reached out to Yaryura in order to put Macri’s team in touch with Trump’s.</p>
<p>Sources who facilitated the Trump-Macri connection told La Nación that Eric Trump’s conversation with the Argentine foreign minister was “friendly and cordial” and that he also put her in touch with his father’s foreign policy team (the foreign minister’s office wouldn’t comment on the story). According to the timeline laid out in the report, she and Trump spoke Nov. 10 and agreed that when his father’s busy schedule cleared, the President-elect would speak with Macri by phone. The two leaders then hopped a call on Nov. 14.</p>
<p>Macri’s office said Ivanka Trump briefly spoke with the Argentine president on the same call. A Macri spokesman <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/21/mauricio-macri-donald-trump-buenos-aires-office" type="external">told the Guardian</a> that Ivanka Trump did not discuss the planned tower, either.</p>
<p>The Macri family and the Trumps <a href="" type="internal">have an interesting relationship</a> dating back to a failed attempt to strike a deal on some New York City real estate in the early ’80s. But the report from La Nación on the genesis of their phone call last week suggests that, at least during this busy and chaotic transition period, it’s easier for Trump’s business partner to get through to the President-elect and his family than it is for a fellow head of state to do the same.</p> | More Details About That Trump/Macri Call | true | http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/more-details-trump-macri-call | 4 |
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<p>PRETORIA, South Africa — The world once cheered Oscar Pistorius, the “Blade Runner,” a double amputee whose gritty determination saw him become the first Olympian to race on twin carbon fiber blades.</p>
<p>But on Valentine’s Day, it all went disturbingly wrong.</p>
<p>South Africans awoke to the news that their country’s most famous sportsman had been charged with murder, accused of shooting and killing his gorgeous model girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in the early hours of Thursday morning.</p>
<p>The motive behind 29-year-old Steenkamp’s murder is still unclear. Police have confirmed that a 9mm revolver recovered at the scene was registered to Pistorius, who in past interviews had spoken of his love of firearms and once tweeted a photo of himself visiting a shooting range.</p>
<p>Pistorius, 26, spent the night in a Pretoria jail cell, and on Friday will appear in court for a bail hearing. Lawyer Kenny Oldwage said at the police station that Pistorius “is emotional, but he is keeping up."</p>
<p>The Blade Runner’s sponsors are already pulling ads, including one for Nike in which he describes himself as “the bullet in the chamber,” and is pictured bursting out of a starting block.</p>
<p>South Africans appear bewildered by this turn of events. The country has in recent weeks been gripped by national soul-searching over endemic violence in society, and in particular by high rates of violence and rape against women.</p>
<p>“Once the South African hero, Oscar is now just another South African tragedy,” said Sarah Britten, a South African blogger.</p>
<p>While there were early reports that Pistorius may have shot his girlfriend multiple times because he thought she was a burglar, police have firmly dismissed the rumor.</p>
<p>Brigadier Denise Beukes, a spokesperson for the national police, told reporters outside the luxury golf estate where Pistorius lives that there was no sign of forced entry, and only two people were on the premises — the resident, and the deceased.</p>
<p>Police had been to Pistorius’ house before to deal with "allegations of a domestic nature," Beukes added.</p>
<p>Adele Kirsten, a spokesperson for Gun Free South Africa, said women in this country face a particular threat of gun violence in the home, and are most likely to be killed by someone they know.</p>
<p>“One of the keys is access to weapons,” she said. “So if you look at Oscar, it is clear he had easy access to guns.”</p>
<p>“People get angry, people get in fights, but if you have a gun, it can be lethal.”</p>
<p>While South Africa requires strict background checks before guns may be purchased, and a follow-up check after five years, enforcement can be patchy.</p>
<p>Kirsten said she hoped the death of Steenkamp would be a “defining moment” for South Africa, one that would lead to a ban on hand guns.</p>
<p>“But I’m not sure,” she added. “We are so inured to violence. This happens daily and it doesn’t get coverage. This is all because a celebrity is involved.”</p>
<p>Violent crime rates in South Africa have declined in recent years, but still remain frighteningly high by international standards. Gun ownership of both illegal and registered weapons remains common, and many South Africans own weapons for protection.</p>
<p>An interviewer last year wrote that Pistorius, who lives in a high-security gated community, slept with a revolver by his bed, a baseball bat behind his door and a machine gun by the window.</p>
<p>Examples of tragic gun deaths, a number of which involving the country’s sports stars, are all too common.</p>
<p>In September, former world heavyweight boxing champion Corrie Sanders was shot and killed when robbers stormed a restaurant near Pretoria during a family birthday party and began firing at random.</p>
<p>That same week, a former Olympic hurdler was shot in the shoulder during a robbery at her family farm northwest of Johannesburg.</p>
<p>The country’s Olympic committee said it has been “inundated” with inquiries about the shooting at Pistorius’ home, but was “in no position to comment.”</p>
<p>Just hours before her death, Steenkamp tweeted messages urging her followers to stand up against abuse of women. She had also tweeted about 17-year-old Anene Booysen, whose <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/africa/south-africa/130207/south-africa-gang-rape-delhi-moment" type="external">recent gang rape and murder</a> in the Western Cape town of Bredasdorp outraged the country.</p>
<p>“What do you have up your sleeve for your love tomorrow???” she wrote on Twitter, later adding: "It should be a day of love for everyone."</p> | Pistorius shooting highlights South Africa’s crime problem | false | https://pri.org/stories/2013-02-15/pistorius-shooting-highlights-south-africa-s-crime-problem | 2013-02-15 | 3 |
<p>After&#160;its <a href="https://www.frbatlanta.org/filelegacydocs/J_whi811.pdf" type="external">1994 peso crisis</a>, Mexico&#160;could have chosen more socialism — or move toward capitalism. It chose the latter and has been one of the world’s growth success stories ever since. <a href="http://www.tradingeconomics.com/mexico/personal-income-tax-rate" type="external">Tax rates</a>actually are lower than in El Norte (although property rights still are not as secure — for now).</p>
<p>Now it’s taking the biggest step of all: Allowing foreign companies back in to drill for oil.</p>
<p>It was 76 years ago that Mexico’s government nationalized all oil production. It was a time when socialism was on the march globally: fascism in Italy; National Socialism in Germany; communism in the Soviet Union. The Mexicans especially didn’t like the meddling Yanqui, who had invaded their country as recently as 1914-17 — 21 years earlier.</p>
<p>But times change. Today, seemingly everyone with a backyard in North America is finding black gold. Neighboring&#160;Texas has doubled oil production in a decade. North Dakota can’t control the growth it’s enjoying from the fracking boom.</p>
<p>The boom is largely being carried out by wildcatters, as told in “ <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1/175-8460666-1551335?url=search-alias%3Daps&amp;field-keywords=frackers&amp;sprefix=fracke%2Caps" type="external">The Frackers: The Outrageous Inside Story of the New Billionaire Wildcatters</a>.” It’s the profit motive. When government tries to find oil, it’s like putting the DMV in charge. Mexico is figuring that out.</p>
<p>According to <a href="http://fortune.com/2014/08/14/pemex-oil-black-gold/" type="external">Fortune</a>:</p>
<p>In a move that has both shocked and thrilled the global oil industry, Mexico’s government is performing an about-face.</p>
<p>For the first time in three-quarters of a century, it intends to invite international oil firms into the country to sink their drills into its petroleum-rich earth. That decision has infuriated many Mexicans, and it fundamentally threatens Pemex, which has always been a monopoly. As the oil giants prepare to pounce, ]Pemex CEO Emilio Lozoya], a Harvard-educated investment executive and an oil industry newcomer, has the task of whipping the bloated behemoth into competitive shape.</p>
<p>“It is, by all means, the most important transformation Pemex has suffered in our entire 76 years,” says the fresh-faced CEO, who speaks excellent English and chooses his words—including his verbs—deliberately. As he talks, he jots talking points onto a small white notepad that has been placed in front of his high-backed chair. By his right hand sits a red phone, a direct line to the office of Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, the oil reform’s architect and Lozoya’s friend and boss.&#160;</p>
<p>It means plentiful new jobs and strong continuing prosperity for Mexico. That means the recent trend of <a href="http://www.pewhispanic.org/2012/04/23/net-migration-from-mexico-falls-to-zero-and-perhaps-less/" type="external">net zero immigration</a> to the United States from Mexico will continue. Indeed, I suspect many Mexicans will go back to enjoy the prosperity and the much lower cost of living. Why put up with median-price $750,000 homes in Southern California and $1 million in Silicon Valley? You can’t even smoke in bars in Puritan California anymore, something the more libertarian Mexicans&#160; <a href="http://www.tobaccocontrollaws.org/legislation/country/mexico/summary" type="external">still can enjoy</a>.</p>
<p>An Anglo friend of mine moved to Baja last year and loves it. Same weather as Yanqui California, but you still can get a safe place on the beach. Everything else is cheaper, including the tequila. And you legally can get Cuban stogies.</p>
<p>Sure, you have to find places that don’t have violence. But it’s the same here. You avoid Detroit.</p>
<p>Time to Go South?</p>
<p /> | Mexico moves toward free-market oil | false | https://calwatchdog.com/2014/08/27/mexico-moves-toward-free-market-oil/ | 2018-08-20 | 3 |
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<p>Paul Salas made a news splash when he was arrested by Albuquerque police earlier this year for an alleged armed crime wave that involved 47 armed robberies from October through March.</p>
<p>But it wasn’t just robbery detectives who were on his trail when he was busted. Bernalillo County sheriff’s deputies who keep track of sex offenders were already looking for Salas after he failed to show up for his annual sex offender registration in the Phoenix area.</p>
<p>Sharing information, APD and BCSO were both tracking Salas when he hit a Verizon store, where he stole several iPhones and a tracking device that eventually led officers to him.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Salas is the sort of convicted sex offender, police say, that the registry was designed to help law enforcement and the public to keep under watch.</p>
<p>He was convicted in 2006 of two counts of attempted sexual conduct with a minor under 16 as a result of a plea bargain that dismissed more serious charges. As part of his sentence under Arizona law, Salas was to report to the local sheriff to be put on the sex offender registry for the rest of his life.</p>
<p>After he absconded in April 2016, Arizona detectives found that Salas had been corresponding with a female inmate in New Mexico, so they notified Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office Sex Offender Registry Team, or SORT.</p>
<p>Detectives from the registry team shared their leads – several local addresses – with robbery detectives.</p>
<p>Salas is now residing in the Metropolitan Detention Center, charged with 55 counts of armed robbery, two counts of robbery and other crimes, including kidnapping, child abuse, conspiracy and aggravated assault.</p>
<p>Prosecutors sought to hold him without bond, but District Judge Stan Whitaker refused that request and set a $100,000 cash bond. Salas is also charged with being a fugitive from Arizona, where his probation has been revoked and has another $100,000 cash bond in that case.</p>
<p>There are literally hundreds of sex offenders who leave one state for another each year.</p>
<p>Many move for personal reasons and abide by the sex offender registration laws in their new state of residence.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Others, like Salas, don’t.</p>
<p>No safe haven</p>
<p>New Mexico was once considered a safe haven for convicted sex offenders seeking to avoid registering with local sheriffs.</p>
<p>The original state law, passed in 1995, had few teeth for prosecutors and law enforcement but lots of loopholes for felons.</p>
<p>Federal laws were not much help.</p>
<p>But a lot has changed.</p>
<p>New Mexico toughened its sex offender registration laws in 2005 and 2013.</p>
<p>For instance, among the changes in the 2005 law was a law that allows offenders convicted of more serious sex crimes to be ordered by a District Judge to register for the rest of their lives. The previous cap was 20 years.</p>
<p>The 2013 changes required tighter reporting requirements – mandating updates with local sheriffs every 90 days.</p>
<p>As a result of the changes, the number of sex offenders in the state has more than doubled to 3,639 since 2005 and in Bernalillo County the number has tripled to almost 1,100. There are 62 people statewide for whom police are looking because they failed to register.</p>
<p>In Bernalillo County, the sheriff’s registry team makes home visits twice a year to make sure the offender is still living at that address.</p>
<p>Detectives say that once an offender is off probation or parole, their contact with the sex offender registration detectives may be the only law enforcement agency tracking their whereabouts.</p>
<p>Federal law enforcement involvement got a big boost in 2006 with the passage of the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, also known as the Adam Walsh Protection and Safety Act.</p>
<p>It provided money to states to improve public access to sex offender registries, tried to standardize state laws across the country for registering sex offenders and made it a federal crime for offenders to cross state lines and not register if they were required to do so.</p>
<p>U.S. marshals offices around the country and in New Mexico routinely investigate cases with local law enforcement.</p>
<p>And in New Mexico such cases are routinely prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office.</p>
<p>“New Mexico cannot be a safe haven for convicted sex offenders,” said Acting U.S. Attorney James Tierney.</p>
<p>And local prosecutors like Bernalillo County District Attorney Raúl Torrez say they also take absconders seriously.</p>
<p>“It is the underlying crime that the public expects us to take very seriously,” he said.</p>
<p>Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Sgt. Harry Landis said in an interview that the registry aids law enforcement in many ways.</p>
<p>“There’s a report of an attempted abduction at a school bus stop by a man driving a white van,” Landis said. “We can put out a list of the convicted sex offenders in that area driving a white van.</p>
<p>“We know who they are. We know where they live,” Landis said. “And in New Mexico we see many sex offenders who are convicted of committing other violent crimes so that type of information is valuable to law enforcement.”</p>
<p>Tierney said, “Our families and friends need to know if convicted sex offenders live in their neighborhoods or work near their children’s schools so they can take protective measures.”</p>
<p>The sex offender registries are designed for online public access and are searchable by name, address, county or city and are available on the state Department of Public Safety.</p>
<p>Failure to register</p>
<p>Federal and state criminal cases against sex offenders who fail to register are fairly common in New Mexico.</p>
<p>n In 2014, Undrio Antwanne Roe, 45, moved to Hobbs from Louisiana where he was convicted in 1999 on state charges of sexually assaulting a minor.</p>
<p>Roe was arrested by deputy U.S. marshals and was sent to federal prison for a year and one day, with five years of supervised release and a requirement that he register when he gets back out of prison.</p>
<p>•  In March, Kevin Gordon Scott, 60, pleaded guilty to failing to register as a sex offender in New Mexico after leaving Colorado. He was originally convicted in 1982 of rape and other sexual assault charges in Indiana and sentenced to more than 20 years in prison. After he was paroled in Indiana, he moved to Colorado where he initially registered but fled to New Mexico.</p>
<p>Bernalillo County Sheriff’s detectives and deputy U.S. marshals tracked Scott down. He awaits sentencing in federal court.</p>
<p>• McQuade Quintana, 29 of Dulce, was sentenced in late 2015 to 22 months in federal prison and three years supervised release for railing to register. Quintana was convicted of aggravated sexual abuse of a child in January 2006. When he was released from prison, he registered in Bernalillo County but then moved to Rio Arriba County where he failed to register.</p>
<p>“The U.S. Attorney’s Office places the highest priority on prosecuting SORNA (failure to register) cases involving sex offenders convicted of abusing children under the age of 12 years,” Tierney said. “These cases are a priority because of the potential danger convicted child sex offenders pose to communities in New Mexico, including our 22 Native American reservations, and are prosecuted as part of the office’s ‘worst of the worst’ anti-violence initiative.”</p>
<p>The bad news</p>
<p>But there are still holes in the system.</p>
<p>Despite the growth in the number of sex offenders registered in the state, New Mexico still lags behind states with small populations.</p>
<p>Nebraska for instance has more than 5,100 registered sex offenders.</p>
<p>Even though New Mexico lagged behind other states in expanding the use of the registry, the state’s numbers will continue to grow – fueled in part by nearly 1,300 convicted sex offenders now serving time in the state’s prison system. Many of them at some point will be released and required to register.</p>
<p>That will require more resources for local sheriffs to oversee the registered sex offenders in their counties or in the case of tribal lands, the appointed chief of police.</p>
<p>Some states have more criminal laws that require registration than New Mexico. For example, many states require registration for crimes involving prostitution, voyeurism and bestiality, while New Mexico does not.</p>
<p>And New Mexico is among the states that don’t require juvenile sex offenders to register.</p>
<p>Failing to register is a fourth-degree felony in New Mexico, which means it can lead to an 18-month prison sentence. Potential sentences in the federal system are much longer with up to 10 years for a first offense.</p>
<p>In New Mexico, district judges imposing a sentence have the discretion to lower the registration requirements, including length of time.</p>
<p>Some crimes in New Mexico require registration with law enforcement, but they are not on the public registry.</p>
<p>For example, a conviction for fourth-degree criminal sexual penetration can carry a 10-year registration requirement, but only with law enforcement.</p>
<p>But the public is allowed to see the registration of someone convicted of fourth-degree criminal sexual contact – considered a less serious offense – which carries a lifetime registration requirement.</p>
<p>Law enforcement and prosecutors just shrug their shoulders at the discrepancy. They don’t know why it exists in the law.</p>
<p>On the other hand, New Mexico takes a tough stand on absconders and will extradite people who fail to register and leave the state.</p>
<p>How to locate sex offenders</p>
<p>The Department of Public Safety maintains the state sex offender registry, which is available online at <a href="http://www.nmjustice.net/" type="external">http://www.nmjustice.net/</a> If you are tracking the whereabouts of a specific sex offender the site offers a free email alert system if that offender moves or the offender’s status changes. If you want to know if any sex offenders are registered in your neighborhood, simply write your address in the area search function and a map of registered offenders will show up on your screen. You can also locate a sex offender by name.</p>
<p />
<p /> | New Mexico has stepped up efforts to monitor sex offenders | false | https://abqjournal.com/1019531/safe-haven-2.html | 2 |
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<p>But was it a security operation or an exercise in mass racial profiling?</p>
<p>After the deadly Dec. 19 truck attack on a Berlin Christmas market by a Tunisian man, Germany is more polarized than ever over how to deal with hundreds of thousands of recently arrived asylum seekers, including many from the Middle East and North Africa.</p>
<p>The New Year’s sweeps in Cologne, about 300 miles southwest of Berlin, became the latest flash point, with police being both hailed and criticized for deploying newly aggressively tactics.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>The divide illustrates the intensifying debate in Germany – and across Europe – over how to balance cherished values of privacy and civil liberties against a new era of risk. German authorities on Monday said they had made yet another in a series of terrorist-linked arrests, taking into custody a Syrian migrant on suspicion of seeking funds from the Islamic State to stage a truck bomb attack.</p>
<p>In Cologne over the weekend, police deployed thousands of officers. Videos showed a large group of men, apparently North Africans, corralled for questioning by police. Critics blasted the police, in part for using a term for North Africans deemed by some to be an ethnic slur.</p>
<p>“Hundreds of Nafris screened at main railway station,” the Cologne police Tweeted on New Year’s Eve.</p>
<p>On Twitter, the popular German comedian Jan Bohmermann retorted, “What is the difference between Nafri and the [n-word]?”</p>
<p>Amnesty International denounced the operation as blatant “racial profiling.”</p>
<p>“Questions over the legality and proportionality arise when nearly 1,000 people are checked and partially stopped only because of their appearance,” senior Green Party politician Simone Peter told the Rheinische Post.</p>
<p>Yet far more voices appeared to push back against the critics, crediting the police with taking preventive measures following last year’s violent New Year’s Eve – when more than 1,200 women were sexually assaulted in various German cities, including more than 600 in Cologne and about 400 in Hamburg.</p>
<p>More than 2,000 men were allegedly involved. At least 120 suspects – about half of them foreign nationals who had recently arrived in Germany – have since been identified.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>The government of Chancellor Angela Merkel – under fire over her former open-door policy toward refugees – backed the Cologne crackdown.</p>
<p>“The government is very relieved that the public New Year’s Eve festivities proceeded mostly peacefully and above all without such dreadful incidents like last year,” government spokesman Georg Streiter said Tuesday</p>
<p>Sigmar Gabriel, chairman of the Social Democratic Party and Germany’s vice chancellor, told the Funke newspaper group that criticism directed at the police operation was unjustified.</p>
<p>It “has nothing to do with racism but with smart public safety,” he said on Monday. Gabriel also defended use of the term “Nafris.”</p>
<p>“What else should the police do apart from stopping exactly that group of North Africans and preventing them from accessing Cologne’s inner city?” he asked.</p>
<p>Even Peter, the Green Party official, softened her tone as party colleagues appeared to distance themselves from her earlier remarks against the police operation.</p>
<p>“That the people of Cologne were able to celebrate more peaceful this year and that the assaults which happened last year did not repeat is thanks to the well-prepared police,” she wrote.</p>
<p>Cologne’s police president Jurgen Mathies on Monday claimed that suspects were screened based on “aggressive” behavior rather than their appearance. He said a large number of men had suddenly turned up at the Cologne’s central train station on New Year’s Eve, leading authorities to send in reinforcements.</p>
<p>Ultimately, police detained 92 people – including 16 Germans and 10 Syrians – on Saturday night in Cologne.</p>
<p>“I feared that the [situation] could suddenly sour,” Mathies.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, he said he regretted the use of the word “Nafris” in a police tweet.</p>
<p>“This term is not supposed to be used for public relations,” he said. He added that the term had been in use internally since 2013 to describe young North African men “who have distinguished themselves for years with a particular willingness to use violence.”</p>
<p>On Tuesday, Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere’s, in a piece for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, called for new steps on deportations. They included the creation of “federal departure centers,” in which rejected asylum seekers could be kept before their deportations to avoid them slipping away or going into hiding.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Noack reported from London.</p> | German police target North Africans in holiday sweeps. Claims of racial profiling came next. | false | https://abqjournal.com/919724/german-police-target-north-africans-in-holiday-sweeps-claims-of-racial-profiling-came-next.html | 2 |
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<p>The indignant call for "bipartisanship" today is from people who want to pass health-care legislation over the equally indignant objections of many, many, many Americans. (I'm avoiding the phrase "most Americans" so as not to appear contentious.) Yet in truth, this partisan obstruction has done the "people's business" more elegantly than bipartisanship would, if we take public opinion as a fair measure of what people really want.</p>
<p>Of course, everyone will agree that a degree of partisanship that creates paralysis in the face of pressing national need (such as a just war) or a morally unanswerable reform (such as the abolition of "don't ask, don't tell" in the military) is a bad thing. We need to go beyond such partisanship. But the current Democratic call to transcend partisanship—and its attack on the Republicans as too partisan—is merely another form of the condition, in which an ostensible critique of partisanship is but a manifestation of partisanship itself: Democrats are trying to pin their inability to pass unpopular legislation on the Republicans, instead of on their own extraordinary misreading of the current political tea leaves.</p>
<p>Partisanship has the benefit of forcing the sides to differentiate themselves and come up with ideas that separate them from the other side. It's a living, dynamic force that keeps inventing new political ideas.</p>
<p>There is a broader question: What is wrong with partisanship in a democracy where information is freely available? We have here a situation where the party in power is having trouble enacting legislation because the party in opposition is doing its utmost to frustrate the process. The party in power says that this is unconscionable. Since when, however, does a party have the right to facile lawmaking? After all, the entire structure of American constitutionalism works on the assumption that the greater risk lies in too many laws, not too few. That is why we do have two houses, and presidential vetoes, with a two-thirds override.</p>
