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Nicaragua riots: Relatives of US embassy staff told to leave Published duration 23 April 2018
image copyright Reuters image caption The protests have turned increasingly violent during the past five days
The state department has ordered relatives of US government employees based in Nicaragua to leave the Central American country.
Services at the US embassy in the capital in Managua will be curtailed.
The order comes after days of deadly rioting triggered by planned changes to Nicaragua's social security system.
Even though Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega had scrapped the changes, the situation remains tense and more protests are expected.
The state department also said it would authorise US government personnel to leave Nicaragua but that those decisions would have to be taken on a case-by-by-case basis.
In a statement it warned that "political rallies and demonstrations are occurring daily, often with little notice or predictability".
"Some protests result in injuries and deaths," it says, adding that buying food and fuel could become a challenge and access to the airport in Managua could be blocked.
A human rights group says at least 27 people have been killed in total as a result of the unrest, more than double the official death toll of 10.
How did it all start?
The unrest first started on Wednesday when hundreds of people, mainly pensioners, took to the streets of the capital, Managua, to protest against changes to the country's social security system.
media caption The protest against pension changes have escalated in recent days
The protesters and some of the journalists covering the demonstration were set upon by men wearing motorcycle helmets who beat them with metal pipes and electric cables.
Some local media said those beating up the protesters were part of pro-government gangs and were wearing T-shirts with pro-government slogans.
How did it escalate?
On Thursday, students and employers joined the protesting pensioners in several cities, boosting the numbers of demonstrators to thousands rather than hundreds. There were also further stand-offs between the protesters and pro-government groups.
image copyright AFP image caption Protesters took out their anger on some of the "Trees of Life" sculptures designed by the First Lady
Students took over the National University of Engineering and confronted riot police, who fired tear gas and rubber bullets.
The protests spread from Managua to a dozen other cities across the country.
On Friday, the army was deployed to guard government buildings and the protests turned deadly with several people, including two protesters and a policeman, killed.
The security forces were accused of using excessive force to contain the protests, which had started peacefully.
But First Lady Rosario Murillo, who is also the country's vice-president, defended the response, saying it constituted a "legitimate defence against a tiny group" of troublemakers.
Over the weekend, protests escalated further with a reporter shot dead during a live broadcast in the town of Bluefields on the Caribbean coast.
image copyright Reuters image caption Stores were looted in Managua
image copyright Reuters image caption Some shop owners armed themselves to protect their shuttered businesses
Some took advantage of the chaos to loot shops, while shopkeepers armed themselves and stood guard around their businesses.
What were the proposed changes?
The changes were aimed at boosting Nicaragua's troubled social security system, which has been running on a deficit.
Pensioners would have had to pay 5% of their pensions into a fund for medical expenses.
Employees would have had to contribute a larger chunk of their salary towards social security - 7% instead of the current 6.25%. And employers, too, would have had to pay more money into the social security pot.
The changes were due to come into force on 1 July.
Are the protests only about social security?
The protests were triggered by the proposed changes but the harsh response to what started as peaceful demonstrations brought many more people onto the streets.
There was also outrage over the fact that journalists were among those killed. A number of TV stations also complained of censorship after they were taken off the cable network.
image copyright EPA image caption Protesters are demanding freedom of speech be restored
Miguel Mora, the director of 100% Noticias, one of the stations to be taken off air, wrote on Facebook: "They are threatening us!"
The protests also appear to have grown into a bigger anti-government movement, with protesters expressing their anger at the president's increasingly authoritarian style.
Is the scrapping of the measure likely to calm matters?
For those whose main concern was the increase in social security payments, its scrapping will be seen as a victory and it may satisfy them.
But the anti-government protests, the largest in decades, have emboldened many Nicaraguans to speak out more freely against President Daniel Ortega and his influential wife and vice-president.
There has been discontent with the president, who is on his third consecutive term in office, for years in some parts of society.
The 2014 scrapping of presidential term limits has been seen as a threat to democracy and some of those who have been demonstrating have accused Mr Ortega and his wife of having "dictatorial tendencies".
The business community has said it will not sit down for talks with the government until police violence stops and freedom of speech is restored. | {
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Hope everyone’s weekend was awesome! And I hope this comic made you forget that it’s Monday (whoops I just reminded you again didn’t I?)
Have a great day!
P.S. The weird things I research in order to draw some of the comics…sheesh…if you check my google history, you’ll see gravestones and tumors. That’s nasty. | {
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But, notwithstanding today's move, much of what critics dislike about ALEC hasn't been changed. A useful point of comparison here is the recent debate over the digital bills SOPA and PIPA. As you recall, many folks were outraged over the bills. Their champions, meanwhile, took that reaction to be a condemnation of the bills' content. MPAA chief Chris Dodd pledged to go back to the drawing board -- surely, Congress and traditional entertainment industry groups could work something out. But SOPA and PIPA's opponents rejected the former senator from Connecticut's operating premise. No more would major telecom bills be negotiated in secret by a handful of interests. The problem was process, not just the bills themselves. With ALEC, the argument is that the very organizational model is no longer acceptable, if it ever was. The vision of a "public-private partnership" that gives companies like Coca-Cola, State Farm, and AT&T equal weight as legislators is concerning in and of itself. In short, according to those who question ALEC's model, it sure seems a perversion of deliberative democracy, not to mention federalism, to have a few folks meet in a room to craft public policy that gets distributed nationwide without any meaningful transparency.
That all forms some of the context for the reactions today amongst those who have been drawing attention to ALEC for a long while now. For its part, the group ColorofChange.org, which being campaigning against ALEC's support for voter ID and other election laws since December, is implying that it doesn't believe that anything has changed when it comes to ALEC's work product. "ALEC's latest statement is nothing more than a PR stunt aimed at diverting attention from its agenda," said a statement put out by the group today, "which has done serious damage to our communities."
Meanwhile, Common Cause said in a statement that, yes, ALEC's decision to close its safety and elections component is "an important victory." But the root objections to how it operates remain. "[B]ad laws the shuttered ALEC task force advanced remain on the books across the country, and ALEC continues to support legislation that weakens clean air and clean water regulations, undermines public schools and infringes on the bargaining rights or [sic] workers." According to the ALEC website, among the eight or so task forces that remain are those on the environment, education, and economic development. There's no sign that the group has any intention of rethinking its work on the issues Common Cause cares about.
And then there's the statement put together by Lisa Graves, who leads the Center for Media and Democracy. It was CMD that put together the "ALEC Exposed" wiki that really kicked off the public conversation about the group in July. The substance of the bills generated within ALEC is one thing. And to be sure, Graves objects to it: ALEC, she writes, has an "extreme agenda" that makes it "more difficult for American citizens to vote and to protect armed vigilantes." But more to the point here, Graves writes that "ALEC's operating procedures undermine the Democratic process by giving corporate lobbyists and special interest groups an equal voice and vote on 'model' legislation alongside elected official at closed-door meetings of ALEC task forces at fancy resorts where the press and public are excluding." That's a useful summing of the structural objection to ALEC, and it's one that the group's move today doesn't do much to address. | {
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Galaxy S10 owners in Canada can now download an update with the September 2019 security patch. However, they will be disappointed to find that the update does not bring any of the Galaxy Note 10 features that the Exynos-powered Galaxy S10 devices received with the September update in other markets. Only the new security patch is included in the update, which bumps the software version up to G97*WVLS2ASI6.
The September update is available on all carriers in Canada and is rolling out over the air. You should be able to download it on your S10e, S10, or S10+ from the Software update menu of the Settings app, though it may not be immediately available for all users as these updates are released in stages. Firmware for the latest software version are available in our firmware archive for those who would like to upgrade their device manually instead of waiting for the OTA update.
When can Canadian users — and those in the US — expect to get the update with those Galaxy Note 10 features? Well, it’s hard to say at this time, as even Exynos Galaxy S10 devices are yet to receive it in every market. Samsung is taking things slower than usual, perhaps because of the sheer number of new features that are included in the latest update, so there may be a long wait in store for Galaxy S10 owners in the US and Canada. | {
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About eight years ago, by some miscalculation, the upmarket Hay Festival came to Thiruvananthapuram. Western and Westernized writers were at first gladdened by the packed main hall but then they soon realized that the audience mostly stared with blank faces and did not react at all to the wisdom and subtle wit of the thinkers. Something about the global sophistication of the speakers was lost upon the literate but deeply local children-of-the-soil Malayalis. Sometimes the weight of honesty in the air can be disastrous for a posh literature festival. But then a young white woman, who was one of the volunteers and not an invited thinker, came to the podium and said, her voice choking with emotion, and tears welling in her eyes, that she had just heard the most wonderful news. Aung San Suu Kyi, who had been under house arrest in Burma (now Myanmar) for 15 years over a period of 21 years, had been released by her nation’s reigning military. The Malayali crowd, finally, was moved by something that was said on the stage. There was applause.
I tried to understand the moment. How did it come to be that parotta eaters and the asparagus-eaters were united by the news about an affluent upper-class Burmese lady? Even though writers project intellectual unity as a virtue and polarization as a disease, the fact is that often a uniform opinion across social classes is a sign that one class has conned the rest, and polarization is a sign that the provincial are liberating themselves from the colonization of global scholars.
Humans are fundamentally virtuous, but then they adopt a hierarchy of virtues, and it is the hierarchy that separates us. Suu Kyi was then among the very few people in the world who could bring together people of distinct virtue hierarchies. Her global reputation was at its peak those days; now it is in tatters. This month she defended a Myanmar court’s handing out seven-year jail sentences to two reporters of Reuters, who were at the time of their arrests working on a story on the role of the Burmese State in the murder of Rohingya Muslims. Earlier, when pressured by an American diplomat for their release, she had even called the journalists traitors. The mascot of Western values was now behaving like a third-world dictator. Journalists across the world, who had once contributed to her legend, tweeted their disgust. They didn’t ask themselves why they had been wrong about her, and how they will ensure that they do not create such global myths again. Instead they appeared to convey that they are better human beings than Suu Kyi.
For many months now there has been pressure on her to make some humane statements against the atrocities of her government against the minority Muslim population. The most sanctimonious from the disgusted global elite have asked for the revocation of one of its most coveted good-behaviour awards—the Nobel Peace Prize.
But Suu Kyi has not yielded. She is not a mere activist now. She is a politician, and a part of the government, and she does not wish to do anything to upset her constituency—the majority Bamars. She has done a political triage, and she knows she should let go of the Muslims and appease the majority. She knows her effigies are now burning, but outside her land. She has more at stake in her own nation than the foreigners who are offering her moral advice. Is it possible that she is indeed a saint, and that she cares deeply about the Muslims in her land but feels that her humanitarian posturing will not help them even as it destroys her popularity among the majority? Or, maybe, she is a communal racist who always had secret majoritarian views. In either case, what emerges is that the propensity of the pious global elite to canonize or defame public figures in cultures and circumstances it does not comprehend is a morally spurious enterprise.
The global liberal elite had built the Suu Kyi myth in its own image. She was of good stock, she went to Oxford, spoke with a British accent, she was refined, classy, beautiful. She spoke of such fabulous European inventions like human rights and democracy. The world loved her. At least one American admirer travelled to Rangoon (now Yangon), and swam in stealth across a lake to meet her. She was rewarded in more sane and substantial ways for being an excellent ambassador of Western values. One evening, in 1991, she had heard the news of her Nobel Peace Prize on the radio.
When she accepted the award, in 2012, she played along. In an exquisite Nobel lecture, she said the award should remind us of, “the oneness of humanity". She recalled the six great human miseries as mentioned in Buddhist texts—“to be conceived, to age, to sicken, to die, to be parted from those one loves, to be forced to live in propinquity with those one does not love." She said that human suffering was inescapable, so the role of reformation was not to end suffering but to reduce it. She said she derived her strength to fight the Burmese military junta from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations. She quoted some parts, “...disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind..." and she said, “human rights should be protected by the rule of law."
This is exactly what she refuses to do now. When she was an activist she did not have to reveal the full spectrum of her personality. Now that she is a local politician, who is far more useful to her people than when she was as a venerable puppet of the West, she is assuming a different public image—an upper caste Bamar feudal lady who is pained not by human suffering but by the loss of her social status. In response to the calls from intellectuals to revoke her Nobel, Gunnar Stålsett, a former member of the Nobel committee, which is always entirely made up of Norwegian citizens, observed, “The principle we follow is the decision is not a declaration of a saint. When the decision has been made and the award has been given, that ends the responsibility of the committee."
It is not the Nobel of Aung San Syu Kyi that has to be revoked, but the morally indefensible right of Western committees to assume they know enough to decide whom the world must look up to.
Manu Joseph is a journalist and a novelist, most recently of Miss Laila, Armed And Dangerous.
He tweets at @manujosephsan
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Stephen Curry was told his whole life that he would never make it to the NBA. He wasn’t tall enough. He wasn’t strong enough. He would be crushed by his competition.
As a high school sophomore, Stephen was a mere 125 pounds and only 5’ 6″ with a baby face. When he graduated high school, he had no offers for college basketball. He was the epitome of an underdog.
Cut to now, 2015, Stephen Curry won the NBA Championships with the Golden State Warriors and was crowned Most Valuable Player.
So how did he do it? How did he rise up through the ranks to prove everyone wrong by going from playing at a small liberal arts college, to the NBA, with the world and even his genetics seemingly against him?
Alan Stein, highly esteemed strength and conditioning basketball coach, shares his experience of working with Stephen Curry before anyone knew his name.
“Several years ago I had the honor of working the first ever Kobe Bryant Nike Skills Academy. Nike invited the top 20 high school shooting guards and the top 10 college shooting guards in the country to this camp with Kobe, and it’s kinda funny now that I look back on it, how many of those players are now household names in the NBA. The least recognised player there was Stephen Curry, but I knew immediately that he was the most impressive and that thinking long term, he was going to be a future NBA superstar, and here’s how I knew that: it was all because of his work habits. Now those skills academies, we’d have two workouts a days for three straight days. Thirty minutes before every single workout, most players were still in their flip flops and would have on their headphones and Stephen Curry had already started doing some form shooting. He’d already started taking game shots from game spots in game situations. By the time the workout officially started he’d probably already made 100–150 shots, almost in a full sweat. And then probably the most impressive thing that he did, was as soon as every workout was over, he would not leave the court until he swished five free throws in a row. You know how hard that is? But that’s the level of excellence he holds himself to.The moral of that story, is that success is not an accident, success is actually a choice. Stephen Curry is one of the best shooters on the planet today because he has made the choice to create great habits.”
Your success in life is the sum of the habits you create. If you look at the most successful people in the world, you will see that they have habits that they practice everyday.
People are rewarded in public for what they practice for years in private.
— Tony Robbins
If you create a habit of going to the gym, you’re going to be in shape. If you create a habit of meditation and practicing daily gratitude, you’re going to be happier. A habit is something you do repeatedly which ultimately will decide the person you are and where you will end up in life.
So how do improve ourselves? How do we create these great habits? The easiest framework to establishing a new habit I’ve found is to take advantage of existing behaviors you already do unconsciously through habit stacking.
Habit stacking is something you’re most likely already doing without even realizing. For example, every morning when I wake up and take a shower and brush my teeth, I am habit stacking. These little habit stacks have been conditioned over time, so much so that you don’t even think about it.
Now, by attaching a new habit with something you already do habitually, you are more likely to stick to that thing.
Feature FREE Download: Habit Stacking Cheat Sheet
The 3 simple rules to Habit Stacking process is:
Decide on your new habits Plan a time to do each one Track that you’re doing it
The Formula to Habit Stacking looks like this:
After/Before [CURRENT ACTIVITY/HABIT], I will [NEW ACTIVITY/HABIT].
For example, from what we know Stephen Curry from his coach, he could have used these formulas:
“Before every team workout (current habit/routine), I will take 150 shots at the basket.”
“After every team workout (current habit/routine), I will shoot 5 free throws (new habit) in a row before I can go shower.”
For people like us, maybe it’s meditation, gratitude, or exercise that we want to add into our routine, so our formula would look like this:
Before brushing my teeth, I will meditate for 3 minutes Before eating breakfast, I will do 20 pushups and 30 squats After taking a shower, I will write down 3 things I am grateful for
It’s important to take it slow with this process, you shouldn’t try to build 5 new habits at once, for example. That’s too much, and it won’t stick. Rather, make a note of the current habit stacks in your day. Your morning or evening routine are usually the go-to’s. Add one new habit to each stack, and do it for 30 days before trying to add anything else.
“I know I’m putting the work in. I know I’m going to excel at this. I have goals in mind, and I’m going to make those goals happen.” — Stephen Curry
In the comments, let me know what activity or habit you want to include into your life. | {
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Preet Bharara, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, is photographed after speaking at the Crain's Business Forum in Manhattan, New York Thomson Reuters The Feds are gunning for the biggest middle man in the American pharmaceutical game, Express Scripts, according to government filings published on Tuesday along with the company's earnings.
Express Scripts is the largest pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) in the country.
It's used by insurers and employers to try and keep a lid on what they spend on pharmaceuticals. It also has its own internal mail-order pharmacy, and manages patient assistance programs for drug companies.
All of that has made it an behemoth.
And all of that is what's worrying politicians Washington and other federal agents. Both the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and the Department of Justice and US Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts want to know more about the company's client payment plans, pricing structures, and its patient assistance programs.
These are all issues that have come up over the last year as drug price hikes have become part of our national conversation. Usually, however, that conversation centers around pharmaceutical firms, not the middle men that distribute the drugs.
From the company's filings:
On August 15, 2016, the Company received a civil investigative demand from the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, requesting information regarding the Company’s relationships with pharmaceutical manufacturers and prescription drug plan clients, and payments made to and from those entities. The Company intends to cooperate with the inquiry and is not able to predict with certainty the timing or outcome of this matter.
On September 12, 2016, the Company received a subpoena duces tecum from the Department of Justice and United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts requesting information regarding relationships between pharmaceutical manufacturers, independent 501(c)(3) charitable foundations providing cost-sharing assistance to federal health care program beneficiaries, and specialty pharmacies. The Company intends to cooperate with the inquiry and is not able to predict with certainty the timing or outcome of this matter.
Express Scripts is already being sued by one of its largest clients, Anthem Insurance, for unfair dealing in their contract. That's just one of a few suits in which clients or whistleblowers accuse Express Scripts of taking advantage of its power and the lack of price transparency in the industry.
This is a huge deal in Washington, and not just because of recent scandals with EpiPen and Martin Shkreli. Republicans in Congress have been causing a stink about Express Scripts and other PBMs because they believe their vertical integration is giving them too much power and killing competition. Democrats worry that PBMs could be part of the reason why drug prices are so high, which is part of what's threatening Obamacare.
With these two investigations, we can expect more clarity as to whether or not those concerns are valid.
We should also note, by the way, that while the number of prescriptions Express Scripts declined in the third quarter, but the company beat earnings anyway on profits. That should tell you something. | {
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A young boy living with a rare childhood condition returned to Dallas for treatment this weekend and attended the Cowboys preseason home game as a special guest.
At just eight years old, Gavin Miller of Charlotte, Michigan has overcome more medical hurdles than most children his age. When he was about 4 1/2 years old, the now-third grader wanted to play hockey. His parents enrolled him in skating classes.
"He kept falling down a lot and complaining of knee pain," his mother Karen Miller said. "We were just like, 'Get back out there, buddy. You can do it,' you know?"
The pain progressed. After countless doctors visits, what was initially suspected as a muscle strain was a diagnosis of Perthes disease.
Dr. Harry Kim with Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children in Dallas said every year, there are only five or six cases per 100,000 children.
"The hip bone is made of ball and socket, and it's the ball that loses its blood flow. We don't know what causes it. We don't think it's genetic, but for some reason, some children get it," Kim said. "When it does, the bone degenerates. The ball part degenerates and rather it being round, it becomes flattened like a mushroom or even a pancake."
Kim said this can lead to joint degeneration, arthritis, pain, a loss of motion and stiffness. Last August, Gavin underwent surgery to allow more joint movement. Monday, X-rays should determine his bone growth in the past year and whether he could return to participating in some of his favorite sports.
Miracle Flights, which provides children and their families free flights to distant and specialized care, has flown Gavin and his mother to see his doctors.
However, this weekend proved to be a particularly special one after he was able to see his "hometown hero" Cooper Rush with the Dallas Cowboys play in the team's first preseason home game. Rush is also a native of Charlotte, Michigan and has followed Miller's medical journey.
"For me, it's just awesome to see how he handles it all. This guy has been through it all, tough as they come," Rush said. "Everyone needs perspective in life and he gives me a lot of it, so it's been really good, someone you just always have in the back of your mind you think about when things are tough. Gavin's been tougher than all of us."
Gavin's mother said they only discovered they were neighbors with Rush's family when she first began fundraising efforts to help with medical treatments and travel.
The families have grown closer as her little boy's medical journey continues. | {
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Updated Aug. 14, 7:15 p.m.
Fire season is in full swing as eight major fires are burning across the region. Officials say the situation could worsen Friday as a weather system brings gusty winds and thunderstorms amid historically dry conditions.
The National Weather Service in Missoula issued a red flag warning starting at noon for the entire northern half of Montana. A cold front is moving through the area with significant lightning and some rain expected, according to forecasters. Gusty winds are predicted for the area through Saturday morning. Cooler weather and higher humidity are expected Saturday, with a return to seasonal conditions Sunday.
“If something new starts in the right spot it could be catastrophic,” said Lincoln Chute, Flathead County fire service area manager.
Chute worries that resources could be spread too thin if multiple fires take off at once. He said local firefighters have responded to 30 fires this week, although most have been contained.
—
The Thompson Fire continues to burn in the heart of Glacier National Park and remains the largest wildfire in the region. Fire managers were able to better map the blaze and have adjusted the size estimate from 15,000 acres to 13,202 acres.
The fire is burning in a remote south-central backcountry area of Glacier Park about 15 miles east of the West Glacier entrance and 12 miles southwest of the Saint Mary entrance. The fire is in the Thompson Creek and Nyack Creek drainages west of Medicine Grizzly Peak where the Flathead and Glacier Counties border follows the Continental Divide.
If weather and smoke conditions permit, two crews will fly into the backcountry area near the fire to work on control measures, according to fire managers. One crew will land near Cut Bank Pass to suppress hot spots along the fire’s edge and direct helicopter water drops. The other crew will work in the Nyack Drainage area to provide additional structure protection measures for the Upper Nyack Backcountry Patrol Cabin; cool down hot spots along the fire perimeter; direct helicopter water drops; and use pumps and hoses on any hot spots along the perimeter.
No structures have been lost or damaged. Two structures, the Upper and Lower Nyack Backcountry Patrol Cabins, have been identified as threatened. Firefighters went in this week to wrap one cabin in hopes of saving it.
A total of 104 personnel are assigned to the fire.
The fire has forced the closure of a vast swath of the park’s backcountry, including numerous trails and backcountry campgrounds in the areas of Nyack, Coal Creek, Cut Bank and Two Medicine.
The Thompson Fire is one of two major fires burning inside Glacier National Park. The Reynolds Creek Fire has burned more than 4,000 acres of land on the east side of the park since late July. It remains 67 percent contained.
The majority of Glacier National Park is unaffected by wildfire and is available for recreational use.
—
Two fires have also started east of Glacier National Park, on the Lewis & Clark National Forest and Blackfeet Indian Reservation.
The Spotted Eagle Fire has burned nearly 200 acres about 25 miles east of Essex. One helicopter is currently working the fire. Further south, near Heart Butte, the Dry Creek Fire has burned 335 acres. As of Friday morning, the Blackfeet Agency was reporting that the fire was mostly contained.
—
On the Flathead National Forest, firefighters are working to contain the 150-acre Bear Creek Fire on the Spotted Bear Ranger District, about 30 miles east of Polson. A handful of structures are threatened and there are numerous trail closures. The lightning storms that rolled across the region resulted in more than 20 different fires on the Flathead National Forest, but spokesperson Ema Braunberger said most have been less than an acre.
—
Three major fires are currently burning in Lincoln County, including the Martson Fire near Fortine. On Friday, the fire grew from 550 acres to 1,200 acres on the Kootenai National Forest. On Thursday night, when the fire first blew up, it was putting up a smoke column that could be seen in Whitefish. Kootenai National Forest Fire Manager Dan Rose said the fire is burning away from private land and that a Type II incident team will take over management of the fire this weekend. Officials will be holding a public meeting about the Marston Fire at the Trego Community Hall at 7 p.m. Friday.
Further west, the Weigel Fire has burned 100 acres about 24 miles northeast of Libby since it started on Tuesday. The fire is burning in heavy timber and smokejumpers were sent in Wednesday to try to contain it.
Because of the fire’s rapid growth, the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation is bringing in a Type II incident management team to fight the fire.
East of Libby, the Dunn Fire has burned about 75 acres near Fisher River. Officials say despite its initial growth on Tuesday, the fire has slowed and is staying on a ridge top.
This story will be updated when more information becomes available. | {
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DLL1 Mon 03-Sep-18 14:33:10
New neighbours have moved in next door to me and asked that I turn my security lights off at the night time. This is because they are (supposedly) shining into their landing and they sleep with the bedroom doors open and don't have a blind so it is going through into the bedroom.
They haven't said they will get a blind or curtain or shut their bedroom doors but want me to turn my lights off instead.
We have nothing but trees behind us so it's very dark without them on.
We have had the lights for 1 year and the family who have just moved out of that house never complained about the lights.
I turned them off last night when they asked but don't want to keep doing so as I paid a lot of money for them and like the garden to be lit up at night.
Am I being unreasonable if I refuse to turn them off during the night? | {
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VIENNA (RNS) Austria’s Muslim community is incensed over the government's plans to amend the country’s century-old law on Islam.
The new bill, championed by Minister for Foreign Affairs and Integration Sebastian Kurz, forbids foreign funding of mosque construction or of imams working in the country and requires a unified German-language translation of the Quran.
The government argues the legislation, which Parliament will vote on this month, will help combat Islamic radicalism. Muslim groups and civic activists say it flouts the principle of equality.
“There is a general tone of mistrust toward Muslims,” said Carla Amina Baghajati, a prominent Muslim rights activist and spokeswoman for the country’s Islamic Religious Authority, referring to the bill. “The 1912 Islam law has set up a model of how state acknowledgment of a religious minority can help this minority better integrate. Muslims in Austria are proud of this law.”
The Islam law, or the Islamgesetz in German, was introduced by Austria’s last emperor, Franz Josef, in 1912 after the Austro-Hungarian Empire annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina. The law made Islam an official religion and guaranteed Muslims wide-ranging rights, including religious instruction in public schools.
Austria’s 8.4 million people include half a million Muslims, many of Turkish or Bosnian origin.
Only Belgium and parts of Spain offer Muslims the same legal protections, said Farid Hafez, a political scientist at Salzburg University.
“But in contrast to them, the institutionalization of Islam here is much more advanced,” Hafez said.
Even so, both the government and Muslim groups agree the original law must be updated to keep up with the times.
“The old text does not reflect the practical questions of our time such as chaplaincy in hospitals or at the military,” said Baghajati of the Islamic Religious Authority.
But she fears the legislation may put at risk a “long tradition of interreligious dialogue and cooperation” fostered by the 1912 law.
The bill has other controversial parts besides the proposed ban on foreign funding and the requirement of a unified Quran translation. It expands the definition of Islam to include the Alevi, a religion of Turkish origin that combines elements of Shiite Islam.
Kurz, the foreign affairs and integration minister, is adamant the changes are necessary.
“We want an Islam of Austrian coinage, an Islam that is independent of influence from abroad,” he told an Austrian broadcaster earlier this month.
Up to 50 Austrian citizens have joined jihadist groups in Iraq or Syria, according to Austrian magazine Das Biber, which has close links to the country’s Muslim community. In a highly publicized case earlier this year, two Austrian-born Muslim girls reportedly married Islamic State fighters in Syria.
But critics of the legislation abound.
Political analyst Thomas Hofer said many Austrian organizations, including political parties, are financed with overseas money, and the proposed legislation is a dubious attempt to show the Austrian public that the government is trying to do something against extremism.
Hofer said the bill plays into the hands of Austria’s right-leaning Freedom Party, which has seen an upsurge in support over the past decade and came in third at the general elections last year.
Two weeks ago, the Freedom Party staged a protest against the construction of a Muslim seminary in a Viennese suburb.
Johannes Huebner, an official in charge of the Freedom Party’s international relations, did not deny the party’s critical stance toward Islam.
“People are suspicious of Muslims, of their different customs, different holidays, different approach to family, to the role of women and the role of religion in politics.”
He acknowledged a ban on foreign funding would never fly with Austria's Jewish or Christian community but added, “Given the present problems, it is adequate.”
YS/MG END KOROLYOV | {
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Finally, a slither of good news in the plight of short men. A new academic paper has raised the suggestion that women should reproduce with the vertically challenged, for the good of the species.
According to the research, published in the journal Nature, the greater the size difference between the sexes, the higher the chance of that species becoming extinct. Could the long-established trend for women to seek tall men be a danger to the existence of humanity?
Well, maybe not. Before you rush to update your online dating profile (men are said to exaggerate their height by an average of two inches), it should be noted that the research was conducted on extinct crustaceans. It's unlikely to change the mating habits of humans any time soon.
In truth, vertigo-inducing height is an established measure of status in the Western world – a learning that's drilled into men from childhood. Commenting on a child's height at a family get-together is the equivalent of saying ‘what do you do?’ at a cocktail party: a conversational ice-breaker that betrays our inner, competitive fascination with social markers.
I speak from experience. As a kid of below-average height, I fared poorly in those conversational ice-breakers. Upon entering a new household, my friends would be greeted by whooping rounds of ‘my, how you’ve grown!’ only for the adults to awkwardly splutter out a business-like ‘um, how good to see you’ when it came to my turn. | {
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Polizeieinsatz gegen Parlamentsmaskottchen
Das Anti-Gesichtsverhüllungsgesetz bzw. Burka-Verbot in Österreich sorgt für immer skurrilere Auswüchse. Nun traf es auch das Maskottchen des Parlaments, das das Gesetz beschlossen hat.
Bei einem Filmdreh vor dem Hohen Haus anlässlich des Tags der offenen Tür des Parlaments am 26. Oktober kam es laut „Tiroler Tageszeitung“ zu einem Polizeieinsatz gegen den Hasen Lesko. Für Filmaufnahmen im Auftrag der Demokratiewerkstatt waren am 9. Oktober vor dem Parlamentsgebäude am Ring Kinder mit dem Parlamentsmaskottchen unterwegs.
Parlamentsdirektion/Thomas Jantzen
Handelte sich um „künstlerische Berufsausübung“
Eine vorbeikommende Polizeistreife unterbrach den Dreh, der Darsteller hinter dem hellblauen Hasen Lesko mit seinen langen wuscheligen Ohren und großen Augen musste sein wahres Gesicht zeigen. Eine Strafe gab es nicht, teilte die Wiener Polizei der „Tiroler Tageszeitung“ mit. Laut Parlament war für die Aufnahmen keine Genehmigung nötig, weil nicht auf öffentlichem Grund und Boden, sondern auf dem des Parlaments gedreht wurde.
Letztlich stellten die Beteiligten fest, dass es sich um „künstlerische Berufsausübung“ gehandelt habe und nicht gegen das Anti-Gesichtsverhüllungsgesetz verstoßen wurde. Seit dem Inkrafttreten des Anti-Gesichtsverhüllungsgesetzes am 1. Oktober hat es in Wien knapp 30 Amtshandlungen nach der neuen Vorschrift gegeben. Nur eine Handvoll davon betraf Frauen mit muslimischer Gesichtsverschleierung - mehr dazu in Verhüllungsverbot: 30 Amtshandlungen.
Links: | {
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Last updated on .From the section Football
Ben Arfa suffered a double leg fracture at Manchester City last October
Newcastle winger Hatem Ben Arfa is out of the Magpies' tour of the United States with an ankle injury.
The 24-year-old was stretchered off the field during the 0-0 draw with Sporting Kansas City on Wednesday.
A club statement said: "[Ben Arfa] will be leaving the club's US tour tomorrow and the injury will be reassessed over the next 48 hours."
The France international missed all but four games last season with a double leg fracture.
The news is a blow to United manager Alan Pardew, who began the trip on Sunday without midfielders Joey Barton and Yohan Cabaya and striker Nile Ranger after the trio were refused visas.
Ben Arfa will hope the injury is not serious having only just returned to action after recovering from the broken leg he suffered at Manchester City last October.
He had made just a handful of appearances for Newcastle since joining on a season-long loan deal from Marseille when a challenge by City's Nigel De Jong left him on the sidelines.
Despite the injury, the Magpies made the move permanent in January and he made his return to action in last Sunday's 2-0 victory over Darlington.
Pardew had hoped the Frenchman could play as an auxiliary striker should the club's hunt for a frontman during the transfer window prove unsuccessful and now faces anxious wait.