<p>What's so wrong with political and legislative partisanship, anyway? It's the best thing for transparency in government, with each side quarrying for information, and keeping a close eye on the other's activities. Furthermore, partisanship is both the cause and the result of a peculiarly American sense of self-help, of a kind of democratic idealism that leads Americans to believe that nothing is inevitable or hopeless in government. This is in marked contrast to the fatalism you see in places like Russia and China, where partisanship is frowned upon. In such unhappy places, the Great Leader syndrome flourishes in exact proportion to the distance between political leaders and the public. (No wonder, then, that many Americans worry about the apotheosis of Obama.)</p>
<p>Partisanship is all about finding policy flaws in politicians, rather like finding character flaws. That's why it seems so ad hominem, something that brings politicians down to our level: They are mere mortals, like us, as flawed and perfectible as we are. In other lands, they develop ineffable mystique, but not here. In terms of ideas, partisanship has the benefit of forcing the sides to differentiate themselves and come up with ideas that separate them from the other side. It's a living, dynamic force that keeps inventing new political ideas. Exposure to partisan criticism helps a politician to refine a policy and to beware of policies which have no support. A good blast of partisan ridicule acts like a pumice stone. It knocks away the dead skin and leaves the body-politic cleaner.</p>
<p>Let us look elsewhere for inspiration: In Britain, the winning team can do what it likes…until it can't. And yet, all the while, the purpose of the British opposition is to oppose. That is one reason why the British Parliament is less prone than our Congress to pass legislation that simply hasn't been checked well for gross oversights and impracticalities. In contrast, in the U.S., bad, unexamined ideas sail through wearing the burqa of bipartisanship. Remember Sarbanes-Oxley? McCain-Feingold?</p>
<p>A weekly equivalent of Question Time, when the Senate or House majority leader has to face off against the lead opposition character, would help everyone figure out what we're fighting about. When that outspoken chap said "liar!" during Obama's bicameral address last year, it was namby-pamby stuff compared with the House of Commons. (For all its traditions, the House of Commons is a much more informal—and cathartic—place than the Hill, which seems almost Regency by comparison, with its deference to titles and "gentleman from Virginia" verbiage.)</p>
<p>But it is not altogether an accident that Democratic partisanship should assume the form of a critique of partisanship. The Democrats and progressives hate partisanship for the same reason they hate the market: Both are built on the idea of a permanent state of competition that produces the public good only indirectly and through what's called "the invisible hand." Progressives hate the messiness of this, preferring the direct application of reason by the intelligent elite.</p>
<p>The root problem, in the case of health care, is the Democratic inclination to treat the Republican Party as a "faction," which Madison defined in The Federalist No. 10 as "a number of citizens…who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community." As Harvey Mansfield <a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/what-obama-isnt-saying" type="external">argued</a> in the Weekly Standard recently, this Democratic attempt to put entitlement issues beyond political recall is an affront to political liberty. And no partisan should have to put up with that.</p>
<p>Tunku Varadarajan is a national affairs correspondent and writer at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a research fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution and a professor at NYU's Stern Business School. He is a former assistant managing editor at The Wall Street Journal. (Follow him on Twitter <a href="http://twitter.com/tunkuv" type="external">here</a>.)</p> | Why Partisan Bickering Works | true | https://thedailybeast.com/why-partisan-bickering-works | 2018-10-04 | 4 |
<p>What makes Harvey Weinsteins?</p>
<p>The chief of Amazon studios, Roy Price, has now resigned in the wake of allegations that he made lewd comments and propositioned a producer. Lists of accused sexual predators in Hollywood and journalism are circulating on social media. President’s Trump’s long history of pawing and&#160; <a href="http://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/article/2016/oct/18/allegations-about-donald-trump-and-miss-teen-usa-c/" type="external">gawking</a>&#160;at women has again reached center stage.</p>
<p>Actress Alyssa Milano, one of Weinstein’s targets, fumed that “this is not an uncommon occurrence. This is a sick culture. Men like Harvey Weinstein are around every corner. Men who undermine women and their strength, ability, and intelligence exist everywhere.”</p>
<p>This is a common theme you find in feminist thinking. Harassment and even sexual assault are seen as part of the spectrum of sexism. It begins with disparagement of women’s abilities and intelligence, then progresses to making them sexual objects, and finally results in abuse and even rape.</p>
<p>The MeToo hashtag and related posts on Facebook are intended as a feminist rallying cry. The&#160;Feministing&#160;website explains that “gender violence doesn’t exist without white supremacy (such as racism, colonialism, zionism [sic], militarism).”</p>
<p>That’s hard to beat for dimness. In China, according to a U.N. study, 23 percent admit to rape. In Papua New Guinea, 61 percent of men say the same.</p>
<p>What if boorishness isn’t a form of sexism, but merely bad behavior? Let’s face it, many a flagrant lecher — Bill Clinton anyone? — has been a stalwart and possibly even sincere feminist. Many a womanizer seeks absolution for his grubby conduct by ostentatious displays of political correctness. The louts seem to calculate that they earn gropes for every contribution to Emily’s List or NOW. Weinstein offered a particularly pathetic appeal to left-wing sympathies by declaring that he would train even more fire on the NRA.</p>
<p>Feminism made a critical misstep when it joined forces with the sexual revolution in the 1970s. Women needed more outlets for their sexuality, they claimed. Traditional notions about women being more interested in relationships than in casual encounters were outmoded. In 2014, feminist Hanna Rosin looked forward, only slightly tongue-in-cheek, to an era when women would surpass men in sex scandals.</p>
<p>For decades feminists have made abortion the signature feminist issue — thus signaling that consequence-free sex for men (who don’t undergo the surgery and heartbreak) was a key goal. Feminists may not have intended to thereby send the message that they were all in on the sexual free-for-all, but some men concluded as much nonetheless. Feminists set themselves a contradictory task — to insist that men and women were indistinguishable in their sexual tastes and appetites but then to demand that men respect women’s particular reserve.</p>
<p>It would be healthier for our culture — about which Alyssa Milano is not wrong — if feminism were more realistic about human nature. Male sexual aggressiveness has been a challenge every civilization has had to manage. Among some Orthodox Jews, one answer is to set such strict limits on contacts between the sexes that men do not even touch women they are not related to&#160;—&#160;not even to shake hands. This can lead to other problems when Orthodox men’s reticence is misunderstood by others, but it isn’t crazy. How many of us have been hugged a little too long and a little too aggressively by men taking advantage of the fact that they can get away with it?</p>
<p>I could easily sign on to the #MeToo campaign. Sexual harassment cost me a summer job in college. But the men = bad, women = good slogan is a bit too simplistic. I’ve seen my share of women behaving badly too. Older women very seldom demand sexual favors from younger men (sorry Hanna Rosin), but I’ve seen young women use sex to get ahead in workplaces, sometimes targeting other women’s husbands. And I’ve known men of all backgrounds, religious affiliations, and political views who were perfect gentlemen not because they were feminists but because they were raised right.</p>
<p>A more realistic approach to sexual misbehavior would be to acknowledge that the temptation is always there. Most men aren’t predators — but why make it easier for those who are by pretending that a business meeting in a hotel room is anything other than wrong? Even in offices, an open door is a good policy when a man and woman are alone.</p>
<p>Perhaps the slogan we need — for both sexes — is #BeDecent.</p>
<p>— Mona Charen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Copyright ©&#160;2017 Creators.com</p> | Harvey Weinstein and Feminism | false | https://eppc.org/publications/harvey-weinstein-and-feminism/ | 1 |
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<p>The Muslim Brotherhood has warned that Egypt's fragile democratic gains are under threat, after a surprise court ruling overturned last year's parliamentary elections. Egypt could see "dangerous" days ahead if power is returned to those linked to the previous regime, the group said.</p>
<p>The group's candidate, Mohammed Mursi, faces former prime minister Ahmed Shafiq in a runoff presidential election this weekend. The decision by the Supreme Court to disband parliament on Thursday plunged Egypt into turmoil.</p>
<p>The World's Matthew Bell reports on the mood in Cairo as Egyptians prepare to vote in a presidential run-off election this weekend.</p> | Ominous Warnings Ahead of Egypt's Run-off Vote | false | https://pri.org/stories/2012-06-15/ominous-warnings-ahead-egypts-run-vote | 2012-06-15 | 3 |
<p>Driven by a mix of concerns over safety and property rights and bolstered by a dose of environmentalism, the opposition blurs ideological boundaries.</p>
<p>Buff Bradley, a 50-year-old champion thoroughbred trainer, makes for an unlikely environmentalist. The son of <a href="http://www.state-journal.com/spectrum/2010/03/27/honoring-a-great-statesman-and-a-great-horse" type="external">Fred Bradley</a>, who’s a former Kentucky state senator, county judge, attorney, songwriter, pilot and horse-breeding icon‚ Buff has spent much of his life bringing up racehorses on his family’s 300-acre farm in western Franklin County. If you like to brush shoulders with the owners of high-speed, million-dollar winning Kentucky thoroughbreds, there’s a good chance you’ve heard the family name.</p>
<p>Buff didn’t choose to take on the fossil fuel industry; the fight came to him. Last April, representatives from the Tulsa-based <a href="http://co.williams.com/williams/our-company/" type="external">Williams Energy</a> and Houston-based <a href="http://www.bwpmlp.com/" type="external">Boardwalk Pipeline Partners</a> visited his family farm and asked to survey the land for a natural gas liquids pipeline. Bradley respectfully declined to cooperate and got in touch with neighboring landowners with whom surveyors had also paid visit.</p>
<p>But it didn’t take long for Kentucky’s Bluegrass Region to become the latest, if improbable, flashpoint in North America’s pipeline wars.</p>
<p>Williams and Boardwalk quickly moved from surveying land to making offers for easements in order to construct the Bluegrass Pipeline, a jointly owned venture that would ship natural gas liquids over the 1,000 miles from the Marcellus and Utica oil-bearing shale deposits to Gulf Coast refineries. The companies want to lay much of the new pipeline in Kentucky—about 150 miles' worth— <a href="http://bluegrasspipeline.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/OverallBluegrassHandout_Memphis-Reroute-West.pdf" type="external">while reconverting old gas pipelines to complete the rest of the route from Kentucky to Louisiana</a>. Meanwhile, environmental groups like Kentuckians for the Commonwealth and the state’s Sierra Club chapter jumped into the fray, taking the side of the property-owners like Bradley who are unwilling to sell easements.</p>
<p>Driven by a mix of concerns over safety and property rights and bolstered by a dose of environmentalism, the opposition blurs ideological boundaries.</p>
<p>“I think lots of folks around here are kinda rubbed the wrong way by the thought that some out-of-state multibillion-dollar corporation could just come in, throw their weight around and take whatever land they want from folks to build this pipeline,” says Sellus Wilder, a former city commissioner in Frankfort, the state capital, who’s filming a documentary about the pipeline. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;</p>
<p>“In Kentucky, in particular, we seem to be a little,” Wilder pauses, “I wouldn’t say territorial, but I think we maybe value our ownership of our own land a little more deeply here.”</p>
<p>The Bluegrass Pipeline isn’t a run-of-the-mill gas pipeline.</p>
<p>The hazardous materials that it would carry, natural gas liquids, are a <a href="http://www.bp.com/sectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=9044982&amp;contentId=7086512" type="external">byproduct of gas drilling</a>. Separated early on from the more commonly used natural gas product that goes toward <a href="http://www.dailyfinance.com/2014/02/18/natural-gas-is-americas-real-green-energy/" type="external">electricity generation</a>, most gas liquids, which include ethane, propane and butane, are used as feedstock for plastics and other petrochemical products. As the <a href="http://shaleblog.com/2013/gas-from-the-upper-devonian/" type="external">shale revolution</a> barrels ahead in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, energy companies are aiming to capitalize on the high profit margins these liquids fetch on the market.</p>
<p>There’s just one major barrier. The chief processing and refining facilities, at least for now, are on the Gulf Coast, about 1,000 miles away from the Northeast’s fracking heartland. But if companies can manage to get their product to export facilities in Louisiana and Texas, lucrative international markets await: the American Chemistry Council <a href="http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/2b1753c4-6024-11e3-b360-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2tDpqkByw" type="external">predicts chemical exports to rise by 45 percent over the next five years.</a>Offering up to 400,000 barrels of daily capacity, the Bluegrass Pipeline would help fuel this boom.</p>
<p>The clear stakes of the fight—the pipeline offers large rewards to a small niche of the gas and petrochemical industries while offering little to the Kentucky corridor it would cross—helps explain the passionate tenor of opposition, says Deb Nardone, Director of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Natural Gas national campaign, which, with its limited resources, has steered clear of the local fight so far.</p>
<p>“[Natural gas liquids] are not at all about domestic energy security,” Nardone says. “It’s about what’s going to make the industry money. And that’s what’s started to bring non-traditional allies together, as they realize it’s not in their personal benefit in the long run.”</p>
<p>Indeed, the more that residents educated themselves about the project, the more the opposition’s ranks swelled. Landowners didn’t need to be experts in the political economy of natural gas liquids—or for that matter, even care about climate change—to conclude the pipeline presented little benefits for their home state.&#160;</p>
<p>“This is private companies doing this,” says Buff Bradley. “It’s not like it’s gonna be something for us. I don’t even want it close to me. I sure don’t want to leave this earth and leave my kids to deal with it either.”</p>
<p>Tom Fitzgerald, director of the <a href="http://www.kyrc.org/" type="external">Kentucky Resources Council</a>, an environmental advocacy group that offers legal assistance, helped circulate information to concerned landowners about the state’s lack of regulation over gas pipelines and the safety risks—two issues that have helped drive public outcry. Hazardous pipeline accidents are rare, but because of the dangerous substances being transported, any leaks and explosions that do occur can be <a href="http://www.wdrb.com/story/24718670/gas-line-explosion-sinkhole-collapse-raise-new-concerns-about-bluegrass-pipeline" type="external">catastrophic</a>.&#160;&#160;&#160; &#160;&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>The non-traditional battle lines are reminiscent of those surrounding the Keystone XL, says Jane Kleeb, director of <a href="http://boldnebraska.org/" type="external">Bold Nebraska</a>, which helped organize local ranchers and farmers against the pipeline before it became the environmental cause celèbre that it is today.</p>
<p>“For us, there was common ground in the property rights issues and eminent domain,” Kleeb says. “That opens the door for us to engage in conversations with landowners about climate change and about fossil fuels and about Nebraska [getting] 80 percent [of its energy from] coal and how we need to be producing more renewable energy.”</p>
<p>Unlike the Keystone XL, however, those latter types of conversations aren’t driving the movement in the Bluegrass State. But not for lack of trying—green groups are increasingly in touch with landowners in an effort to broaden the politics of opposition. Activists from Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, for example, have pointed to the dirty pipeline proposal as evidence for the need to produce alternative, more sustainable sources of energy.</p>
<p>Those environmentalists also helped bring the movement to the streets: <a href="http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20140212/NEWS01/302120111/-Love-Mountains-protesters-rally-against-Bluegrass-Pipeline" type="external">on Wednesday</a>, hundreds rallied in Frankfort for the ninth annual “I Love Mountains Day.” The rally, which is organized by Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, usually focuses on mountaintop removal. But this year, some of the speakers, like Sister Claire McGowan, a Dominican Sister of Peace, blasted the Bluegrass Pipeline. (Nuns from the Sisters of Loretto brought attention to the project last fall, <a href="http://ncronline.org/blogs/eco-catholic/lorettos-resist-proposed-pipeline" type="external">when they refused to allow pipeline surveyors on their land</a>).</p>
<p>In spite of these efforts, however, much of the opposition remains grounded in an old-fashioned, libertarian commitment to respecting private property rights, says Fitzgerald of the Kentucky Resources Council.</p>
<p>Of course, not everyone is opposed to the pipeline. Much like the proposed Keystone XL, <a href="" type="internal">heavily backed</a> by the AFL-CIO’s Building and Construction Trades Department, a slice of organized labor is siding with the energy industry.</p>
<p>“We support it because it’s work for Kentucky workers,” says Ed Willoughby, director of the <a href="http://www.kltf.org/" type="external">Kentucky Laborers Training Fund</a>, which counts 3,000 members. “It provides jobs for Kentucky workers, and that’s something we need.”</p>
<p>There’s no guarantee any of the <a href="http://bluegrasspipeline.com/tag/jobs/" type="external">estimated 6,000</a> construction jobs would actually go to members of any union. But Willoughby says the potential is good enough—swayed, one imagines, by Kentucky’s <a href="http://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm" type="external">8 percent unemployment rate, which is eighth-highest in the nation</a>. He’s also unconvinced by the timeless green argument that unions shouldn’t be gobbling up short-term gains at the long-term detriment of the planet.&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>“The people that work construction, all of our jobs are temporary,” Willoughby says. “Every project has a beginning, every project has an end. When those projects begin they help those working families, they help their kids go to school, they help the economy around because they’re spending more money and are able to pay their house payments and their car payments.”</p>
<p>In the next few months, the pipeline’s opponents are hoping that a pending lawsuit and upcoming state legislation can stick the final dagger into the heart of the project.</p>
<p>They’ve calculated that Williams and Boardwalk, struggling to secure the necessary easements, will eventually be forced to seize property using eminent domain. Kentucky state law is ambiguous on the matter: While the use of eminent domain is restricted to projects that have a “public use,” the law doesn’t <a href="http://www.wdrb.com/story/24296340/eminent-domain-emerges-as-new-front-in-bluegrass-pipeline-battle" type="external">explicitly prohibit</a> private natural gas liquids pipelines from qualifying. The companies, for their part, have refused to promise they won’t resort to eminent domain.</p>
<p>The state’s <a href="http://wfpl.org/post/group-files-lawsuit-seeking-clarification-eminent-domain-bluegrass-pipeline" type="external">Attorney General has already said he doesn’t believe the pipeline would qualify</a>. But to play it safe, <a href="http://wfpl.org/post/group-files-lawsuit-seeking-clarification-eminent-domain-bluegrass-pipeline" type="external">Kentuckians United to Restrain Eminent Domain</a>, represented by Fitzgerald, is asking the Franklin County circuit court to clarify whether the operators have grounds to invoke eminent domain.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, in response to pressure from landowners and environmentalists, the Kentucky Legislature is slated to move on a series of bills that would prohibit the pipeline operators from seizing private land. In the upper chamber, <a href="http://www.lrc.ky.gov/legislator/S014.htm" type="external">Jimmy Higdon</a>, a Republican from Marion County, is <a href="http://www.lrc.ky.gov/record/14RS/SB14.htm" type="external">sponsoring a bill</a> that would limit the use of eminent domain to state-regulated utilities.</p>
<p>“Our opinion is they can’t get across Kentucky without using eminent domain,” Higdon tells In These Times. “We just want to make sure if a landowner says no, that no means no.”</p>
<p>Higdon says he would rather not comment on any of the environmental issues. He is, quite emphatically, not attracted to this issue out of concern for climate change.</p>
<p>“I can’t say that I’m on board,” Higdon says. “I’m not convinced that [man-made climate change is] 100 percent a sure thing. I think there’s some conflicting information on climate change and I’m not totally convinced yet.”</p>
<p>When it comes to impeding development of the natural gas industry, though, activists in Kentucky will take whatever allies they can get. And environmentalists better get used to these sorts of fights, say Kleeb of Bold Nebraska and Nardone of the Sierra Club. As the gas industry seeks to move its products to foreign markets—whether it's LNG or NGL—that means more pipelines. And that, in turn, means more struggles like these.&#160;</p>
<p>“It is much more than just an environmentalist fight,” says the Sierra Club’s Nardone. “It’s about an industry that’s rogue and very little regulated trying to muscle its way into impacting people’s lives.”</p>
<p>Like what you’ve read? <a href="https://secure.actblue.com/contribute/page/itt-subscription-offer?refcode=WS_ITT_Article_Footer&amp;noskip=true" type="external">Subscribe to In These Times magazine</a>, or <a href="https://secure.actblue.com/contribute/page/support-in-these-times?refcode=WS_ITT_Article_Footer&amp;noskip=true" type="external">make a tax-deductible donation to fund this reporting</a>.</p>
<p>Cole Stangler writes about labor and the environment. His reporting has also appeared in The Nation, VICE, The New Republic and International Business Times. He lives in Paris, France. He can be reached at cole[at]inthesetimes.com. Follow him <a href="http://twitter.com/ColeStangler" type="external">@colestangler</a>.</p> | Kentucky’s Keystone XL | true | http://inthesetimes.com/article/16307/kentuckys_keystone_xl/ | 2014-02-18 | 4 |
<p>Want to mingle with hobbits? All you’ll need is a time machine and these coordinates: Flores Island, Indonesia, 700,000 B.C.</p>
<p>There, you’d find 70-pound, three-foot-tall humanoids dwelling in caves. If you met the hobbits on a good day, you might catch them butchering a tiny elephant-esque species the size of a Dodge Caravan.</p>
<p>And on a bad day? You might see hobbits mauled by a Komodo dragon — a fanged creature that’s twice their weight.</p>
<p>Over the past decade, scientists have debated the existence of homo floresiensis — affectionately titled “hobbits” by paleo-anthropologists. But <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/jun/08/flores-fossil-discovery-provides-clues-to-hobbit-ancestors" type="external">new revelations</a>, tied to the discovery of teeth and skull fragments, just ended the debate.</p>
<p>Case closed. Hobbits were real.</p>
<p>Like neanderthals, they belonged to a distinct species of hominid that walked the earth at the same time as homo sapiens. As far as we know, the hobbits existed for more than half a million years on a remote island the size of Puerto Rico. The island, named Flores, is to the east of Bali.</p>
<p>Adam Brumm, an archaeologist with Australia’s Griffith University, co-authored the study confirming the existence of homo floresiensis. “There are many unknowns,” he says, but his team now has enough evidence to speculate about the daily lives of our long-extinct hobbit cousins.</p>
<p />
<p>A Hominin fossil.</p>
<p>Kinez Riza</p>
<p>Their home, Flores, was a “small, impoverished island environment” with plenty of dry grasslands but not much nutrition. “This was not a lush, verdant environment,” Brumm says. “Clearly there was enough food to survive for a long period of time. But not enough to flourish.”</p>
<p>In a land where nourishment is limited, tiny humanoids thrive. Small bodies require less food to survive and are better able to pass along genes.</p>
<p>One compelling origin theory, Brumm says, involves another hominid — homo erectus, which stood about 5’4”&#160;— reaching Flores and gradually evolving into hobbits.</p>
<p>In previous years, researchers have speculated that hobbits or their ancestors somehow arrived to the island by boat.</p>
<p>Brumm finds that evidence unconvincing because “boats were almost certainly beyond the cognitive ability of those early humans.” Perhaps they were “victims of a freak ecological event like a tsunami,” he says, “that carried hominids out to sea from the mainland.”</p>
<p>He cites accounts from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami in which humans were swept from Indonesian coasts. “Some people,” he says, “survived for days by clinging to floating coconut palms.”</p>
<p>But he concedes that <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/higher-education/flores-hobbit-ancestors-likely-castaways-australian-researchers/news-story/467004cd0764605117213b60e2b97f1f" type="external">this castaway scenario</a>, while not impossible, remains hard to fathom.</p>
<p>To solve this mystery and others, Brumm is now calling for intensive excavation work in the hobbit’s potential origin point: Sulawesi, a large island 400 meters to the north.</p>
<p>They held their own. These tusked creatures weren’t technically elephants — they were elephant ancestors called “stegadons.” As with hobbits, the island’s nutrition deficit shrunk their bodies.&#160;Many were the size of buffalo.</p>
<p>“They were like mini-elephants,” Brumm says. “We’ve found thousands of stone tools associated with thousands of their bones. What we don’t find is evidence of stone tools used to cut meat or fat from their bones. There are no bones with cut marks.”</p>
<p>In other words, humanoids surely hunted these mini-elephants. But there’s no ironclad proof that they ate them. Still, Brumm thinks it’s highly possible that hobbits dined on stegadon steaks.</p>