Newcastle face Orlando City on Saturday before taking on Columbus Crew three days later in the final fixture of the three-match tour. | {
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There is a new area in Saigon, closed off to motorbikes, where artists and creative minds from different disciplines as well as businesses come together. This is the idea sketched out so far behind the still developing 3A Station (Alternative Art Area), located in 3A Ton Duc Thang in District 1.
I went to have a look at this new space after an artist that I met at Vin Space mentioned it while talking about graffiti in town.
3A is a 2000 square meter space in which three abandoned warehouses are being refurbished and converted into ‘spaces’ for galleries, shopping areas, consignment warehouses and coffee shops. In addition, the courtyard as well as other units will be used to host art activities and performances for the community, ranging from live music to fashion shows.
Most of 3A is still under construction but they’ve already had some young, local graffiti artists work on the old warehouses’ walls. On the April 6, the first warehouse opened its doors to the public; adding to the already existing Mai Gallery, a fashion space including independent designers, Sadec District (a creative housewares store) and a fashion boutique, Dieu Anh.
Sadec’s (www.sadecdistrict.com) products come from the Mekong Delta; in fact, all the items are either inspired or have been bought from various villages and towns along the river, from Thailand to Vietnam. The idea is to select and create very traditional and unique pieces but that simultaneously have a contemporary appeal to them. The designers working on their products come from different nationalities so that they can add their technical knowledge to the making of traditional pieces such as bowls, tablecloths and so on.
Dieu Anh is an independent fashion designer whose collection rethinks ways to make every day, casual pieces of clothing wearable and delicately feminine; for instance I particularly liked how an otherwise plain, striped men’s shirt has been converted into a V-neck dress with the buttons on the back.
While I was wandering around 3A, its manager was kind enough to explain her vision behind the project, “in many cities around the world, it is already a common trend to have designated areas for performing arts, street arts and antiques markets, however this does not yet exist in Saigon. Since I already had a gallery, I thought of transforming the abandoned warehouses into units where people in Saigon as well as tourists can access community art and creative products in a more relaxed way, that is why I do not want motorbikes entering the area, so that people can walk and enjoy their time. It is such a rarity in Saigon.”
The idea of combining high-end shops with street art and street performances might raise a few eyebrows, “this is a concept typical from the Western world where the art scene is so developed and broad to allow a ‘division’ between the target groups and purpose of different kinds of art, if you wish. Here, there are so few creative spots as well as people that the separation between the different groups cannot be made”, she explained. She welcomes creative people from different businesses and disciplines as long as they can contribute to the cultural environment within the community by offering an alternative to the mass production and to pre-packaged retailer products.
The manager added that many artists and businesses, especially young ones, have already approached her regarding organizing cultural events and also to join the project, a sign, she is happy to say, that there is a need for a space like 3A.
There is not an official plan to be released to the general public, so if you want to follow the updates about the project, e-mail: [email protected]. | {
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mumbai
Updated: Apr 18, 2017 20:24 IST
Amboli police on Monday arrested a 52-year-old man for allegedly using the F-word in an email addressed to a woman employee last year.
The accused, who had been in the United States for several months now, did not return to India despite being summoned by police. He was finally arrested upon his arrival at the Mumbai CST International Airport on the basis of a look-out circular.
According to police, an email from accused had asked the complainant – a journalist in her 30s – to “f**k off” for some inexplicable reason in November last year. The enraged woman had then registered an FIR with the Amboli police under section 509 (word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman) of the IPC and section 26 (when employer fails to take action like constituting a committee or contravenes other provisions in the Act) of the sexual harassment of women at workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013.
“We learnt that the accused was in the United States. When repeated requests to return to India went ignored, we issued a look-out circular against him. So, we were alerted the moment he landed in Mumbai on Sunday. He has been remanded in judicial custody,” said a police officer from the Amboli police station.
(Names withheld to protect identities) | {
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IF
THEN
Adelaide
Simmo coached his team to the supposedly unloseable finals loss on Thursday night ... ... Pykey won't have slept well last night, and will be restless again tonight and Saturday night.
Brisbane Lions
David Noble isn't in charge of the Lions' footy department inside a month ... ... we'll be surprised. Job is his if he says yes.
Carlton
you're compiling a list of good trades ... ... factor in the No.33 pick the Blues gave up for Sam Docherty.
Collingwood
you think about it carefully ... ... it makes sense that the Pies are keen to chat about a future with Nicky Dal. Off half-back, would make Pies better.
Essendon
Kane Cornes' dream to fight fires was doused before it even started ... ... we hope the flames in Tayte Pears' dream stay dancing a little longer.
Fremantle
you ever stop to think about the toll of this game ... ... don't ever forget Anthony Morabito. In 2009, he was going to be anything.
Geelong
you go back through recent history and think of the players who have demanded the finals stage ... ... Duck, Gaz snr, Jars, Hodgey, Bud, Derm, The Dominator, Longy come to mind. Reckon Danger will join them after tonight.
Gold Coast
this club needed some good news on the player retention front ... ... it came with big Tom Nicholls agreeing to a new deal.
Greater Western Sydney
there's one thing that Stevie J has been thinking about all year ... ... it is the qualifying final which looms at 3.20pm AEST Saturday afternoon.
Hawthorn
the Hawks add Mitchell, Vickery and O'Meara this year ... ... there's no reason they won’t go after Fyfe and Hogan next year. They just get deals done while other clubs are too scared to even pick up the phone.
Melbourne
we're extremely happy for Jack Viney in securing the Demons' best and fairest ... ... we're equally disappointed for Max Gawn that he didn't win it. Thought he did more than enough.
North Melbourne you're Brad Scott right now ... ... you're channelling Luke Beveridge.
Port Adelaide
you bring in Ryder and Dixon on massive money ... ... there's not much point in having them on your books if it squeezes out a quality mid. Salary cap exploding.
Richmond
a cardiologist reckons he knows how the Tigers should play footy ... ... good on him. Adversely impacted his cause to become club boss that he chose to express that publicly though.
St Kilda
you cut Delaney and leave Fisher and others hanging, while in the full knowledge Goddard has an Achilles issue ... ... we know you're up to something.
Sydney Swans
your side has Nankervis, Aliir, Hewett, Naismith, Marsh, Papley and X Richards, and you're the No.1 team entering finals ... ... you've got a gun coach.
West Coast
the track's not flat as a pancake flat ... ... this mob won't cut it. Past two finals have been embarrassing. Need to make some serious calls on personnel, style, attitude, big names (hello Jack). And stop drinking the bathwater. It's all become a bit too cosy, despite what Simmo says.
Western Bulldogs there's room on that little roundabout outside Whitten Oval for another statue ... ... they may soon need to squeeze in another bust – for the little bloke with long hair, massive biceps and who played just 31 games for the club back in the '90s.
And wait, there's more, as per constant reader request ... | {
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SOURCE: Patheos
By Ryan Adams
Being raised in a Protestant home, the Scriptures were (and in many ways still are) the end-all-be-all of the faith for me. However, there is a reason I am no longer a Protestant. This reason has many branches but all points back to one thing, context. Given the necessity of context, I find the whole idea of “Scripture Alone” horrifying.
What it is:
Sola Scriptura is the idea that Christianity ought to be based off of “Scripture Alone” (which is the English translation of “Sola Scriptura”), that is to say, it should be without ritual, or the teaching authority of anyone. And that each of us is obligated to read the Scriptures and form ourselves through them, on our own.
It Can’t Really Exist:
Many of the things we are afraid of do not exist. Zombies, Armageddon cults (the kind who bring on the end of the world via some long-forgotten Egyptian deity), Cthulhu, and so on, are all prime examples of thing which are scary, but don’t really exist.
This is how I feel about Sola Scriptura. It’s frightening, but in reality it doesn’t exist.
It would seem a little ridiculous to say that it doesn’t exist; being that it’s the staple doctrine of nearly all Protestants. However, that’s just the point… it’s a doctrine. It’s already going against itself, erasing itself from the realm of possibility by its own action. A doctrine (not scripture) which proclaims that all doctrine are to be rejected is ludicrous (A harkening back to the, now terribly clichéd, argument against relativism). It simply isn’t possible to have Scripture alone, since you didn’t receive Scripture alone. Instead, all of us were taught about Scripture by someone else. It didn’t just fall out of the sky and land on us. And even if it did, it’s still given to us by someone, the authors who had lives, cultures, rituals, and all number of things which provide a context for the Scriptures. And context means that Scripture is by no means “alone.”
If It Does Exist, It’s an Autobiography:
All this talk of texts, context, authorship and interpretation reminds me of a certain Frenchman…
Anyways, there’s a serious problem which arises from the relentlessly individualistic model of Biblical interpretation. Whenever anyone begins their own interpretation of anything, without direction, they form a sort of autobiography in their interpretation. Interpretation of this sort reflects nothing but oneself.
This is a main idea of that certain Frenchman (philosopher Jacques Derrida), that whenever one interprets a text without context, one is simply painting a self-portrait with the colors of the text they are interpreting. This is because pure ideas do not simply pass from one person to another, instead they must pass through the filtration of language, which is passed further through the schema of one’s consciousness which allows one to make sense of things. This schema is built, in part, by the social, historical, political, etc, context in which we live, making it impossible to avoid unless we allow our understanding to be mapped by another context. If this contextual misreading and subsequent autobiography is turned upon the Scriptures, then I can think of no more grievous blasphemy than to make the Scriptures, which are supposed to be the image and fulfillment, the Word of God, into nothing more than an autobiography.
To deform God into an image of yourself is idolatry itself; a golden calf of proudly defended misinterpretation.
It Isn’t Biblical:
Nowhere in the Bible will you find any discussion of the Bible or how to interpret the Bible. Both the New and Old Testament will make reference to “the Scriptures,” but this does not refer to the Bible as a whole, only the Old Testament.
2 Thessalonians 2:15 makes it clear that there is a decisively important element of tradition and that much was taught by word of mouth. The separation between what has been taught by word of mouth and what has been relayed by the epistles (which are letters by bishops/Apostles) means that not everything which was important to know was recorded in the epistles.
Furthermore, the New Testament makes it clear that the Apostles (and in the First Letter to Timothy, bishops) are the bearers of the teaching of Christ, and that it is their duty to protect those teachings, and to instruct those of the faith in these teachings. Also made abundantly clear is the fact that anyone’s interpretation of the teachings of Christ is not as good as anyone else’s, were this true, there would have been no need for Paul’s letters, or really any of the New Testament aside from the Gospels.
What About History(?):
As I’ve already mentioned, the concept of Scripture Alone rejects a basic fact of the Scriptures; that they were written by men. While I do believe that they were inspired by the Holy Spirit, and kept free of error by the Holy Spirit, it doesn’t change the fact that people wrote these books, and as such, they are full of context (historical situation, cultural practices, societal expectations, and (perhaps most importantly) language and idiom). Without knowledge of the history and culture of the human authors of the Scriptures, one can have no hope of understanding what they are trying to communicate.
This is not even to mention the fact that the Bible itself (especially the New Testament) is a book with a lot of historical movement. The early Church (in the time of the Apostles) did not have the books of the New Testament (mostly since they were still being written), and it wasn’t until many generations later that these books were codified and the canon was created. The Church spent the bulk of its early life without these New Testament scriptures, thus, Sola Scriptura is historically speaking a fairly new idea (it’s hard to preach “Scripture Alone” when you don’t yet have Scriptures…).
What’s more is that this ideal of “Scripture Alone” rejects the whole of Christianity which has come before the individual Christian. It rejects the history of the Church and the great teachers of the faith (and when it doesn’t, it doesn’t uphold its own values.)
Pride:
All of this culminates in my reason for rejecting Sola Scriptura (and thus Protestantism); pride.
I am perhaps one of the worst offenders when it comes to this particular sin, so I place no judgment on those who fall into it; however this doesn’t mean that even I, the worst among the prideful, should sit by and allow my pride to become dogma. Rather, we should always struggle against our sins.
The pride of Sola Scriptura, if it is even possible, is in its rejection of those who have taught us: our parents, our preachers/priests/teachers, the history of the Church (the saints, the councils, the Fathers), and through this, even the Apostles, those who learned everything directly from the mouth of Christ himself; in favor of a vain autobiography of self-interpretation. A self-portrait painted with the colors of the Gospel.
This is obvious the worst case scenario of the doctrine, but this is the result of it’s actually being followed. Even the most well-meaning person who takes the “Scripture Alone” seriously will be nothing more than an arm chair theologian, someone who is completely ignorant of the period and context of the texts written and so instead is forced to put their own context and period in as a stand in. Thus the self-portrait appears again, even when the believer is well-meaning and pious in their practice. In this, Scripture Alone is again found impossible, as it’s no longer “Scripture Alone,” but rather it is “Scripture and Me.”
This is why Sola Scriptura frightens me. I am full of sin: failings and misgivings and bias. As such I much prefer “Scripture and Tradition,” to “Scripture and Me.” | {
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Lathe cut vinyl a relatively new way of producing a one off vinyl record that is very different to the traditional method of transferring audio to vinyl master discs; you cannot replicate a custom vinyl record it is not a master disc. All records are individually cut on lathe cuts and mastered in real-time.
A lathe cut vinyl record gives the client the opportunity of having their music cut onto vinyl instantly without having to wait many months for the finished product to be pressed at the pressing plant.
We produce Stereo Lathe cut records at Byron's Yard by spraying the polycarbonate blank with an antistatic solution, to allow the chip that is cut out of the groove to be removed by the vacuum suction and to reduce background noise. The chip removal of a lathe cut record is much more difficult than with cutting a lacquer master or dubplate. We cut the records on the Scully vinyl mastering lathe that's fitted with the Vinylium pitch 98 pitch controller.
The audio is sent to the Vinylium SC99 cutter head housing the diamond styli from the Vinylium VC200 cutting amplifier, which in turn supplies Logic Pro and focus-rite Forte DAW.
The diamond stylus has to be heated, also to eliminate background noise from the disc when creating a custom vinyl record. The other main difference between conventional vinyl lacquer mastering is the use of a diamond Styli instead of a Sapphire or Ruby as used in the lacquer mastering process.
Our lathe cuts are in black, clear or white transparent polycarbonate discs that have been routed and cut on a CNC machine. The blanks are thicker than standard records and match the weight of heavyweight factory produced vinyl record pressings.
We require a WAV file to be supplied for mastering the track or tracks though we can cut from mp3. And can work with sample rates up to 96k in either 16 or 24bit, the better the audio quality we receive, the better the results.
Preparing Songs For Cutting To Vinyl Record
Some rules to follow when preparing your audio for Short-Run record cuting polycarbonate disc or to acetate master disc. It is essential to keep all bass frequencies below 500hz mono and use any stereo widening effects above 500hz as these can cause the cutting styli to jump and ruin the cut as well as the somewhat expensive cutting styli.
Be very careful with the high freqs like cymbals and hi-hats as they distort severely on record, and should not be boosted above 10k look to gain more brightness boosting a bit lower than 7k.
Sibilance
Excessive sibilance is another problem when mastering for vinyl sibilant sounds distort terribly and limit the level that we can cut the record at and also requires the use of a deesser to be used just to make the record cuttable without destroying the lathe cutter head.
So as well as a loss of volume on your vinyl master there is a loss of high-frequency content. To enable the record to be cut sibilance should be dealt with in the mixing process either by riding the faders or by using compression.
Sibilance: High levels of sibilance will mean the use f the de-esser filter. The de-esser filters are in the 5-8khz range, and therefore rather than only de-essing the vocal tracks, everything in that frequency range will be changed this along with volume reduction is what has to be done to eliminate or reduce this distortion.
This compression reacts only to the problem-frequencies. It is fast and easy to tweak and find the problem, but it can make your vocal sound boxy and pull down other syllables if applied too harshly.
Overly Limiting or even limiting at all is not necessary for vinyl mastering dynamics is king! We can still cut your record from limited files, but will have to cut a quieter vinyl master, and your recording is also closer to the noise floor. Any noise or hiss will be more pronounced or noticeable especially when cutting longer sides.
Another thing to plan is the track listing. Although this advice only really applies to ep and albums. The high freqs fall off the closer you get to the center of the record, more audio data needs to fit into a smaller space. You can eq the inner tracks a little more brightly to compensate for this
When listening to lp’s have you noticed that the softer or quieter songs are nearer the center of the record? And the stand out tracks towards the edge? All off this should go into your thinking when you are planning out your vinyl production.
Total Audio Length for 7″ and 12″ records
12″
45rpm 9 mins per side
33rpm 1519 mins per side
7″
45rpm 4mins per side
33rpm 6 mins per side
Dubplate Cutting And Acetate Masters
Producing an acetate master or cutting a dubplate is the next stage, the dubplate is usually used to test the sound on club systems.
The acetate is an intermediate stage before the production of the master disc and is used for test purposes to assess the sound transfer from the master tapes to vinyl. If a sound or mix is rejected, then the acetate pressed is a unique item as there are never many copies of acetates produced, usually no more than 10 and are highly sought after.
The acetate is an aluminum disc covered with a thin coating of nitrocellulose lacquer that has the sound groove, from the master tape, cut into it using a "lathe."
They come in various sizes including 10", 12" and 14."
The lacquer disc is soft and thin and repeated playing of the acetate will degrade the sound. Lacquers are produced for quality control and not continuous playing.
There are two types of acetate single-sided and double-sided discs. For single-sided discs when the mastering is complete, there will be two acetates to take away, one for the "A" side and another for the "B" side.
On the back of these singles, there are two peg holes, the center one as with regular records to place on the turntable and the offset one. This second peg hole is for turning the disc on the lathe to stop the disc slipping.
There are two discs used in the vinyl record mastering process as you cannot proceed to the next step with a double-sided acetate.
Double sided discs are reference discs given to band members or record companies, but are also well loved by DJ's and Producers and often referred to as dubplates, very much used in the reggae, drum and bass and dubstep community.
A dubplate is an acetate disc – usually 10 inches in diameter – used in mastering studios for quality control and test recordings before proceeding with the final master, and subsequent pressing of the record to be mass-produced on vinyl.
The "dub" in dubplate is an allusion to the plate's use in "dubbing" or "doubling" the original version of a track.[1] The name dubplate also refers to an exclusive, 'one-off' acetate disc recording pioneered by reggae sound systems but also used by drum and bass and other electronic music producers, DJs and sound systems.These dubplates will often be either unreleased recordings (which may or may not end up being made available to the general public) or exclusive versions or remixes of existing recordings. They are often used as a market research tool to assess the probable sales of a tune once it is released, as they are far cheaper to produce than a pressed vinyl record.
The material of the disc is very soft as the groove is worn out little by little with every playback. After about fifty plays the loss in sound quality becomes noticeable. Vinyl dubplates are a recently developed format that allows exceptionally durable recordings to be made (lasting 90% as long as pressed vinyl records.
The benefits of short run vinyl cutting
The advantage to lathe cuts and Vinyl pressing is that you don't need a significant amount of money to get going and you can start of small and not be left with hundreds of records you cant shift yet.
You can also sell them at a premium even if you have a small following. Say you have 10 or 20 lathe cuts made, they are the only copies on vinyl anywhere in the world you can get creative by hand designing the artwork tailor-made for each buyer, individually signed or stamped. There are so many ways to be creative it is an exceptional product as each record is individually lathe cut.
With most of the vinyl pressing plants seemingly at capacity and records taking months to produce. Making short runs of lathe cut vinyl the way of getting records for your fans and promotional use quickly.
Brand New Record Presses
When CDs emerged in the mid-1980s, most of those aging LP presses ended up in landfills and warehouses. Fueled by the youth feeling nostalgic for something they had never experienced, vinyl is enjoying a stunning revival and, defying all predictions, has become more than just a passing fad. The Major labels rereleased their legacy acts on vinyl, and then they gave us Record Store Day.
The primary cause of all the delays is the renewed interest in vinyl records has meant that the old 1950s record presses have come back into service. The majority of the industry is still using these presses, and there has been no development until new vinyl presses have now come online from companies such as Newbilt
these guys have brought the first new presses in decades, the first 8 of the Newbilt lathes were installed in Jack Whites Third Man Pressing in Detroit, consisting of 2 x 7-inch vinyl presses and 6 x 12-inch vinyl presses.
There is also Viryl Technologies founded in 2015 by Chad Brown, Rob Brown, and James Hashmi. These guys have gone even further and manufactured a fully automated and semi-automatic record press as well as providing vital support for startups and the existing community.
Warm Tone Vinyl Press Fully Automated
The first new record-pressing machines built in over 30 years are finally online. The brainchild of some Canadian R&D guys with a background designing MRI machines, the Warm Tone record press is everything that its vintage counterpart is not: safe, fast, fully automated, reliable, run by cloud-based software, and iOS-controlled. These $195,000 hi-tech machines, the new product of Toronto based company Viryl Technologies, are the record presses our 21st-century vinyl industry has been waiting for.
Unlike the old presses, a single worker can operate several Warm Tone units at once. Its unrivaled speed and efficiency leave the standard cycle time benchmarks in the dust, too: 20 seconds versus 35 seconds, which translates to three records per minute instead of only two. That's pretty good, but the actual product yield is even better than that. That's because the old school presses run at a 30 to 40 percent product loss due to everything from operator error to mechanical failure. To press a high-quality record, the vinyl "puck" is steam-heated up to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and water-cooled down to 50 degrees Fahrenheit in only 22 seconds. Product loss with the Warm Tone is a miserly one percent.
The Warm Tone is modular (making repairs a snap), mobile-friendly (manufacturing data is instantly relayed to smart devices through a custom interface), and has passed the most rigorous stress tests (24/7 operation is encouraged).
While the press churns away, Viryl Technology's proprietary quality-control software collects data from every vital point in the Warm Tone manufacturing process. The tool also allows the operator to make necessary tweaks in real time—from changing nozzle and steam pressure to adjusting flywheel trimming speed and vinyl blend—that can mean the difference between a successful run and a budget-breaking failure.
After much planning and infrastructure build-out, Hand Drawn Records, a 12-man indie label outside Dallas, has just flipped the switch on the first Warm Tones to enter the vinyl supply-side chain. Housed in the Hand Drawn Records Pressing plant in Addison, Texas, the two machines,
are currently running 18-hour shifts, and are on pace to churn out 1.8 million units in 2017.
Sony Japan Vinyl Pressing Plant
Almost thirty years after it left the vinyl market after they had introduced the now dwindling CD format. Sony will resume pressing again to deal with the growing demand for releases on record.
The factory south-west of Tokyo will churn out freshly pressed records from March 2018 but have heard no more information at this time.
Sony stopped making vinyl records in 1989 as consumers flocked to CDs and other emerging technology. Japan produced nearly 200m units a year in the mid-seventies, according to the country’s recording industry association.
Sony was a significant global player in the development of CDs, which have since taken a back seat to downloads and music streaming.
Vinyl Records are making a global comeback as it attracts not only older consumers but also the younger generations.
Japan’s sole record maker, Toyokasei, is struggling to keep up with the resurgence in vinyl demand, the Nikkei newspaper reported. That Sony is scrambling to find older engineers familiar with how to make records, it added.
The Sillitoe Audio Cutting Lathe
Tne newest and most advanced Vinyl Record Mastering lathe is soon to come onto the market, designed and built by the highly talented, creative individual James Sillitoe who has a real love for vinyl and his craft.
Desiged and built by James Sillitoe for Sillitoe Audio Technology
The lathe is almost ready for public release and the final tweeks are being made to this brilliantly designed and technically advanded lathe.
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Baldur’s Gate II: EE, 50% off ↘️ $4.99!
Continue the story started in the first Dungeons & Dragons game; avg 4/5 stars (540+ ratings); 50% off, was $9.99, now $4.99!
Every day I curate deals, but I make no money from App Store affiliate links. If you appreciate what I do, would you Buy Me a Coffee?
Follow @MDMDeals on Twitter to see deals; mute hash tags to filter the deals you want! | {
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The Orion Nebula, March 23
This was made by stacking ~10 16 second exposures taken with my OPPO R11 phone through my Meade ETX125 telescope in my front yard. Stacking was done in Registax 6, and edited in Photoshop CS6.
Done | {
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Russia warned Wednesday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s pledge to extend Israeli sovereignty to the Jordan Valley could escalate tensions, as the Israeli premier geared up to hold talks with President Vladimir Putin.
The Russian foreign ministry said it was concerned over the Israeli leadership’s plan, saying its implementation could lead to a “sharp escalation of tensions in the region (and) undermine hopes for the establishment of long-awaited peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors.”
Moscow pointed out that Netanyahu’s pre-election pledge drew a “sharp negative reaction” in the Arab world and reiterated its call for direct talks between Israel and Palestinians.
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Battling to win re-election in September 17 polls, Netanyahu issued the pledge on Tuesday night, drawing firm condemnation from the Palestinians, Arab states, the United Nations and the European Union.
The pushback from Moscow came at a particularly awkward time for the Israeli leader, who is slated to travel Thursday to the Russian resort of Sochi for talks with Putin.
The trip is largely seen as a chance for Netanyahu to burnish his diplomatic bona fides ahead of the Israeli vote.
“The leaders will discuss regional issues including the situation in Syria, with an emphasis on tightening the military coordination mechanisms,” Netanyahu’s office said on Wednesday.
Netanyahu is also expected to meet with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
Netanyahu’s ties to Putin are seen by him as important in pulling in votes from Israel’s large community of Russian speakers. Contacts with Moscow ramped up in recent years as Israel carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria against targets linked to Iran and Tehran-backed Lebanese terror group Hezbollah.
Like Russia, Iran and Hezbollah have backed Syrian President Bashar Assad in his country’s civil war. But Moscow has largely allowed Israel to go ahead with the airstrikes unimpeded.
Israel and Russia have established a hotline to avoid accidental clashes in Syria, but the system did not prevent a friendly fire incident in September 2018 in which Syrian air defenses accidentally downed a Russian plane during an Israeli raid, angering the Kremlin, which blamed Israel.
Netanyahu also met with Putin in Moscow days ahead of Israel’s April 9 elections.
Voters with roots in the former Soviet Union are thought to make up some 12 percent of the 6.3 million eligible voters in Israel — or some 770,000 people.
Netanyahu has hoped to pull Russian community voters away from rival Avigdor Liberman, whose Yisrael Beytenu party has traditionally been their home. Liberman refused to enter Netanyahu’s coalition after the April election, denying him a majority coalition and leading the prime minister to call new elections.
Evidence has so far pointed to Netanyahu’s efforts to hurt Liberman having failed, with Yisrael Beytenu consistently projected in polls to jump to 9-10 seats from its current tally of five. | {
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A Republican operative-turned federal judge has emerged as one of the most powerful critics of President Obama's environmental rules.
Judge Brett Kavanaugh -- a 50-year-old George W. Bush administration appointee to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit -- has pounded the administration in a series of legal opinions rebuffing some of its most high-profile air pollution rules. And because he's widely seen as an influential voice with Supreme Court justices and a leading contender for a GOP nomination to the high court, Kavanaugh's legal moves are being closely watched by those on both sides of the environmental debate.
Given Kavanaugh's "track record in these important cases over the last few years, I would think him a judge that is more open to second-guessing the EPA than nearly anyone," said Tom Donnelly, counsel at the left-leaning Constitutional Accountability Center.
Kavanaugh "happened to be on a bunch of big environmental cases, and he's written separately in several of them and the Supreme Court paid attention," said Jonathan Adler, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University who previously clerked on the D.C. Circuit.
With the fate of nearly every major environmental rule hinging on the outcome of lawsuits that could drag out for years, Kavanaugh could play a major role in determining which policies survive. And his take on environmental law will become even more relevant should he ultimately secure a seat on the high court.
Most recently, Kavanaugh has been central to a high-stakes battle surrounding which judges will hear challenges to U.S. EPA's landmark greenhouse gas standards for power plants.
In a lucky draw for those looking to pre-emptively challenge the draft rule, three GOP-appointed judges (including Kavanaugh) were selected for the panel picked to hear their arguments. Those judges said the challenge was premature, but that didn't stop EPA's opponents from making some interesting procedural maneuvers in an attempt to secure Kavanaugh and the other two judges on the panel that will ultimately hear challenges to the final rule.
So far, the judges have denied the attempts by states and industry to maintain that panel, but the unusual legal maneuvering is a clear indication that EPA's challengers see those judges as a favorable audience in what promises to be a broad legal assault against the administration's signature climate change rule.
It's unclear what role, if any, Kavanaugh will ultimately play in refereeing the legal disputes over that climate rule. But with a lifetime appointment to the court where many of the administration's most controversial environmental rules are challenged, his environmental opinions are certain to have lasting impacts.
'Auxiliary solicitor general'
Kavanaugh's track record on big clean air cases has given the left reason to fret.
In late 2012, after the D.C. Circuit upheld a suite of EPA's early greenhouse gas regulations, Kavanaugh penned his own lengthy opinion dissenting from his colleagues. He argued that EPA "exceeded its statutory authority" and said the whole court should have reheard the case.
The Supreme Court later agreed to hear the case and struck down portions of EPA's permitting regime that Kavanaugh, too, had found objectionable.
In a 5-4 vote, the court's conservative wing ruled in 2014 that EPA couldn't force stationary facilities to obtain air pollution permits and install pollution controls based solely on their emissions of greenhouse gases. The court also ruled that EPA unlawfully interpreted the Clean Air Act when it revised the greenhouse gas emission thresholds that trigger permitting rules for factories, for power plants and on industrial facilities.
Kavanaugh had laid out similar reasoning in his at-times sharply worded dissent. "In my view, EPA's reading of the statute was impermissible," he wrote in 2012. "An agency cannot adopt an admittedly absurd interpretation and discard an eminently reasonable one."
While he strongly repudiated the agency's legal rationale, he noted that the climate regulations in question "may well be a good idea as a matter of policy. The task of dealing with global warming is urgent and important."
The Supreme Court ruled that EPA could require greenhouse gas reductions for stationary sources that are required to obtain the permits for emissions of other pollutants. That decision was seen largely as a win for EPA, although it did limit the agency's ability to crack down on industrial facilities' emissions (Greenwire, June 23, 2014).
"They didn't adopt all of his reasoning but reached sort of a similar result to what Kavanaugh had suggested in his dissent from rehearing below," said Donnelly of the Constitutional Accountability Center.
"At the time, I thought there's this weird way in these environmental cases where Kavanaugh serves as almost an auxiliary solicitor general, where he can -- for the conservative justices on the court -- signal these cases might be of interest to them," he said.
'He doesn't always win'
In another high-profile clean air case surrounding hazardous air pollution from power plants, Kavanaugh appeared again to have some sway with the Supreme Court.
The D.C. Circuit last year upheld EPA standards to curb mercury and other hazardous pollution from power plants. But in the 2-1 opinion, Kavanaugh dissented from his two Democrat-appointed colleagues when it came to EPA's cost considerations.
"[W]hen considering just as a general matter whether it is 'appropriate' to regulate, it is well-accepted that consideration of costs is a central and well-established part of the regulatory decisionmaking process," he wrote. "But EPA did not consider costs here. And EPA's failure to do so is no trivial matter."
In a 5-4 opinion issued in June, the Supreme Court agreed. In the ruling backed by the court's conservative majority, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote that the Obama administration unlawfully failed to consider compliance costs before issuing the landmark rule.
"It is unreasonable," he added, "to read an instruction to an administrative agency to determine whether 'regulation is appropriate and necessary' as an invitation to ignore cost" (Greenwire, June 29).
In another case, Kavanaugh wrote for the majority in a 2012 ruling that tossed out EPA's Cross-State Air Pollution Rule that aimed to rein in harmful emissions that cross state lines. "In this case," he wrote, "we conclude that EPA has transgressed statutory boundaries."
The Supreme Court agreed to hear that case, too, and in 2014 dealt a blow to Kavanaugh and the D.C. Circuit when it upheld the EPA rule (Greenwire, April 29, 2014).
"He doesn't always win; that's one point that's important," said Simon Lazarus, senior counsel at the Constitutional Accountability Center.
Not all of Kavanaugh's opinions have angered environmentalists.
In a 2014 ruling, Kavanaugh wrote a majority opinion that vacated part of an EPA rule for cement kilns that shielded polluters from lawsuits if they exceeded emission limits during malfunctions, a move that greens welcomed. Industry groups, too, applauded that ruling (Greenwire, April 18, 2014).
And he signed on to a 2013 opinion finding that EPA's 2011 retroactive veto of a major West Virginia mountaintop-removal mining project was legal (Greenwire, April 23, 2013).
"He's been assigned to some high-profile cases in which the EPA was acting particularly aggressively and which presented particularly difficult legal issues," Adler said.
Ultimately, Kavanaugh is someone who "really wants to get the legal questions right and doesn't worry too much about where that leads him," Adler said. "I don't think he's a consistent vote against EPA; I don't think he's a consistent vote against regulation."
'Political animal'?
Kavanaugh's judicial tenure began with a political splash.
He was assistant to President George W. Bush and the White House staff secretary in 2003 when the president nominated him to the appeals court. The pick infuriated congressional Democrats, who painted him as a right-wing ideologue.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) in 2006 called Kavanaugh the "go-to guy among young Republican lawyers appearing at the epicenter" of many controversial issues.
Kavanaugh, who was 41 at the time, had helped the Bush White House fill judicial posts with conservatives and was one of the authors of the "Starr report" issued in 1998 that argued for President Clinton's impeachment.
Brett Kavanaugh
"[I]f there has been a partisan political fight that needed a very bright legal foot soldier in the last decade, Brett Kavanaugh was probably there," Schumer said during Kavanaugh's 2006 confirmation hearing. At a previous hearing about Kavanaugh in 2004, Schumer had called the nomination "not just a drop of salt in the partisan wounds, it is the whole shaker."
At a speech earlier this year, Kavanaugh recalled those salt comments. "It's good to have your mom at these hearings," he said, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. "She said, 'I think he really respects you.' Gotta love your mom."
Despite Democrats' long-running complaints, Kavanaugh was ultimately confirmed in 2006.
And in his first decade on the bench, lawyers on the left and the right credit him with being smart, savvy and tough to pigeonhole.
"A lot of people -- like me, for example -- thought he was really a political person who wasn't going to be a formidable jurist as a judge, but I think we were wrong. He's very conservative, but he's clearly a thoughtful judge. ... That's why he's formidable," Lazarus said.
Said Adler, "It's hard to look at [Kavanaugh's] record on the D.C. Circuit and say he's just a political animal. He's written very thoughtful, very detailed, very impressive opinions."
And he's widely seen as a possible GOP Supreme Court nominee.
"He would, I think, be on a short list," Adler said. "He has the characteristics that presidents or those who pick judges tend to look for. Would he be a controversial nominee? I don't know."
Kavanaugh spent a stint at the high court himself; he was a clerk for Justice Anthony Kennedy from 1993 until 1994. He now manages an annual basketball game at the Supreme Court that pits its clerks against D.C. Circuit clerks. Kavanaugh and Sri Srinivasan -- an Obama appointee to the D.C. Circuit -- are the only judges who play.
And Kavanaugh is known as a "feeder judge," whose clerks often score clerkships with Supreme Court justices.
Kavanaugh hails from Bethesda, Md.; he's the only child of Martha and Ed Kavanaugh. He credits his mother, who was a state prosecutor and judge, with influencing his career path. His father was the longtime head of the trade association representing the cosmetic, toiletries and fragrance industries.
In 2004, Kavanaugh married Ashley Estes, who also worked in the Bush White House as the president's personal secretary. President Bush and first lady Laura Bush (along with their weapon-wielding Secret Service detail) attended their wedding ceremony at Christ Church in Georgetown, The Washingtonian reported. The Kavanaughs have two daughters.
People who know Kavanaugh describe him as a friendly, personable guy.
"Judge Kavanaugh is a real pleasure to appear before -- he's very well prepared and poses thoughtful, incisive questions in a courteous and engaging way," said Sean Donahue, an attorney who frequently represents environmental groups before the D.C. Circuit and who clerked for former Justice John Paul Stevens when Kavanaugh was also a Supreme Court clerk.
When Adler was a summer associate at Kirkland & Ellis, Kavanaugh -- then a partner at the firm -- would see Adler working late into the night and urge him to go out and have fun.
"He's always struck me as a fairly easygoing guy," Adler said. "He's not a firebrand." | {
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Suggested wine pairing: merlot.
YES, I’M DRUNK,
so whaddaya say we finish off this horrific, scatterbrained year with a Thursday and a New Year’s update?
ALSO
we could really use another Patreon member or two to help round out the monthly group comics! It only takes a dollar to get in, and we’re just a month and a half away from 10 years of Mountain Time.
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The true cost of shrimp
Shrimp: The trade from the Global South has hidden human and environmental impacts. NatalieMaynor under a Creative Commons Licence
Global trade of this luxury commodity ignores the true human and environmental impact, writes Brototi Roy.
Watching villagers standing waist deep in the brackish water of the Sundarbans – also home to crocodiles, Bengal tigers and poisonous snakes – armed with just hand nets is terrifying.
Dayapur is an island village located in the South 24 Parganas district of West Bengal, India. Residents catch shrimp seeds from the riverbeds, which they sell for starvation wages to nearby shrimp farm owners. From there, slave labour turns them into the cheap frozen shrimp which many people eat during the festive season.
‘Shrimp farming is making more money for the rich, who invest in the big shrimp ponds and processing industries,’ says Jagdish Chandra Mridha who has grown up catching shrimp seeds and works on the boats. ‘Poor people like us can’t even afford a boat and have to stand in water for hours. We are paid ten times less than what we were even five to six years ago.’ Mridha adds that this job is usually carried out by children, women and old people.
Advert
In the Sundarbans, the extremely disproportionate risks and returns of the shrimp industry became visible through the muddiest of all waters. Most shrimp from coastal countries in the Global South comes at prices which do not account for the hidden socio-ecological costs, ranging from destroying fragile ecosystems to promoting slave labor.
Value for whom?
The story of shrimp is a relatively recent one. Commercial shrimp aquaculture, primarily for exports, has been promoted across the Global South since the mid-1970s by governments and international institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, shrimp now has the second highest value in seafood trade , after salmon, and its production is projected to continue growing in the next decade.
In 2015, the US and the European Union were the two largest importers of shrimp. The lucrative profits in the form of foreign exchange are concentrated in the hands of a few, who are ruthless in cutting costs and creating legal loopholes. An investigative study by the Environmental Justice Foundation revealed how the rural poor and the environment bear the real brunt of commercial shrimp aquaculture.
In countries like India and Bangladesh, agricultural lands are converted into shrimp ponds, often forcibly. This renders them forever unfit for cropping, due to the high salinity. As the locals don’t eat shrimp, space for food production in the Global South is sacrificed for food production for the Global North. In most other cases, the mangrove forests upon which the poor also depend for their survival are destroyed to build shrimp ponds.
More than shrimp
Shrimp is just one part of the broader conflict between global free trade and environmental protection. This trend of neglecting the true value of commodities is known as Ecologically Unequal Exchange (EUE). To explain it simply this is the act of exporting goods from poorer countries to rich nations at prices which do not take into account local externalities such as ecosystem costs, depletion of natural resources or violation of human rights generated by these exports. As new insights show, EUE is an underlying source of most ecological distribution conflicts today.
Numerous cases of ecological distribution conflicts, stemming from resource exploitation in the Global South for the purpose of trade, such as disposal of e-waste, fossil fuel extraction and mining are mapped in the Environmental Justice Atlas.
Inequalities and injustices give rise to environmental justice movements by local people protecting their land and livelihoods. In Santa Rita, Brazil, a large shrimp company called PRJC has been severely harming the mangrove forests through its production practices. In 2007, the company broke a dike contaminating mangroves killing several species of marine animals. In 2011 it dumped 14 tons of virus infested shrimps into mangroves putting the entire ecosystem at risk. The fishermen and the local communities took collective action, launching campaigns and legal action. However, PRJC is still operational.
In South East Asian countries, especially Thailand, the situation is even grimmer. In 2014, after a six-month long investigation, the Guardian reported how slavery is connected to leading producers and traders of shrimp, including the top four global retailers: Walmart, Carrefour, Costco and Tesco. This was followed by another report in 2015 about the trafficking of Rohingya migrants who were sold as slave labour for the export-oriented seafood industry in Thailand, with shrimp as the most highly valued commodity. These enslaved workers are locked up under horrific conditions, including regular beatings, 20 hour shifts and execution style killing.
So, before reaching for frozen shrimp in your nearest supermarket, do give a thought to its journey from the coastal South and what it entails. | {
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ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) — The Latest on former President Barack Obama (all times local):
6:05 p.m.
Vice President Mike Pence says it's disappointing that former President Barack Obama is back on the campaign trail criticizing President Donald Trump.
Says Pence: "The truth is, the American people in 2016 rejected the policy and direction of Barack Obama when they elected President Donald Trump."
Pence comments in a taped interview set to air on "Fox News Sunday." Fox released an excerpt on Saturday.
Obama campaigned for congressional Democrats from California on Saturday, a day after he excoriated Trump in a speech in Illinois.
Pence said it's "very disappointing" to see Obama break with the tradition of former presidents, who largely shun the campaign trail, and "become so political."
Pence says Obama rolled out "the same tired arguments that he and liberals have made over the last eight years."
___
2:15 p.m.
Former President Barack Obama says November midterm elections give Americans "a chance to restore some sanity in our politics."
Appearing in Southern California on Saturday, the former president took another swipe at his successor as he raised his profile campaigning for fellow Democrats to regain control of the House. Obama didn't mention President Donald Trump by name during a 20-minute speech in the key Southern California battleground of Orange County.
Obama's appearance comes one day after a strongly worded critique of Trump at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In California, the former president touched on themes of retirement security, climate change and education.
He told the audience at the Anaheim Convention Center, "If we don't step up, things can get worse."
___
12:55 p.m.
Former President Barack Obama says the midterm elections in November will give Americans the chance to — in his words — "restore some sanity in our politics" by changing control of Congress.
He's in California trying to help out a group of congressional candidates. And Obama tells the crowd in Anaheim that "we're all in this together and that what makes America exceptional and unique is that from all around the world people ... came here because they believed in a certain set of ideals."
Story continues
___
12:40 p.m.
Barack Obama has made a political appearance in California on behalf of Democratic congressional candidates he says have "decided to step up and bring out the best in our country."
The former president says "we're in a challenging moment" when enormous changes are taking place. He says 'people feel unsettled, people feel scared," and they're worried about their children's future.
Obama says there are no problems that can't be solved if "we're working together and we're true to the traditions that are the best in America." But he's also warning that it's "always tempting for politicians — for their own gain and for people in power — to try to see if they can divide people, scapegoat folks."
When that happens, he says, people become cynical and decide not to participate in the political process — creating a vacuum that lobbyists and special interests fill.
___
8:15 a.m.
Former President Barack Obama is in California to campaign for Democratic congressional candidates one day after issuing a stinging rebuke of his successor in the White House.
Obama is set to appear later Saturday at the Anaheim Convention Center in the heart of Orange County, a once-solid Republican stronghold that voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election that Donald Trump won.
Obama will share the billing with seven Democratic candidates in competitive U.S. House districts across California. Those races are considered crucial to the party's efforts to retake control of the House from Republican. Four of those districts are at least partly in Orange County.
Obama issued a scorching critique of President Donald Trump on Friday in a speech at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. | {
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Imagine what it would be like if you moved to the other side of the world, where the landscape is very different to what you are used to. Now, think about a much bigger move: What do you think it would be like if the Earth moved to a different part of our Galaxy?
Our Galaxy, the Milky Way, is shaped like a whirlpool: It has bands of stars that spiral around the centre, which astronomers call the Galaxy’s ‘arms’. (To see what our Galaxy looks like, click here.) We live in the outer parts of the Milky Way, in one of its spiral arms. This is a quiet part of our Galaxy, where the closest stars to our Sun live far away.
The small centre of the Milky Way is a much more crowded place, as this is where most of its stars are found. This new photo, which was taken by a telescope called VISTA, shows a small part of this busy centre. It is so crowded here that if we moved to this part of our Galaxy, the night sky would be spectacular: stars in the night sky so close that it would be bright enough to read a book without switching on a lamp!
Obviously, it’s impossible for us to pack-up our belongings and relocate to the Milky Way’s centre. But with powerful telescopes like VISTA, astronomers can still observe its beauty from a distance.
Cool Fact
The Milky Way doesn’t just look like a whirlpool – it rotates like one too! It takes about 200 million years for our Galaxy to complete one rotation.
This Space Scoop is based on a Press Release from This Space Scoop is based on a Press Release from ESO
More information This Space Scoop is based on an ESO Press Release
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El Gobierno de Cristina Kirchner decidió ceder a las Provincias 125.000 millones de pesos que hasta ahora iban a la ANSeS y a la AFIP. Lo hizo para acatar el fallo de la Corte Suprema conocido la semana pasada. Es el que ordena al Poder Ejecutivo que deje de descontar a las provincias el 15% de la coparticipación de impuestos y el 1,9% de la recaudación neta de impuestos y recursos aduaneros que se destina a financiar los gastos operativos de la AFIP.
La resignación de los fondos aparece hoy en el Boletín Oficial. Está contenida en el Decreto de Necesidad y Urgencia 2635/2015. De esta manera, el Gobierno resolvió modificar el Presupuesto de este año para dar cumplimiento al referido fallo. La decisión implica una complicación presupuestaria extra para el Gobierno de Mauricio Macri que arranca el 10 de diciembre, que recibirá las arcas c0n una poda monumental a la recaudación y un rojo fiscal que ya trepa al 7%.
Leé también: Cristina y sus funcionarios dejan el poder más ricos que cuando llegaron
El DNU conocido hoy especifica que la AFIP deberá cesar de retener el 15% de la coparticipación a la totalidad de las Provincias. Y como esa masa de dinero hasta ahora eran recursos de la ANSeS (15%) para el pago de jubilaciones y pensiones y de la AFIP (1,9%) para cubrir sus gastos de funcionamiento, el Tesoro Nacional, con cargo a Rentas Generales, deberá remitir a esos organismos la suma equivalente, "las que seguirán siendo tenidas en cuenta como referencia a los fines del cálculo de la movilidad".
Esta aclaración es importante. Esos fondos ahora devueltos a las provincias eran tenidos en cuenta a la hora de calcular los ajustes de las jubilaciones que se otorgan en marzo y setiembre de cada año.
Leé también: Macri pondrá su fortuna en un fideicomiso luego de su jura
Están en juego, a valor de 2015, más de $ 125.000 millones. El 15% que recibía hasta ahora la ANSeS suma este año 98.182 millones. Y el 1,9% son otros $ 30.000 millones.
El fallo de la Corte, que abarca a las Provincias de Santa Fe y San Luis, da un plazo de 120 dias para que el Gobierno acuerde la manera de devolver lo retenido desde que esas Provincias hicieron los reclamos. Si se suma Córdoba, que hizo un reclamo parecido, son unos $ 50.000 millones, que podrían ser devueltos en bonos. | {
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Even on the edge of the Arctic, in a wind chill of –52, things slow down.
Along the western coast of Hudson Bay, a few American tourists have come to Churchill, Man., to watch the northern aurora. They're impressed by nature's light show, blown away by the cold.
It's that ruggedness and closeness to nature that first drew Steve and Dawne Palmer to make Churchill their home.
But that remoteness is becoming unbearable. Last spring, record flooding in Manitoba's north washed out portions of the Hudson Bay Railway, severing the only land link in and out of town and the community's economic lifeline.
"There is nowhere else like here, but it's getting harder and harder for regular people," Steve Palmer said as he sat at his kitchen table.
Dawne and Steve Palmer are trying to find a way out of Churchill. (Warren Kay/CBC)
Ever since the flood, life in the town of 800 known internationally as the "Polar Bear Capital of the World" has become harder. Everything from groceries to fuel to basic household supplies needs to be flown in or lifted in by sea barge.
"We're at our wit's end. It's very hard. There's not enough money," said Steve Palmer, who works for Manitoba Housing, Dawne Palmer works at the local elementary school.
"You don't make enough money, costs are going up too quick," she said.
Like many here, they are making drastic and definite decisions. Their house is for sale and if they can sell it, they'll leave.
"Yeah, I'd sell my house in a heartbeat," said Steve Palmer.
Problem is, no one is buying. And they aren't the only ones trying to get out of Churchill.
Broken lifeline
Last May, record snowfall led to record flooding in northern Manitoba, damaging the final 249-kilometre stretch of the Hudson Bay Railway that links Churchill to southern Manitoba.
A polar bear statue stands in front of the Port of Churchill. The community famous for polar bear tourism is hoping to revive international shipping in Manitoba's north. (Cameron MacIntosh/CBC)
An engineering study found 20 washouts and damage in 130 places. It pegged the cost of fixing it all at $43.5 million, although estimates have run as high as $60 million. That was before the track got buried under snow this winter.
The company that owns the line, U.S.-based Omnitrax, says it doesn't have the money to fix it. It was trying to sell well before the flood.
A sign warns people to stay off the damaged railbed of the Hudson Bay Railway just outside Churchill. (Cameron MacIntosh/CBC)
"We've said right from the get-go that our company won't repair the railroad. We've been that way from Day 1. It will get repaired as part of a deal, " said Merv Tweed, president of Omnitrax's Canadian subsidiary that runs the railway.
A sign on the door of the Churchill train station advises trains still aren't running. (Cameron MacIntosh/CBC)
The federal government, which regulates railways, says Omnitrax isn't living up to its obligations and has taken it to court, trying to force the company to undertake repairs.
No one in Churchill is counting on that getting the train back anytime soon. Meanwhile, life is changing by the day.
While the fall polar bear season is the real money-maker here, late winter aurora viewing was developing into a secondary season.
Like everything here, it's been slow. Without the train, numbers are down. A return, 90-minute flight from Winnipeg can cost more than $1,200. Only the most motivated are making the trip.
Aurora viewing season is slow this year in Churchill because of the loss of the community's train. (Alex de Vries-Magnifico)
Once an example of how an economy could be built in the North, many are now relying on federal subsidies for food and gasoline that aren't covering rising costs.
The high cost of flying is forcing many locals to stay in the community. The local hospital can handle basic and emergency care, but a visit with a specialist now likely means a costly plane ticket.
At the local Home Hardware store, Rhoda and Dale deMulles have seen their business drop by 90 per cent over the last year.
People still come in, but no one is really buying much.
Rhoda and Dale deMulles have seen business in their hardware store drop by 90 per cent. (Warren Kay/CBC)
"I think everyone is conserving their money, " said Dale deMulles. "What I am worried about most is seeing families leave here."
The train not only brought up supplies for his store, but also let people get out to buy things they can't find in Churchill. Rhoda deMulles calls it a lifeline.
"Everybody is talking about the train. They want the train back so they can get out of here."
Families leaving
Sharice Sinclair isn't waiting. On a cold Friday night, she was checking in for the late flight at Churchill's one-desk, one-gate airport. It's a one-way ticket she can't really afford and bought reluctantly.
"I understand people live in Churchill because it's where you are free," she said. "It's the land of the bears and home of belugas. I was born and raised here."
Sharice Sinclair has moved away from Churchill with her one year-old daughter Tessa. (Warren Kay/CBC)
She's moving to Winnipeg, 1,000 kilometres south, taking her one-year-old daughter with her. Life is just too expensive here now.
"If the train was still here, I would probably still be here. All the people that are moving out of Churchill are families."
Enrolment at Churchill's only school reflects that. The kindergarten to Grade 12 Duke of Marlborough School usually has slightly more than 200 enrolled. This year it's fallen well below that.
At the local hockey rink, the Churchill Bears, a team of 10- to 13-year-olds, is practising. The team is down to fewer than a dozen kids.
Churchill's 10- to 13-year-old minor hockey team only practises because it can't get out of town to play games. (Warren Kay/CBC)
"It takes a beating on the town, " Steven Gould said as he was watching his son chase down a puck.
Even if they could ice a full squad, the loss of the train means they can't afford to leave town to play another community, just one of the many new realities of Churchill's isolation.
"It's becoming the new norm. I don't think you can cry about it too much. You just have to work through it," said Gould.
He's still hopeful the train will come back.
"It's easy to be pessimistic about it. I like to force myself to be an optimist. Prove me wrong."
Last hope
No one here is really hopeful the federal government's lawsuit will resolve this, at least not in time to save the coming tourism season.
If the solution is a sale, Churchill is among a group of rail-line communities and First Nations that is trying to put together a deal to purchase the rail line from Omnitrax.
Churchill Mayor Mike Spence says the group wants to establish a local authority to run the rail line, reinvesting revenues back into itself, similar to how most major Canadian airports operate.
Churchill Mayor Mike Spence is optimistic the railway can be back running by summer 2018. (Warren Kay/CBC)
"It's got to be shovels in the ground by April. That's the target we're working towards," said Spence, conceding it's a complicated deal with a rapidly approaching deadline.
New hope stirs in northern Manitoba as Fairfax joins groups to buy Churchill Railway
The group has some financial backing from a Toronto holding company looking to re-establish the rail line as a link to Hudson Bay and Arctic shipping routes, the original reason the rail line was built in the 1920s.
Still, a deal is no certainty. For now, the track continues to sit broken and buried under northern Manitoba's snow.
Back at their kitchen table, Steve and Dawne Palmer are speaking in a resigned tone.
They don't know what their future is, just that their present isn't sustainable.
"For us, the train coming back — it's not so we can leave. It's so we can stay," Steve Palmer said quietly.
"I don't want to leave." | {
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California has a drinking water problem on top of its drinking water problem. Oil companies, with the permission of state officials, have been injecting their wastewater into clean aquifers, according to a damning new report. The practice goes back decades, and is now threatening water quality at a time when the drought-plagued state needs every drop it can get.
The San Francisco Chronicle broke down state data stretching back to 1983, when the EPA first handed over responsibility for enforcing regulations to California’s oil field regulators. While state officials say there's no indication yet that they contaminated drinking water wells, the Chronicle counted 464 wells that injected wastewater into aquifers that should have been protected under state law and the federal Safe Drinking Water Act:
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To gauge water quality in a river, lake or aquifer, researchers often start with the water’s total dissolved solids — salts and other materials in the liquid. High counts don’t necessarily make water harmful to drink, but they can cloud it and give it a salty or bitter taste. In general, anything below 500 parts per million requires no treatment and is considered high quality. Water from San Francisco’s Hetch Hetchy system, piped straight from the Sierra, averages 71. State water officials want to prevent contamination of any aquifers that are below 3,000. And yet, the oil industry drilled 171 injection wells into aquifers with counts of 3,000 parts per million or less, according to state data. Companies also received permits to drill five wells into aquifers of the same quality, but for those wells there is no record of injections. Another 253 injection wells went into saltier but potentially usable aquifers that the EPA considers protected. Companies received permits for an additional 26 wells of the same quality. Finally, companies drilled 40 injection wells into aquifers for which there is no water-quality data. A total dissolved-solids count above 1,000 may require treatment before use, either by blending it with fresher water or putting it through reverse osmosis, the process used in seawater desalination plants. But it is usable, for crops or people.
This isn't the first indication that California's drilling and fracking operations might be polluting aquifers: last July, regulators shut down eleven wastewater injection wells over that very concern; they later confirmed that at least nine were, in fact, dumping wastewater contaminated with fracking fluids and other pollutants into protected drinking water sources. But this new report reveals just how widespread the threat is; it also, the Chronicle points out, happens to be disproportionately threatening California's Central Valley, where is literally sinking under the demand for usable water.
Unless they can come up with a plan for how to deal with this by February, the EPA said, the federal government intends take control back from the state. “If there are wells having a direct impact on drinking water, we need to shut them down now,” Jared Blumenfeld, the regional adminstrator for the EPA, told the Chronicle. “Safe drinking water is only going to become more in demand.” | {
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The public relations firm working behind the scenes with the faithless electors is rife with ties to prominent Democrats like President Obama and twice-failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
Megaphone Strategies, whose stated mission is to “use PR as a tool to diversify progressive movements,” typically works with progressive causes like Black Lives Matter. The firm is representing the handful of “faithless electors” trying to keep President-elect Donald Trump from winning the Electoral College vote.
The firm was co-founded by Van Jones, the former green jobs czar in the Obama White House who later resigned after it was revealed he signed a statement questioning whether the Bush administration had a role in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Jones now works as a CNN commentator.
Molly Haigh, Megaphone’s co-founder and president, worked for Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign. Haigh blames the Republican party’s “racist, misogynist, xenophobic fear mongering” for Trump’s rise to power.
Megaphone communications manager Diane May worked for Bernie Sanders on his 2016 presidential campaign. Megaphone’s website advertises the fact that May worked on both Obama presidential campaigns in 2008 and 2012.
Megaphone associate Carlos Vera “previously worked at the White House, European Parliament, House of Representatives, and Latino Victory Project,” according to the firm’s website.
[dcquiz] Only two of Megaphone’s listed employees have not worked for Democratic politicians, although they have both worked for liberal causes.
Vien Truong, one of the firm’s four listed board members, headlined a Hillary Clinton fundraiser hosted last September by pro-Clinton environmentalist organization CleanTech Party. Truong also serves as the director of another Van Jones endeavor: Green for All, an environmentalist org that received a $200,000 cash infusion from left-wing financier George Soros through his Open Society Foundations as recently as 2010. Soros recently met with other liberal mega-donors to plot to their opposition to Trump, as first reported by Politico’s Ken Vogel. (RELATED: Leaked Emails Show Clinton Campaign Coordinating With Soros Organization)
The two board members that don’t have direct Obama or Clinton ties, Jodi Jacobsen and Catalina Velasquez, are still solid liberals.
Jacobsen, who is also the editor-in-chief of leftist publication Rewire, wrote in an article last October that “To Trump, women are sex objects. To the GOP, they are valued only insofar as they can reproduce children or serve their husbands. That is a world in which Donald Trump is very comfortable. Their vision is indeed the same.”
Velasquez served on the LGBT policy team for the Sanders campaign and previously worked for liberal organizations like People for the American Way.
Texas Republican elector Chris Suprun, who has said he will not cast his vote for Trump, claimed in an interview with The Daily Caller last week that he decided to switch his vote after watching Vice President-elect Mike Pence defend one of Trump’s tweets on TV.
In his interview with TheDC, Suprun went out of his way to deny any ties to George Soros.
“Nobody got to me,” he added later.
Follow Hasson on Twitter | {
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HBO Brings Three Series to Comic-Con International: San Diego 2019
HIS DARK MATERIALS, GAME OF THRONES and WESTWORLD Confirmed for Panels
The HBO series HIS DARK MATERIALS, GAME OF THRONES and WESTWORLD are confirmed for panels and autograph signing sessions at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2019.
WATCHMEN fans should keep a look out around the Gaslamp Quarter for a surprise in-world opportunity to engage with the new HBO series.
Below is information on the three panels.
Thursday, July 18
The HIS DARK MATERIALS panel in Hall H at 4:45 p.m. will include (in alphabetical order): James McAvoy (Lord Asriel), Dafne Keen (Lyra), Lin-Manuel Miranda (Lee Scoresby), Jane Tranter (executive producer) and Ruth Wilson (Mrs. Coulter).
Autograph signing is at 2:45 p.m.
Friday, July 19
The GAME OF THRONES panel in Hall H at 5:30 p.m. will include cast members (in alphabetical order): Jacob Anderson (Grey Worm), John Bradley (Samwell Tarly), Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime Lannister), Liam Cunningham (Davos Seaworth), Nathalie Emmanuel (Missandei of Naath), Iain Glen (Ser Jorah Mormont), Conleth Hill (Varys), Maisie Williams (Arya Stark) and Isaac Hempstead Wright (Bran Stark). Other panelists include creators and showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss and director and executive producer Miguel Sapochnik.
Autograph signing is at 3:30 p.m.
Saturday, July 20
The WESTWORLD panel in Hall H at 1:15 p.m. will include creators, executive producers and directors Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, and cast members (in alphabetical order): Ed Harris, Thandie Newton, Aaron Paul, Tessa Thompson, Evan Rachel Wood and Jeffrey Wright.
Autograph signing is at 11:45 a.m.
The autograph signings will take place in the DC Warner Bros. booth #4545. Attendees wishing to participate in autograph signings may log in to their Comic-Con Member ID account to submit their interest via the Exclusives Portal. WBTVG follows Comic-Con’s selection process and wristband distribution procedures. For more information visit www.comic-con.org/cci/exclusives. | {
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Innalanmäen tilalla Taipalsaarella laiduntaa ylämaankarja tyytyväisenä viimaisesta pakkassäästä välittämättä. Isäntäpari Nina Lappalainen ja Simo Vitikainen luopuivat maitotilasta muutama vuosi sitten ja siirtyivät kokonaan lihakarjaan.
Tilalla on nyt kuutisenkymmentä nautaa, joista kerran kuussa yksi lähtee teuraaksi. Yhdestä naudasta tulee lihaa noin 200 kiloa lihaa.
Ylämaankarja laiduntaa ulkona talven viimoista välittämättä. Sirkka Haverinen / Yle
Emäntä Nina Lappalainen antaa lihan leikkaajalle aina tarkat tiedot, miten liha leikataan.
– Minä haluan aina kauden mukaan erilaista lihaa. Kesällä grillipaloja ja talvella lihaa pataruokiin. Myös asiakkaiden muita toiveita kuunnellaan.
Älä pelkää epäonnistumista
Tuvan pöydällä valmistetaan osso bucoa. Hienosta nimestään huolimatta kyseessä on naudan potkasta tehty ruoka.
Potka on sahattu kiekoiksi ja maustettu mustapippurilla sekä yrttisuolalla. Uunivuoassa kiekkojen kupeessa lepää kaalia, sipulia, palsternakkaa, porkkanaa ja vettä.
Osso bucon valmistukseen tarvitaan potkakiekkoja, mustapippuria, yrttisuolaa, vettä ja kauden vihanneksia. Sirkka Haverinen / Yle
Sinä aikana kun osso buco on leivinuunissa, voi tehdä muita kodin töitä.
Osso buco ja monet muut vähän erikoisemmat lihasta tehdyt ruoat ovat hyvin helppotekoisia. Siitä huolimatta suomalaisten ruoanlaittotaidot ovat kaventuneet, kun esimerkiksi osso bucoon tarvittava sahattu potka ei tartu mukaan kaupan lihatiskiltä.
– Ei ehkä osata tehdä luisesta lihasta ruokaa. Pelätään epäonnistumista. Jauheliha on tuttu ja turvallinen, mutta se on aina samantyyppinen, sanoo ruoka- ja yritysasiantuntija Outi Penttilä Etelä-Suomen maa- ja kotitalousnaisista.
Outi Penttilä muistuttaa, että pitkään haudutettavat lihan osat ovat lähes samanhintaisia kuin jauheliha. Siksi rahan ei pitäisi olla esteenä erikoisempien lihanosien hankkimiseen.
Ainostaan turkki jää käyttämättä
Taipalsaarelainen Innalanmäen tila saa lihansa hyvin kaupaksi ruokaringin ja lähikauppiaiden ansiosta. Tilalle on tulossa myös oma puoti.
Asiakkaina ovat erityisesti ne kuluttajat, jotka haluavat nähdä vaivaa ruoanlaittoon ja käyttää eläimen osia monipuolisesti.
– Moni ostaakin lihansa suoraa pientuottajalta, koska he pystyvät paremmin määrittelemään, miten haluavat lihansa leikattavan, sanoo Outi Penttilä.
Jauhelihan suosio kotitalouksien keittiöissä selittyy nopealla valmistustavalla. Myös Innalanmäen tilalta teurastetuiden eläinten lihasta lähes puolet myydään jauhelihana.
Vaikka tuottaja saa hyvin myytyä teuraslihat, kannustaa Nina Lappalainen kuluttajia tekemään rohkeasti ruokia kaikista ruhon osista ja sisäelimistä.
– Sisäelimistä menee eniten maksaa. Kielelle on aina oma ostajakuntansa, samoin sydämelle. Teuraseläimestä myydään käytännössä kaikki. Ainoastaan turkkia ei vielä ole kaupattu, kertoo Nina Lappalainen.
Naudasta saa monipuolista ruokaa, kun rohkeasti kokeilee ruhon eri osia. Asmo Raimoaho / Yle
Monipuolisesta ruoanlaitosta hyötyvät kaikki
Etelä-Suomen maa- ja kotitalousnaisten ruoka- ja yritysasiantuntija Outi Penttilän mielestä eläimen hyödyntäminen kokonaan on kaikkien etu.
– Opimme ruoan kautta paljon kulttuuristamme. Meillä on muitakin vaihtoehtoja kuin jauhelihapullat, lasagne, makaronilaatikko ja sisäfilee, sanoo Penttilä.
Eläimen kokonaisvaltainen käyttö hyödyntää kaikkia: tuottaja saa lihasta paremman hinnan eikä synny ruokahävikkiä, kuluttajan ruokakulttuuri monipuolistuu ja lisäksi ihmisten ympäristötietoisuus kasvaa, mikä on osa myös kestävää kehitystä.
Järjestä haudutusilta
Kuluttajan ruokatrendejä muokkaavat muun muassa TV-kokit. Lisäksi valveutuneet lounaspaikat ja ravintolat voivat tuoda uusia ruokalajeja listalleen.
Outi Penttilän mielestä esimerkiksi eläimen posket ovat hyvää ruokaa myös arkiruoaksi.
– Kun saadaan hyvää ruokaa esimerkiksi lounaalla, niin siitä saa uusia ideoita myös omaan kotikeittiöön, sanoo Outi Penttilä Etelä-Suomen maa- ja kotitalousnaisista.