<p>“There’s a lot of meat and fat on those bones,” he says. “You can get enough meat to keep God knows how many barbecues going without ever making contact with the bones.”</p>
<p>Barbecue? Yep. Some <a href="http://australianmuseum.net.au/homo-floresiensis" type="external">evidence suggests</a>hobbits also knew how to manipulate fire.</p>
<p />
<p>An excavation site in Indonesia.</p>
<p>Dr Gerrit van den Bergh/University of Wollongong, Australia</p>
<p>It’s possible but “not likely,” Brumm says.</p>
<p>However, at various points along our evolutionary journey, homo sapiens (note: if you’re reading this, that’s your species) <a href="http://www.thewire.com/technology/2011/09/it-wasnt-just-neanderthals-ancient-humans-had-sex-other-hominids/42117/" type="external">has indeed procreated</a> with other hominid species.</p>
<p>It’s common for a European to host 3 percent neanderthal DNA. A newly discovered hominid species called Denisova, whose remnants were discovered in Siberia, left its genetic imprint on many modern-day people in Oceania.</p>
<p>But it’s also possible that our species went to Flores to make war, not love. Homo sapiens arrived on the hobbits’ native island about 50,000 years ago. That just so happens to be the era in which homo floresiensis started to die out — and that stokes speculation that we <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/03/160330-hobbits-humans-flores-cave-older-species/" type="external">“wiped out”</a> the hobbits.</p>
<p>It’s likely but not certain. Hobbit brains were roughly three times smaller than the modern human’s brain.</p>
<p>But brain size is an imperfect measure of intelligence. Human males have slightly larger brains than females, for example, while sperm whale brains have all humans beat by a factor of six.</p>
<p>What we do know is that they had “culture,” Brumm says. “Not culture in the sense of having a Sydney Opera House. But a tradition of tool making, passed down through many generations, is a culture.”</p>
<p>One of the original archeologists who helped discover this species wanted to title it <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/the-discovery-of-homo-floresiensis-tales-of-the-hobbit-1.16197" type="external">“homo hobbitus.”</a> Officially, the name didn’t stick. Its formal classification became “homo floresiensis.” But the term “hobbit” remains its colloquial name even among serious researchers.</p>
<p>“I always thought, 'This name is really, really cool,'” says Brumm. “A lot of scientists may think, 'Oh, you’re a bunch of heathens down in Australia,'” where many hobbit-focused researchers are based.</p>
<p>“But 'hobbit' is an affectionate term and it’s here to stay,” he says. “It’s just a bit of fun. Why not?”</p>
<p />
<p /> | 'Hobbits' probably barbecued mini-elephants on this Indonesian island | false | https://pri.org/stories/2016-06-10/hobbits-probably-barbecued-mini-elephants-indonesian-island | 2016-06-10 | 3 |
<p>The President of Venezuela Nicolas Maduro gave a media conference on February 15 that brought us to date on the Venezuelan government’s position to several important events that have occurred recently. The openness of the media conference could be inferred by the fact that Maduro gave a very short introduction and immediately allowed questions from reporters. The first two reporters to ask questions were one from the Washington Post and another from Reuters. At the time of writing I have not seen reports from those outlets. But the content of what Maduro had to say was more important.</p>
<p>Some observers have reacted to Maduro’s announcement that he will attend the Summit of the Americas in Lima in April “come rain, thunder or lightning!” despite the unwelcome message by Peru. That is sensational news that has gained him the label of “party crasher.” However, Maduro’s confirmation of holding early elections is more deserving of attention for its relevance to all Venezuelans, for the immediate future of the country and possibly the region, and for all those who believe in democracy.</p>
<p>The stalled dialogue by the Venezuelan opposition in the Dominican Republic did not stop Maduro from unilaterally signing the agreement with the terms agreed on. This allowed the Consejo Nacional Electoral (CNE – National Electoral Council) to announce the date established in the agreement for April 22 of this year.</p>
<p>Maduro has announced his candidacy for a second term 2019-2025. He stressed that y offered to achieve peace with the National Constituent Assembly and peace was achieved. “Now,” he said, “I offer to get out of the economic war and achieve [economic] recovery after the elections.”</p>
<p>But the Venezuelan opposition is seriously divided and cannot agree on an electoral tactic much less a platform other then getting rid of Maduro. Seemingly, they are caught between two not edifying alternatives. One is participating in the elections with the fear of being defeated by what appears to be a large support for the governing party, and then having to claim electoral fraud repeating the pattern of past elections. The other alternative is not participating and pre-empt the whole process with claims that the elections will be fraudulent. This can only be construed as a boycott.</p>
<p>The latter seems to prevail at this time as it coincides with the U.S. position of not recognizing the Venezuelan elections results. The Canadian government seems to be on the same page. On February 14, Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland echoed the statement by the Lima Group from the day before by saying, “We maintain our demand that presidential elections be called with sufficient advance notice, that international observers participate, and that all Venezuelan political players be included in the election. With these conditions unmet, Venezuela’s elections will lack any legitimacy or credibility.”</p>
<p>Maduro addressed those same points in his media conference. On the elections being called with “sufficient advance notice”, he stressed that the date was agreed on with the opposition in the unsigned agreement.</p>
<p>On the issue of international observers, he also seemed to refer to the unsigned document and said, “We have given all guarantees to the opposition for the upcoming electoral process, including a UN mission of observers.” On February 8 he had already posted a wider invitation to international observers on Twitter: “Venezuela is open to every necessary guarantee and welcomes every international observer willing to come. More than to inspect, they will be able to learn from the flawless electoral system we’ve built”.</p>
<p>On the last point of the Lima Group, that “all Venezuelan political players be included in the election”, Maduro spoke quite at length. He stated that the Lima Group “does not want elections”, but he was unequivocally adamant on the fact that “there will be elections with or without the opposition.” “We have a debt with Hugo Chavez”, he said.</p>
<p>To the Venezuelans abroad he reminded them that the National Electoral Council has extended the time to register to vote in their consulates until February 25. Ironically, if those voters would want to vote against Maduro, they will not be able to do so without their opposition candidates.</p>
<p>Having said that, there are some smaller opposition parties that are participating in the elections. But those do not question the democratic process in place now, nor are the ones that are receiving the support from the U.S. and Canada. On the contrary they are ignored.</p>
<p>In a clear sign of confidence Maduro added that he hopes the opposition would participate with a single coalition candidate suggesting his desire to have a real match of political forces. He called on specific opposition leaders like Henry Ramos Allup of the Accion Democratica party (AD – Democratic Action), Henri Falcón of the Avanzada Progresista (AP – Progressive Advance), and Claudio Fermín, independent, to register.</p>
<p>To the question of what will happen to the opposition, Maduro said, “Now the opposition does not know what to do because it depends on its foreign masters.” More explicitly he stated, “Only Washington knows. That’s the truth.”</p>
<p>Indeed, beyond the confusion of the Venezuelan opposition in disarray, and the obvious questionable interference by foreign governments in the internal affairs of a sovereign country, the greatest harm is being inflicted against the notion of democracy. Is abstention to participate in an electoral process, and claim fraud before the facts, contributing to democracy? Is encouraging abstention to participate in elections not a form of boycott of democracy and of holding the country hostage?</p>
<p>In 2018 there will be seven presidential elections in Latin America – a region of constant political changes, social unrest, resistance and resilience. Honduras has recently had turbulent elections with a lot to be questioned about “legitimacy or credibility.” No international voices were raised or sanctions slapped on the country.</p>
<p>Is the final message that some elections are more “democratic” than others? Do Latin American countries need Washington’s stamp of approval on when and how to hold elections despite all the assurances to abide to democratic process? The majority of Latin Americans are saying a resounding “No” if we care to listen.</p> | Venezuela Decides to Hold Presidential Elections, the Opposition Chooses to Boycott Democracy | true | https://counterpunch.org/2018/02/19/venezuela-decides-to-hold-presidential-elections-the-opposition-chooses-to-boycott-democracy/ | 2018-02-19 | 4 |
<p>Citigroup Inc. said Wednesday it had net income of $3.57 billion, or $1.14 a share, in the fourth quarter, up from $3.34 billion, or $1.02 a share, in the year-earlier period. Revenue fell to $17.0 billion from $18.5 billion a year ago. The FactSet consensus was for EPS of $1.12 and revenue of $17.3 billion. Shares were slightly higher premarket, but have gained 37% in the last 12 months, while the S&amp;P 500 has gained 20.6%.</p>
<p>Copyright © 2017 MarketWatch, Inc.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p> | Citigroup Revenue Falls Slightly Short In Latest Quarter | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/01/18/citigroup-revenue-falls-slightly-short-in-latest-quarter.html | 2017-01-18 | 0 |
<p>To mark World Refugee Day, The World's Beirut correspondent Richard Hall selected images from his reporting on the historic movement of migrants and refugees, across continents and oceans, from the past few years.</p>
<p />
<p>Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, February 2016.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>This is what a “refugee camp” looks like in Lebanon.</p>
<p>The country is hosts more than 1&#160;million Syrians who fled the war next door. Tens of thousands of them live in informal settlements like this. The Lebanese government forbids Syrian refugees from building of permanent structures. They don’t want them to&#160;get too comfortable and stay for a long time.&#160;The result&#160;is that many Syrians have lived in these structures for years:&#160;They are hot in the summer, freezing in the winter.</p>
<p>Read:&#160; <a href="" type="internal">Lebanon doesn’t want Syrians getting too comfortable. Even in winter</a></p>
<p />
<p>Ketermaya, Lebanon, September 2015.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>By the fall of 2015, one small village in Lebanon was hosting more Syrian refugees than the entire United States had taken in from the start of the Syrian war. Some locals let the newcomers use their land&#160;for informal camps. While others charge&#160;rent.</p>
<p>Read: <a href="" type="internal">One village in Lebanon hosts as many refugees as the entire United States&#160;</a></p>
<p />
<p>Serbia-Croatia border, September 2015.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>In 2015, the Syrian refugee crisis spilled into Europe in what became a&#160;record migration to the continent. Hundreds of thousands made the journey across land to find safety within European Union borders. Most Syrians were heading to Germany, where Chancellor Angela Merkel had promised to welcome them. The journey was arduous, and involved long walks through fields to cross borders. In this picture, a family crossed from Serbia into Croatia, a day before the border was closed.</p>
<p>Read: <a href="" type="internal">Croatia closes its border, but migrants keep coming anyway.</a></p>
<p />
<p>Rostock, Germany, September 2015.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>Merkel’s decision to open the doors to Syrians fleeing war followed a remarkable interaction with a Palestinian refugee named Reem Sahwil. At a televised question-and-answer sessions with the German chancellor, Sahwil asked why people like her faced deportation from Germany, where she had lived for years and gone to school. She broke down in tears during the interaction. Not long after that, Merkel’s policy softened.</p>
<p>Read: <a href="" type="internal">The girl who changed Merkel’s mind&#160;</a></p>
<p />
<p>Zahle, Lebanon, January 2017.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>Children are a constant presence in all refugee camps. Many are unable to go to school, and so are forced to hang around the house all day. Some are even forced to go to work to provide for their family.</p>
<p />
<p>Sinjar Mountain, Iraq, April 2017.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>ISIS’&#160;ferocious takeover of much of Iraq&#160;displaced more than 3 million people. The group killed thousands of members of the&#160;Yazidi minority, sending survivors fleeing to the mountains near&#160;their homes. More than three years after the ISIS attacks against their people, thousands are still stuck on the mountain.</p>
<p>Read: <a href="" type="internal">Years after US intervention, Yazidis are still stuck on the mountain</a></p>
<p />
<p>Mediterranean Sea, May 2017.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>A lifeboat carries out a rescue operation of migrants on a dinghy off the coast of Libya.&#160;In 2016, the EU and Turkey struck a deal to stop refugees and migrants from entering Europe. As a result, land migration into the EU&#160;largely halted. But many thousands still take the deadly voyage from North Africa across the Mediterranean Sea.&#160;Most on board are from sub-Saharan Africa, fleeing poverty, conflict and political instability.</p>
<p />
<p>Mediterranean Sea, May 2017.</p>
<p>Richard Hall</p>
<p>After Save the Children took them aboard its Mediterranean rescue ship, hundreds of migrants had to sleep&#160;on the deck, wrapped in blankets, on the way to Italy.</p> | Refugee Day: Photos of a historic migration of people seeking safer and better lives | false | https://pri.org/stories/2017-06-20/refugee-day-photos-historic-migration-people-seeking-safer-and-better-lives | 2017-06-20 | 3 |
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<p>Nearly half of the 12 players on this year’s list are from Class 5A state champion St. Pius and Class 4A state champion Sandia Prep as we unveil our top choices from the 2016 season.</p>
<p>The Sartans, who were the metro area’s top team in any division, have three players among the dozen, led by senior outside hitter Julianna Zamora who is part of the first team.</p>
<p>Junior Catherine Kelly was arguably New Mexico’s best player this year. The Sundevils junior, a powerful 5-foot-8 outside hitter who does a masterful job finding angles, is also among the first-team selections.</p>
<p>If Kelly was at the offensive end of the spectrum, then Volcano Vista libero Kamryn Lopez was at the other end, supplying the Hawks with a relentless defensive presence. She is on the first team.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>As are two district rivals, Cleveland junior setter Kenley Vote and Cibola junior hitter Lauren Montoya.</p>
<p>The first team is completed by La Cueva’s outstanding 6-foot junior middle, Annabelle Kubinski.</p>
<p>Second-team choices Allie Lackner (libero) and Nicole Peery (hitter) are the other two St. Pius representatives on the All-Metro team.</p>
<p>The other second-team hitters are Sandia’s Jaedyn Fuqua and Miranda Jaramillo from Los Lunas. Eldorado junior Gracelyn Stubbs is in the middle, with Sandia Prep’s Mirabelle Kinberger doing the setting.</p> | Journal All-Metro volleyball team | false | https://abqjournal.com/907526/journal-all-metro-volleyball-team.html | 2 |
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<p>your email</p>
<p>your name</p>
<p>recipient(s) email (comma separated)</p>
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<p>message</p>
<p>captcha</p>
<p />
<p>The lawsuit charges Amazon and Amazon Logistics Inc. with violating the minimum wage law in Seattle, state labor law in Washington and the federal Fair Labor Standards Act. (soumit/ Flickr) &#160;</p>
<p>With wage and hour lawsuits becoming increasingly common across the country, there was little reason for the lawyers at Amazon.com’s Seattle headquarters to be surprised when one landed on their doorstep recently. But they may have been concerned to learn that their newest legal adversary is “Sledgehammer Shannon” Liss-Riordan, a <a href="http://www.llrlaw.com/shannon-liss-riordan/" type="external">Boston attorney</a> who gained legal fame by beating corporate giants like FedEx and Starbucks in just these kinds of contests.</p>
<p>The new lawsuit against Amazon is similar to one of Liss-Riordan’s best known cases—a suit against FedEx that charged the company was misclassifying delivery drivers as independent contractors when the workers were, as a matter of law, regular employees. Liss-Riordan won that fight and, this year, FedEx announced that it would <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-fedex-settlement-idUSKCN0Z229Q" type="external">give up on a series of related legal fights and pay</a> $240 million to some 12,000 drivers in 20 states.</p>
<p>Liss-Riordan took the fight to Amazon in a <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/326535713/Amazon-Driver-Lawsuit" type="external">suit</a> filed October 4 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. It charges Amazon and Amazon Logistics Inc. with violating the minimum wage law in Seattle, state labor law in Washington and the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).</p>
<p>Liss-Riordan explains that Amazon is experimenting with a delivery system where the company contracts with individuals to use their own cars to pick up parcels at Amazon warehouses and deliver them to local customers. The drivers typically sign up for a specific work shift and are paid an hourly wage. They are not compensated, however, for expenses like gasoline, car maintenance, telephone calls, or other incidentals. When subtracting these expenses, drivers often end up earning less than the minimum wage and are denied overtime pay, she says.</p>
<p>That description of delivery methods was echoed by Stacy Mitchell, co-director of the advocacy group Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Along with co-author Olivia LaVecchia, Mitchell has just completed a <a href="https://ilsr.org/amazon-stranglehold/" type="external">major study</a> of Amazon’s business practices that warns that the giant corporation is killing good jobs in local economies as it seeks to monopolize different sectors of the retail business.</p>
<p>“Amazon has substantially expanded its warehouses in recent years and is experimenting with the so-called ‘last mile’ of the delivery system. They are increasingly using on-demand drivers, and also regional couriers, to move goods,” Mitchell says. “In the past, this sort of ‘last mile’ delivery was typically done by the U.S. Postal Service or United Parcel Service. USPS and UPS jobs are good-paying union jobs, and Amazon is undermining these with its gig economy model.”</p>
<p>In These Times reached out to Amazon to comment on the lawsuit. Spokesman Jim Billimoria provided the following response:</p>
<p>"The small and medium sized businesses that partner with Amazon Logistics have their own employees and are required to abide by applicable laws and Amazon’s Supplier Code of Conduct, which focuses on compensation, benefits, and appropriate working hours.&#160;We investigate any claim that a provider isn't complying with these obligations."</p>
<p>Liss-Riordan says this sort of a defense is typical of large corporations, many of which have lost wage and hour lawsuits in court.</p>
<p>“It’s not what you say that counts, it’s what you do,” she said. “We’ve been able to demonstrate, time and time again, that a lot of these corporations just don’t live up to their stated policies when it comes to real-life employment practices on the ground. That’s why you see more and more of these suits.”</p>
<p>Indeed, a <a href="http://www.seyfarth.com/news/FLSA-Suits-Skyrocket" type="external">2015 report</a> from the law firm of Seyfarth Shaw LLP described an “onslaught” of litigation resulting in a record high number of federally-filed wage and hour cases in 2015. According to the firm, there were 8,781 such cases in 2015, compared to only 1,935 in 2000.</p>
<p>Asked about her nickname “Sledgehammer Shannon,” Liss-Riordan laughed out loud.</p>
<p>“It’s sort of silly. Mother Jones magazine did an <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/12/uber-lawsuit-drivers-class-action-shannon-liss-riordan" type="external">article</a> last year about a case I have against Uber, and I get a lot of jokes. I don’t care. The fact is, we will take on cases like this and fight them for 10 years if we have to.”</p> | Delivery Drivers Sue Amazon Over Misclassification, Failure to Pay Overtime and the Minimum Wage | true | http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/19712/delivery_drivers_sue_amazon_over_misclassification | 2016-12-12 | 4 |
<p>Matthew Ramirez (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)</p>
<p>Name: Matthew Ramirez</p>
<p>Age: 24</p>
<p>Occupation: Staff assistant for Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.</p>
<p>Identify as: Male/gay</p>
<p>What are you looking for in a mate? Someone who isn’t afraid to speak his mind, but also makes me laugh. I look for ambition, kindness and passion. Fitness is important, but by no means a deal-breaker. A charming smile and cute butt don’t hurt.</p>
<p>Biggest turn-off: Being rude or inconsiderate to people in the service industry and immaturity.</p>
<p>Biggest turn-on: Oddly enough, I’m a sucker for ears that stick out. A sense of humor, boyish good looks and quick wit.</p>
<p>Hobbies: I enjoy all things true crime, weightlifting, live music and collecting sneakers.</p>
<p>Describe your ideal first date: Preferably we try something new together, whether food, drink or activity. From there, I like dates where we are mostly chatting and laughing. If someone can teach me something new, make me laugh and keep the conversation going, there is likely a kiss at the end of the night.</p>
<p>Favorite TV show: Favorite: “House of Cards.” Most-watched: “Law and Order Special Victims Unit”</p>
<p>Celebrity crush: Russell Tovey</p>
<p>One obscure fact about yourself: I have an identical mirror image twin brother. No, he is not gay.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE TOP 20 LGBT SINGLES</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Matthew Ramirez</a></p> | MOST ELIGIBLE SINGLES: Matthew Ramirez | false | http://washingtonblade.com/2017/02/07/eligible-singles-matthew-ramirez/ | 3 |
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<p>NEW YORK — Facebook says it’s testing video advertisements that will show up in its users’ news feeds.</p>
<p>When they appear, the advertisements will automatically start playing without sound. Users can either click on the video to view them with sound, or keep scrolling by if they’re not interested.</p>
<p>The move could significantly boost Facebook’s advertising revenue. The company’s shares rose $1.05, or 2 percent, to $54.86 in premarket trading.</p>
<p>Facebook says the idea is still very much in the testing phase and that it’s not currently selling video advertisements.</p>
<p>As part of its testing, Facebook says it’s partnering with Summit Entertainment to show a series of videos related to its upcoming film “Divergent” to some of its users on Thursday.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p> | Facebook testing video advertisements | false | https://abqjournal.com/321676/facebook-testing-video-advertisements.html | 2 |
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<p>Though 2017 hasn't been a banner year for shareholders of Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) -- its stock is up 8% overall -- things have definitely improved for them lately. Intel shares rose 17% in the past three months, and by more than 11% over the past 30 days, pushing their price to highs not seen since 2000.</p>
<p>With the third-quarter earnings report scheduled for Oct. 16, shareholders wondering if Intel's rapid run-up will continue need two questions answered: What factors have been driving the recent bullishness, and are they sustainable?</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>There was no single catalyst responsible for Intel's stock performance; instead, it was a host of positives. The self-proclaimed "data center first" chipmaker has a way&#160;to go, but recent events suggest CEO Brian Krzanich's transition to a focus on cutting-edge markets is beginning to bear fruit.</p>
<p>One of the primary drivers of competitor NVIDIA's &#160;(NASDAQ: NVDA) jaw-dropping earnings -- last quarter, its revenue increased 56% year over year to $2.23 billion -- was a more than 150% jump in data center revenue. Though Intel's data center sales still dwarf NVIDIA's, the latter is making headway. But still, some payback was warranted.</p>
<p>It looks as though the payback will come in the form of Intel supplying the components for Tesla's comprehensive infotainment systems, pushing former supplier NVIDIA to the curb. <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/09/27/intel-corporation-reportedly-snatches-tesla-inc-bi.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Tesla isn't Opens a New Window.</a>&#160; <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/09/27/intel-corporation-reportedly-snatches-tesla-inc-bi.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">the largest auto manufacturer, Opens a New Window.</a> but it's still a major Internet of Things (IoT) feather in Intel's cap.</p>
<p>Virtual reality (VR) is another market expected to skyrocket, and <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/09/30/3-things-you-need-to-know-about-intel-corps-new-ga.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">not just for gaming Opens a New Window.</a>, though that application is expected to lead the charge. Intel hopes its recently unveiled wireless technology -- and the freedom to roam it offers users -- will be the catalyst that gets the ball rolling. According to one conservative estimate, VR will drive over $40 billion in sales in 2020.</p>
<p>Advertisement</p>
<p>Expanding cellular network capacity and performance utilizing 5G is another opportunity with nearly limitless potential, and Intel is also delivering in this key market. Intel has partnered with a couple of European-based networking &#160;giants, and they recently unveiled what they have described as "the first public 5G live network use cases in Europe."</p>
<p>You might think that after Intel's recent stock price run, it's too late to jump on board. The good news is that nothing could be further from the truth. Intel is valued at a mere 12.9 times forward earnings estimates. For some perspective, its peer group average today is 24.2 times trailing earnings. Intel is also a screaming bargain by almost every other common metric used to measure value.</p>
<p>Intel's recent wins in what are expected to become huge markets have gotten much of the attention recently, and rightfully so. But let's not forget Intel's is also delivering with each successive quarterly earnings report.</p>