Outi Penttilä kehottaa ihmisiä tekemään ruokaa yhdessä ja kokeilemaan sillä tavalla itselle uusien ruokien tekemistä.
– Ostakaa kimpassa vaikka neljännesruho ja järjestäkää lihan haudatusilta. Menkää porukalla sen luokse, jolla on leivinuuni. Lihan kypsyessä ehtii turista mukavia. Lopuksi jokainen lähtee kotiin kypsä lihapotti kainalossa.
Ruoan hauduttaminen leivinuunissa on vanha perinteinen tapa kypsentää ruokaa. Sirkka Haverinen / Yle
Erilaiset ruokakurssit auttavat eteenpäin, mikäli haluaa oppia tekemään monipuolista ruokaa ruhon eri osista. Myös palveleva lihatiski on oiva paikka saada tietoa lihasta ja sen käytöstä. Lisäksi tietoa voi ammentaa internetistä.
Lihan kulutuksen vähentäminen on ilmastomuutoksen ja kasvissyönnin lisääntymisen myötä noussut vahvasti esille.
Taipalsaarelaisen Innalanmäen tilan emännällä Nina Lappalaisella on selkeä näkemys lihansyönnistä.
– Vaikka lihaa ei syödä joka päivä, niin silloin kun syödään, kannattaa panostaa laatuun. | {
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News
Testicles may make men more vulnerable to coronavirus: study
Sign up for our special edition newsletter to get a daily update on the coronavirus pandemic.
The coronavirus could linger in the testicles, making men prone to longer, more severe cases of the illness, according to a new study.
Researchers tracked the recovery of 68 patients in Mumbai, India, to study the gender disparity of the virus, which has taken a worse toll on men, according to a preliminary report posted on MedRxix, which hosts unpublished medical research papers that have not been peer reviewed.
Dr. Aditi Shastri, an oncologist at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, and her mother, Dr. Jayanthi Shastri, a microbiologist at the Kasturba Hospital for Infectious Diseases in Mumbai, said the virus attaches itself to a protein that occurs in high levels in the testicles.
This protein, known as angiotensin converting enzyme 2, or ACE2, is present in the lungs, the gastrointestinal tract and the heart in addition to large quantities in the testicles.
But since testicles are walled off from the immune system, the virus could harbor there for longer periods than the rest of the body, according to the study.
The mother-daughter researchers said these findings may explain why women bounce back from the virus more quickly than men.
They determined that the average amount of time for female patients to be cleared of the virus was four days, while men saw recoveries that on average were two days longer, the report said.
“These observations demonstrate that male subjects have delayed viral clearance,” the authors wrote, adding that the testicles may be serving as “reservoirs” for the virus.
The study may offer an explanation for reports out of Italy, South Korea and New York City that men are dying at higher rates from the virus.
Others have suggested that men are more vulnerable because they are more likely to smoke, have high blood pressure or suffer coronary artery disease.
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Filed under Coronavirus , research , 4/19/20 | {
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Family is complicated: this is a truth Brent Oswald knows intimately. The current owner and operator of Cottonwood Holsteins Ltd., based in Steinbach, Man., is well-versed in the succession history of his operation, and it hasn’t always run smoothly.
Steinbach-based Cottonwood Holsteins Ltd. has been in the Oswald family since the 1930s. Steinbach-based Cottonwood Holsteins Ltd. has been in the Oswald family since the 1930s.
For more, check out the related succession success stories below:
His grandfather and grandmother bought the original land back in the 1930s. From the beginning, their plan was to pass the mixed farming operation on to their elder son, but when he died in a carbon monoxide accident, they put the farm up for sale. Their younger son, Edwood, “wasn’t supposed to be a farmer,” but along with his wife, Gwen, he became the highest bidder for the land.“That wasn’t a smooth transition,” Brent Oswald says. “In my grandpa’s eyes my dad wasn’t supposed to get the farm.”Soon after Edwood and Gwen bought the farm in 1968, their focus narrowed to dairy, but for several years everything was an uphill climb. “When they started farming they were so financially strapped they had to park vehicles because they couldn’t afford the insurance,” Oswald says. “They really had to struggle. I’m not going to say I didn’t have to work hard, but I didn’t have to climb that mountain.”Edwood passed away in 2016. These days, Oswald and his wife, Kirsty, are farming 2,400 acres, milking 136 cows and discussing expanding their barn. This year, the pair was chosen as Manitoba’s Outstanding Young Farmers for 2017.Oswald believes their succession to farm owners went perhaps as smoothly as such a major transition can. After his own experience, Edwood wasn’t taking any chances.“My dad always said if his kids wanted to get the farm, he’d be the ‘ultimate partner’ helping with the transition,” Oswald says.He signaled his interest in the farming operation early (his two brothers now work, respectively, at a General Motors dealership and as a veterinarian), and Edwood took note by giving him both responsibility and decision-making power very early on.“Even by age 16 I was selling the hay and grain. I had full signing authority at age 18,” he says.When Oswald and Kirsty got married in 2006, their accountant, Jerry Lupkowski, recommended that the family begin working on a succession plan.“Mentally we knew how everything should play out; it was a matter of getting it all on paper,” Oswald says. “We spent probably two years doing it. It didn’t need to take that long, but the professionals see so many horror stories, they made sure that it was exactly how we wanted it to be.”The first and most onerous part of the plan involved reviewing and appraising all farm assets, which Oswald undertook during the winter months.“You don’t realize how much stuff you have to place a value on, right down to the lawnmower and the tools in the shop,” he says. “It’s a value that my parents built over the years that they should get something for.”In 2008 the family did an estate freeze, once the value of all farm assets had been calculated. The shares were frozen and new common shares were issued to Brent. “Any growth from 2008 on was mine,” he explains. “So the idea is that over time I will buy the farm assets that are held in mom’s name personally, and that’s my way of buying the farm. We do that on years where it makes sense from a tax standpoint to mitigate losses and best utilize capital gains exemptions.”The Oswalds structured the transition this way to ensure the farm could be flexible and not go into a holding pattern for a decade. In the meantime, the family updated their wills and shareholder agreements to reflect the changes.Oswald says the transition took time because the family wanted to be fair – but “fair” is not the same thing as “equal” when it comes to succession planning, as Edwood explained to Oswald’s siblings and their partners when they questioned the breakdown.“My dad said, ‘You are getting a lump sum cheque, but you’re not tied down to anything. If the dairy industry fails, Brent loses everything. It doesn’t need to be equal.’ ”Many experts recommend that family meetings be held at the outset of succession planning to discuss expectations. In this case, Oswald and his parents sat down to hash out their shared goals for the farm itself and then called a larger family meeting to go over a general succession plan.If he had the opportunity for a do-over, Oswald says he might have done things a little differently. Although the advice they received was to keep things simpler, Oswald says he would have preferred to have his brothers involved in some of the preliminary meetings “so there was never any guessing as to why the decisions were made the way they were,” he says. “But it wouldn’t have bothered me for them to know everything that the farm was doing.“Could we have handled it better? You can always handle this stuff better,” he says.All in all, he believes the transition went well, largely due to the help and advice his family received early on from Lupkowski and others. “We had a great team of people around us,” Oswald says. “We spent a lot of time making sure that our accountant, banker and lawyer met together regularly and conversed with each other. That probably made the whole process a lot easier because everyone on the team was on the same page from start to finish.”It’s a legacy Oswald and Kirsty will pass on to their own future successors. | {
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President Trump stayed after his commencement speech at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs Thursday to shake hands with nearly 1,000 graduating cadets.
Trump, who wasn’t scheduled to return to Washington until late evening, said he would stick around, despite his advisors telling him he didn’t have to.
“They gave me a choice. They said, ‘Sir, you don’t have to shake any hands, some people do that,’” Trump told the audience.
“You can shake one hand, to the one person, top of the class. You can shake 10, 50 or 100, and you could also stay for 1,000, OK?” Trump said to cheers.
During his commencement, Trump told the graduating cadets: “To dominate the future, America must rule the skies. And that is what your time at this great academy has been all about – preparing you to do whatever it takes to learn, to adapt and to win, win, win.”
Trump also pardoned the pranksters and mischief makers, a tradition for presidents speaking to graduating cadets.
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“So keeping with tradition and as your commander-in-chief, I hereby absolve and pardon, all cadets serving restrictions and confinements,” Trump said. “And that you earned, you earned it.” | {
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Gerichtsverfahren wegen Zwergzypresse
Ein Streit um Zwerg-Muschelzypressen ist am Montag vor dem Landesgericht in Klagenfurt verhandelt worden. Eine 64 Jahre alte Pensionistin soll Äste der Zypresse abgeschnitten haben, die auf einem Grab in Annabichl stand. Die Verhandlung endete mit einer Diversion.
Zwerg-Muschelzypressen werden etwa 80 bis 100 Zentimeter hoch. In dem vor Gericht verhandelten Fall wachsen sie auf einem Grab am Friedhof in Launsdorf. Die 64 Jahre alte Angeklagte soll mehrere Hauptäste der Pflanze abgetrennt haben, die ihr nicht gehört. Laut Anklageschrift entspricht das einer schweren Sachbeschädigung, für die ein Strafrahmen von bis zu zwei Jahren Gefängnis vorgesehen ist.
Angeklagte bestritt die Tat
Die Angeklagte bestritt die Tat. Trotz eines Zeugen, der sich auch das Kennzeichen der Angeklagten aufgeschrieben hat, zeigte sich die Pensionistin vor Gericht nicht geständig. Sie sei an besagtem Tag gar nicht in Launsdorf gewesen, sondern hätte sich wegen einer Schwellung an ihrer Hand in Klagenfurt von einer Masseurin behandeln lassen, sagte die Frau.
Ob sie die Schwellung denn vom Schneiden von Pflanzen bekommen hätte, fragte Richter Oliver Kriz nach. Nein, antwortete die Angeklagte. Um zu beweisen, dass sie zum Zeitpunkt der Tat nicht am Friedhof war, führte die Angeklagte die Masseurin als Zeugin an.
Zeugin konnte das Alibi nicht bestätigen
Die Masseurin trat als Zeugin vor Gericht auf. Sie sagte aus, dass die Angeklagte am Tattag nicht bei ihr in Behandlung war. Erst viel später sei die 64-Jährige zu ihr gekommen und habe eine Bestätigung für den besagten Tag verlangt. Die Zeugin gab an, gutgläubig gewesen zu sein und der Angeklagten die Bestätigung ausgestellt zu haben, ohne in ihre Aufzeichnungen gesehen zu haben.
„Rechtlich wäre es geschickt, wenn man jetzt die Kurve kriegt und in Diversion geht“ - sagte Richter Kriz, nachdem sich das Alibi der Angeklagten nicht bestätigen ließ. Nach einer kurzen Unterredung mit ihrem Verteidiger entschied sich die 64-Jährige für die Diversion. Sie muss den Besitzern der Zwergzypresse nun einen Betrag von 800 Euro zahlen. Die drohende Gefängnisstrafe war damit vom Tisch. | {
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LONDON (Reuters) - Bitcoin’s share of the cryptocurrency market is sliding, with a host of alternative digital coins gaining ground as developers race to create digital cash that can gain a footing in mainstream commerce and finance.
FILE PHOTO: The Monero cryptocurrency logo is seen in this illustration photo January 8, 2018. REUTERS/Thomas White/File Photo
As these “altcoins” grow in prominence, Reuters is publishing a series of stories that examines the features and characteristics of some of the alternatives to bitcoin that have grabbed the attention of developers, investors and regulators.
The first in this series looks at Monero - referred to as a privacy coin because it allows users to conceal nearly all details of transactions. It has become increasingly used for illegal purposes.
Since its launch in 2014, Monero has grown to be the 12th biggest cryptocurrency by market capitalization with around $1.4 billion-worth in circulation.
HOW IS MONERO DIFFERENT TO BITCOIN?
Every transaction involving Monero obscures the digital addresses of the senders and receivers, as well as the value of the transaction. That offers users near-total anonymity, allowing them to instantaneously send digital cash without leaving any clues.
Bitcoin was initially seen as opaque, as the identity of the owners of digital wallets used to send and receive bitcoin is not public.
But details recorded permanently on the blockchain after bitcoin is sent and received can, in fact, give up clues that can be used to pinpoint those identities. This has become increasingly easy with the advent of firms that specialize in analyzing blockchain transactions.
WHY’S IT GAINING ATTENTION?
When Norwegian police earlier this year gave details of the kidnapping of the wife of a wealthy businessman, they said the family had demanded a ransom in cryptocurrencies. Local press reported that the suspects wanted to be paid in Monero.
The unusual request underlined a growing trend for criminals to seek alternatives to bitcoin, which through its first decade has become the cryptocurrency of choice for illicit activities from buying contraband to laundering money, cyber security experts and law enforcement agencies say.
Bitcoin proponents say that traditional cash is also widely used for criminal activities.
Monero’s use on darknet marketplaces - sites used for buying illicit goods from drugs to stolen credit cars - is on the rise, said Tom Robinson, chief data officer of Elliptic, a London-based firm that provides blockchain-tracking software to law enforcement agencies and private companies.
Three of the biggest five darknet markets now accept Monero, Robinson said, though he added the caveat that bitcoin is still the most widely used cryptocurrency for darknet payments.
One of Monero’s developer team said Monero enables crime no more than cash. Its developers should stay out of debates on its traceability or risk undermining its decentralized nature, Francisco Cabanas told Reuters.
“It doesn’t selectively encourage crime, it encourages commerce,” said Cabanas, who goes by the nickname “ArcticMine,” in an interview via Skype from Vancouver. “In that respect, it’s no different to cash.”
Monero is also widely used for “cryptojacking,” or illicit cryptocurrency mining, where hackers infect computers and steal their power to mine new coins - a highly lucrative endeavor.
Nevertheless, over 4 percent of the 17 million Monero in circulation were mined using malware, said Guillermo Suarez de Tangil, a cybersecurity lecturer at King’s College London who has researched Monero.
“There is a clear phenomenon of the underground using Monero, and selling malware that will contribute to Monero mining,” he said.
Monero’s developers say its characteristics make it a useful tool for companies looking to maintain commercial secrecy. Users in repressive countries looking to avoid censorship or surveillance can also safely move money in the form of Monero, they say.
IS LAW ENFORCEMENT WORRIED? WHAT DO REGULATORS SAY?
Cryptocurrencies are mostly unregulated. Though countries from Britain to the United States are looking at how to deal with the phenomenon, few have set out comprehensive strategies for dealing with digital coins.
Asked about Monero, Borja Pastor de la Morena, an official at Europol in The Hague who oversees the agency’s work on money laundering said: “This kind of alternative cryptocurrency is more opaque and better at concealing the activity of the users.”
He said: “It’s a phenomenon that we are paying attention to”
And though aware of the propensity for cryptocurrencies to be used for money laundering, few financial national-level regulators have specifically addressed privacy coins.
Britain’s finance ministry, which leads a task force that is looking at if and how Britain will regulate cryptocurrencies, said it was aware of the potential for Monero to be used for criminal ends.
“We recognize the risks with cryptoassets like ‘privacy coins’ being used for illicit activity,” a spokesperson said, adding that it would “soon” launch a consultation on bringing crypto-related companies under anti-money laundering regulation.
Japan’s financial watchdog, sensitive to money laundering potential of privacy coins, last year asked a Tokyo-based exchange to review its listings. The exchange later ceased trading Monero.
WHO’S BEHIND MONERO?
Like bitcoin, Monero is governed by a virtual community of hundreds of developers that lacks any centralized authority.
Cabanas is one of only two publicly-known members of its seven-person core developer team, who act as stewards for updates to its code.
Mitchell Krawiec-Thayer, a San Francisco-based blockchain developer who is part of Monero Research Labs, said Monero is designed so it can be easily mined by individuals rather than powerful groups that team up to mine coins in industrial quantities.
“This lowers the barrier of entry to everyone,” he said. “The downside is that criminals have started using that. Stealing other people’s resources, putting strain on their equipment – it’s a straight-up threat.”
Monero has recently launched a response group, where those infected by malware can seek help, Krawiec-Thayer said.
WHO USES MONERO FOR LEGITIMATE PURPOSES?
Data on who uses Monero, and why, is scarce. That’s a challenge for understanding the usage of any cryptocurrency, even more so for one designed to obscure its tracks.
Daily transactions for Monero - one proxy for how widely the cryptocurrency is used - have hovered around 8,000 this month, data from website CoinMetrics shows. The number of active digital wallet addresses for Monero has hung around 5,000.
By comparison, bitcoin sees around 320,000 transactions a day, with about 785,000 active addresses.
Monero is not the only privacy coin. Others, such as ZCash, have grown popular with investors, often for speculative reasons but also because of interest in their privacy features.
Grayscale, the world’s biggest crypto asset manager with around $1.3 billion under management, allows investors like hedge funds to invest in ZCash.
Amid growing acceptance of privacy coins, a number of major exchanges list Monero. For example, Malta-based Binance, one of the world’s largest exchanges, allows users to trade the coin.
Binance declined to comment on Monero, but said it has a comprehensive review process for evaluating coins and tokens for listing, and that it carries out periodic reviews on projects. | {
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New Democrat MP Randall Garrison is putting together a bill aimed at repealing anti-terrorism measures brought in by the Conservative government a year ago. Mr. Garrison says the Liberal government is moving too slowly on its election promise to soften the security legislation, commonly known as Bill C-51, that gave the spooks all kinds of new powers.
Our New Democrats have been considerably muted as a result of the October election. So it's good to hear them – they should be getting some inspiration from the likes of Bernie Sanders – holding up the values of the left.
Any move by them to salvage civil liberties, however, won't get far. In due time there will probably be a few amendments to C-51. But they are likely to be minor in nature, like the timid change the Liberals have introduced thus far – the appointment of a parliamentary oversight committee to monitor and scrutinize spy activities. It has the claws of a kitten.
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EDITORIAL: How is the Liberal government using Bill C-51? Good question
Justin Trudeau did not want to be seen as being soft on terror when the Harper government brought in C-51, which was in response to consecutive terror incidents on domestic soil. The Liberals backed the bill and sought cover with the promise of amendments. But given the climate of the times, given the recent spate of terrorist atrocities, they now feel a new need to be cautious.
What if, an insider explained, the Liberals brought in big-time amendments to defang C-51 and there was a subsequent terrorist act on Canadian soil: "How would we look then?"
There's another timing problem. The Liberals don't want to do anything until the U.S. election is over. If Donald Trump becomes president (a doubtful prospect), all hell breaks lose. Security policy, border policy, immigration policy south of the border would be overhauled. Ottawa would have to respond in a manner considerably different than it would if Hillary Clinton wins the Nov. 8 vote.
RELATED: Entrapment verdict: Canada's anti-terror strategy found guilty
Politically speaking, the Liberals, because of all the global terror, are under little public pressure to move quickly. When C-51 was first introduced, there was a civil liberties outcry. Rather than just gathering intelligence, C-51 gave our spy agency (the Canadian Security Intelligence Service) powers to make arrests on suspicion that someone might carry out a terrorist act. "Suspicion" is a word of considerable latitude. The spooks were given powers to apprehend anyone engaging in an act that is deemed to promote terrorism. "Promote" is a rather flexible term as well. CSIS was given powers to disrupt gatherings whereas previously it had only a monitoring function.
Reaction on the left was heated: "We're creating a new parallel police force." "Anyone can be locked up without judicial recourse." "Police state here we come." But you don't hear much of that any more. For example, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, in conjunction with the Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, is trying to get Canadians to raise their voices through a parliamentary e-petition. They are getting very little response.
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The NDP has been steadfast in its opposition to C-51, its point being that you can have tough anti-terrorism laws which do not infringe on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Among the Liberals' promises of change to C-51 was one that would ensure that CSIS warrants did not contravene the Charter. The Liberals promised a wide range of public consultations on the legislation. But such consultations have yet to begin. The Liberals promised to review petitions by Canadians who find themselves on a no-fly list. But that promise has been diluted.
The parliamentary oversight body is supposed to fill a glaring omission in the Anti-Terrorsim Act (it was inexcusable that the Conservatives were so opposed to oversight). But the committee is severely handcuffed. The government can cite national security to deny it information it is seeking. And the committee doesn't report to Parliament but to the Prime Minister; he is then free to censor or do with its report as he wishes.
It's symptomatic of the Liberal approach to C-51, which is to tinker. But on the anti-terrorism law, that may be all that the people want. | {
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There is still a (not so) long way to go regarding crypto mass adoption. Maybe slower than we think (allowing to buy at low prices) but not too far out (far enough so time can work its magic).
A large part of consumers and content creators are still crypto phobic and the common media platforms, especially in some countries, propagate negative and speculative news about the crypto sphere conveying an overall sense of distrust to it.
Why so many tokens?
All this technology can be quite confusing. Recently I watched a video from Ivan on Tech youtube channel, where Ivan an international speaker, blockchain educator, software developer, and data scientist interviews Grant Cardone a social media influencer and real estate mogul. Grant Cardone is pro cryptocurrencies but states that the problem is that there are too many cryptocurrencies and that might constitute a problem. This is something most people believe. Ivan explains that calling everything cryptocurrencies can mislead the public interpretation. Many tokens can be considered as an equivalent to loyalty points and not real currencies. And this is the beauty of this new economic model. Tokens have a value but are not competing with each other, they have a distinct utility and application.
Blockchain technology allows tokenizing almost everything. This feature allied to a lack of real understanding about what are the different types of tokens generates noise and confusion. Fake projects and airdrops also don't help — the most powerful form of marketing it's viral and passed by word of mouth — and people don't need much to completely discard a novelty.
Between projects that are born out of a willingness to participate but lack a strong foundation and vision, others steadily and diligently are creating the space they need to grow. The strength of such projects, the driving force behind some blockchain networks and its native tokens is a set of characteristics that make it a versatile asset, ensuring strong applications and practical case uses that facilitate adoption and allure investors.
The time is always now, and many are pointing 2020 as a turning point where some of the current strong cryptos that still have a low price, will rise in value. So crypto investors are buying, holding on, and staking digital assets.
I can't predict the future, and there's always risk regarding investments, but it sure feels right...
Wich Coins or tokens do you truly believe to the point of making you forget about the trilogy Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt? | {
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Huges, slow-moving swirls called Rossby waves have been detected on the sun. These waves move in the opposite direction of the sun's rotation.
Huge, slow-moving waves that drive Earth's weather and shape the swirls in Jupiter's atmosphere also exist on the sun, new research reveals.
Called Rossby waves or planetary waves, the large-scale waves occur in all rotating fluids, but now they've been identified on the sun. "Solar Rossby waves are gigantic in size, with wavelengths comparable to the solar radius," study co-author Laurent Gizon, of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, said in a statement. (The average radius of the sun is a whopping 432,450 miles, or 696,000 kilometers.)
Even so, these waves move very slowly, with shallow troughs and peaks, so they aren't always easy to detect, especially amid the other swirls and disturbances on a body as lively as the sun.
Last year, scientists used measurements from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory to deduce that Rossby waves might exist on the sun. The new measurements, also taken from the SDO, are more direct and detailed, confirming that the Rossby waves indeed roil the sun's interior. [Anatomy of Sun Storms & Solar Flares (Infographic)]
Hidden movement
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, the University of Göttingen (both in Germany), New York University Abu Dhabi and Stanford University analyzed data from the SDO's Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager instrument. They focused on bubble-like granules on the visible surface of the sun, called the photosphere. These granules — each about 600 miles (1,000 kilometers) across, according to NASA — are the peak of convection cells, where heated material from the sun's interior pops up toward the surface, spreads out and then cools, sinking down along the dark lines that divide the granules. According to NASA, these granules are hyperintense, with materials bubbling up as fast as 15,000 mph (more than 24,000 km/h).
The movements of these granules revealed underlying Rossby waves, the researchers reported May 7 in the journal Nature Astronomy.
Energetic waves
The researchers found that the waves occur deep below the surface of the sun, about 12,400 miles (20,000 km) in its interior.
They estimate that the waves are responsible for about half of the sun's kinetic energy, making them key to understanding the star's internal dynamics.
"All in all," Gizon said in the statement, "we find large-scale waves of vorticity on the sun that move in the direction opposite to rotation."
Original article on Live Science. | {
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June 01, 2011 18:58 IST
There was a clear polarisation of Christian and (especially) Muslim votes in favour of the UDF. This caused enough misgivings to start a consolidation of Hindu votes behind the LDF, says T V R Shenoy.
"I have come to an insane asylum!" Swami Vivekananda reportedly exclaimed after touring Kerala.
My own memories, obviously, do not stretch as far back as 1892 but I can easily recall the time before the reorganisation of states gave Kerala not just its current contours but also its current name, remember back when it was Travancore-Cochin at the dawn of independent India, and even farther back when it was two princely states and a Malabar integrated into the giant British province of Madras.
Delving into 70 years of memories I cannot recollect another time when Kerala was so split on communal lines. Look no farther than the newly-elected Kerala assembly if you want to see proof of that.
If I had to sum it up I might use the abbreviation 'PCM'. In the season of the IIT-JEE results some might mistake that for 'Physics, Chemistry, Maths', and that is true in a sense. (More on that later.)
But it could also easily be shorthand for 'Polarisation of Christians and Muslims' -- inevitably leading to a counter-aggregation of Hindus.
Kerala is still, technically, a state where the majority of the population is Hindu. The data for the 2011 Census are not out but according to the 2001 numbers, 56.2 percent of Keralites were Hindus, 24.3 percent were Muslims, and 19 percent were Christians. Those values have almost certainly changed over the past decade; the 2001 Census also revealed that the Hindu and the Christian figures had fallen since 1991, the Christian population dropping by 0.32 percent and the Hindu population by 1.48 percent.
Assuming, however, that Hindus still constitute about 50 percent you would think the majority community make up roughly half of the assembly. As they, nominally, represent the majority that assumption should be particularly true of the treasury benches.
Wrong. 49 of the 72 MLAs in the ruling United Democratic Front are non-Hindus -- a tad over 68 percent. Contrariwise, only 19 of the 68 MLAs in the Left Democratic Front are non-Hindus -- just under 28 percent.
There was a clear polarisation of Christian and (especially) Muslim votes in favour of the UDF. This caused enough misgivings to start a consolidation of Hindu votes behind the LDF. (And yes, I recognise the irony of Hindus surging behind nominally atheist Marxists but that is the reality of Kerala!)
At this point, I know there are some readers who will whine about journalists writing about 'communal' topics. Spare me the rubbish!
We live in a day where the Manmohan Singh cabinet has approved a caste-based census. This is also a time when, in the wake of the Sachar Committee Report, reservation for Muslims is being openly discussed.
I hope you realise what this means. It was the Congress, at the urging of Mahatma Gandhi, that ensured there would be no separate enumeration of castes in the census after 1931. And the founding fathers of the Republic of India -- memories of where Muslim reservation had led India fresh in their minds -- did not opt for religion-based reservation.
If the Sonia Gandhi-Manmohan Singh duopoly wish to overturn over 60 years of Congress policy let us admit that there will be consequences. Both caste and religion will play increasingly larger roles in public life. Berate it if you like but start getting used to the fact.
The second reason for writing about the make-up of the Kerala assembly is that every section of society in the state is already talking about it -- from mailmen to ministers -- but privately. Nobody wants to come out and admit the obvious, that in a democracy it is deeply flawed to have a government where the majority community is severely under-represented.
It makes for some bad physics, worse chemistry, and some absolutely horrible maths.
The current set-up is bad from the point of view of physics because it is inherently unstable. Ideally, a ministry would be like a pyramid -- resting on a broad base of support. What we have right now is a ministry that is like a spinning top -- narrow at the base and broader above. A top is nice to look at while it works but we all know how it ends -- thrashing about, then toppling over.
Ministries have been given to one-MLA and two-MLA parties because there is no other option. The numbers are so finely balanced that a couple of disgruntled MLAs could topple the Oommen Chandy ministry.
I have already mentioned how skewed the Hindu to non-Hindu ratio is on the treasury benches. But, in the spirit of the caste-based enumeration approved by the Congress high command, it gets even worse when you look at the caste break-up. The Ezhavas, for instance, are numerically the largest Hindu community, and yet they have but three MLAs to represent them on the UDF benches. And soon the Nairs shall start counting how many they have, and then each of the rest.
It makes for rotten chemistry because, as noted above, the Congress is only too aware of the lack of support from Hindus. This has already led to a face-off between the Congress and its principal partners in the UDF before the Chandy ministry was two weeks old.
The Congress has ten representatives in a 20-strong ministry. Since the Congress has only 38 MLAs that is a ratio slightly better than 1:4. The Muslim League (whose name reveals its leanings) and the Kerala Congress (whose name conceals its Christian base) think they should enjoy the same ratio of MLAs to ministers. In other words, the Muslim League thinks itself entitled to five ministerships while the Kerala Congress wants three, one more each than has been allotted.
Panakkad Sayyid Hyder Ali Shihab Thangal, president of the Muslim League, set the cat among the pigeons before the Chandy ministry was a week old. He unilaterally announced the name of Manjalamkuzhi Ali as the candidate for the proposed fifth berth. This may have been either a bid for 'parity' with the Congress, or an attempt to keep the MLA in good temper since he had quit the LDF.
The Kerala Congress is not to be left behind. It has delicately suggested that a ministerial berth for, say, P C George would be welcomed.
It leads to bad chemistry within parties when 'X' gets a ministry and 'Y' does not, particularly so when a 'Y' was once part of another bloc. But trying to settle the chemistry within the Muslim League and the Kerala Congress would lead to a mathematical nightmare for the Congress.
The first difficulty lies with the Ninety-First Amendment. The relevant part reads: "The total number of ministers, including the chief minister, in the council of ministers in a state shall not exceed fifteen percent of the total number of members of the legislative assembly of that state."
Kerala elects 140 MLAs, meaning there cannot be more than 21 ministers. The current cabinet is already 20-strong, so there is no way that both the Muslim League and the Kerala Congress can be satisfied.
Second, consider what happens if the Congress sacrifices one of its own seats to keep the two powerful allies happy. The Muslim League will put up a Muslim and the Kerala Congress shall field a Christian. That will further dilute the Hindu element in the cabinet.
As we all know, the Congress is promoting not just a caste-based census and greater opportunities for Muslims but also gender-based representation. I note without comment that there is exactly one woman MLA in the UDF benches, P K Jayalakshmi.
It used to be said that what Bengal thinks today India shall think tomorrow. When it comes to politics it would be more accurate to say that what Kerala suffers today India must endure tomorrow. Kerala was experimenting with coalition governments long before they took shape in New Delhi -- and Kerala is seeing the effects of communal polarisation on government well before the caste-based and religion-based policies of the UPA regime are felt in India as a whole tomorrow.
Yes, it is disgusting to see so decent and secular (in the noble sense of the word) a man as Chandy immersed in calculating by caste and creed. Get used to it; the policy is set in Delhi, not Thiruvananthapuram.
How might Swami Vivekananda react if he were to return to Kerala today? Perhaps he might say, "The inmates have taken over the asylum!" | {
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A study conducted by the Ne’emanei Torah V’Avodah Organization shows a continuing growth in the number of Zionist talmidei torah in Israel, stating at present there are at least 56 operating around the country in which 8,500-10,000 boys are studying. It states in this framework, boys and girls are separated and there are increased Torah studies as compared to a regular religious public elementary school. Often the Zilberman or Barkai methods of teaching are employed.
The research shows a steady growth in the Zionist talmidei torah over the past decade and while one may only have found such a school in Yerushalayim or Yehuda and Shomron years ago, today they are available in many areas of the country, including Ramat Gan, Nazareth Illit and Eilat. Two-thirds of these talmidei torah operate within the framework of the state run religious public school system.
Eyal Berger, who headed the study, points out this shows the Zionist talmidei torah are no longer a fringe entity but a growing one that is a part of the religious state run education system. He feels soon there will be a need to discuss the future and how this growing trend will impact this tzibur. He points out the growing number of elementary schools that are shifting from the delicate balance that existed in dati leumi education in the past regarding Torah and secular education.
Shmuel Shetach, who runs the Ne’emanei Torah V’Avodah organization, added that “the inherent problems associated with the talmidei torah phenomenon lie in the perception that Torah is detached from a life of action. Furthermore, these institutions of Torah study are based largely on rote methods that lead to greater student proficiency but at the expense of understanding the depth of Torah. Richness and depth of Torah study are current internationally accepted doctrines in Zionist yeshivos, made possible largely due to a focus on analysis and understanding and not because of methods of memorizing that diminish the breadth of the Torah”.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem) | {
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Purnia: Protesting against some `blasphemous` statements made by a Hindu Mahasabha leader Kamlesh Tiwari, a large number of people on Thursday went on a rampage in Purnea district of Bihar, torching vehicles and attacking a police station.
While returning from an All India Islamic Council-led peaceful protest march against Tiwari's statement, some protesters turned violent and ransacked Baisi police station.