<p>Last quarter's $14.8 billion in total revenue was another record-breaking result, and its data center, IoT, memory solutions, and PC units all performed admirably. And in a result that may come as a surprise to some, PC-related sales rose 12% to $8.2 billion. There is growing sentiment among analysts that the PC market is stabilizing, and Intel's results continue to prove that point.</p>
<p>Data center revenue climbed 9% to $4.4 billion last quarter, IoT was up 26% to $720 million, and memory sales soared 58% to $874 million. Krzanich's cost-cutting efforts are also in full-swing; the company shaved its operating expenses last quarter to $5.27 billion, down 21% year over year.</p>
<p>Not only has Intel won over investors, it's earned the plaudits that are finally coming its way. It's scoring big wins where they count, its PC component revenue continues to climb quarter in, quarter out, and its data center sales are back on track. And most important for investors, it's not too late to jump on and enjoy Intel's ride.</p>
<p>10 stocks we like better than IntelWhen investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.*</p>
<p>David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the <a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-static%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=11484947-eaff-4f34-a9de-a67e7a7bcb28&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">10 best stocks Opens a New Window.</a> for investors to buy right now... and Intel wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.</p>
<p><a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-static%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=11484947-eaff-4f34-a9de-a67e7a7bcb28&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Click here Opens a New Window.</a> to learn about these picks!</p>
<p>*Stock Advisor returns as of September 5, 2017</p>
<p><a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/timbrugger/info.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Tim Brugger Opens a New Window.</a> has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Nvidia and Tesla. The Motley Fool recommends Intel. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=357fa4ae-a852-11e7-93bf-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | Is Intel Corp. Finally Winning Over Investors? | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/10/05/is-intel-corp-finally-winning-over-investors.html | 2017-10-05 | 0 |
<a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/video/full-pelosi-interview-trump-white-house-using-diversionary-tactics-870511683900" type="external">spoke with</a>NBC’s Chuck Todd on Sunday. Asked if Democrats would be willing to work with the Trump Administration on legislation related to the
<a href="http://2dmibv10v2ssjm7g015dm681.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Trump-EO-Immigration-Refugee-Program.pdf" type="external">executive order</a>temporarily
<a href="" type="internal">limiting travel from seven countries and suspending the US Refugee Admissions Program</a>, Pelosi said: Pelosi called for an investigation into
<a href="" type="internal">allegedly</a> compromising personal, financial, and political information&#160;that the Russians have on Trump. Todd said people voted for new leadership during&#160;the 2016 election, but
<a href="" type="internal">the Democratic Party has remained</a> with the same leaders: Pelosi, Sen. Chuck Schumer,&#160;Sec. Hillary Clinton. Pelosi responded: Share on
<a href="" type="internal">Facebook</a>
<a href="" type="internal">Twitter</a>
<a href="" type="external">Email</a> | Pelosi: “I want to know what the Russians have on Trump” | false | http://thewhim.com/pelosi-want-know-russians-trump/ | 2017-02-06 | 2 |
<p>Judge Andrew Napolitano, Fox News senior judicial analyst, on special counsel Robert Mueller reportedly subpoenaing Deutsche Bank in the Russia probe.</p>
<p>Judge Andrew Napolitano said U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election, reportedly subpoenaing Deutsche Bank is dangerous for President Donald Trump.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Mueller has asked Germany’s largest bank for data on accounts held by President Trump and his family, according to <a href="" type="internal">Reuters Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p>“Deutsche Bank was his go-to lender in the years that he was developing real estate in New York City. This is an area that the president profoundly did not want to be investigated. In fact, the president publically said to … Bob Mueller ‘stay away from my personal finances, my family finances and my corporations finances,’” Judge Napolitano told FOX Business’ Stuart Varney on “Varney &amp; Co.”</p>
<p>Judge Napolitano added that if there is any involvement between the Trump family, President Trump, the Trump organization, the campaign and the Russians, especially if it’s monetary, that could be “very dangerous for the president.”</p>
<p>“It’s the danger of an independent counsel,” he said. “So you have a team of lawyers, prosecutors and FBI agents outside the chain of command of the Justice Department and not answerable in the normal way, going after anybody they want. And that thing is not recognized under the constitution. We have it and it’s a monkey on the president’s back.”</p> | Mueller's alleged Deutsche Bank subpoena very dangerous for Trump: Judge Napolitano | true | http://foxbusiness.com/politics/2017/12/05/muellers-alleged-deutsche-bank-subpoena-very-dangerous-for-trump-judge-napolitano.html | 2017-12-05 | 0 |
<p>This essay is adapted from <a href="http://www.easycartsecure.com/CounterPunch/CounterPunch_Books.html" type="external">Born Under a Bad Sky: Notes From the Dark Side of the Earth by JEFFREY ST. CLAIR</a> (CounterPunch/AK Press).</p>
<p>These are desperate days for Entergy, the big Arkansas-based power conglomerate that owns the frail Indian Point nuclear plant, located on the east bank of the Hudson River outside Buchanan, New York—just twenty-two miles from Manhattan.</p>
<p>First, a scathing report issued in 2005 by a nuclear engineer fingered Indian Point as one of the five worst nuclear plants in the United States, and predicted that its emergency cooling system “is virtually certain to fail.”</p>
<p>This disclosure was hotly followed by the release of a study conducted by the Los Alamos National Laboratory for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that ominously concluded that the chances of a reactor meltdown increased by a factor of nearly 100 at Indian Point, because the plant’s drainage pits (also known as containment sumps) are “almost certain” to be blocked with debris during an accident.</p>
<p>“The NRC has known about the containment sump problem at Indian Point since September 1996,” said David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer with the Union of Concerned Scientists. “The NRC cannot take more than a decade to fix a safety problem that places millions of Americans at undue risk.”</p>
<p>Entergy and the NRC both downplayed the meltdown scenario and defended the leisurely pace of the planned repairs. Entergy says that there’s no rush to fix the problems with the emergency system because a breakdown isn’t likely in the first place.</p>
<p>But that’s flirting with almost certain disaster. Entergy and the NRC are staking the lives of millions on odds of a single water pipe not breaking under pressure. The problem is that these very kinds of pipes have corroded and been breached at other nuclear plants, which featured similar pressurized water design. At the Davis-Bessie plant near Toledo, Ohio, a vessel head on one of the cooling water pipes had been nearly corroded away by acid and was dangerously close to rupturing.</p>
<p>The cooling water in these pipes is kept at a pressure of 2,200 pounds per square inch. If a pipe breaks, the 500-degree water would blow off as steam, tearing off plant insulation and coatings. The escaped water will pour into the plant’s basement, where sump pumps are meant to draw the water back into the reactor core. But the Los Alamos tests showed that the cooling water would collect debris along the way that will clog up the mesh screens on the pipes leading back into the reactor. If this happens, the cooling of the reactor fuel would stop, the radioactive core would start to melt, and the plant will belch a radioactive plume that will threaten millions downwind.</p>
<p>All this would happen very fast. The Indian Point 2 reactor would exhaust all of its cooling water in less than twenty-three minutes, while the number 3 reactor would consume all of its water in only fourteen minutes. Try getting a nuclear plumber that quickly.</p>
<p>Yes, it sounds trite, but that’s essentially what Entergy proposes as its quick fix to the meltdown scenario. Jim Steets, Entergy’s spokesman on Indian Point matters, told the New York Times last month that the company was training its workers to scour the plant for flaking paint and potential debris, and that if an accident occurred, they would pump the water into the core more slowly, a plan that would buy plant managers and executives a few more minutes to flee the scene.</p>
<p>Where people would go and how they would get there in the event of a nuclear meltdown or other radioactive release at Indian Point is unclear. In September 2002, New York Governor George Pataki commissioned a report on Indian Point’s evacuation plan. He picked James Lee Witt, who served as head of FEMA during the Clinton administration, to oversee the investigation. At the time, Pataki said that he would support closure of the plant if Witt’s report revealed that communities near the plant could not be safely evacuated.</p>
<p>Witt submitted his report on January 10, 2003. While somewhat timid and cautious, Witt concluded that Entergy’s off-site evacuation plans for Indian Point were woefully inadequate.</p>
<p>Witt wrote: “It is our conclusion that the current radiological response system and capabilities are not adequate to overcome their combined weight and protect the people from an unacceptable dose of radiation in the event of a release from Indian Point, especially if the release is faster or larger than the design basis release.”</p>
<p>In the end, Witt concluded that it was not possible to fix the evacuation plan, given the problems at the plant, the density of the nearby communities and looming security threats.</p>
<p>This scenario was followed by news that a review of the company’s security record revealed that Entergy, in cahoots with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, faked a test designed to determine whether the plant is vulnerable to a terrorist attack.</p>
<p>The NRC assured members of Congress that Entergy had developed a “strong defensive strategy and capability” for the plant and passed a so-called “force-on-force” test—a mock assault—with flying colors.</p>
<p>It turns out that the NRC gave Entergy officials months of advance warning about the test and then, as the Indian Point team cribbed for the exam, dumbed down the assault to ensure that they would pass.</p>
<p>Most assessments by the CIA and other intelligence agencies suggest that a raid on a nuclear plant would require a squad-sized force of between twelve and fourteen attackers, assaulting the plant by night, armed with explosives, machine guns with armor-penetrating bullets, and rocket-propelled grenades.</p>
<p>This isn’t the attack that was repelled by the Entergy security team. Instead, Entergy’s men battled off a squad of four mock terrorists, armed only with hunting rifles, who assaulted the plant in broad daylight. Moreover, the attacking squad weren’t former Delta Force operatives trained in terrorist tactics, but security officers from a nearby nuclear plant, who assault the plant from only one point after crossing open fields in plain view of Indian Point’s security guards.</p>
<p>Just to make sure that there were no surprises, the Entergy security team, which consisted largely of guards hired only for the test, was warned that a mock attack would take place sometime within the next hour. Even under these rigged conditions, Entergy barely passed the security test.</p>
<p>Environmentalists and anti-nuke activists living near the plant hoped this would be the final straw for the aging reactor. They marshaled their evidence of safety violations, inept evacuation plans, and lax security and headed off to offices of the most powerful Democrat in America, Hillary Clinton.</p>
<p>But Hillary remained as reserved as Pataki on Indian Point, issuing robotic requests for more studies, but refusing to call for the plant’s closure. Not that her words mean much. The senator pledged to filibuster the nomination of Utah governor Mike Leavitt for director of the EPA. She ended up voting to confirm his nomination.</p>
<p>Of course, Hillary’s ties to Entergy are almost primal. The Little Rock-based Entergy Corporation, which once employed John Huang, the infamous conduit to the Lippo Group, was one of Bill Clinton’s main political sponsors, shoveling more than $100,000 into his campaign’s bank accounts from 1992 to 1996.</p>
<p>The more plaintive the cries for Indian Point’s closure, the more money Entergy spreads around to politicians with reputation for flexibility in these matters. Already this year, Entergy’s New York Political Action Committee—ENPAC New York—has doled out more than $25,000 to New York politicians alone. Everyone got into the act from Pataki and Clinton to Democratic congressman Eliot Engel to lowlier foot-soldiers for the nuclear plant, including two state assemblymen; commissioners from Westchester and Orange counties; Bronx Borough president Adolfo Carrion; and state comptroller Alan Hevesi, whose election campaign was endorsed by the Sierra Club.</p>
<p>Political money isn’t the only tool in Entergy’s bag of tricks. In late October, community activists in the Bronx reported that emissaries from Entergy were canvassing black and Hispanic neighborhoods in New York City and Westchester County with an ominous warning: If Indian Point closes, air quality in urban areas will deteriorate and more blacks and Hispanics will develop respiratory illnesses. The Entergy reps told people that new coal-fired power plants would be built in their neighborhoods and urged them to sign a petition.</p>
<p>“In recent years, nearly all proposals for new power plants in New York state have been in or adjacent to areas with high concentrations of people of African descent and Latinos,” a memo handed out at the door warns. There is, naturally, much truth to this claim, and Entergy is in a unique position to know, since throughout the Southeast the company has targeted its power plants in black neighborhoods, where it has heralded them as bringing economic engines for impoverished communities.</p>
<p>The canvassers also carried cell phones as they ambled from door to door. They hit the speed dial number of a local legislator, handed the phone to the resident and then prompted them on how to express their concerns about the possible closure of Indian Point.</p>
<p>The petition drive, which discreetly by-passed the thirteen predominately white districts in Westchester County, was run by a group calling itself by the lofty-sounding name: “The Campaign for Affordable Energy, Environmental &amp; Economic Justice.”</p>
<p>The group was supposedly based in Manhattan. In fact, it was created and wholly funded by Entergy.</p>
<p>JEFFREY ST. CLAIR is the author of <a href="http://www.easycartsecure.com/CounterPunch/CounterPunch_Books.html" type="external">Been Brown So Long It Looked Like Green to Me: the Politics of Nature</a> and <a href="" type="internal">Grand Theft Pentagon</a>. His newest book, <a href="http://www.easycartsecure.com/CounterPunch/CounterPunch_Books.html" type="external">Born Under a Bad Sky</a>, is just out from AK Press / CounterPunch books. He can be reached at: <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a>.</p>
<p />
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Inside America’s Most Dangerous Nuclear Plant | true | https://counterpunch.org/2011/03/24/inside-america-s-most-dangerous-nuclear-plant/ | 2011-03-24 | 4 |
<p>The Portuguese center-right ultraliberal government, which went “far beyond the troika” won a relative majority in the 4th of October general election. With 36.8% of the vote and 1.994 million votes, the previous governmental coalition (PSD and CDS) was the winner. In second place came the Socialist Party, with 32.4% and 1.746 million votes.</p>
<p>The biggest surprise and strongest rise was the Left Bloc, which had 10.2% of the vote with 551 000 votes, followed by the Communist Party, with 8.3% and 446 000 votes. When compared to the previous 2011 election, the right-wing parties lost more than 700 000 votes, the Socialist Party (PS) had 160 000 more, the Left Bloc (BE) rose by 260 000 and the Communist Party (PCP) by 3400 votes. The PS, which has for the last forty years been running the country with the Social-Democrats (PSD) and the conservatives (CDS) suffered a massive shock, although the polls in previous weeks clearly predicted this outcome. Not seen as an alternative to the rightwing’s austerity, it had a disastrous campaign after its best-known leader, previous prime-minister José Sócrates, was arrested for corruption. It now faces its greatest dilemma: turning right and approving a right-wing government or turning left and opening a whole new scenario, never seen in Portuguese politics: a PS government supported in Parliament by left-wing parties (BE and PCP, which now amount to 18.5%, one million votes).</p>
<p>The President of the Republic, former prime-minister (1985-95), Cavaco Silva, had previously stated, far exceeding his mandate, that he would not empower a relative majority and an unstable government. After a long career once more he has lied. Two days after the election, after meeting with only his own party (PSD), Silva told the country he had asked Passos Coelho (former prime-minister and head of the winning coalition) to form a stable government, in which there couldn’t be parties that didn’t assume “international and historical treaties and agreements”, as well as “the grand strategical options” adopted for the last 40 years: that is, NATO, European Union, the Euro, the EU’s Budgetary Treaty and the future TTIP. This option clearly meant to exclude BE and PCP from any governmental solution.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, it was to the left that António Costa, leader of PS, turned. The PS-PCP meeting, the day after the President of the Republic laid out his “rules” as to who could be in government, came as a shock: the communists said that they would support a PS government and could even eventually be a part of that government. The communists felt the pressure from being overtaken once again by the Left Bloc and gave a historic sign of the political possibilities of participating in a broader coalition. During the campaign, in the debate with PS leader, BE’s spokeswoman Catarina Martins laid down conditions for talks on a left agreement, telling the PS to retreat on three points of its program: no freezing on current pensions, no welfare reform with cuts on future pensions and no flexibilization of labour laws. On the election evening speech, Martins was also clear: “The Left Bloc will do everything to prevent the right wing coalition forming a government. We now await for the response of the other parties”. PCP spoke afterwards and supported this idea. The final decision would be in the hands of the PS.</p>
<p>After the support of PCP, the Socialists started talking about good chances of forming a left-wing government. This put the right-wing coalition and all pundits in a terrified frenzy. From calling it a coup to anti-democratic, everything has been said. Waving the banner of the red scare, and of the Portuguese revolutionary period, news and opinion columns have shown how the simple prospect of a discontinuty to extreme austerity opens the gate of generalized hostility from the mainstream media. From the EU, through Wolfgang Schauble, came the cheer for the right-wing coalition’s meager victory as a sign of support of the Portuguese for more austerity measures, came Durão Barroso’s claim that a government supported by far-left parties would face a major backlash from the markets. After a frustrating meeting of the coalition (PSD-CDS) with PS, Costa went to meet Catarina Martins in BE’s headquarters. The Left Bloc spokeswoman declared afterwards that “the Passos (PSD) and Portas (CDS) government is over”.</p>
<p>The fall in the stock markets, the day after, was presented as as a consequence of this meeting and declarations. Since the "markets" rose, which meant "they" didn’t really care. A second meeting of PS with the coalition turned out to be another frustrating assembly, put an end to negotiations in the "central bloc". PSD-CDS accepted 20 of the PS’s election program measures, and PS had demanded at least another 20 (to which the right-wing said they were willing to negotiate everything). PS fully turned to a left-wing solution, although there is turmoil inside the PS’s ranks, with senior leaders both supporting and opposing a left-wing solution. António Costa has now promised to take the left-wing solution to a party referendum. The right-wing parties accepted they were losing ground and victimised themselves, relying heavily on a Presidential veto. The possibility of a Socialist Party government supported in Parliament by the Left Bloc and the Communist Party is now a credible one.</p>
<p>The devil, of course, is in the details. It is clear that the PS will not assume any anti-capitalist stance, it will not accept defiance of the EU’s austerity regime and will have important difficulties in implementing some of the agreements it is making with BE and PCP. The left-wing parties are fighting to ensure a stop to austerity in the short term and some recoverage in labour income — and stopping the “further than the troika” coalition from returning to power. They are also exploiting all the possibilities of forcing the PS to choose a path between PASOK and Labour, pulling it to the left and exposing a lot of PS members and leaders as de facto right-wing representatives. Two weeks after the election, the President of the Republic insisted on on naming Passos Coelho as Prime Minister, against the majority of Parliament (PS+BE+PCP+Greens = 53% of Parliament). In his speech to the country on the 22nd of October he directly addressed PS MPs calling on their rebellion to vote against their own party and give their support to the right-wing government. Further, he again attacked the Left, pointing out is unavailabity to support a solution with "anti-european" parties, which is the current term used by the right to undermine any deal between the PS, the Left Bloc and the Communists. He finished with a very clear threat that he would not accept a majority government of the left.</p>
<p>Now, PS, BE and PCP (or any of the three) will have to present a no confidence vote, which will lead to a fall of government. The question is: in January, there will be presidential elections and this president cannot dissolve the parliament and call another election. Also, any incumbent president will not be able to dissolve parliament and call for another election in the first 6 months of mandate. This means the current parliament will stay for at least 9 months. If Cavaco Silva insists on the ilegal action of not naming the left for government, the previous government will stay in power without most of its powers, managing without a budget, that is, without being able to implement any new measures. On the day after Cavaco Silva named the right to run the country, PS’s candidate for the second figure in the Republic, the President of the Assembly of the Republic, Ferro Rodrigues (one of the most leftist MPs of the socialists), was elected with 120 votes, uniting PS, BE, PCP and the Greens and defeating the right-wing candidate. It’s the first defeat for the right, and next week there will be the final test, the vote to fail the right-wing government and put all responsibility on the President of the Republic for either naming a left-wing government or leaving the country in a 9 month coma (that’s stability and responsibility for you, right?).</p>
<p>The contradictions in this whole process seem to be solidifying the PS’s turn to the left. The rebellion of its most right-wing leaders seems to be put down by the reactionary actions of the President of the Republic. If the PS had chosen not to make a turn to the left (that is, not accepting a minimum program to halt austerity and restore parts of all that has been taken from the people in the last years) it faced a melting into PSD. This apparent move to the left opens a whole new set of possibilities. In Portugal as in other countries, with Spanish and Irish elections just around the corner. All signs from the Portuguese bourgeoisie were that there should have been a government between PS and PSD. That possibility is over. Now that the political center is shattered, the left needs to push and make sure that the middle ground is just quicksand from now on. The class struggle settling in the Portuguese Parliament has amassed all reactionary forces to speak out. The desperate actions of the President of the Republic, to safeguard the status quo of misery, austerity, precarity and the massive theft of wealth from the workers to capital, represent how off guard they were caught by an emboldened left. The time will soon come to once again push all these contradictions back in the streets and destroy once and for all the “arc of power” and the end of history.</p>
<p>From <a href="http://www.internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article4258" type="external">International Viewpoint</a>.&#160;</p>
<p><a href="/filter/tips" type="external">More information about formatting options</a></p> | The Portuguese election: quicksand in the center, an emboldened left and a desperate president | true | http://newpol.org/content/portuguese-election-quicksand-center-emboldened-left-and-desperate-president | 2015-10-24 | 4 |
<p>James Berglie/ZUMA</p>
<p />
<p><a href="" type="internal">Elizabeth Warren</a>—the senator from Massachusetts, liberal icon, and&#160; <a href="" type="internal">fundraising machine</a>—has a new book out, <a href="http://www.powells.com/biblio/9781627790529" type="external">A Fighting Chance</a>. It’s a memoir and a brisk read. The book&#160;begins&#160;with Warren’s hardscrabble youth in Oklahoma City and traces&#160;her unlikely rise from twentysomething single mother teaching legal writing part time to Harvard law professor to United States senator. A Fighting Chance has a casual, folksy style—”Daddy had always been handy”; an industry-written bankruptcy reform bill “stunk like a pile of manure”—with a hearty serving of&#160;clichés.</p>
<p>A Fighting Chance&#160;has every hallmark of a campaign book, the memoir/manifesto not-so-subtly announcing&#160;a politician’s aspirations for higher office. Campaign books&#160;are&#160;usually written with the help of an ideologically friendly columnist or ghostwriter. (In this case, Warren’s daughter and frequent collaborator, Amelia Warren Tyagi, contributed research and moral support.) Like a super-PAC, the campaign book is a box to be checked by up-and-coming <a href="http://www.amazon.com/American-Son-Senator-Marco-Rubio-ebook/dp/B007HU7OXC/ref=sr_1_sc_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1398102574&amp;sr=1-1-spell&amp;keywords=marcorubio+book" type="external">pols</a>. In recent years, presidential wannabes such as Govs. Bobby Jindal and Scott Walker and Sens. Rand Paul and Marco Rubio have all “written” one. Hillary Clinton’s new campaign book, Hard Choices, chronicling her tenure as secretary of state, comes out in June, in time for the 2016 campaign. (In a pitch-perfect parody, the writers of HBO’s Veep <a href="http://variety.com/2014/scene/news/julia-louis-dreyfus-veep-season-three-hbo-party-1201146010/" type="external">titled</a> ne’er-do-well VP Selina Meyer’s book Some New Beginnings.)</p>
<p>Yet unlike the aforementioned politicians, Warren says she’s not interested in the presidency. She’s not running, so stop asking. Even after reviews of A Fighting Chance began appearing, she <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/21/elizabeth-warren-2016_n_5187672.html" type="external">denied</a> any presidential ambitions. Why, then, did she write a campaign book?</p>