The situation was controlled by Pankaj Kumar Pal, District Magistrate, Purnea.
There has been violence in Uttar Pradesh (Kanpur, Lucknow and Bareilly) and West Bengal (Malda) due to Tiwari's statement.
Following Uttar Pradesh Urban Development Minister and senior Samajwadi Party leader Mohd Azam Khan's statement that all Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) leaders and members were homosexuals, Kamlesh Tiwari had made similar comments about Prophet Muhammad.
This has incensed Muslims and they have been holding protests in various states. | {
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Mitt Romney knows a thing or two about losing a presidential election, which is why the minds behind Veep approached him ahead of their new season.
The sixth cycle of the HBO political satire, which premiered Sunday, heads into uncharted territory as it follows former President Selina Meyer's (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) life after the White House. After losing the presidency on last season's finale, Selina and her staff were scattered beyond the confines of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. for the first time on the series.
"We've talked to people on both sides of the aisle," Louis-Dreyfus told Jimmy Kimmel during a visit to his late-night show Wednesday. Veep has never identified which party Selina and her staff belong to, which, she added, "has worked very well, particularly now, because everything is so polarized."
That decision results in real politicians, both Democrat and Republican, being fans of Veep — including former President Barack Obama and Romney, who lost to Obama in 2012.
"It was really useful [to speak with Romney] because we really wanted to talk to him about what it's like to lose," said Louis-Dreyfus on Jimmy Kimmel Live! "The thing about Mitt Romney is, he is very dedicated to his family and he has a life well beyond politics, which of course Selina Meyer does not."
Showrunner David Mandel spoke to THR about Romney's influence on Selina's sixth-season journey after the premiere, explaining how "un-Selina" Romney is, which helped them better map out her trajectory.
"He's a wealthy gentleman with this incredible support system," said Mandel. "Selina doesn't care about family or have her mother's money anymore, so she doesn't have that to fall back on. All the things that helped him when he lost, she has none of that. We realized she's going to have it really hard."
Louis-Dreyfus said they even took a line right from Romney's mouth and used it in the show.
When asking him about his memorable "47 percent" moment during the campaign (when a leaked video of him claiming 47 percent of Americans don't pay income taxes went viral), this is what he told the Veep star.
"The truth is, when you're running, if you're explaining, you're losing," she said, quoting Romney. "I thought that was such a great expression, and we put it into the show."
She also revealed the story behind casting guest star Amy Brenneman, who appears on Sunday's episode as Selina's old college roommate.
"Last year we had a scene in the show in which Richard Splett [Sam Richardson] is having a conversation with another character and is very nervous and he starts talking about a movie he likes, Heat, and the two actors in Heat being so fabulous, such heavy hitters: 'De Niro and Brenneman,'" she explained. "For those of you who don't know, the real actor was [Al] Pacino."
She said the Leftovers actress is a big fan of Veep and tweeted at the star: "I love your show. I'd love to be in it. Maybe I could play Selina's college roommate that she experimented sexually with" (referencing a joke from the show).
On Sunday's episode, Selina and her team visit her old alma mater, Smith College, while in pursuit of her plans for a presidential library, and Brenneman plays her former roommate who is now president of the school. Sexual experimentation jokes ensue.
After hearing both of her stories, Kimmel called Romney and Brenneman "uncredited" writers on the upcoming season. "You should give Mitt and Amy one of your Emmys," he joked to Louis-Dreyfus. "You have too many anyway." | {
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But that doesn’t appear to be happening. Instead, her entry into the race seems to have been greeted with pleasure — which tells us something interesting about the Democratic Party right now, particularly in contrast to its opponents.
It’s not that liberal Democrats don’t want the most liberal candidate possible in every race, all else being equal. It’s that they seem to have a nuanced view of what “all else being equal” means. In a state like Arizona — relatively conservative but getting more purple all the time — a candidate like Sinema might have the best chance to pick up a precious seat. Democrats seem to realize that it’s not necessary to make every race an ideological fight to the death within their party.
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The contrast with the GOP — which just had a remarkable primary runoff in Alabama, in which the president and the Senate majority leader endorsed a candidate who was vilified by the president’s former chief political adviser for not being a true enough embodiment of the president’s vision — couldn’t be more striking. Just what is making these Democrats so darn pragmatic?
The biggest reason may be that the market for ideological warfare within the Democratic Party just isn’t as robust as it is within the Republican Party. And boy, is it ever robust in the GOP. That’s what Stephen K. Bannon has recognized, which is why in the wake of Roy Moore’s victory in Alabama he’s now planning to promote primaries against other Republican incumbents. On a personal level, it’s obvious that Bannon is most comfortable when he’s waging a guerrilla war against the powers that be, whether it’s in his party or the other party. And there are lots of Republican base voters who feel the same way. They may have particular grievances against the Republican “establishment,” but mostly they just like fighting the establishment. The fight itself — a noble rebellion of idealists against hidebound fat cats who have become too comfortable to stand up for what’s right — is the whole point.
Are there Democrats who have the same perspective? Yes, there are. Many of them associated themselves with Bernie Sanders’s 2016 presidential campaign. But relative to the Republicans, their numbers are much smaller. And at the moment, they seem to be happy to have arguments about substance and tactics — such as what sort of health-care system Democrats should want and how they should advocate for it — in a context more geared to the 2020 presidential election than to House and Senate races in 2018.
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That could change between now and next November. But it appears that Democrats are looking at congressional races through a much more pragmatic lens. Another reason is that, unlike Republicans, they actually take governing seriously. If the past decade or so — both the experience Democrats had when they controlled Congress under Barack Obama and what Republicans are going through now — has taught them anything, it’s that legislating is hard. Not only do you need to have put in the work to prepare the policies you want to advance; you also need a coalition of members that can be managed and focused to get things accomplished. Promoting internal wars might feel good in the moment, but it can make the the point of the whole exercise — changing laws and solving problems — much more difficult down the road.
That doesn’t mean that liberal Democrats are going to eschew strongly liberal candidates and flock to centrists. But it may mean that at certain times, they’ll decide to put aside ideological fights for another day. They may look at a race like Arizona and say, “okay, so Sinema is never going to be my favorite senator. But if she’s the strongest Democratic candidate in this particular election in this particular state, I’m not going to try to turn the primary into an ideological bloodbath.” With 2018 presenting the possibility of a genuine wave election that gives Democrats the House and maybe even the Senate, the stakes of every race become incredibly high.
If it holds, that pragmatic outlook could also be explained by the fact that there’s going to be a much better time for that ideological bloodbath: the 2020 presidential primaries. There could be dozens of candidates of a variety of ideological stripes running for president, and the debate will be broad and encompassing, about the damage of the Trump years, the future of the Democratic Party and fundamental questions about where America is and where it should go. It’s a lot easier to get worked up about that than about the often-parochial discussions that can dominate a House or even a Senate race.
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There’s one more factor at work: Not only are the substantive differences among Democrats actually pretty minor, but also the party has been moving left recently in ways that tend to defuse whatever anger the base might feel. Single-payer health care is on its way to becoming a consensus position among Democrats, to take just one example. It takes some effort to vilify candidates who have come around to your position on issue after issue. | {
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Brown received a warm reception from the crowd at the Northeast Republican Leadership Conference. Flinty New Englanders all, attendees said he'd have to work to earn their votes. But they were clearly eager for a big-name candidate to take on the Democratic incumbent, Jeanne Shaheen.
"It's a game-changing moment for New Hampshire," said Jim Merrill, who directed both of Mitt Romney's New Hampshire campaigns. "This instantly catapults the race to the top tier nationally." Brown, he said, would "put Senator Shaheen on defense and make sure it's a long, hot summer for her."
Merrill and others believe Shaheen, a former governor finishing her first Senate term, is vulnerable because of her vote for Obamacare and the "D" next to her name, at a time when the president's approval rating has been sinking like a stone. Sure, he's a recent import—Brown recently made his longtime vacation home in Rye his primary residence—but a sizable percentage of Granite Staters get their television and radio stations from Boston, giving Brown a level of name recognition that likely outweighs the carpetbagger rap.
Many New Hampshire Republicans recall driving across the border to campaign for Brown in 2010. "I made a lot of phone calls for Scott Brown in that special election—a lot of us did," said Mark Vincent of Amherst, whose role as a state GOP official barred him from making an endorsement ahead of the September primary. "I'm from Massachusetts originally, so that was a very proud day for me."
Brown is counting on those residual warm memories, and not the fresher recollections of his 2012 loss to Democrat Elizabeth Warren. Can he win this time? The most recent public poll, released this week by Suffolk University, showed Brown losing to Shaheen by 13 percentage points; others have shown a closer race, though none has shown him winning. Still, New Hampshire, a state Obama won by about six points last time, is certainly friendlier territory for Brown than Massachusetts, which Obama won by 23.
And that, of course, was why Scott Brown was here, telling the crowd about the tour he planned to undertake to introduce himself to the people of New Hampshire, "listen to them, and learn of their concerns."
Rubens, one of Brown's three likely Republican primary opponents—the others are a kooky former senator who's been living in Florida and a social-conservative activist—wasn't buying it. "Washington tried to feed us Obamacare and now Washington is trying to feed us a candidate," he grumbled. "I've been on a listening tour of New Hampshire for 40 years, if you catch my drift."
We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to [email protected]. | {
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Despite the growing number of HIV diagnoses in eastern Europe, governments have yet to implement programs that would help.
Russia has reached an unprecedented number of HIV cases compared to the rest of Europe. One million Russians are currently living with HIV — a 60 percent increase from ten years ago and an 8 percent increase from the previous year, according to NAM's AIDS Map.
Researchers found that Russia’s 98,177 new HIV diagnoses in 2015 equate to one Russian with HIV out of every 1,493 people in the country. In comparison, according to Kaiser Family Foundation, in the U.S. there are 16.5 people with HIV out of every 100,000 people. Overall, when considering the other 55,230 diagnoses throughout the rest of the World Health Organization’s Europe region, it was found that nearly two-thirds of new HIV cases in Europe are in Russia (despite the country representing less than half the population of Eastern Europe).
So what’s the deal with Russia?
The country of 143 million people has refused to implement programs that could slow — let alone reverse — the high rates of HIV. One reason for this is the social stigma around HIV. In the ultra-conservative and LGBT hostile country, the vast majority of citizens believe that HIV is a result of gay sex (rather than say drug use, or condomless heterosexual sex). Views like these lead to a total misunderstanding about how HIV is transmitted, and create additional reasons for why people don't to get tested.
In 2012 — in a shocking demonstration of ignorance and misinformation — the Russian government blamed condoms for spreading HIV and cast doubt on statistics that showed increasing rates of HIV. In that kind of environment, sexually transmitted infections can spread like wildfire, and HIV rates continued to climb. It's gotten so bad that Russia’s State Duma health committee actually suggested mandatory HIV testing for every couple intent on getting married.
Meanwhile other countries in central Europe (Poland, Cyprus, and Turkey, to name a few) have seen their HIV rates remain low, despite having a significant increase of new diagnoses in 2010. Eastern European countries like Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia have seen HIV rates fall since 2010. According to Avert, 1.5 million people were living with HIV in Eastern Europe and Central Asia in 2014. Of that number, 51 percent had contracted the virus by injection drug use. Russia, by far, has the highest number of injection drug users — 1.8 million compared to nearly 3 million overall in the other regions combined. Yet despite the epidemic of injection drug use, Russia’s government has not implemented programs or initiatives to either fight the drug use or help prevent or treat HIV. | {
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In probably the scrappiest game so far in Copa America, the United States pulled off a 1-0 win over Paraguay. A total of nine yellow cards were shown with six going towards the US and three to Paraguay. Right back DeAndre Yedlin lost his cool for just a minute in the game and earned two yellow cards in a 30 second span. US manager Jurgen Klinsmann commented on the two yellow cards after he was seen arguing with the ref after the second yellow.
“The red card that DeAndre got, the coaches showed me. It’s two yellows. It’s totally fine,” Klinsmann stated.
USMNT Qualifies for Copa America Quarterfinals After 1-0 Win over Paraguay
Coming into the game, Alejandro Bedoya, Fabian Johnson and John Brooks were already on yellow cards and another yellow would mean they would miss the quarter finals. The yellow cards carry over into the quarter finals, but seven different players in today’s game now have a yellow card (Bradley, Wood, Orozco, Jones, Bedoya, Brooks, Johnson).
In the statistics category, Paraguay dominated the game. And it was not even close. La Albirroja had a total of six shots in the first half alone with half on target. In the entire game, Paraguay completed exactly 400 passes with 52 incomplete passes. Paraguay had more complete passes in the first half than the US had all game. Paraguay completed 171 in the first half and US completed 163 total passes.
There’s a mindset in soccer where it doesn’t matter how much possession a team has in a game, it’s what you do with the ball when you have it. That saying would ring true for Paraguay as they had 60% possession without a goal to show for it. Paraguay absolutely needed a win to go through to the quarterfinals. It was quite literally win or go home. They came out guns blazing and ready to fire on all cylinders. But the US out-performed them in one category and that was in the hustle department.
Paraguay was through on goal and they are known for being lethal in transition. It was a three on one situation. Having a counterattack that off balanced usually should lead to a goal. But Brooks thought other wise. This match was possibly the best performance the Hertha Berlin-based centerback has had in a US kit. He had a game leading 14 clearances and five steals. He was named deservedly Budweiser Man of the Match. Along with the defensive performance, the hustle was shown in the recoveries category. They had 27 total ball recoveries, a huge number which came about by US’ 74% pass accuracy.
The lone goal was scored by Clint Dempsey in the 27th minute. Gyasi Zardes made a low percentage cross into the box where Dempsey tapped the ball into the net on the American Outlaws side of the field. Zardes nearly had a goal himself but Paraguay veteran goalkeeper Justo Villar pounced on the ball after a poor touch, which Zardes is known for doing. Paraguay had a chance to equalize in the 85th minute, but the potential goal was waved off after Gustavo Gomez was found to be just a bit offsides. Goalkeeper Brad Guzan late in the game made a tremendous double save to keep the score line at 1-0. | {
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Republican controlled states across the US are whittling away the landmark Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade which enshrined a woman’s right to an abortion. On Friday the Florida State Senate approved a bill which would require doctors to perform a medical exam to determine a fetus’ viability before allowing an abortion thereby outlawing abortions possibly earlier than the 20th week of pregnancy.
Twenty week mid-pregnancy abortion bans have been instituted in a number of states including Alabama, Arkansas and Louisiana. In Mississippi, Governor Phil Bryant signed a bill last week banning abortions at 20 weeks of gestational age with no exceptions for rape or incest. And Texas Republican Governor Rick Perry has gone a step further by not only banning abortions after 20 weeks but also requiring that any doctor performing an abortion have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic, a requirement which is near impossible in a State where most of the hospitals are religiously affiliated. Texas, the second largest state in the country now has only 5 abortion clinics.
And, laws which grant fetuses full constitutional rights are also on the rise. In Tennessee, Governor Bill Haslam is expected to sign a bill allowing the state to file criminal charges against pregnant women if they’ve taken illegal drugs which have resulted in a miscarriage, stillbirth or a newborn with symptoms of drug withdrawal. Mothers could potentially face jail times of up to 15 years if the bill grants personhood to a fetus.
GUEST: Loretta Ross, former Coordinator of SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Health Collective | {
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Scientists find that mesenchymal progenitors can be grown without use of animal derived compounds, making strides in creation of clinical grade bone, as published in Stem Cell Research and Therapy.
Scientists from the New York Stem Cell Foundation have identified 2 types of growth media that can support effective expansion of mesenchymal progenitor cells from stem cells in a clinically compatible, GMP setting for treatment of bone disease and/or injury. It is essential to produce high quality cells that meet safety requirements to bring effective cellular therapies to patients in need, says Susan L. Solomon, CEO of NYSCF.
MPs resemble MSCs which can go on to form a variety of cell types including bone cells, muscle cells, fat cells, and cartilage cells, as well as modulate behavior of other types of cells. MSCs are often scarce and don’t expand well enough to provide the amounts of cells need for an effective therapy; while MPs can be produced in large numbers for each patient when generated from iPSCs and show promise for the treatment of heart, blood, immune diseases, and repair of damaged bone and cartilage.
MPs have been derived from iPSCs in the past, but not in a growth medium without animal derived compounds, the team is happy to find MP cells grown in GMP compliant media showed the same biological and functional properties as those grown in research grade media with animal derived products, says Ralph Lauren, PhD.
MP cells grown in a medium supplemented with fetal bovine serum were compared with MP cells grown in two different xeno free medias without animal products: one supplemented with human platelet lysates and the other in a commercial high performance GMP medium. While MPs grown in xeno free and GMP media showed slightly different morphology, expansion potential, gene expression, and cytokine profile than those grown in the animal product containing medium the cells were found to be healthy and functional in the new conditions.
According to the scientists, collectively results show promise for eventual application of these MP cells into cellular therapies. | {
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Nashville SC went to Indianapolis and fought for a 0-0 draw in a tight, defensive affair. Let's take a look at some stats and tactics to get a better look at the result.
xG
It was the second match of the week for Nashville, and neither was filled with chances.
Nashville actually had a better xG value by about 33%. A big part of this is that four out of Indy's five shots inside the box were headed, which is a lower percentage shot than shots taken with the foot. Nashville only had one headed attempt, coming from Bradley Bourgeois in the 70th minute.
Nashville did most of their damage in the first half, only taking three shots in the second. Their best chance of the night came in the 16th minute, after Lebo Moloto played Tucker Hume in on goal.
CHANCES
The phrase "matches are won and lost in the midfield" is used a lot, probably because it's true. The majority of this match was played in the midfield.
Both teams had issues getting into the final third, but Nashville particularly couldn't break through Indy's defensive line. They had a couple opportunities in the first half, but in the second half Smith had his team sit back and focus on keeping the clean sheet.
Nashville's first half passes (left) vs second half (right)
Nashville's two best chances both came from Tucker Hume. The first came after Lebo Moloto chipped a fantastic ball over the top, allowing Hume to get 1v1 with goalie Evan Newton. Hume took one too many touches, allowing Newton to make the save.
The other big chance came in the 62nd minute. Ropapa Mensah found space on the right wing, isolating Kenny Walker 1v1.
Mensah gets a half step on Walker and plays a gorgeous ball into the box, beating three Indy players and putting the ball on Hume's left foot.
Hume gets on the ball, but when he strikes it, he's stretching and leaning back. It was a decent enough run, but a little late. Even being a half step earlier there would have allowed Hume to keep his body over the ball and put it on target, potentially even scoring. Hume is a good player, and has shown his scoring ability in the past, but that chance shows the difference between him and a player like Daniel Ríos. Ríos times his runs to perfection, and is consistently able to put his shots on target, converting 36% of his chances this season (Hume has converted 14%). It was the first match this season in which Ríos didn't start, and his absence showed just how valuable he is to this team.
RETURN OF THE 352
After using a 4231 formation for the past four matches, Gary Smith returned to a 352. Indy Eleven have used a 343 all season, and the move seemed designed in large part to counter this. Both sides limited the other's effectiveness from central areas, forcing their opponent to rely on crosses and balls served in from wide areas.
PLAYING FOR A POINT
We've talked on the pod about there being instances where a single point on the road is a good result, and although this wasn't a fun one to watch, I think it's fair to say that a point was a good result. Nashville had their moments to get ahead, but in general they seemed focused on keeping Indy off the scoresheet.
Nashville got plenty of bodies behind the ball, especially in the second half.
They defended in two banks of four, with the back five sitting just inside their box and the midfield just outside. After he came on, Kharlton Belmar tracked back and dropped into midfield at times, giving Moloto more of a free role underneath Ríos. It wasn't particularly thrilling, but it was quite effective, limiting Indy's effectiveness in the final third. After conceding eight goals in the previous six matches, they've kept two clean sheets in a row. With a bye this weekend after their Open Cup match, they'll have time to rest and get players back to full health after a stretch of eight games in 24 days.
Neither match was pretty, but good teams find ways to get results even when they're not in the greatest run of form. Nashville hasn't been in the greatest run of form, but for the most part they've gotten results.
| {
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What did you do yesterday to commemorate our nation’s fallen soldiers? When we are at home in Ann Arbor, we go to a neighborhood event, a fun celebration marked by a children’s parade, candy thrown to the crowd and finally a short solemn reading of the names of soldiers who were killed in the previous year. Then we eat donuts. It’s quite different from the events we witnessed yesterday in a small town up north.
How do these two compare with the events in your area?
In northern Michigan, the ceremonies were long on solemnity, short on celebration and fun. The events started at a pavilion in town with Boy Scouts lowering Old Glory to half mast. Veterans in uniform from WW II, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan were in attendance. An honor guard marched to the nearby river to give a 21-gun salute. Right before they fired, a woman cast a bouquet of flowers into the current.
The assembled troops then marched through town to the Memorial Park, where wreaths were laid at a memorial for all soldiers and another for veterans of the Vietnam War. They paused there. Then, they marched to the local cemetery for the final service. In the span of those few minutes, my young son went up to a grizzled Vietnam vet, shook his hand, and thanked him for his service. I had noticed this vet at the start of the march to the Memorial Park. He had stepped off late, pausing to take a sip from a flask, slipping it into his shirt pocket.
I noticed his K-9 patch and burgundy beret with Scout Dog on it. I asked him to explain what he did. He and his German Shepard were the first into the jungle, he said, sent ahead of the main squad, with the hazardous task of identifying threats and ambushes ahead. “My dog saved me more than once,” he said. As we said goodbye, I reached out to shake his hand. His hand trembled but his grip was strong and my knuckles popped.
We walked back to our car. My son asked a few questions about the Vietnam vet and the ceremonies. “I felt like I was going to cry,” he said.
“Me, too,” I replied.
What were Memorial Day events like in your area?
Do we do enough to honor the fallen?
How about the vets who return home?
Please leave a comment below: | {
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The TTC will only make a few changes to its schedules for the November and December board periods.
November 18, 2018
Express Service Rebranding
Five routes will be rebranded into the new 900-series of Express routes. In all cases there is no increase in service, only a change in the route number.
41E Keele express becomes 941
95E York Mills express becomes 995
131E Nugget express becomes 903, and will interline with 131 “local” service between STC and Old Finch.
188 Kipling Rocket becomes 944 Kipling South Express.
192 Airport Rocket becomes 900.
It will be interesting to see how long the 192 route number will live on in TTC maps to confuse the tourists.
Construction Changes
Work at Bathurst Station will be complete and the bus routes will resume their normal platform assignments.
Work at Kennedy Station will be complete to the point that routes normally on the north side of the bus terminal can use their regular bays.
Service Changes
One additional gap train will be scheduled on 1 Yonge University during each of the peak periods to fill service gaps.
Service on 505 Dundas (still operating as a bus route) will be rescheduled to remove some of the excessive running time with reduction of scheduled vehicles in some cases, and service improvements in others, notably Saturday evenings.
Service on 511 Bathurst (also still operating as a bus route) will return to the split version with a short turn at Front Street.
81 Thorncliffe Park will be changed so that it circles Thorncliffe counterclockwise at all operating hours rather than changing direction at 3 pm. The official “end of the line” will be moved out of the loop to Thorncliffe and Overlea so that passengers do not sit part way around the loop while the bus waits for its time. This will improve transfer connections with other routes on Overlea.
Weekday Run As Directed service will be reallocated as weekend Standby and Service Relief for the November-December shopping season including Sunday, December 23 (which is technically part of the next schedule period).
Other minor changes are listed in the details linked below.
December 23, 2018
For the two week holiday period, the usual arrangements will apply with many routes reverting to summer schedules.
No subway construction buses will be scheduled as there are no planned shutdowns during the holidays.
Late night service will be operated on most routes on New Year’s Eve. There has not yet been announcement about a sponsor for free service.
[The table linked here was corrected at:
11:15 pm on October 20, 2018 to reflect that the Keele express buses terminate at Finch West, not at Pioneer Village, and at
10:00 pm on October 21, 2018 to specify (a) articulated buses on the 41 Keele local service and (b) to include “before” figures that had been omitted.]
2018.11.18_Service_Changes | {
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Spaceflight is exciting, and you don’t have to be a “Rocket Scientist” to share in the excitement! 16.00x makes the basics of spaceflight accessible to everyone. Join MIT Professor Jeffrey Hoffman, a former NASA astronaut who made five spaceflights and was the first astronaut to log 1000 hours on the Space Shuttle, as he teaches you the core principles behind space travel and exploration. The course will cover how rockets work, how spacecraft move in orbit, how we create artificial environments inside spacecraft to keep astronauts alive and healthy, what it’s like living in a world without gravity, how the human body adapts to space, and how spacewalks happen, plus more. Many lessons will be illustrated with Professor Hoffman’s own experiences in space. | {
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It's a shared sentiment by many in the Ontario rural community of Grey Highlands that Emanuel Bauman has paid enough for the accidental death of his four-year-old son.
"I think it's horrible, horrible. He has to live with his son dying and now maybe he's going to do time?" said Donna Lisanti, who works at a local farm equipment supplier.
"It was a farm accident. It's not like he went with the intent of wanting to kill his son or kill anybody for that matter."
Yet the local farmer will appear at the Owen Sound Court House on Thursday afternoon, facing a possible jail sentence in what is believed to be a precedent-setting case.
In May, Bauman was found guilty of criminal negligence in the death of his son Steven, who died after falling out of a skid steer bucket.
Bill Jameson acknowledges that 'rural country' residents don’t always abide by the safety rules as they should. (Mark Gollom/CBC)
In her written decision, Justice Julia Morneau of the Ontario Court of Justice noted that neither she, nor the Crown attorney nor Bauman's lawyer could find any similar cases in criminal law involving a child dying in a farm accident.
And that's why many within the community believe the law has gone too far by finding Bauman criminally culpable.
"It is my sincere hope that mercy triumphs over judgment," said Angela Fawcett-Demmans, who owns a general store in the area.
Living in rural country means, said Bill Jameson, who grew up in the area, "we don't always abide by the safety rules as we should."
"Bad enough that he lost his son," said Jameson. "You'd think that would be enough punishment."
Bauman and his family are part of the Mennonite community in Grey Highlands, a rural farm area located about 110 kilometres northwest of Toronto.
Lisanti said he would come to the shop, often in a horse and buggy, or get someone else to drive him.
"He's a great guy," she said.
At the Bauman farm, huge piles of wood for sale are stacked sky high. But in front of the two-storey white farm house is a warning sign for the large trucks that come on to the property to load up: Watch for children.
It was here, almost a year ago on Aug. 30, that Bauman, then 32, was building a laneway on his farm, using a skid steer to pull a trailer full of wood chips.
Bauman is part of the Mennonite community in Grey Highlands, an area about 110 kilometres northwest of Toronto. (Robert Krbavac/CBC)
As he pulled the trailer, the chips would land in the laneway. Meanwhile, his two children, Luke, 7, and Steven, 4, were standing in the skid steer's front-end bucket.
At some point, as Bauman's attention was diverted while looking back, Steven fell out of the bucket.
Bauman found him on the ground, his head trapped under the bucket. He immediately called emergency services.
His neighbour recalled the scene that followed.
"I just got home and I didn't know what was going on," said Scott Murison. "When I saw … the [air] ambulance come in, I thought maybe he had hurt himself on the saw."
Charged with criminal negligence
Steven died from head injuries and his father was charged with criminal negligence. He pleaded not guilty but conceded to everything in the Crown disclosure. Morneau stated in her decision that Bauman has always accepted full moral responsibility, but the question is whether he is criminally responsible for his son's death.
His lawyer, Douglas Grace, argued Bauman shouldn't face criminal liability; that this was a tragic accident. But Crown Attorney Peter Leger said Bauman is indeed criminally liable, just by having allowed Steven to be in such a dangerous situation.
Donna Lisanti says it's 'horrible, horrible' that Bauman could face jail time for the death of his son. (Robert Krbavac/CBC)
Perhaps not surprisingly, an expert reported to the court that it would never be safe for children to ride in the bucket of a skid steer. And Bauman himself told police that he knew his sons shouldn't have been in the bucket.
"A lot of times I never thought of letting them be there," he told police, according to Morneau's decision.
Still, he acquiesced to Steven's pleas, who was excited about riding in the bucket.
Morneau herself acknowledged farmers have, for generations, not necessarily made safety a priority.
"Children have ridden with their fathers on their tractors for generations. Objectively assessed those tractor rides … have always been dangerous," she wrote.
'Completely foreseeable'
Fawcett-Demmans, the general store owner, said she grew up on a farm where her dad often let her ride in the tractor bucket.
"This so easily could have been our story," she said.
And Lisanti said she remembers as a kid she always rode on her dad's tractor "or on the bailer."
But Morneau said this case is different and that Bauman must have known his attention, at times, would be diverted from the children.
"Any reasonably prudent parent would realize that a four-year-old child could fall from this bucket in seconds with devastating consequences."
"It was completely foreseeable that if Steven fell from the bucket as the machine moved forward, that he would suffer serious bodily harm or death," Morneau wrote.
The Crown has recommended a sentence of two years less a day, three years probation and a driving prohibition of 10 years, according to the Owen Sound Sun Times.
Bauman's lawyer has argued for a suspended sentence with two or three years of probation, along with other conditions such as speaking to others in the community about farm safety, the Sun Times reported.
Some residents believe Bauman should face legal consequences. Jane McNaulty, for example, believes he should have been charged.
"He was being neglectful. Just not cautious enough," she said.
But being sentenced to jail time, may be a little extreme, she added.
"They needed to charge him with something but that's going a little too far because what's going to happen to his family when he's gone." | {
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Except of course that it is not. An outbreak of protectionism is just what the still-fragile economic recovery doesn't need. China makes an easy scapegoat for America's ills, but it is not the cause, nor would making it revalue its currency provide the solution. The debate is echoed in Europe, where Germany – an exporter second only to China – finds itself blamed for the eurozone crisis. If only Germany would make itself less competitive, if only Germany would save, invest and export less, then everybody else would be fine. The virtuous find themselves depicted as the villainous. If the argument were not so perverse, it would be laughable. | {
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She was 4 when she was kidnapped from her garden in 1954, and abandoned in a Colombian jungle where she was raised by Capuchin monkeys for 5 years, until she was discovered by hunters and sold to a brothel in the city of Cúcuta. She lived as a street urchin enslaved by a mafia family, before being saved by a neighbor and eventually moving to Bradford, Yorkshire.
An incredible, extreme, unbelievable tale or a radical case of adaptation and survival? In December 2012, as part of a new National Geographic documentary Woman Raised by Monkeys, she traveled back to South America in an attempt to uncover her mysterious past. In The Girl With No Name: The Incredible True Story of the Girl Raised by Monkeys she shared her experience with the world; Marina, along with her daughter Vanessa, has pieced together a foggy memoir.
After being dumped into the Colombian rainforest, half-drugged, terrified, and starved, she bumped into a troop of Capuchin monkeys. She ate what they ate and learned to fend for herself, eating berries and roots, nabbing bananas dropped by the monkeys, climbing trees and walking on all fours. Capuchins are well-mannered towards humans, so they eventually accepted Marina into their territory. Though she found a family with the monkeys, she lost the ability to speak, lost all inhibitions, lost any real sense of being human, and replaced the structure of human society with the social mores of her new simian family.
Marina would get frightened by armed hunters who would occasionally visit the jungle. But one fateful day, she pleaded in grunts for them to rescue her, naked and walking like a monkey. They did… and ironically this is where her story became more harrowing. At 10, she was sold to a brothel (below) for a parrot, where she was named Gloria. Forced to clean, she was regularly beaten. Just before she was about to be given to her first man, she escaped.
After her escape, she lived on the streets of Cúcuta with other homeless children, and was renamed Pony Malta. She put the skills she had learned in the jungle to good use, and survived as all the homeless children survived.
One day Marina found a family who had agreed to take her on, and renamed her Rosalba. But it turned out that they were notorious criminals, and they enslaved her. She fled with the help of a neighbor, a woman called Maruja and was flown to Bogotá. At 14, she was adopted by Maria, Maruja’s daughter. Marina was freed… and she called herself Luz Marina – Luz, after a Colombian beauty queen.
Her adoptive family in 1977 sent their children to Bradford. Marina followed as their nanny. She met John Chapman at church and they fell in love. Six months later they were married.
However, Marina’s transition into civilized culture wasn’t easy. She focused on becoming normal. She trained as a cook, eventually becoming chef at Bradford’s National Media Museum. She reined in the urge to walk like a monkey. She became a respected member of the church, and a loving mother, forever making sure her children and grandchildren did not go hungry.
“When I came out of the jungle, I had to learn how to sit in a chair, how to open doors, sanitation, all the things I’d never done. I’m still really bad in terms of sitting down and behaving like anybody else. I watch people eating their food and I copy them. I felt I’d been a bad person as a child, and that stays with you. Because you were brought up in a brothel house, you feel bad about it. You feel you shouldn’t mention it to anybody. Your family adopt you as a child and you think if you tell them, they will chuck you out. I was frightened people would try to exorcise me because they think you’ve got something vile in your life,” she told The Guardian.
Marina began to understand how her early experiences would go on to shape her. “You do learn a lot of instinct from animals, especially when you have to survive on the streets in a city. When you have to defend yourself, you know how to fight back. Whenever I’ve been attacked, I always hit before they hit me. You become a survivor, you become resilient and hard. I consider myself a really hard person. Tough. I take any problem I’ve got and get on with it, because you just have to carry on to survive,” she added.
Marina and her family stand by her story. The proceeds from the book are being donated to a charity for abandoned children. “We’re just telling our family story, and it doesn’t matter what people think really,” Vanessa said.
Marina Chapman may live a quiet life now, but the story of her childhood is more akin to a wild fairytale – The Huffington Post
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Yes. I took LSD. At a psychedelic trance festival called Karmaclysm. No state of mind like that can be put into words, but I have done my best to describe it. Uploaded as PDF to preserve formatting that I developed in OpenOffice.
karmaclysm
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C++ User Group Meetings in July 2016
published at 01.07.2016 11:47 by Jens Weller
The montly overview of upcoming C++ User Group Meetings. In July there are 23 C++ User Groups meeting already, and a few more are probably still planning their meetings.
There are 2 new C++ User Groups: Stockholm and Copenhagen.
The Meetings
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A large explosion has shaken the downtown area of the Lebanese capital, killing former government minister Mohammed Shattah. Lebanese television showed footage of dead bodies lying near the wreckage.
At least 5 people were killed in the explosion that went off just a few hundred meters from the parliament building and other official government headquarters, said Reuters, citing security sources.
Ambulances rushed to the site of the explosion. Almustaqbal TV Lebanon broadcast footage of the aftermath, with burning cars and rubble littering the street.
The Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation reported the blast was caused by a booby-trapped car.
Mohammed Shattah had previously been advisor to former Prime Ministers Fuad Siniora and Saad Hariri and had also served as Lebanon’s envoy to Washington.
Former Prime Minister Hariri laid the blame for the attack at the feet of Hezbollah following the attack.
Shattah had reportedly been on his way to a meeting of the March 14 Alliance due to be held at the Center House in the downtown area, when his convoy was hit by the blast.
The Alliance is made up of representatives from political parties and individuals who are against the current regime in neighboring Syria. The on-going violence in Syria has spilled over the border into neighboring Lebanon on a number of occasions, where the population is divided over its support of embattled President Bashar Assad.
Mohammed Shattah was an outspoken critic of Bashar Assad and had openly voiced his opposition to the influence of Hezbollah in Lebanon. | {
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A new exchange-traded fund has been trading for nearly a month with the goal of helping people make sure that their money is going towards making America great again.
The Point Bridge GOP Stock Tracker, which invests exclusively in companies that support the Republican Party and President Donald J. Trump, even trades under the ticker MAGA. Other ETF’s focus on socially responsible investing, which generally lean to the left and focus on issues such as green energy, or specific industries and products. The MAGA ETF appears to be the first of its kind, focusing on politically responsible investing.
Point Bridge Capital founder and CEO Hal Lambert told Big League Politics to ensure the companies are politically responsible, he reviews the political contribution data of PACs of possible investments.
Trending: ILHAN’S DISTRICT: 17-Year-Old GOP Volunteer Shot Dead Outside of Gas Station in Minneapolis
Lambert, who launched Point Bridge in 2013 and the Republican stock ETF on Sept. 7, said he started by looking at a commonly followed index.
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“What I did was I took the S&P 500 and I screened it for the top 150 Republican supporting stocks from a standpoint of political contributions,” he said.
“I looked at the PACs of the companies and employees — and whether or not they supported Republican candidates,” he said. “I then created an index which is used for the ETF which is traded like a stock on the stock exchange.”
People can buy it anywhere that they have a brokerage account, and it trades like a stock., he said.
Lambert said the idea for the ETF came to him because companies are becoming very vocal with their political alliances, often leading to boycotts, while people don’t realize they are still contributing to these very companies through their mutual funds.
“What gave me the idea is that people have been very upset about what is going on, as companies have become very political,” he said.
“Not only are they giving money politically, but they are also speaking out publicly like never before,” he said. “People were getting upset and you see people boycotting particular companies, but they didn’t realize that they own these same stocks in their mutual funds. So, on the one hand, they are boycotting Starbucks or Target, but they are losing money in the mutual fund they own and they don’t realize it.”
With the MAGA EFT, people, who may not be able to give money to a candidate, can do it this way through their investments,” he said.
“It’s important because there’s a lot of money being given, and people should have the option to invest with companies that are supporting their types of candidates,” he said.
One recent and highly controversial issue where this ETF could help people, Lambert said, is with the recent ‘Take a Knee’ campaign and subsequent ESPN boycott.
“One of the latest things that I have been talking about, and will continue to talk about, is Disney and ESPN,” Lambert said, explaining that many people do not realize that Disney owns ESPN. He also noted that Disney is one of the top Democratic political contributors. “People have turned off ESPN, which really hurt Disney’s stock prices — but many people may not realize that they own Disney in their mutual funds.”
If you're going to #BoycottNFLSponsors, know if you own those companies in your investment funds? @MAGAindex https://t.co/0GRz37aTBf — Hal Lambert (@MAGAindex) September 25, 2017
Lambert said that with many of these big controversies there is usually a political agenda, and you can spot them by looking at a company’s political contributions.
“People don’t realize that a lot of these companies are widely held, Disney being one of them, yet Disney is probably one of the top companies that have caused this whole controversy with people kneeling for the national anthem,” Lambert said.
Those who are interested in the ETF, or just keeping up with where companies are spending their money politically, can follow Lambert’s efforts on Twitter or through his website InvestPolitically.com. | {
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Volgens De Wever lopen er nog te veel mensen rond met radicale ideeën die door de mazen van het politienet glippen. "Ik stel vast dat na de terreuraanslagen het democratisch debat is begonnen over inlichtingenmethodes en welke mogen worden gebruikt om mensen op te volgen. Ik denk dat het tijd is voor een soort Patriot Act, maar wel met maximaal respect voor onze burgerrechten en vrijheden", zei hij aan Radio 2 Antwerpen.
Hoe die Belgische Patriot Act er dan moet uitzien, laat De Wever vooralsnog in het midden. Hij benadrukt wel dat de maatregelen die de regering heeft genomen helemaal in de goede richting gaan. | {
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One of the biggest deals at the Cannes Film Festival this year was fledging studio STX ponying up a staggering $50 million for the international rights to Martin Scorsese‘s “The Irishman.” It’s a figure that matches the huge expectations that are greeting the movie, before a frame has been shot, that will see Scorsese potentially work with a cast including Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Joe Pesci, and Harvey Keitel. However, it appears one of those names needs a bit more convincing.
According to THR, Joe Pesci has reportedly turned down Scorsese’s offer for a role in the movie. Pesci has pretty much hung up his hat from acting, and hasn’t appeared in a film since 2010’s “Love Ranch,” directed by Taylor Hackford. And Scorsese isn’t the only offer that has come knocking on Pesci’s door.
Last month Louis C.K. revealed he approached Pesci for “Horace and Pete,” and not only did he turn him down, but offered some stinging criticism (“I watched your stand-up, which I can tell you’re just trying, and you’re no good at it…quit that now”).
Can “The Irishamn” be made without Pesci? Definitely, but you have to bet that part of the reason STX plunked down $50 million was the allure of having the movie that would bring back the trio behind “Goodfellas,” “Casino,” and “Raging Bull.” Not to mention it makes marketing a slam dunk as well.
All that said, Scorsese is still hoping to twist Pesci’s arm and get him to appear in the movie, and if anybody can convince the actor to get in front of the camera again, it’s likely to be his old friend. For now, listen to Louis C.K. recount his meeting with Joe Pesci.
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Savage Avengers #5 is in stores on Wednesday from Marvel Comics, by the Gerry Duggan of comics, Gerry Duggan, and Mike Deodato. We've got a preview of the issue below.
The recap page gets us up to speed on the reason this group of Marvel killers has joined together and violated the Avengers' trademark.
And we join the action in Shanghai, where the Savage Avengers do battle with Jhoatun Lau, who is also a centaur.
And the Savage Avengers do what they do best…
…in order to give Wolverine the opening to do what he does best!
Unfortunately, Wolverine's claws are having trouble doing their job thanks to his opponent's own healing factor. How ironic! Luckily, he's willing to improvise.
For more of this — and how could you not want more?! — pick up Savage Avengers #5 on Wednesday.
SAVAGE AVENGERS #5
JUL190949
(W) Gerry Duggan (A) Mike Deodato (CA) David Finch
• The Marrow God has eaten the sentient population of entire planets, but he never had to dance with the Savage Avengers. Kulan Gath is on the verge of defeat…or is that what he wanted the entire time?
• A Pyrrhic victory lights a fuse that will only burn more of the Marvel Universe.
• Plus, the Punisher is curious about Crom…
Parental Advisory
In Shops: Sep 04, 2019
SRP: $3.99 | {
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Advertising Read more
Moscow (AFP)
A giant Orthodox cathedral adorned with images of President Vladimir Putin and Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin is slated to be finished next month to commemorate the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.
The Cathedral of the Armed Forces in a military theme park outside Moscow features a veritable pantheon of the country's top leaders gracing its lush interior alongside God, the Virgin Mary and saints.
Built to coincide with the 75th anniversary of the defeat of the Nazis, the church also glorifies other "feats of arms of the Russian people" including Moscow's takeover of Crimea, the defence ministry said.
Nearly 100 metres (330 feet) tall and crowned by six golden domes, the cathedral will be Russia's third-largest Orthodox Christian church, a ministry spokesman told AFP.
The centrepiece is a colourful series of mosaics that feature Stalin, Putin and top officials including Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev.
Another mosaic features the slogan "Crimea is ours!" -- which has become a nationalist refrain after the peninsula's seizure from Ukraine in 2014.
The project is steeped in symbolism: its bell chamber is 75 metres high to mark the 75th anniversary and melted-down parts of Nazi tanks and planes were used to build its steps.
The ministry spokesman said several thousand workers are labouring around the clock to have the church finished by May 9, when Russia celebrates Victory Day.
"It will be ready by May 9," the spokesman said, adding that he did not know when the church would formally open.
Russia marks the anniversary every year with a military parade through Red Square but this year's event -- which many world leaders had agreed to attend -- was postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The cathedral has come under fire from critics like historian Sergei Bryun who called its interior a "mockery of Russian history and statehood".
Writing in business daily Vedomosti, he noted the irony of an Orthodox Church for the first time featuring an image of Stalin, who clamped down on religion and purged the clergy.
The Russian Orthodox Church dismissed criticism.
"You cannot dismantle the history of our state," archpriest Leonid Kalinin, who heads the Church's art and architecture council, told Govorit Moskva radio.
He defended the depiction of Stalin, pointing out that he led the Soviet Union to victory in World War II, as well as images of masked and armed commandos who took over Crimea in a "bloodless" operation.
© 2020 AFP | {
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North Korea Had Spurned Talks With U.S. Due to Trump’s Latest Sanctions
In the weeks before U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s call Tuesday for talks with Pyongyang, North Korean officials were privately telling their international counterparts that they see little point in discussions with the United States and other key powers, several current and former U.S. and U.N.-based officials told Foreign Policy.
North Koreans complained that Washington reneged on a pledge made earlier this fall to to restart talks with Pyongyang if it halted all nuclear and missile tests for sixty days, according to those sources. Instead of talks, North Korea says, it got slapped with a fresh round of U.S. sanctions.
The development has dealt a blow to diplomatic efforts by the State Department and the United Nations to restart great-power talks with North Korea, which withdrew from those discussions in April 2009 to protest U.N. sanctions.
Pyongyang’s skepticism about the value of negotiations comes just as Tillerson made the administration’s most direct overture for talks yet, saying he was open to sitting down with his North Korean counterparts for a first meeting “without preconditions” — though only after they showed their seriousness by imposing a pause on nuclear and ballistic tests.
But it’s not clear that Tillerson has the full backing of President Donald Trump, who publicly kneecapped previous diplomatic efforts by his secretary of state.
The White House on Wednesday appeared to pour cold water on the idea of an immediate new round of talks. A National Security Council spokesperson said that the North would first have to change its behavior, including but not limited to halting nuclear and missile tests.
“Given North Korea’s most recent missile test, clearly now is not the time,” the NSC spokesperson told FP.
North Korea, meanwhile, appears to be waiting to see how serious the United States really is.
“The North Koreans have put the whole issue of contacts with the Americans on hold,” said Joel Wit, a senior fellow at the U.S.-Korea Institute at the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, who said the North Koreans are likely confused by the contradictory messages emerging from Washington.
“The Trump administration is sending mixed signals, and it is only undermining Secretary Tillerson’s effort to start some sort of dialogue,” Wit said. The administration, he added, “needs to get on the same song sheet, and the White House needs to be backing Tillerson in everything he says.”
The United States and North Korea have been engaged in a mostly secret diplomatic dance for much of the year, according to several published reports. But even before the latest round of U.S. sanctions in November, Pyongyang seemed to have gotten cold feet about the idea of returning to the negotiating table.
In a closed-door briefing to the U.N. Security Council Tuesday night, U.N. Under-Secretary-General Jeffrey Feltman, who just concluded a visit to Pyongyang, said the North Korean government told him that the time is not right for such talks, according to a Security Council diplomat — though Pyongyang is open to continuing discussions with the United Nations. North Korea has sent similar messages to the United States through a number of intermediaries, including the Russians and Chinese envoy Song Tao, who visited Pyongyang in November in what one well-placed diplomat characterized as a “failed” effort to start talks.
The State Department reached out to the North Koreans as early as May, when the State Department’s special representative for North Korea policy, Joseph Yun, traveled to Oslo, Norway, for secret talks with a senior North Korean official, Choe Hon Sui, the director-general of her foreign ministry’s North America bureau, to discuss Washington’s concerns about American detainees.
The following month, one of those detainees, an American university student named Otto Warmbier, was released on the brink of death. He died shortly after.
The talks covered more ground than just prisoners, providing an opening for broader nuclear talks, according to current and former U.S. officials. Tillerson encouraged Yun to maintain his contacts with Choe as well as with diplomats at the North Korean mission to the United Nations to explore the possibility of reopening stalled talks.
For her part, Choe signaled that North Korea had its own red line. Speaking to a group of former U.S. officials in separate meeting in Oslo, Choe said that her government would not enter into talks with the United States if Washington sought to make North Korea give up its nuclear weapons, according to a source familiar with those talks.
As part of his outreach, Yun signaled to the North Koreans that Pyongyang could create an atmosphere for direct talks if they enforced a voluntary moratorium on nuclear and ballistic missile tests for 60 days, according to current and former U.S. officials. The Washington Post previously reported on Yun’s proposal.
Trump followed up on Nov. 21 by relisting North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism and imposed a new round of sanctions. Before the month was over, North Korea launched its most powerful intercontinental ballistic missile ever, a monster Hwasong-15 missile capable of traversing the American mainland.
But North Korea’s interest in talks had already cooled after President Trump delivered a highly provocative address in September to the U.N. General Assembly, where he threatened to “totally destroy” North Korea.
The following month, North Korea’s negotiator, Choe, attended a Moscow conference on nonproliferation along experts and former U.S. officials, including Wendy Sherman, the former U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs. This time, she declined to hold any discussions with any of the Americans.
Instead, she met with Russian officials, and informed them that her government was not prepared to restart nuclear talks with the United States.
“Choe rejected talks when she went to Moscow in October,” said one diplomat briefed on the back-channel talks. “Kim Jong Un clearly said ‘no’ through all the diplomatic channels.”
Still, Trump had not fully closed the door to diplomacy.
In October, the president gave his blessing to an initiative by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres to try a diplomatic approach, several sources said.
During an Oct. 20 White House meeting, the U.N. chief broached the idea of sending a personal envoy to Pyongyang, envisioning it as a way to calm the war of words between Trump and Kim. That meeting came about one month after North Korea’s foreign minister, Ri Yong Ho invited Guterres during the U.N. General Assembly summit to send a personal envoy to Pyongyang to begin discussions on a range of issues.
Trump expressed skepticism that a fresh U.N. initiative could persuade North Korea’s leader to contain his increasingly provocative nuclear activities, but gave enough encouragement for Guterres to dispatch Feltman on a three-day trip to Pyongyang in December.
When he got back, Feltman said there could “only be a diplomatic solution” in North Korea, and underscored the urgency of opening diplomatic channels to “prevent miscalculations” that could lead to war.
Though Feltman told the U.N. Security Council late Tuesday that North Korea wasn’t ready for talks, all the progress that Pyongyang has made on its weapons program — and continued U.S. and U.N. sanctions — might be changing that calculus.
Since it appears to have overcome many of its technical hurdles, North Korea may be ready to come to the table, said Robert Einhorn, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s arms control and nonproliferation initiative.
“I think the North Koreans will wait a few days to see if this is a genuine signal from the Trump administration. They will want to see what the president has to say or tweet about it,” he said.
“But they are undoubtedly getting more pressure from the Chinese, and the Trump administration has done a pretty good job of tightening the screws. They may be beginning to feel the pressure pinch.”
But there are differing views inside the administration as to the prospects of diplomacy, and some officials who are skeptical of talks are more inclined to potential military action against North Korea, former officials and congressional aides said.
For the moment, the White House believes the sanctions are working and it doesn’t need a full-court diplomatic press.
“I think they’re satisfied with the trajectory of the pressure campaign,” said Ely Ratner of the Council on Foreign Relations. “So they’re not going to take their foot off the gas right now,” said Ratner, who was former Vice President Joe Biden’s deputy national security advisor.
The question is whether there’s enough time left to pressure Pyongyang after the latest milestones in long-range missile development.
“It’s unclear there’s enough runway left for the administration to do that, given how quickly the North Koreans are moving,” he said. “And it’s unclear if there’s a negotiating partner on the other side.”
FP staff writer Robbie Gramer contributed to this report. | {
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First times are always difficult, especially when someone is new in VR Porn business and has to make her debut with a threesome. However, on VirtualRealPorn there’s always a silver lining and sensual Turkish Anya Krey will help Russian Alecia Fox with a practice which will cool her nerves; a pussy-licking to get her vagina wet and ready to have an adventure in VR 180º … with you. Grab your oculusgo or any other VR headset you may have, because this time newbie Alecia Fox will make her debut with your penis and expert Anya Krey on a threesome so complete that this sexy blonde’s blowjobs will be those of a master. | {
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NEW YORK (GZERO MEDIA) - Who is to blame for the outbreak of the coronavirus?
The topic is an interesting one considering an unusual public spat between China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian and China's ambassador to the US, Mr Cui Tiankai.
On March 12, Mr Zhao suggested in a tweet that the US military might have brought the virus to Wuhan.
When asked about Mr Zhao's comments in an interview with Axios On HBO, Mr Cui opposed the theory, saying that such speculation is "harmful."
The split amongst Beijing's diplomatic corps is rare considering that the countries' officials stick closely to the Communist Party's official line.
But the blame does not matter as much as the global community's response to the virus' impacts, says American foreign policy expert Ian Bremmer.
The number of coronavirus infections has now exceeded 3 million, many countries have travel restrictions in place and economies are taking a hit.
"Millions have been forced out of work and this ongoing feud between superpowers is making it that much harder to come up with a unified plan," he says.
The one thing that is certain is that the Covid-19 pandemic has only placed further strain on US-China relations in an already heightened moment of competition and rivalry between the two nations.
This GZERO media video is being shown here as part of a media partnership agreement with The Straits Times. | {
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The Canadian Press
TORONTO - Ryerson University is taking action against its men's hockey team for violating the student-athlete code of conduct.
The university announced on Monday that it had suspended the team for seven days for "the consumption of alcohol" on their recent pre-season road trip to New Jersey.
Ryerson also announced that head coach Graham Wise has been suspended for four games.
"The University takes incidents of misbehaviour seriously and student-athletes and coaches are well aware of the behaviour expected of them," Ryerson said in a release.
The team will forfeit their next two games -- against the University of Ontario Institute of Technology on Thursday, and against Queen's on Saturday -- before returning to the ice on Nov. 15 against the Royal Military College of Canada. | {
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In March 2017, PhD candidate Thulaisi Sivapalan under the supervision of Professors Peter Wells and Roman Lanis and Dr Brett Govendir set out to study the effective tax rate of Australia’s industry super funds. He first noticed the lack of any literature which “assessed the accounting aspects of the superannuation landscape such as tax, financial reporting, and disclosure”. Bad news as his study hinged upon acquiring and analysing tax notes in the unabridged audited financial statements.
There is presently a dearth of transparency. Thulaisi was unable to obtain financial reporting data from Australia’s super funds easily. This is due to a lack of legislation requiring superannuation funds to lodge audited financial statements to any of the regulative authorities, including APRA. Not good for a $3 trillion industry.
When asked why he and his team chose to analyse industry super funds and not retail super funds, Thulaisi said “retail super funds were a different beast. There are so many products that it’s difficult to understand their financials… and because they have a profit orientation, you really can’t tell which assets belong to which fund”.
Industry funds, on the other hand, have a consistent structure and are “the best performing funds”, says Thulaisi.
NO INFORMATION AVAILABLE
Unfazed, Thulaisi first trawled through the usual government resources looking for the superfund tax notes. Nothing was found searching through the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Australian Tax Office, and the Australian Securities & Investments Commission. However, APRA had some information which caught Thulaisi’s eye. APRA requires superannuation funds to adhere to the Superannuation Reporting Framework (SRF) for their prudential and oversight functions.
Yet the information provided in the SRF does not contain audited tax notes, which is the accounting industry gold standard and according to APRA “may not be suitable for another purpose.”
However, Thulaisi knew that the superannuation funds were required, under the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) (SIS) Act, 1993 “to prepare an annual report to members” but these reports only provide an abridged financial report. A few of the funds did provide their unabridged financial statements online to the public, yet “they were quite hard to find and usually only available for two to three years,” he says. In this, the disclosures in the super industry are similar to the disclosures in Australia’s biggest poker machines sector, the NSW Clubs industry.
APRA’S ACCOUNTING BLACK HOLE
Not being a member of the super funds Thulaisi collected all the unabridged tax notes he could find online; still not enough for his primary study, and decided to compare the non-audited statements found in APRA’s database earlier and these new audited financial statements.
He found significant discrepancies between what super funds reported to their members and what they told APRA.
For reasons of research integrity, the names of specific funds cannot be named. However, in 2015 certain large industry super funds under-reported their total investments to APRA by up to $1.9 billion whilst other super funds over-reported their total assets or investments by up to $600 million.
Accounting information is meant to be accurate, so the key question is: why are billions of dollars either over or under-stated for in APRA’s reporting framework? Why the billions in discrepancies.
Thulaisi called APRA. Unfortunately, APRA could not provide a reason and rebuffed Thulaisi when asked if they kept unabridged financial statements with a reference to the section 56 of the APRA act concerning secrecy.
Thulaisi notes APRA’s own language in specifying that it “generally expects superannuation entities to report in accordance with Australian Accounting Standards” gives super funds significant leeway in their reporting duties and also makes it doubtful whether APRA is even analysing audited, unabridged accounts. This calls into question APRA’s capacity to regulate effectively. Are they collecting accurate information?
“Are any of these fund’s financial statements read by anyone?” asks Thulaisi.
MOST DIVERSIFIED SUPERFUND INVESTOR IN AUSTRALIA
Whilst reading through the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act and regulations, something occurred to Thulaisi. “I realised that if I become a paid member of the superannuation funds then they are required by law and the trust deed to provide me with the unabridged statements”.
In order to get the data he needed, Thulaisi attempted to join each of Australia’s 41 industry super funds; a task made difficult by the closed nature of some of the funds. Many industry super funds require their members to prove that they work in the industry which the fund oversees. This led to a little bit of hustle on Thulaisi’s part.
One example: “I went down to the abattoir to try and join up with the meat industry super” AMIST Super. After convincing the manager that he wasn’t after anyone’s retirement fund, he explained the reason behind his study and was given the appropriate joining forms.
After joining as many as he could, around 30 of the 41 in all, Thulaisi still had to work to get the unabridged financial accounts which he was now entitled to as a member of the funds.
“Even after you become a member, they” the admin staff over the phone “don’t even know what unabridged audited financial statement are.” Thulaisi says “Super funds assume that no one will call for financial statements” and so they are sometimes impossible to get.
NO ONE HAS CAPTURED THIS MUCH INFORMATION BEFORE
Eventually, administrators caught onto what Thulaisi was up to and he was denied access to further financial statements. However, in around a year’s time, he had managed to obtain approximately 30 full sets of audited tax notes for years 2014 – 2016.
According to Thulaisi, this is the “first time you get to look at the financial information of the superannuation funds. No one has captured this much information before”. Thulaisi notes that even the Productivity Commission finds it difficult to attain accurate information from the funds which begs the question, “Why isn’t there this data? Why is it so secret?” Because after all “this is everyone’s money. This is every working Australian’s capital”.
Thulaisi asks everyone to try an experiment. Call your super fund and simply ask for them to provide you with a full set of unabridged audited financial statements and see how you go. This is your money, not theirs, and you are guaranteed the right to this information. You might find it may be harder then you expect.
How much tax do they actually pay? Our next article in this series details the findings of Thulaisi and the Accounting Discipline Group at the UTS Business School’s study, which reveals the effective tax rate of Australia’s industry super funds. | {
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usage note for criterion
Like some other nouns borrowed from the Greek, criterion has both a Greek plural, criteria, and a plural formed on the English pattern, criterions. However, the -s plural is rarely used; the plural ending in -a is the usual form: These are the criteria for the selection of candidates. Though criteria is properly a plural noun, it is increasingly used as a singular noun, most often in speech but also occasionally in edited prose: One criteria is that the candidate must be over 18. This use of criteria as a singular noun is generally considered incorrect. | {
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MELISSA FRANCIS (CO-HOST): The problem I think with the president taking this up, even though he's hardly the first person to think of it, is the idea -- the history of the 14th Amendment. And when it was ratified in 1868, related to Dred Scott [v. Sandford] and all of its ties through history, basically, I mean, I'm not a lawyer, but have to do with race relations. So it's -- to me it seems like a very bad idea to pick up this fight right now.
LAWRENCE JONES (CAMPUS REFORM): Yes, I come at it from two lenses. I agree with the president's frustration, I'm very upset with Congress for inaction. But at the same time, the law is the law. And so I believe the president is going to get himself in a legal battle that I think he would lose at the Supreme Court. Whether he wants to be frustrated -- this is the process in America. And so when he does this before an election, yes, it will get some of the base riled up, but it's also going to get people on the left riled up, because it says that the president doesn't respect the Constitution. I disagree with that. I think there are a lot of people that made the same argument as the president, but even our Judge Napolitano has said, “This is very clear, people. The 14th Amendment stands.” And so I think this is a bad move for the president.
KATIE PAVLICH (CO-HOST): I would say there's a distinction, though, with the 14th Amendment. It was put in place to -- for freed slaves to become citizens of the United States, to make them equal citizens and to unify the country. So that's different than illegal immigrants coming to the country and having children and wanting them to be equal, and then, of course, that means that the parents eventually, usually, get to say because we're a compassionate country and we don't want to tear families apart and deport the parents and keep the citizen children here. That being said, this is a legal issue that the president’s going to have to take on. The Supreme Court has not ruled specifically on this issue.
But the broader point is, there is a very serious problem with birth tourism fraud. China has an entire curriculum for families that come to California, they apply for visas under -- saying they're going to work or they're just coming to visit. And then they have children here, and then it -- essentially the entire family gets to stay. Russia's also doing this with Florida. So the issue here is really visa fraud and people coming here to have children, to gain that access to the United States through a child's citizenship. | {
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Silverstone Managing Director Stuart Pringle has contested claims the circuit’s new track surface was at fault for an incident-packed end to MotoGP FP4 that led to riders expressing concerns of the running of Sunday’s race in seriously wet conditions.
Three riders crashed at Stowe Corner in the closing minutes of the weekend’s final free practice session, including Tito Rabat, who suffered serious fractures to his right leg, while several other names avoided crashes and ran on.
Aside from Rabat, each of those riders spoke of an excess of standing water on the Hangar Straight in those moments and described their machines aquaplaning at well over 100mph. MotoGP Race Director Mike Webb concluded those conditions to be “unraceable,” after organisers had brought Sunday’s race forward to 11:30.
On Saturday evening, work was well underway at the circuit’s two trouble spots (turn seven and eight) to aid the draining of standing water in the likelihood of the forecasted heavy rain arriving around noon on race day.
Silverstone MotoGP Video of Silverstone MotoGP CrashTV: Video Thumbnail:
As Webb explained, “The problem we have in turn seven and eight is the natural drainage of the water on the track puts it on one place. We’re talking about things that we have done often before: making some cuts in the track to make it drain in a certain direction, to stop it forming a river on the track.”
And while Webb and a number of riders felt Silverstone’s new surface, laid in February, was a reason behind the high levels of standing water in what were exceptionally wet conditions, Pringle felt otherwise.
“It was a Biblical downpour,” said the Englishman of the rain toward the close of FP4. “Frustratingly we didn’t have an accurate measurement about how much rain fell in a very short period of time, but it was more like a monsoon you’d see in Malaysia than heavy, normal rain. So it was an exceptional cloud bit of a burst, made all the more peculiar by the fact that it wasn’t up here. The drainage on the circuit is very good.
“So we are happy that we are constantly on the drainage and improving it where we can. We did alter as part of the track works a small amount of some civil engineering. We did a bit of civil engineering work, but not on Stowe [turn seven, where the incident took place]. The curves remain the same.
“So if there was any change there, it was a middle essentially because everything is flush to the curbs. But we are in consultation, having a meeting a FIM. We’re taking some remedial action now, namely putting some shortcuts in to try and help channel the rain away. We actually have a new drain.”
On the charge the new surface was incapable of dispersing water in case of the heavy downpour, Pringle said, “It’s pretty good at throwing the water away most of the time. Not pretty good - it’s good. It’s good at throwing the water away the vast majority of the time. We have to deal with a wet circuit here very regularly.”
Most riders – and Race Director Mike Webb - felt otherwise, however. Yet to the circuit’s credit overnight works attempted to aid the draining process to avoid such a build up of standing water.
“We have a relentless program of maintenance and upgrading to this circuit,” said Pringle. “We’re constantly working away just tweaking where we need to. If we’ve got a problem, the nice thing is we’re pretty agile as a business. We’re pretty agile as a circuit. We’ve got experienced guys. If we see a problem, then we can react to it.
“So I don’t think this is going to be a problem in the future going forward, because I’m sure that there is an engineering solution to it that we can effect pretty quickly and efficiently.”
The Bumps
Through the weekend, riders have complained of excessive bumps, a feature that has remained despite the resurfacing which took place earlier in this year. Again, Pringle was keen to play this down. Admitting there were issues at four corners, he was keen to point out improvements in grip and consistency.
“I’ve had two riders speak to our motorcycle people in the business who have been extraordinarily complimentary about the surface and said there isn’t a problem.
“They say there’s a bump at Copse, which I know there is. I know about that one. There’s a bump at Abbey. I know about that. I know that one needs fixing. There’s those two, but I think there are two others. There’s one at Brooklands and one at Stowe. I think there are four things that need addressing.
“But they say that everything else is good. They said it’s fast, it improved. The grip is consistent. I know that Michael and I have had this conversation before, but the request from the FIM or the real problem was the inconsistency in grip.
“As seasoned observers of Silverstone, you all recall that we’ve had some quite significant financial challenges in recent times. So when we were asked to resurface about 38% of the track, broadly Stowe round to Abbey, between Abbey and Village through Farm Curve, that looked like a stretch.
“But actually I understood that if we really wanted to address the fundamental issue, which was the inconsistency in grip, that would only go so far. So we made what for us was a significant commitment to this.
“Bear in mind, this is one weekend of the year. We earn a lot more money out of cars and bikes, be it testing, track days, or events. But we did a full 3.66 mile resurface, 15 meters’ width, with the first available funds we’ve had in this business for many years.
“I’m deadly serious about my commitment to MotoGP taken seriously as a motorcycle racing circuit, not just a car racing circuit. So the number one thing was to provide a consistent grip for everybody, and that’s what we’ve done.
“We could debate all evening what the definition of dangerous is. I don’t really feel that I want to talk to you now in the heat of a weekend about that, but perhaps it’s a conversation we could have.
“I’m fearful that I could be hung out to dry on another thing that sounds like I’m criticizing the riders, and there’s no way I want to go anywhere close to that. But the reality is, this has got a grade one FIM license. It’s also got a grade one FIA license.