<p>The first clue that A Fighting Chance&#160;belongs on the same shelf as the tomes of Rubio,&#160;Paul, and&#160;Jindal appears on the first page, which&#160;begins like a campaign ad:</p>
<p>I’m Elizabeth Warren. I’m a wife, a mother, and a grandmother. For nearly all my life, I would have said I’m a teacher, but I guess I really can’t say that anymore. Now I’d have to introduce myself as a United States senator, though I still feel a small jolt of surprise whenever I say that.</p>
<p>Four paragraphs later comes Warren’s cri de coeur, the brief description of what it is that drives her:</p>
<p>Today the game is rigged—rigged to work for those who have money and power. Big corporations hire armies of lobbyists to get billion-dollar loopholes into the tax system and persuade their friends in Congress to support laws that keep the playing field tilted in their favor. Meanwhile, hardworking families are told that they’ll just have to live with smaller dreams for their children.</p>
<p>Rigged was the working title of A Fighting Chance. This&#160;should come as&#160;no surprise to anyone who’s followed Warren’s ascent. It’s this rigged system that she has&#160;worked to fix since first plunging&#160;into the murky world of bankruptcy law decades ago as a professor at the University of Texas–Austin. And as a politician, it’s a favorite theme of hers, <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/transcript-elizabeth-warrens-democratic-convention-speech/story?id=17164726" type="external">one</a> she <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0812/79391.html" type="external">used</a> nonstop <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/05/warren-to-middle-class-system-is-rigged/" type="external">during</a> her successful 2012 <a href="http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/06/14/warren-americans-understand-the-game-is-rigged/" type="external">run</a> for Senate in Massachusetts, including during her star-making prime-time speech at the Democratic National Convention.</p>
<p>Warren’s book can, at times, read like an extended stump speech. The arc of her story won’t be news to her many fans, and she devotes a chapter each to the major acts of her life thus far. She&#160;fought to reform the nation’s bankruptcy laws (“The Bankruptcy Wars”); chaired the Congressional Oversight Panel, the chief watchdog for the bank bailouts (“Bailing Out the Wrong People”); launched the new consumer protection agency that she’d previously conceived of; and of course ran for Senate against Republican Scott Brown (“The Battle for the Senate”).</p>
<p>Here and there Warren sprinkles in newsy details—nothing explosive, but juicy enough to <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2014/04/elizabeth-warren-book-washington-105799.html" type="external">feed</a> the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/17/elizabeth-warren-book_n_5170018.html" type="external">Washington</a> <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/17/elizabeth-warren-book_n_5170018.html" type="external">media</a> <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/WN/elizabeth-warren-details-middle-class-struggles-political-fights/story?id=23414995" type="external">machine</a>. She dishes on her frosty relationship with former Obama economic adviser Larry Summers (“He teed it up this way: I had a choice. I could be an insider or I could be an outsider”). She labels Scott Brown “one of [Wall Street’s] favorite congressmen.” And she takes a shot at Republican political strategist Karl Rove and his dark-money nonprofit, Crossroads GPS. “Since Rove’s donor list was secret, Crossroads GPS didn’t even pretend to be embarrassed if they were caught in a lie,” she writes. “These guys were playing for keeps, and they seemed to be perfectly willing to lie and cheat if that’s what it took to win.” (Notably, as The New Republic‘s&#160;Noam Scheiber <a href="http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117409/warrens-new-book-whitewashes-hillary-history" type="external">observes</a>, Warren glosses over her past criticism of another female Democratic star, Hillary Clinton, for her support of an industry-friendly bankruptcy bill in 2001.)</p>
<p>Like any good stump speech, Warren mentions the requisite faceless victims to illustrate&#160;her point about the Obama administration’s failure to aid working people in the wake of the financial meltdown. She writes of “Flora,” who lost her home to a mortgage refinancing scammer, and of a Las Vegas man she calls “Mr. Estrada,” who thought he’d renegotiated the terms of his mortgage only to have his house sold out from under him and his family at auction. “Even now, I think about Mr. Estrada and his little girls,” Warren says. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.”</p>
<p>Reading the rousing finale of A Fighting Chance, it’s all too easy to picture Warren delivering the words&#160;on a dais in Des Moines or in a gymnasium in Concord. You can hear the sound of the crowd roaring with approval.&#160;You can see Warren jab&#160;the air as she says:</p>
<p>No one is asking for a handout. All we want is a country where everyone pays a fair share, a country where we build opportunities for all of us, a country where everyone plays by the same rules and everyone is held accountable. And we have begun to fight for it.</p>
<p>I believe in what we can do together, in what we will do together. All we need is a fighting chance.</p>
<p>That sounds an awful lot like a campaign call to arms to me.</p>
<p /> | Elizabeth Warren Says She’s Not Running for President. So Why’d She Write a Campaign Book? | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2014/04/elizabeth-warren-a-fighting-chance-2016/ | 2014-04-22 | 4 |
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<p><a href="http://www.goodmagazine.com" type="external">Good Magazine</a> has found a way to neatly wrap up the absurdity of funeral costs into a great <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9PKO5WyPpg&amp;eurl=http://www.goodmagazine.com/section/Transparency/business_of_death" type="external">little YouTube video</a>. Really. I recommend you watch minus the sound. There is something somewhat creepy about death stats accompanied by music. The figures on the other hand are informative and fairly astonishing. I mean, it’s definitely not news that the funeral industry is a boon to certain markets. There’s cosmetics, casketry (I’m sure that’s not a word), and of course real estate. The average funeral costs $6,500 in the U.S. No wonder I vaguely remember hearing relatives complaining about money at, well, all the funerals for each of my grandparents. And that cost doesn’t even include the plot of land for burial. But don’t despair: While apartment hunting, you can pick up a burial plot for $1,000 on Craigslist. We happen to not be the most out of control funeral industry. An average funeral in Japan costs $45,000, which is why nearly 98 percent of its citizens opt for cremation.</p>
<p>Good also reminds us that death can be bad for the environment. Cremation adds to global warming and the formaldehyde leached into the ground water from burials is not so great for Mother Earth either. There are other options though. You could be buried in a forest or in an eco-friendly cardboard coffin (like the Aussies), have your ash turned into 250 pencils (like the Japanese), or if cost is not your issue, spend $12,500 and be left on the moon.</p>
<p /> | The Bottom Line Six Feet Under | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2007/11/bottom-line-six-feet-under/ | 2007-11-29 | 4 |
<p>Fleetwood Mac -- Never Going Back Again</p>
<p>I don't know how many of you watched the Rachel Maddow-hosted special " <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/maddow-why-we-did-it" type="external">Why We Did It</a>" this week. I spent a disproportionate amount of time yelling at my screen. Because *we* didn't do it (meaning invade Iraq). There were many of us in that all-encompassing "we" who knew it was all bullshit and yelled and protested and fought like hell to be heard over the roar of the media. Maddow claims that the meda was fooled and duped, just like the rest of us Americans. Well, no, actually, I don't think that's true. They weren't duped. They were active misinformers, just like <a href="http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/22265-how-a-cbs-video-about-an-obamacare-victim-misled-millions" type="external">CBS was in this egregious report on Obamacare</a> this year.</p>
<p>Active misinformers. Just like David Gregory, Bob Schieffer and GeorgeStephanopoulos.</p>
<p>*We* didn't do anything. *They* have failed us. And continue to do so.</p>
<p>ABC's " <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2014/03/sunday-on-this-week-sen-ted-cruz-and-sen-rand-paul/" type="external">This Week</a>" — Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich.. Roundtable: Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, Republican strategist and ABC News contributor Ana Navarro, Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan, and former Obama White House senior adviser and ABC News contributor David Plouffe. Misty Copeland.</p>
<p>NBC's " <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/sunday-mtp-ukraine-francis-effect-future-gop-n47136" type="external">Meet the Press</a>" — Tony Blinken, deputy national security adviser; New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan. Roundtable: California Democratic Congresswoman Karen Bass; Chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition Ralph Reed; Senior Political Columnist and Editorial Director at the National Journal, Ron Fournier; and NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell.</p>
<p>CBS' " <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/coming-up-sunday-march-9-on-face-the-nation/" type="external">Face the Nation</a>" — Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis.; former Vice President Dick Cheney; former Secretary of State James Baker and retired Marine Corps Gen. Jim Jones, a former NATO commander in Europe. Roundtable: Rich Lowry of the National Review, CBS News State Department Correspondent Margaret Brennan, Peter Baker of the New York Times, and Jeffrey Goldberg of Bloomberg View.</p>
<p>MSNBC's " <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/up-with-steve-kornacki" type="external">UP with Steve Kornacki</a>" -- Abby Rapoport, The American Prospect; Djuan Trent, Fmr. Miss Kentucky; David Weigel, Slate; Brian Murphy, Baruch College; Evan McMorris-Santoro, BuzzFeed; Terry Golway, Kean University; Al Cross, Director of the Institute for Rural Journalism at the University of KY and columnist for the Louisville Courier Journal; Josh Barro, New York Times; Brian Thompson, NBC4; William Hiss, Fmr. Dean of Admissions; Holly Schepisi, New Jersey Assemblywoman.</p>
<p>MSNBC's " <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/mhp-syllabus-march-9" type="external">Melissa Harris-Perry</a>" -- Elise Jordan, Contributor to the Daily Beast / Former Speechwriter for Condoleezza Rice; David Cay Johnston, Author of “The Fine Print” / Contributing Editor at Newsweek; Ian Bremmer, President of the Eurasia Group / Author of “Every Nation for Itself”; Katrina vanden Heuvel, Editor and Publisher of The Nation Magazine; Alexis Goldstein, Writer/Communications Director for “The Other 98%”; 9th Wonder, Rapper and Music Producer/”The Hip Hop Fellow”; Laura Gottesdiener, Freelance Journalist and Author of “A Dream Foreclosed”; Dorian Warren, Associate Professor of Political Science and International Public Affairs at Columbia University; Rep. Mark Takano (D-CA); Jeremy Richardson, Senior Energy Analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists.</p>
<p>MSNBC's " <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/disrupt" type="external">Disrupt with Karen Finney</a>" -- Angela Glover Blackwell, Founder and CEO, Policy Link; Perry Bacon, TheGrio.com; Carolyn Jones, Texas Observer; Eduardo Porter, New York Times; Jane Fleming Kleeb, Bold Nebraska; Michael Blake, Director of Public Policy and External Affairs, Green For All; Viviana Hurtado, Wise Latina Club.</p>
<p>CNN's " <a href="http://sotu.blogs.cnn.com/2014/03/07/sunday-on-state-of-the-union-26/" type="external">State of the Union</a>" — Blinken; former Fla. Gov. Charlie Crist; Zygimantas Pavilionis, Lithuania's ambassador to the United States; Marina Kaljurand, Estonia's ambassador to the U.S. Panel: Donna Brazile, AB Stoddard and Ben Ferguson.</p>
<p>CNN's " <a href="http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2014/03/07/on-gps-sunday-live-analysis-on-the-latest-developments-in-ukraine/" type="external">Fareed Zakaria GPS</a>" -- Former National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, New York University’s Stephen Cohen, Canadian politician and journalist Chrystia Freeland and Princeton University’s Stephen Kotkin. Israel’s economics minister Naftali Bennett.</p>
<p>" <a href="www.foxnews.com/on-air/fox-news-sunday-chris-wallace" type="external">Fox News Sunday</a>" — Paul; former Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Panel: George Will; Jane Harman, President of Woodrow Wilson Center &amp; Fmr Congresswoman (D-CA); former Senator Rick Santorum; Rana Foroohar, Assistant Managing Editor,TIME.</p>
<p>So what's catching your eye this morning?</p> | Sunday Morning Bobblehead Thread | true | http://crooksandliars.com/2014/03/sunday-morning-bobblehead-thread-0 | 2014-03-09 | 4 |
<p>Cuba's Fidel Castro finally spoke out Monday about the recent death of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez. In a heartfelt article in a Communist Party newspaper, Castro <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/fidel-castro-laments-loss-best-friend-chavez-170139302.html" type="external">mourned the loss of a "best friend."</a></p>
<p>"On the 5th of March, in the afternoon hours, died the best friend the Cuban people had in their history," Castro wrote in the front-page Granma article, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/11/us-venezuela-chavez-castro-idUSBRE92A0FU20130311" type="external">according to Reuters</a>.&#160;</p>
<p>Chavez and Castro were said to be extremely close, an alliance that also brought their nations together: Venezuela is now Cuba's top trading partner, <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/fidel-castro-laments-loss-best-friend-chavez-170139302.html" type="external">the AP noted</a>.&#160;</p>
<p><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/11/us-venezuela-chavez-castro-idUSBRE92A0FU20130311" type="external">Venezuela provided Cuba with two-thirds of its oil</a> at a critical point in the early 1990s, and the two revolutionary leaders shared a similarly critical view of American influence in Latin America.</p>
<p>"We have the honor of having shared with the Bolivarian leader the same ideals of social justice and of support for the exploited," Castro wrote, adding: "The poor are the poor in any part of the world," <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/11/us-venezuela-chavez-castro-idUSBRE92A0FU20130311" type="external">according to Reuters</a>.</p>
<p>Chavez, who died of cancer at the age of 58, saw the 86-year-old <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/fidel-castro-laments-loss-best-friend-chavez-170139302.html" type="external">Castro as something of a father figure</a>.&#160;</p> | Castro on Chavez: We've lost our 'best friend' | false | https://pri.org/stories/2013-03-11/castro-chavez-weve-lost-our-best-friend | 2013-03-11 | 3 |
<p>One week into its launch, the Obamacare website continues to struggle with glitches, even after some weekend downtime that was supposed to start addressing some of those issues.</p>
<p>Information technology <a href="" type="internal">experts have been skeptical</a> of the administration’s claims that all of the technical issues have been due solely to unexpected overwhelming demand.</p>
<p>As I mentioned in that prior post, many have remarked that at the very least, the issues have revealed a lack of planning if volume truly caught the administration so off guard.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" /></p>
<p>The Washington Post reported today that <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/many-remain-locked-out-of-federal-health-care-web-site/2013/10/08/be8e71e6-302c-11e3-bbed-a8a60c601153_story.html?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm_twitter_washingtonpost" type="external">many remain locked out of the federal health-care website</a>, including health insurance companies.</p>
<p>Health insurance companies also are continuing to have trouble accessing the parts of the federal Web site on which they need to rely to find out who has enrolled in their health plans and to get payment information. A few days into the launch, one major Blue Cross plan said the part of the Web site used by insurers “was unresponsive most of the day.” And even the Web site that was continuing to run tests on the system’s ability to convey enrollment and payment information to health plans was only “periodically available,” according to an insurance industry executive.</p>
<p>In the week since the federal exchanged launched, would-be customers have not been the only ones frustrated by the computer systems on which it relies.</p>
<p>Some insurance brokers have been stymied in getting authorization from the federal government to sell the health plans available through the exchange. “Agents are having just as much trouble accessing the online sites as consumers are,” said Kathryn Gaglione, a spokesperson for the National Association of Health Underwriters.</p>
<p>That might explain, in part, why the administration <a href="http://www.atr.org/timeline-obamacare-signup-cover-up-a7909" type="external">can’t give any official numbers</a> on successful enrollments overall.&#160; But good luck getting any straight-forward answers from the administration.&#160; Even <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/10/08/kathleen-sibelius-s-daily-show-disaster-jon-stewart-slams-obamacare-rules.html" type="external">The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart</a> couldn’t get any straight talk from Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on his show last night.</p>
<p>Yesterday, the NY Times reported that the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/08/us/health-exchange-delays-tied-to-software-crash-in-early-rush.html?_r=1&amp;&amp;pagewanted=all" type="external">health exchange delays were tied to a software crash in the early rush</a>, offering the first glimpse of additional technical details from officials on the project.</p>
<p>But there were a few paragraphs near the end of that article that particularly caught my attention.</p>
<p>As the engineers for the contractors struggle to recover from the Web site’s failures, officials said, the partial shutdown of the federal government is also hampering efforts to carry out Mr. Obama’s health care law and has slowed work on a federal insurance marketplace for residents of more than 30 states.</p>
<p>All insurers participating in the federal exchange have been assigned an account manager, who serves as the primary point of contact with the exchange. The account manager is supposed to assist insurers, clarifying their responsibilities and answering questions about the federal Web site, enrollment transactions and other operational matters.</p>
<p>But many of the account managers have been furloughed in the shutdown.</p>
<p>The Obama administration has drafted a manual describing operations of the federal exchange, including the enrollment process. But federal officials said the shutdown had delayed a final review of the manual by lawyers and other federal employees who have been furloughed.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" /></p>
<p>The Affordable Care Act was passed over three years ago.&#160; The federal government has known since then that launch day would arrive.&#160; With any system of this magnitude and so many cooperating resources, documentation is typically a major component of the launch preparation.&#160; You make plans for how to handle certain situations in the instance employees or capabilities – online or offline – become unavailable, among other things.&#160; And in most of these types of projects, participating stakeholders do review and sign off on such documentation – that can include anyone and everyone from legal counsel, customer service managers, IT managers, sales/account managers, partners and suppliers, marketing, and more.&#160; That’s all a process that’s done well in advance, before a system launches.&#160; In most company launches of this magnitude, no approved final documentation, no launch.</p>
<p>I will grant insurers and even the administration that the unavailability of account managers due to the furloughs might hinder the process some.&#160; But how is it that review of “a manual describing operations of the federal exchange, including the enrollment process,” has been delayed by the shutdown?&#160; Why was such documentation not already approved and disseminated long before now?</p>
<p>The Washington Post article mentions that the federal government didn’t definitively know until earlier this year that it would be operating the exchanges for as many as 36 states. &#160;So I will even take that into consideration.&#160; Maybe the administration didn’t have a full three years to know exactly what to plan for.&#160; But weeks before the launch, one would expect that such documentation would have been complete.&#160; That being the case, then why launch without enough time to have such documentation approved and disseminated?</p>
<p>As the NY Times wrote, “outside experts said that White House officials should have spent more time tending to the computer code and technology of the Web site, rather than recruiting Hollywood celebrities to promote it.”&#160; Those experts may be right.&#160; I’d add reviewing documentation of the processes to that equation.</p>
<p>To blame the lack of such documentation on the shutdown just seems unacceptable.&#160; The fact that the administration has blamed all of the Obamacare website’s technical glitches on overwhelming demand beyond their expectations has already revealed a woeful lack of planning on their part, if that’s even the sole reason (I remain skeptical).&#160; That approved documentation of an operations manual has been delayed by the shutdown only further emphasizes that lack of planning.</p>
<p>If the government hasn’t been able to adequately plan for the launch of the Obamacare website, I shudder to think what else we don’t know about yet that hasn’t received the necessary attention in planning.</p>
<p>And yes, my own account still remains <a href="" type="internal">stuck in Zombieland</a>.</p> | We’re from Obamacare, and we’re here to help | true | http://legalinsurrection.com/2013/10/were-from-obamacare-and-were-here-to-help/ | 2013-10-08 | 0 |
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<p>Surik Mehrabyan, a physicist from Armenia, spades soil to make a raised bed for growing potatoes on his quarter-acre plot at the Groundswell Center incubator farm in Ithaca, N.Y., on Wednesday, July 23, 2014. The farm is one of dozens that are springing up around the country to give a head-start to career-changers and others who want to get into farming. (AP Photo/Mary Esch)</p>
<p>ITHACA, N.Y. — A physicist from Armenia, a juice-maker from Bermuda and a Burmese sushi chef are crafting new careers in agriculture under a program that applies the business incubator model to farming.</p>
<p>The Groundswell Center for Local Food and Farming is one of dozens of incubator farms springing up around the country to nurture the next generation of agricultural entrepreneurs. The projects help would-be farmers get started by providing a plot of land, shared equipment, mentoring on business planning and marketing, and the opportunity to build a track record of success that will help them qualify for startup loans when they’re ready to launch their own farms.</p>
<p>“It’s giving me an opportunity to implement business ideas that I hadn’t had a chance to before,” said Damon Brangman, 43, an immigrant from Bermuda who wants to grow his own vegetables for the mobile juice business he runs with his wife in Ithaca. “I’m looking to buy or lease land, but there’s more risk and cost involved. This was more within my reach.”</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>The 10-acre farm in Ithaca, in New York’s Finger Lakes region 140 miles west of Albany, is now in its second growing season with Brangman and two other farmers tilling quarter-acre plots that they can use for three years. Surik Mehrabyan, 54, came to upstate New York with a contract for physics research at Cornell University, but after it ended, he wanted to return to the agrarian lifestyle he grew up with in Armenia.</p>
<p>“My goal is to understand what to grow to make a living,” Mehrabyan said as he spaded stony soil to build a raised bed in his plot at Groundswell. “All the time, I’m doing different experiments and finding markets, planning. For me, it’s most important to get established with buyers before I invest in land.”</p>
<p>Ye Myint, 47, a native of Myanmar, is growing sushi cucumbers and greens such as gongura and water spinach, which are popular in Asian communities. “I have a deal with a Burmese grocery store in Syracuse to buy gongura,” said Myint, who makes sushi for the Cornell University food service.</p>
<p>There are about 105 incubator farms in 38 states, many of them still in the planning stage or just a few years into operation, according to the National Incubator Farm Training Initiative at Tufts University in Massachusetts. The program, launched in 2012, advises new incubator farms and helps farmers connect with them.</p>
<p>More than half the farms serve immigrants and refugees, but others nurture a range of new farmers including young people, career changers and retirees.</p>
<p>In 2008, new grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program spurred a number of incubator programs into existence. The USDA program was a response to the rising average age of U.S. farmers and the 8 percent projected decrease in the number of farmers from 2008 to 2018. The 2014 farm bill includes $100 million for the program.</p>
<p>“The barriers to getting into this industry are so large that we have to come up with new strategies to get people on the land,” said Jennifer Hashley, project director of the New Entry Sustainable Farming Project, parent organization of the Incubator Training Initiative.</p>
<p>A network of mentor farmers is key to the success of the incubator farm, said Joanna Green, director of the Groundswell Center. “The farmers we work with are really interested in helping the next wave get started and succeed,” Green said. Groundswell’s oversight team also includes advisers from Cornell’s horticulture department and farm credit organizations.</p>
<p>The New Entry incubator program requires farmers to pay startup costs including a $175 fee for a quarter-acre plot, plus the cost of their seeds, nursery pots and other supplies. Farmers must take a farm business planning course and write a plan that will be refined at the end of the growing season. In the first year, some earn only enough to recoup startup costs, while others may earn as much as $10,000.</p>
<p>“It depends on what they grow, how much time they put into it and what their market is,” Hashley said.</p> | Incubator farms nurture agriculture entrepreneurs | false | https://abqjournal.com/436593/incubator-farms-nurture-agriculture-entrepreneurs.html | 2 |
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<p>&lt;a href='HTTP://videos.answermedia.com/display/link.html' target='_blank'&gt;&lt;img src='HTTP://videos.answermedia.com/display/image.png' border='0' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;</p>
<p>LISTEN TO 21WIRE’S INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR JAY DYER HERE: <a href="" type="internal">Episode #42 – SUNDAY WIRE: ‘America Hangs By A Cultural Thread’ with Jay Dyer and Dean Ryan</a></p>