“We’ve got runoff as big as Brighton Beach in some places that the current FIM safety inspector says is grossly excessive and we could bring the barrier in in places. It doesn’t feel like a dangerous circuit, but I’m sitting in an office and I’m not sitting on a bike at 320kph.” | {
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The first of three Ardennes Classics went to former World Champ Philippe Gilbert on Sunday after he put the hammer down on his favorite hunting ground, the Cauberg. His uphill strike was so powerful that not even the likes of Alejandro Valverde or Michal Kwiatkowski could reel him in over the final flat 1.8 kilometers of the Amstel Gold Race. Jelle Vanendert made a valiant move past a chasing group for 2nd, and Simon Gerrans outsprinted Valverde and Kwiatkowski for 3rd. A possible bunch sprint was nullified by the power of the big favorites up front: the pack could not survive the impressive climbing skills of Gilbert and Co. on the Cauberg. Anyone who struggled on the Cauberg will have an even harder time on Wednesday, as the peloton takes on the mighty Mur de Huy at La Flèche Wallonne (which I am generally styling as La Fleche Wallonne because accented vowels and easy-to-write, searchable internet text are not great friends).
At 199 kilometers, La Fleche Wallonne is shorter than some of the other classics the peloton has taken on this season. That opens it up a bit to riders who don’t specialize as heavily in the overlong spring races. Still, the route is peppered with grueling ascents in rapid succession, including two trips up the Mur de Huy (1.3 km, 9.3% average grade) before the third and final ascent at the end the race. The group that makes it to the bottom of the final climb will be very much reduced by the day’s many challenges. Unlike the Amstel Gold Race, La Fleche Wallonne has no 1.8 kilometer drag after its decisive climb. The Mur is also steeper than the Cauberg. This is a race that goes to explosive climbers, period. Last year’s Top 10 was a who’s who of ascending heavyweights (figuratively, as all of them are, of course, quite light of frame). Daniel Moreno was strongest on the day, with Sergio Henao, Carlos Betancur, and Daniel Martin hot on his heels. Purito, Valverde, and Mollema weren’t far behind. La Fleche Wallonne 2013 was decided in the final moments on the climb to the top of the Mur, and it’s hard to see a different script for 2014, though there will be some other riders playing the roles this time around. Before I name my top names, a note: as usual, I’ll be tweeting plenty of analysis live during the contest, so be sure to follow @VeloHuman for more real-time thoughts on the race!
The Contenders
Philippe Gilbert won the race in 2011 and podiumed in 2012. He seemed to have lost a bit of a form for 2013, but his victories at Brabantse Pijl and Amstel Gold this year have catapulted him back into the conversation. He played his cards just right at Amstel, exploding up the climb and then hanging on over a not insignificant distance. A crucial component in his victory was an attack from teammate Samuel Sanchez, who will join him again at La Fleche Wallonne, making BMC an even tougher opponent for the rest of the pack. Still, with such a brutal climb to close out the race, even Gilbert’s punchy legs will be put on the limit trying to hold off some Grand Tour talent. He will also no longer benefit from the hesitation that he’s gotten from his rivals in the past several month of reduced form; everyone knows Gilbert is back now.
Movistar’s Alejandro Valverde is another past winner of the race, and he will certainly be among the favorites to contend for this year’s La Fleche Wallonne. The bookies’ favorite for Amstel Gold finished 4th on the day after being unable to follow Gilbert on the final climb, though I do wonder if a part of his failure to cover the Belgian’s attack was indecision and hesitation, as he, Simon Gerrans, and Michal Kwiatkowski did not react immediately to the move on the Cauberg. He’ll get a chance at revenge on Wednesday. Without the injury question marks of some of the other big contenders, I imagine Valverde will occupy at least one of the spots on the podium for this race. Mountain goat teammates like Ion Izagirre and Benat Intxausti make his bid for victory a formidable one.
Were it not for the aforementioned health issues confusing things, there are three riders I might favor among Gilbert and Valverde; unfortunately, each comes with unknowns. First and foremost is Joaquim Rodriguez. Katusha has dominated this race in the past two years: Purito won in 2012, and Daniel Moreno won in 2013. Both riders are perfectly suited to the finish on the Mur de Huy, and more than capable of making it there without too much trouble. However, Rodriguez crashed out of yesterday’s Amstel Gold and was immediately taken to the hospital for further examination. Reports indicate that he did not suffer any serious injury, but there was also talk that he was a bit dizzy after going down. None of this inspires confidence. It doesn’t help that he is really targeting Sunday’s Liege-Bastogne-Liege, and next month’s Giro, and will probably be willing to take La Fleche Wallonne easy if he thinks it’s necessary for recovery. Were it not for the question marks, Purito’s form this year and his skillset might have made him my overall favorite, but as it stands, it’s hard to put that kind of confidence in him. His teammate Moreno, winner last year, may be a better choice, with a similar skillset and a proven ability to win the race. Moreno was 9th in Amstel yesterday and 3rd behind Contador and Quintana in the summit finish fourth stage of Tirreno-Adriatico this year, so he’s looking strong to defend his title here in 2014.
2013 Liege-Bastogne-Liege winner Daniel Martin is another would-be favorite with injury question marks. He pulled out of Amstel Gold early with knee pain. He has stated that he does not think it will be a lasting issue, but like Purito, Martin is targeting Liege and the Giro and he has a capable teammate (in Tom-Jelte Slagter) to take up the reigns if he decides to take it easy. Were his health not in question, La Fleche Wallonne’s finish would be ideal for the Irishman, who came in 4th last year (he missed a podium place by about half a centimeter), and probably would have done better had he not been somewhat out of position at the start of the final climb. Should Martin not be up for it, Garmin will turn turn to the hot hand in Slagter. He was disappointing at Amstel Gold, but the young rider might have a bit more left in the tank at the end of the shorter race on Wednesday. Ryder Hesjedal was not long ago one of the better Ardennes riders in the peloton and he’ll be in attendance as well.
AG2R’s Carlos Betancur is the other injury-bitten top rider in the race. He was 3rd here last year and he is on fire in 2014. Unfortunately, he’s also been suffering from a knee issue lately, and it’s very much unclear what his status is for La Fleche Wallonne. He did not contend at Amstel Gold, but he didn’t get dropped off the pace right away either. His tools (perfect for this race) and body of work put him among my top 10 riders in this race, as I think he’s quite capable of winning, but it’s hard to say whether he’ll be able to put all that ability to good use. Romain Bardet will be the other option for AG2R, and the way he’s been climbing this year, he could feature in the finale.
Michal Kwiatkowski of OPQS was 5th in the race last year. Given his blazing form in 2014, I’d imagine we’ll see him in the vanguard on the Mur again this year, but the do-it-all 23-year-old might find the finish line just a bit too steep for his liking. As versatile as he is, he may be looking to Sunday’s Liege-Bastogne-Liege as a prize more suited to his talents. Still, anything is possible for Kwiatkowski. OPQS has another strong card to play in Wout Poels, who has been climbing very well this year and could take a crack at the final ascent himself. Jan Bakelants makes another strong supporter.
Lampre’s three-pronged attack was unable to make much of a mark on the Amstel Gold Race, but I think they’re better suited to La Fleche Wallonne: Diego Ulissi is a star on these finishes, and his biggest weakness so far in his career has been long days in the saddle. Significantly shorter than its Ardennes brethren, La Fleche Wallonne is perfect for Ulissi, and he is targeting this race heavily. He came to the base of the Cauberg with the pack at Amstel Gold, which suggests to me that he is in shape and primed for success in a race more tailored to his talents. Teammate and World Champ Rui Costa could also give things a go. The Mur might be a bit too steep for his liking, but victory in this race requires perfect timing and Costa has one of the sharpest minds for strategy in the entire peloton. Damiano Cunego has a pair of podium performances in La Fleche Wallonne on his resume, but even with his surprise 2014 form I’m not sure he can hang with the best in the bunch anymore, especially not after an anonymous showing in an Amstel Gold Race that suited him better.
I had questions about Bauke Mollema‘s form coming into Amstel Gold, but his 7th place in that race answered them for me. La Fleche Wallonne puts the spotlight more squarely on the GC climber types, and Mollema has the kind of climbing legs to contend for Grand Tours. He also has a very strong finish and a very aggressive approach, which are key in this race, and they’ve given him back-to-back Top 10s here in the past. I would put Mollema among the best value bets for a podium in this race, just a few steps outside the spotlight but very capable of contending. Talented climbers Lars Petter Nordhaug and Laurens Ten Dam make a fine support squad. Tinkoff-Saxo’s Roman Kreuziger was unable to defend his Amstel Gold title, but like Mollema, he is a Grand Tour climber with a strong finish. Though he did not feature among the contenders, he was among the Top 20 on Sunday, and the vicious Mur de Huy gives him another chance at victory. Teammate Nicolas Roche is building up to the Giro and could also make a move.
Astana again brings their talent-packed squad to the startline; Enrico Gasparotto was their best placed finisher at Amstel, coming in 8th, but Jakob Fuglsang looked strong in a breakaway and Vincenzo Nibali came to the base of the Cauberg with the pack. Nibali was 8th in La Fleche Wallonne in 2012 and he has the uphill ability to land another top result. Fuglsang isn’t well-known for explosiveness but he’s certainly got the climber’s physique. The Mur might be too much for Gasparotto and Iglinskiy but they’ll be valuable teammates as well.
Lotto’s Jelle Vanendert suddenly roared back into relevance with a runner-up performance at Amstel Gold, where he chased heavier favorites up the Cauberg and sailed past many of them on his way to 2nd place. He has a pair of La Fleche Wallonne top 10s to his name as well, so he certainly deserves a look for Wednesday’s race. Teammate Tony Gallopin is another good climber and one-day rider, and Jurgen Van Den Broeck nabbed the final spot in the top 10 in 2012.
Simon Gerrans of Orica-GreenEdge won’t be riding this race (the finish is a bit too steep for him), so they send punchy Ivan Santaromita, 2012 runner-up Michael Albasini, aggressive Pieter Weening and Simon Clark, and Simon and Adam Yates to represent their interests. No favorites among them, but plenty of riders to animate the race. Trek’s Julian Arredondo has had an impressive start to the season and will like the finish. Andy Schleck crashed out of Amstel Gold, but he should make the start with brother Frank, who has shown signs of life in 2014. IAM Cycling’s Mathias Frank is a good climber who will be riding for his own interests for once. Giant-Shimano’s Tom Dumoulin and Warren Barguil will hope to make an impact. Sky’s best bets are probably Mikel Nieve and David Lopez. Europcar’s Pierre Rolland is still looking for success in 2014. Daniel Navarro of Cofidis is a strong climber with a decent supporting cast. They’ll all have their work cut out for them in a race with a finish that tends to weed out long shots, but a number of the contenders are facing injury concerns, which could open doors at La Fleche Wallonne 2014.
VeloHuman Top 10 Favorites
Winner: Philippe Gilbert
Podium: Alejandro Valverde, Daniel Moreno
Other Top Contenders: Joaquim Rodriguez, Diego Ulissi, Bauke Mollema, Vincenzo Nibali, Michal Kwiatkowski, Carlos Betancur, Daniel Martin
Remember to follow @VeloHuman for more race-day thoughts, and come back soon for the Liege-Bastogne-Liege preview!
-Dane Cash
Photo by Max Mayorov. | {
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AP Images
This isn't our first rebuilding rodeo.
The baseball-loving world has been in this exact position heading into spring training many times before, anticipating a team with a massive overhaul only to watch said team fizzle mightily during the season. The stench of those failures still wafts in the air, and the 2015 San Diego Padres are trying to avoid it sticking to them.
Padres general manager A.J. Preller took his position on Aug. 5 last year, and soon after the regular season ended and the hot stove started, Preller went to work on the game’s latest rebuild/reload/remake. The Padres are now a hot ticket in San Diego—they’ve already seen a 63 percent increase from secondary ticket sales at this time last year, according to Jeff Sanders of U-T San Diego—and the excitement is understandable.
Preller has added both legitimate and potential superstars to the roster, giving the Padres a realistic chance of earning their first playoff berth since 2008 in the tough National League West…on paper, at least.
“You can say we gambled on [Preller],” Padres managing owner Ron Fowler told U-T San Diego’s Nick Canepa. “We expected a lot of energy, a lot of excitement, and we got it—quicker than we thought.”
The challenge for this Padres revamp is finding different results than the failures we’ve seen in the recent past in Miami, Toronto and New York.
Lenny Ignelzi/Associated Press
Rebuilds that did not rely on waiting for draft picks to develop into young superstars have been successful lately. The Boston Red Sox in 2013 are the most recent success story, as that project culminated in a World Series title. The 2009 New York Yankees won a title after adding Mark Teixeira, CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Nick Swisher during the previous offseason, and the 1997 Florida Marlins also emptied the wallet in the offseason to end up with a ring.
But the failures are just as documented and certainly more salacious.
The 2012 Miami Marlins hired a charismatic and controversial manager in Ozzie Guillen, signed free agents Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle and Heath Bell and traded for Carlos Zambrano. That experiment lasted all of three months before the club started trading off pieces during its first season in a new state-of-the-art stadium. The Marlins lost 93 games that year, fired Guillen and held a fire sale much the same way they did after winning the World Series in 1997.
Uncredited/Associated Press
The 2012 dismantling in Miami directly led to another quick rebuild, this time for the Toronto Blue Jays.
The Marlins finished their teardown in October of 2012 when they traded Reyes, Buehrle, Josh Johnson, John Buck and Emilio Bonifacio to the Jays. That deal, paired with the Jays’ blockbuster trade for reigning National League Cy Young Award winner R.A. Dickey, brought expectations in Toronto to an all-time high.
In 2013, the Blue Jays lost 88 games and finished in last place in the American League East. The Dickey trade, which cost Toronto catcher Travis d’Arnaud and pitcher Noah Syndergaard, now looks like a big loss.
The following offseason, the Yankees were livid at missing the playoffs and the Red Sox winning it all. Their 2013-14 offseason was an epic one, as they were intent on reloading their roster. The team spent $471 million on new additions, including Masahiro Tanaka, Jacoby Ellsbury, Brian McCann and Carlos Beltran. The result was one fewer win than the season before and another missed October.
So how will the Padres be any different this summer?
For one, Preller completed this franchise face-lift by adding players like Matt Kemp, James Shields, Justin Upton, Wil Myers and Derek Norris, yet still managed to keep the team’s payroll at around $100 million, according to Sanders. That total cost is barely up from the team’s $90.6 million payroll last season, when it won 77 games.
Preller also added Shields and low-risk, high-reward guys like Brandon Morrow and Johnson to an already strong rotation. He made his moves without dismantling last year’s rotation or depleting the farm system.
It's pretty obvious that A.J. Preller can do whatever he wants. He'll probably show up to #PadresFanFest like this. pic.twitter.com/WBCSUOHcjS — Friar Fever (@FriarFever) February 13, 2015
Before a pitch is thrown this season, we can say the Padres have one of the best pitching staffs in the majors after adding to one that was already elite both in the rotation and in the bullpen. We couldn't say the same thing about the Marlins, Blue Jays and Yankees of recent rebuilds.
That foundation can carry the Padres even if the offensive acquisitions don’t live up to the hype and if the defense fulfills its low expectations.
However, some still don’t see this latest experimental rebuild working. respected baseball writer Joel Sherman of the New York Post is one of these voices.
But something else must be remembered: The Padres did not blow up a competitive team, and none of the newcomers will oust incumbents who should be starting. Even if you don’t like everything Preller has done, you have to admit the Padres are better at every outfield position or in the rotation from where they were at the end of last season.
The Padres also did not necessarily set out to create this massive overhaul when the season ended. Opportunities presented themselves—Shields with his dwindling market and price tag would be one example—and Preller struck.
“Sitting there with [manager Bud Black] and the staff after the season, if you asked if we thought if there would be this kind of volume and activity, that wouldn’t have been the case,” Preller told Canepa. “But one thing led to the next.”
Now, the Padres’ offseason has led to wildly high expectations for this summer and fall. The way it unfolded, we should not be surprised if this club lives up to them.
All quotes, unless otherwise specified, have been acquired firsthand by Anthony Witrado. Follow Anthony on Twitter @awitrado and talk baseball here. | {
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Omaha, NE - The buzz was noticeably different around Baxter Arena last night. Pulling up to the arena 45 minutes early, there was a line ... | {
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Looks both ways before crossing the street still gets hit by a car
162 shares | {
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We received three separate DVDs of information. There is a lot of stuff here. Too much for me to post all at once. So, what I'm going to do is upload all the video to YouTube and include links here and upload all the documents to Scribd and include links to that as well. With these document productions, I am going to withhold any comment because I simply haven't been able to review them all. I will be editing this post as I add additional content.
(videos may still be processing through YouTube)
Documents (Scribd deleted my documents, will upload from dropbox and share shortly)
Part One of the Documents (Large file)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/w9iufw1ft6z4bu6/Combined%20Statements%20WM.pdf?dl=0
Part Two of the Documents (Large file)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/4u6z0q4rv8z7iq7/Combined%20Statements%20p2%20WM.pdf?dl=0 | {
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Wow what can I say. Santa did great!
I’ve been needing real sunglasses since my car doesn’t have a sun visor. These glasses are stylish and look snazzy! I got a really nice bag. I have the hardest time finding a sewing pattern or an already made bag. It has lots space (for my needs) and pockets. I found a dollar bill and a beautiful beaded skull craft. My SS is from NY so of course I got yummy NY maple syrup. Can’t wait to try it! For books, I got a Europe travel guide which will be perfect for when I finally go to the UK and Norway and a Pusheen coloring book (I absolutely love pusheen). I also got a bunch of pretty damn cool Star Wars stickers which I found in the coloring book. As a lot of people know, Washington is now banning plastic straws so these stainless steel straws will help with my straw addiction as well as the environment. Last but not least my Santa gave me an Indian Times newspaper. I love learning about other cultures and I’m looking forward to reading it.
Thanks so much santa! I love everything. You put so much thought into this. | {
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The big news from last night’s speech is that our pundits is not learning. After all the debacles of 2016, they swooned over the fact that Trump — while still lying time after time and proposing truly vile initiatives — was able to read from a teleprompter without breaking into an insane rant. If American democracy falls, supposed political analysts who are actually just bad theater critics will share part of the blame.
But that aside, I was struck by Trump’s continued insistence that he’s going to bring back coal jobs. This says something remarkable both about him and about the body politic.
He is not, of course, going to bring back coal mining as an occupation. Coal employment’s plunge began decades ago, driven mainly by the switch to strip mining and mountaintop removal. A partial revival after the oil crises of the 70s was followed by a renewed downturn (under Reagan!), with fracking and cheap gas mainly delivering the final blow. Giving coal companies new freedom to pollute streams and utilities freedom to destroy the planet won’t make any noticeable dent in the trend.
Photo
But here’s the question: why are people so fixated on coal jobs anyway?
Even in the heart of coal country, the industry hasn’t really been a major source of employment for a very long time. Compare mining with occupations that basically are some form of healthcare in West Virginia, as percentages of total employment:
Photo
Even in West Virginia, the typical worker is basically a nurse, not a miner — and that has been true for decades.
So why did that state overwhelmingly support a candidate who won’t bring back any significant number of mining jobs, but quite possibly will destroy healthcare for many — which means jobs lost as well as lives destroyed?
The answer, I’d guess, is that coal isn’t really about coal — it’s a symbol of a social order that is no more; both good things (community) and bad (overt racism). Trump is selling the fantasy that this old order can be restored, with seemingly substantive promises about specific jobs mostly just packaging.
One thought that follows is that Trump may not be as badly hurt by the failure of his promises as one might expect: he can’t deliver coal jobs, but he can deliver punishment to various kinds of others. I guess we’ll see. | {
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On land, catching wildlife poachers in the act is difficult. On the vast open seas, it’s even harder—especially at night. A small boat using illegal gillnets can easily escape detection while indiscriminately killing all manner of marine wildlife—including endangered species—just to acquire a fish part that fetches a high price because it happens to be prized in Chinese medicine.
Sea Shepherd, an ocean conservation group known (and sometimes criticized) for its aggressive tactics, recently deployed what might be an ideal weapon for catching such poachers red-handed: a quadcopter drone equipped with a thermal night vision camera. Last week the group used such a drone to record nighttime poachers in the act with an illegal gillnet in Gulf of California waters belonging to Mexico.
The poachers quickly fled, but the conservationists, from their own boat, used the drone to track them, relaying coordinates and headings to the Mexican Navy. Once the latter took over the chase, the Sea Shepherd crew investigated the scene of the crime. In the poachers’ left-behind nets (which snag the gills, spines, or other body protrusions of a fish, causing it to become entangled) they found a variety of creatures, including four live crownose rays and two dead hammerhead sharks.
Sea Shepherd A hammerhead shark caught up in the nets.
The poachers were after something more valuable: totoaba. Native to the Gulf of California, the totoaba can grow to six feet long and live up to 25 years. Chinese medicine prizes a tubular organ that regulates the fish’s buoyancy; the bladder, of sorts, is thought to help promote fertility. That one body part can fetch as much as $645,000 in black markets, as Quartz reported earlier.
To catch totoaba, poachers use gillnets that kill many other species. In the process they’ve driven the vaquita—a shy, snub-nosed porpoise native to the Gulf of California—to near-extinction. All nets are dangerous to vaquita, but especially ones used to catch totoaba, due to the mesh size. Vaquita get entangled in the nets and drown. Today it’s the most endangered marine mammal in the world, with the population suspected to be only a few dozen individuals.
To save the vaquita, in April 2015 Mexico enacted a two-year ban on the use of gillnets in a large portion of the northern Gulf of California, where the porpoise lives. | {
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Facing a critical staffing shortage, Portland Police Chief Danielle Outlaw next month is relaxing hiring standards for the bureau: A high school diploma or GED certificate now will be sufficient.
And there’s more: Tattoos above the collar and beards might also be allowed.
The change in the education requirement take effect July 1, the chief announced Wednesday.
The bureau has 128 officer vacancies and hasn’t been able to fill them as fast as veterans are retiring, with another large wave of retirements expected in August 2020.
“We will revisit the effectiveness of these changes after two years to determine if our hiring numbers have increased,” Outlaw said in a statement.
Times have changed and “what we look for in today’s police officer has evolved,” Outlaw said.
“Access to post-secondary education isn’t the same for everyone, as we know,” she said in an email to The Oregonian/OregonLive. “Removing any potential barriers for entry allows us to increase our selection pool and also allows us to become more competitive as an employer.”
Mayor Ted Wheeler, who also serves as the city’s police commissioner, supports the chief’s decision, said spokeswoman Eileen Park.
Past Portland police chiefs have grappled with the education standard for officers.
In 2001, former Chief Mark Kroeker lowered Portland’s four-year college degree requirement to the current standard: an associate degree or a minimum of 60 college credits, two years of active U.S. military duty, four years in the military reserves or two years of law enforcement experience at another agency. Former Chief Charles Moose set the four-year degree standard in 1996, arguing that the complexities of the job demanded more education.
When former Chief Rosie Sizer considered lowering the standard to a high school diploma or equivalency degree in 2007, she faced pushback from community members who attended her Chief’s Forum.
Then, some residents questioned the wisdom of lowering standards when the job demanded so many varied skills. And others didn’t like the suggestion that lowering the standards might improve diversity in hiring. But several supporters said life skills and street smarts are more important than a college education.
Outlaw said she’s choosing to align the bureau with state law enforcement standards for police certification.
The bureau will provide incentive pay to officers who pursue higher education and earn degrees. And as of July 1, applicants who hold college degrees or have experience at other police agencies will no longer have to take a National Testing Network exam. All others will have to pass the test within 60 days of being placed on the bureau’s hiring eligibility list.
Officer Daryl Turner, president of the Portland Police Association, isn’t too sure that lowering the educational standard will help the bureau, considering what he calls anti-police sentiment among some city commissioners and outspoken community members that he believes drives applicants away.
"Right now, with our catastrophic staffing issues, I don’t know if the changes in the hiring standards will help with recruits,'' he said. "People who want to come here want to be able to do the job. Right now, in the city of Portland, our hands are tied. We can’t enforce some rules, but we can enforce others.''
Turner said the bureau needs applicants who are "well-qualified'' and able to pass the bureau’s background checks, keep a cool head and think quickly on their feet.
Lt. Craig Morgan, president of the Portland Police Commanding Officers Association, said, "On its face, the GED requirement is concerning, because we really value education. With that said, we recognize the troubles with hiring and appreciate the Bureau had to try something different.''
In 2007, when Sizer floated the idea of requiring only a high school diploma or equivalency degree, then-police union president Robert King -- who is now the mayor’s public safety adviser -- was adamantly opposed and noted studies that showed a correlation between education and officers’ professionalism. At the time, King said, “Any time you step away from education as a criteria, you put the organizational effectiveness at risk.''
King said Wednesday the bureau is facing a staffing crisis that he couldn’t have imagined back then and that the bureau is “taking proactive steps to increase the applicant pool to address the risks we face due to officers shortages.”
“This adjustment is consistent with standards all across our state,” King said. The bureau "will fill the vacant positions with excellent police officer candidates,'' he said.
Turner said he’s also unsure about allowing tattoos on the neck and face.
"The Police Bureau should mirror the community it serves. Would someone with tattoos above the collar be hired by Nike or Columbia or other big corporations?'' Turner asked. "When police have someone come to their front door, especially in their time of need, what do they expect to see? They might wonder if they’re getting the service they need.''
It’s not right to judge people based on their appearances, he said, but it’s impossible to get around "first impressions.''
Morgan said he had fewer concerns about the proposed tattoo policy. "Gotta change as social norms do,'' he said.
Officers currently can have tattoos below the collar, but they’re examined to ensure there’s nothing sexually explicit, racially or sexually biased or could be viewed as discriminatory, according to the bureau. The same reviews would apply to tattoos above the collar.
Allowing beards isn’t as controversial. The main constraint: Beards wouldn’t be able to interfere with the proper fit of any police equipment or gear.
The beard and tattoo policies are in review and will be sent out for public comment. The bureau gave no estimated date for when the policies might change.
-- Maxine Bernstein
Email at [email protected]
Follow on Twitter @maxoregonian
Visit subscription.oregonlive.com/newsletters to get Oregonian/OregonLive journalism delivered to your email inbox. | {
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TaQuon Marshall ran for 175 yards and two scores to lead Georgia Tech to a 66-31 victory over Louisville on Friday night.
The Yellow Jackets (3-3, 1-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) ran for a season-high 542 yards, the third-best total in school history and the second most ever yielded by the Cardinals (2-4, 0-3). Tobias Oliver, who relieved Marshall at quarterback late in the third quarter, ran for 108 yards and two scores on eight carries.
In their first nine drives, the Yellow Jackets scored eight touchdowns and a field goal. Then they got a 95-yard interception return for a score from Juanyeh Thomas with 2:18 left.
The 10th drive ended the game.
Georgia Tech took advantage of a couple Louisville misplays to jump out to a 14-0 lead midway through the first quarter. The Cardinals turned the ball over on downs at midfield on their first drive, and five plays later, Marshall’s 33-yard score gave Georgia Tech the lead less than five minutes into the game.
Louisville fumbled at its 36 on the second play of its second drive. Five plays later, Marshall’s 1-yard run doubled Georgia Tech’s lead.
Jawon Pass completed 23 of 35 passes for 299 yards and two touchdowns to lead the Cardinals.
Love tosses 4 TD passes; Utah State beats BYU again, 45-20
Jordan Love threw for a career-high four touchdowns and ran for another and Utah State beat BYU 45-20 Friday night, the Aggies’ first back-to-back wins in the 88-game series since 1973-74.
The Aggies, who opened their season with a 38-31 loss at then-No. 11 Michigan State, are 4-1 for the first time since 2012 and have scored 30-plus points in their first five games for the first time.
The Aggies won 40-24 last season with the Cougars committing seven turnovers. Friday night, Utah State scored first on Tipa Galeai’s 56-yard interception return and went up 21-0 on Love’s 6-yard score to Ron’quavion Tarver six plays after a BYU fumble. Another BYU fumble led to a fourth-quarter touchdown.
Love threw for only 165 yards on 18-of-28 passing with his four TD passes going for 6 yards or less. His second TD pass to Tarver, a 4-yarder with 4:55 remaining in the third quarter, made it 35-7.
Darwin Thompson rushed for 109 yards on 17 carries. BYU (3-3) had only 39 yards on the ground. Tanner Mangum was 27-of-46 passing for 270 yards, two touchdowns and an interception.
Middle Tennessee’s Stockstill hits 10,000 mark in 34-24 win
Brent Stockstill threw for 317 yards and two scores, going over 10,000 career yards passing, and Middle Tennessee beat Marshall 34-24 on Friday night.
Stockstill, who also ran for a score, became the 24th player in NCAA history to pass for 10,000 yards. He has thrown a touchdown pass in 28 straight games, the second-longest active streak behind Penn State’s Trace McSorley (33). The redshirt senior, who missed nine games over the past two seasons with injuries, hadn’t faced the Thundering Herd (3-2, 1-1 Conference USA) since 2015, a triple-overtime win in which Stockstill threw for 353 yards.
The Blue Raiders (3-2, 2-0), coming off a 25-24 victory over defending C-USA champ Florida Atlantic, won in Huntington for the first time after four losses there.
Marshall scored with 17 seconds left in the second quarter to take a 17-10 halftime lead. Middle Tennessee tied the game on Stockstill’s 2-yard pass to Patrick Smith then went ahead on Tavares Thomas’ 8-yard run with two minutes left in the third quarter. Thomas also caught a TD pass.
Marshall’s Tyler King rushed for a career-high 165 yards, 138 in the first half.
Ex-player charged in lineman’s death
A former Rice University football player was charged with selling the drugs that a current player fatally overdosed on earlier this year. Stuart Michael Mouchan- taf, 25, was being held in the Harris County jail in Houston on a charge of delivery of a controlled substance causing death.
The county district attorney’s office says in a news release that Blain Padgett, a 21-year-old defensive lineman, thought he was buying hydrocodone but actually received pills from Mouchantaf containing carfentanil, which was originally made as an elephant tranquilizer.
Changes in transfer rules considered
The NCAA Division I Council has introduced legislation that would allow some athletes to transfer and be immediately eligible to play for a new school if there is a coaching change before the first day of fall classes.
The NCAA announced four new rules proposed by the council . The others would require schools to commit two years of financial aid for all graduate transfers, allow walk-ons to play immediately after transferring and prohibit athletes from competing for two different schools in the same academic year. | {
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Все мы с раннего детства знаем, что в сутках 24 часа. Но известно ли вам, что так было не всегда и когда-то давно у динозавров было заметно меньше времени для бодрствования, чем у нас? Это связано с тем, что миллионы лет назад Луна располагалась гораздо ближе к нашей планете, из-за чего Земля вращалась быстрее. Как следствие, на смену дня и ночи уходило меньше времени, чем сейчас. Недавно ученые решили точно рассчитать, сколько часов длился день во времена динозавров. В этом им помогли окаменелые останки древнего моллюска, строение раковины которой менялось каждый день. По сути, ученые рассчитали длительность дней времен динозавров, как по толщине колец в стволе определяется возраст дерева.
О проведенном исследовании и его результатах было рассказано в научном издании New Atlas. В распоряжении ученых оказались останки древнего и уже давно вымершего моллюска вида Torreites sanchezi. Исследователям уже было известно, что ежедневно на раковине этих крохотных созданий образовывался новый слой минерала, который известен как кальцит. Изучив окаменелую раковину, оболочка которой в дневное время менялась быстрее, ученые выяснили, что во времена динозавров день длился 23,5 часа.
Длительность дня миллионы лет назад
Так как 70 миллионов лет назад каждые сутки были на полчаса короче, в год помещалось целых 372 дня. То есть, если бы динозавры отмечали новый год, они бы праздновали на неделю позже, чем мы. На протяжении миллионов лет длительность дней увеличивалась, потому что Луна ежегодно удаляется от Земли примерно на 3,8 сантиметра. Так как за один день наша планета совершает ровно один оборот вокруг своей оси, а отдаление спутника замедляет скорость вращения, длительность дней постепенно увеличивается. В итоге, спустя миллионы лет со дня вымирания динозавров, в сутках мы имеем 24 часа.
Читайте также: Почему время идет только вперед, но не назад?
Длительность дня миллиард лет назад
Стоит отметить, что до появления динозавров, примерно 1,4 миллиарда лет назад, день длился всего лишь 18 часов. Тогда Луна располагалась очень близко к нашей планете и заставляла Землю вращаться быстрее, чем сейчас. Об этом стало известно примерно в 2018 году, а подробнее о проведенном исследовании можно почитать в научном журнале Science.
Если вам интересны новости науки и технологий, подпишитесь на наш канал в Яндекс.Дзен. Там вы найдете материалы, которые не были опубликованы на сайте!