<p>By Jay Dyer <a href="http://jaysanalysis.com/2014/07/10/the-prestige-2006-a-film-about-revelation-of-the-method/" type="external">Jay’s Analysis</a></p>
<p>‘The Pledge’For most viewers,&#160; <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4gHCmTQDVI" type="external">The Prestige</a>&#160;was a film about rival stage magicians in the Victorian Era, alternately seeking to top one another in the dank climate of emerging industrial revolution and technological wonder. Lord Caldlow/Angiers (Hugh Jackman) is the secret nobleman who has a flair for the art of illusion, while Robert Borden and his twin (Christian Bale) are the working class stage hands who have devoted their lives to their art. &#160;In the midst of this rivalry, the curious figure of Nikola Tesla enters (played by David Bowie) to interject the element of real magic, titled in the film, “wizardry.” Both magicians are on a quest to sabotage the other, while seeking to perfect the greatest trick of all – ‘The Transported Man’.</p>
<p>IMAGE: A Tesla tower in rural Colorado.</p>
<p>Stage rivalry and obsession&#160;is&#160;what&#160;The Prestige&#160;is about, but it is also about much more. After several viewings (as is my normal habit), my thesis began to congeal:&#160;The Prestige&#160;is about Hollywood and film-making itself. &#160;And not only that, it is an industry that is an art of deception and illusion. &#160;The director and the actors are in effect illusion artists, or con men, if you will. &#160;The successful director is able to fool the audience into accepting that what is presented on the screen is real, even if it is evidently fantastical. The magicians’&#160;ingenieure, Mr. Cutter (Michael Caine), explains this principle of film as illusion at the beginning, which is to be applied to the film itself. Cutter states:</p>
<p>“Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called “The Pledge”. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course… it probably isn’t. The second act is called “The Turn”. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you’re looking for the secret… but you won’t find it, because of course you’re not really looking. You don’t really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn’t clap yet. Because making something disappear isn’t enough; you have to bring it back. That’s why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call “The Prestige”.”</p>
<p>Director Christopher Nolan explains in “The Making of&#160;The Prestige” this is to be applied to both directing and the film itself as theatrical illusion: “For me,&#160;The Prestige&#160;is very much about film-making. &#160;It’s very much about what I do. &#160;It is also intended to suggest to the audience some of those ideas about how the film itself is spooling its narrative out to the audience. &#160;You want people to be aware of the effect the film is having as it’s unfolding before their eyes.” The Prestige&#160;follows this same tripartite structure, as it draws you into an ordinary story of human rivalry and obsession, the “Turn,” where the audience is looking for the secret of Angier and the Borden’s trick, but not truly looking, because like film, stage magic operates under the audience’s suspension of disbelief. &#160;The audience “wants to be fooled.” And in the end, the transported man must come back – reemerge or resurrect, as the final climax of the show.</p>
<p>Keep ya bird in her cage, mate.</p>
<p>‘The Turn’In order to properly understand Nolan’s film, we must consider the same principle elucidated concerning David Lynch films – twilight language. &#160;Researcher&#160;Michael Hoffman defines “twilight language” as follows in his&#160;Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare: &#160;“The path to unlocking this gnosis was centered in “twilight language,” a once nearly universal subliminal communication system used in Egypt, Babylon, the Indian subcontinent and among the Aztecs, consisting of a combination of numbers, archetypal words and symbols, which in our time are sometimes embedded in modern advertising, and in certain modern films and music….</p>
<p>In Oriental Tantra, the mantra (including&#160;dharani,&#160;kavaca,&#160;yamala, etc.) is sonically calculated to induce a particular action. &#160;It forms part of the original sanskrit concept of&#160;sandhyabhasa&#160;(aka ‘twilight language’). &#160;In Tantra, ‘Sandhyabhasa… is a language of light and darkness…in this higher type of discourse, words have another, a different meaning: this is not to be openly discussed.” (pg. 207)</p>
<p>Like Kubrick, Lynch and Hitchcock, Nolan utilizes this same pattern, where certain words, images and phrases will stand out as ciphers to the film on the deeper level. &#160;This is a tricky process, as it is not always a simple science of picking out which clues and words are key, but it can be done with experience. &#160;This is one of the more controversial aspects dealt with at JaysAnalysis, so I intend on providing other examples of the same in other arenas to help convince skeptics. Hoffman continues:</p>
<p>“Ritual is obsession in motion. &#160;Obsessive people are walking rituals and they attract “coincidentally,” aids to their obsessions. &#160;If this is done consciously and the obsession happens to coordinate with the trend and tendency of the time, a lot more “coincidental” magnification will be forthcoming. &#160;Coincidence can be summoned. &#160;It is a matter of attention and timing. &#160;First you must be aware of – believing in and observing – the mechanism of coincidence when it agrees with your work, then you coordinate what you’re working on with what you were predestined to do. &#160;When you start to see the pattern of coincidence and it becomes a language for you, you have either become an initiate or a schizophrenic, take your pick, because you lose the protection of materialism – our own protection against the disordering of the arrangement we’ve given to the world to make it manageable.” (Ibid., 130)</p>
<p>Sandy Hook in The Dark Knight, prior to the Sandy Hook event.</p>
<p>Nolan’s films are replete with uses of Jungian archetypes and synchronicity – another Jungian concept. &#160;In my&#160;Inception&#160;analysis,&#160; <a href="http://jaysanalysis.com/2010/08/21/inception-my-labyrinthine-analysis/" type="external">I wrote</a>:</p>
<p>“The other crucial element is that the story is not a linear story, just like a dream is&#160;often non-linear.&#160; The film concerns essentially the “architecture of the mind,” as director Christopher Nolan described it.&#160; Jung’s theories involve&#160;the idea that&#160;the individual is a disparate instantiation of the collective unconscious, and thus fragmented from the collective. The collective conscious manifests itself in images and archetypes in our deepest selves – the lowest of the subconscious. It is here that we hide out most intimate failures, sins and fears. We guard this sensitive part of our selves, and have defense mechanisms by which we hide and guard these deeper, more elemental ethereal truths about who we really are. For Jung, being&#160;the gnostic he was, the goal is to overcome all purported&#160;fragmentation, work through the so-called self-realization/individuation process, and thus&#160;escape dualities. The masculine “side”&#160;must reconcile with the feminine. One notices here familiar themes found throughout the history of alchemy, and Jung was known for&#160;his penchant in such arcane studies.”</p>
<p>The above quotes thus solidify a central concept in my analysis of&#160;The Prestige&#160;– the film is not just about Hollywood illusion and twilight language, but the usage of that power through the illusion of the stage/screen to produce an effect in the consciousness of the viewer. &#160;In my&#160;Eyes Wide Shut&#160;analysis, I claimed the film was an attempt to initiate the reader, whereas with&#160;The Prestige, the film seems to delight in fooling the audience. &#160;It is an exaltation of the fact that most of the viewing audience will not understand the connotations, thinking the film was only about rival magicians, while being unable to place the usage of Nikola Tesla. &#160;It is also crucial to remember that Nolan’s&#160;Batman&#160;Trilogy included numerous examples of archetypal symbolism and conspiriana,&#160; <a href="http://www.infowars.com/confirmed-section-of-gotham-renamed-sandy-hook-in-latest-dark-knight-release/" type="external">the most famous of which being the Sandy Hook reference on Bain’s map of the city, prior to the Sandy Hook incident in 2012. &#160;Given that level of planned “synchronicity,” we may infer that nothing in Nolan’s films is accidental, especially not Tesla.&#160;</a>&#160;Nolan is telling you something.</p>
<p>TESLA: Wireless transmission of energy.</p>
<p>Recall as well that Nolan’s 2005&#160;Batman Begins&#160;was entirely a conspiracy-themed plot, lending credence to my thesis that all of his films may legitimately be assumed to be “written” twilight language. &#160;On Batman Begins, I explained about the League of Shadows, the dark eastern cult that had become Batman’s nemesis:</p>
<p>“It is also relevant to consider that&#160; <a href="http://www.infowars.com/articles/science/fluoride_study_finds_horror_stories_factual.htm" type="external">the drugging of the water supply</a>, an old Soviet and Nazi tactic, is, in fact, still practiced today, as much of the United States’ water supply is purposefully drugged in order to chemically attack the masses, reducing Iqs&#160;and causing sterilization.&#160; <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHPeF-PoEAs" type="external">See this video</a>. &#160;Psychoactive drugs have also been proposed for addition to water supplies, as well as actual antidepressants, rocket fuel and radiation, turning up in samples. Drugs are also being sprayed in&#160; <a href="http://www.infowars.com/the-government-is-already-geo-engineering-the-environment/" type="external">geo-engineering and “chemtrail” programs</a>. For the League of Shadows, the purpose is mass insanity directed towards an engineered social collapse. Again, art mirrors reality. The hallucinogen mind control chemical is developed by “Scarecrow” (Cillian&#160;Murphy), who is a doctor specializing in mental health and brainwashing. Scarecrow represents the pharmaceutical complex which works in tandem with the military industrial complex to engineer and control society. The Scarecrow character brings to mind the famed&#160; <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKULTRA" type="external">MKULTRA program</a>&#160;which did experiment with various methods, including drugs, to solve and control the human mind.”</p>
<p>In&#160;The Prestige, dualities play a tremendous role. &#160;Borden has a double, his twin brother, who shares his life as the family man, as well as Angier having his initial double, Mr. Root, the drunken failed actor. &#160;As the rivalry intensifies, Borden and Angier become doubles in a way, each seeking to top the other and obsessing over the other. &#160;Both Borden and Angier live double lives, not being who they appear to be. &#160;This duality is a common theme in Hitchcock and Nolan is clearly utilizing it. &#160;Dialectical dualism is one of the oldest religious principles, operating as a dialectic in both eastern and western religion and occultism. &#160;Our temporal life in that perspective is seen as one of constant struggle with duality and opposition, with alchemical fusion or other-worldly transcendence seen as the usual escape. &#160;Oriental religions are especially taken up with dualities and dualism and this becomes a symbolic indicator with the old Chinese magician. &#160;Cutter tells Borden and Angier they can have ten minutes of audition time if they can solve the old man’s act. &#160;After viewing it, Borden tells Angier the secret to the routine was that he always played the character of the old magician. &#160;It was all an act, because that is true devotion to the art, and true devotion to the art is the only way to “escape all this” (as he pounds on a rock wall). &#160;On one level, Borden was referring to his life of poverty, but on a deeper level, it is a reference to the film’s continual usage of bird cages, water tanks and boxes.</p>
<p>Bowie as Tesla.</p>
<p>The bird-cage is explained by Nolan as an image of being trapped. &#160;The magicians use of the tank and Angier’s use of “Tesla’s box” exemplify this, too, and the meaning is twofold. &#160;On the one hand, the characters are trapped in their own mental prisons of obsession over both women and their stagecraft. &#160;The obsession leads to the death of one of the Borden’s and his wife, as well as countless clones of Angier from the Tesla machine. &#160;As I will explain later, the amazing technology of Tesla is presented inThe Prestige&#160;as something wholly other – something no one at that time was able to accept and could only be slowly introduced. &#160;</p>
<p>The film presents Tesla as working covertly in Colorado to power a whole town while also conducting secret experiments involving cloning. &#160;I have written elsewhere about the truth behind this idea, that Tesla did do many of the seemingly miraculous things attributed to him, but that his work was confiscated by officials of various intelligence agencies, which is even referenced in passing in the film. &#160; <a href="http://www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/ll_colspr.html" type="external">Tesla did work on secret projects in Colorado</a>, and this is significant in terms of twilight language in regard to another famous novel,&#160;Atlas Shrugged…</p>
<p><a href="http://jaysanalysis.com/2014/07/10/the-prestige-2006-a-film-about-revelation-of-the-method/" type="external">Continue this article at Jay’s Analysis</a></p>
<p>READ MORE HOLLYWOOD NEWS AT: <a href="" type="internal">21st Century Wire Hollywood Files</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" />READ MORE TESLA NEWS AT: <a href="" type="internal">21st Century Wire Tesla Files</a></p>
<p>–</p> | A Film About Revelation of the Method: The Prestige (2006) | true | http://21stcenturywire.com/2014/07/13/a-film-about-revelation-of-the-method-the-prestige-2006/ | 2014-07-13 | 4 |
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<p>Communications software provider&#160;Twilio on Wednesday defied stock market volatility prompted by Britain's referendum on European Union membership by raising $150 million, a higher amount than it had originally targeted.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Market jitters and fluctuations in technology stocks have kept investors skittish about the sector, making&#160;Twilio's offering only the third U.S. technology IPO of 2016. Uncertainty over the so-called Brexit vote, scheduled for Thursday, added to the volatility.</p>
<p>San Francisco-based&#160;Twilio&#160;priced $10 million shares on Wednesday at $15, above its previously indicated $12-$14 range, according to a statement.</p>
<p>Twilio, which was valued at roughly $1 billion in its last fundraising round in July 2015, according to a regulatory filing, is being closely watched by other so-called "unicorns," private companies valued at more than $1 billion. Though these companies have lured plenty of investors in the private fundraising market, no venture-backed unicorns had broken through the IPO market this year.</p>
<p>Twilio&#160;won early favor with investors by touting a fast-growing business model that does not require marketing expenditure to boost revenue. The IPO also follows a string of high-profile and large technology acquisitions that have boosted corporate valuations in the sector.</p>
<p>Mutual fund manager T. Rowe Price, a late-stage investor in&#160;Twilio, had publicly registered an interest in buying 15 percent of the IPO. While the offer was not binding, it helped boost&#160;Twilio's appeal with other investors.</p>
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<p>This helped overcome stock market volatility. On Wednesday, the Market Volatility Index, which measures investor nervousness, breached its warning threshold of 20, rising as high as 21.2.</p>
<p>Twilio's software is used by large companies such as car-hailing service Uber to allow drivers to speak and text with passengers without exchanging contact information.</p>
<p>Twilio&#160;will list on Thursday on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "TWLO."</p>
<p>Goldman Sachs &amp; Co, J.P. Morgan and Allen &amp; Company LLC are among the underwriters on the IPO.</p>
<p>(Reporting by Lauren Hirsch in New York; Editing by Sandra Maler and Andrew Hay)</p> | Twilio IPO Exceeds Expectations | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/06/23/twilio-ipo-exceeds-expectations.html | 2016-09-01 | 0 |
<p>If you think you’re going to hike with Ron Habney, you’d better be prepared. The 6-foot-tall, 130-pound, 25-year-old treks an average four to six miles a day on some of the most challenging trails in Southern Indiana’s Upland regions. Not everyday, to his chagrin, but multiple times a week. Last summer, on one 96-degree day, Ron hiked 9.4 miles through the Charles Deam Wilderness Area in two hours and 20 minutes.</p>
<p>So says John Willman, who knows. He’s been Ron’s hiking companion and caregiver for almost eight years now. “He’s truly an athlete,” John says of Ron. “His hiking skills are almost unmatched.” Beneath close-cropped, thick, black hair, Willman’s blue-green eyes beam proud-parent-like as he recounts Ron’s on-trail achievements. But they’re just a footnote to this rainy-gray November afternoon interview.</p>
<p>Ron has autism, and John, who is not Ron’s parent, is preoccupied with his fate.</p>
<p>Ron has a history of violence, Willman says. “Property damage, breaking out almost every window in this house at one point,” is how he begins the history. He mentions broken bones and exceptional strength. “I’m 5’11” and weigh 190, and during his worst aggressions … his strength is comparable to mine.”</p>
<p>It’s been two years since Ron’s last violent outburst, he adds. But when cutbacks in state funding for his <a href="http://www.in.gov/fssa/ompp/2549.htm" type="external">Medicaid/Autism Waiver</a> alter his hikes and well-honed routines in January, the slope back to the bad old days will be “very short.”</p>
<p>Despite Ron’s progress vis-a-vis violence, minor incidents still occur, for example, when John takes time off or on days when intervening factors preclude their hiking time in Pate Hollow, or Shades State Park, or Leonard Springs Trail, or Yellowwood State Forest, etc.</p>
<p>“He didn’t get to go on the outings he wanted,” Willman explains, “he didn’t get to do the long hike, he didn’t get to do what he knows is his daily routine, and at the end of those days, it resulted in aggression toward the staff.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>John Willman works for the Bloomington-based nonprofit <a href="http://www.optionsfbl.com/" type="external">Options for Better Living</a>. His title “these days” is “direct support professional.” He’s been at it since March 2003, when he and Ron met.</p>
<p>According to its Web site, Options’ mission is to provide “customized, holistic services to assist individuals achieve their desired lifestyle, including housing, rewarding employment, fulfilling relationships and active citizenship in communities throughout Southern Indiana.”</p>
<p>Options has been around since 1982, when it was called Better Living for Special People and served 22 families. By the time the name changed in 1990, the agency operated two group homes that helped individuals who were assimilating back into the community after having lived in institutions.</p>
<p>In the early 1990s, Options started providing services to those with developmental disabilities through the Medicaid Waiver, which permits federal funds to be used for “an array of home and community-based services that an individual needs to avoid institutionalization.” Among the requirements for assistance: “The recipient would require institutionalization in the absence of the waiver and/or other home-based services.”</p>
<p>Medicaid has five waiver types, which are administered through state governments. In Indiana, the responsibility falls to the <a href="http://www.in.gov/fssa/" type="external">Indiana Family &amp; Social Services Administration</a> (FSSA), which distributes the federal funds to agencies like Options to hire professionals like Willman to care for folks like Ron.</p>
<p>The bulk of individuals served by Options falls under the Autism Waiver and the Developmental Disabilities Waiver, which includes conditions like cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, Angelman syndrome and others, Willman says. Most of the rest are covered by the Traumatic Brain Injury Waiver.</p>
<p>FSSA says the Autism Waiver helps individuals living with their families or in other community settings to “gain and maintain optimum levels of self determination and community integration.”</p>
<p>The Developmental Disabilities Waiver helps individuals stay in their own homes or in community settings and assists those who “transition from state operated facilities or other institutions to community settings.”</p>
<p>On Nov. 10, the State announced $34 million in new budget cuts, which includes a 5 percent cut in reimbursements to hospitals serving patients on Medicaid. The <a href="" type="internal">Associated Press reported</a> the reductions came “in response to state revenue shortfalls and growth in the state Medicaid rolls.”</p>
<p>The article quoted then-FSSA Secretary Anne Murphy as saying the cuts and other measures would “avoid reducing vital services to the 1.2 million Indiana residents to whom the agency provides benefits.”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>From almost the minute Willman positioned himself on the plush, green couch facing the kitchen for a 35-minute conversation in the living room of a circa 1960s Bloomington subdivision, Ron repeatedly paced into the room. He’d turn left just inside the door, walk to a window and adjacent bookshelf and gently tap them. He’d exit as rapidly as he arrived.</p>
<p>He occasionally detoured to the couch to give Willman “high-fives,” which were actually gentle, almost slow-motion taps, fingertips to fingertips. Ron held an 8.5X11 binder opened to a photo of a car, which meant he wanted to go for a drive.</p>
<p>“I understand that you want to go for your outing,” Willman says during one such interaction. “We’re just going to wait a little bit more, and then we’re going to go, okay? You’re doing a great job waiting. If you want something to eat, you show me, okay?”</p>
<p>Ron has autism and requires professional care, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, most but not all of which Willman provides. He was born in Bloomington and attended special education in the Monroe County Community Schools until early high school, when his violent tendencies overtaxed the system, Willman says.</p>
<p>Ron is the only one of triplets with autism. He’d been living in group homes for four years when he and Willman began their ongoing eight-year partnership.</p>
<p>“I remember his mother saying Ron became stronger than her when he was 10 years old,” he says. “I think that was a large part of the decision of why he had to go to a group home.”</p>
<p>Due to his inability to cope with five roommates, Ron transitioned from the group home to a house owned by his family in March 2003, just about the time Willman started his Options training. He spent two weeks in the classroom before his first assignment sent him to Ron’s new place.</p>
<p>“When I showed up here, I walked in the house, and the manager introduced me to Ron,” Willman says. “He was working on some paperwork, and he looked up from the table and said, ‘You can take off with Ron.'”</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>Almost eight years later, Willman knows Ron like a son. His distinctive qualities include hyper metabolism and energy levels that are off the chart. “These long hikes we do together, rarely does he ever show fatigue,” Willman says. “He’ll perspire a little. He drinks enough water to where dehydration is not an issue. But he does not show fatigue.”</p>
<p>On the autism spectrum, Ron is in the Autistic Disorder range. While many children with the disorder begin speaking and then lose the ability, Ron has never spoken a word in his life.</p>
<p>His “outgoing expressions” are limited to “affective communication,” Willman says. For example, tapping the pocket in which John keeps his keys means Ron wants to go somewhere. His “basic communication book” has pictures of household items or destination choices, like trailhead markers.</p>
<p>“That limitation in communication can be very frustrating for him,” Willman says, “particularly with new staff or substitutes who don’t know how to understand some of his affective, nonverbal communications.”</p>
<p>Ron’s “incoming communication skills,” his ability to understand, are good, Willman says. “I can say, ‘Ron, if you’re ready for your bath, go in the bathroom and turn the water on.’ Instant response. To me, that ‘s pretty clear evidence that he understands exactly what I’m saying.”</p>
<p>Personality-wise, Ron can be joyful. “He loves to dance to music,” Willman says. “Lots of laughter, expressions of happiness like that.” He’s never more content than when riding in the car and listening to music. A Brittney Spears poster adorns one wall of his bedroom (a Sport Illustrated swimsuit model another).</p>
<p>While he may not vocalize his needs, Ron knows precisely what they are, Willman says. In addition to hiking, his outings include shopping for his groceries, going to Target and the mall, and occasionally eating out.</p>
<p>“More than anything his desire is to be able to leave the home during the day and participate in activities that are beneficial to him and that he enjoys,” he says.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>The Medicare Waiver cuts, at least as thus far interpreted for Ron, will most likely mean an end to the activities that keep him happy and nonviolent and a quick slide back down the short slope.</p>
<p>Ron’s progress has paralleled the development of routines that suit his particular needs, Willman says. “For people with autism, that routine is comfort to them.” For example, Ron awakens at 10 a.m., “almost exclusively,” every day. But, he adds, with finger-clicking punctuation, Ron’s pace, regardless of the activity, is hard to match.</p>
<p>“Basically I do not know of another individual in this community, period, regardless of the agency they’re served by, that could participate in Ron’s daily hiking activity,” he says.</p>
<p>Willman can, and for the past eight years he has spent more time alone with Ron than many Americans work. “On average, I’m scheduled five days a week, 40 hours,” he says, “but it often ends up many more than that.”</p>
<p>In January, their time alone together, and by extension Ron’s hikes, will most likely come to an end.</p>
<p>Like nearly all Options houses, Ron’s place houses two roommates and one support provider for each of three shifts. Each roommate also has one-on-one time with individual providers every day. Ron and John’s hikes are part of that routine.</p>
<p>As a result of the cutbacks, Willman says, each house will have three roommates, each classified on a scale of 1 through 6, with 1 needing the least support and 6 the most.</p>
<p>“When Ron’s funding was reviewed recently, he was determined to be in a Category 3,” Willman says, “which is kind of preposterous, given some of the behavioral issues he’s had.”</p>
<p>After an appeal process, Ron was reclassified to a 5, which Willman says leaves him wondering just what a 6 might be. But the chances that Ron will have any, let alone enough, time for riding in the car and hiking in the woods are slim.</p>
<p>“I can’t stress enough what a catastrophe it’s going to be for his life,” Willman says. “I mean, basically his home will be his prison. He will not have freedom of choice. He will lose the routine.”</p>
<p>Ron Habney’s is but one story among dozens at Options, Willman notes. And the waiting list for others to even get services through the Medicaid Waiver is roughly seven years.</p>
<p>“In some ways he’s still a lucky individual, when you consider how many people are on the seven-year waiting list, desperately trying to get these services,” Willman says.</p>
<p>The <a href="" type="internal">Associated Press</a> says some families have waited 10.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>As Ron’s high-five trips become more frequent this blustery, fall Indiana afternoon, the conditions outside are anything but hiker-friendly. But the intrepid trekkers are prepared.</p>
<p>“I have some pretty good expedition gear I brought for today,” Willman says. “So, it’s I think 34 degrees outside, with rain, and we will hike in this. We will hike four to six miles today.”</p>
<p>Their likely destination, he says, is the Pate Hollow Trail, a 7.7-mile path through mixed hardwoods just north of Lake Monroe and the Paynetown State Recreation Area.</p>
<p>Three minutes before the conversation ends, Ron makes his last entreaty. “I know you want to go, Ron,” Willman responds. “You’re doing a great job waiting. Okay? We’re going to wait, just a little more, and then we’re going to go, okay? You’re the man.”</p>
<p>Willman concludes his thoughts recalling a late-October <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_disabled_homeless_shelters" type="external">Associated Press</a> news story headlined “Indiana parents told drop disabled kids at shelters.” FSSA denied such advice is given to families calling for help, but at least one mother said that’s what she was told.</p>
<p>“That’s a pretty scary thought,” he says.</p>
<p>Steven Higgs is editor of <a href="http://www.bloomingtonalternative.com" type="external">The Bloomington Alternative</a>. He can be reached at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a>.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p /> | Autism Waiver Cuts Spell Catastrophe | true | https://counterpunch.org/2010/12/15/autism-waiver-cuts-spell-catastrophe/ | 2010-12-15 | 4 |
<p>Here is a headline from CBS This Morning: “Undocumented transgender woman filing domestic violence claim arrested at El Paso courthouse by ICE, official says.” The ultimate victim! An illegal immigrant transgender woman abused by a domestic partner, deported for the crime of showing up to a courthouse! Stop the presses!</p>
<p>Here are some other media headlines about this horrifying story: “ICE detains domestic-violence victim in El Paso court.” Huffington Post: “ICE Reportedly Detained A Domestic Abuse Victim Who Sought Court Protection.” Newser: “ICE Agents Arrest Woman in Domestic Violence Court.” New York Magazine: “ICE Arrests Domestic Violence Victim at Texas Courthouse.” The Washington Post: “‘This is really unprecedented’: ICE detains woman seeking domestic abuse protection at Texas courthouse.” Even Fox News: “ICE Agents Reported Arrest Alleged Domestic Violence Victim At Texas Courthouse.”</p>
<p>Now, here’s how the headline should have read: “ICE Agents Arrest Repeatedly Convicted Criminal For Deportation At Courthouse.”</p>
<p>The transgender woman in question has been deported six times before and “ <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/undocumented-transgender-woman-filing-domestic-violence-claim-arrested-at-el-paso-courthouse-by-ice-official-says/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab8d&amp;linkId=34563655" type="external">voluntarily returned to Mexico one other time</a>.” Here’s the rap sheet from 2013: assault, probation violation, domestic violence, false imprisonment of a minor.</p>
<p>That information is buried in the second-to-last paragraph of the 19-paragraph CBS News story. The Washington Post buries that information in paragraph 10. The Huffington Post didn’t mention that at all.</p>
<p>All of the stories mentioned a comment from the county prosecutor, who said that ICE knew about the deportee’s location because of an anonymous tip. The prosecutor suggested that the tip came from the alleged domestic abuser – but admitted that she had no specific information that would lead her to that conclusion. There are <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/el-paso-ice-detains-domestic-violence-victim_us_58a51f68e4b037d17d24cb2d" type="external">provisions in US law</a> that apparently prevent arrest of someone for immigration status based solely on reports from a domestic abuser.</p>
<p>But you don’t get the whole story from the media, particularly not from their headlines. The crusade is now on to find victims of the supposedly Gestapo-esque Trump immigration enforcement policy. And the media won’t let inconvenient facts like repeat criminality of those arrested stand in the way.</p> | Media Say Trump's ICE Arrested Transgender Domestic Violence Victim. They Ignore One Rather Important Fact. | true | https://dailywire.com/news/13551/media-say-trumps-ice-arrested-transgender-domestic-ben-shapiro | 2017-02-16 | 0 |
<p>The conservative group Americans for Prosperity stretches the truth to attack Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas for “higher gas and grocery bills.”</p>
<p>The Arkansas race is <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2014/07/15/new-election-lab-forecast-suggests-86-percent-chance-that-gop-wins-senate/" type="external">one of nine</a> competitive races considered critical to whether Republicans can regain control of the Senate. Already, there has been more than $7.5 million in <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/races/indexp.php?cycle=2014&amp;id=ARS1&amp;spec=N" type="external">outside money</a> spent on the race, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.</p>
<p>The ad from <a href="" type="internal">Americans for Prosperity</a> claims Pryor has “made things harder” for the state’s unemployed and working families “living paycheck to paycheck.” It shows images of downcast men and women, who could be “your neighbor, your friend, your daughter.”</p>
<p>&lt;iframe style="width: 500px; height:300px;" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen src="https://video.factcheck.org/play/ec73c660327"&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;</p>
<p>AFP TV Ad: You know who they are. Your neighbor, your friend, your daughter. Maybe it’s you. 84,000 Arkansans out of work. Families living paycheck to paycheck. And Mark Pryor has made things harder. Voting with Barack Obama 90 percent of the time. Higher gas and grocery bills. Higher healthcare costs from Obamacare. Driving up the debt we owe China. Tell Mark Pryor Arkansas families need jobs, not bigger government.</p>
<p>It’s true, as the ad claims, that were 84,000 Arkansans out of work in May, according to the <a href="http://www.bls.gov/lau/" type="external">Bureau of Labor Statistics</a>. But that’s the fewest number since November 2008.</p>
<p>As for the claim that Pryor has voted with President Obama 90 percent of the time, that was true last year, according to a <a href="http://atr.rollcall.com/senate-democrats-supported-obama-on-overwhelming-number-of-votes-in-2013/" type="external">vote analysis</a> by CQ Weekly. But as <a href="" type="internal">we noted</a> once before, Pryor also voted against Obama more than any other Senate Democrat last year.</p>
<p>More importantly, AFP provides weak evidence to support its claims that Pryor is responsible for such things as “higher gas and grocery bills” and “higher healthcare costs from Obamacare.”</p>
<p>Gas Prices</p>
<p>AFP <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&amp;session=1&amp;vote=00288" type="external">cites</a> <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&amp;session=1&amp;vote=00052" type="external">three</a> <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=108&amp;session=1&amp;vote=00059" type="external">votes</a>Pryor cast against domestic drilling to support its assertion that Pryor is responsible for higher gas prices. The three votes were for amendments which would have banned drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).</p>
<p><a href="http://www.fws.gov/refuge/arctic/1002man.html" type="external">ANWR</a>covers over 19 million acres of land and water in northeastern Alaska. In 1980, the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) designated most of the area as protected wilderness, except for a section of about 1.5 million acres. This area along the coast — since referred to as the “1002 Area” after the section of the bill that defined it — is subjected to studies that relay to Congress the potential impacts of oil and gas exploration and development. ANILCA placed the area in limbo, and whether or not to authorize drilling in ANWR has been a political issue for <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5007819" type="external">nearly 40 years.</a></p>
<p>A 2008 report by the <a href="http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/anwr/pdf/sroiaf%282008%2903.pdf" type="external">Energy Information Administration</a> examined the impact of drilling in ANWR and concluded that oil production in that area would not significantly influence world oil prices. The projected potential price reduction would be around 41 cents to $1.44 per barrel of low-sulfur, light (LSL) crude oil in 2026/2027. The price of oil is <a href="http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/steo/report/" type="external">currently</a> a little over $100 per barrel. According to <a href="http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=24&amp;t=10" type="external">EIA</a>, U.S. refineries produce about 19 gallons of motor gasoline from one barrel of crude oil. So, that translates to pennies per gallon at the gas pump. But since oil is a global commodity, EIA warned that there may not be any impact at all.</p>
<p>EIA, 2008: Assuming that world oil markets continue to work as they do today, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) could neutralize any potential price impact of ANWR oil production by reducing its oil exports by an equal amount.</p>
<p>For some context, the average price of regular conventional gasoline was $2.34 per gallon when Pryor cast the last of the three votes cited by AFP, and it was $3.56 on July 14, according to <a href="http://www.eia.gov/petroleum/gasdiesel/" type="external">EIA data</a>. The price of gasoline fluctuated a good deal between those dates, and was $1.83 per gallon when Obama took office in January of 2009. In 2011, we <a href="" type="internal">looked into</a> some of the claims about whether Obama was to blame for higher gasoline prices and found that much of the rhetoric was misplaced.</p>
<p>Finally, the claims about higher gas and grocery bills come immediately after the ad blames Pryor for “voting with Barack Obama 90 percent of the time.” That may leave the false impression that Pryor voted with Obama to raise prices, but, in fact, the ANWR votes cited by AFP were cast in 2003 and 2005, long before Obama became president — although then-Sen. Obama voted in favor of the two bills in 2005.</p>
<p>Grocery Bills</p>
<p>How was Mark Pryor responsible for “higher grocery bills”? Because he voted for the <a href="https://beta.congress.gov/bill/110th-congress/house-bill/6?q=%7b%22search%22%3A%5b%22hr+6%22%5d%7d" type="external">Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007</a>, according to AFP. This, too, is a stretch.</p>
<p>In 2005, a section of the <a href="http://energy.gov/eere/femp/downloads/energy-policy-act-epact-2005" type="external">Energy Policy Act</a> created the <a href="http://www.epa.gov/otaq/fuels/renewablefuels/index.htm" type="external">Renewable Fuel Standard</a> program. That program mandates that a specified level of renewable fuel be blended into gasoline. In 2007, the program was expanded, increasing the required volume of renewable fuel. The rapid increase in demand for <a href="http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/crops/corn/policy.aspx#ethanolp" type="external">ethanol</a>, which increased prices of livestock and corn products.</p>
<p>However, increased renewable fuel mandates were not the only cause of rising food prices. Other factors, such as “low global stocks, droughts, exchange rates, policy responses by some major trading countries, and rising incomes in some countries such as India and China, have also contributed to price increases,” according to the <a href="http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/bioenergy/findings.aspx#ethanol" type="external">USDA</a>.</p>
<p>In fact, the USDA said, in 2008, that the inflated price of corn had very little affect on overall retail food prices. According to the <a href="http://webarchives.cdlib.org/sw1vh5dg3r/http://ers.usda.gov/AmberWaves/February08/Features/CornPrices.htm" type="external">USDA’s Economic Research Service</a>, “higher corn prices increase animal feed and ingredient costs for farmers and food manufacturers, but pass through to retail prices at a rate less than 10 percent of the corn price change.” Because food using corn as an ingredient makes up less than one-third of retail food spending, the report states, “overall retail food prices would rise less than 1 percentage point per year above the normal rate of food price inflation when corn prices increase by 50 percent.”</p>
<p>In April 2009, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/100xx/doc10057/04-08-ethanol.pdf" type="external">estimated</a> that about 10-15 percent of the rise in food prices in 2008 could be attributed to ethanol subsidies. Food prices that year rose 5.1 percent, so the effect of ethanol subsidies was responsible for less than a 1 percent increase in the price of food that year.</p>
<p>CBO, April 2009: CBO estimates that from April 2007 to April 2008, the rise in the price of corn resulting from expanded production of ethanol contributed between 0.5 and 0.8 percentage points of the 5.1 percent increase in food prices measured by the consumer price index (CPI). Over the same period, certain other factors — for example, higher energy costs — had a greater effect on food prices than did the use of ethanol as a motor fuel.</p>
<p>The retail cost of food has, historically, risen about 2.5 percent to 3 percent a year, said Ephraim Leibtag of the USDA’s Economic Research Service. Factors such as weather, production issues and changing consumer demand, all effect the overall price of food, he said. And a spike in the price of any single commodity, such as corn, generally translates to only a small overall increase in retail food prices.</p>
<p />
<p>It is worth noting that the Energy Independence and Security Act passed the Senate with bipartisan support, <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=110&amp;session=1&amp;vote=00430" type="external">86-8</a>. (Seven Republicans and one Democrat opposed it; and then-Sens. Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, as well as John McCain, did not vote). And it was signed by then-President George W. Bush, not Obama, although the ad implies otherwise.</p>
<p>Food prices are up under Obama, but not as much as they were before he took office. The index measuring the average consumer price of all food and beverages (including restaurant meals) was 10.7 percent higher in May than it was when Obama took office five and a half years earlier, according to <a href="http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/surveymost?cu" type="external">figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics</a>. For some perspective, food prices rose by 21.9 percent in the five and a half years prior to Obama taking office.</p>
<p>Health Care Costs From Obamacare</p>
<p>The ad also claims Pryor’s vote for the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, is responsible for higher health care costs. AFP cites a <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2014/06/18/3137-county-analysis-obamacare-increased-2014-individual-market-premiums-by-average-of-49/" type="external">Forbes story</a> reporting on <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2013/11/04/49-state-analysis-obamacare-to-increase-individual-market-premiums-by-avg-of-41-subsidies-flow-to-elderly/" type="external">an analysis</a> from the conservative Manhattan Institute that concluded that individual market premiums would rise by an average of 49 percent due to the new health care law.</p>
<p>But the ad does not mention that it is referring only to those who buy insurance on their own as opposed to through an employer. Just over <a href="http://kff.org/other/state-indicator/total-population/" type="external">120,000 Arkansans</a>, or 4 percent of the state’s population, purchased insurance on the individual market in 2012, according to the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation.</p>
<p>A couple other big qualifiers (which we have <a href="" type="internal">noted previously</a> when the Manhattan Institute report has been cited in attack ads): The institute didn’t adjust for the fact that the ACA requires certain minimum benefits, which many pre-ACA individual market plans didn’t meet. By and large, the post-ACA plans are more robust (whether purchasers like or want that or not). So it is not comparing similar types of plans before and after the ACA. And the institute’s figures don’t account for federal subsidies, which the Congressional Budget Office estimated would be extended to 80 percent of all those buying exchange plans nationwide.</p>
<p>As we have said repeatedly, premiums in the individual market can go up or down, perhaps significantly, depending on the individual.</p>
<p>And most Arkansans —&#160; <a href="http://kff.org/other/state-indicator/total-population/" type="external">40 percent of the population</a>&#160;— have insurance through their workplaces. Nationwide, employer-sponsored premiums for family plans went up 3.8 percent, on average, in 2013, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation’s annual employer health benefits survey. Since the ACA was passed in 2010, those premiums&#160; <a href="" type="internal">have gone up 5.9 percent, on average, per year</a>, while in the five years before the ACA, premiums went up 4.8 percent, on average, per year.</p>
<p>When we <a href="" type="internal">have explored</a> this issue in <a href="" type="internal">the past</a>, we noted that experts attributed a small increase in work-based premiums <a href="" type="internal">directly to the ACA</a>. When family premiums jumped 9 percent from 2010 to 2011, for example, experts told us that the law was responsible for a 1 percent to 3 percent increase, with the remainder due to higher medical costs. That was expected, as the law required the elimination of preexisting condition exclusions for children, the coverage of dependents on their parents’ plans up to age 26, free coverage of preventive care, and an increase in caps on annual coverage. Since that initial jump, however, the yearly employer-based premiums have risen at historically low rates.</p>
<p>Another <a href="http://kff.org/other/state-indicator/total-population/" type="external">38 percent</a> of Arkansans have government-sponsored health insurance, primarily Medicare or Medicaid, which would not be affected by the changes in the individual market.</p>
<p>— Eden Everwine and Robert Farley</p> | Stretching the Truth in Arkansas | false | https://factcheck.org/2014/07/stretching-the-truth-in-arkansas/ | 2014-07-21 | 2 |
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<p>Yvonne Todacheene plays with a puppy at her farm in Shiprock. She and her husband, Izzy Todacheene, take in hundreds of feral dogs from around the Four Corners. The couple is currently raising funds to help Bailey, a shepherd mix with a piece of wire embedded in his hind leg. (Farmington Daily Times)</p>
<p>SHIPROCK - For three months, Bailey, a shepherd mix, wandered around City Market in Shiprock with a piece of wire sticking out of his leg. People saw the dog and tried to catch him.</p>
<p>"Everybody and their brother was out there throwing ropes at him," Izzy Todacheene said.</p>
<p>Todacheene and his wife, Yvonne, took in Bailey after Navajo Nation Animal Control caught him.</p>
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<p>The Todacheenes volunteer with Soul Dog Rescue, a nonprofit rescue run by a Denver woman that provides low-cost spay and neuter services to rural communities in Indian Country, particularly on the Navajo Nation. The couple fosters animals for the organization before they are transported to shelters in Denver.</p>
<p>In addition to their nine dogs, the couple's farm in northern Shiprock often is filled with dozens of others. Izzy Todacheene said they had 65 mouths to feed last month and, last June, 187 dogs, mainly puppies, passed through the farm's kennels.</p>
<p>Soul Dog Rescue provides food for the dogs, which is dropped off every few weeks when volunteers pick up the next load of dogs to transport up to Denver shelters.</p>
<p>Even with the frequent transports, the Todacheenes' kennels are often full. They said that, within two days, the kennels can fill up.</p>
<p>"It's a passion," Yvonne Todacheene said. "I mean you got to want to do it to do it."</p>
<p>When Bailey was brought to the farm around April 1, there were almost 30 dogs at the property.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal" />Catching Bailey</p>
<p>For months, Stacey Daw, a senior animal control officer with the Navajo Nation, got calls about a dog running around with a wire in his leg, but every time she went to City Market, he was gone.</p>
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<p>That was when Yvonne and Izzy Todacheene heard Bailey was staying at a residence not far from City Market.</p>
<p>Daw went to the home and met the man who lived there. The man confirmed Bailey had started hanging out at his house and told Daw the dog had started sleeping in a dog house he had outside. But, the man told Daw, he wasn't feeding the dog or caring for it.</p>
<p>So Daw set out a live trap for Bailey, but the dog didn't go into the trap. Instead, it went inside an old outhouse near the side of the man's house.</p>
<p>"Trapping him in there with the flimsy plywood door - man, it was a battle," Daw said.</p>
<p>Eventually, with the help of her catch pole, she was able to get Bailey into her truck, where he was sedated and his leg was examined.</p>
<p>She said she doesn't know how the wire got in his leg.</p>
<p>The wire is embedded in the dog's left hind leg, behind the tendon, and the muscle has atrophied.</p>
<p>"We're thinking, just by looking at him, it's probably going to have to be an amputation," Yvonne Todacheene said.</p>
<p>Izzy Todacheene is friends with Patrick Goddard, a veterinarian in Durango, Colo., who provides much of the medical care for the Todacheenes' dogs. He has agreed to perform the amputation if funds are raised.</p>
<p>Rescued puppies jump at the fence at the Todacheene Farm in Shiprock. (Farmington Daily Times)</p>
<p>For the last several years, Goddard has provided reduced-cost veterinary care in the Four Corners. He currently works as a veterinarian for the La Plata County Animal Shelter, but he also volunteers with Soul Dog Rescue and the Dogster clinics on the Navajo Nation and in Towaoc, Colo.</p>
<p>Before examining Bailey, Goddard looked at photos of the dog and said the only likely option will be amputation.</p>
<p>"Often times, the only option for these animals is the cheapest option," he said.</p>
<p>With Bailey's skittish nature, he said it would be difficult for Yvonne and Izzy Todacheene to help the dog through the intense physical therapy that other options would require.</p>
<p>Goddard performs a couple dozen amputations a year and estimates it will cost between $400 and $500 for the surgery - half the cost many other clinics charge.</p>
<p>Because Bailey hasn't put weight on his leg for weeks, Goddard said the amputation won't affect the dog's life much.</p>
<p>"If anything, it's kind of a burden on him," he said.</p>
<p>The amputation will be just the start of the Todacheenes' work. After that, they will start getting Bailey accustomed to being around humans.</p>
<p>Izzy Todacheene said that, while people had good intentions trying to catch Bailey, their efforts may have further scared the injured dog.</p>
<p>Until he is socialized, Bailey will live at the Todacheene farm in Shiprock.</p>
<p>"We don't like to send anybody off until they're ready," Izzy Todacheene said.</p>
<p>So far, they have had success socializing most of their dogs.</p>
<p>Izzy Todacheene points to Jackie, a Rottweiler mix, as an example.</p>
<p>When Jackie first came to the rescue, she was terrified of people and wouldn't let them touch her. Now, Jackie runs up to strangers and begs to be petted.</p>
<p>Bailey is seen in a cage after being captured last month by Navajo Nation Animal Control near the City Market in Shiprock. (Farmington Daily Times)</p>
<p>Small shelter, huge territory</p>
<p>The Shiprock Animal Shelter, located near the intersection of U.S. Highways 491 and 64, consists of six kennel runs, and a series of small cages for puppies and cats.</p>
<p>Each kennel run can hold a single dog, although the shelter frequently has many more.</p>
<p>Daw said an animal sweep can bring up to 40 dogs to the small shelter. The staff then sorts through the dogs. Dogs that have bitten people or hurt livestock are euthanized and so are the ones that are sick or injured.</p>
<p>The shelter tries to hold the dogs for as long as possible to reunite them with their owners.</p>
<p>The friendly, healthy dogs are often sent to Todacheene Farm, where Yvonne and Izzy Todacheene take care of them.</p>
<p>In addition to the small capacity shelter, Daw and her sole temporary employee are responsible for answering animal control calls in the eastern half of Navajo Nation.</p>
<p>"The Navajo Nation is a huge area," Daw said. "Some people think there's like 20 of us."</p>
<p>Her patrol area is bordered by the Pueblo Pintado area in the east; Sheep Springs in the south; Montezuma Creek, Utah, in the north; and Teec Nos Pos, Ariz., in the west.</p>
<p>However, she occasionally answers calls outside her area, as far away as Tuba City, Ariz.</p>
<p>The animal control unit consists of six full-times officers and three temporary workers.</p>
<p>One of the reasons so many dogs go through the shelter and Todacheene Farm is the cost of neutering. The Todacheenes said many people in the Shiprock area cannot afford a few hundred dollars in veterinary bills and few other options exist.</p>
<p>There are some reduced-cost clinics, including a mobile unit and clinics in Farmington.</p>
<p>Soul Dog Rescue also offers clinics. The clinic neuters pets for whatever the owner can donate. However, those clinics fill up quickly and the rescue gets hundreds of calls a day from people wanting to get their pets neutered.</p>
<p>In the past few years, groups like Soul Dog Rescue have focused on areas such as Shiprock, Kayenta, Ariz., and Towaoc, Colo.</p>
<p>Their efforts have included trapping, neutering and releasing feral dogs to control their populations and help the dogs have better lives.</p>
<p>Goddard said spay and neuter also has other advantages. Unaltered dogs are more prone to certain kinds of cancer and tend to be more aggressive.</p>
<p>Their efforts are beginning to pay off.</p>
<p>"I think we're starting to see a visible impact," Goddard said.</p>
<p>Like Goddard, Daw said the number of dogs running around Shiprock has decreased. But certain locations still have large packs of dogs.</p>
<p>"For some reason, it's always City Market and the flea markets where I see stray dogs roaming," she said.</p>
<p>Daw stresses that educating people about animal control will continue bringing down feral dog populations.</p>
<p>"It's always a people problem," she said. "It's never a dog problem."</p>
<p>She said people need to understand that just because their dog is spayed or neutered doesn't mean it can run free, and that vaccines need to be given every year, not just once in a dog's life.</p>
<p>There are various clinics available to help the people vaccinate and neuter their pets.</p>
<p>"People get new pets every day," Daw said. "Hopefully, they take advantage of these clinics."</p>