Примечательно, что длительность суток из года в год до сих пор увеличивается. Однако мы не можем этого почувствовать, потому что дни становятся длиннее на 1,8 миллисекунды примерно в 100 лет. Так что, можно предполагать, что спустя несколько сотен веков дни будут особенно длинные. Только застанем ли мы это время или нет, пока неизвестно, потому что некоторые ученые прогнозируют, что уже в 2050 году мы достигнем точки невозврата и планета начнет вымирать.
Интересные факты о времени
Вообще, время является очень интересным явлением. Чтобы узнать о ней больше и насладиться всей ее красотой, можно посмотреть документальный фильм «Путешествие времени», продюсером которого выступил актер Бред Питт. Съемочная группа побывала в самых разных уголках мира сняла потрясающие кадры с тем, что способно жить веками и чему неподвластно время. | {
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Chicago Cubs manager Joe Maddon argues with umpire Sam Holbrook (34) over the delivery of Washington Nationals relief pitcher Sean Doolittle during the ninth inning of a baseball game Saturday, May 18, 2019, in Washington. Maddon thought Doolittle was using an illegal delivery. Maddon believed the left-handed Doolittle was tapping his right toe on the ground before coming to the plate. The Nationals won 5-2. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Chicago Cubs manager Joe Maddon argues with umpire Sam Holbrook (34) over the delivery of Washington Nationals relief pitcher Sean Doolittle during the ninth inning of a baseball game Saturday, May 18, 2019, in Washington. Maddon thought Doolittle was using an illegal delivery. Maddon believed the left-handed Doolittle was tapping his right toe on the ground before coming to the plate. The Nationals won 5-2. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Chicago Cubs have dropped their protest over the pitching delivery of Washington reliever Sean Doolittle.
Cubs manager Joe Maddon made the announcement before Sunday night’s game against the Nationals.
Maddon came out twice in the ninth inning of a 5-2 loss Saturday night to complain to plate umpire San Holbrook about Doolittle. Maddon said he believed the left-handed Doolittle was tapping his right toe on the ground before coming to the plate.
Cubs reliever Carl Edwards Jr. was informed at the end of spring training that his delivery, which featured a similar toe-tap, was illegal. That ruling miffed Maddon and the Cubs.
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“The whole thing I really wanted to get done was to protect Carl,” Maddon said Sunday. “I really didn’t anticipate a whole lot to be done with (the protest) even though I still don’t agree with the conclusion because I think it’s exactly what Carl did, only a different version of it.
“But the point was, I would not be a good parent had I not spoken up for my guy.”
After being told Doolittle’s delivery was legal, Maddon announced the Cubs were playing the game under protest.
“He thought he was tapping his foot, which in itself is not illegal, and this all kind of stems from his pitcher being called on something that was a little bit different than what Doolittle was doing,” Holbrook said after the game. “So, in our judgement, Doolittle did nothing illegal at all.”
Maddon countered a bit on Sunday.
″(Doolittle) actually tapped a couple of times. I think he tapped and he grazed. He did whatever,” Maddon said. “They’re saying Carl put his whole foot on the ground and that somehow is different. And that’s where I thought, semantically speaking, I just don’t agree.”
Doolittle, who retired the side in order for his eighth save in nine chances, said after the game he thought Maddon had a different motive for coming out.
“In that moment, he’s not trying to do anything other than rattle me and it was kind of tired,” Doolittle said. “I don’t know. Sometimes he has to remind people how smart he is and how much he pays attention to the game and stuff like that. He put his stamp on it, for sure.”
Maddon said Sunday he had no issue with Doolittle’s comments.
“We’re all emotional,” Maddon said. “I’ve said a lot of things I didn’t want to say years ago, even in this ballpark. But I think if he understood the entire context, he might have had a different opinion.”
___
More AP MLB: https://apnews.com/MLB and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports | {
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Bridgette B. – My Wife is My Pornstar
7561 71% | {
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Famous oak tree that sheltered Jewish brothers from the Nazis during the Holocaust wins 'Tree of the Year in Europe' competition for 2017.
In the town of Vishniova, in southeastern Poland, a famous oak tree known as "Jozef" grew.
With the outbreak of World War II, two Jewish brothers with the family name "Himi" decided to find a hiding place in the large tree trunk.
Historians who investigated the story claim that the Himi brothers escaped from the nearby "Pristeck" ghetto and found refuge from the Nazis in the large tree trunk, after a Polish citizen who lived nearby showed them the tree and its hiding place.
Since the end of the Second World War, the tree has become a famous tourist attraction and many tourists have come to Vishniova be photographed nearby. An illustration of the tree appeared on bills of 100 Polish zloty.
The oak tree "Jozef" has now been selected as the "Tree of the Year in Europe" in a competition held since 2011 in which a famous tree with special historical significance is chosen. The competition takes place in order to emphasize the importance of ancient trees and prevent their destruction.
This year trees from 16 countries took part in the competition. Hundreds of thousands of people from around the world took part in the vote. "The hiding place within the tree trunk was brought to the attention of the Jewish brothers by a woman named Rosalia Prushak. The space in the trunk was huge, people said it had two levels, the bottom was used for hiding while the top was used for observation. But their fate after the war is unknown," said Jakub Pavlovski of the Olme Family Museum in the city of Markov, where Jews hid during the Holocaust.
Robert Gudek, the head of the Vishniova district, accepted the "Tree of the Year" award on "Jozef's" behalf for hiding the Jewish brothers inside it. "I sincerely thank all residents of Vishniova and the citizens of Europe who chose Jozef as the tree of the year in Europe, and we will celebrate the win as this tree deserves it," said Gudek. | {
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By Biologic Institute
In 2010 Mike Behe published a paper in the Quarterly Review of Biology in which he concisely stated the first rule of adaptive evolution : “Break or blunt any functional coded element whose loss would yield a net fitness gain.” By this he meant several things. First, there are indeed adaptive mutations, mutations that yield a benefit to the cell under a particular set of circumstances. Second, the primary way such adaptation occurs is by breaking or inactivating some non-essential pre-existing function, in order to make the cell more fit, more competitive than its neighbors.
Behe was talking about microbes –viruses and bacteria–but it also happens at the cellular level in higher organisms. The best example where this rule is played out is in cancer. Cancers develop when one or more normal functions in a cell are disrupted, broken. The ironic thing is that for the cancer cells, this breaking increases their fitness, their rate of growth and cell division, and thus is beneficial—for them. Normal constraints have been removed, allowing uncontrolled growth. For the cancer cell that’s good, but bad for us, of course. So one can say that cancer is a prime example of what adaptive evolution can accomplish on the multicellular level, by breaking or disrupting some normal function.
What does Behe’s first rule of adaptive evolution say about evolution in general? If most “beneficial” mutations are due to the loss of something rather than a gain of something, we are losing information when most adaptations occur, sometimes irreversibly. Let me give an example.
Ralph Seelke and I published a paper in 2010 where we demonstrated that cells always, or nearly always take the easiest road to success. When given a choice between a simple two-step path leading to repair of two genes needed to make tryptophan, versus a one-step path that eliminated expression of the those genes, only one out of a trillion cells went down the path toward making tryptophan, even though that path would ultimately be much more beneficial. Why did this happen? The genes to be repaired were overexpressed—too much of their products were made. Because one of the genes was broken in two places, no tryptophan could be made. Thus both genes were expensive to keep around. It was easier for the cell to break the useless genes than to repair them—one step instead of two—and the cells, having no foresight, took that path. Some of those cells deleted the genes, thus losing the information needed to make tryptophan for good.
Let me explain in every-day terms. A faucet leaking badly but with no way to hook it up to a hose is entirely useless. While it is relatively easy to repair the faucet, requiring only two parts, the owner of the faucet doesn’t know that. Since he can do without the faucet, he is likely to cap the faucet to stop the expense of the wasted water. But he has lost the ability to water his back yard using that faucet.
Like the clueless owner, evolution has no foresight and does not know there is a big pay-off just two mutations away. If the cells can prevent the overexpression of the tryptophan genes or remove them in a single step, that’s what they will do, especially since there are many more ways to inactivate a gene than repair it. Any cell that does this instantly becomes more fit than its neighbors, because it is spending less energy making useless stuff.
In fact, that is what we observed. Nearly all the cells inactivated the genes (only one out of a trillion didn’t). Some of the cells even deleted the genes, thus losing the capacity to make tryptophan for good. Darwinian evolution travels by the shortest road, without regard for where it’s headed. And if the shortest road is to break an existing function–to lose information–that’s the path it chooses.
I’m sure you can think of parallels in the business world, when only the bottom line, corporate fitness, is what matters, and executives have no long-term vision. They don’t see how some things, if adjusted, may yield big pay-offs. As a result, whole technologies can be decimated or lost in a push for efficiency, technologies that if maintained could prove vital in the future. But fortunately, unlike Darwinian evolution, we do have foresight and can plan ahead. We do have the capacity for innovation, and can make wise choices or correct our mistakes.
The process of innovation is the opposite of the first rule of adaptive evolution. In the biological world, the quickest road to adaptation may be to delete or inactivate genes that are not necessary. But you don’t get new features by deleting information. Building something new, which is what is required to explain the diversity around us, requires more than the happenstance and selection of Darwinian evolution. It requires foresight, planning, and a clear picture of the goal. It requires intelligent design.
Image credit: Forest & Kim Starr [CC BY 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons | {
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Escribo este post a la luz de un seminario sobre Renta Básica que estoy siguiendo actualmente, dirigido por el economista Daniel Raventós.
Muchas cosas se han dicho y escrito sobre la propuesta estrella del programa económico de Podemos. Voy a intentar aclarar en este breve artículo muchos de los puntos que generan controversia o que no se han entendido del todo. Antes de nada es importante señalar que en economía siempre hay un grupo social que sale beneficiado y otro que sale perjudicado. No existe dentro de las coordenadas y de los parámetros establecidos por el sistema capitalista la posibilidad de que todo el mundo salga ganando, como si fuéramos un todo orgánico que persigue los mismos intereses. Una política económica siempre perjudica a un grupo social y beneficia a otro. Hace muchos años que las políticas nos perjudican a los trabajadores de rentas medias y bajas, parados y pobres. La Renta Básica se inscribe en la lógica de invertir y transformar esta tendencia y que sean las rentas altas las que se vean perjudicadas y las rentas bajas las que salgan beneficiadas.
La renta básica es una asignación monetaria universal, incondicional. Todo el mundo la recibe pero no todo el mundo gana. Hay que repetir esta idea, todo el mundo percibiría la cantidad monetaria establecida -650 euros al mes- sin discriminación de renta. ¿Esto significa que Amancio Ortega o Iker Casillas las recibirían? SÍ.
Estableciendo la universalidad de la asignación monetaria, eludimos la estigmatización de la pobreza así como al dedo acusador. Si una persona quisiera increparte o insultarte porque vives de la renta básica tú podrías contestarle: “pues sí, al igual que tú”. Al mismo tiempo, el Estado se ahorrará una cantidad ingente de dinero que se pierde en la administración y gestión de los subsidios. Pues, no lo olvidemos, una vez se implemente la renta básica desaparecerán todos los subsidios y ayudas sociales pecuniarias.
“Todo esto es muy bonito, pero, ¿Cómo se va a financiar tal cosa? ¿No es una utopía?” Estas preguntas apuntan al núcleo duro de la propuesta y se repiten mucho en los medios. La respuesta es sencilla, a través de una reforma fiscal profunda. ¿De qué manera o en qué dirección debe ir esa reforma fiscal? Pues acabando con la dualidad existente en el IRPF (renta del capital-renta del trabajo) y establecer un único impuesto con un tipo nominal fijo al 50%, eliminando todos los tramos que actualmente existen así como todas las deducciones. Esto puede sorprender a más de uno. Es contraintuitivo pensar que un tipo fijo pueda llegar a ser progresivo. Pero lo es y mucho, pues tenemos la renta básica. Os voy a dejar un cuadro para que se visualice mejor: (son cuadros a modo de ejemplo):
Base imponible Retención Total limpio 1000 10% 900 100000 45% 55000
Base imponible Retención Renta Básica Total limpio 1000 50% 650 1150 100000 50% 650 50650
Cómo se puede observar a través de este cuadro, siendo la renta básica una asignación universal y exenta de impuestos, ésta siempre se suma a lo que se ha retenido de la base imponible. Así, por ejemplo, si actualmente en bruto estás cobrando 2000 euros al mes pues se te retendrían 1000 euros (50%, tipo fijo) pero se te sumarían los 650 euros de la renta básica, por lo que en limpio te quedarían 1650 euros.
La medida está calculada para que beneficia a todos los trabajadores pobres así como personas que realizan tareas y trabajos no remunerados. Es una redistribución de rentas, de las más altas hacia las más bajas (lo contrario de lo que ocurre actualmente). Y es completamente asumible por un Estado como el Estado español, si hubiera la voluntad para ello. Además de esta reforma fiscal profunda hay que luchar eficazmente contra el fraude fiscal. Pensemos que con el aumento de consumo de las clases populares aumentará la recaudación del Estado vía impuestos indirectos. Aunque ésta no es la cuestión a tratar en este breve artículo. Tan sólo hay que visualizar que todo esto es técnicamente posible, que no sería un despilfarro de dinero público como nos lo quieren pintar desde los mass media. Y, todavía más importante, se suprimen muchos gastos inútiles de la administración (en control de las personas que reciben subsidios etcétera). Además de ello, no podemos sino contraargumentar la falacia de los incentivos perversos. Actualmente, con ayudas condicionadas, hay una trampa de la pobreza ya que muchos subsidios están condicionados a tu condición de pobre. Si aceptas un trabajo de mierda pierdes el subsidio, los incentivos para seguir cobrando el subsidio en vez de aceptar el trabajo son muy elevados.
Algunos preguntarán, llegados a este punto, “Pero, aunque todo esto está muy bien, ¿No caeremos en una tendencia inflacionista imparable? La respuesta es no. No tan catastrófica como nos lo quieren hacer creer. No se está generando nueva masa monetaria, sino que se está redistribuyendo una riqueza que ya existe. En todo caso, aumentarán los precios de los productos/bienes de primera necesidad, que son los que mayormente consumimos las clases populares, lo que puede provocar, en esos mercados, leves tendencias inflacionistas. Pero muy lejos de cualquier tipo de hiperinflación apocalíptica.
Por último, la renta básica es esencial en una sociedad postindustrial en la cual los sindicatos de clase han perdido mucha fuerza. La renta básica es entonces nuestra mejor arma para poder negociar salarios dignos frente al empresario, que siempre busca pagarte lo menos posible. En el mismo orden de ideas, una existencia material garantizada y mínimamente digna es imprescindible para poder tener un mínimo de libertad política, además de que por nuestra condición de animales humanos debemos tener la posibilidad de vivir nuestra vida sin imposiciones estructurales que, además, están para el provecho y para el mantenimiento del privilegio de unos pocos.
¡RENTA BÁSICA YA! | {
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The 49ers have held discussions with three teams inside the top 10 and three teams outside the top 10 about a possible trade for the No. 2 overall pick, a league source told NBC Sports Bay Area on Thursday.
The Cleveland Browns decision-makers met Thursday and finalized the team’s plan to select Texas A&M defensive end Myles Garrett, Mary Kay Cabot of cleveland.com reported, citing multiple league sources.
Garrett’s spot as the No. 1 overall pick in the draft had not been in doubt until this week. On Wednesday, Adam Schefter of ESPN reported he was hearing from “well-connected people” who thought the Browns could take North Carolina quarterback Mitchell Trubisky at No. 1.
The Browns are believed to be interested in trading back up to get into a position to select Trubisky.
The 49ers, coming off a 2-14 season, are in a position to trade out of the No. 2 pick because of their need at multiple positions.
General manager John Lynch has stated that the 49ers are “open for business” when it comes to holding discussions with any teams interested in acquiring the 49ers’ No. 2 overall pick. | {
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¿Qué tanto de ciencia ficción tienen los planetas de las sagas galácticas más reconocidas del cine? ¿Existirán mundos con dos soles o con anillos gigantescos? ¿Si existieran cuerpos celestes tan asombrosos como Tatooine o Pandora los humanos podrían habitar en ellos? Para averiguarlo, el Planetario de la Universidad de Santiago de Chile te invita a participar de la segunda charla del Ciclo de Divulgación Científica.
Se trata de la charla titulada “Mundos extraordinarios: de la ciencia ficción a la realidad”, a cargo de la astrónoma y futura doctora del observatorio de Ginebra en Suiza, Javiera Rey. La actividad se enmarca en la novena versión del Ciclo de Charlas de Divulgación Científica 2015.
Durante la presentación, la astrónoma, expondrá sobre la evolución científica en la búsqueda de nuevos mundos. Desde los antiguos astrónomos que solo observaban luces en la esfera celeste, pasando por Galileo Galilei que reveló, con su telescopio, la verdadera forma de estos objetos astrales hasta el descubrimiento de los primeros planetas extrasolares, en 1995, que en la actualidad superan los 1.500 confirmados y más de 3.300 candidatos.
Investigaciones científicas que durante décadas han llevado a autores de la ciencia ficción a imaginar y plasmar en libros, pinturas, cómics y películas mundos con condiciones extremas y paisajes inhóspitos, muy distintos a todo lo que conocemos. Sin embargo, ¿qué tan factible sería encontrar planetas reales que se asemejen a los salidos de la imaginación de estos autores? En la presentación de Planetario la ciencia nos entrega algunas respuestas a esta interrogante.
Cuándo : Martes 12 de mayo de 2015 a las 18:45 h.
Dónde : Planetario USACH. Alameda 3349, metro Estación Central, Santiago.
Valor : Entrada liberada, previa inscripción en [email protected] (290 cupos), indicando nombre completo, número de acompañantes y nombre de la charla. Cada reserva es validada con una confirmación de Planetario.
Contacto : [email protected] | {
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Membri ai Consiliului Superior al Magistraturii (CSM) au discutat, saptamana trecuta, in Comisia nr. 1, o serie de propuneri de modificare a Legii 303/2004 privind statutul judecatorilor si procurorilor.
Propunerile comisiei vizeaza, printre altele, promovarea magistratilor.
Conform legii in vigoare, pot participa la concursul de promovare la instantele sau parchetele imediat superioare judecatorii si procurorii care au avut calificativul "foarte bine" la ultima evaluare, nu au fost sanctionati disciplinar in ultimii 3 ani si indeplinesc o serie de conditii de vechime.
Comisia propune sa poata participa la concurs si magistratii care au obtinut calificativul "bine" la ultima evaluare.
Pe de alta parte, creste vechimea necesara pentru participarea la concursul de promovare, astfel: de la 5 ani vechime in functia de judecator sau procuror, pentru promovarea in functiile de judecator de
tribunal sau tribunal specializat si procuror la parchetul de pe langa tribunal sau la parchetul de pe langa tribunalul specializat, la "7 ani vechime efectiva", de la 6 ani vechime in functia de judecator sau procuror, pentru promovarea in functiile de judecator de curte de apel si procuror la parchetul de pe langa aceasta, la "10 ani vechime efectiva in functia de judecator sau procuror, din care 2 ani vechime efectiva in functia de judecator de tribunal sau tribunal specializat si procuror la parchetul de pe langa tribunal sau la parchetul de pe langa tribunalul specializat", si de la 8 ani vechime in functia de judecator sau procuror, pentru promovarea in functia de procuror la Parchetul de pe langa Inalta Curte de Casatie si Justitie, la "12 ani vechime efectiva in functia de judecator sau procuror, din care 2 ani vechime efectiva in functia de procuror la parchetul de pe langa curtea de apel pentru promovarea in functia de procuror la Parchetul de pe langa Inalta Curte de Casatie si Justitie".
Conditiile minime de vechime se modifica, tot in crestere, si pentru numirea in functii de conducere: pentru functia de presedinte si vicepresedinte de judecatorie, prim-procuror al parchetului de pe langa
judecatorie si adjunct al acestuia, de la o vechime de 5 ani in functia de judecator sau procuror, la 6 ani, adauganduse ca pentru functia de presedinte de sectie la judecatorie este necesara o vechime efectiva de 4 ani in functia de judecator sau procuror, pentru functia de presedinte si vicepresedinte de tribunal sau tribunal specializat, precum si presedinte de sectie la tribunal, prim-procuror al parchetului de pe langa tribunal sau al parchetului de pe langa tribunalul pentru minori si familie, adjunct al acestuia si procuror sef sectie al parchetului de pe langa tribunal sau al parchetului de pe langa tribunalul pentru minori si familie, de la o vechime de 6 ani in functia de judecator sau procuror, la o vechime efectiva de 10 ani, iar pentru functia de presedinte, vicepresedinte, presedinte de sectie la curtea de apel, procuror general al parchetului de pe langa curtea de apel si adjunct al acestuia, procuror sef sectie al parchetului de pe langa curtea de apel, de la o vechime de 8 ani in functia de judecator sau procuror, la o vechime efectiva de 12 ani.
Propunerile comisiei urmeaza a fi discutate in plenul CSM. | {
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Julian Assange’s lawyer said that Assange is too sick to carry on a normal conversation, that his health has deteriorated since his arrest, and that he has been transferred to the health ward of Belmarsh prison.
His health had reportedly been failing even before his arrest, as a result of being cooped up in a windowless room for seven years and not being able to get medical care he needed.
There is now no good reason why he shouldn’t receive all the care he needs, and it is possible that he is receiving such care. I hope my suspicions are groundless, and maybe they are.
But the events of the past 15 or 20 years have left me unable to say, “Such and such is impossible because the British (or U.S.) government would never do such a thing.”
It would be much more convenient from the U.S. and British governments if he were to die before being put on trial. And treating Assange as some sort of super-villain terrorist who requires extra isolation from human contact is one way to accomplish that.
LINKS
Statement of Kristin Hrafnsson, Wikileaks editor-in-chief.
Assange Is Reportedly Gravely Ill And Hardly Anybody’s Talking About It by Caitlin Johnstone.
The UN Torture Report on Assange Is an Indictment of Our Entire Society by Caitlin Johnstone [Added 5/31/2019]
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Étymologie [ modifier le wikicode ]
Étymologie manquante ou incomplète. Si vous la connaissez, vous pouvez l’ajouter .
Vient des préfixe et suffixe dijiti (doigt) et -vore (régime alimentaire).
Adjectif [ modifier le wikicode ]
Singulier Pluriel Masculin
et féminin digitivore digitivores \ \
digitivore masculin et féminin identiques | {
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Fox News deceptively edited a clip of President Obama's statement on demonstrations following the shooting death of Michael Brown to suggest Obama is “choosing sides” and has “set an atmosphere” for discord and violence. In fact, Obama emphasized the importance of both “a basic respect for public order and the right to peaceful public protest.”
Obama addressed the tense protests that followed the death of Brown -- an unarmed teen who was killed by police in Ferguson, Missouri -- in an August 15 statement that called for “healing,” “peace and calm.”
The August 15 edition of Fox & Friends promptly suggested Obama may have gone too far by noting that there is “no excuse for police to use excessive force against peaceful protesters.” In a teasing segment, an on-air graphic asked if the president was “choosing sides.” Fox News legal analyst Peter Johnson Jr. later argued that Obama “may have chosen a side too quickly with regard to this issue of excessive force.” Though Johnson acknowledged that Obama “did to some extent” invoke reason, he concluded that “the shadings in his statements ... set an atmosphere -- unfortunately, I think -- for continued discord and possibly violence in such a community” :
JOHNSON: Well, I don't know if he jumped in too quickly. He may have chosen a side too quickly with regard to this issue of excessive force and with regard to the police being an assaultive force on protesters. What I expect, and I think a lot of Americans expect, is the president to invoke the rule of law, to invoke reason. He did to some extent. But if you look at the shadings in his statements, he's clearly made a statement that the police were acting in an excessive way, that they were violating rights not only of the protesters, but of reporters on the scene. So when you do so, you set a scene and you set an atmosphere --unfortunately, I think -- for continued discord and possibly violence in such a community.
But the portion of Obama's statement that Fox & Friends aired during the segment was deceptively clipped to hide the fact that Obama also condemned “violence against police” as well as “excessive force against peaceful protests.” Fox spliced together the Obama's comments that “I know that many Americans have been deeply disturbed by the images we've seen in the heartland of our country, as police have clashed with people protesting” and “There's also no excuse for police to use excessive force against peaceful protests,” skipping over the portion of his statement that condemned violence against police (the portions Fox aired are in bold):
Now, second, I want to address something that's been in the news over the last couple of days and that's the situation in Ferguson, Missouri. I know that many Americans have been deeply disturbed by the images we've seen in the heartland of our country, as police have clashed with people protesting. Today, I'd like us all to take a step back and think about how we're going to be moving forward. [...] There is never an excuse for violence against police, or for those who would use this tragedy as a cover for vandalism or looting. There's also no excuse for police to use excessive force against peaceful protests, or to throw protestors in jail for lawfully exercising their First Amendment rights. And here, in the United States of America, police should not be bullying or arresting journalists who are just trying to do their jobs and report to the American people on what they see on the ground. Put simply, we all need to hold ourselves to a high standard, particularly those of us in positions of authority. I know that emotions are raw right now in Ferguson and there are certainly passionate differences about what has happened. There are going to be different accounts of how this tragedy occurred. There are going to be differences in terms of what needs to happen going forward. That's part of our democracy. But let's remember that we're all part of one American family. We are united in common values, and that includes belief in equality under the law; a basic respect for public order and the right to peaceful public protest; a reverence for the dignity of every single man, woman and child among us; and the need for accountability when it comes to our government. So now is the time for healing. Now is the time for peace and calm on the streets of Ferguson.
Even Fox News' Geraldo Rivera disagreed with this assessment. In a later segment, he pushed back against a similar suggestion from Fox & Friends host Elisabeth Hasselbeck, noting that Obama “tried his best to do a measured presentation.” | {
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Within hours, the attorneys who bought the suit, Jared and Elizabeth Beck, were providing updates on the case to the blogger and fantasy author H.A. Goodman. Calling out the people and outlets who they believe had covered them unfairly, the Becks described a legal system so corrupt that there could be no fair accounting for what the DNC did. It would be up to alternative media to get the truth out.
“This population has been battered by propaganda, and misinformation, and corrupt politicians for so long,” Jared Beck said. “If you go into court, and you represent anyone but a rich person or a powerful corporation, the chances of you having a fair day in court are slim to none.”
More than a year after Hillary Clinton won the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, her opponents on the left remain in a few distinct but overlapping camps. Most, like Sanders, have remained in Democratic Party politics to drive the conversation further to the left. Organizations like Justice Democrats and #AllOfUs are oriented around primary challenges and bullet-pointed agenda; Sanders’s own Our Revolution is providing a national donor network progressives in often-ignored local races.
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But for a certain kind of 2016 Sanders supporter, the primary never really ended. It grew into a defining, eye-opening event — a moment when it became clear that Democrats could not be trusted, were not worth co-opting, and might literally be getting away with crimes.
Goodman, whose devotion to Sanders as a Huffington Post blogger gained him a small but dedicated audience, transitioned from columns about the Vermont senator’s inevitable victory to vlogs about the truth coming out about Clinton and the DNC. Sitting in front of a WikiLeaks logo, Goodman alternated updates on the #DNCFraudLawsuit with updates like “CLINTON EMAIL GRAND JURY TO INDICT HILLARY CLINTON UNDER ESPIONAGE ACT: Imminent,” and “SETH RICH MURDER ANNIVERSARY MARKED BY GUCCIFER 2.0 FILES COPIED LOCALLY, NOT HACKED BY RUSSIA.”
And Goodman is one node in a busy network of pundits on full-time war footing against the DNC. YouTube, with its easy use, free storage, and possibility of global reach, has become an agora of 2016 primary bitter-enders. YouTube previously played the same role for far right; in reporter John Herrman’s read, it made mini-celebrities out of “monologuists, essayists, performers and vloggers who publish frequent dispatches from their living rooms, their studios or the field, inveighing vigorously against the political left and mocking the ‘mainstream media,’ against which they are defined and empowered.”
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Something similar, but smaller, has grown up around the people who want to prove that the 2016 primary was stolen from Sanders. Over the weekend, there was no TV coverage of the case; it was easy to spend hours, instead, absorbing punditry on YouTube. The case against the “mainstream media” was easy to make, anyway as the Becks’ lawsuit drew little national attention.
“If you’re in independent media, and you didn’t think it was your job to cover the underbelly of the DNC, I’d like to know exactly what you think your job is,” said YouTuber Tim Black after the case was dismissed. “How can you look in the mirror, a journalist, a speaker of truth, and not cover this case?”
The Baltimore-based The Real News Network, which called the lawsuit “overlooked” — contrasting the lack of coverage with the copious coverage of Russian meddling in the 2016 election — followed up with a report on its dismissal. In an interview with Elizabeth Beck, TRNN founder Paul Jay suggested that even in dismissing the case, the judge had agreed with the plaintiffs, stating that the DNC “used resources and surreptitious methods to support Clinton over Sanders.”
Beck found herself in a strange position — telling an interviewer that he was giving her lawsuit too much credit. The language in the dismissal that assumed the plaintiffs’ arguments was not, in itself, admission that the DNC had rigged primaries.
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“The court is obligated to take all those allegations as true. I would point out that the court is not saying that those allegations are true,” she told Jay. Jared Beck performed some of the same cleanup after the Observer falsely reported that the judge “reaffirmed that the primaries were tipped in Hillary Clinton’s favor.”
The churn of commentary and accusations let the story get away from the DNC hack itself. The intrusion was one of at least three that badly damaged Democrats in the 2016 election, followed by hacks of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta.
But the emails taken from DNC accounts, while embarrassing enough to force Wasserman Schultz’s resignation, did not reveal an effort to rig primaries. At worst, they revealed that Wasserman Schultz insulted Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver behind his back; that DNC chief financial officer Brad Marshall suggested that someone might want to ask Sanders about his religion, to cost him votes in Appalachian primaries; and that in May 2017, Wasserman Schultz had gruffly insisted that Sanders would not be president. (At the time, Sanders was fighting to win a majority of delegates in the final primaries, in the hopes of creating momentum ahead of the DNC; without that, he was on the path to defeat.)
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Some DNC staffers were hostile to Sanders, especially in the final stretch of the primaries; the best evidence of how this hurt him was not in the hacked email, but in the fact that the DNC scheduled only a few, late primary debates for Clinton’s rivals to climb onto a stage with the front-runner. The events that did the most to anger Sanders supporters, like New York’s early voter registration deadline, Brooklyn’s voter roll purge, and a debacle that created long lines for voting in Arizona, were produced by state government and elections officials, not by the DNC.
On channels obsessed with the fraud case, however, the DNC’s conduct eventually took a back seat to the atmosphere around the courtroom. In the months between the April hearing and the August dismissal, the #DNCFraudsuit Web speculated about the deaths of the process server who had handed papers to the DNC, of attorney Beranton Whisenant, of a Haitian official who was set to testify in a corruption case, and of the former DNC IT staffer Seth Rich.
“The DNC fraud lawsuit continues to be ignored by the mainstream media; meanwhile, the Clinton body count continues to grow,” said Infowars’ Owen Shroyer last month, before asking Elizabeth Beck whether the deaths were related to the fraud case.
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The Infowars interview was one of several intersections between the DNC case obsessives and right-wing media. The Haitian story was inflated into a “Clinton” story by fake news outlets, which put the wrong quotes in the mouths of the story’s characters. The story of the Becks seeking a motion for protection, out of questions about the mysterious deaths and some harassing phone calls, got big play on WorldNetDaily. (That website, which once sold bumper stickers promoting the conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was not an American citizen, also has a GoFundMe to fund Seth Rich reporting. It’s more than $95,000 short of a $100,000 funding goal.)
As of Tuesday afternoon, the dismissal of the Becks’ lawsuit had done little to slow down speculation, or snuff out hope that somehow, the DNC’s perfidy would be exposed. | {
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Shamrock Rovers face Dundalk in the tie of the round in this year's FAI Ford Cup quarter-finals.
The draw was made this afternoon in Abbotstown and paired the Hoops and the leaders of the SSE Airtricity Premier Division.
Dundalk have won three and drawn one of the four meetings of the sides so far this season.
Last year's finalists Drogheda United will host Derry City in another exciting tie.
The winners of tonight's replay between Shelbourne and St Patrick's Athletic will take on Bohemians at home in a Dublin derby.
Finn Harps will travel to face Avondale or St Michael's who also replay their last 16 clash.
FAI Ford Cup quarter-final draw: Shelbourne/St Pats v Bohemians, Drogheda United v Derry City, Shamrock Rovers v Dundalk, Avondale/St Michael's v Finn Harps.
Ties to be played on the week ending 14 September | {
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Former NFL Legend Johnny “Money” Manziel’s Wife Bre Tiesi Files for Divorce after Catching Him Cheating on Her.
“u been married? U been betrayed I don’t do betrayal for a person I was devoted to period. Vows were broken f*** money and f*** u and every other loser on here,” | {
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Subsets and Splits