<p /> | Playing canine catch-up in a huge area | false | https://abqjournal.com/392871/playing-canine-catchup-in-a-huge-area.html | 2 |
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<p>Federal and state regulators have conceded that potentially polluted water from the proposed PolyMet copper-nickel mine could flow toward the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness instead of away from it, as intended.</p>
<p>As a result, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has urged Minnesota officials to propose a solution in the final version of the environmental review of the project, which has been in the works for 10 years and is due out later this year, the Star Tribune reported Wednesday (http://strib.mn/1UrhjU8 ).</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>The problem, which was identified by scientists working for the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, was first reported last month by the Timberjay, an Ely weekly newspaper.</p>
<p>Environmentalists and tribal officials say technical documents show the project's water flow model is badly flawed and understates the threat to the pristine BWCA.</p>
<p>"How, after 10 years of study, can we not know which way the water is going to go?" said Kathryn Hoffman, an attorney with the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy. "It suggests that there is a lot we don't know about the impact."</p>
<p>The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, which is leading the environmental review, said in a statement Tuesday that it is evaluating the scenario. It was only brought to its attention recently, the agency said.</p>
<p>But PolyMet Corp. said it is confident that its water modeling is valid. It said in a statement that questions will be addressed by the lead regulators.</p>
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<p>It was long assumed that water from PolyMet's planned mine would flow south toward the St. Louis River and Lake Superior, and away from the BWCA.</p>
<p>But the tribal scientists with the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission pointed out in a June 18 letter to government agencies that groundwater flow in the area is strongly influenced by a 12-mile long iron mine just a mile north of PolyMet's proposed site - the Peter Mitchell pit owned by Northshore Mining Co. Recent operations in the Mitchell pit have removed a geological barrier that once stood between the two watersheds.</p>
<p>When the iron mine eventually closes, its water level will be 300 feet lower than the level in PolyMet's open pit at closure, according to the GLIFWC scientists. And water flows downhill.</p>
<p>In a June 22 memo, the DNR and federal officials disputed the tribal scientists' conclusions. They said they believe rain and other drainage sources will create an underground "groundwater mound" that would act as a barrier to any flow from the PolyMet site.</p>
<p>However, they conceded that a northward flow from the PolyMet site is a "theoretical possibility."</p>
<p>Technical documents reviewed by the Star Tribune outlined some actions, such as monitoring and groundwater extraction wells, that could mitigate a northward flow of groundwater. The EPA told the state such "adaptive management" strategies could be acceptable.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Information from: Star Tribune, http://www.startribune.com</p> | Regulators concede some water from PolyMet copper-nickel mine might reach Boundary Waters | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2015/09/02/regulators-concede-some-water-from-polymet-copper-nickel-mine-might-reach.html | 2016-03-09 | 0 |
<p>SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - Puerto Rico's governor has signed a new law aimed at fighting corruption in the U.S. territory amid a deep economic crisis.</p>
<p>The measure bars judges from granting probation to anyone accused of corruption, obstruction of justice or any other charge that involves public funds. People convicted of graft are prohibited from running for elected office.</p>
<p>Gov. Ricardo Rossello said Thursday that the law also strengthens protections for whistleblowers and increases the statute of limitations for those seeking to file a civil complaint for alleged reprisals.</p>
<p>The government can seek triple the amount of compensation in a civil claim for any case involving misuse of public money that results in a conviction.</p>
<p>SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - Puerto Rico's governor has signed a new law aimed at fighting corruption in the U.S. territory amid a deep economic crisis.</p>
<p>The measure bars judges from granting probation to anyone accused of corruption, obstruction of justice or any other charge that involves public funds. People convicted of graft are prohibited from running for elected office.</p>
<p>Gov. Ricardo Rossello said Thursday that the law also strengthens protections for whistleblowers and increases the statute of limitations for those seeking to file a civil complaint for alleged reprisals.</p>
<p>The government can seek triple the amount of compensation in a civil claim for any case involving misuse of public money that results in a conviction.</p> | New Puerto Rico law targets graft, shields whistleblowers | false | https://apnews.com/c8682c7292ab464cb1898fb408f99fc3 | 2018-01-04 | 2 |
<p>The heavily circulated letter was signed by 25 members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, including director Ang Lee, actors Sandra Oh and George Takei. It was a protest of the tone-deaf Asian jokes at this year's Oscars ceremony — but it wasn't meant to be an open letter.</p>
<p>"It was a private message to our friends and our colleagues in the organization," says Freida Lee Mock, the chair of the Academy's Documentary Executive Committee, who penned the first draft.</p>
<p>But none of the signatories seem too bothered that it was leaked to the press, <a href="http://variety.com/2016/film/news/oscars-asian-jokes-protested-ang-lee-racist-stereotypes-1201729638/" type="external">first reported by Variety</a> and then rebounding around the Internet earlier this week. It wasn't until the letter became public that CEO Dawn Hudson <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/movies/full-text-the-asian-academy-members-letter-andthe-academys-response.html" type="external">issued a swift apology</a>. And it wasn't until George Takei called the apology "patronizing" and "a bland, corporate response" that Hudson scheduled a future meeting with these 25 members to show them that the Academy leaders were serious about these issues.</p>
<p>This was the first time in recent history that a grassroots collaboration like this amongst Asian Americans has happened within the Academy. The organization is divided into branches based on craft — for actors, directors, executives, etc. — and for the most part, members work within their lanes. Long-time Academy members Mock and documentarian Arthur Dong have been involved in numerous campaigns for documentary films. They successfully lobbied for the documentary branch of the Academy and Mock was voted the first governor. Dong joined her in as a fellow governor soon after. In the '90s, when there was an attempt to get rid of the Academy Award for Documentary Short, they helped rally people like Steven Spielberg to get the decision unanimously overturned.</p>
<p>But they've never had to band together by ethnicity, because before this year's Oscars ceremony, there was no need.</p>
<p>Moments after Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs took the stage to speak about the importance of diversity at this year's ceremony, Oscars host Chris Rock brought out <a href="" type="internal">three Asian American children to make a child labor joke</a>. Later in the night, presenter Sasha Baron Cohen delighted in cracking an Asian penis joke.</p>
<p />
<p>8-year-old Estie Kung&#160;(right) was one of the actors cast&#160;as "accountants from PricewaterhouseCoopers" to take the stage at the 88th Academy Awards on Sunday. Neither she nor her mother knew that the three were going to become the butt of a joke about Asians, though.</p>
<p>Mario Anzuoni/Reuters</p>
<p>Also:&#160; <a href="" type="internal">What it's like to be the butt of the joke. One of the kids at the Oscars speaks out.</a></p>
<p>"It hit me in gut," says Dong, now a film professor at Loyola Marymount University. He was watching the Oscars with his 11-year-old son. "I just thought, 'This is our organization. We understand the process and how decisions are made, so how could this have happened?'"</p>
<p>When the joke first aired, social media erupted with criticism. Constance Wu, Daniel Dae Kim and Jeremy Lin — the all-stars of Asian American entertainment — spoke out. It’s not uncommon, though, for <a href="" type="internal">these kinds of outcries to rise and then fade quickly</a>.</p>
<p>But then the Hall-of-Famers came out to play. Mock is one of the most decorated Asian American Academy members with one Oscar win and five nominations. Dong, and public relations powerhouse David Magdael were also planning to write letters individually when they all decided to collaborate. With no official roster of Asian American members, they didn't know where to start, but they enlisted the help of documentarian Renee Tajima-Pena (Who Killed Vincent Chin?), producer Janet Yang (Joy Luck Club), publicity executive Laura Kim (Participant Media) and actress Jodi Long — all with decades in the film industry — to quickly get input and signatures from members, both experienced and new.</p>
<p>When the press got hold of it, Ang Lee became the poster boy. <a href="http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/race/george-takei-rips-academy-demands-875848" type="external">George Takei gave a detailed interview to The Hollywood Reporter</a> demanding an apology.&#160;Strand Releasing executive Marcus Hu penned an <a href="http://www.indiewire.com/article/marcus-hu-open-letter-oscars-academy-diversity-20160316" type="external">open letter to the Academy in Indiewire</a>.&#160;Yang, Hu and Mock gave <a href="http://www.scpr.org/programs/the-frame/2016/03/16/47262/two-asian-american-filmmakers-react-to-academy-s-p/" type="external">interviews to Southern California public radio station KPCC</a>.</p>
<p>"A lot of people say that Chris Rock isn't obligated to represent us," says Magdael. "And they're right.&#160;We&#160;have to represent ourselves. And it's fine if some people weren't offended by his joke, but for those of us who were, it's our responsibility to speak out. Otherwise everyone will think it's okay to make fun of us."</p>
<p />
<p>Holding their Oscars for best achievement in a live action short film, Chris Tashima (left) and Chris Donahue celebrate for their work in "Visas And Virtue" at the 1998 Oscars.</p>
<p>Blake Sell/Reuters</p>
<p>"As minorities, we've been associated with a racial group since birth and, especially as actors, we're used to dealing with it," says Tashima. "But white people aren't&#160;used to being classified as a racial group, so they assume they're being accused. When really, we're just trying to discuss these racial issues, to show that diversity in casting is an inevitable, obvious destination. Otherwise the work we're creating now is going to look outdated very soon."</p>
<p>More:&#160; <a href="" type="internal">However you feel about Chris Rock's Asian joke, it takes guts to talk openly about race</a></p>
<p>President Cheryl Boone Isaacs has <a href="https://www.oscars.org/news/academy-adds-diverse-voices-its-leadership" type="external">announced new appointments to the Academy</a>, including Kung Fu Panda 3 director Jennifer Yuh Nelson as a new governor. This is progress but it’s just a start, says Dong.</p>
<p>"It's easy to add some people of color on a board," he says. "It's harder to dig in and have these difficult conversations to address systemic problems in the film industry and question our own values and perceptions."</p>
<p />
<p>Director Arthur Dong poses with the award after winning Best Documentary for "Hollywood Chinese" at the 44th Golden Horse Awards in Taipei, 2007.</p>
<p>Bobby Yip/Reuters</p>
<p>But it also said: “We are proud that the Oscars reach several hundred million people around the world of whom 60 percent&#160;are Asians and potential moviegoers."</p>
<p>One of the reasons Mock found it shocking that Asians were treated as such an easy target was that Academy not only has a global audience for the Oscars ceremony, but also global investors. In 2013, China's Dalian Wanda Group gave $20 million for the Academy Museum being built&#160;in Los Angeles. This is the same conglomerate that bought out AMC Theatres, the second largest movie exhibitor in America.</p>
<p>Dong and Tashima say that the Academy is much more than the awards, even though the Oscars are the highest-profile event and their biggest moneymaker. There's the Academy Film Archive which, with Dong's help, restored The Curse of Quon Gwon, the earliest known Chinese American film and one of earliest films directed by a woman. They have a library that houses 90 years of historical artifacts, including Japanese posters from films that were screened at <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2007/mar/03/local/me-lindalea3" type="external">the historic Linda Lea Theater</a> from the mid 50s through the 70s. They’re home to the Student Academy Awards, which is known for discovering talents like director Spike Lee. They give grants to other non-profit organizations and provide educational outreach.</p>
<p>If the public boycotts the Oscars, these are the programs at stake, says Tashima.</p>
<p>"We've gotten a groundswell of support from our colleagues, both Asian and non-Asian," says Mock, who never expected the letter to go viral. "And it's all been positive. In the end, we were trying to correct some misinformation. And to the credit of the board of governors, they're open and want to do the right thing."</p>
<p>Tashima agrees that there has been a dramatic shift in the last five years. He credits Academy leadership, who have pledged to double the amount of female and minority members in the next five years.</p>
<p>"It's still a battle, but it no longer feels like we're pushing a ball uphill," says Tashima. "It's no longer us saying 'You need to change.' It's them saying 'We know we need to change. Please help us.'"</p> | Ang Lee and George Takei signed the letter, but here’s who wrote it | false | https://pri.org/stories/2016-03-18/ang-lee-and-george-takei-signed-letter-here-s-who-wrote-it | 2016-03-18 | 3 |
<p>President Donald Trump is praising the recovery efforts in Florida before departing for the state to survey hurricane damage from Irma.</p>
<p>The president tells reporters at the White House that “power is being turned on rapidly,” and the state’s leaders and emergency responders are doing an “amazing job” in helping the state respond to the massive storm.</p>
<p>Trump is traveling to Naples and Fort Myers to meet with those affected by the hurricane and learn more about relief efforts. Trump will travel with Vice President Mike Pence and first lady Melania Trump.</p>
<p>His trip to Florida follows two earlier outings in which Trump reviewed Harvey recovery efforts in late August.</p> | Trump Praises Florida Recovery Efforts | false | https://newsline.com/trump-praises-florida-recovery-efforts/ | 2017-09-14 | 1 |
<p>On Friday, President Obama ordered the sequester to begin after lawmakers failed to reach a deal to avert the $85 billion in automatic federal budget cuts that it triggered.</p>
<p>Still confused by what that means for you? You’re hardly alone. As Democrats and Republicans haggle over the severity of the reductions, “Saturday Night Live” took the opportunity to explain how exactly the sequester could affect you–or at least, it mocked the possibilities on its latest show.</p>
<p>Since Obama (played by Jay Pharoah) has “no idea how money works or how budgets work,” teachers, astronauts, meat inspectors and an affected group that closely resembles the Village People will have to suffice.</p>
<p>— Posted by <a href="" type="internal">Tracy Bloom</a>.</p>
<p /> | 'Saturday Night Live' Explains the Sequester | true | https://truthdig.com/articles/saturday-night-live-explains-the-sequester/ | 2013-03-04 | 4 |
<p />
<p>Image source: McDonald's.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>After five straight quarters of positive comparable sales growth in the US,McDonald's(NYSE: MCD) fell once again in the fourth quarter, declining 1.3%.</p>
<p>Management blamed the strong response to the launch of all-day breakfast for the slide in domestic comparable sales. Outside the US, performance was strong as global comps were up 2.7%.</p>
<p>Still, the slowdown in US sales underscores the challenge that CEO Steve Easterbrook faces now that all-day breakfast is no longer a reliable sales driver. Going into his third year leading the fast-food giant, he may have already picked much of the low-hanging fruit to boost US sales, making future sales gains more difficult.</p>
<p>One factoid may show more than any other why McDonald's is likely to face continued headwinds at home. According to the company's own internal research, only one in five millennials has tried the Big Mac, the company's signature sandwich.McDonald's has more than 14,000 restaurants nationwide and does about $35 billion in annual systemwide sales. It is by far the #1 restaurant chain in the country by sales, and for years has touted "billions and billions" served on its trademark golden arches. The Big Mac even had its own jingle in a popular ad campaign in the 1990s. That 80% of the country's young adult generation that has never tried its most famous sandwich is stunning, and bodes poorly for the its future as American food tastes continue to change.</p>
<p>Advertisement</p>
<p>Interestingly, McDonald's isn't the only Big Food purveyor that's noticed such a trend.AB InBev's(NYSE: BUD) Budweiser found that 44% of drinkers aged 21 to 27 had never tried its classic brew, which despite several years of declining sales is still the third-most popular beer in the US, after Bud Light and Coors Light.Since the discovery, Budweiser has tried a number of different ad campaigns to target younger consumers, with mixed results.</p>
<p>To combat the widespread diffidence to its trademark sandwich, McDonald's is introducing variations of the Big Mac for a limited time -- the Grand Mac and the Mac Jr. The Grand Mac will be a one-third pound burger with an extra slice of cheese, dressed like the Big Mac, while the Mac Jr., at just 420 calories, will have just one patty and no middle bun. McDonald's is also giving away 10,000 bottles of its special sauce to further promote the burger.</p>
<p>Offering varieties of the popular sandwich seems like a clever move. It will give McDonald's something to boast about in ad campaigns, and it may even entice millennials to sample one for the first time. But it does little to mitigate the underlying trends that are dissuading young people from visiting McDonald's in the first place.</p>
<p>Sales of organic foods increased 11% in 2015, well outpacing the overall growth rate of 3% in the food industry. McDonald's has taken some steps to accommodate these changing food tastes, pledging to eliminate chicken treated with human antibiotics from its supply chain and eventually use only eggs from cage-free chickens. The company has also been experimenting with burgers made from fresh, rather than frozen, meat, but the McDonald's brand is built on automation and convenience. It's designed to serve cheap, tasty food quickly, and as customers crave more authentic, traditionally made food, the Golden Arches is at a disadvantage.</p>
<p>Budweiser's parent has the luxury of diversifying into craft beer brands, as that company has bought several breweries to get a piece of the fastest-growing segment of the beer market, which is being driven by millennials. But such a strategy would not have the same benefits for McDonald's as it does not have a distribution network to leverage in the way that Budweiser does.</p>
<p>Ironically, McDonald's was the one-time majority owner ofChipotle Mexican Grill(NYSE: CMG), which was a millennial darling before 2015's E. coli outbreak. McDonald's spun off the burrito chain in 2006 as Chipotle Founder Steve Ells had become increasingly frustrated with McDonald's way of doing business, which was at odds with Chipotle's "Food with Integrity" platform.</p>
<p>The lesson for McDonald's shareholders may be that the spike in sales following the all-day breakfast launch is going to be a tough act to follow. With international performance still strong and a refranchising program that seems to be boosting profits, the stock looks safe for now. But at some point down the road, Mickey D's will have to solve its millennial problem if it wants to remain the nation's dominant fast food chain.</p>
<p>10 stocks we like better than McDonald's When investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.*</p>
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<p>*Stock Advisor returns as of January 4, 2017</p>
<p><a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/TMFHobo/info.aspx" type="external">Jeremy Bowman Opens a New Window.</a> owns shares of Chipotle Mexican Grill. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Anheuser-Busch InBev NV and Chipotle Mexican Grill. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | 1 Statistic That Shows Why McDonald's Struggles May Continue | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/01/26/1-statistic-that-shows-why-mcdonald-struggles-may-continue.html | 2017-01-26 | 0 |
<p>AMRITSAR, India — On a recent sweltering summer day, 27-year-old Gaurav Sharma tossed and turned on a small bed in the corner of a well-lit room. He buried his face in the pillow to try and forget the aches in his legs. A plaque hanging on the wall behind him spoke to his anguished state: “Drug addicts are not bad people who need to be made good, they are sick people who need to be made well.”</p>
<p>Sharma had not had any heroin for 24 hours. The withdrawal symptoms had begun.</p>
<p>“When it is really bad, it feels like I’m drowning and can’t breathe,” he said.</p>
<p>Drug use has become an epidemic here in the city and throughout the northern Indian state of Punjab, with officials estimating that more than 50 percent of people between 18 and 35 are using illegal drugs, including heroin and prescription opiates. More than <a href="" type="external">two-thirds</a> of the state’s rural households have at least one drug addict.&#160;</p>
<p>The drug problem took center stage during the April national elections as two of the state’s biggest political parties, the incumbent Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and the Congress, publically <a href="http://www.tribuneindia.com/2014/20140114/main5.htm" type="external">traded charges</a> of ignoring the problem and courting drug traffickers. In Punjab, many political workers were <a href="" type="external">allegedly bribing</a> voters with drugs. But after a bruising vote where the ruling SAD party lost a number of its supporters, it has since jumped into action, launching a massive crackdown on drug dealers and complicit politicians that could signal a major shift in policy for the state.</p>
<p>Because most drug abusers deny use, the number of addicts in Punjab is hard to quantify. But government officials report that the prevalence of illicit substance use is greater than 10 times worldwide use, which was <a href="http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/press/releases/2011/June/world-drug-report_-drug-markets-stable-but-consumption-of-synthetic-and-prescription-drugs-rises.html" type="external">nearly 5 percent</a> in 2010. The rampant drug abuse in Punjab stems partly from the once affluent state’s struggling economy and rising unemployment, as well as the easy availability of drugs smuggled into the country from Afghanistan and Pakistan.</p>
<p>For Sharma, the problem started three years ago, when some friends in his neighborhood of Sundernagar started snorting heroin. He tried it with them, thinking he’d keep his use recreational. Before he knew it, he was addicted.</p>
<p>Within a year, Sharma was using heroin seven to eight times a day, heating up the powder on an aluminum foil and inhaling the smoke at home and at work. When his employer found out, he lost his job, making it harder for him to afford the 3000 rupees ($50) it cost to buy his fix—a gram a day. Within two years, Sharma was spending the majority of his time obtaining the drug and recovering from its effects.</p>
<p>“I would travel more than a 100 kilometers if required in the middle of the night, just to get the drug and take care of my craving,” Sharma said. He is now in his second attempt at rehab.</p>
<p>Sharma was fortunate to get into a private treatment center, called the Amrit Foundation Clinic, where he will receive detoxification treatment for five days. In all of Punjab, which has a population of nearly 28 million, there are just 10 government and 63 private drug counseling and rehabilitation centers—much less than the number of treatment options many doctors say are required.</p>
<p>In Maqboolpura, a severely affected neighborhood in Amritsar, so many families have lost male members to drug addiction that they call it a “ <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-asia-11925617" type="external">village of widows</a>.”&#160;</p>
<p>Across the state, local politicians and police are regularly accused of being complicit in the drug trade.&#160;</p>
<p>“Whenever we catch a drug peddler, we get a phone call from the political bosses to let him go,” said a local retired police officer speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid trouble with the ruling government.</p>
<p>But there are signs this might be changing in Punjab as a result of the elections. Within just two weeks after the election, the <a href="http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/punjabs-drug-crackdown/" type="external">state government arrested</a> more than 3,000 people on drug charges and dismissed 25 police officers for suspected links with drug racketeers. At least one state minister has been forced to resign due to his son’s involvement with the illegal drug trade.&#160;</p>
<p>Critics on the other hand, such as the Congress party, still feel that the efforts are insufficient and the arrests misdirected at drug addicts rather than peddlers, sparing higher-ups in the ruling party who have also been implicated.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, after five days of rehab, Sharma was ready to go home to his wife and parents.</p>
<p>“The hardest part of the treatment is now, when he is away from direct supervision,” said Jaswinder Singh, an anesthesiologist at the clinic. Singh said that relapse rates were disturbingly high, with nearly half of his patients returning to drug use once they left the clinic.</p>
<p>Sharma knows this all too well. The last time he was in treatment was in February more than a year ago, and he started using again within two weeks of returning home.</p>
<p>“It is very hard but I have suffered enough, this time I am determined to quit,” he said.</p>
<p>More from GlobalPost: <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatches/globalpost-blogs/global-pulse/when-life-saving-surgery-turns-life-threatening" type="external">When life-saving surgery turns life-threatening</a></p>
<p>Editor's note: This post is part of a regular series called "A Doctor's Notes" that originates with Harman Boparai's reporting in India last summer for the GlobalPost Special Report, " <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/special-reports/step-by-step-path-ending-child-mortality#slide-1" type="external">Step by Step: The Path to Ending Child Mortality</a>."&#160;</p> | Heroin epidemic takes hold of people—and politics—in India’s Punjab state | false | https://pri.org/stories/2014-06-11/heroin-epidemic-takes-hold-people-and-politics-india-s-punjab-state | 2014-06-11 | 3 |
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